Defender of Jerusalem

by Helena P. Schrader

  Baldwin sought Balian d’Ibelin in the sea of faces, and their eyes met. Across the distance, Baldwin pleaded voicelessly with his friend for forgiveness and support. His eyes said: I was wrong! I know I was. Forgive me, Balian—and please intervene. Please speak up for me!

  Balian started forward, to the irritation of the men around him, but then they fell silent as they saw him gently push his younger brother Henri aside and go down on one knee before the King. “Your grace, do not mistake our reluctance to see you take command of the army for mistrust in your leadership. We—my brothers and I—have fought with you at Montgisard, on the Litani, and at Le Forbelet. We know you are capable.” He paused to let this sink in before adding, “But we fear for your health. Each time you take to the field, you are left weaker than before. Can you afford to take the field again? Now? So shortly after recovering from near-certain death?”

  The silence in the room was brittle, as if men were holding their breath.

  “My lord of Ibelin, that you care for my health I do believe,” Baldwin answered steadily, his eyes fixed on Balian, trying to convey how deeply he regretted the hurt he had done him in the past. “But it is a King’s duty to put the welfare of his Kingdom ahead of his own. The Count of Jaffa is right to say we cannot let Kerak—or my sisters—fall into Salah ad-Din’s hands.”

  “But, your grace,” the Bishop of Bethlehem replied, moving up behind Balian. “In your condition—”

  “I can be carried in a litter,” Baldwin assured him.

  “Yes, of course—but, your grace, if, as the good Baron of Ibelin says, the exertions of this campaign render you—incapacitated—who then is to rule the Kingdom?”

  “According to the Count of Tripoli, that is for this High Court to decide. What does it have to do with me?”

  “Your grace!” the Bishop protested, with a scowl in the direction of Tripoli. “The kings of Jerusalem have always designated their heirs; the High Court then reviews that recommendation and ensures that there are no impediments.”

  “My heir is my nephew and namesake, my sister Sibylla’s son,” Baldwin answered, pointedly looking at the Count of Jaffa.

  “The boy is six years old!” Jaffa protested in exasperation.

  “Then he will need a Regent—when the time comes,” Tripoli replied coolly, harvesting exclamations of support that silenced Jaffa.

  “If it would please this High Court,” Baldwin spoke into the chatter that gradually stilled as they waited for him to continue, “we can crown my nephew King—anoint him in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher—so no one can challenge his right to rule when I am dead—which we all know will not be so long from now.”

  “Your grace!” the Bishop of Bethlehem gasped, but then fell silent, as the silver mask swung in his direction and Baldwin’s burning eyes fell on him.

  “I may be dying, my lords,” Baldwin told them coldly. “But I will die a king—and not a discarded and disregarded fool!” He looked pointedly at Jaffa as he spoke. “I will be Regent for my nephew as long as I live, and I will tolerate no Regent to be placed over me as long as I draw breath. God is my witness!”

  The High Court muttered a collective “Amen,” greatly subdued by the King’s stance.

  “So light the fire, Constable, and summon the army. I will lead it to Kerak.”

  “After your nephew has been crowned,” Tripoli added with an audacity that surprised many in the room.

  “You can’t crown the boy with his mother trapped in Kerak!” Jaffa protested. But the other barons loudly overrode his protest and insisted on a coronation at once. This need be no grand affair, the Templar Master noted; the boy would only be a co-monarch, after all. The Patriarch protested, however, that he wasn’t ready, and that the sacred oil and vestments were locked away. The boy needed to be prepared, taught his lines, and spend time in prayer, the Bishop of Nazareth added.

  “A week from now, then!” Ramla concluded to widespread applause. “Kerak can be held that long at least. Indeed, much longer. There is no rush.”

  Baldwin had stopped listening and had returned his gaze to Balian, who was still on his knee before him. There was so much that needed to be said—to right the wrongs he had committed, to thank him for taking in Ibrahim, to beg forgiveness and support in the days, weeks, maybe even years ahead. There was so much Baldwin wanted to say, but he didn’t have the strength to say it all.

  Balian pulled himself to his feet and approached the throne. He laid his hand on Baldwin’s arm, which lay dead upon the armrest of the throne. “I am still your knight, your grace. You need not doubt it.”

  “And your wife my step-mother? Will she, too, forgive what I have done?”

  Balian drew a deep breath, for he could not honestly speak for Maria Zoë. “I do not know, your grace. Much will depend on how she finds Isabella.”

  Baldwin closed his eyes in shame and whispered, “God forgive me.” Then he opened them and looked again at Balian. “Tell her—tell her that she was right to attack my mother and sister. Tell her that it was that desperate cry of a wounded mother that finally penetrated the walls of lies they had woven around me. I did not comprehend it until I had recovered from the fever, but I heard it and remembered it. And tell Ibrahim that I did not throw him out, that I miss him every day, every hour, but I do not deserve his love and care. My punishment for not having had the strength to prevent my sister from dismissing him is to live without the comfort of his care.”

  “I will tell him, and Maria Zoë—as soon as we have lifted the siege of Kerak.”

  Kerak, December 3, 1183

  Beth sought to flee the stench and misery of the crowded courtyards by seeking fresh air upon the ramparts. It had been roughly six weeks since the start of the siege, and while the food seemed to be holding out, water had long since become rationed. There was little enough to drink and nothing whatsoever for bathing. The masses of humanity crammed into the inadequate spaces not locked against them (for Oultrejourdain had no intention of letting people live amidst his stores or armory) stank abominably. More and more of the children were becoming ill, vomiting and defecating wherever they happened to be, while even the adults hardly made the effort to go to the filthy battery of latrines in the outer ward.

  Obviously the nobility lived above the squalid courtyards, but with so many guests, conditions even here were crowded. Beth shared a small tower room with Eschiva, Maria Zoë, Elizabeth, Rahel, and Elizabeth’s waiting woman, Martha. The noblewomen shared the bed that had been Isabella’s until her marriage, while the waiting women slept on pallets on the floor. At least they had their own garderobe, but Beth sometimes needed to get away from the others. Elizabeth was increasingly on edge and very short-tempered, and her maid Martha looked down on the base-born Beth and ordered her around like a scullery maid. Meanwhile Eschiva had fallen into a deep depression that left her listless. Beth had done all she could to try to cheer up her mistress, but what was she supposed to say? She was more terrified of the future than any of the others.

  Her only solace was Dawit. His mere presence in the castle was a comfort to Beth, and they met in the stables, where he was desperately trying to protect the Dowager Queen’s horses from being deprived of water or losing all condition from standing still. They usually met there, but when she had expressed her longing for fresh air, he had offered to take her to the ramparts.

  He led her up a narrow, twisting stair to the top of the southeast tower that she would not have known about—much less risked visiting—on her own. Beth held her skirts in her right hand, seeking her footing cautiously and uncertainly, for the stairs narrowed to little more than three inches wide on the inside where they joined the central stone column running up the center of the stairs. Beth might have been safer clinging to the outer wall where the stairs were wider, but that would have meant letting go of Dawit’s hand. Beth was still very shy of touching him, and grateful for occasions like this when she could hold his hand “innocently.”

  “Just a few more
steps,” Dawit promised her, hearing how she gasped for breath after the steep climb.

  Beth nodded, too out of breath to speak. She was tired of climbing, but part of her did not want the climb to end, because then she would have to let go of Dawit’s hand. The stairwell, however, was getting steadily lighter as they approached the top. It darkened briefly as Dawit blocked the door while exiting, and then she stepped out onto the roof of a small tower that jutted out from the rest of the walls. There were two sentries here, but they just looked dismissively over their shoulders at the Ethiopian and the serving girl.

  Dawit gestured Beth to follow him to the wall, and when she stepped up beside him and looked down between the parapets, she gasped and caught her breath. The view was breathtaking and dizzying. They were hundreds of feet above the valley floor, which fell off in a sheer cliff to a lazy, muddy stream below. The tents and camp spread out on the floor of the valley at the foot of the precipice were tiny, and the figures moving between the tents looked more like little insects than men. Even the horses and wagons looked like toys from here.

  “They don’t look so threatening from here,” Dawit remarked with a quick, reassuring smile that seemed, as always, to understand exactly what was going through her head.

  “No,” Beth agreed with a smile of her own.

  “Look.” Dawit was anxious to show her what he knew. “Do you see that large tent over there, surrounded by smaller tents and flying the very long banner?”

  Beth leaned closer to Dawit in a pretense of straining to follow his outstretched arm. “Yes.”

  “That is Salah ad-Din’s own tent. And that green tent,” Dawit changed the direction of his arm, “You see the one with all the black banners?”

  “Yeees,” Beth agreed, not entirely sure if she was looking in the right place.

  “That is the tent of al-Adil, the Sultan’s brother. He’s the one who arrived almost two weeks ago with the army of Egypt.”

  The arrival of the Egyptian army had caused considerable consternation among the defenders, since it had tightened the noose around Kerak and ensured that the siege was utterly impenetrable. Before the arrival of the Egyptian army they had managed to get several men out of Kerak, and others had slipped in as well, including Sir Henri with the news that the barons had refused to march until Guy de Lusignan was dismissed as Regent and Baldwin V was duly crowned in the Holy Sepulcher, a process that had taken longer than expected.

  The mention of al-Adil thus led Beth to admit, “Oh, Dawit, I’m so frightened.”

  “There’s nothing to be afraid of,” Dawit assured her; “the relief army is on its way. We’ve seen the fires at night.”

  “But the fires were lit over a month ago,” Beth protested. “What is taking it so long?”

  “It takes time to muster an army and collect the provisions. Coming into Oultrejourdain isn’t like going to Bethsan. They have to transport water for the men and horses in big wooden barrels on wagons. Horses need twelve gallons a day each. Loaded wagons can’t move more than six or seven miles a day,” Dawit explained knowingly.

  “But we’re almost out of water here,” Beth protested. “I’ve heard many of the women say we can’t hold out much longer.”

  “Of course we can,” Dawit insisted. He pointed to the reservoirs at the foot of the castle walls, which were still hundreds of feet above the enemy. “See, they aren’t near empty yet.” Yet he did not sound as confident as he would have liked. Dawit’s fear was that they would soon kill the horses to save water, and he couldn’t bear the thought.

  Beth, however, had other fears. She drew a ragged breath of clean air and admitted to Dawit, “If—if we surrender, Dawit, they’ll kill me as an apostate.”

  Dawit looked over at her sharply, and although she did not dare meet his eye, he judged her mood correctly and risked putting his arm around her. She did not shrink back from his touch or even wince. Instead, she leaned against his warm, strong body in instinctive search of protection. “How would they know you were once Muslim?” he asked.

  “They’ll know! They’ll know!” Beth insisted irrationally. “Or someone will betray me. Martha hates me.” Although this was an exaggeration, there was little doubt that Elizabeth’s serving maid considered herself much better than the Syrian convert, and in the stress that would follow surrender and capture, there was no way of knowing what anyone might do.

  “But if it comes to a surrender, then I will be with you,” Dawit assured her. “I’ll tell everyone you are my wife.”

  “Oh, Dawit,” Beth nestled closer. “I wish that that were true—even though it would not stop them from killing me. In Sharia law, a Muslim woman who marries a Christian must be stoned to death just like an adulteress, because Christian marriage isn’t recognized. To them,” she nodded with her head to the Saracen army at their feet, “I am a whore and a traitor and something only to be spat upon and kicked to death. The women would do it to me even if the men didn’t. There is no one in that whole army who would feel so much as a whisper of pity. They will tear me apart alive.” All her pent-up terror was pouring out.

  “No, they won’t,” Dawit insisted, holding her more firmly. “They won’t because I won’t let them—ever. And they won’t because this castle isn’t going to fall. Even if we have to kill the horses, we’ll hold out until the army comes.”

  “No, Dawit!” Beth knew just how much he loved the horses and what it took for him to say this. “We won’t have to kill the horses—just turn them loose. They,” again she indicated the Saracen army with her head, “would rather tear a girl apart limb for limb and trample on her belly until her guts come out of her mouth than harm so much as a hair on a horse’s body. You can let the horses all go free and they will be well fed and watered and groomed.” Tears were running down her face as she spoke—for much as she wished the horses well, it hurt to be reminded that she was worth less than even her donkey to the men outside the castle.

  Dawit, on the other hand, was reassured to think the horses might not be slaughtered after all. He nodded to himself and held Beth closer. They stood like that in silence, content to be together and (comparatively) alone. But then the sentries shattered their moment of peace.

  “What the hell’s going on there?”

  “Messenger of some kind.”

  “They sure the f**k look upset about something.”

  “They’re mounting up—the whole lot of them.”

  “Better report to Oultrejourdain.”

  One of the sentries ducked down the stairs while Beth and Dawit stared at the camp below. The agitation was clearly spreading, like the ripples from a stone thrown in a still pond. The disturbance had reached al-Adil’s tent, and a moment later several men emerged from it and gestured dramatically until horses were brought. Ad-Adil rode straight for his brother’s tent, and soon men emerged from Salah ad-Din’s tent as well. Although from this distance it was impossible to guess which was the Sultan himself, they could be sure he was there, that they were seeing him. Meanwhile horns were being sounded, and they appeared to be answered from within the castle. Going to the other side of the tower, Beth and Dawit looked down into the ward to see Oultrejourdain storm out of the tract of buildings south of the chapel, trailed by a least a dozen other men. They crossed the inner courtyard and plunged into the ward, lost from view by the chapel. But more men were streaming out of all the buildings around the ward, most of them donning helmets and girding on swords as they ran.

  “They’re going to assault!” Beth concluded in alarm.

  “We better get back inside,” Dawit decided and hustled Beth down the stairs.

  He escorted her to her chamber, and when she entered she was received with reproachful cries of “Where have you been?” and “I’ve been frantic with fear!”

  Dawit backed away, and Beth faced the deluge of censure alone. She didn’t care what they said or thought, because the moments with Dawit had been worth it all. If she was going to die tonight or tomorrow, it would be kno
wing that Dawit loved her.

  And then the Dowager Queen swept into the room and ordered everyone to be still. “The northwestern lookouts are reporting the banners of Antioch and Tripoli at the head of a large force. They estimate as many as two thousand horse with infantry behind.”

  “Hail Mary!” Elizabeth dropped on her knees and started offering profuse thanks, but Maria Zoë cut her off. “Stop that! The army has come, but the outcome of the battle that must now ensue is far from certain. We are about to have the dubious pleasure of watching our husbands fight—maybe even die—to rescue us.” That Balian and Baldwin, not to mention the Constable of Jerusalem, were in the approaching host was beyond doubt.

  Elizabeth’s jaw dropped, and Eschiva clapped her hand over her mouth in horror. Neither of them had given a thought to the fact that the arrival of the army did not necessarily mean rescue. It just meant the confrontation that had failed to take place in September had been postponed and relocated. Only now, the Christian army did not occupy a spring.

  Oultrejourdain was not so naive as the women. He called his own and the visiting knights and lords together in the great hall. Maria Zoë attended because she commanded the largest single body of knights after Oultrejourdain himself, those from Nablus. Not that she could personally lead them in combat, but they technically took their orders from her, and so she had the right to attend the council of war. Maria Zoë was not prepared to renounce her rights, nor was Stephanie de Milly. Of Agnes de Courtenay and the Countess of Jaffa, on the other hand, there was no sign.

  “We’ll know by morning where the Constable—or Antioch, whoever is in command—has decided to deploy,” Oultrejourdain opened. “If I were the Constable, I would bring the army past Kerak, where it can camp without worrying about bombardment from the siege engines. Wherever the royal army deploys, however, it will have only the water it has in the train—and that won’t be enough to last for long, so the relief force will have to attack. The sooner the better.”