The Devil's Crossing

by Hana Cole

  ‘We cannot return now,’ was the boy’s simple reply. ‘We are so close.’

  ‘Others are joining us from every part of France,’ said another. ‘A great convergence.’

  ‘But look at you!’ Agnes implored. ‘Look at the little ones. If nothing else think of the suffering you cause to your family.’

  ‘You think our families did not try to stop us?’ One of the others spoke, his lips covered with sores. ‘The Lord wants the proof of our sacrifice. The older generation don’t understand. If we cannot change this world then no-one can.’

  ‘Not in this way.’ Gui drew breath for another line of his sermon but the vague eyes of the group told him that not even Jesus himself could turn these boys back. Gaze lifted to the horizon, he murmured, ‘What have we become that our children should feel our burden fall upon them?

  They were half a league away when Agnes said, ‘I wish we had never come across them.’

  Arms circling Gui’s waist, she felt his body flinch at her words, but he did not slow their pace.

  ‘Did you see the state they were in?’

  ‘Of course I did,’ he snapped. ‘What would you have me do?’

  ‘That’s not what I mean…’ The air wheezed from her lungs as her voice faltered. Gui stopped their mount and turned to face her. ‘Are you alright?’

  She tried to hold on the dark eyes, the deep groove between his brows, but his face was a blur. She blinked to focus.

  Squeezing her shoulders, he said, ‘He’s not dead, my love. I feel it. Can you not feel it? He is not dead.’

  Her head felt so heavy. She let it fall into the shield of his body.

  ‘He is not dead.’ Although his voice was steady, she felt a tremor from deep within his chest.

  The lost faces of the boys harried her. One by one their features arranged themselves into the same face: Etienne. A sickness of the mind was attacking her body. She knew it would continue its assault until she held her son in her arms again.

  Gui peered at her with a doctor’s intense look of concentration. ‘We have to rest,’ he announced.

  ‘Just a few more miles,’ Agnes replied.

  Her eyes burned, chest tight as she struggled for air. Marseille was so close, no further than two or three days’ ride. They mustn’t stop. Once they were together again nothing else would matter. All three of them could disappear. Bernard de Nogent and his hideous cohorts be damned. She tried to swallow down her cough but it would not be contained. A convulsion rippled through her. I am drowning, she wanted to tell him.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she said. ‘I’ll be fine.’

  Shouldering her weight with one arm, Gui swung his leg round, ready to dismount.

  ‘Please, Gui. We can’t stop. We are so close.’

  ‘No. We rest and take a drink here, then ride to the nearest village. You send word to this aunt of yours you told me about.’

  ‘Margarida. No, I…’

  ‘She can tend to you whilst I go on to meet Philippe.’ The soft brown eyes surveyed her sternly. ‘That is what we are going to do. You have to rest.’ Gui reached over and in one practised movement, swung her down from the horse.

  ‘Oh quick,’ she said. In the next breath she was on her hands and knees, choking up the terror.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Fountain stood at the intersection of a main thoroughfare and an alleyway. Lantern light made dim shadows of the men within but, swamped beneath a large cloak and a wide-brimmed hat, Gui recognised his friend immediately.

  ‘All these theatrics for an old friend?’

  The guttering laugh and the firm clutch of his hand did not hide the air of uncertainty that radiated from Phillippe.

  ‘My inquiries as to the whereabouts of your boy yielded much more than I bargained for, I can tell you,’ Philippe began. ‘I had to take every precaution.’

  ‘Someone followed us to Tours,’ said Gui. ‘A retinue of retainers from the Chartraine.’

  Philippe scratched at his hairline. ‘I’m not surprised.’ The merchant sighed, his attention drifting to the entrance. ‘We should move from here.’

  Gui stayed him with his hand, looked him in the eye. ‘Philippe, one of their saddle bags was embossed with the arms of Champol.’

  Philippe’s face contorted in surprise.

  ‘Why don’t you tell me what is going on?’ Gui said.

  The broad shoulders slumped. ‘My house at Tours was robbed. A warning or a search, I don’t know which.’

  ‘The men who followed Agnes and me?’

  ‘It seems likely. As soon as I arrived in Chartres I began making inquiries as to this shepherd’s crusade. At first all I found were other families who had lost children, young men. It was easy enough to establish they had headed to the Fairs.’ He eyed Gui reluctantly. ‘But before long there were other pieces of information.’ The merchant took a long draught of ale.

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘The group had dispersed in every direction, some to Alsace, Rome, the southern ports. I also discovered they have come to the attention of others.’ He lowered his voice. ‘There are scouts along the routes looking for them, attempting to gather as many as possible into the same location.’

  Gui’s gut beat a pulse of alarm. ‘Marseille.’

  ‘From what I was able to gather the children are being corralled by men of little scruples to be sold.’

  A hot wave pulsed through Gui’s body. ‘Slavery?’

  ‘I met someone, a Sicilian oil trader who told me he had been offered a couple of northern house boys for six livres.’

  ‘Less than the price of a palfrey.’ Gui rubbed his face as though he were trying to wash away a bad dream.

  Philppe pressed his lips together in condolence. ‘He had the impression they were not in healthy enough condition to travel on.’

  Gui drew close enough to see the red-rimmed fatigue in the other man’s eyes and said carefully, ‘But what of Etienne? Do you know if he is here or not?’

  Philippe nodded, grave. ‘It’s likely. I think they are being bought to Marseille to be sold onto Muslim households in Spain or even further afield.’

  The merchant pressed his palms together in prayer as Gui’s eyes blackened. ‘Gui, you have to understand, I don’t move in this underworld. After the robbery…There was nothing more I could do alone.’

  ‘Where can we find these scouts?’

  Philippe stood, gestured for Gui to follow him. ‘An errand boy I was able to encourage told me where to go,’ he said rubbing his thumb and index finger togther. ‘Come.’

  The cool evening air was a welcome respite from the smell of stale beer and bodies inside and Gui took a deep, steadying breath.

  The bolt came silently. It wasn’t until Philippe staggered round, clutching his arm, that Gui realised he had been struck. He lurched forward to catch his friend and a second bolt clattered at their feet. Braced against Philippe’s weight, Gui scanned the alleyway. It was deserted.

  Philippe’s fingers curled around Gui’s cloak. ‘Go to the quay,’ he mouthed. ‘Now.’

  ‘We have to get you back inside.’ Gui edged towards the tavern, his friend’s bulk resting on his shoulder.

  ‘Go now. I can get myself inside.’ Bent double, Philippe limped for the cover of the doorway, a deep red stain blooming on his shirt. Another bolt ripped through the fabric of Gui’s tunic.

  ‘The docks,’ Philippe said through gritted teeth, ‘where the porters load oil for North Africa.’ He walked his fingers inside his cloak and dragged out a leather pouch. ‘This should buy you what you need,’ he wheezed. ‘Now go.’

  Numb with disbelief, Gui backed away as his friend stumbled back inside the tavern. Turning one way and then the next, Gui tried to guess the direction of the port. The narrow alleys were a labyrinth closing in around him, the sound of his own breath grating as his lungs dragged the air in and out. Don’t panic, said the voice in his head, just run.

  *

  Gui scrutinised the old
woman, challenging her certainty, but the sagging eyelids did not blink or stray. Stooped low, she interrupted his conversation with a dockyard porter to tell him there had been French children here. Not two or three days ago she saw them, two score, maybe more. They came round with the noon sun, looking for the late morning scraps from the markets. They were blessed; she could tell they were on the business of the Lord. The porter moved to shoo her away but Gui held up a hand of clemency. She was hard to understand. A gypsy, her skin browned and shrivelled by the sun. She stank.

  ‘Do you know where they went?’ Gui spoke slowly, inserting the bits of Occitan he knew from Agnès. The hag wrinkled her brow and sighed. Gui opened his pouch, certain that coin would reveal her answer, but before he could hand her the money, she nodded to the other side of the harbour, ‘Behind the foundlings home.’

  The porter’s face soured as Gui gave her a coin. In return she made the sign of the cross and muttered something that was neither French nor Occitan. Although Gui did not understand the tongue, there was no mistaking the warning.

  The warehouse behind the orphanage was empty. Gui stood in the doorway, short of breath, heart hammering in his throat. All around the vacant space were signs; a scorched patch where a fire had been lit, dirty straw strewn over the floor, empty clay bottles, crates brimming with rotting refuse. Something caught his eye by the bedding area. He squatted down and filleted his hand beneath the straw - a wooden spinning top, it’s handle snapped. He brought his hands to his head.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  Gui looked up. The bright sun made shadow of the man’s face but the black cross on his white tunic was unmistakable – a knight of the Order of the Hospital.

  ‘There was a group of children here.’

  The knight was a good head taller than Gui, his cheek scarred.

  ‘I believe I know what has happened to your boy,’ he said.

  Gui felt his body jolt as though he had been struck by an external force. ‘What do you mean my boy?’

  ‘I guessed. Watching you with the toy, you have the air of a father. Am I wrong?’

  Gui shook his head.

  ‘If he was among the group camped here then I believe I may know something.’ The knight extended his hand. ‘I am Etienne of the Order of the Hospital.’

  ‘Etienne is my son’s name.’

  ‘Then he takes his looks from you.’

  Gui’s eyes shot wide open. ‘You have seen him?’

  ‘He came with some others to the priory not a week gone. His hair was fair but the same curls. The brow, the shape of the eyes. I’m trained to notice such things.’ The knight paused, then said sadly. ‘And your accent. The boy said he had come from Montoire because he didn’t want to be a shepherd.’

  Mouth clamped shut, Gui held his breath to contain the wave that was building inside his chest, threatening to spill out and shame him before this stranger.

  ‘Come.’

  Outside, the glare from the sun was a blinding contrast to the gloomy warehouse. The air was a cacophony of merchants, seamen, peddlers, their cries now and again consumed by the crash of a ship’s gangway hitting the dock. Etienne pointed at two fat-bellied merchant cogs anchored on the other side of the harbour.

  ‘Those ships?’ Gui felt the host of dreadful possibility bearing down on him.

  ‘They run supply routes in the western Mediterranean. The boat I believe they boarded was bound for Corsica.’

  ‘What boat?’ Reaching for the support of shattered packing crates behind him, Gui blinked rapidly, trying to bring the world to order.

  ‘The boat they boarded.’ The knight bowed his head. ‘I did not pay them enough mind. You have to understand there are so many groups of pilgrims here, young men claiming they want to go overseas….I wasn’t much older than your son when I sought service myself.’ The knight rubbed the back of his neck. The noose of guilt, thought Gui.

  ‘We are in contact with the harbourmaster. So many slave ships come and go from this harbour, trafficking of Christians is always a problem.’

  The cawing of the seagulls was suddenly very loud in Gui’s ears. A rush of blood pounding at his temples, he whispered, ‘I was told there might be children being sold into service in Spain.’

  ‘Not just Spain.’ The Hospitaller stood at the threshold of the warehouse entrance, grappling with his task. ‘Alexandria, Crete, Venetian colonies on the Black Sea. These men are slavers and the truth is they profit from trade in Christians as well as Mohammedan or Jew.’

  All Gui could do was stare back.

  ‘Theirs will not be a fast boat. If you want to retrieve your son then you’re best advised to leave as soon as you can. I can arrange passage for you on one of our galleys.’

  ‘Dear God. Yes.’

  ‘You’ll need money but you should be able to purchase your son back without trouble if you approach them with one of our Brothers.’ He placed a huge, knotted hand on Gui’s shoulder. ‘I know it must seem an impossible world away but we travel overseas regularly. The world is not so vast as you might imagine once you are used to it.’

  ‘I can sell my horse,’ stammered Gui. ‘But my wife…she’s sick. I left her outside the city.’

  ‘The ship sails at sundown. If you want to see your son again you must be on it.’

  Shielding his eyes against the sun, Gui surveyed the bay, the departing boats, how quickly they became black flecks on the horizon and then were gone. Drawing his shoulders back, he stiffened.

  ‘Please arrange it,’ he said. ‘I will return within that time.’

  The knight gave him a firm pat on the shoudler. ‘I do not think you have to fear the worst on your boy’s account. He has something rare about him.’

  ‘He is a shepherd. He knows nothing of how to fight.’

  ‘Yet I saw the same conviction in your son’s eyes as I see in yours now. It is not a quality of one who easily abandons his faith.’

  Gui laughed, a casual, self-mocking cough.

  ‘You’re a priest, aren’t you?’ said the knight.

  ‘You are an astute observer of men.’

  ‘I have travelled to many places, met men of so many different creeds, different lives. The priest who has tired of the Church wears a shroud that is impossible to hide. You should take this chance as an act of His mercy that you have not forsaken your faith.’

  Before he realised it, Gui had pulled his rosary from his cloak. Eyes closed, he made the sign of the cross on his chest.

  The streets of the city centre span him a congested web; thoroughfares blocked by carts unloading, cut-throughs that ended in piss-soaked dead ends, beggars and drunks under his horse on any path wide enough for him to take some speed. When he broke free of it, he tore up the road back to the inn, making half a day’s ride before noon. His mind tossed on the seas of fetid pirate vessels, the wide-eye trust of innocents and his own wretched guilt. There was no space left to consider the choice he had to face, so when he returned to Agnes, sweat-damped hair tumbling about her, he was struck unprepared by the sensation of being wrenched asunder.

  Gaze searching for focus, she smiled. He sat on the bed, took her frigid hand and rubbed it in between his. These were the little gestures that had the power to slow time. Perhaps, if he could link up enough of them without uttering a word, his decision would never have to be made.

  ‘Agnes, my love, can you hear me?’ He took her fingers to his lips.

  She nodded. He let out a laugh of relief. The thought that came to him next was so loud he could have sworn it was someone else’s voice. If you leave her now she will die. Invisible hands squeezed his heart. Gui knew that if he tried to speak in that moment he might weep, so instead he smiled back, the well-practised consolation his profession had taught him. Stroking the hair from her face, it occurred to him that he could say nothing and she would never know. It would be his guilt to carry alone. Their son was gone - the chances he would ever find the boy alive, let alone reclaim him, were so small. But her life, rig
ht here, was under his touch.

  ‘You should rest, my love,’ he said, going over to the washing stand for the distraction of wetting a face cloth.

  ‘What is it?’ Her voice was weak but insistent.

  Arms braced against the stand, head bowed, Gui could see his reflection distorted dimly in the pewter jug. He looked away from the darkly circled eyes staring back, challenging his selfish fantasy with the truth: as much as Agnes meant to him, Etienne was her world. What would be the more painful? A lifetime of guilt that he had not disclosed the slim chance in his power to find their son, or the knowledge that he would be riding away now from the only love he had ever known. It was not his choice to make and he knew what her choice would be.

  Gui bit down on his lip and turned to face her.

  ‘Etienne has boarded a vessel with the other children bound for the Holy Land.’

  Agnes raised her head. ‘The Holy Land?’

  Gui nodded, throat clamped shut by the truth. He closed his eyes on his crumbling faith. Lungs battling for air, Agnes’s sobs turned into hacking retches. Helpless witness, he pulled her to his chest. Then, blotting her cheeks with his hand, he said, ‘The Knights of the Hospital offered me passage on one of their transports. They think the ship the boys have taken is bound for Corsica.’

  She looked up at him. ‘Corsica?’

  ‘I believe it is a week or so under sail. The Orders use it as a supply station.’

  Briefly her eyes cleared. ‘And they could get us there before this other vessel?’

  Gui nodded. ‘I would likely arrive before the other boat if I leave immediately.’

  Comprehension dawned on her face. He spoke before she had the chance to.

  ‘You cannot board a ship, Agnes. The journey would kill you. The damp. The conditions…you don’t know what it is like.’

  It was when she raised no protest that he realised she knew how sick she was. She gripped his tunic. ‘Then you must go alone.’

  He swallowed. ‘The chances of finding him…’

  ‘You must go. You must find him. You must.’ Her bright blue eyes were fractured with threads of blood. ‘Promise me you’ll find him. No matter what.’