The Templar Knight

by Jan Guillou

  With that the king and his men were rid of the person who by her presence most hampered their speech—a desire for candor that soon began to make itself felt just as implacably as the need to relieve themselves outside in the pine boughs. It was a hindrance to have the abbess at their feast, no two ways about it.

  But it was not much better with two maidens whose young ears would probably be badly singed by the long talks that the night still promised.

  The king explained that they had arranged beds for the Cecilias in a chamber on the upper floor, and that a guard would be placed outside their door all night so that no malicious tongues could do harm. For the Cecilias this leave-taking was just as important as it was for the men, because they had only one last night together to say everything that they might otherwise long regret not having said. They withdrew in a courtly manner, although Birger Brosa cleared his throat and stopped them on their way, pointing at his mantle. Cecilia Rosa flushed and took off the mantle. When Birger Brosa turned his back in amusement, she placed the jarl’s mantle adorned with the Folkung lion over the shoulders where it belonged.

  Soon the two Cecilias climbed into bed upstairs among the linens and thick pelts so that they were able to sleep in only their shifts and still find the night unusually warm and pleasant. Affixed to one of the log walls were tallow candles that would burn much longer than ordinary wax ones.

  They lay for a while side by side, staring at the ceiling and holding hands. On a bench next to the bed lay the queen’s mantle, a majestic blue with three glinting crowns of gold reminding of all the wondrous things that had happened on this day. For a while they were so absorbed in this thought that neither of them spoke.

  But the night was still young, and from downstairs came noise and laughter from the now female-free company. The men could concentrate on enjoying a good feast with liveliness and vigor, an honor demanded when dining with the king.

  “I wonder if the archbishop is started on his fourth helping of roast lamb by now,” Cecilia Blanca giggled. “And I wonder if he’s as simple-minded as he seems. Did you see the way he brushed aside Mother Rikissa as if a fly had got into his wine glass?”

  “That’s exactly why he’s not the simpleton he makes himself out to be,” replied Cecilia Rosa. “He couldn’t feign obedience to the king’s slightest whim. Nor could he feign that he thought it was important to decide for the king and against Mother Rikissa, so he pretended there was a fly in his wine glass, and that was that. Besides, Arn always spoke well of Archbishop Stéphan, even though he sentenced both of us to such a harsh punishment.”

  “You’re far too good and you think too well of people, my dearest of friends,” Cecilia Blanca said with a sigh.

  “What do you mean, dearest Blanca?”

  “You have to think more like a man, Rosa, you have to learn to think as they do—the way all men think whether they bear the crown of a jarl or carry a bishop’s staff. It was not at all a fair sentence that you and Arn were given. As Birger Brosa said so clearly, many have committed the same sin without being punished at all. You were both judged too harshly, that’s clear as water, don’t you realize that?”

  “No, I don’t understand. Why would they do that?”

  “Rikissa. There you have the malevolent soul behind the entire matter. I was at Gudhem when your sister Katarina, who is probably no longer so dear to you, urged Rikissa to begin spinning her web. Arn, your beloved as you say, was Knut Eriksson’s friend and a Folkung. That was the relationship that Rikissa was intent on destroying; she wanted to harm the king’s friend and sow dissension. And Arn was a swordsman who could vanquish all others; many stories were told about him. That was a skill that the archbishop was intent on using.”

  “But what would the archbishop and Father Henri want with another swordsman?”

  “My dear beloved friend!” Cecilia Blanca burst out impatiently. “Don’t make yourself the stupid goose that Fru Helena talked about. Bishops and other prelates are constantly talking about how we must send men to the war in the Holy Land, as if we didn’t have enough to do with our own wars, and how anyone who takes up the Cross will enter Paradise. Yet they have had scant success with such speech. Do you know anyone who took the Cross and went there voluntarily? No, me neither. But they could send Arn, and they surely said many prayers of thanksgiving afterward. The truth is sometimes hard and cold. If Arn Magnusson hadn’t gained a saga-like reputation after the duel at Axevalla, had he been a man like all the others with sword and lance, you would have received a sentence of two years, not twenty.”

  “You’re starting to think like a queen. Is this the talent you wish to practice?” asked Cecilia Rosa after a moment. She seemed deeply affected by her friend’s claim that the sword was the reason for the harsh judgments levied against Arn and herself.

  “Yes, I am trying to learn to think like a queen. Of the two of us, I’m probably the one most suited to it. You are much too good, my dear Rosa.”

  “Is that how you talked them into bringing me over here to this feast, because you were thinking like a queen? By the way, Mother Rikissa looked like she was about to burst with hatred when she came to get me.”

  “She probably could have, that hag; she has to learn that she is certainly not the will of God. No, I tried first with normal cunning and caresses. But Knut did not seem to be very taken by my arts. He went and asked his jarl, so there I was disappointed. I have a long way to go to be treated as a queen.”

  “So it was Birger Brosa then who decided that I should be invited?”

  “He and no other. In him you have a supporter whom you must tend well. When he went over and draped the Folkung mantle around you, it was not meant merely to protect you from the cold.”

  They fell silent because the salvos of laughter were now thundering up through the floor planks, and because they felt somewhat embarrassed that their conversation had taken such a somber turn. It felt as if the queen’s mantle, lying in the darkness close to them, had forced them to become something other than simply the dearest of friends. And even though the hour was not yet late, the night would end as all nights did, even nights spent in the carcer. And with that they would be separated for a very long time, perhaps even forever. Surely there was something else to talk about besides the struggle for power.

  “Don’t you think he’s a handsome man? Does he look the same as you remember him?” Cecilia Rosa asked at last.

  “Who? Knut Eriksson? Yes, though I no doubt remember him as younger and more handsome. It’s been a few years since we’ve seen each other, and even then we met only seldom. He’s still tall and looks quite strong, but his hair is starting to thin so that soon he’ll resemble a monk, even though he’s not very old. He isn’t exactly an old man from Linköping, but my choice could have been better, of course. And he isn’t as smart as Birger Brosa. Summa summarum, the betrothal could have been better, but also much worse. So I’m fairly satisfied.”

  “Fairly satisfied?”

  “Yes, I have to admit as much. But it’s not that important. The important thing is that he’s the king.”

  “Then you don’t love him?”

  “The way I love the Virgin Mary, or the way they love in the sagas? No, it’s obvious that I don’t. Why should I?”

  “Haven’t you ever loved a man?”

  “No. But there was once a stable boy…ah, I was only fifteen at the time. My father caught us together and there was an awful row. The stable boy was shown the gate after being whipped, but he swore that he would come back someday with many retainers. I cried for days, and then I got a new horse.”

  “When I get out of here I’ll be thirty-seven years old,” Cecilia Rosa whispered although they had been talking quite loudly to be heard over the feast downstairs.

  “Then you may still have a lot of your life before you,” Cecilia Blanca replied in a much louder voice. “You can come to me and the king. You and I are friends for life; that’s the one thing that Mother Rikissa can do nothing abo
ut.”

  “But I’ll probably only get out of here if Arn comes back as he vowed to do. Otherwise I’ll dry up and spend the rest of my life in the convent,” said Cecilia Rosa in a somewhat louder voice.

  “You must pray every night for Arn until that day comes,” said Cecilia Blanca, squeezing her friend’s hand harder. “I promise you that I’ll pray for the same thing, and maybe together, if we both keep trying, we can persuade God’s Holy Mother.”

  “Yes, maybe we can. Because it’s well known that Our Lady has many times been persuaded by prayers of love if only they are persistent enough. I know a story about such a case that is very beautiful.”

  “What if I ask you the same thing you asked me—do you really love Arn Magnusson? Or is he just your footbridge that will carry you across this chasm called Gudhem? Do you love him the way you love Our Lady, or the way they love in the sagas?”

  “Yes, I do,” said Cecilia Rosa. “I love him so much that I’m afraid of the sin of loving a man more than God. I will love him forever, and when these cursed twenty years have passed, I will still love him.”

  “You may not be able to understand this, but I envy you,” said Cecilia Blanca after a while. She turned in the bed and threw her arms around her friend.

  They lay like that for a while as tears came to them both. Finally they were interrupted by the necessity that can intervene at any time after a feast. Cecilia Blanca had to get up and relieve herself in the wooden bucket that had been thoughtfully placed under their bed.

  “I have to ask you two things that can only be asked of one’s dearest friend,” Cecilia Blanca resumed when she crept back in under the sheepskins. “How does it feel to have a son and yet not have a son? And is it as bad as many women say it is to give birth to a child?”

  “You’re certainly asking a lot all at once,” said Cecilia Rosa with a wan smile. “Having to give up a son like mine, a boy named Magnus who is growing up with Birger Brosa and with Brigida as his mother, was so hard that I force myself to think of him only in my prayers. He was so beautiful and so little! It’s a misfortune greater than my captivity with Mother Rikissa, not to be with him. Yet in spite of this misfortune, I am happy that he will be raised by a man as good as Arn’s uncle. Does this seem a bit crazy? Is it hard to understand?”

  “Not at all, I believe it’s exactly as you say. But what was it like to give birth?”

  “Are you starting to worry already? Isn’t it a little early for that, now that they’ve put a guard outside your bedchamber and taken all these precautions?”

  “Don’t make fun of the matter. Yes, I am worried. I’m sure that I will give birth to more than a few sons. What is it like?”

  “What do I know? I’ve had only one. Do you want to know if it hurts? Yes, it hurts terribly. Do you want to know if you feel glad when it’s over? Yes, you do. Now have you found out from an experienced woman anything that you didn’t already know?”

  “I wonder if it hurts less if you love the man who is father to your child,” Cecilia Blanca mused after a while, half in earnest and half in jest.

  “Yes, I think that’s true,” replied Cecilia Rosa.

  “Then it’s probably best if I start loving our king,” joked Cecilia Blanca with a sigh.

  They both burst out laughing, and their laughter felt cleansing and liberating. They wriggled around in bed so that they lay entwined, almost like the night when a nearly frozen Cecilia Blanca was brought up from the carcer. And as they lay there they both came to think of that night.

  “I believe and will always believe that you saved my life. I was frozen to the bone, and my life felt like it was the last blue flame that flickers just before the last ember dies out,” Cecilia Blanca whispered in her friend’s ear.

  “Your flame is no doubt stronger than that,” said Cecilia Rosa sleepily.

  They fell asleep but awoke when it was time for lauds. Both of them stumbled groggily out of bed and started to get dressed before remembering that they were in the hospitium, and bellowing could still be heard downstairs.

  As they crept back underneath the sheepskins they were wide awake and couldn’t go back to sleep. But the candle had burned out and it was pitch dark outside the window.

  They began again where they had left off, talking of eternal friendship and eternal love.

  Chapter 5

  When Saladin arrived at Gaza he was not fooled by any of the defenders’ traps. He had been a warrior much too long for that; he had laid siege to too many cities, and defended too many cities from besiegers, to believe what he first saw. The city of Gaza at this moment looked easy to take, as if they could simply ride straight in, as if the city had given up and would surrender voluntarily. But from the tower above the wide-open city gate and the lowered drawbridge across the moat waved the black-and-white banner of the Knights Templar and their standard bearing the image of the mother of Jesus, whom they worshipped like a goddess. It was those banners that should be kept in mind and not what the enemy wanted the advancing troops to see. The idea that a Templar knight would surrender without a fight was almost ridiculous; it was even more of an affront that their commander thought they could succeed with such a simple trick.

  Annoyed, Saladin waved off the emirs who came riding up to him with one idiotic proposal for a lightning attack after another. He held to his orders. They would do as he had planned, and not change their tactics because of an open gate and what looked like an unguarded approach.

  Arn stood up on the city ramparts along with his weapons master Guido de Faramond and his confanonier Armand, tensely watching the incoming enemy army. In the city beneath and behind him the streets had been cleared of rubbish and everything flammable; all the windows were closed with wooden shutters or stretched skins soaked in vinegar. The refugees had been herded into the grain storehouses made of stone that had been emptied when they filled the storehouses inside the fortress, and the city’s inhabitants were either in their homes or with the groups that were responsible for fighting fires.

  The city of Gaza stood on a hill that sloped down to the sea toward the fortress and the harbor. Atop the hill was the city gate, so that any enemy would have to attack uphill. Between the city gate and the gates of the fortress on the shore, the way was clear and without obstacle, like a practice field for equestrian games. Visible up on the city walls were mostly Turkish archers and an occasional black-clad sergeant; from the outside it must have looked like a surprisingly meager defense. That was because two hundred sergeants, mostly armed with crossbows, were sitting with their backs against the breastwork walls so that they were invisible from outside. In an instant Gaza’s defense forces would more than double if Arn gave the order.

  Just inside the closed but not barred gates to the fortress itself sat eighty Templar knights mounted and ready to ride to the attack.

  Arn had hoped that the enemy’s army would advance in groups and not in a body. He had hoped that some emir, in a lust for glory, then wouldn’t be able to keep from showing his bold valor so as to reap rich praise when Saladin himself arrived. The excitement was often greatest, just as the dread was the worst, at the beginning of an attack.

  If the Mamelukes had sent in their cavalry through the open city gate, it would have been closed when the crush was sufficiently great, after about four hundred men. Then the gates would have opened down in the fortress and the knights would have emerged, hacking at the Mamelukes in the perfect situation, crowded and hard-pressed, where Saracen speed was no longer an advantage. And from the city wall the sergeants would have turned their crossbows inward and downward. The enemy would have lost a tenth of his force in the first hour. And anyone who then initiated a siege would encounter much trouble afterward. Actually this had been more of a pious hope than a cunning plan. It was well known that as a foe, Saladin was not to be easily fooled.

  “Is it time to give our knights something else to do?” asked the weapons master.

  “Yes, but they must remain on high alert, be
cause there may be another opportunity,” Arn replied without revealing either disappointment or hope in his voice.

  The weapons master nodded and hurried off.

  “Come on!” said Arn to Armand, leading him out on the breastwork next to the tower by the city gate so that they ended up standing immediately below the colors of the Knights Templar and in full view of the enemy. Arn himself was the only white-clad knight now visible among Gaza’s defenders.

  “What happens now that they weren’t fooled?” asked Armand.

  “Saladin will first show his strength, and when that is done there will be some swordplay that is not intended to be taken seriously,” said Arn. “We’ll have a calm first day, and only one man will die.”

  “Who’s going to die?” asked Armand with a puzzled frown.

  “A man of your own age, a man like you,” said Arn in a tone that almost sounded a bit sad. “A brave young man who believes he’ll have a chance to win great glory and perhaps for the first time take part in a great victory. A man who believes that God is with him, although God has already marked him as the one who will die today.”

  Armand couldn’t bring himself to ask any more about who was going to die. His lord Arn had answered him as if he were miles away in his thoughts, as if his words might mean something completely different from what they at first seemed to mean. It was the way that the exalted knight-brothers often spoke.

  Soon Armand’s attention was entirely absorbed by the drama outside the walls, where Saladin, exactly as Lord Arn had predicted, now showed his strength. The Mameluke cavalry paraded forward on their beautiful, lively steeds in ranks of five by five, their uniforms gleaming with gold in the sun. They shook their lances and raised their bows as they rode past the city wall by the tower gate where Arn and Armand stood. It took almost an hour to finish the parade, and even though Arn lost count toward the end, he had a good idea that the enemy cavalry was probably more than six thousand strong. It was the largest mounted army Armand had ever seen; to him it seemed utterly invincible, especially since everyone knew that these glistening gold Mamelukes were the best soldiers of the entire Saracen enemy. But his lord Arn did not seem especially worried by what he saw. And when the parade of horsemen was over he even smiled at Armand, rubbing his hands together with satisfaction. He began to loosen up his fingers as he did before practicing with the longbow that now stood inside the tower by the gate, along with a beer barrel filled with more than a hundred arrows.