Free Almodis by Tracey Warr

King Charlemagne himself,’ father says, ‘and we hold our lands proudly, independently. Since Charlemagne, there has been no central power and each man has put his trust in his own sword.’
    My father is tempering his language for Hugh’s sake. Usually he is forcefully abusive about his neighbours but now he is choosing his words carefully in order not to re-open old wounds and revive old arguments. Eye for eye, kin for kin vendettas have been the way for decades between our three families. Peace was ever precarious.
    ‘My father invaded Aquitaine, intending to dispossess Duke Guillaume V of Aquitaine, old Guillaume the Great, but my father took an arrow after the battle of Gencais and died of his wound at Charroux. The troops captured his brother, Gausbert, and cruelly blinded him for good measure. My mother, Adalmode, held out against the duke for weeks right here in the castle of Roccamolten but when he finally took the fortress she was forced to marry him and abandon me here under the guardianship of my uncle Boson. I was a mere babe at the time.’
    I smile at that. It is hard to imagine my burly, battle-scarred father as a baby. He wipes his greasy fingers on the tablecloth and continues his story. ‘My mother willed her inheritance of Limoges to my first-born daughter, Almodis here, in order to protect Limoges and La Marche from the ambitions of the Aquitaine family. And then on your side, sire, your family were great castle builders.’ Father pauses politely to let Hugh take up the story.
    ‘Yes, my great-grandfather, Hugh II, built the castle of Lusignan which is the largest in all Aquitaine, Lady,’ Hugh says addressing me. I nod encouragingly but he says no more.
    ‘According to some doctors,’ Audebert interrupts, yelling a little too loudly down the table and holding up his brimming beaker, ‘wine will give you good blood, good colour, strengthen your bodily virtues and make you happy, good-natured and well-spoken .’ He raises his cup to Hugh who nods politely but makes no rejoinder to Audebert’s humour. Hugh is drinking slowly, taking small mouthfuls and, unlike Father and Audebert, he is mixing water with his wine. It is a very good wine from Burgundy so it can’t be the taste that is causing him to be so moderate. Perhaps he is being careful in potentially antagonistic company.
    ‘Your father, Hugh the Brown, now he fought hard for his rights against both Aquitaine and myself.’ Father pauses again to see if Hugh wants to give his own account of his notoriouslybellicose and land-hungry father but he still says nothing so father goes on. ‘He fought for many years with me and had many arguments and resentments with Aquitaine and others too.’
    ‘Yes,’ says Hugh, ‘but these arguments seem most complex and difficult to unravel, with Fulk Nerra, Count of Anjou, the Vicomtes of Limoges and Geoffrey of Thouars also involved.’
    ‘Oh they were complex alright,’ yells father, laughing down the table in the direction of Audebert. I shift in my seat, hoping that father will not get carried away with his stories of old battles and say something to offend Hugh.
    ‘Your father claimed the lands of Thouars as his but Guillaume of Aquitaine, that wily old bastard, he thwarted your father at every turn,’ father says.
    ‘So I understand,’ says Hugh. ‘My father used to tell me how the Duke of Aquitaine said to him, “If all the world were mine I would not give you what I could lift with my finger”’.
    ‘Your father threw Thouars’ men from the keep in one of the battles,’ father says, ‘and so Geoffrey of Thouars burned your father’s fortress at Mouzeil, captured his horsemen and cut off their hands.’
    A pained expression creases Hugh’s forehead, but he still seems uninterested in giving his own version of his father’s exploits.
    ‘Then your father was trying to lay claim to Vivonne and to Civray, which were mine, of course,’ father continues. ‘Guillaume forced your