Heresy: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery by Sharan Newman

from him a bit. There was something about the bitterness of the man’s anger that unsettled him. It was important to Amulf that Astrolabe take the blame for Cecile’s death. But there was no need to be so passionate about it. Murder and heresy were not to be made instruments of revenge.
    Nor, he reflected, could they be allowed to go unpunished because the criminal’s mother was friends with half the nobility of Champagne and his father had taught half the bishops. It would have been better if the man had been no one of any importance. Still, Amulf reflected, the choice had not been his.
     
    Far to the north of the Paraclete, another friend of Heloise was awake in the dark winter morning. Faintly she could hear her new baby crying, but that didn’t concern her. The wet nurse would be feeding him in a moment. Sybil, countess of Flanders, had more serious matters to worry about. Her husband, Thierry, had also gone to the Holy Land, leaving Sybil to run the country, care for their four small children and deliver the fifth safely.
    No sooner had he left than their old enemy, Baldwin of Hainaut, had attacked the country. Sybil had immediately been faced with the task of raising and directing an army. She had managed to arrange a truce for the last month of her pregnancy, but no sooner had Peter been born, even before she had been churched, than Baldwin had made more incursions. Sybil wasn’t surprised. A man who would break an oath made to the pope wouldn’t be intimidated by one sworn to her.
    Normally, the absence of the count would not have been a disaster. Sybil had allies of her own. But most of the lords had left with the king. Her brother, Geoffrey of Anjou, was fully occupied with seeing that his son, Henry, inherited the duchy of Normandy and the throne of England. That left few whom she could turn to in her need.
    And now word had come that the count of Tréguier had dared to remove Cecile of Beaumont from her convent. Sybil had not yet told Cecile’s sister, Annora, who was living in the castle under Sybil’s protection. She had sent one of her men to Brittany to find the count and see that the girl was returned at once to her proper cloister. It angered her that this was necessary at a time when she needed every one of her knights.
    Sybil was proud of her army and the loyalty of her men. They had fought off Baldwin’s attacks and even taken the battle into his own territory. Nevertheless, Baldwin had sworn to keep the peace while Count Thierry was on pilgrimage, and he had broken this vow. It was up to Pope Eugenius to see that he was punished. To acquire papal help, she needed the support of people of undoubted piety and wisdom.
    She had decided to present her case before the pope, his cardinals and the bishops of Europe when they convened at Reims next month. The ignominy alone might be enough to convince Baldwin to withdraw his forces, although she would prefer more concrete aid. But first she would go to the Paraclete. Heloise would know whom to approach and how. She could also lend her voice to the demand that Henri of Tréguier be punished for violating the sanctity of the convent of Saint-Georges-de-Rennes.
    If Pope Eugenius couldn’t convince Baldwin to stay in his own land, then she had only one other recourse. Sybil would take the drastic step of unleashing the full force of the censure of all the women religious she knew. She had friends or family in all the great convents of Christendom. All those women had fathers, brothers, sons and nephews who listened to them. And they would all counsel these men to protest Baldwin’s aggression and Henri’s blasphemy.
    Having made her decision, Sybil returned to her bed. In his keep, miles away, Baldwin whimpered in his sleep.

    Solomon regretted suggesting that they make haste on their journey. The roads were deadly for two men going this quickly on horseback. He expected any moment to be thrown as his poor mount went down on the icy trail.
    “Edgar,