No Man's Son

by Doris Sutcliffe Adams

  NO MAN’S SON

  The odds were five to one, and more than Rodriga could stomach; so she charged to the rescue, had to be rescued herself by the young squire, Piers, and learned her pity was needless. She had saved the notorious renegade, Marco, who had already been hired to murder Piers by his crippled step-brother, Robert.

  Discovering that Robert had stolen Piers’ inheritance, Rodriga’s father, Landry, hunted for proof through Richard the Lionheart’s army during the last days of Acre’s desperate resistance to the Crusaders. Landry was poor, landless, and too old to find employment. This was his only chance to marry Rodriga creditably before he died.

  The quest was to take Rodriga into the battleline, into the King’s hall, the hermit’s cave and the House of the Black Girl. But through peril and betrayal she had the unsought aid of Marco the harlot’s son, who at least knew gratitude.

  By the same author

  POWER OF DARKNESS

  NO MAN’S SON

  by

  DORIS SUTCLIFFE ADAMS

  WALKER AND COMPANY

  New York

  Dedicated to

  RICKY, BILLY, AND MY JEMIMA

  With my dear love

  Copyright © 1961 by Doris Sutcliffe Adams

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.

  All the characters and events portrayed in this story are fictitious.

  First published in the United States of America in 1969 by Walker and Company, a division of the Walker Publishing Company, Inc.

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 70-87070.

  Printed in the United States of America from type set in Great Britain.

  Table of Contents

  Foreward

  NO MAN’S SON CHAPTER I

  CHAPTER II

  CHAPTER III

  CHAPTER IV

  CHAPTER V

  CHAPTER VI

  CHAPTER VII

  CHAPTER VIII

  CHAPTER IX

  CHAPTER X

  CHAPTER XI

  CHAPTER XII

  CHAPTER XIII

  CHAPTER XIV

  CHAPTER XV

  CHAPTER XVI

  CHAPTER XVII

  CHAPTER XVIII

  CHAPTER XIX

  CHAPTER XX

  GLOSSARY

  CHAPTER I

  Eastward the stars were paling, and the great bare sweep of sands, that stretched southwards from Acre to where the gaunt spur of Mount Carmel thrust into the sea, shone lighter every moment, though the moon still ruled the sky. The waves, crisped by a brisk breeze, glimmered as they broke in lines along the curve of the bay, and the soft sigh of their breaking was already punctuated by voices, hoofbeats and the whinnying of horses. Prudent men exercised their mounts before the heat of the eastern day came to stun man and beast, and many were spreading south over the sands.

  Just beyond the Christian trenches that ringed the besiegers’ town of tents, a group of men, mounted and afoot, stood halted while two voices discussed earnestly the Saracens’ use of Greek fire and the best methods of countering it. On the edge of the group a tall courser fidgeted with his bit, tossed his head and sidled uneasily, impatient to be away. His rider murmured soothingly in a feminine voice, and the deeper man’s voice broke off in mid-sentence with an understanding chuckle.

  “Fretting, Rodriga? Off with you, lass—never stay for us to be done arguing!”

  “I might stay until Doomsday if I did, my lord!” retorted the girl on a note of exasperated amusement, and without further ado turned her horse and cantered away towards the brightening lines of surf. Her white kerchief gleamed, a fair mark in the paling moonlight, as she moved beyond the thin scattering of riders to the empty stretch of sands. The courser lengthened his stride and tugged at the reins, and when at last she had the whole sweep of the bay before her she settled down into the saddle and gave him his head. He reached into a long, raking gallop, spurning the firm damp sand in showers. The sky turned grey, the stars went out, the east flushed rose and gold. All at once the heaven was clear, cloudless blue, the sun’s edge tipped the sand-dunes on her left hand, and day had leaped upon them in one long stride.

  The girl laughed aloud in exultant gladness of flight over the perfect surface. The rush of wind set her kerchief straining back from her dark face, her black plaits leaping, her skirts a-flutter against the courser’s grey sides. The beach was not hers alone; about half a mile ahead a man was galloping in the same delight of surging speed, astride one horse and leading another. Out to sea, a little spot on the dazzling glitter of the waves, a black head bobbed, and wet limbs flashed in the low sunbeams, coming in fast on the curling crests. Envious of the swimmer’s refreshment, she watched for a moment, and had thundered past a little heap of dark clothing and white linen on the sand beyond the waves’ reach before she had more than glimpsed it. The sun’s strength was already manifest, reflecting from the sands in prophecy of noon’s searing glare.

  When the courser’s first urgency of speed slackened she reined him to a canter and then to a halt, and turned to look behind her, alone against the blue of sea and sky. None of her companions had followed her, but she had expected that and was not dismayed. She could see the honey-gold walls and towers of Acre, the mole and the harbour, and the Tower of Flies rising from the water to guard the Saracen galleys clustering like black beetles beyond it. Beneath the walls, along the sands, as far as the marshes of the River Belus, the city of tents encompassed Acre, but to the east the line of dunes concealed the encampment of Saladin and his army.

  The rider with the led horse, most likely a squire or groom exercising his lord’s destriers, had also halted far over the sands. The swimmer was in the shallows, wading thigh-deep up the long slope of the beach to the tiny mark that was his clothing. The throngs on the golden sands were increasing, and she should return to her people, but she would make concession to modesty and wait until the man had dressed. He was splashing through the edge of the surf now, a tiny spidery figure at that distance, dark against the glitter of the sea. More folk were drifting down from the camp, coloured specks and glints moving from the head, of the bay, and she shaded her eyes with her hand to look for her companions. The nearest human beings, apart from the swimmer, were the best part of a mile away, a little group of men on foot coming diagonally towards her and the sea. There was no rider with them, so they were no concern of hers.

  The little dark figure was clear of the water now and stooping; a moment more and he straightened, his arms jerking in the awkward gestures of one pulling on garments that clung to wet skin. He stooped again. The group of men, now obviously making for him, broke into a run, and the girl rose a little in her stirrups and shaded her eyes again. A shout came faintly over the sands, thin and far off, like the cry of a bird, and her fingers tightened on the plaited-leather stock of her riding-whip. The group had split into five units, running headlong at the swimmer. He bent to his clothing again, and she caught the glint of steel as he backed to the edge of the water. The girl realised what was happening, and fury and sympathy filled her. She uttered one fierce screech and touched her spurs to the courser’s flanks.

  He squealed in surprise, reared up, and thundered into a gallop in a storm of sand. The five murderers, spreading to surround their victim, were closing in fast, and she knew she could not be in time. But the victim, a slim white-shirted shape against the shimmer of the sea, was not going to die like a sheep. As the half-circle closed on him he feinted at its centre and then leaped, agile as a wildcat, at the further end of it. The girl cried a
loud in applause as he sidestepped, struck up the shaft of a lunging spear, ducked under and along its thrust and stabbed upward. The spear fell, and its wielder folded forward and kicked feebly in the sand. Then the other four were upon the swimmer.

  He backed into the shallow water, desperately holding them off as they circled about him in the surf like dogs on a bayed wolf. They were too intent on their killing to hear or heed the hooves storming down on them, and never turned to see the white-faced girl with the raised whip charging their backs. Their victim, backing and dodging with the waves creaming round his ankles, could not hold them off for long. He was armed only with a dagger, and shielded himself with a garment bundled round his left forearm. Rodriga glimpsed a thin dark face under plastered, dripping hair, a short black beard and deadly narrow eyes, and then the grey was rearing and squealing as she spurred him at the nearest back and slashed savagely at a raised dagger-hand with her whip.

  Vicious, startled faces gaped at her, and she lashed right and left at them with all her strength. The man who had been set upon, tall and lean and swift, leaped at the nearest. A club swung, and he reeled, spun round and dropped. A knife flashed as another knave pounced, and the girl forced the terrified, struggling horse at him and slashed fiercely at his face, bowling him over across the body of his victim. Water spattered into her face. She swung her mount round on his haunches beside the fallen man, laying about her furiously with the whip. A squat ruffian leaped at her, clutching at her gown and leg to tear her from the saddle. She beat savagely at his head and face with the butt of the whip, and the courser plunged and squealed, flailing out with his hooves. The other three, dodging them, crowded in on her, and one sprang, grabbed a great fistful of her skirt and heaved so that she was almost off her mount and into his arms.

  Someone raised a breathless yell of alarm over a sudden pounding of hooves, and the grip on her skirt fell away. A fair head and a pair of broad shoulders loomed up before her, a great bay head reared against the sky and steel-shod hooves pawed air, and a sword swept. The man’s gaping head opened in two halves like a split melon, and he went down, with his yell broken in mid-syllable. The force of his own blow almost spilled the rescuer, who straddled his mount bare-back, over the destrier’s tail, and by the time he had righted himself and wheeled about the remaining three were running madly in different directions. He let them go.

  Rodriga sprang from her saddle, caught up her skirts with one hand and splashed recklessly through the little waves to the fallen man. Then she checked for a heart’s beat, recognising the upturned face, and her indignant pity cooled a little. The attackers might have had good reason to make away with the most notorious knave and unscrupulous killer in Acre. Then she saw the blood that spread and wavered in the clear water washing intermittently over his face, and waded forward again. Since he had not been sufficiently obliging as to fall face-down and drown while the dispute raged over him, her duty was plain. She reached him, let fall her skirts to trail heavily in the warm water, and stooped to grip him. “Quickly, friend!” she gasped, hearing no sound from the rescuer who had brought such timely aid. “Help me with him!”

  Feet splashed to her side, and a big brown hand fell on her arm.

  “Leave him to those fellows, lady. The cur is not worth your trouble,” growled a sullen young voice.

  He had voiced her own first unworthy thought, and that lent heat to her indignation. She lifted her face angrily to his. “Leave him? To die like a dog?” she exclaimed, and when his hand tightened as though to drag her away, lifted her whip to menace him.

  “Do you not know him? That is Marco the renegade!” he protested.

  She slid her arm under the man’s neck to hoist his head out of the waves that washed over it. It fell back over her arm, streaming water and blood, the wet beard tilted to the sky. “Of course I know!” she snapped savagely. “And even he shall not drown by inches while I can prevent it!”

  “That is easily remedied!” answered the young man, and came round her, swinging his stained sword up and back as he measured his distance for a blow. “Stand away, lady, and his death shall honour him!”

  The girl let the heavy head souse back into the sea and scrambled between it and the blade, her whip lifting to strike and her thin face white and deadly. In the face of that protective fury the fair young man halted and then sulkily lowered his sword. “You shall not!” she spat. “You shall not murder him!”

  “No murder to cleanse the earth of such a reptile!” the young man replied hotly, but she turned her back on him and went down on one knee in the warm water. She got her arms under the lean body that was at once hard and limply yielding, and heaved his head and shoulders up and against her knee. He was still breathing, and whatever kind of knave he was, he had put up too valiant a fight to be left to drown miserably in six inches of sea-water, or to be finished off by a pack of jackals who chose odds of five to one. Above her, however, the injured voice of her fellow-rescuer protested against her decision.

  “I tell you, demoiselle, he is better dead! He is a renegade, a traitor, a trafficker with the Infidel, a hireling murderer!”

  “I do not care if he be Mahound himself! Have you no Christian charity in you?” cried the girl.

  “Charity? For him? A deal of it, since I have not pinned him to the sand like a beetle!” The young man turned away and swept his sword through the shallow water to wash off the blood and brain, and then stalked beyond the waves and gathered a handful of warm sand to rub it dry.

  Rodriga glared at his broad back and shock of rough fair hair. Plainly there was no aid to be had from him, but she was stubbornly determined on her salvage. “Go, you heartless hound!” she cried, changed her hold to the man’s armpits, clenched her teeth and started to drag him up the beach. She was much stronger than her thin body suggested, and heaved him round, his lax head dangling so that his hair trailed in the water. Her soaked skirts, clinging to her legs, hampered her, and she caught her heel in the cloth and nearly sat backwards. She kicked back to clear her legs and threw all her weight and strength against the inert body. A little grunt of effort escaped her.

  The young man uttered an impatient oath and his feet splashed towards her. She looked up, crimson with heat and exertion, and twisted to set a defensive shoulder between him and the senseless renegade. “You shall not touch him! He is hurt and helpless, un-knightly knave!”

  The young man flushed hotly. “As you wish,” he said gruffly. “Here, let me!” He stooped, set one arm under the heavy shoulders, the other under the man’s knees, and hoisted him bodily. He carried him up the beach and dumped him on the dry sand with no particular gentleness. Then he stood back, his fists on his hips, and inspected him like a fisherman assessing a disappointing catch. Rodriga, surprised and suspicious at his sudden change of front, squelched anxiously after him as fast as her sodden gown permitted.

  Marco the renegade sprawled on his back, his mouth slightly open and his eyes shut, clad only in loose shirt and short braies, and drenching the thirsty sand with sea-water and blood. He was breathing heavily and irregularly, as the lift of his chest under the clinging linen made evident. His shirt was ripped from left elbow to shoulder and streaming crimson, and more blood was soaking back through his hair from a gash high on his temple. The most dangerous criminal in Acre did not look at all formidable in that state, and the young man’s sulky scowl slowly changed to a grim smile as he stood over the girl and watched.

  Rodriga flopped to her knees, edged closer and lifted the dripping sand-clogged head to her lap. She hurriedly unwound a dark tunic from the man’s forearm and ripped his sleeve to the wrist, pulling it back from a long gash in the renegade’s lean brown arm. It was not deep, and the bleeding was already slackening. She snatched off her head-dress, a light linen kerchief held by a silver fillet in the comfortable old fashion now almost universally superseded by the intolerably hot wimple, and tore it into strips. In sixteen unsheltered years she had seen as much bloodshed as many men ach
ieve in a lively lifetime, and she bound up the wound with brisk competence and no change of countenance.

  The renegade stirred feebly as she tied the last knot, moving his head a little on her thighs. A faint frown gathered between his eyes. The young squire grunted and squatted beside him to prod unsympathetically at his head wound, and he flinched slightly, though his eyes remained shut. A purpling lump was rising under and around the cut, and the bleeding had slowed to a trickle. The young man pulled a disappointed grimace. “No creak or shifting,” he announced regretfully. “Skull in one piece. He will live to be hanged.”

  “Have we water?” asked Rodriga, ignoring the last comment. However true, it was scarcely seemly. She wiped the wound with her skirt, on which blood and water mingled in a sorry mess. The young man jerked a thumb unhelpfully at the glittering expanse of the Mediterranean.

  “Ample,” he said, and looked about him for a vessel as though he expected to see one materialise from the air at his need.

  “To revive him, I mean!” said Rodriga impatiently. His perfunctory co-operation was beginning to exasperate her. “He is coming to his senses.” She plastered back his sticky, drying hair and used the last of her kerchief to bind his head.

  “He will come to them without, demoiselle,” the young man answered indifferently. “None nearer than the river, in any case.” He rose to his feet, and stood a moment looking down at the unconscious man. He glanced about him, and then splashed back into the surf and stooped. He returned holding out a dagger to her across the palm of his hand; a heavy, long-bladed, double-edged weapon with a short cross-guard and a haft of some unfamiliar material that looked to be composed of tiny rough teeth. He thrust it into his own belt and straddled there with his hands on his hips, frowning.

  “He is rousing!” exclaimed Rodriga in sudden delight, feeling a quiver run through the slack shoulders propped against her, a hardening of limp muscles.