Two young men grow up in medieval France in the high Pyrenees: Arnaud, a quiet lad, who lives with his Catholic father after his Cathar mother has thrown them both out of the family home, and Cathar Guillaume, a cocky loudmouth, who kills a man in a brawl and has to go on the run. Arnaud becomes an itinerant cobbler and Guillaume somehow finds himself a Bonhomme, one of the Cathar holy men. The Cathars were a heretical sect who flourished throughout southern France in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. They were persecuted by the French Inquisition and their Bonhommes assured of certain burning at the stake if caught. Life was difficult for all Cathars and the dangers very real, especially for their holy men. Arnaud is bitter because the eventual burning of his mother means he loses his family, his mother's house and all her wealth. Is he looking for revenge? Guillaume does not have the qualities of a holy man. He is greedy, scheming and even manipulates his best friend to cover up the fact that his mistress is pregnant. Bonhommes were not supposed to be sexual beings, but Guillaume is almost everything Bonhommes were not supposed to be. He is desperate to remain at the centre of the little Cathar community which has established itself around him in Catalonia, where many Cathars went into exile to escape the Officers of the Inquisition. When the two men eventually discover one another in Catalonia, a friendship of sorts develops between them. Guillaume is initially wary, but slowly begins to trust Arnaud. Arnaud is at first friendly but as he begins to understand the sort of man Guillaume is, and the money to be made from betrayal, a dilemma sets in. A spectacular 'sting' is set up. Read to find out how Guillaume is drawn from the safety of his life in Catalonia into the hands of Jacques Fournier, the Bishop Inquisitor of Pamiers. These are more authentic characters from Bishop Fournier's Inquisition Register, which he took to the Vatican when he became Pope Benedict X11 in 1334.
About the Author: This is my second Cathar book. Living in the Aude in France, I have come to know them very well. I can see their mountains, their villages and their 'castles' all around the beautiful countryside of southern France. I have read so much about them, in French as well as English. I was formerly a French teacher in England and am now a teacher of English in my local village school. The Cathars are part of my landscape and my imagination. They were ordinary people, not kings or queens, lords or ladies.