The Sword of Damascus

by Richard Blake

  The Sword of Damascus

  Richard Blake

  www.hodder.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain in 2011 by Hodder & Stoughton

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © Richard Blake 2011

  The right of Richard Blake to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

  Epub ISBN 9781848947030

  Book ISBN 9781444709667

  Hodder & Stoughton Ltd

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.hodder.co.uk

  To my wife, Andrea,

  and to my daughter, Philippa,

  with deepest love,

  I dedicate this novel.

  CONTENTS

  The Sword of Damascus

  Imprint Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Epilogue

  Also by Richard Blake

  Acknowledgements

  The verse in Chapter 3 is from Ad Puerum Anglicum, by Hilary the Englishman (twelfth century). Translation by the author:

  O pretty boy – gorgeous as the flower,

  Shining like a gem – I’d have you know

  How the beauty of your face

  Seems to me the very torch of love . . .

  The words spoken at the crucifixion in Chapter 28 are from the Koran, 5:33, translated by George Sale (1697–1736).

  The words ascribed to Euripides in Chapter 39 are actually from John Milton, Paradise Lost, I, 263.

  The story recounted in Chapter 40 is the, ‘Story of the Confectioner, his Wife, and the Parrot’, from The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night, translated by Richard Burton (1821–90).

  The verse in Chapter 43 is from the Diwan of Ibn al-Farid (twelfth century), translated by R.A. Nicholson (d.1945), Studies in Islamic Mysticism, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1921.

  The verse in Chapter 53 is from Virgil, Aeneid, Book VI, 6–7.

  Now, when the purple morn had chas’d away

  The dewy shadows, and restor’d the day.

  Translation by John Dryden (1631–1700).

  The Latin quote in Chapter 62 is from M. Tullius Cicero (106–43 bc), First Speech against Catiline. Translation: ‘How long, O Catiline, will you abuse our patience? How long is your madness still to mock us? When shall there be an end to your unbridled audacity?’ Translation by the author.

  The words ascribed to an ancient poet in Chapter 65 are actually from Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822).

  Chapter 1

  Jarrow, Thursday, 27 December 686

  ‘Is that wank on your sleeve?’ I croaked accusingly. The boy opened his mouth and stepped backwards through the doorway. I gave him a bleary look and carried on with pulling myself together. If I’d supposed I could hide that I’d been dozing, this was – all else aside – the wrong boy. Out of habit, I’d spoken Greek. Edward was barely competent in Latin. I leaned forward in the chair. My neck was hurting where my head had fallen sideways. The beer jug I’d brought with me into my cell was empty, and I was feeling cold again.

  ‘My Lord Abbot presents his compliments,’ Edward opened in obviously rehearsed Latin, ‘and begs your presence in the bell tower.’ His face took on a faint look of relief before lapsing into its usual blankness.

  ‘The bell tower, indeed!’ I grunted. ‘And Benedict imagines I can skip up and down his twelve-foot ladder as if I were one of Jacob’s angels. One day, if he’s lucky, he might have eight years of his own to every foot of that ladder.’ But I stopped. It was plain I’d lost the boy. I groaned and reached for my stick. As I finally got to my feet, he tied the threadbare shawl about me. I ignored the offer of his arm for support, and made my own way into the corridor.

  As I came back to what passes with me for life, I noticed that the banging had stopped yet again. I looked round. My cell was only a few yards along from the side gate of the monastery. It was still barred. However, the buckets of water I’d suggested were filled and ready for use.

  ‘Do be a love, Edward,’ I said, now in English, ‘and have some more charcoal put in that brazier. It’s perishing in here. If I’m to live long enough to have my throat cut, you’ll need to keep me warmer than you do.’ I looked again at him. Wanking would have been pardonable in the circumstances. But it was most likely snot.

  I gripped at the rail and looked down at the rain-sodden waste that is Northumbria. On better days, you can see from here all the way down to the Tyne. This wasn’t one of the better days. In the mist that had come up again, a few hundred yards was about the limit. There was a fire burning now close by the limit of visibility, and some of the northern beasts were dancing about it. I supposed they’d looted more beer from somewhere. Lucky beasts! I thought.

  ‘So, what is it that’s got all these old women in another panic?’ I wheezed. I spoke once more in Greek. This time, I got an answer.

  ‘It’s over here,’ said Brother Joseph in his flat Syrian accent. He guided me across the floor of the little tower and pointed down to a spot about fifty feet from the main gate. ‘The Lord Alaric will see that we do indeed have a new development.’

  ‘The Lord Alaric died when he left Constantinople,’ I said, now softly. ‘I must tell you again I’m plain Brother Aelric – born in Richborough, to die in Jarrow.’

 
‘It is as Your Magnificence wishes,’ he said, with one of his maddening bows.

  No point arguing here and now, I thought. I looked out again into the mist. My heart skipped a beat and my hands tightened on the rail. Focusing isn’t what it used to be. But I could see from his hair that they’d got hold of young Tatfrid. He was one of the boys who hadn’t been able to make it through the gates before they’d swung shut. Now, he’d been dragged from whatever hiding place he’d found. They’d nailed him to a door and slit his belly open. His guts they’d arranged about him in the shape of an eagle’s wings and nailed them in place. How they’d kept him alive was beyond me. But if he was no longer up to screaming, he was still twisting. The door was propped up at the angle of a pitched roof, and more of the beasts were dancing in front of it. One of them was pulling at the boy’s trousers, and another was waving a knife up at us. It wasn’t hard to see what they had in mind. It was all noiseless, and, with the progress of the afternoon, white mist swirled thicker on the ground like insubstantial snow, hiding the lower halves of the cavorting bodies.

  I swallowed and looked steadily down. Oh, I’ve seen suffering and death enough to fill many more years than I’ve been in the world. One way or another, I’ve caused enough of it myself. But it isn’t every day you see one of your best students butchered. Only five days before – no, it must have been just three – and he’d been construing Virgil downstairs. Now, the poor boy was – I forced myself to look away and turned back to Joseph.

  ‘Can you get an arrow into the right spot?’ I asked.

  He looked and pursed his lips. He nodded and reached for his bow.

  ‘In the name of God – no!’ It was Benedict. He hadn’t followed the words, but the meaning was plain enough. He snatched at the bow and threw it down. ‘Has there not been enough killing?’ he cried indignantly in Latin. ‘If these benighted children have brought perdition on their heads, must we now do likewise?’

  I bent slowly down and took up the bow. I gave it back to Joseph.

  ‘Take careful aim,’ I said. ‘We can settle things with the Bishop as and when.’ I stared at the Abbot until he looked away.

  As Joseph fitted an arrow, there was a sudden commotion over on our right. It was the Chieftain and his retainers. They stood in a tight group, their cloaks pasted heavily about them by the fine rain. While I strained to see them properly, the herald stood forward and began another shouted message. The work of gelding laid aside for the moment, everyone nearby gathered round him to wave spears and shout fiercely at every pause.

  ‘What’s he saying now?’ I asked. Benedict had assured me their language was close to English. I’ve known many Germanic tongues, and most of them have been pretty close to English if you can hear past the different inflections. This one was beyond me. It might have been a dog down there barking away.

  ‘He says, Master,’ someone whispered from behind, ‘that they will all go away tomorrow morning if we but open the gate and let them take what they have come across the wide northern seas to obtain. They also ask for food.’

  I looked round as far as my neck would turn. It was Edward. His words had come out in a strangled gasp, and I’d not recognised the voice. His face carried a look of alarm – which was natural enough, but also of confusion, and just a little of fascinated curiosity.

  ‘They want food, eh?’ I snarled. ‘Well, they can go fuck themselves!’ I looked back to Joseph. ‘Any chance of getting an arrow in the big man?’ I asked. He shook his head. I’d guessed already the wet leather was as good at this distance as plate armour. But it had been worth asking. ‘Then see to poor Tatfrid,’ I said. Before he could protest further, I took Benedict by the arm and moved with him until we were looking again at the distant fire.

  ‘Where is King Aldfrith?’ he wailed, pulling on the few strands of hair his tonsure had left. ‘Why has he not sent men to protect us?’

  It was a stupid question. Even if word had reached the royal court, they were all probably still too hung over from Christmas to set out to the rescue. And according to the villagers who’d made it through the gate, the attack party had come ashore at Yellow Tooth Creek. It was one of those darting attacks from across the northern sea that are over before anyone outside the immediate area even notices. We were on our own. If I’d believed a word of what I now daily recited, it was for us to huddle within the thick walls of the monastery and pray for a miracle.

  ‘If we’d just done as they asked,’ Benedict struck up again, ‘if we’d but listened to their plea for food, they might even now be back on their ship.’

  ‘Might?’ I sneered. ‘Might?’ I paused at the twang of Joseph’s bow and the soft thud a moment later. I listened to the low, terrified murmur of the other monks and boys behind us. I didn’t bother turning. I’d already seen Joseph in action. He didn’t miss. ‘My dear Benedict,’ I said with a change of tone, ‘you never open a gate to these animals. You’ve seen what they did to the other villagers they caught. My age and your vows may have made them a superfluous treasure. But I rather fancy dying with my testicles still attached.’

  I looked again at the fire. The mist was blotting out most of the sound. But if I listened hard, I could hear those dancers barking like a whole pack of rabid dogs.

  Chapter 2

  Down in the great hall, Brother Cuthbert was making trouble again.

  ‘O ye of little faith!’ he bellowed, waving his arms in what he doubtless thought a dramatic gesture. ‘Do you not see the sinful folly of sheltering within these walls? Are not these devils sent here to call us to our duty? Do they not hold out, though in reeking hands, the violet crown of martyrdom?’ He wheeled round and, as if in supplication, held out both arms to the barred and bolted gate. ‘Let us cast aside this pitiful shelter and receive the blessings that are without. Why fear ye death when it is but a second birth – a birth to a new and glorious life in the world that is to come? Every cutting and searing of the flesh, every snapping of bones, every dismemberment – what can it be to us but so many steps on the hard ladder that leads to Paradise?

  ‘For all of us, our heavenly birthday is at hand. O Lord, Thy will be done! O Lord, Thy will be done!’

  I got to him just as he was pretending to pluck out his eyes. With a hard prod of my walking stick to the back of one of his knees, I had him on the floor. As he rolled over, I jabbed hard into his belly and looked down at the face creased into a mask of unexpected agony.

  ‘If you value your front teeth,’ I said softly, ‘you’ll keep your cunty mouth shut.’ I glanced briefly about the hall. The local villagers were huddled into a tight mass at the end furthest from the brazier. Cuthbert had been raving in Latin, and they hadn’t followed a word. The other monks and boys, though, were looking decidedly scared. Worse, I could sense that many of them felt at least a vague duty to agree with him. I took in their pale, tense faces and looked back down to Cuthbert.

  ‘Haven’t you lived long enough already?’ he jeered up at me, his breath recovered.

  ‘No,’ I said shortly. I could have quoted Lucretius on the unending sleep that is death. But it would only have confirmed his opinion about my own beliefs. ‘Let me tell you,’ I went on instead, ‘that if I hear you so much as breathe another word of this nonsense, I’ll set the boys on you with sticks. If you go anywhere near that gate, I’ll have Brother Joseph strike you dead.’

  ‘You wouldn’t dare!’ he cried, sitting up. ‘You know that my person is sacrosanct. You know the damnation due to any who lay hands on a man of—’

  I shut him up with the best knock I could deliver to his chest. He fell back again, his head smacking nicely on the flagstones. No point, for sure, in quoting Lucretius or any of the poets. Certainly none in pointing out the inconsistency of not wanting to be killed before he could commit suicide.

  ‘Don’t presume to tell me what I would and wouldn’t dare,’ I said, now louder. ‘Joseph will have a knife in your back before you lay hands on that gate. And I’ll see he gets the sort of
penance for it that boys get for scrumping. If you don’t believe that, you still don’t know me.’

  I left him nursing his head and made my way to the top of the table. It was evening, and we’d be safe enough now till morning. Benedict was up in the bell tower – as if the lookouts needed any encouragement to stay awake – and he’d not be down to claim his place. I carefully seated myself. Just behind me, the brazier was glowing bright. I looked round. Just three evenings before, Benedict had sat here. Then, he’d been all smiles and jollity as he dispensed the Christmas bounty of the Church to us and anyone else of quality who felt inclined to join us.

  Now, the cups and platters were gone. The lamps were burning low. No one had thought to move the big table back into the refectory. But the few who were sitting round it picked nervously at the stale crusts that had been doled out. The other monks and boys stood about clutching at their rosaries or trying not to cry with terror.

  Joseph poured me a cup of hot cider mixed with beer. I motioned him into a chair beside me and looked at the jug. He poured another cup for himself. We drank awhile, keeping to our own various thoughts.

  ‘My Lord is still convinced,’ Joseph asked eventually, his cup now empty, ‘there will be no proper attack?’ He spoke again in Greek – not that anyone was paying attention to us. I looked about the hall. It had been so very jolly on Christmas Eve. I’d been too pissy drunk at first to follow what the boy was saying when he’d burst in unannounced with the dreadful news. But I’d staggered out into the damp night air and had seen the flames of the village not a half-mile away. I’d seen the more fortunate villagers hurrying towards us with whatever they’d been able to pick up and carry. The arrival, come dawn, of the raiders outside the gate had finalised the gulf between the secure jollity of Christmas Eve and the impending horrors of the present.