Wordlessly, the anointed slayer took position, adjusting his feet, correcting his grip on the leather-bound hilt. Calculations needed to be made. In the shadow of the impending strike, Sergeant Hugh was whispering urgently to the Sultan, driving a last bargain, striving for the release of his young charges to the freedom they deserved. They in turn watched, disbelieving in the horror of the situation.
The moment came. With a piercing scream of exultation, the executioner lunged, his sword arcing clean, his body tensing for imminent contact. Kurt flinched. He had heard the cry before, had listened and shuddered when four men gutted the hapless Hans on the track in northern Italy. The same shout, identical dread. He clenched shut his eyes and closed his mind. To his front, Sergeant Hugh was trembling, his gaze wide in dull expectation.
But he was not the target. His blade slashing wildly, the executioner rushed at Saphadin. He was frantic to achieve a kill, inspired by Allah and orders to ensure that the hated ruler of Islam would lead no more. It would be a blow landed for righteous followers of the Faith, a personal journey that would conclude in paradise. Religious fire was abruptly doused. Before he could reach the Sultan, the tip of a javelin had buried itself deep within his chest. Sound and momentum were cut and the man slumped dead. Heaven attained.
Emotionless, Saphadin scrutinized the outcome. ‘As I suspected. He is hashshash.’
‘Assassin?’ Sergeant Hugh shook himself from his altered state. ‘You stage performance to humour me, test me, al-Adil?’
‘I create situation to flush out traitors from within.’
‘It is no more than fooling with me.’
‘Are not all of us trifled with, Hugh of York? Are not all of us stalked as prey by those who employ Assassins, by those who plot to bring our kingdoms to swift and bloody end?’
‘I am no part of it; these young are no part of it.’
‘Portentous times hold everyone in their mailed fist. You are fortunate I open debate with Outremer, an avenue for conciliation with the regent John of Brienne.’
‘Your cavalry remain armed, your raiding-parties still raid.’
‘As do those of your military Orders. Suffice for each adversary to take share of blame, for both to draw back and seek to confer.’
‘I value your mercy, al-Adil.’
‘It saves your neck. Be thankful to the Lord of Arsur, grateful he arranges meeting at start of your month of March between your regent king and myself.’
‘We must hope it bears fruit.’
The Sultan directed his sight from the bowman kneeling close to the body resting closer. ‘Should it fail, there will be tens of thousands of corpses strewn.’
Back on the road, Sergeant Hugh was in silent and reflective mood. It had been a challenging encounter, one that had improved from poor beginnings. Perhaps he would live to die on the battlefield after all. He rocked his head and checked reflexively at his throat.
Otto was first to speak. He echoed in jest the earlier advice of the longbowman. ‘Like any good soldier, you measure probability and event, Sergeant Hugh?’
‘I measure vulnerability of my neck.’
Kurt laughed, exultant again to have survived, to have outlived capture by a fearsome razzia group and worrying meeting with the lord of lords the Sultan of Damascus. There was much to tell Brother Luke. He was sure matters could only improve.
‘Eat well, you dogs.’
Stale bread and rancid meat showered down upon the prisoners through the overhead grille. There was never enough. It was occupational humour for the Templars, a means of conditioning and control, of provoking a brawl between slaves that would sift the dominant from the frail. On the fortress isle of Arwad, the weak did not inherit the earth. They simply lost ground and sustenance and hope, and died.
Brother Luke made no move to join the grabbing fray. He sat in a corner, gauging the patterns, the actors, the haves and the dispossessed. Every struggle had its casualties.
Clutching his spoils, a bearded galley slave slumped beside the friar and began to devour his meagre ration. Then he stopped, broke off a piece of biscuit and held it out as offering.
The Franciscan shook his head in refusal. ‘You won it in fair fight, my son.’
‘What is fair in this stinking hole? Take it.’
‘I cannot.’
‘If you have no food, you will fade. If you fade, you will have no use. If you have no use, the Grand Master will bind rocks to your feet and drop you in the harbour.’
‘God in His holy wisdom will provide.’
A bitter laugh came from the man. ‘Thus far He provides us with shit to feed on, a rod for our backs, an oar to work.’
‘He tests us as He tested His Son.’
‘That He does, and worse beside. Now accept this paltry fare.’
Reluctantly, the friar complied. He did so as gesture of goodwill and participation, as a breaking of bread and shared communion. A bond was forged. Both prisoners chewed slowly, savouring the tasteless morsels and appreciating the moment.
‘Bless you, my son.’ Brother Luke gnawed at the crust. ‘I thank you for such kindness.’
‘Our jailers would strip us of humanity. To keep it is to win small victory.’
‘You have a name, my son?’
‘None that is important. Either you or I shall be dead before the rowing-season is done.’
‘I am certain you are wrong.’
The stranger observed him close, masticating on a fragment of meat, contemplating with inner sight and experienced eye. Veterans were rarely duped.
‘In here, we are reduced to equal share of misery.’ The prisoner gestured to the scuffling throng. ‘Christian, Jew, Saracen, we all brawl for air and space and scraps of food. Not you, father. You sit alone, untouched by troubles. You have the stillness of one who has seen it pass before.’
‘My years grant me perception. I am a mendicant, a wandering friar.’
‘There is more. Your eyes tell me so. They contain in them no fear, no surprise, no despair.’
‘Faith bears me as it will carry you, my son.’
Discussion was interrupted. An informal delegation of inmates approached, their expressions hungry and intent menacing. Leadership rested on a short and swarthy man with the cropped ears of a criminal and the scars of a thousand clashes. A killer who saw challenge everywhere, perceived threat and disrespect even in submission. The Franciscan bit into the hard biscuit.
An order was given. ‘Stand.’
Meekly, Brother Luke obliged. He was stronger than any of them, could snap them at will across his knee. But he would wait, keep violence in reserve and as last resort. Quickness to temper was the failing of many men. Jesus preached understanding and love; it seemed lost on this chief and his brutish crew.
‘How may I help you, my son?’
The leader wrinkled his nose. ‘We have a peacemaker among us.’ His lieutenants guffawed without generosity.
‘Is peace not the true path for each of us?’
‘Not for those who wish to live.’ The man squinted at the friar. ‘They tell me you are a priest, a holy man. Prove it.’
‘In what manner?’
‘Forgiveness.’
The blow was hard and stinging, delivered as expression of authority and opening move. It generated a ripple of enthusiastic mirth among the audience. Blood was up and about to flow. Pleased with the effect, the master of ceremonies tried again. He would enforce his law, reduce an easy and obvious target to cringing ruin. Lest others forget. The new-found friend of the priest raised objection, but was kicked back into place.
‘Give me the last of your bread, holy man.’
‘It is not mine to grant you.’
‘You plan to turn it to a thousand loaves? To feed us all?’
‘I intend to sit and eat in quiet contemplation.’
‘Bless me, father.’ Another punch landed.
Sport would be excellent. The chief cocked his head, making assessment. He wore a look of confide
nt superiority, was almost benevolent with the punishment he would mete. Time to raise his performance. He turned to his men, accepting their encouragement, gaining length and leverage for the return swing.
He read it wrong. As his fist travelled in, it was blocked and his wrist seized and crushed by a powerful hand. He opened his mouth to scream, but already fresh and instant pain cut into his nervous system. It made no sense. His nose was suddenly crushed, his knee shattered, his instep stamped down upon. And he dropped away, rolling among his followers in a tormented frenzy of concertinaed limbs and bubbling shrieks.
Brother Luke resumed his corner position and retrieved his discarded rusk. The crowd had backed away, would soon return with pledges of loyalty and samples of food. He had won the admiration of the herd.
Beside him, his prison ally wiped away the streak of blood from a cut lip. ‘A Christian friar who fails to turn the other cheek.’
‘I aspire to godliness without ever reaching it.’
‘Piety will not aid you here. The Templars prepare us for their galleys. They want slaves with steel in their backs and basalt in their hearts.’
‘You believe they plan for something?’
‘I know it.’ The weather-worn features hardened in intensity. ‘Their treasure-house fills, the pace quickens in their dealings, the regularity of their patrolling increases.’
‘They have visitors?’
‘Personages of importance, men of rank brought by cover of night or shielded from enquiring gaze. Not always hidden from me.’
‘Describe what you see.’
‘A pale lord with sombre air and mysterious aspect, one whom others fear and to whom all bow their head and knee.’
The Franciscan lapsed into silent thought. In days to follow he would bring pastoral and religious care to these pitiable creatures, would teach them of the healing power of Christ and the solidarity to be gained through brotherly kindness and state of grace. A pale lord with sombre air and mysterious aspect. There were many considerations on his mind.
His neighbour again spoke. ‘I am a Dane, a Varangian guard who bore witness to the slaughter and bloodshed exacted by the Franks upon the great city of Constantinople. They tortured, killed, raped and stole.’ The words were precise and undramatic. ‘Worst among them was this noble, this same ashen-faced demon who comes to Arwad. He is Satan himself, father.’
In the background, the sometime and self-appointed leader of the prisoners crawled damaged to a more uncertain future.
Disappointment at their failure to find Brother Luke was tempered by gladness at reaching the monastery of Belmont. The old Franciscan had grown restless and headed south, the Templars said. He was ever the wanderer, always pushing on, seeking new landscape and the unenlightened to dwell among. Kurt and Isolda, Otto and Sergeant Hugh would surely catch up with him. And so they had travelled on from Tortosa and its forbidding defences, journeyed into the hills above Tripoli and alighted at this place.
Around them in the courtyard were the containing walls, a proclamation in stone of Christian belief raised high over the Mediterranean Sea. They were safe here, for it was home to the white monks, the Cistercians.
‘We at last are where we should be.’ Sergeant Hugh looked about with satisfaction from the saddle. ‘Honest brothers and a meditative life.’
Otto grinned with scepticism. ‘You are drawn to it, Sergeant Hugh?’
‘Not at all. Yet I value their compassion. On instruction of Lady Matilda, I have left at least a dozen bedraggled children to their care.’
‘Each earns you money.’
‘My place in heaven is more important to me.’ It was not said to convince.
Brother and sister too observed their surroundings. The twelve-year-old tried to share the ebullient contentment of the soldier, was pleased to have left the road. But unease plucked at his thoughts. It might have been the cloistered quietness, the manner in which glimpsed faces were averted, the lifeless melancholy that seemed to rest upon the whole. Or he simply missed the wise company of the friar. He shrugged to himself. Experience had taught him to accept with composure and without complaint and to ready himself for any event. Seated behind, Isolda was silent with her own concerns.
‘Peace and Jesus be with you, friends.’
Greeting came from a stooped monk with the dry and learned tone of his years. Not unkindly, though hardly fulsome. Around his neck was a small wood cross, on his crown the tonsure of his creed and order. Nothing to denote his office save the authority of his bearing and the salutation of the Englishman.
‘Good eve to you, abbot. I bring further number to swell your flock.’
‘They replace those since departed.’
‘Departed?’ Sergeant Hugh swung himself down. ‘Some dozen were with you when last I counted.’
The abbot pressed his palms together in practised sign of piety. ‘Occasion overtakes us. Victuallers and merchants paid visit while on route for Tyre. The children went gaily with them.’
‘It was not the desire of Lady Matilda.’
‘We oblige her wishes as best we may. But we are a holy order with tasks and hours uncommon to the world beyond. Our monastery is no site or situation for the unversed young.’
‘They are pilgrims, abbot.’
‘And we are monks dedicated to the simple life and rigours of the Cistercian way.’
‘Does this simple life not include charity? Is that charity not rewarded with silver from the treasure-chest of Lady Matilda?’
‘We have discharged our duty, Hugh of York.’
Sharpness had entered the voice, an edge that signalled disapproval and faint warning. Sergeant Hugh was used to such response. He sniffed and beckoned his companions down from their steeds. With luck he would trace the cellarer and arrange food and drink, would shun participation in any act of religious worship.
The abbot appraised him. ‘I remind you we are in a house of the Lord. You shall leave behind all weapons and armour in this stableyard, will enter our domain in humility and cleansed of warlike trappings.’
‘I am more content with my bow and sword beside me.’
‘Your contentment has no worth in the sight of God.’
‘Hark to it.’ The soldier grimaced at Otto. ‘It seems we are to be shorn of our defence.’
The young noble was already unstrapping his scabbard. ‘There are strong walls about us, a myriad holy brothers to man them and give warning of approach.’
‘Habit dies hard.’
A thin frost of amusement settled on the countenance of the abbot. ‘As does soldatesque, Hugh of York. Observe our strictures, discard your barrack-room licentiousness, or seek other refuge for the night.’
‘I have no complaint, abbot.’
‘That is to your benefit. Bring your cohorts and enter inside. You shall have your reward.’
As was custom, the refectory meal passed in contemplative and holy silence. Only the clatter of wood bowls and consumption of winter potage, the reading of a Gospel, intruded. If there was tension or awkwardness it was hidden well, disguised in the hand movements and signed language of the monks. Kurt sloughed off his returning doubts. A strange setting could often generate unreliable response. He was with Otto and Sergeant Hugh in the company of religious brothers who wished no harm.
Later they repaired to their own chamber in a distant part of the dark and lofty edifice. It was a large room, sparse-furnished with horsehair mats and a wooden crucifix fastened to the wall. Sufficient for their purpose. Yet it was redolent with empty abandonment, filled with the blank space of recent occupation by children who had gone before. Kurt would not admit to trepidation. Nor would his sister. She distracted herself, opening the shutters to peer over the edge of the sill into the night and plunging chasm below. Sergeant Hugh made himself comfortable. He was mildly drunk on honey mead, had deftly obtained a leather gourd of drink. It would while away the hours.
Liquor lent him insight. ‘You are troubled, Kurt. Be at ease.’
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br /> ‘These monks barely greet us with much friendship, Sergeant Hugh.’
‘Their zeal is saved for books and prayer. Unsmiling strictness is their way.’
‘You do not feel their cold mood?’
‘I do not.’
‘You believe the other children left with merchants for the south?’
‘I do.’ The soldier quaffed from the flask and smacked his lips. ‘Our holy brothers are generous when they try.’
‘They do not like us.’
‘Who could not like you, boy? Who would resent the presence of such agreeable guests?’
Otto had settled himself, lay back on bedding and rested his arms behind his head. ‘What a quiet place this is, Sergeant Hugh.’
‘Until three hours are past and next watch is called. Then you will hear the clatter of sandals on stairways, the rush from dormitory to chapel.’
‘They will not call us to join them?’
‘Should they do so, I am elsewhere.’
Isolda returned from the window and perched on a rolled bundle. ‘We are placed so high up here, set on a cliff that would make an eagle faint.’
The soldier shook his bottle. ‘The easier to protect.’
Or to prevent escape, thought Kurt. Conversation faded as the hour grew late and slumber closed in. Otto snuffed the lamps; Isolda said her prayers; Sergeant Hugh emptied the last reserved drops of his evening brew. In the morning they would continue south for the crusader ports of Nephim and Jebail and for Palestine beyond. Beirut was fifty miles distant, a long and arduous trek, a stepping-stone in their quest to reach the royal city of Acre. The dangers would keep.
A low sound of scraping, of objects being dragged, insinuated into the quietness. It stopped. Then it came again, closer, approaching. The shadow-form of Otto padded across the floor, brother and sister sitting upright to see, Sergeant Hugh continuing to snore. It was best to confront the unknown. Kurt manoeuvred into a crouch and waited, ready to support his friend. The latch rose, the door swung wide.
‘Who comes?’ Otto whispered his challenge.
‘Please, brother. I am no threat.’
The youthful voice quivered with urgency. Possibly he was, as he claimed, no threat. But threat lay somewhere behind. Kurt bent lower, anticipating the inrush of armed men and of flaming torches, the ringing clamour of steel. Instead, there was the rattle of the stranger and his cargo, the tumbling explanation of his words.
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