Templar

by Paul Doherty

  By the end of May both besieged and besieger were searching for a way to shatter each other. The Army of God, deluded by certain merchants of Antioch into thinking that the city would surrender, dispatched envoys through Bridge Gate under Walo, Constable of France. These were immediately surrounded and killed, their severed heads catapulted into the Frankish camp. The bloody incident increased tension. Theodore, fearful of Yaghi Siyan discovering his plot, believed Firuz was ready. On the Feast of the Blessed Virgin, the last day of May, the Year of Our Lord 1098, he and Firuz went out along the ramparts of the Twin Sisters. Theodore loosed an arrow carrying a message into the darkness below; a lantern flashed three times in reply, a sign that the message had been safely received and understood. The die was cast. The Twin Sisters were to be betrayed on the night of 2 June.

  The hours in between were both fraught and frenetic. The city was bracing itself for more attacks and greater food shortages. News came through that Khebogha, the leader of tens and tens of thousands, was only a day’s march away. The Army of God would be trapped before Antioch and utterly destroyed. Speed became the essence; the hours were passing. Early on the morning of 2 June, during the third watch of the night, Theodore roused Eleanor. Simeon was told to guard Imogene whilst she and Theodore followed Firuz up on to the fighting platform of the main Twin Sisters tower. The Armenian was quiet but resolute in what he intended to do, a man, according to Theodore, who had closed one door of his life and was prepared to open another.

  Eleanor felt as if she was in a dream. She could hear nothing from the darkness below as a slight breeze cooled their sweaty faces. She stayed at the top of the steps just within the shadows of the doorway whilst Firuz and Theodore chattered to the guards, warming their hands over a brazier. Suddenly she heard the hiss of steel, the crack of an arbalest, followed by the sighs and moans of dying men. Her name was called and she hurried out. Corpses were strewn about the fighting platform; curls of blood coursed down the gulleys. Theodore was busy at the wall, leaning between the crenellations, letting down a tarred rope, whilst Firuz was tying the other end to an iron hook thrust into the wall. Eleanor ran across, peered over and glimpsed the dim glow of a lantern. On the strengthening breeze came the clink of armour. Men were massing below, desperate, hungry and eager for bloodshed. Theodore sighed loudly as he pulled up the rope; on its end hung an ox-hide ladder. Firuz secured this over the battlements. As Eleanor and Theodore waited in the shadows, an eternity seemed to pass. She heard gasps and moans from the blackness below, then Hugh appeared, stepping on to the fighting platform, Godefroi behind him. Theodore whistled, and they came over. In the poor light both looked like gaunt grey ghosts, chain-mail coifs pulled close over their heads, faces hidden by helmets with broad noseguards. Hugh embraced Eleanor in a gust of sweaty leather, stroked her gently on the back of the head, whispered something and disappeared into the tower. Godefroi kissed her full on the lips, winked and followed Hugh down the steps. Theodore hastened after them as others poured over the crenellations. A short while later, across on the other tower, dark shapes bobbed and moved along the fighting platform. The faint clash of steel echoed; figures fell. Eleanor heard a scream.

  ‘The ladder!’ Firuz shouted. ‘It’s broken.’

  Harassed, he threaded down the rope, and another ox-hide ladder was raised and secured. Eleanor kept to the shadows as Theodore had instructed her. More knights climbed over, pushing their way forward, eyes glazed with fear and anger. They were full of battle fury, torn between terror and the desire to wreak revenge on their enemy. Swords drawn, they hurried down the steps of the tower; Firuz followed. Eleanor heard a crashing and banging below. The knights were now trying to force the postern gates. Lights flared along the walls. The clatter of steel rang like a tocsin from the neighbouring towers. At last a resounding crash sent her hastening down the steps. Shadows fluttered. The narrow, winding steps reeked of sweat, leather, horse and the stench of the camp. A corpse swimming in blood lay across the threshold of the tower; the courtyard beyond milled with mailed men. The postern gate had been torn apart. A giant on a black war horse came clattering through. The blood-red banner he carried was unfurled to shouts and acclamations. Bohemond had arrived, standard in one hand, sword in the other; his great voice boomed through the darkness proclaiming the death knell of Antioch.

  ‘Deus vult! Deus vult!’ The cry was taken up. ‘Antioch has fallen.’

  Now the killing began in earnest. The Army of God secured other gates before spreading like a turbulent river through the streets and across the squares. Turks, men, women and children, rushed out into the night only to be cut down until the paved areas looked like a bloody carpet. Horrible screams and heart-chilling yells broke the night, ringing out above the clash of steel and the thud of axe against wood. Bridge Gate was seized and pulled apart. Raymond of Toulouse and his Provençals poured in like a pack of ferocious wolves, fanning out down streets and alleyways. The army had rotted outside in the wind, rain and boiling heat. They’d eaten leaves and roots and drank water so muddy it stuck to their throats. Now, God’s Day, the Day of Anger, the Day of Vengeance, had arrived. Blood would cleanse and purify the hardships they had endured. Antioch was to be put to the sword.

  The Franks burst into mosques, expecting to discover all sorts of abominations, only to find peace and quiet, the sweet smell of candles and dawn’s first light pouring through the fretted windows of coloured glass. The beauty of these places of prayer was savagely shattered. No mercy was shown to the imams and holy men turned devoutly towards Mecca; these met their death bravely enough as the prayer carpets on which they knelt became soaked in blood. The Franks stormed the palaces searching for gold, silver and precious stones. They looted hangings, tapestries, coverlets and cloths, wandering back into the streets dressed in their plundered finery. They smashed cabinets, coffers and chests. They seized women of the harem, beautiful Armenians and Circassians, violating them cruelly on the luxurious cushions and beautiful embroidered divans. Pale-skinned Greeks chanted prayers, made the sign of the cross and showed the crucifix in the hope of mercy at the hand of these killers sweeping through Antioch, their long swords cutting off life like the wind snuffs out a candle.

  Turks were trapped and tortured; their stomachs ripped open, their entrails pulled out so that they could be burned or led around like dogs until they collapsed. The garrison retreated into the security of the citadel, where they displayed their green and white banners and waited for help. Bohemond immediately attacked the citadel, now commanded by one of Yaghi Siyan’s sons, until an arrow took him in the leg and forced him to withdraw. Yaghi Siyan himself panicked and fled; drunk and frightened, he kept falling from his horse until his escort, desperate to flee, left him on the ground. An Armenian butcher came across the fallen ruler of Antioch, hacked off his head and took this and Yaghi Siyan’s armour and harness to Bohemond for a reward.

  Eleanor learnt all this as she sheltered in the Twin Sisters tower, exhausted and depleted. Theodore came to feed her, and Hugh and Godefroi returned, but Eleanor just sat, sprawled on cushions, staring into the distance. She quietly confessed to Theodore that she wanted to go home. He put it down to the tension she’d endured before the city fell. Eleanor, beside herself, just retreated deeper into the darkness of the tower, whilst outside the bloodshed gradually subsided. On 4 June, however, she was roused by Theodore, who breathlessly informed her that Turkish outriders and scouts had appeared in the foothills to the north of Antioch whilst those still holding the citadel had hoisted the black banner of war and threatened to push down into the city.

  ‘You must come,’ Theodore insisted. He hurriedly forced Eleanor to dress, collected her few possessions and pushed her through the door, down the steps and out of the tower. Hurrying along the dusty trackway, he warned her what to expect. They entered a city of the damned. Corpses still littered the streets. The white walls of houses and other buildings were now crimson with blood. The stench of corruption spread everywhere, polluti
ng the air and sickening the stomach. Adhémar of Le Puy was doing his best to collect corpses in the squares and marketplaces; huge funeral pyres roared, their acrid black plumes blossoming like something evil against the white-blue sky. A new plundering was now taking place. The Army of God was locked in Antioch and there was little food to be had. Already Bohemond and other leaders, banners unfurled, were riding through the street, heralds scurrying before them, summoning men back to the standards. Eleanor felt as if she was crossing the wastelands of hell. Fires burned. Black smoke curled everywhere. Corpses, bloated and rotting, blocked her way. Only Theodore’s arm around her shoulder provided protection against the feeling of utter hopelessness that hovered to engulf her, a night of gathering blackness that threatened to sweep her soul. One thought dominated her senses: Firuz! She did not know what had happened to him. Yet his personal pain was the cause of all this. He had been betrayed by Asmaja so he, in turn, had betrayed all. Yet, if he hadn’t, what would have been the fate of Hugh, Godefroi and the rest? Was that life, she wondered, one door of betrayal leading to another? The priests preached hell; Eleanor felt as if she was buried there already. Was there salvation, or were she and the rest, Armenian, Greek and Turk, already judged and experiencing the horrors of eternal punishment? Eleanor babbled such thoughts as she was placed in the bedchamber of a Turkish merchant, its owner dead or fled. A leech was summoned who force-fed her a bitter-tasting drink that plunged her into a sweat-soaked sleep.

  Over the next few days Eleanor, breaking through fitful dreams, became more aware of the gathering storm around the Army of God. Khebogha had arrived with an army, a moving mass of at least seventy thousand men against a Frankish force now reduced to thirty thousand, starving, still bereft of armour, horses, food and drink. The city was invested. A conflict, bloody and violent, began in earnest. The Mahomeri tower, the Castle of the Blessed Virgin, held by Robert of Flanders, was besieged. The Turks brought up mangonels and catapults to rain down sharpened death. Robert of Flanders burnt the castle and withdrew through Bridge Gate. Meanwhile, in the city, the Turks holding the citadel went on the attack, launching fierce assaults. Bohemond organised the defence along a ridge opposite the citadel. Nevertheless a constant rain, a mass of missiles, arrows and stones, fell on the Army of God. Fighting lasted from dawn to dusk, so those who had bread did not have time to eat it and those who had water were not able to drink. Courage and chivalry were not lacking. Robert of Barneville, with fifteen knights, charged a Turkish troops of horse only to be ambushed by even more. Robert turned, trying to flee back into the city, but his body was pierced by an arrow, his horse struck from under him. He was killed by a spear thrust through his head, which was later cut off and hoisted on a lance to taunt those watching on the battlements.

  Bohemond emerged as the leader. He concentrated on the citadel, flying his blood-red banner, bandaging his wounded leg and driving back the Turks. He also fired the houses around, and the flames, whipped up by storm winds, ravaged the city but also drove out the Frankish deserters, whom Bohemond and his captains immediately marshalled against the enemy. Inside Antioch, Adhémar continued the grim task of cleaning the streets and burning the corpses. Chruches were reopened and consecrated. The ancient patriarch, found hiding, was restored to his office. The Army of God still hoped for help from Emperor Alexius, but this hope was cruelly dashed. The stream of deserters grew; even Stephen of Blois and other leaders joined the ‘rope-sliders’, those who clambered down the walls of Antioch at night, evaded the Turkish patrols and fled to spread the widening tale of woe. They reached the port of St Simeon and warned off the sailors there. The Turks attacked the port and burned what was left, killing anyone unable to leave. Alexius also retreated, believing the Army of God, trapped in Antioch, would be annihilated, a conclusion even the Franks now faced. The outer forts were burned and abandoned, and the army fell back into Antioch, confronting a force over twice their number. Yet worse was to follow.

  Starvation began to bite. Famine became commonplace. The Franks were forced to eat fig leaves, thistles, leather belts and even the dried hides of dead animals. A horse’s head, without the tongue, sold for three gold pieces, the intestines of a goat for five and a live cockerel for ten. The knights were so desperate they drew the blood from their own horses and donkeys and drank it for sustenance. The Franks even opened negotiations with Khebogha, who demanded their total unconditional surrender and also that they renounce their religion. The Army of God truly faced annihilation. Hugh and Godefroi, however, vowed to fight to the death. They joined Eleanor in making their final confessions and returned to their plotting. God, they had decided, needed a helping hand.

  One evening, a week after the fall of the city, Eleanor sat on the flat roof of the merchant’s house with Hugh, Godefroi and Theodore. She watched a meteor score the heavens and fall in a fiery mess behind the Turkish camp. The Poor Brethren were joined by Count Raymond of Toulouse, who came to share a tun of special wine found in the cellars of an Armenian merchant. At first the conversation was desultory. They all agreed there was little hope of relief, so they sat enjoying the wine and the cool evening breeze, staring out at the pinpricks of light in the sprawling camp of Khebogha’s advance guard. Eleanor drank slowly, half listening to the ranting of Peter Bartholomew the visionary, who was striding up and down the cobbled yard below. Peter’s young, powerful voice rang out, quoting the psalms as he cursed the enemies of the Army of God.

  He has sent divers swarms of flies amongst them

  which devoured them and frogs which destroyed

  them.

  He also gave their harvest to the caterpillar and the

  fruits of their vineyards to the locust.

  He has destroyed their vines with hail and their

  sycamore trees with frost.

  He has given their cattle to the hail and their flocks of

  sheep to hot thunderbolts.

  He has cast upon our enemy the fierceness of his anger,

  laughter and indignation by sending evil angels

  among them.

  He has made a way of anger.

  He has not spared their souls.

  He will give their lives over to the pestilence.

  Count Raymond drained his cup, his one good eye fixed on Hugh.

  ‘It is only God we have left,’ he declared. ‘The Emperor will not help us. The Turks demand our surrender, or our heads, or possibly both. Our shepherds have deserted their flocks whilst the sheep starve.’ He paused at fresh cries and shouts.

  Eleanor stared up at the flashes of fire scoring the night sky. Broad blood-red flames lit the blackness. From the city rose shouts of ‘Deus vult, Deus vult! A sign, a sign!’

  ‘They have asked for a sign; give them a sign!’ Raymond leaned across and thrust his goblet into Hugh’s hands. ‘Give it soon.’ He rose, cocking his head as if listening to Peter Bartholomew’s fresh ranting, then made his farewells and left.

  A short time later the Poor Brethren of the Temple reassembled on the roof of the house. This time they were joined by Alberic and Norbert; they looked like brothers, cowls shrouding their cadaver-like faces, flesh shrunken from the depredations they’d suffered. Nevertheless, the eyes of both men were as bright and sharp as ever. They looked impatient, as if eager to begin some important enterprise. They were also joined by Beltran. He had openly rejoiced to find Imogene safe and well, delighted to be reunited with her though clearly bitter at the way he and his beloved had been deceived. Hugh had shrugged this off, dismissing Beltran’s growing coolness by declaring that in order to succeed, Bohemond’s plan had had to remain secret.

  ‘Well, well,’ Beltran murmured now, forcing a smile and glancing round. ‘Will we escape this by treachery? By deceit, by cunning?’

  ‘What shall be done?’ Hugh retorted, his voice harsh at Beltran’s jibes.

  ‘What can be done?’ Beltran’s reply was almost a jeer.

  ‘We must fight!’ Theodore declared. ‘We cannot withstand the
siege. We grow weaker by the day. We have no choice but to leave Antioch and bring Khebogha to battle.’

  ‘And be defeated?’ Beltran asked.

  ‘We are desperate!’ Hugh broke in. ‘We have no other choice. Theodore is correct. The army must be roused. They have seen the signs in the heavens. The Army of God must have a rallying point. We must be purified and purged.’ His voice had risen; now it sank to a whisper. ‘The count knows what I have discussed with him; God’s will be done.’ He and Godefroi rose and went down the steps. They were joined a little later by Alberic and Norbert. Finally Beltran murmured his farewells and withdrew, leaving Theodore and Eleanor alone.

  ‘You are well?’

  She smiled thinly back at him. ‘I am tired, hungry, dirty and . . .’

  ‘Lost?’ Theodore asked.

  ‘Yes, lost.’

  ‘We have all lost our way.’

  Eleanor cocked her head. Peter Bartholomew was now silent. ‘What does my brother plan, Theodore?’

  ‘A sign.’ He came over and sat on the cushions piled beside her. ‘A sign from God.’

  ‘With a little help from my brother?’