The lead rider hailed him. ‘Peace and good morrow, young sir.’
‘And to you, brother. Safe travel, wherever you head.’
‘A fine horse you have.’
‘The better to travel the distance I cover. Is there assistance that I or my companions may offer?’
‘I cannot tell. We come with message for one Otto of Alzey.’
‘Fortune smiles upon you.’ Hans delivered a lavish bow, hoping his friends watched. ‘For I am he.’
In the fraction of a second that passed, a quizzical look might have shadowed the face of the horseman. Before him was not the boy described by others. He was no Adonis, exuded no natural and winning charm, no relaxed insouciance of one born to noble blood and gentle mother. So be it. People for ever embellished and overstated. It could not be helped. The boy could not be saved.
At the margins of earshot, but within their sight, the children witnessed the Assassins in the bloody act of execution. With a rush of dagger-blows, they closed to deliver sentence. Hans took a while to topple. He was flailing his arms, attempting to back his horse, to protect himself, to fight and evade. But he was surrounded, hemmed in, and steel turned crimson as butchery continued. There was little sound save for the grunts of the victim and the muttered exertions of his killers. He must have struck one of them with his shoulder or fist, for the man was unseated and fell. A small victory for so high a price. Hans slumped and disappeared.
In a haze of instinct and action, Otto and Egon responded, the son of the blacksmith running with a stirrup-iron to hand, the young noble snatching up his sword and leaping on to the grey mare to give chase and battle. The Assassins did not stay long. They were galloping fast, charging south with their blades raised in victory salute. Behind, Egon had caught their dismounted accomplice, was pinning him down, bludgeoning him to death in blind ferocity. Riding bareback, Otto was narrowing the distance on his quarry. While their horses were tired, Gerta was rested, eager to stretch her legs, to join pursuit, to obey the desperate urging of her master.
He overhauled them at two hundred yards. With a sideways slash of his sword, he removed the head of the nearest and went for the second. He would not go unopposed. The Assassin slewed his horse in a spray of dust and vectored round to meet him.
‘Allahu akhbar! Allahu akhbar! Allah! Allah! Allah!’
Blades and horses clashed. But Gerta was a steady mare, her opposite an untested beast bought recently in market at Biel. Skittish with nerves, it jinxed and sidled, denied its rider clean angle of attack. And Otto had greater reach. He used it, sweeping his sword-arm in a generous arc, carving the heavy edge through air and bone. The trophy fell across him and he spun away in horror.
Along the strewn and spattered trail, the scene had evolved from its previous tranquillity. Egon was doubled-over, vomiting with shock. Otto slipped to the ground and knelt, his torso striped with blood, trembling and panting in his distress.
‘Hans is dead . . . Hans is dead . . . I have killed . . . I have killed.’
In the distance, the surviving horseman did not pause in his flight. Closer by, the children were screaming.
Chapter 5
On a day such as this, there was no need for the solitude of the loom or hours spent in contemplation and prayer. The warming ground was pulling in the sea breeze, the undulating terrain was sending it upward. Perfect conditions for falconry. Beyond the walls of the royal city of Acre, Lady Matilda looked about her and smiled. These were the moments she craved, when attended only by a single manservant she could ride out with her favourite saker or peregrine on her wrist, or gallop free and unrestrained for miles along the coastal sands. Aged seventeen, there was much to live for and everything to enjoy.
Behind her, the dune-coloured walls of the city rose as formidable as any fortress, as inviting as any prison. She was glad to escape the confines of court. While she loved and honoured her guardian, the regent John of Brienne, and his baby daughter Yolanda, there was still the clinging grief that came with the recent death of the young Queen Maria. His sorrow was immense. And encircling him, stifling her, was the boorish licentiousness of the barons and their secular knights, the cold-blooded zeal of the warrior brethren of the military Orders. The atmosphere in Outremer was an acquired taste. Yes, she was pleased to pass through St Anthony Gate and head for the wild.
A small Arab boy waved and shouted in greeting. She called back to him by name and in his native tongue.
‘Peace be upon you, Hassem.’
‘Upon you also, my lady. Where do you travel?’
‘Anywhere that sport exists for my falcon and wind is present to carry it. Perhaps we shall go closer towards Tel el Fukhkhar.’
‘Take care, my lady. There are bandits and robbers in every quarter of this land.’
‘I shall heed your advice, Hassem. But I have friends enough to guard me.’
‘I too am your friend, my lady.’
Wherever she went, Lady Matilda could turn heads and draw comment. She was a rare beauty, a vision of alabaster skin and dark coiled tresses, of green eyes and radiant smile. Peasant or noble, adult or child, Moslem or Christian, all responded to her warmth and compassion, were soothed by her empathetic charm. Talk was of whom she might wed. There were suitors and rumour aplenty, even idle and misplaced gossip that old John of Brienne himself might be tempted from mourning and widowhood by his ravishing ward. Little wonder they called her the Flower of Acre.
But this flower was not yet for the picking. With a flick of her leather quirt, she eased her horse into a trot and, riding side-saddle, travelled on past the orchards and citrus groves, the outlying and flat-roofed neighbourhoods, for open ground. It was easy to forget in this placid scene that the earth was steeped in blood. Both Saracen and Frankish armies had met here, had besieged those walls and in turn snatched ownership of the prize. Twenty-one years before, on 20 August 1191, as Saladin watched helpless from the hills, the army of King Richard I of England had led out the surrendered Moslem garrison and slaughtered them to a man. Salah ad-Din had failed to pay their ransom of twenty thousand gold dinars, had refused to cede possession of the one True Cross. Over two and a half thousand souls murdered: one event, a single stitch, in the hidden fabric of Palestine.
Beside a dusty plantation of olive trees, a mounted troop of Teutonic knights had filed from their compound at the St Nicholas Tower and were practising at the tilt. The business of war was never far from the minds or preparations of the warrior caste. To huzzahs and shouts, each lowered his lance and charged in for the imagined kill. There was something sinister in the faces hidden by enclosed steel helms, in the black German crosses emblazoned on white mantles. It was said a massed attack by Christian knights could rupture the very walls of Baghdad itself. Lady Matilda could well believe it.
She left the settlements and their rhythms of daily life, looked beyond the fields towards the barren land beyond. Hooded and held by jesses, the saker sat passive on her hawking-glove.
The servant shaded his eyes against the eastern sun. ‘We should have brought beaters and dogs, my lady.’
‘Where is isolation and sport in that?’ Her horse crested a small rise and dipped into the shallow indentation of a valley. ‘We shall stake our claim here and see what arises.’
Without exercise, the thrill of the stoop, her bird of prey would soon start to bait and agitate for release. She understood it well. They were old companions, the saker a link to the skills and accomplishments taught her by a beloved and long-dead father. How he had wished for a son and heir; how he had doted on her with the clumsy affection of a crusader lord. With him, she had toured Outremer, had learned to speak the Arab way, to respect the values and customs of local tribes. Once, she had even met Saphadin, had drunk sherbet as her father conversed with the Sultan and attended to diplomacy. Peaceful days. Her father had succumbed to illness, her mother shortly after. She would not betray their memory.
‘The birds begin to fly, my lady.’
A
flock of doves had scattered from cover, were wheeling directionless and low. Something had disturbed them. With a practised hand, Matilda drew off the hood and launched the bird into flight. It fluttered and spiralled upward, gaining height, searching for a cushion of air and the apex of a climb where it could hover and look down.
Instinct, or the short and breathless cry of her manservant, caused her to break concentration. Momentarily, her gaze dropped. It took time to focus, to redirect sight and mind from circling speck to a nearer mark. The ridge-line appeared to be alive. Fascinated, she stared, unable to move, to speak, to fully comprehend. Facing her were horsemen, hundreds of them. Pennants fluttered from lances, light sparkled on helmets and bridles, a tension seemed to hold them in temporary pause before action. The Saracens. They were a magnificent and terrible thing to behold. Matilda continued to gape wide-eyed and open-mouthed. But her servant was screaming now, his words intruding on her torpor, and the stillness fractured.
‘Away, away! We must hurry, my lady!’
She was already convinced. As the glittering mass curled forward, and the lances depressed to the horizontal, she spun her horse to flee. Gone was any pretence at decorum. She was astride her mount, driving it on, exhorting it, herself, her servant to greater effort and speed. There was much to lose and no reason to linger. The travelling wave came on, a tide surging and lapping with a roar at their heels. An arrow passed close, then another, and a third. Matilda ducked low, whispering a prayer, muttering encouragement in the ear of her beast. The animal obliged and forged ahead.
Only once did she turn to look. It happened when she heard the high and helpless shriek of her servant. He must have tried to cover her retreat, offering himself as sacrificial lure. It had worked. The feathered profile of arrow-flights protruded from his back. He wallowed atop his horse, his eyes beseeching, his mouth imploring, his hand gesturing weakly for Matilda to proceed alone. She imagined she could read his lips. Do not concern yourself with me, my lady. Save yourself. And he was gone.
Terrified, she galloped on, the noise gathering, the pounding of hooves, of blood, of war-chants, beating remorseless in her ears. She did not want to die, to fall to an arrow or the sharp end of a spear. It helped concentrate and direct her thoughts. Survival was all that mattered. She owed it to herself, to the sweet recollection of her parents.
They were almost upon her as she reached the outskirts of Acre. Like a storm-force of nature, the enemy crashed over and through the gardens and grounds, sweeping aside the running shapes that scampered to get away. Most were too slow, were caught and felled by the torrent. A drover herding geese towards the city gates sank beneath the weight of numbers; farmers picking fruit from trees were themselves picked off and hung limp in branches. Others were stampeded, corralled, cut down.
Counter-attack came, the line of Teutonic knights switching from rehearsal to reality in a valiant charge against the flank. It had no effect. The Saracen force absorbed the blow, surrounded and consumed the Germans in a crowding, piling melee of swords and maces. Men screamed and clutched at faces; men twitched dead and upright in their saddles; men were clubbed and disembowelled. Close-quarter battle was never pretty. The cavalry of al-Mu’azzam was getting into its stride.
Matilda crossed herself and frantically slapped the reins. Her horse was tiring, fading in its exertions. She could hear the ceaseless drone behind, a metallic rattling at her tail. Her shoulders hunched. It was her body preparing for the fatal strike. O Lord, let it be swift. An Arab charger whinnied, its sound close and closing, transforming to a strange squeal of fighting ecstasy. The clatter belonged to a lance being aligned. A bell tolled, raising alarm from the city ramparts. Too late for her. She could see the narrowing gap of light as the great oak doors began to shut, the portcullis start its downward slide. Another trembling in the air, the hiss of passing shot, and a flaming arcuballista bolt flew low to remove Saracens, horses, the immediate threat. She was through.
High overhead, the saker hung on a thermal and called. Confused by the landscape, uninspired by sudden and turbulent change, it eventually soared to a new heading and disappeared. Hunting was more rewarding elsewhere.
‘I thank merciful God you are safe, Matilda.’
John of Brienne embraced her, holding her arms and standing back to view the effects of her escape. His ageing and battle-worn face was creased with anxiety. As regent of Outremer, he had much to ponder, the political and military implications of the Moslem raid to consider. But the fate and well-being of Matilda were his particular concern.
‘To bear the recent passing of my young wife Queen Maria was hardship enough. It would be torment beyond compare to lose you also to cruel fate.’
She leaned and kissed him fondly on the forehead. ‘We both mourn her, sir. Yet this time, at least, I survive.’
‘By dint of divine providence and your own horsemanship.’
‘Through gallant and selfless sacrifice of my man-servant and accurate shooting from your rampart guards.’
‘Still, we lose much. My men take inventory, but the destruction is apparent all about. Loss of life, of property, of calm. A bleak day and prospect for our kingdom.’
‘Our walls hold, sir.’
‘For how long? I make peace with the treacherous vipers of Islam and this is how they repay me.’ He stared in her eyes. ‘You are a daughter to me, Matilda; your mother and father were my dearest of friends. It seems already I break my promise to them to guard you from any danger.’
‘Not even a regent king may foretell every hazard, sir.’
‘Here is one who has misread every sign, misjudged every aspect of our present circumstance. I believed Saphadin, Sultan of Damascus, wished for truce and accord, that prosperity and harmonious relations were in the interests of us all.’
‘I know little of politics, sir. But I recognize we have benefited from the peace.’
‘And, of this moment, that peace lies shattered at our feet.’
His eyes clouded, his shoulders hunched with the isolation and heaviness of his office. Matilda pitied him his responsibilities. He was a kind and righteous man, popular with the barons, respected by the Mohammedans, a force for stability and restraint. Wherever there was tension, he intervened; whenever there was argument, he mediated and brought solution. Often it was the runt of a litter, the smallest in a pride, which grew to outshine its siblings. So it had proved. There had been few rivals for the vacancy as king of Outremer, disquiet and perturbation at the arrival of an impecunious knight of Champagne to take the hand of Queen Maria. He was aged sixty-two at their wedding in 1210, she nineteen. It was rumoured he was exiled from the French court following a scandalous liaison with the Countess of Champagne, that Pope Innocent and King Philip of France had raised forty thousand silver pounds as bribe and dower to ease his progress to the Latin kingdom. Forecasts were poor. Yet he surprised them all: his love for the young queen infinite, his authority growing. Events changed once more.
He shook his head. ‘I was a fool to believe this kingdom could ever rest in ease and tranquillity, a greater fool to accept position as its ruler.’
‘Had you not landed in Outremer, you would never have wed and loved our dear queen, never have fathered your Yolanda.’
‘Maria is dead and I am widowed. As for Yolanda, her inheritance will be nothing but a land beset by conflict and woe, rent by factions, invaded by infidels, clinging only to tenuous existence.’
‘Existence alone is worth a psalm of exultation, sir.’
‘Is it?’ He flashed a look of melancholic resignation. ‘I had hopes for more.’
‘Surely one foray signifies merely that the Saracens are discontented, wish to communicate their message.’
‘In Palestine, one attack begets another, one barbarous act promotes ten more, a thousand in reply.’
‘Parley may follow.’
‘Or war itself.’
He began to walk about the chamber, his head bowed in thought. Around him, richness preva
iled: tapestries woven with gold and silver thread; candlesticks gilded and set with eastern gemstones. Trappings of office that shackled rather than consoled. There was rarely security of tenure in the Latin kingdom of the Franks.
‘Hawks fly about us, Matilda.’ The regent spoke as he restlessly moved. ‘Pope Innocent condemns my treaty with Saphadin; his Templar fanatics agitate for the fray. Any excuse they seize upon to show me weak and my endeavours wrong. This single Mohammedan raid they will use to initiate escalation and foment tumult. And we are unready for it.’
‘You will always have allies.’
Of that I am certain and most grateful.’ He sighed and smiled tenderly at her. ‘I should not impose such worries on you, my sweet Matilda.’
‘I am privileged you have reason to entrust me with them, sir.’
‘As I am blessed to have you near. Would that you may one day find the happiness I once had with Maria, enjoy the fruits and bliss of wedlock.’
‘I await my time.’
‘It is said the Lord of Arsur searches for a new bride. He is rich, established, a true friend of this court, a presence of constancy and good in our land.’
‘He is also chill and remote, has profited well from the deaths of two previous and noble wives.’
‘Alas, he is stripped of love as I.’
‘I fear I cannot replace it, nor add my estates about Mount Carmel to his own.’
‘We shall talk again of it. Your father would surely wish it so.’
The regent turned as the doors were opened and a wet-nurse carried in the infant queen. Placid and sated with milk, Yolanda gurgled contentedly and stretched her limbs as her father billed and cooed above her.
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