by Angus Donald
‘O singing boy!’ crooned the voice. ‘O singing boy; did you think I did not expect you to try this?’ said Sir Richard Malbete. ‘Do you take me for a fool?’
I said nothing, but my heart was burning with rage at my own stupidity. Of course, he must have expected this. And I had involved my friends in this disaster.
‘Are you there, singing boy?’ Malbête called again, and I had to bite back a foul retort. ‘It seems you have cut up another one of my people, singing boy. I think perhaps I shall now cut up one of yours.’ He laughed a low, dark, bubbling chuckle. I had heard enough, and I dug my heels into Ghost and led Reuben’s slumped and moaning form away from the evil sound of laughter in the dark.
‘What the hell did you think you were playing at?’ said my master, his silver eyes glinting like a pair of barber’s blades. It was later that same night and we were in the Hospitaller’s quarter, where a cowled bone-setter was efficiently splinting Reuben’s broken leg. Outwardly, the Earl of Locksley appeared icily calm, but I knew that he was incandescently angry. ‘You nearly got yourself killed, and, more importantly, you nearly got Reuben killed, and I’m told you even involved your servant William in your childishly stupid scheme.’
‘All you care about is saving Reuben for your grubby money-making plots,’ I flashed back at him. ‘Killing Malbête is important! It is a matter of personal honour for me. Not that you’d understand that, you ... you merchant!’
To my surprise, he merely laughed; a dry hollow chuckle, admittedly, and not a pleasant sound; but it was the sound of human mirth. ‘You were a snot-nosed little thief when I found you, a cut-purse of no family, no money, no lineage, and now you - hah! - you are lecturing me about honour, and calling me a merchant!’ He snorted. ‘You ridiculous, unworldly little puppy; go on - get out of my sight.’ And I found myself walking away from him; and fighting back a great black wave of self-pity. He was right: I was a snot-nose thief, a cut-purse of no family and no lineage - but I did know about honour.
Reuben’s leg was a clean fracture, and though very painful he was well tended in the Hospitallers’ dormitory, where I went to see him and to apologise. ‘Do not concern yourself with it, Alan. We tried to take him; we failed. There will be other opportunities,’ said my Jewish friend - and I felt better about the whole sorry affair. Robin had not spoken to me since our argument, and I knew I was in disgrace, because even Little John was distant with me and found some excuse to cancel our shield practice the next morning. As a result I spent much of the next few days making love to Nur in the little house she shared with Elise in the women’s quarters, and in the light of what was to happen, I was very glad. I can still remember her perfect face - dark eyes you could drown in, her exquisite little nose, the high cheekbones, her luscious berry lips that begged to be kissed ... I remember her face so clearly, even now after more than forty years. She was so fragile, so beautiful - it sometimes makes me weep to remember her. I remember her words to me that night, too, when I told her about my spat with Robin: ‘I know that you always try do the right thing, Alan, always. It is one of the reasons why I love you so very much.’
A week or so later, in the searing heat near the middle of August, I was summoned again to see Robin, by William, who found me practicing with sword and shield, alone, in the courtyard of the Hospitallers’ quarter. He was accompanied by Keelie, now a glossy, confident fully-grown lion-yellow dog, who bounded over to greet me and lick my face. King Philip had left Acre at the end of July, taking a some of his knights with him, but others had remained and were prepared to fight on under King Richard’s banner. There was an air of quiet purpose in our army, a sense that we were very soon going to march; and I was determined to prove myself on the field of battle against the Saracens. So despite the crippling heat, and the sweat that drenched me, I practiced my sword and shield patterns every day. There was one fly in the soup: Saladin still had not paid the huge ransom on the three thousand Muslim captives, nor had he returned the True Cross to us - and many said that he had no intention of relinquishing such a wondrous object to his enemies. I secretly thought that the King would have to release the Saracen prisoners before we marched on; we could not possible guard and feed such a multitude on the road to Jerusalem. It would be a blow to his prestige - but what else could he do?
‘The Earl wa-wants you,’ said William, hauling a slobbering Keelie off me and offering a shy smile of greeting. I had hardly seen him since our disastrous attempt on Malbête’s life and even in that short amount of time he seemed to have grown a couple of inches; his face seemed to have changed, too, become less round, the cheekbones more prominent: he must be twelve or thirteen now, I guessed, and it was clear that he was becoming a man. ‘Something bi-big is going on at headquarters,’ he said, ‘everybody is bu-bustling about looking pe-pepleased with themselves: people sharpening weapons, packing ba-ba-bags. I think we might all be on the momove.’
I doubted it; there would have been plenty of rumours if the whole army were to depart Acre. The moon had been waxing in the past few days and, by my amateur calculation, would be full tomorrow night. It was more likely that whatever Robin had arranged with Aziz the sailor would be happening tomorrow.
Robin was curt when I presented myself to him, not a little nervously, that afternoon in the main ground-floor room of his palace by the sea. He was richly dressed in a long silk gown, seated at a table, going through a stack of parchments, checking accounts of some sort. Although I now regretted my outburst of the week before, he looked, in truth, exactly like a merchant. He wasted no time in pleasantries: ‘Are you fit?’ he said. I told him I was. He merely grunted and carried on writing. ‘When you entered my service, two, two and a half years ago,’ he said, slightly formally, ‘you swore that you would be loyal to me until death; do you stand by that oath?’
‘I hope I am not an oath-breaker, — ’I said, a little too haughtily.
He finally looked up from his pages and stared at me, his eyes as cold as naked steel in winter. ‘You might not be an oath-breaker, but you are insolent. What I want to know is: are you obedient?’
It hurt me to be at odds with my master: despite his many faults, he was still a man I respected and liked enormously. In a slightly more conciliatory tone, I said: ‘I serve you, sir, with all my heart, and in doing my duty, I strive always to be as loyal and obedient as I can.’
He finally smiled: ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I need you, Alan, to come with me tomorrow on a... on a training exercise. Speak to no one of this, but tomorrow we will be riding out. Be ready, mounted and armed, here at dawn. Oh, and don’t wear anything with my badge or blazon on it. You might say that we are to be travelling incognito.’ And with another brief smile, he looked back down at his papers; I was dismissed.
When I returned to the palace just before dawn the next day - mounted on Ghost, armed with sword and poniard and carrying my old-fashioned shield, with the snarling wolf device painted over with limewash - I was surprised to see Reuben, his leg a massive bundle of splints and bandages, mounted on a horse. He looked pale and had a slightly bemused look on his face, but he greeted me cordially, and I returned his affectionate words with gratitude. ‘What’s going on, Reuben,’ I asked. ‘In the first place, what are you doing on a horse, in your condition? You should be in bed.’
‘Best to leave the questions till later,’ advised my dark friend in a slightly slurred voice. ‘Let us just say that it is necessary that I accompany you. Do not be concerned for my discomfort — I have taken a strong draft of hashish dissolved in poppy juice - and the pain is hardly noticeable. In fact, I feel... I feel wonderful.’ And he giggled a little.
He might be feeling wonderful. But I was not. I had slept badly and awoke feeling dizzy and sweaty, with a slight but persistent headache. But I pushed all thoughts of my bodily weakness aside as we rode out of the high gates of Acre and turned our horses south. We were forty men in our company, roughly half archers and half men-at-arms, and all of us mounted on well-fed and re
sted horses. As we rode over a makeshift bridge that spanned the trenches that our army had dug while we were besieging Acre, I noticed that almost everybody in the party had a very familiar face: nearly all of them were former outlaws, who had been with Robin for many years. We were an elite group, I presumed, chosen because each man knew and trusted his fellows and had shared hardship and battle with them. There was also a sense of excitement in our band that I had not felt since we left England. We were going to undertake a training exercise, Robin had said, but it felt as if we were riding through Sherwood Forest on some mad escapade that would put silver in our pouches and a blush of shame on the Sheriff’s face.
We crossed a shallow river and turned south on to a wide expanse of sand, barely a road at all, that ran along beside the sea, and I saw that the countryside here could not have been more different to Sherwood: away from the deep blue sea, it was a stark, sun-bleached landscape, sandy and spare and even at that early hour glowering with the threat of a brutally hot day to come. To our left was a rank stretch of marsh land and beyond that, five miles or so away, rose a steep wall of green mountains — somewhere in those mountains, a mere morning’s ride away, Saladin was waiting with his vast army of Saracens, but I saw none of his famous Turkish cavalrymen that day. However, after a half a dozen miles of riding through that blindingly bright sand, the countryside began to bear the marks of Saladin’s presence: we passed burnt-out farms, charred olive trees, and the blackened stubble of whole fields of corn and barley that had been put to the torch. We saw no living thing, save the lizards that stared a proud challenge at us from the rocks on the side of the road before scuttling away at our approach. Saladin had emptied the area of anything that might give comfort to his enemy, and burnt anything he could not carry away, and we rode through a grim, blackened wasteland that stank of smoke and fear.
We stopped about mid-morning for a drink from the water skins - my headache had grown worse with the ride and now it felt like a tiny man was beating a great drum in my skull - and Robin passed out large black squares of silken cloth. ‘Tie these over your nose and mouth,’ he said. ‘It will stop you from breathing in the dust.’ We all tied these on and when we had ridden on for a few hundred yards, I did find that it was easier to breathe without choking on a fine mist of dust and powdered cinders from the burnt landscape. I also noticed that wearing these kerchiefs over our faces, it was very difficult to identify us. We were now a band of masked men, I realised, riding through enemy teffitory. For some reason the phrase ‘bandit- infested’ kept echoing around in my skull. And suddenly I knew why. And the realisation hit me like a mace to the face. We were the bandits, we were the predators who infested the countryside; and I then knew what the target for our ‘training exercise’ would be. It was a camel train loaded with frankincense, worth more than its weight in gold.
Robin was not content with merely telling the merchants of Gaza that they were getting a very good deal by selling their incense to him in that southern port; he was going to demonstrate in brutal terms why it was a big mistake not to trade with him.
Chapter Sixteen
As noon approached, Reuben led us off the coastal track and on to a path that led into the foothills. My head was splitting, but we were all suffering in the tremendous heat by that point, the sun beating down on our heads like the open door of a furnace. We all wore thin leather gloves, even in the heat, because to touch a piece of metal that had been so many hours in the sun was to receive a painful bum. Finally we turned off the track on to an even smaller path, fit for no more than goats, and steadily rising. We travelled in single file, and in silence, at Robin’s order, heads down, enduring the heat, our universe restricted to the dusty haunches of the horse in front; the only sound the clop-clopping of hoof on stony outcrop, blindly trusting that Reuben would lead us right.
Finally we stopped, long past noon, in a grove of cedar trees, which miraculously contained a small trickling spring. I watered Ghost and tied him to a bush, stripped off my mail hauberk, felt under-tunic and sodden chemise and sponged my body with deliciously cold spring water. I seemed to have no strength at all; my head was pounding, my body felt alternately hot and then very cold. I began to shiver even in the heat of the day. I tried to eat a little, but could not force anything down. Many of the men curled up in the shade of the trees. But I resisted an almost overwhelming the urge to sleep.
Little John was idly sharpening his great war axe beside the spring and I sat myself down next to him, hoping to distract myself from my discomforts, and said: ‘John, what are we really doing here?’
‘We are following orders like the loyal soldiers we are,’ he said, and carried on working the whetstone smoothly along the round edges of his weapon in rhythmic sweeps.
‘Seriously, John, please tell me. What are we doing here? What is going to happen?’
‘You don’t look well, lad. Are you ailing?’
‘I’m all right,’ I lied. ‘Tell me what is going to happen.’
He sighed. ‘God’s greasy bollocks. Don’t get all high and mighty, Alan. What we are doing is just the same as what we always used to do in the old days in Sherwood. We are going to stop a train of fat merchants, and relieve them of their wealth. See those scouts up there on the ridge?’ I looked over to the slight rise to the east of us; I could make out two human forms lying flat against the dun-coloured earth just below the crest. ‘I see them,’ I said.
‘They are watching for the camel train,’ said John. ‘When it comes, we are going to go up that crest, shoot the train full of arrows, charge down the other side and kill everybody who resists us. In short, we’re going to ambush them. We are going to take their goods - and teach them a lesson.’ He grinned at me, his old reckless battle-mad grin. ‘It’s what Robin wants; and as his loyal men we are going to carry out his commands. Some people might call it banditry, some might call it highway robbery. I call it a rewarding day’s work! Any road, Alan, you cannot speak of this to anyone, ever. Do you understand?’
I stared at him. I knew all the rules of being in Robin’s familia; and silence was one of the first. I was about to say something about Christ’s teachings, right and wrong, good and evil, but suddenly the world seemed to spin, my eyes fluttered, I felt myself falling, falling and everything went dark.
When I came to, I found I was wrapped up like a baby in my cloak and set under a broad cedar tree. Clearly the fever had returned and I found I hardly had the strength to move. I vomited once, copiously, and felt if anything slightly worse. Then I slept again. When I awoke, the sun was hanging low over the sea to the west and I could just make out a faint dust cloud to the south.
A signal was passed to the men and, as silently as they could, the archers strung their bows, and the cavalry mounted their beasts, and they moved into their positions on this side of the crest. Robin insisted that every man wear his black silk kerchief over his face. I had slept for perhaps two hours in the afternoon heat, and while I was not expected to fight because of my sickness, I wanted to see the battle. So I forced myself to my unsteady feet and slowly climbed up the side of the ridge on leaden legs until I was a yard or two from the top. My head was spinning, and my stomach lurching, but I made it, and cast myself down on the hot sand and rock.
Lying down flat just below the crest, I could see the camel train approaching through a haze of dust and heat. There were about forty beasts, ambling along with their peculiar swaying gait; each burdened with two great bundles, tied either side of their humps, and with a man sitting well forward on almost on the camel’s neck, driving the animal along with a long stick. The camels were tied nose to tail to the animal in front and beside this long train of beasts of burden rode a single file of cavalry. They were perhaps twenty men, mounted on destriers, big, well-schooled warhorses, the men heavily armed with lance and shield - and wearing, I noticed with a splash of shock, white surcoats with a red cross. They were a detachment of Templar knights. We were going into battle against our friends and allies,
the humble knights of Christ, whose solemn duty it was to protect travellers and merchants on the dangerous roads of the Holy Land. I felt a wave of nauseous disorientation that was not entirely due to my fever: I was on the wrong side. These riders were holy knights, doing God’s work protecting the weak. My friends and companions were thieves who meant to murder innocent men and steal their goods. My vision blurred, blackened, and I had to drop my head into my arms for few moments to regain my senses.
When I looked up, the camel train was now a mere fifty paces away. Should I warn them? The Templar knights were riding into a trap. But what of my loyalty to Robin and my friends? Before I could come to a decision, the choice was taken from me. To my far left, I heard Robin shout: ‘Up!’ and twenty bowmen sprang out of the earth on the ridge; pulled arrows from their arrow bags on their hips and nocked them to their bows. ‘Stand fast ...’ shouted Robin. ‘Aim at the horsemen, we only want the horsemen ... And loose!’
There was a noise like a passing flight of birds and the first wave of arrows smashed into the column of Templar knights like a mighty wind rattling a stand of dry reeds: the yard-long ash shafts clattering shields and armour, some of the steel bodkin heads lancing deep into mail-clad torso and thigh, puncturing bellies and lungs. There were yells of pain and gouts of blood; horses hit by accident screamed and cavorted on their hind legs. The camel train, panicking, began to run madly, blindly ahead; coming closer to our position. ‘Fast... and loose,’ shouted Robin and once again the grey shafts sliced into the white surcoats of the horsemen below us, punching into flesh. Half a dozen saddles were now empty, but these knights were some of the best-trained fighting men in Christendom. There were shouts of command and some sort of order was quickly forged from the chaos of bucking horses and cursing, blood-splattered men. The knights massed in a single line facing the bowmen silhouetted on the ridge and, shields high, lances levelled, they began to gallop towards us - only to be met by another devastating flight of arrows, which emptied another handful of saddles.