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butternuggets-blog · 2 years ago

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FOR WANT OF A NAIL

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Part Twenty-Six

Summary: Baldwin Montclair had a string of ex girlfriends, a single child, and a lifetime longer than most people could dream of to make all kinds of mistakes. His family knew one which kept coming out of the woodwork to irritate him every other century.

Also on AO3

INCENDIARY CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY SPEECH AT THE END. Necessary for historical context and world building.

Martin rebuilt the map of the village he kept in his mind as the carts climbed the hill to the castle. He had passed through occasionally when business took him south, but he tended to avoid the place if he could.

There was quite a pile up in the courtyard already, but Josselin steered them into a corner and began instructing the servants on how to remove and store everything properly.

Martin climbed down from the front seat and stretched. They had travelled first by canal barge, then by cart; conditions had been cramped, and it felt good to be able to walk around properly once again.

‘Welcome to Sept Tours!’

It took a moment for the name to come to mind.

‘Gallowglass’

He smiled and nodded. They had met briefly in Córdoba; he had come looking for his fathers and uncle after they had taken too long to come home.

The ginger giant stood up a little straighter, and gestured to the three women who had stopped next to him.

‘ Sieur Martin, may I present my aunts; Freyja, Stasia and Verin.’

Social butterfly. Spy. Seductress.

Philippe's secret weapons. They had been skirting the edges of the politics of France for a while now; Martin had heard third-hand accounts of their exploits, and was both impressed and deeply concerned.

Martin thought he recognised the six foot Dane on the left from an old woodcut, and the raven-haired woman on the right was wearing a dress that was perfectly tailored to distract from the fact that she had a knife concealed in a secret pocket in the side. The one in between them stood tall, but there was a touch of sadness lingering in her eyes.

'A pleasure to meet you' Verin purred.

'Likewise' Martin brusquely kissed the back of her hand when she proferred it, then his face lit up with genuine glee as his favourite punching bag walked over.

'Lucius'

'Still Baldwin'

Martin shrugged.

Baldwin was glaring at him. The words Why do you always do that? were struggling to get out, but Martin saw the moment Baldwin realised that the answer was Because it annoys you and decided to let the question die in his throat.

'I have brought the wine' Martin motioned to the barrels in a loose sweeping gesture. 'And what are you providing for the grand event?'

Baldwin gritted his teeth.

'The venue'

Sainte-Marie-Principale sat between Place Delille and the Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral. The little church was freshly rebuilt, having been burnt to the ground by the Normans, and was looked after by a community of priests living nearby.

'We are expecting quite the congregation' Verin slipped her arm around Martin's and let him "lead" her inside.

...does not like to be ignored...

Inside the castle was just as busy as the courtyard, with a line of people stretched out along the hall. They passed a harried-looking Alain, who nodded at them and turned back to the queue, and Verin brought them up short as Marthe bustled out of the throng towards them.

'Welcome, sieur'

'A pleasure to see you again. If my people can be of assistance please do not hesitate to call on them'

Marthe bobbed her head a second time. 'Thank you. We are about to serve refreshments in the courtyard...'

'Josselin prefers white wine mixed with rabbit; the tint should be rosé. The others will want water.'

Marthe smiled and scuttled away.

'How is Estienne's apprentice coming along?' asked Freyja.

When his steward had first presented his great niece for the position, Martin had been sceptical. A thin slip of a woman, barely twenty-four, and from a humble branch of the family that sold candles. But she was business-savy, and had some education, so he had allowed it.

'She comports herself well. She is a credit to her uncle.'

'He didn't..'

'No. Her maker was Helga Jurgis'

'The Whore of Klaipėda?' Baldwin scoffed. Martin glowered at him, lips pinching into a sneer.

'A savvy businesswoman' Freyja smoothly interjected.

'Twenty-six children for fifteen families,' Stasia looked pensive. 'She was allegedly negotiating a contract for her twenty-seventh when the carriage accident happened.'

'Such a shame'

They stopped by the large oak door to Philippe's private office and Baldwin knocked.

‘Introite.’

Martin unwound from Verin’s arm and let himself into the office.

Martin had never been inside Philippe's inner sanctum before. The scale of it surprised him; his own private office was at least double the size. The large oak table Martin passed to get to Phillipe's desk was littered with maps and neat piles of receipts weighed down by empty bottles of wine and heavy tankards. A large map with four heavy stones pinning the corners was stretched out before Philippe.

We underestimated him.

The scale of Philippe's hubris was breathtaking. The map showed a sliver of land beside the Mediterranean Sea, stretching from Jerusalem, in the south, to Edessa, in the north. Two heavy bronze placemarkers sat atop Antioch and Edessa; one was fashioned into Godfrey's personal crest, the other, Baldwin's.

'The Pope is going on Crusade' said Martin, fiddling with Godfrey's marker for a moment before pulling his hand away.

'Urban will announce the call to arms at the council.’

‘What reason is he giving? He has been calling for retaliation against the rising tide of attacks on Christians in the East for some time. Which particular issue forced his hand?’

Philippe looked over his steepled fingers at him from his desk chair. ‘Emperor Alexios sent envoys pleading for help against the Turks. Urban decided to honour the call.’

Emperor Alexios I of Komnenos inherited a kingdom on the verge of collapse. Besieged on two fronts by the Seljuk Turks, and the Normans, he was the latest in a long line of Byzantine emperors who had begged for assistance from the papalcy to curb the rising violence.

Philippe leaned forward. ‘We cannot afford to waste this opportunity to build the foundation of Outremer.’

‘Bold of you to assume you will be able to hold it.’

‘I understand that your sister has her misgivings but Urban has handed us legitimacy on a silver platter.’

Martin raised an eyebrow. ‘Merula is one player in a complicated political landscape. She will not welcome our advance into her territory and neither will her neighbours.’

Philippe’s ears caught the emphasis. ‘How many men can you muster in support?’

‘I will need to wait until the fervour dies down. Burgundy is...Phillip’s excommunication complicates recruitment. And Odo may be fishing for a conveniant pretext not to sally forth in defense of the realm, after Iberia.’

‘Regardless, I appreciate your support.’

‘It is hard to stand against the tides of change’ Martin said, trying not to let the whirl of emotions churning in his gut show on his face.

***

The council meeting was closed to the public. For over a week around three hundred clerics representing diocese across France gathered inside Sainte-Marie-Principale to discuss various ecclesiastical matters, such as Cluniac reforms. Martin’s mood had soured significantly when he heard that they had also voted to reinforce, and extend, King Philip’s excommunication.

Now he was standing on a raised platform beside the church, in a wide open space which had once been forest. The crowd had swollen to well over a thousand, jostling and calling out loudly to each other as they waited.

The druids praised the gods here once. Now look at it.

A great roar rose up amongst the crowd as the figure of Pope Urban II slipped out from the church door. He raised his hands; immediately the crowd fell silent.

"Most beloved brethren. Urged by necessity, I, Urban, by the permission of God, chief bishop and prelate over the whole world, have come into these parts as an ambassador with a divine admonition to you, the servants of God. I hoped to find you as faithful and as zealous in the service of God as I had supposed you to be. But if there is in you any deformity or crookedness contrary to God's law, with divine help I will do my best to remove it.”

“For God has put you as stewards over his family to minister to it. Happy indeed will you be if he finds you faithful in your stewardship. You are called shepherds; see that you do not act as hirelings. But be true shepherds, with your crooks always in your hands. Do not go to sleep, but guard on all sides the flock committed to you. For if through your carelessness or negligence a wolf carries away one of your sheep, you will surely lose the reward laid up for you with God.”

“And after you have been bitterly scourged with remorse for your faults, you will be fiercely overwhelmed in hell, the abode of death. For according to the gospel you are the salt of the earth. But if you fall short in your duty, how, it may be asked, can it be salted? O how great the need of salting! It is indeed necessary for you to correct with the salt of wisdom this foolish people which is so devoted to the pleasures of this world, lest the Lord, when He may wish to speak to them, find them putrefied by their sins unsalted and stinking.”

“For if He shall find worms, that is, sins, In them, because you have been negligent in your duty, He will command them as worthless to be thrown into the abyss of unclean things. And because you cannot restore to Him His great loss, He will surely condemn you and drive you from His loving presence. But the man who applies this salt should be prudent, provident, modest, learned, peaceable, watchful, pious, just, equitable, and pure.”

“For how can the ignorant teach others? How can the licentious make others modest? And how can the impure make others pure? If anyone hates peace, how can he make others peaceable ? Or if anyone has soiled his hands with baseness, how can he cleanse the impurities of another? We read also that if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the ditch. But first correct yourselves, in order that, free from blame, you may be able to correct those who are subject to you.”

“If you wish to be the friends of God, gladly do the things which you know will please Him. You must especially let all matters that pertain to the church be controlled by the law of the church. And be careful that simony does not take root among you, lest both those who buy and those who sell church offices be beaten with the scourges of the Lord through narrow streets and driven into the place of destruction and confusion.”

“Keep the church and the clergy in all its grades entirely free from the secular power. See that the tithes that belong to God are faithfully paid from all the produce of the land; let them not be sold or withheld. If anyone seizes a bishop let him be treated as an outlaw. If anyone seizes or robs monks, or clergymen, or nuns, or their servants, or pilgrims, or merchants, let him be anathema.”

“Let robbers and incendiaries and all their accomplices be expelled from the church and anthematized. If a man who does not give a part of his goods as alms is punished with the damnation of hell, how should he be punished who robs another of his goods? For thus it happened to the rich man in the gospel; he was not punished because he had stolen the goods of another, but because he had not used well the things which were his”

"You have seen for a long time the great disorder in the world caused by these crimes. It is so bad in some of your provinces, I am told, and you are so weak in the administration of justice, that one can hardly go along the road by day or night without being attacked by robbers; and whether at home or abroad one is in danger of being despoiled either by force or fraud. Therefore it is necessary to reenact the truce, as it is commonly called, which was proclaimed a long time ago by our holy fathers. I exhort and demand that you, each, try hard to have the truce kept in your diocese. And if anyone shall be led by his cupidity or arrogance to break this truce, by the authority of God and with the sanction of this council he shall be anathematized."

Section of the crowd went forth one by one, to kneel and repeat the oaths they had sworn to uphold. The Peace and Truce of God had been enacted to reduce feuding via the threat of spiritual sanctions. It protected ecclesiastical property and clerical rights, and limited the amount of time, and the reasons why, nobility were permitted to engage in violence.

Eventually, Urban spoke again.

"Although, O sons of God, you have promised more firmly than ever to keep the peace among yourselves and to preserve the rights of the church, there remains still an important work for you to do. Freshly quickened by the divine correction, you must apply the strength of your righteousness to another matter which concerns you as well as God.”

“For your brethren who live in the east are in urgent need of your help, and you must hasten to give them the aid which has often been promised them. For, as the most of you have heard, the Turks and Arabs have attacked them and have conquered the territory of Romania as far west as the shore of the Mediterranean and the Hellespont, which is called the Arm of St. George.”

Cries of outrage rang out, and various people near Martin hissed loudly with anger.

“They have occupied more and more of the lands of those Christians, and have overcome them in seven battles. They have killed and captured many, and have destroyed the churches and devastated the empire. If you permit them to continue thus for awhile with impurity, the faithful of God will be much more widely attacked by them.”

“On this account I, or rather the Lord, beseech you as Christ's heralds to publish this everywhere and to persuade all people of whatever rank, foot-soldiers and knights, poor and rich, to carry aid promptly to those Christians and to destroy that vile race from the lands of our friends.”

“I say this to those who are present, it meant also for those who are absent. Moreover, Christ commands it. "All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea, or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. This I grant them through the power of God with which I am invested.”

A ripple went through the crowd. The remission of sin was a tempting offer; cuthroats and murderers, bigamists and thieves would be allowed into Heaven for the simple price of fighting for a “righteous” cause. Martin felt his heart break a little further.

“O what a disgrace if such a despised and base race, which worships demons, should conquer a people which has the faith of omnipotent God and is made glorious with the name of Christ!”

“With what reproaches will the Lord overwhelm us if you do not aid those who, with us, profess the Christian religion! Let those who have been accustomed unjustly to wage private warfare against the faithful now go against the infidels and end with victory this war which should have been begun long ago.”

“Let those who for a long time, have been robbers, now become knights. Let those who have been fighting against their brothers and relatives now fight in a proper way against the barbarians. Let those who have been serving as mercenaries for small pay now obtain the eternal reward. Let those who have been wearing themselves out in both body and soul now work for a double honor.”

“Behold! on this side will be the sorrowful and poor, on that, the rich; on this side, the enemies of the Lord, on that, his friends. Let those who go not put off the journey, but rent their lands and collect money for their expenses; and as soon as winter is over and spring comes, let hem eagerly set out on the way with God as their guide."

Author's Notes

In the World of All Souls, Deb explains that Philippe had Sept Tours built in the village of Saint-Lucien. The filming location for the village was Arquà Petrarca, Italy. I forgot this, so my mental map of where Sept Tours is moved the castle over to Clermont-Ferrand, France. It doesn't affect the plot but it does make things slightly more hilarious because Martin's literally a two hour drive away 😆😅

I realised too late that I hadn't yet introduced Gallowglass so he's here with us now. And the sisters just never fit in to the story yet.

Me, desperately trying to hold every De Clermont at once: I'M SORRY BUT I CAN ONLY PUT SOME OF YOU IN THE SPOTLIGHT AT ONE TIME!! WORK WITH ME HERE!!

Introite - enter

Outremer - literally derived from the French word for “overseas”. Modern historians typically use the term “Crusader states”.

The First Crusade wasn’t just a cash/land grab. There was a schism between secular Western rulers and the Church, a schism between the Eastern and Western Church, and calls for help from the Byzantine emperor. Urban came into his papacy eager to heal the complicated European political situation, and put a stop to the rising clashes between Christians and Islamic powers. He landed on a holy Crusade as the best solution.

King Phillip I of France was excommunicated for repudiating his wife Bertha and marrying his mistress, Bertrada of Montfort, the wife of the Count of Anjou (who she had been married to when she first got together with Philip).

“...Odo may have viewed the crusade as an enterprise fabricated by his enemies, the Cluniacs, and at the instigation of a pope hostile to the crown of France...if he was looking for a reason not to get back into the business of holy war after his bad experiances in Iberia..this may have provided a conveniant pretext..” The Duchy of Burgundy and the Crusades, 1095-1220 [PHD Thesis] by Hilary Marie Rhodes.

The copy of Urban’s speech was recorded by Fulcher of Chatres in Gesta Francorum Jerusalem Expugnantium. It is considered the most accurate, given that Fulcher was actually present at the council.

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