Crusade

by Robyn Young

  “It’s all right,” Will told them. “We’re not here to hurt you.”

  “What do you want?” demanded the plump woman, her voice shrill with fear.

  “We need to speak with Guido Soranzo,” said Will, lowering his sword, his gaze on the skittish guards.

  “He’s not here,” she said in a rush, but her eyes flicked away from Will as she said it and he knew she was lying.

  Will was about to ask her again, when Angelo’s voice snapped out behind him.

  “Where is Guido? Tell me before I come in there and rip out your tongue.”

  The woman flinched, and one of the children grabbed her cloak and began to cry. Will was about to order Angelo back, when he heard a loud clatter and a yell from farther down the passage. Angelo sprinted for the last door.

  “Guard them!” Will ordered Zaccaria, racing after the Venetian.

  “Help me!” came a strangled cry from inside the room.

  “Open the door, Guido,” barked Angelo. Swearing, he stepped back and gave it a mighty kick. The latch shattered and the door burst open. Angelo entered, flicking his long sword, with its rock crystal pommel, out in front of him.

  As Will stepped in, he thought that the room, a bedchamber, was empty and was surprised to hear another yell, until he realized it was coming from the window. Beneath the ledge was a box which had smashed open, spilling a few glittery trinkets. On the ledge itself were two meaty hands, clinging desperately to the smooth stone. Dropping his sword, Will ran to the window and just managed to grab one of them as they began to slide off the ledge.

  “God in Heaven, save me!” came a wail from below.

  “Help me,” gasped Will at Angelo, as the sweaty hand began to slip through his.

  Angelo, having paused to sheathe his own sword, came forward. Between them, they managed to haul up a panting, sweating man, who slithered over the ledge into a heap at their feet.

  Angelo glanced contemptuously out of the window to the stone courtyard, two stories below. “Did you suddenly imagine you could fly, Guido?” He kicked at the merchant. “Get up.”

  “Please, Angelo,” begged Guido, holding up his hands and staring at the young Venetian. “Please don’t hurt my family.”

  “No one will be hurt if you tell us what we want to know,” said Will, retrieving his falchion.

  Angelo rounded on Will. “I will take it from here, Commander Campbell.”

  “I am in charge,” said Will, disliking the arrogant Venetian more and more.

  “And your grand master charged you with escorting me here to question this man,” responded Angelo tautly. “You have played your part. Now let me do mine.”

  Will heard a polite cough from the doorway and saw Zaccaria standing there.

  “Might I have a word, Commander?”

  Zaccaria pulled the door to as Will headed out. “The grand master told us that Vitturi has full authority within this house, Commander. He will expect his orders to be carried out exactly.”

  Will heard no criticism in the Sicilian’s words, only frankness. “He’s a liability.”

  Angelo’s voice rose through the wood. “Answer me, you wretch!”

  Zaccaria glanced at the door. “That he might be. But it is not for us to question or condemn. We must only obey. Must we not, sir?”

  Will nodded after a pause. “Are the family secure?” He could see Carlo standing outside the room where the women and children were huddled.

  “We’ve disarmed the guards and calmed them as much as we can.”

  “Go and wait for me there,” Will told him.

  Zaccaria looked as if he might say something further, then seemed to think better of it and inclined his head. “Yes, Commander.”

  Will stood outside the bedchamber and waited. The minutes crawled by, the night silence broken only by the baby’s crying and the voice of Angelo behind the door. The Venetian was speaking in a low tone, and Will could only hear snatches of the conversation.

  “Did you tell anyone?” The question was repeated several times.

  Will heard Guido’s voice.

  “It was the contract! I swear! I wanted the shipping contract! That’s all!”

  There was a hissed response to this.

  Will wanted to go closer, but Zaccaria was watching him, and even though he was the ranking officer he knew that any interruption of the task at hand would be reported to Guillaume. He didn’t relish the thought of losing his commandership as soon as he had been granted it. He heard shouting again, then a harsh cry, followed by a scream.

  The door was yanked open and Angelo appeared, holding one hand to his cheek, where a red line had been scored. The blade of his sword was bloody. Beyond, Will could see Guido on the floor, clutching his hand, his face screwed up in pain.

  “The bastard had a dagger,” said Angelo, brushing past Will and striding down the passage into the room where Guido’s family waited. There was a wail and Angelo reappeared dragging a young boy.

  “What are you doing?” demanded Will, as Angelo marched the screaming child down the passage.

  “I told him what the consequences would be if he didn’t talk.”

  “No,” said Will flatly, planting himself in front of the Venetian. “I’m not going to let you hurt a child to force Soranzo to talk. I don’t give a damn what the grand master ordered.”

  “Move aside, Commander,” growled Angelo, brandishing the struggling boy.

  Just then, the two unarmed guards barreled out of the room where the family was gathered. Several servants came rushing out to help them, and Zaccaria shouted at Will. Cursing, Will ran to aid his men, leaving Angelo to haul the boy into the room where Guido was still prostrate on the floor. Will ducked in past Zaccaria, who had pinned one of the guards against the wall, and tackled the other. Together, he and Carlo got the man to the ground. There was a scream from down the passage. Will whipped around in time to see Angelo stab down at Guido with his sword. “No!” he shouted, running back to the bedchamber.

  The scream was continuing, one strident note like a trumpet sounding an alarm. Will thought it was coming from Guido, until he entered and saw the boy had been thrown to the floor and was staring at his father, lips peeled back. The sound was coming from him.

  Angelo turned to Will. “It is done. I got what I came for.” Will went to push past him, but Angelo caught his arm. “I said it is done, Commander.”

  Zaccaria was shouting again. Guido’s wife, on hearing that scream, had launched herself at the Sicilian. She was a big woman, and the knight, who was still holding the guard against the wall, couldn’t restrain her.

  Will wrenched his arm from Angelo’s grip and went to Guido as she raced down the passage.

  “My husband!” she was screaming. “My God, what have you done! ” She flew at Angelo, who caught her by the wrists and turned her expertly, pinning her arms remorselessly behind her back.

  Will crouched beside Guido. There was a neat, bloody hole in his chest. Will was about to rise, when the merchant’s eyes opened. He gurgled blood down his chin. He was groaning, his eyes wide, bulging. No, not groaning, Will realized. Guido was speaking, trying to form words. His wife’s shrieks and Angelo’s curses echoed around the chamber, drowning him out. Will put his head closer.

  “You and your grand master will burn,” came the words, forced through Guido’s lips. “The Black Stone will be your downfall, not your salvation. I swear it. I swear it!” He dragged in a whistling breath, then slumped and lay still.

  Will sat back on his heels, as Guido’s wife collapsed in Angelo’s grip and began to sob. Angelo let go of her and she slid to the floor.

  The Venetian turned to Will. “Escort me back to your grand master, Commander Campbell. I have the information he wanted. We are finished here.”

  Ignoring Angelo, Will went to Guido’s wife and helped her to her feet. Her face crumpled as she saw her dead husband. “I’m sorry,” Will told her quietly. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”

&nbs
p; She pursed up her lips and spat in his face. Throwing herself down by her husband, she cradled his face in her hands.

  As Will wiped the warm wad of spit from his cheek, he met the black eyes of Angelo Vitturi. The Venetian stared at him for a moment, before heading from the room. Will let him go, then followed, leaving the Soranzo family with the dead body and their grief. Walking numbly into the night air, Guido’s final words echoed back to him.

  The Black Stone will be your downfall, not your salvation.

  12

  The Venetian Quarter, Acre 16 MARCH A.D. 1276

  The warehouse on Silk Street was cool and dark. It always was, even at the height of summer, the shutter closed over the window to protect the rows of fabric from fading in the light. Elwen breathed in the familiar smell of the place. The warehouse had a rich, almost sweet odor. Hundreds of bolts of cloth lined the shelves, ready for transportation to Venice and from there to cities across the West. Elwen walked the rows, counting the bolts, a last check before they were secured for shipping. She ran her hand over a roll of luxurious samite, a favorite of her former mistress, the queen of France, who for years had been one of Andreas’s best customers.

  Elwen looked round as Andreas muttered something. He was shuffling through a pile of papers on the workbench that she had tidied earlier.

  “Where is the ledger for the stock?”

  Elwen moved over to the shelf behind the bench, stood on her toes and pulled down a thick leather-bound book.

  Andreas smiled as she handed it to him. He was a large man, not fat, but broad around the shoulders, with big hands and a long face, framed with hair the color of tarnished metal. “I do not know how I managed before you came,” he told her, licking his thumb and flicking through the ledger. The early pages were filled with his careless scrawl, the later ones with rows of orderly numbers printed in Elwen’s neat script. He ran a finger down the list on the last page. “You checked each bolt is recorded?”

  “Twice.”

  Andreas nodded, pleased. “I will take this to Niccolò so that he can oversee the loading tomorrow.” He shut the book. “We should do well with this shipment.”

  Elwen smiled to herself as he stowed the ledger in a bag and began to whistle a tune. She liked to see him happy, liked that things were going well for him and his family.

  Andreas was a first-generation mercer, who had started in the trade twenty-five years ago. He had spoken of how hard it had been to build the business, setting himself against already established and powerful Venetian families. His father had instructed him in accounting, expecting him to follow in his footsteps, but Andreas, an unwilling pupil, was captivated by tales of distant kingdoms told by the merchants whose books his father kept. He had listened in awe to hear them speak of slaves who dove for pearls off the Arabian coast, rising out of incandescent blue waters with fistfuls of coarse gray shells to buy their freedom. He hung on every word as they told stories of strange beasts and blue mountains, a red moon rising over a desert, whispered tales of perfumed, ebony women. Elwen, listening to Andreas speak of his early life, had recognized that lure.

  For years she had wanted to travel, restless wherever she had lived, whether the cramped two-roomed hut in Powys she had shared with her silent mother or the echoing gray halls of the royal palace in Paris. Once, she had asked Andreas whether he found the reality to be as good as the dream.

  “Better,” he had replied. “For in the dream I did not have such a beautiful wife and children.”

  Elwen had nodded, but kept silent. Her own reality was somewhat different to how she had imagined.

  Andreas set the bag on the table. “I know it has been busy of late and that I haven’t shown you how to keep the accounts, as I promised.” He held up a hand as Elwen started to speak. “But I do have something I want you to do for me in the meantime. The spring fair in Kabul, I need you to go in my place. Niccolò is going to Venice, the Easter market will soon be upon us, and with Besina about to give birth I simply cannot leave her, not even for a day.” He smiled at Elwen’s expression. “You are surprised?”

  “I’ve never bought before.”

  “Of course you have.”

  “With you,” she responded.

  Andreas shook his head. “You do not know your own talents, Elwen. I have watched you.” He tapped the corner of his eye. “I see how good you are.” He regarded her as she frowned thoughtfully, appraising the situation. He had not made the decision lightly, and she would not accept it lightly.

  Elwen had a quick mind and a desire to learn, but that wasn’t what made a merchant rich. You had to know how to charm, to barter, to sell, and at these she was a natural. The local suppliers in Acre’s market loved her. When he had taken her there for the first time to show her how to judge the quality of the cloth, Andreas had been astonished to see the prices falling when she tried, with a sweetly embarrassed laugh, to ask her questions of the sellers in the few words of Arabic she knew. Afterward, when she confessed that she had often been sent into the markets in Paris to buy little luxuries for the queen, Andreas had seen an opportunity.

  “Is it safe?” Elwen asked him. “On the roads?”

  “I wouldn’t send you if it wasn’t,” Andreas replied. “The treaty that was signed with Sultan Baybars grants us all safe passage on the pilgrim roads in Palestine. Kabul is less than a day’s ride from here and you will have Giorgio and Taqsu with you.”

  The men were Andreas’s escorts, who drove the wagon when he traveled to suppliers to buy the silks. Giorgio was a retired Venetian soldier, once a member of the city guard, and Taqsu was a former Bedouin slave whom Andreas had bought in Acre’s market fifteen years ago. He had freed the young Bedouin the day after and had offered to pay him a wage. Taqsu had been with him ever since and acted as guide and interpreter. Elwen knew and liked both men.

  “You can take Catarina,” Andreas added, seeing that she was going to accept. “Besina needs her rest. Besides, I take Catarina every year and she’ll be disappointed if I don’t let her go.”

  “All right,” said Elwen, now smiling. “Thank you,” she added. She gestured at the shelves. “Everything is ready. Do you need me to do anything else?”

  “We are finished with work for today. But I need to talk to you about one last thing.” Andreas leaned against the workbench. “This man you see, Elwen. Who is he?”

  The words shocked her as much as if Andreas had just slapped her. There was no time to hide her guilt or fear; they were etched into her face in her flushed cheeks and open mouth, in her startled green eyes.

  “Catarina told me,” he said.

  Elwen hung her head. “Andreas. I am sorry. I ...”

  “You are not in trouble. Indeed, I am pleased.”

  “Pleased?”

  “You are a beautiful woman, Elwen. But you are almost thirty. You’ve been alone too long. Besina was married to me when she was fourteen and she has brought the greatest joy to my life.” Andreas shook his head. “At least now I understand why you spurned Niccolò’s advances.”

  Elwen flushed even hotter. “It wasn’t that I didn’t . . .” She paused, struggling to find the Italian. Sometimes the language flowed like water; at other times, particularly when she was flustered, it felt slow, clumsy. “I was flattered. I just ...”

  “You don’t have to explain it to me. But I do need to know, when you marry, will you still work for me? Will your husband allow this?”

  Elwen dropped her eyes. “He is a Knight of the Temple, Andreas.”

  Andreas looked shocked. “A Templar? Catarina did not tell me this.” He blew through his cheeks. “Now I am not so pleased for you. This is no life. To live in sin, in secret? Do you want to lose your chance at children? At a family?” His voice softened. “I think of you as a daughter, Elwen. I want you to be happy. If this man cannot offer you that, then I pray you find someone who will.”

  “I can’t help the way I feel.” Elwen’s eyes were fierce and bright. “I wish I could, but I’v
e loved him since we were children. We grew up together in France. We were betrothed once.”

  “Before he was a knight?”

  “He asked me to marry him on the day he took his vows. I know,” she said ruefully at his incredulous expression. “We were going to do it in secret.”

  “What happened?”

  She sighed heavily. “It is a long story. It is enough to say that he was betrayed by a friend and did something that hurt me very deeply. It wasn’t really his fault, but we ended that day and he came here to Acre and I stayed in Paris.”

  “And now you are back where you started?”

  Elwen gave a humorless laugh. “Except with more lines on my face.”

  “Will he not leave the order for you?”

  Elwen was quiet for a pause. “No,” she said finally. “I thought he might for a while, but not anymore. He is a commander now. He waited to become a knight for so long. It was what he always wanted. I think . . .” Her brow furrowed. “I think if you took away the mantle, you would take away part of him. If he wasn’t a knight, he wouldn’t be Will anymore.” She shrugged. “Surely, if I love him, I should love every part? I should want him to be happy, shouldn’t I?”

  “But where does that leave you?”

  Elwen pushed off her coif and ran a hand through her hair, tousling it.

  Andreas was looking thoughtful. “I have heard of men joining the Temple with their wives.”

  “Only if they are already wed,” Elwen corrected. “They can join the order, but cannot wear the white mantle, and if they take the vow of chastity they cannot share a bed with their wives. If any of the masters knew Will was visiting me, he would be stripped of his mantle and expelled. And anyway,” she added resolutely, “I have no desire to join the Temple. Life as a nun in a monastery is no life for me.”