The King's Witch

by Cecelia Holland

  Richard had a lute in his lap, his legs propped on a stool in front of him. He plucked a run of notes from it. “Yet he’s got some powerful support, those northern barons, the Church. You’ve known Saladin awhile.”

  “Some years. He’s a man of broad tastes. He loves poetry and music as much as war. I’ve always enjoyed talking to him. He’s a Kurd, also, not an Arab, not a Turk. These are important distinctions.”

  “Then how did he become Sultan?”

  “Quick thinking, loyalty in the right places, and a few wellchosen murders. A point of some interest to you: He prefers to fight on Fridays.”

  “You were his hostage?”

  “Briefly. It was not unpleasant.”

  “You speak to him in Arabic.”

  “Yes. He doesn’t speak French.”

  A page stepped just inside the curtain and bowed. “My lord Philip de Rançun.”

  Humphrey stood and backed to the wall, deferring to the King’s cousin. Rouquin walked in, glanced once at Humphrey, and faced Richard. He had obviously just gotten off his horse. He still wore his mail, but the hood hung down his back and his short hair stood on end. Richard laid the lute down beside him and put his feet on the floor. They had not talked much since Richard forced him into the army with Guy de Lusignan, and the King was a little unsure of Rouquin’s temper.

  His cousin did not bow. “I’ve got Isaac trapped in a monastery out on the northeastern cape. He was trying to run to the mainland, but now he’s asking to talk. If you want Guy to do that, you’ll have to send to him; he’s in the west somewhere chasing his tail.”

  “Good work,” Richard said, mildly. He sat down again, set one foot on the stool, and picked up the lute. “I knew you’d get him.”

  “It wasn’t easy.”

  Richard smiled wider and thumbed a laughing note out of the lute. His left hand moved on the frets. “That’s why I sent you.”

  Rouquin grunted at him. Richard flicked a glance at Humphrey and back to his cousin. He said, “Guy was useless?”

  “Worse,” Rouquin said. “He cannot make his mind up. I rode out on him.”

  Richard shrugged. There was another rumor, but this sounded more like the truth. “Still. We need him to have some respect again, when we get to the Holy Land. Where there will be honor enough even for you, Rouq’. Be patient. You are my right arm; I can’t do anything without you.”

  “God, you talk,” Rouquin said. He scratched in his beard; he was frowning, but Richard could see that he understood the purpose now. He had used up his fury on Isaac anyway. He said, “ What do you want me to do now?”

  “Go down to Akrotiri and fetch the women back here. We sail as soon as Isaac’s secured.”

  “Why do you have me herding women?”

  “Maybe they’ll teach you better manners,” Richard said.

  Rouquin snorted at him again and left, brushing through the curtain. Richard studied the empty doorway a moment. “But probably not,” he said.

  Humphrey de Toron came back to the divan across from his. “No, I think he is rough by trade.”

  Richard laughed. His vow of chastity was already wearing on him. But he meant it, even with the familiar lust rising in him, and he lowered his gaze from the young man opposite him and studied his hands on the lute. A vow was something serious, and God would not yield if he broke his. He could keep his hands off Humphrey. Meanwhile it was pleasant enough to talk, and useful besides. He watched his fingers move on the throat of the lute, up and down.

  “Tell me more about Saladin.”

  Three

  SAILING TO TYRE

  Edythe bit off a little of the pale brown root she had bought from the Greek hospital, and it burned her tongue. From that and the strong taste she guessed its power, but she knew Berengaria would never take it plain. Finally she mashed it up and steeped it in a flask of oxymel, the tonic of honey and vinegar she gave Johanna when she felt gloomy, and Gracia for her cough. That tasted awful, and Berengaria would only swallow a few sips.

  But it was enough. Now they were gliding over the sea, halfway to Tyre. Under the awning by the mainmast, Berengaria sat placidly in the midst of her women; being married, she could wear her hair in a different way, and she had her servants combing and braiding it and arranging it in loops around her head, pinned in place with ebony combs and big silver clips.

  Edythe and Johanna and Johanna’s other women sat on the foredeck, where there was a little breeze. The wide triangular sails of the galley spread above them, billowing and shaking in the light wind, and the oars swung on either side with their steady creak. Edythe loved the sway of all the oars together, the power and grace that seemed to lift the long ship across the tops of the waves.

  Johanna said, “Whatever you gave her, it seems to have worked.”

  “It’s been calm, though,” Edythe said.

  In truth the sea around them was mild in the sunlight. The rest of the ships stroked along around them, scores of galleys big and small, stretching to the horizon. Richard’s fleet filled the sea; with all their prows aimed in the same direction, all the oars swinging at once, they seemed unstoppable, as if when they reached the land, they would just go on over it, striding on their wooden legs.

  Johanna said, “Edythe, I’ve meant to tell you this. You have been an excellent servant to me, to us all, and the Crusade hardly begun.”

  “My lady,” Edythe said. “The Queen Mother bade me do it.”

  “My mother is very wise.” Johanna lowered her voice. “Tell me—I want to know—there is a story of how you came to be with her.”

  Edythe went stiff all over, her mouth dry. She did not want to rehearse this; every time she said it, every new ear that heard it, made the story more real. Johanna watched her steadily. She could not look away. She said, “I—I was in a nunnery, in England. There was—there was a man—I ran away.” Her ears and throat felt red. She was blushing all over. She hated this. “The Queen took me in. So I—” Now at least she was climbing up again onto a solid shore of truth. “I owe the Queen my life.”

  Johanna nodded and put her hand on Edythe’s arm. “This agrees with what I have been told. I understand. A young girl can be misled. As I said, you have made yourself dear to me. So when this is over, when we are home again, I will find you a noble husband, and we will dower you. Whatever happened before, I shall make you a fine marriage. I promise you.”

  Edythe lifted Johanna’s hand and kissed it, more to hide her face than in homage. She struggled to school her expression. She should look happy. Grateful. “My lady, you are most kind, I hardly deserve . . .” That came out as a whisper. She looked out over the sea.

  She should want this. The weight was the weight of belonging. A well-born husband would bring her a title, a home of her own. Children, with names.

  But then the bad story was true. The wrong name became right. She was losing something. She wasn’t even sure what it was. She would have to be happy with it. She said, again, “Thank you, my lady,” and heard her own voice croak out like a raven.

  Behind her, Gracia coughed again. Glad of the distraction, Edythe turned and frowned at the other woman, and the plump face creased in a smile.

  “Don’t worry,” Gracia said. “It’s only the same old thing.”

  Johanna, with Edythe at her side, went swiftly across the beach; the great galleys were already drawing up in the shallows. The resounding crash of a ramp falling made Johanna start and look around. On the ships men shouted to the shore, and the others there answered. The neighing of horses mixed with the frantic trampling beats of their hoofs on the ramps. She urged Edythe up the beach ahead of her, toward safety.

  On their left, on its rock in the sea, the great walled city of Tyre stood, black against the fading sunset. Pennants flapped from its peaked towers. It seemed a single impenetrable mass, a dark hulk in the gloom.

  Shouting, a man at a dead run led a string of horses by, and Johanna stopped, one hand on Edythe’s arm, waiting until the way wa
s clear. The porters were hauling baggage off a beached skiff and piling it in the stalky grass above the tide line.

  Beyond the windblown sand, palm trees sprouted up in their elegant arcs, a dozen square stone houses around them. Out of these houses several women were hurrying, bundles over their shoulders. Johanna saw her brother standing under the closest palm tree and turned that way, and then Rouquin strode up to her, trailing some other lords.

  “We’ve ordered a tent for you, Jo, you and the rest of your gaggle. Stay here, Richard’s busy.”

  “A tent,” she said, startled, and turned her gaze on the city with its jagged spires looming on its rock at the end of the beach. “Aren’t we going into Tyre?”

  “They won’t let us in,” Rouquin said, and behind him, among the other men, there was a chatter of rage.

  “What?” she said.

  “Conrad of Montferrat and King Philip have refused to let us enter Tyre.”

  The Grand Master of the Templars pushed forward. “It’s an insult, to us—to the King especially.” He gripped Rouquin’s arm and bawled into his ear. “You must call for an attack. He’ll heed you.” Rouquin shook him off with a hard look.

  “Attack?” Johanna said, alarmed.

  “We can storm the city,” said another of the men behind Rouquin. “Conrad is unlikely to have more than his personal guard. We’ll crush him like a worm.”

  Johanna said, “I won’t hear this. Rouquin, show me our tent.”

  He gave the barest glance at the other men. “The King will hold a council tonight, talk there.” He led the women off down the beach.

  Johanna glanced at him; she could see he was angry. She said, “They would attack Christians! It’s all mad.”

  He gave her a hard look. “Stay out of this, Jo. Don’t make trouble.”

  “I’m not making trouble, I’m telling the truth. Wait.” Her eye caught on the row of village women who had spread out their bundles under the next palm tree, offering fruit and bread, cheese and fish for sale. “Let’s get food first.”

  Berengaria said, “I want good place, bed, room, city. Up there. Why we have no hall?”

  Busy with the work of making the room ready, Edythe pretended not to hear her. Berengaria was sitting on a fringed cushion at the back of the tent; when Edythe made no response, she looked away and her hand clenched into a fist. Edythe stacked the linen on Johanna’s bed. Outside, nearby, a yell went up from the crowd of men around the King, down by the palm trees; they were holding their council. In here, the pages were going around the space lighting lamps, and in a moment the tent would be hot and smoky.

  But the warm light sweetened everything. The work done, for the moment, Edythe went back to the corner, where Gracia was sitting on a cot, and said, “Are you all right?”

  The elder maid’s eyes were hollow and her skin flaky. She had been coughing all day. She looked haggard. She said, “Oh, I’m just tired.” Edythe put one hand to her cheek and felt a flush of heat. Then Gracia started to cough and did not stop for a while and finally hacked out a thick green glob.

  Alarmed, Edythe said, “You must lie down. I’ll get you some wine.” She stood up; she had some feverfew and rosemary to put in the wine, but this was getting past what she could do. Gracia’s body was wracked with an excess of humors, the cold and moist phlegm, the hot and dry fever of the choler. Soon the other humors might swell out of balance too and find their own escape, and ruin Gracia as they went.

  The tent was crowded with people and chests, and nobody knew where anything was. Finally she got a cup of wine and mixed the herbs in, but no one had lit a brazier—it was hot, maybe there would be no brazier—and she took the wine back to Gracia without warming it.

  Lilia and the Navarrese women were fluttering around Berengaria. Johanna stood alone in the middle of the room, listening to the men yelling in the distance, a frown on her face.

  A page came in the door.

  “The Queen of Jerusalem!”

  There went up a collective gasp. Falling silent, everybody in the tent tuned to face the opening, even Berengaria. Three women came in through the drawn back flap, maids in their dark rich dress and bowed coifed heads, and then a lovely girl.

  At the sight of her, they all gasped. She was as beautiful as an icon. Her skin was smooth and white, her blue eyes wide under the plucked arches of her brows. The layered blue satin of her gown was trimmed with clusters of little white pearls and silver lace ribbons, so that as she moved the cloth whispered and winked around her. Her coif was of white silk and over it there fit a simple gold circlet of a crown.

  As she came farther into the tent everyone bowed, except Johanna, so the newcomer knew at once who she was. She came to Johanna with her hands out.

  “My sister—for so I feel you are my sister—”

  Johanna said, “Isabella, we are sisters all.” She drew the girl into her embrace, and Edythe, behind them, saw the tears in the eyes of the Queen of Jerusalem.

  Isabella drew back, her hands on Johanna’s sleeves. “Lionheart’s sister,” she said. “I should have guessed you would be a lioness.” She blinked, her eyes sleek; she looked sad, even in her youth and beauty. “I only could get away because all the men are in council. I can’t stay long.”

  Johanna said, surprised, “Your lord came down here—”

  “No, no.” The girl’s voice was uneven. Her white hands were clasped at her waist. “They are holding council in Tyre, also, do you doubt that? My—Conrad is there, scheming. But I came to tell you—to warn you—”

  Johanna said, “Come sit. The rest of you, go. Edythe, bring us wine to drink. The rest, go!” She led Isabella into a close side of the tent where they could talk unheard. The rest of the women stood back, and Edythe went for wine.

  When she returned, the two Queens sat with their heads tilted together. Isabella was saying, “Don’t believe what they tell you. What anybody tells you. I love Humphrey. I hate Conrad. Conrad hates everybody else.”

  Johanna took a cup from Edythe. “We’ll restore your rightful husband to you, my lady.” She handed one cup to Isabella and took the other from Edythe. With her eyes she sent Edythe off also.

  Isabella was saying, “No. Humphrey and I will never be together again. But it is Conrad I warn you against. Conrad is doublehearted. Black-minded, and wicked.”

  Edythe moved away from all of them; she went to Gracia, now lying on a pallet at the far side of the tent. All the other people in here had their backs to her, rapt, watching the two Queens whispering gossip over their wine, while ignored in their shadow Gracia sank into disease.

  Edythe gave the older woman wine and oxymel to drink and held her up while she coughed. The fever was steadily mounting, Gracia’s skin dry and harsh, her eyes dull as stones. Edythe wiped her mouth, and putting her ear flat against Gracia’s back she heard the squeaks and gurgles and rasps of the humors corrupted. She thumped Gracia’s back to get her to cough again. If Gracia could rid her body of enough of the cold, moist humor, the rest might come back into balance.

  Edythe’s heart knocked in her chest. She felt helpless against this. Although her arm was tight around the maid, she felt as if Gracia were miles away, and drifting farther every moment.

  Now Isabella was leaving, as swiftly as she had come, with a kiss for Johanna and an embrace, and then with her women out the door. Lilia came at once across the tent to Gracia.

  “Is she all right?”

  “No,” Edythe said.

  Lilia wrung her hands. “It’s this terrible place. It’s this terrible place.” She looked around the tent as at a cave hung with bats.

  Johanna was pacing nervously around the room. When she heard that, she came toward them.

  “What is it?”

  “The cough,” Edythe said, and put a hand on Gracia’s shoulder. “She’s not well.”

  “She always coughs,” Johanna said. She wound her hands together. Outside, the men’s voices rose again in a thunderous howl. Johanna said, “Mother wa
s right, the whole Crusade is cursed. They call this the Holy Land, but it turns them into devils. The first thing they want to do is kill each other.”

  Berengaria came forward, her gaze on the sick maid. To Edythe, she said, “I help. I pray. I pray for Gracia.”

  Edythe smiled at her and touched her arm. Johanna flung her arms up.

  “As if that will do any good.” Her gaze was steadily on Edythe. “Come with me.”

  “My lady—Gracia—”

  “Let Lilia care for her awhile. I—” Johanna’s tongue slipped over her lips. “I must talk to my brother. Come.” She got a page and sent him on ahead, and took Edythe by the hand.

  Edythe gave Lilia a single, pleading look and followed Johanna out of the tent. She guessed Johanna needed to tell Richard what had just happened, that the Queen of Jerusalem had suddenly appeared. A great crowd stood all around the center of the camp. Night had fallen; the dim glow of lamps showed through the cloth of the three other tents near theirs. Johanna slid her arm through Edythe’s and held her close to her, and led her toward the King’s tent.

  Packs of armed men surrounded it, and now more men, shouting, streamed out of the tent, arms shaking in the air and feet stamping. The council was over. Moving through the crowd felt like being in the midst of a great jumble of moving rocks, the men stirring around them in their mail and shouting in their ears. The page went ahead, his voice unheard, and the women had to sidle and creep and edge their way forward to the tent door.

  There the page went in before them, but Johanna followed before she was announced, with Edythe on her heels.

  The tent was all but empty. Heaps of gear stood around in it, saddles and lances, lumpy sacks and barrels and the treasure chest, a bed back by the far wall, the middle ground trampled to dust, one lamp burning. Richard stood in the light. Johanna flew through the room toward him.