The Edge of the Blade

by The Edge of the Blade (retail) (epub)

  * * *

  Justin de Vallen’s mirror image had thought the smoke would be enough. Angry to learn that Baynard was a confrère of Enrique, he had nevertheless felt confident of trapping the Gros Ventre once the vessels were clear of Tarragona.

  Instead, his ship had been crippled by the slowest member of the fleet, the grappling hooks cut away and lost, the cumbersome transport now sailing due east from the coast. And taking with it, not only its cargo of iron, but Tremellion’s treasure.

  It would be several hours before a temporary steerboard could be rigged at the stern of the Hawksbill, by which time the Gros Ventre would be out of sight. The self-styled Roger Grevel supposed the transport to be circling wide – prayed so anyway – for other traps awaited her in Marseilles. His own failure enraged him, though he drew comfort from the knowledge that Baynard and his companions would be intercepted as soon as they stepped ashore. With the carriers killed and the gold recouped, the slab-faced Ranulf Falkan would be appeased.

  So blunder on, he encouraged, glaring in the wake of Burywell’s ship. Plough your furrow wide as you like to Marseilles. We’ve plenty more snares set out for you, my friends. More than you imagine.

  * * *

  Aboard the Gros Ventre, the morose John Burywell waited for Baynard’s permission to swing the ship north. ‘It’s time we turned with the wind, my Lord Falkan. Stay on this course, and we’ll pass Marseilles entirely. As it is, we’re a hundred and fifty miles to the south.’ Then in plaintive defence of his floating smithy, he added, ‘She’s only a coastal trader, the Gros Ventre. Laden like this, she’d never survive a storm. She’s already further from shore than she’s ever—’

  ‘Two things I must tell you, Captain Burywell. Those men aboard the Hawksbill-, they’re not the only ones who’d do us mischief. I suspect there are others who await us in Marseilles. Enemies who dress as Crusaders, yet have no interest in the Cause. Enter that port, and it’s likely we’ll all be killed, you along with the rest.’

  ‘Me? But why me? What part am I in this? You forced me to assist you back there—’

  ‘So I did,’ Baynard said gently. ‘And by doing so made you a target for their wrath. Unfair, but unavoidable, Captain Burywell. As is my intention to hold this vessel due east.’

  ‘But what if a storm—’

  ‘Ah, yes. The second thing. We’ll need to lighten the ship.’

  His words half strangled with alarm, Burywell queried, ‘Jettison the cargo? But I won’t be paid if—’

  ‘Yes, you will. You’ll be paid.’

  ‘You don’t understand! How could you? It’s only when I heard King Richard was raising a fleet —’

  ‘You’ll be paid.’

  ‘that I managed to secure – the Gros Ventre being old and—’

  ‘I’ve told you,’ Falkan snapped. ‘Before I leave this ship, you will be paid. Now get your crew assembled. We’ll leave enough ballast to keep her stable. Short of that I want everything dumped in the sea.’ According Burywell a smile, he said, ‘After all, it’s as you yourself remarked. They must surely have hammers and anvils in the East.’

  The unhappy sailor shrugged with resignation. He’d never wanted the four passengers aboard; never imagined the Gros Ventre involved in a fight; never supposed it would be with a Christian vessel.

  All he’d wished from life, these past few months, was the chance to haul cargo from England. Show by his skills that the drowning of the drunken Hugh Marleigh had not – and it hadn’t, God strike him – been his fault.

  Marleigh’s friends had claimed it so, and the authorities had accepted their account. But it had not been the way they told it; their stories distorted, embellished; their jewelled fingers extended in blame at the stammering John Burywell.

  According to them, it was simply a case of clumsy navigation, Lord Marleigh’s dinghy upset by the swing of the transport. Five voices to one, and Burywell was convicted, his licence to trade revoked, his livelihood cut from under him – until the day King Richard announced The Great Crusade.

  His spirits extinguished, Burywell turned to the rail. His scarred hands gripped the smooth-worn oak as he gazed unseeing at the lift and fall of the sea. Empty her belly, if you must. Throw the contents overboard. Make her as buoyant as you like. Then let me hear again, Falkan of Tremellion – Hugh Marleigh – how I’ll be recompensed for the loss.

  * * *

  The anvils ripped holes in the coverlet of the sea. Then the kegs of nails, the tools and horseshoes, chests of saddlery, boxes of leather, lumps of iron and cones of moulded lead.

  The Gros Ventre rode higher in the water; ran faster now, scouring eastward through the Mediterranean Sea.

  With the approach of dark the sail was furled, draglines lowered all around the ship. She was too far out for the anchors to touch bottom, but the draglines would slow her drift.

  The crew and passengers ate salted meat, olives and dry Spanish bread. They washed the food down with wine and fresh water, then moved apart, the crew settling amidships, Falkan and his companions in the stern.

  Nightfall acted as a drug on those aboard the Gros Ventre. They would sleep from now until the summer’s early dawn, the rhythm of their minds and bodies attuned to the light. All except Baynard Falkan, who sat hunched near the tiller-bar, his spare frame wrapped in a cloak, hands folded on the pommel of his sword.

  He doubted that John Burywell would attempt to turn the ship back toward Marseilles. The captain might distrust him, convinced the Crusader would cheat him at the last. But he was not the type to court trouble.

  Nor was the vessel herself much at risk from pirate galleys, or the Moorish dromonds that probed north from the African coast. By day, perhaps, yes. But not at night, the lanterns doused, the Gros Ventre no more than a wallowing hulk in the dark.

  Even so, Falkan remained watchful, hearing the slap of the waves, the night sounds of the sailors. Alone with his thoughts, he thanked God for delivering the transport from the iron-hooked clutches of the Hawksbill. Smiled briefly, and thanked Quillon for having identified the face of Roger Grevel.

  The travellers must needs be more alert from now on. True to his nature, Ranulf would stay in the background, employing others to do his dirty work. He was most likely still in England, probably at Tremellion, though his presence would not be far off in the months to come.

  He’d pay his henchmen well – if and when they snatched the treasure.

  The payment doubled – if and when they murdered his brother. For by doing so they’d silence all talk of that other, earlier murder, the slaying of Sir Geoffrey.

  Peering beneath the cloud-skeined moon, Baynard affirmed that the crew were sprawled as before. Murmurs and snores susurrated the air, one of the men coughing violently, another drumming a fist in a dreamed tattoo. Then sleep beckoned them down again, the night given over to the creak of the vessel, the splash of unseen fish, the curl of the waves.

  Baynard closed his mind to future dangers, inviting instead the image of the woman he remembered, feeling again the brush of her lips, her name on his own… Christiane… Christiane de Magnat-Vaulmier…

  He was a Crusader now, voyaging east in the name of Christendom. In memory of his father. In honour of Tremellion.

  He was also the guardian of gold, hunted by his brother and the devil alone knew how many greedy hirelings.

  Yet, along with all that, he was a lean young suitor; worldly enough in some things, naïve in others; wiry though lacking in muscle; dark-complexioned for a Cornishman; courteous to the point of pomposity; sensitive toward others and, yes, he believed he could say this, a man of his word.

  But the clay had not yet hardened, his character still in the kiln.

  And how would that match, he wondered, with those leathery warriors in the Kingdom of Jerusalem? How will she view me out there, my once-seen Christiane?

  Chapter Seventeen

  Her belly emptied, the store-ship continued east. She spent a second night at sea, the watch now sh
ared by Enrique and Quillon, then made sail again at dawn.

  An hour before noon and a shout from the lookout brought Burywell and Falkan to the bows. Ahead of them, though still a smudge on the horizon, lay the mountainous island of Corsica; her more fertile sister, Sardinia.

  Steering toward the Straits of Bonifacio, the Gros Ventre passed the rock of Asinara, turning south into the wide scoop of a bay. The Golfo dell’ Asinara; an open port in the midst of the Western Mediterranean.

  Twenty miles wide, the bay served as a harbour and sanctuary for every kind of vessel. Frequented by corsairs, fishermen, traders, off-course Crusader ships, smuggling craft and spies from North Africa, the waters of Asinara were controlled by a single, unwritten law. No one attacks another, and everyone minds his own business.

  This was not true of the spies, of course, though neither the Moors nor the common corsairs would board another vessel in the gulf. Once out of it, the merchant ships were fair game. But anchored here, off Sardinia’s northern shore, galleys and carracks mingled with fishing smacks and dromonds, Italians nodding at Arabs, pirates assessing their future prey. And – on this mid-July afternoon – Baynard Falkan studying a narrow-beam, two-masted galley, a dark blade in the water.

  He told Enrique de Vaca, ‘I shall bid for her services. We’ve come as far as we dare aboard the store-ship. Burywell’s discontented with us, as I am with his coffin-like craft. The further we venture east, the greater our need for mobility. And that ship there, whatever her calling, would give anyone a run.’

  * * *

  At Baynard’s command, the Big Belly anchored some distance from the galley. Then, taking Burywell with him, he went ashore, where he paid a local fisherman to find out what he could about the narrow, dark-daubed vessel. ‘Ask if her captain will take passengers aboard, conduct four of us to Palestine. Tell him we’re – no, I’ll tell him that myself.’

  Whilst he waited for the fisherman to locate the master of the galley, Falkan walked the morose John Burywell toward the headland that shielded the bay. As Baynard had expected, Burywell said nothing, his ruined spirits anticipating the worst.

  Away from the port, Baynard said, ‘I told you once, there were two things you should hear. There are now two more.’

  ‘Spare me your apologies, Lord Falkan. It’s much as I supposed. You lack the funds and – Let me ask. Are you in any way acquainted with the story of Hugh Marleigh, the nobleman who drowned in Romney harbour?’

  ‘I am not. Why? Should I be?’

  ‘I just thought—’

  ‘Thought what, you miseried man? Thought to link me with some mishap in your past?’

  ‘Drunk to the gills,’ Burywell murmured. ‘He stumbled and went over whilst transferring from the Gros Ventre to a dinghy. Oh, you’d no doubt charge me as a liar, you being Lord of Tremellion, and Hugh Marleigh—’

  ‘Christ, you’re a maudlin fellow! So all cats scratch, is that it, Burywell? All grapes are sour, and all men of rank cast you down. Yet you, whom I’ve promised to recompense for your losses, choose to disbelieve me, suggesting I lack the funds. You ask if I’ve heard of Lord Marleigh? Then I’d ask you if you’ve ever met Captain Gregorius Simeon Bigorre, out of Plymouth? As fine a master of his ship—’

  ‘I did once,’ Burywell told him, his head dipped in respect, or bowed in defeat. ‘But we’re not all cut from the same weathered wood.’

  Falkan moved away, his patience exhausted. Then gradually, gazing at the surf that washed the headland, he spared a thought for the unhappy John Burywell, twice met with knights of the realm, and each time worse for the meeting.

  Turning to him again, Baynard said, ‘The points I wish to make. You heard me enquire about that galley. If all goes well, you’ll be rid of us by tomorrow. In any event, you’re to prepare a list of your cargo, all the things your crew were forced to discard when we fled the Hawksbill. You are also to estimate the cost of repairs to the bow and portside quarters of your ship, damaged when we struck. And finally, my doubting countryman, make sure you’ve enough feed aboard for the horses. They’ll be yours to do with as you wish, for the galley I’m after is far too narrow to house them.’ Then he watched the man’s slowly dawning belief, and told him, ‘Contrary to what you may think, Captain Bury well, not all dogs bite, even if they were raised in a muddy castle yard.’

  * * *

  Returning to the port, they were met by the fisherman who informed Falkan that yes, the dark-daubed galley was for hire. The captain’s name was Renato Moretti, and he’d discuss terms as soon as the passengers wished, aboard the Lampreda, the Eel.

  ‘But I should warn you, signor. Renato Moretti is not a man to be trusted. It’s said that he—’ Then the fisherman changed his mind, decided he’d spent long enough with the strangers, and disappeared among the nets and spars and caulking fires of the beach. He’d been paid to arrange a meeting, not invite his own murder.

  * * *

  Back on the Gros Ventre, the captain made an inventory of the cargo he’d abandoned. Scrupulous in his honesty, he checked the figures till they blurred beneath his eyes. When it was done, he presented the lists to Baynard, who settled the bill without comment, ignoring Burywell’s moan of bemused satisfaction.

  Then Tremellion said, ‘Even if terms are arranged with Captain Moretti, we shall lodge on your ship tonight. I’d like to have heard more from our fisherman friend, but his very unwillingness to talk was a warning in itself. Keep the Gros Ventre well guarded, Master Burywell, else we might all get bitten and scratched.’

  Leaving the captain to warm his hands at the fire of his re-kindled future, Baynard held Enrique de Vaca, Constable Guthric and the safeguard Quillon in earnest conversation on the stern deck.

  He told them who they would be, and what, if anything, they would say. For the moment however, the Spaniard and Quillon would remain aboard to protect the treasure, whilst Guthric rowed Falkan through the swell of the bay and alongside the Lampreda.

  The two men exchanged a glance as they neared the galley, aware they were venturing unarmed, and with a well-rehearsed lie on their lips…

  * * *

  Seeing them approach, Renato Moretti guessed the lean one, huddled uncomfortably on the thwart, to be a petty official from some minor southern port. His face was too dark for a northerner – unless, of course, he’d been spawned in some casual coupling…

  As for the other one, the burly lump who was rowing – well, all he’d be was the skinny one’s protector – bend to the oars and be sure you don’t splash the young master.

  The captain of the Lampreda watched with interest. What was it the fisherman had told him? Four would-be passengers, eager to be conducted to the East? A pity they weren’t nicely burnished Crusaders, equipped with arms and armour. A decent profit to be made from arms and armour. Sell it anywhere. A wide open market, the Mediterranean, especially for—

  With a thud the dinghy swung clumsily against the hull. Moretti gave a start of anger, smothered it with a smile and hurried from his vantage point to greet the men whose throats he would happily slit – but only if they made it worth his while.

  ‘Welcome aboard, signori. Have we a common language?’

  Falkan reached for the rail, missed it on purpose, tried again and was hauled aboard by one of Moretti’s crew. He gasped and grinned foolishly, attempted a bow, spluttered that French was his native tongue, but a smattering of Italian – then stumbled against the shrouds.

  Renato Moretti’s smile was as insincere as the workings of his mind. ‘You are not a natural sailor, m’sieur. It takes practice to walk with the waves.’

  ‘I am not practised in anything, Captain, unless it be with inks and paper, and the sand to dry my scribblings. Oh, yes, by the way, my name is Baynard, senior clerk in the household of Thomas Guidron, a wealthy and respected pillar of England. This man here, this Guthric, he’s a soldier, not long ago returned from the East. If it was not for what he found out there, I’d be forced to mark him as a sweaty and nois
ome companion. Is this ship at anchor, Captain? The way it rocks—’

  ‘I’ve been told there are four of you, Master Baynard. You and this lumpen creature, and who else?’

  ‘Allow me to be seated, Captain. The motion of the ship… I fear I might disgrace myself…’ In keeping with his plea, he grabbed at Guthric, the Saxon holding him firmly, turning him to the rail.

  Renato Moretti studied the antics of his visitors. Saw Baynard for what he claimed to be. As clownish a dupe as I could wish for. If the other two are as flimsy as this – But first, let’s weigh him for value.

  He gestured toward a canvas sling, halfway between a hammock and a chair. Guidron’s clerk settled himself gratefully, then watched as the Lampreda’s captain prowled the deck. The man was smiling, smiling, all the while smiling as he told the scribbler it was no mere jaunt, running the length of the Mediterranean Sea.

  ‘Busy at your desk, m’sieur, you’d be ignorant of the dangers we must face. The currents and whirlpools. Monsters that arise by night from the depths. Black-faced enemies who’d cut us to pieces, flay the living skin from our bodies.’

  Baynard raised a hand to his mouth. He seemed unable to speak for a while, then swallowed his fears and said, ‘The thing of it is – why we need to take passage – this ugly Guthric was out there in Palestine. Ambushed by the Saracens, he sought refuge in a cave in the hills of Judea. When it happened, what, five years back, he was with a young priest—’