Shortlisted for the Costa Children's Book Award 2009.
Costa Book Awards 2009 Judges' comment: "We loved this terrific historical adventure story with its passionate and gutsy heroine."
There’s romance, intrigue, religion and bloodshed all tightly interwoven in this historical thriller. Rather than marrying the old nobleman her father has chosen for her, Elinor determines to run away with Bertran the Troubadour. As the witness to a brutal murder for which the all-powerful Pope is bound to seek revenge, Bertran is on a mission to warn all other heretics of the terrible dangers which are pressing in around him. Elinor and Bertran make wonderful guides to the historical upheaval that threatened the south of France.
A story of persecution and poetry, love and war set in thirteenth century southern France. A troubadour, Bertran, witnesses the brutal murder of the Pope's legate, and risks his life to warn others of the war that he knows is certain to follow this act. The lands of the peaceable Cathars - deemed heretics - are now forfeit and under threat from crusaders who have been given authority by the Pope to take the Cathar domains by force. But the Pope is trying to track Bertran down and so is somebody else: Elinor, a young noblewoman in love with Bertran but facing a loveless arranged marriage, flees her family and becomes a minstrel herself. Soon both Bertran and Elinor find themselves enveloped in a rising tide of bloodshed that threatens the very fabric of their society.
