Son of Blood (8 page)

‘Count Roger, I would ask that you join me on the dais.’

‘And I, Lady Sichelgaita, would not wish to elevate myself above the other lords present. I am content to remain at the level of every one of my brother’s vassals.’

It was impressive, the way she dealt with that, for it was a potent response from such a powerful man and it was not an obviously supportive one, which was plain by the expression on the faces of the others present, though many worked hard not to react at all as they
sought to filter in through their own feelings and deep-seated hopes. Sichelgaita, although she must have been both hurt and anguished, managed a beaming smile and spoke with enough sincerity to seem untroubled.

‘Such an attitude does you great honour, brother. I hope that others present will see it as an example.’ Then she paused, her eyes ranging over the assembly. ‘You are all aware that my husband, your liege lord, is gravely ill and while we pray for his full recovery it must be accepted that our wishes and entreaties may not be answered.’

That set the archbishop nodding and naturally set up a murmur, but it did not last; all wanted to hear what they knew was coming.

‘When I married Duke Robert there were reasons for our match that transcended the regard we found for each other as man and wife. I need not tell you Normans present that the lands he holds are peopled more by my race than your own, even more by Greeks than either combined, and that has only increased as he has expanded his possessions. If he has granted you lands and titles, he has also granted you overlordship of a less than settled polity. You will all be aware that in the last rebellion, it was not only his dissatisfied Norman barons who rose against him – some of whom are present and have been in receipt of his benevolence – it was Lombards too.’

Her eyes then, as they ranged around the room to pick out the mutinous, were like agate, and those of whom she was speaking had the good grace to look abashed.

‘My husband realised that no Norman could hold this patrimony with the numbers he could muster, and he took me as wife as much because I am a Lombard as a princess of the House of Salerno. Also, when he has been absent it is to me he has given the reins of his power to wield, and I have used it to create harmony amongst a population
that does not love you any more than they loved Byzantium.’

Abelard could not restrain himself; he stepped forward, tall and gangly, for if he had the de Hauteville height he had none of the physical substance. ‘I will not be party to this. My uncle, whom I will not grace with any title, stole my inheritance. It is fitting that should he cease to lord it over my rightful possessions, then they should be mine to take by my bloodline.’

‘I invite you to find support in this chamber,’ Sichelgaita replied, lowering her voice to add a caveat. ‘With a reminder that the
Guiscard
still breathes, as you have all borne witness. I would not want to promise that he would be magnanimous if those whom he has so recently forgiven their transgressions against him were to show a lack of gratitude. I would certainly counsel him against it.’

As a warning it was palpable; she had, at this moment, the power to act as she saw fit and would see hung, drawn and quartered any such ingrate even if Robert was against it.

‘My claim is just,’ Abelard cried, looking around for a pair of eyes that would meet his own; none were forthcoming and it was a sorry retreat that saw him seek to lose himself, after only a moment’s consideration, back in the crowd.

‘If my husband knew that to hold his fiefs required that the Lombards from whom he took power were appeased, who amongst you would dare to think yourself even his equal, and be willing to ignore that? Are there not men in this chamber that share my race whom he had promoted to that purpose? And is not the principle of any succession to maintain that which we now hold and do so in a way seen to be legitimate?’

She was never going to mention Bohemund’s name, but that was as good a way as any of saying that he, as a pure-blood Norman, for all
his supposed attributes – and they were as yet hardly proven – neither had the right, nor would be able to control such an inheritance.

‘I therefore demand that you accede to your suzerain’s wishes, which he would shout to the rafters if he were present, and swear, that should God see fit to take away that dazzling light, the only person who can hold tight what he leaves behind is his own beloved son, Roger, known to you all as
Borsa
.’

With that she looked very pointedly at the man after whom
Borsa
was named, but she was addressing them all. ‘I therefore demand here in this chamber and on this day, in the presence of His Grace the Archbishop of Bari, that on your honour and at risk of the damnation of your soul, you swear allegiance to my son and his title, as the heir to the triple Dukedoms of Apulia, Calabria and Sicily.’

The silence that followed seemed to last a lifetime, with not so much as a whisper, not even from Abelard, from an assembly that could not number less than two hundred men who held, in their own fiefs, a degree of power. The Archbishop of Bari had stepped forward and made the sign of the cross and that allowed the knights to do likewise and murmur a small incantation, some of which would have been the mere pious request for guidance. That was when Roger, Count of Sicily, chose to move and the crowd parted to allow him to approach the dais, for he had remained at the back of the hall where he had entered.

Stony-faced, Sichelgaita observed his progress; her son was less in control, for he showed a measure of apprehension as he tried to read from his uncle’s expression what he was about to say. Count Roger knew all he had to do, once he came close, was to mount that dais and declare his own right to the title; the Normans in the hall would erupt in approval and there were too few Lombards to contest with
them. Close to the archbishop he fell to his knees and crossed himself, and spoke in a strong and echoing voice.

‘I, Roger de Hauteville, Count of Sicily by grace of my brother’s trust, do hereby swear to be a true and loyal servant to his son, named after me at birth, and to attend upon his person as my liege lord when the time comes for him to rightfully assume his father’s titles, may God strike me down if I transgress this vow.’

The archbishop, with some relief of his own, sprinkled holy water on Roger’s head and said a prayer that bound the kneeling man to his words. Behind the Count of Sicily the others lined up, Ademar of Monteroni to the fore, to make the same vow and then kiss the out-held hand of the youth they were anointing as their coming suzerain. Standing to one side and watching, Count Roger finally met Sichelgaita’s eye, to see there a feeling of hurt, for she knew what he had done; her son had been told, and so had she, that he held his titles only at the will of his powerful uncle.

But another message had gone out to those assembled and that was just as plain, for they knew to a man that Bohemund would not quietly accept such a dispensation; he would fight for what he considered his rights. Roger of Sicily had left a message for his absent bastard nephew to say that he would not stand by and let him overthrow his half-brother
Borsa
; he would, if need be, intervene to keep him in power.

‘I wonder, Roger,’ Sichelgaita enquired of him once the chamber was emptied. ‘Would you have sworn that oath if you possessed a son of your own?’

‘Since I do not, your question is not one I can answer.’

Sichelgaita could not hide the fact that she was reassured. Much as she would fight like a she-wolf for her firstborn son, and young
Guy if
Borsa
expired before her, she also knew, like Robert himself, that the laws of nature indicated she would die before either of them. However, Sichelgaita also knew that Roger’s wife Judith, who had been fecund in producing daughters, was now past child-bearing age.

‘You will remain with us?’ she asked.

‘Until my brother recovers,’ Roger replied, smiling, ‘and then I am his to command.’

The assembly had done that for which it had been called and most of those called to attend preferred to return to their own domains with their liege lord still not recovered. It was never possible to discover where the rumour began that Robert de Hauteville was dead, but it had begun to spread, perhaps either through malice, delusion or even wishful thinking. Suffice to say that it travelled in the wildfire way that such things do despite strong denials to the contrary from those who knew the truth, first through the city then out into the hinterland and beyond, snaking at walking pace up the trade routes, much more rapidly along the coast, carried by fast-sailing merchant ships to every port on the Adriatic and thence into the interior.

It was an irony that, as that news began to be promulgated across the northern Apennines, the object began to show the first signs of recovery – an occasional bout of consciousness, and a day or two later wakeful enough to take on the first solid food he had consumed for an age and with strength enough to ask that those miserable clerical supplicants disturbing his peace with their prayers be removed. He was weak and Sichelgaita kept anyone from his bedside that might trouble the recovery, even Count Roger, though
Borsa
and his younger brother were admitted to be blessed by a feeble parent. Sichelgaita took to nursing him herself.

‘The rumour in the marketplace this last week,’ she said, in between feeding him, ‘is that you have gone to meet your maker.’ Then she smiled. ‘Or the Devil who spawned you.’

‘I think I spoke with Satan recently,’ Robert croaked.

‘It certainly sounded as if you were at war with him in your fevers. But it would be well to show yourself, even in your diminished state, and lay to rest such rumours, which is the only evidence some folk will believe, for they can cause nothing but trouble and messengers must be sent out to suppress it in the countryside.’

‘There is no risk here in Bari, surely?’

‘No, all who matter know you are recovering and those who might want to profit by it have dispersed, while Count Roger has taken command of the garrison. He is anxious to speak with you, of course.’

The expression that crossed his face could not be the same as before; his eyes were too opaque to sparkle and the cheeks too drawn. ‘A week, you say.’

‘At least.’

The laugh began heartily enough, but soon turned into a hacking cough, from which Robert took time to recover his breath, but there was no mistaking the gleam of a coming prank.

‘Then a few days will make no difference, for I am not yet recovered enough to be seen. Let the rumour run and let us see who seeks to make mischief with it.’

T
he Leonine City was in mourning: Pope Alexander, who had throughout his pontificate brought to the city a decade of something approaching harmony, was dead and once more all the demons that cursed the election of a successor were back in play. The Roman aristocrats looked at their extended families to select a possible papal candidate and counted the money in their coffers to calculate how much they could disburse in bribes to the mobs that often took control of the city, should they be able to conjure up some clerical support. The Imperial Prefect sent messages off to Bamberg to alert his master, the Emperor-elect and King in Germany, Henry IV, to a potential crisis, while other riders had spread out to the great monasteries and important bishoprics to call to Rome those whom Archdeacon Hildebrand knew would be required to both attend the obsequies as well as name and elect a successor.

Now the last of these divines had gathered, it was time for the
funeral of Alexander to go ahead. Hildebrand was in the act of finalising the arrangements of the procession which would assemble the next day, when he received, from across the mountains, the news from Apulia. The cries of ‘God be praised’ echoed through the Lateran Palace, for Hildebrand was a man much committed to his hatreds. If it had taken action by the Normans of Capua and Apulia to secure Pope Alexander’s position as well as that of his predecessor, plus their aid to defeat the machinations of an imperial antipope, it had come at the cost of confirming those demons in their ducal and princely titles in a ceremony that, when he recalled it, seemed to Hildebrand a form of nightmare.

Such concessions had been brought about by the expedient need to keep the armies of the boy Henry IV north of the Alps; easy when he had been a mere child with his mother as regent, it would be much more troublesome now he was grown to manhood and said to be wilful with it, so perhaps he would have to seek their aid again. If having to rely on the Normans sat ill with Hildebrand, it was not just them; he hated to have to rely on anyone. Surely that could not be the will of the omnipotent God to whom he continually prayed?

As the archdeacon saw it, the Church of Rome had to be the fount of all authority; how could it not be, given where its teachings came from: the very mouth of Jesus, the Son of God, as relayed through his disciples? No temporal power had the right to challenge that and it was his life’s work, as he saw it, to bring to pass that such supremacy should be acknowledged. Emperors, kings, dukes and counts bowed the knee to the Pope, not the other way round, for that flew in the face of scripture.

But if the archdeacon was beset by his passions and his beliefs, he was ever the pragmatist, playing a weak hand with consummate
skill as he sought to ward off all the perils that threatened the institution he controlled until the proper acknowledgments could be secured. Keep the Emperor-elect and his desire to interfere in Rome at bay, yet not so barred from influence as to allow the Normans free rein to do as they pleased. As a policy it had worked well sometimes and failed just as many, yet now some form of action must be taken. In the delicate scales of Italian politics, the death of the
Guiscard
altered the balance and might present an opportunity from which Hildebrand could profit, and a move towards his ultimate goal that acknowledged papal supremacy be initiated.

A message was sent to the religious home of the Benedictines in Rome, to summon into his presence his most trusted advisor – the divine who ran the great monastery of Monte Cassino, for if there was one man who would help him to decide what this portended it was Abbot Desiderius. His monastery bordered the lands controlled by the Normans of Campania and he knew the ways of the Apulians well; indeed none had been more troubled over decades by their depredations than that institution. Desiderius had dealt with them to keep Monte Cassino secure and his diplomacy had from time to time brokered an occasional amity – or was it a mere marriage of convenience? – between the Normans and Rome.

‘News to gladden the heart, Desiderius – the
Guiscard
is dead.’

The abbot had not even got through the double doors of the chancellor’s luxurious work chamber; tall, angular and simply dressed in his habit of undyed white, with his desiccated features that bespoke a life of much denial, he immediately crossed himself, then gathered his hands and said a short, silent prayer. Hildebrand was about to scoff but stopped himself, for he was in the presence of one of the few
people who could make him feel inadequate in his love of God. Then there was his bloodline.

Desiderius had been born into a cadet branch of the princely family that had ruled Benevento prior to their being ousted by Humphrey de Hauteville, yet he had renounced all that brought in wealth and comfort for his faith and the simple life of a Benedictine monk. If both men were Lombards, they could be marked more by their differences than their similarities: Hildebrand was ill-tempered, dogmatic in his faith and intolerant of any perceived transgressions of the creed. Physically short and stocky, swarthy of face and with untidy black hair, he wore his canonical garments badly, managing, even in magnificent vestments, to look every inch the peasant many claimed him to be. The Abbot of Monte Cassino eschewed display, yet with his silver-grey locks, kindly, well-proportioned features and forgiving nature, looked and behaved like the aristocrat he was.

‘We must pray for the soul of every one of Our Saviour’s flock, Hildebrand, regardless of how much they have sinned.’

‘The
Guiscard
won’t cease to do that even in death,’ Hildebrand snorted. ‘He’ll probably storm St Peter’s very gates, prodding with his lance and demanding heaven submit; that is, if he ever gets to paradise.’

‘He has endowed many places of worship.’

‘And destroyed ten times more and he is an excommunicate. He deserves to burn in hell.’

‘My friend, if I pray for his soul, I shall do so for you with as much sincerity when your time comes.’

That stopped whatever Hildebrand was about to say; the notion that he would need as many entreaties as a devil like the
Guiscard
 
to enter heaven was a sobering one and enough to silence even his normally uncontrollable temperament.

‘You know these heathens better than I, Desiderius. I need your advice on how to proceed.’

That made even the calm abbot look askance; Hildebrand was as likely to ignore him as endorse any opinion he put forward, but it was true he knew the Normans well and had dealt with them on numerous occasions, all the way back to Rainulf Drengot and William
Bras de Fer
. His aim had been to protect his monastery, which lay sandwiched between Rome and Campania, and in that he had been more than successful. Destroyed many times, not least by marauding Saracens, and rebuilt only to be diminished by Lombard-inspired Norman incursions, Desiderius had managed to secure it their protection, and that brought with it both peace and prosperity till the only rival it now had in Christendom, in terms of riches and prestige, was the mighty French Abbey of Cluny.

Naturally, with the news of Duke Robert’s death came a report of the assembly called by Sichelgaita, its purpose as well as the conclusion. Desiderius was well acquainted with, indeed he had appointed, the personal confessor of the putative heir.

‘This Roger they call
Borsa
is a pious young man I am told.’

‘Which,’ Hildebrand snapped, ‘will do him no good at all if he cannot rule in Apulia.’

‘The boy’s mother is a formidable woman. If what we hear of this swearing of vows is true, I would surmise that while he may hold the title, it will be she who controls the reins until the boy reaches maturity.’

‘What will Capua do when he hears this news?’

‘Nothing, unless he had support from the Apulian barons, and they
have just been soundly routed. Richard lacks the strength to invade without that, and even then he would come up against the Count of Sicily now he has sworn allegiance to a legal inheritance. You know less of him but he is as good a general as ever was the
Guiscard
.’

‘If he is so puissant a warrior why did he not take the title himself?’

‘I surmise he is an honourable man.’ That got a loud snort from Hildebrand; the concept of honour in a Norman was not one he could easily accept. ‘If Roger
Borsa
has a difficulty it is with his half-brother, Bohemund, who is, I am told, a formidable young man.’

Hildebrand, when he replied, had no need to seek to appear cunning. His features inclined towards that naturally – his trouble was an appearance of sincerity. ‘It could be in our interest to set them at each other’s throats.’

‘Would it not, Hildebrand,’ Desiderius responded with a sigh, ‘be better to bring them to a peaceful understanding?’

‘Understanding, with a Norman?’ Hildebrand sneered. ‘No such thing is possible, but let us leave that aside, as we have other matters to consider.’

‘I beg you not to go to them,’ the abbot replied, for he had a very good idea of what was coming.

‘I do not comprehend you, Desiderius. The Supreme Office is yours for the asking. Not a voice would be raised, even in Bamberg, if you assumed the papacy.’

‘One voice would object most heartily, Hildebrand, and that is my own. I do not want it.’

‘Well,’ Hildebrand replied, in a way that did nothing to convince Desiderius he accepted his decision, ‘I will convey that to the Curia, but do not be surprised if they do not accept it.’

‘It is not an office that can be forced on any man.’

‘What if it is the will of God?’

‘How can one be sure of that, when it is expressed through mere mortals?’

‘You should pray for guidance.’

‘That must wait till tomorrow morning,’ was the reply, as the abbot made to depart. ‘Until then I shall do as I intended before you sent for me and sit vigil by Pope Alexander’s catafalque. If my supplications have any value, which I doubt, then they should be employed to see that good man into the arms of Our Lord, not me into his vacant chair.’

Hildebrand went back to the arrangements for the next day’s interment; having buried four pontiffs, it was a task to which he was well accustomed, but he had other concerns, not least how to persuade the man who had just departed that it was his duty to accept the mitre of St Peter and his own personal feelings had no bearing. If he felt it a burden all he would have, if he so wanted, were the trappings; Hildebrand had been running things for so long, down to the most tedious level, and he could continue to do so if asked.

Unbeknown to him, there were several conversations of the same topic being carried out in houses as well as palaces all over Rome, as the assembled cardinals and bishops met with the Roman aristocrats to see where they had common ground in the election of a successor to Alexander. What emerged took much overnight scurrying to and fro from meeting to meeting, as well as messages flying between the most important locations. In a city where plotting was endemic, the sole surprise was the speed of unanimity in coming to a conclusion between such disparate entities.

Those divines who had risen to high office in the last twenty years found, to their surprise, that they shared a desire with the leading
Roman families for an outcome, and given those same aristocrats controlled the mob, and they could with their coins direct them to carry out their aims, it fell to these families to make necessary arrangements to ensure the right candidate was elected.

Hildebrand was up long before it was light, first to say his devotions and then prepare for the coming ceremony, made sad by contemplation, because he had loved Alexander as a person as well as he had served and guided him faithfully. As that, he would have liked to lead the procession to the nearby Lateran Basilica where Alexander was to be interred, but even as Chancellor of the Apostolic See he must give precedence to cardinals, the senior bishops and abbots like Desiderius, now assembling with the clergy of Rome to perform the ceremony of consecration and burial. It was fitting that he fast this day, so with only a sip of watered wine to sustain him he stood while his servants robed him in his vestments, trying, and as usual failing, to make him look as noble as he should.

Outside, when he emerged, stood the Church of Rome assembled and his heart swelled to see their magnificence: vestments of heavy silk sown with pearls and jewels, crosses of solid gold, studded with gems, to be carried in procession, all the trappings that testified to the glory of God and his Vicar on Earth. In his lifetime the religion for which he had toiled so hard had been much reduced, and if his efforts had restored its pride he had also been instrumental in the restoration of its revenues to the point that there was no display of splendour it could not undertake. Yet for all that glitter, there was Desiderius, still simply robed as the monk he was, and the two exchanged greetings, an act repeated with all those whom Hildebrand had summoned to Rome. But no time was wasted and the bishop who would perform
the Mass went to the head of the gathering to lead the catafalque and those who would follow it the short distance to the basilica.

A huge crowd of citizens had gathered, both high-born and low, and they fell in behind, the aristocrats naturally to the front. Most would be barred from the interior of the Lateran Basilica – space would not allow them all entry – but equity as well as sound policy dictated that a number of representatives of the guilds as well as the urban poor be admitted. For the rest, they would remain in the plaza yet still take full part in the Mass, conducted to them by relays of priests. Smoky incense filled the air as the bearers swung their thuribles and the plainchant of the accompanying monks rose in a slow but sweet dirge, which changed its note as it went from the open air and entered the high-roofed building, echoing off the rafters.