by Peter Kerr
‘Now I know why God has blessed me with the task of reclaiming this land from the infidel,’ he murmured, his eyes alight with almost childlike wonder. ‘Did you ever see such a beautiful place?’ He savoured the view for a moment or two, then turned to his companions and said, ‘You know, when I was a child being brought up by the Templars in Aragon, one old knight told me of a Muslim legend which has it that, when Allah created Earth, each land was given five wishes. Al-Andalus, as the Saracen thieves named Spain, asked for a clear sky, for a sea full of fish, for beautiful women and plentiful fruit. The final wish, which was for good government, was rejected by Allah on the grounds that it would have completed the creation of an earthly land to rival Heaven itself.’ A look of grim determination was on the king’s face as he concluded, ‘But with God’s help, we will surely show our contempt for Allah’s lack of benevolence by establishing a true Christian Heaven right here in Mallorca!’
En Nunyo Sans respectfully though pointedly replied that, while the king’s motives were unquestionably pious and worthy of the steadfast support of all his followers, there was still much to do before he’d be in a position to create a government of any kind in Mallorca. ‘Firstly,’ he went on, ‘there’s the matter of finding a suitable landing place for our forces. The logic behind our chosing the northern Bay of Pollença was that our advance on the city of Medîna Mayûrqa would be made by traversing southward over the island’s central plain – an easy route for our men and horses, while providing precious little opportunity for ambush by the Saracens.’ He gestured towards the mountains the king had just been admiring. ‘Now we’re faced with an altogether more daunting route to our target, I fear.’
To which En Guillen de Muntcada quickly replied, ‘Unless, of course, there’s a landing place with a more even terrain between here and the city.’
‘But that’s where we’re at a loss,’ En Remon put in, ‘because we’ve no detailed knowledge of this southern coastline.’
With a wry smile, En Guillen shook his head. ‘You should never jump to a negative conclusion so readily. Remember, an essential of any military campaign is to be prepared for at least the most likely contingencies.’
En Remon raised his shoulders. ‘You have the better of me.’
‘And me,’ King Jaume admitted.
Nunyo Sans smiled knowingly, but maintained a diplomatic silence.
With mischief in his eyes, En Guillen gave the king an enquiring look. ‘Are you forgetting the captain of my ship’s controversial appointment of a certain ex-pirate to the crew of your Majesty’s galley?’
‘Certainly not!’ the king retorted. He gave an imperious toss of his head. ‘In fact, I was just about to summon him myself.’ Snapping his fingers, he beckoned a seaman who was standing in attendance nearby. ‘Take the skiff to my galley and bring the helmsman Pedrito Blànes to me immediately!’
*
A wiggly line drawn with a stick into the sand of Es Pantaleu’s tiny beach comprised Pedrito’s improvised map of the south-western coastline of Mallorca. The king and his council of war, which comprised a selection of senior nobles and the shipmasters of most authority in the fleet, looked on attentively.
‘So, senyors,’ Pedrito said, pointing with his stick, ‘this mark here denotes where we are now.’ He moved the stick eastwards along the crude chart. ‘And here we have the inlet to the port of Andratx. An excellent natural harbour, but still with a mountain pass to negotiate before gaining a level approach to the city.’ He moved his pointer farther in the same direction. ‘And this curve is the Ensenada of Santa Ponça, a cove quite wide enough to accommodate a large fleet, and with the creek of Sa Caleta at the far end a handy place for unloading vessels directly ashore.’
Mutterings of approval were exchanged.
‘Then, senyors,’ Pedrito continued, while moving his twig even farther eastward, ‘you have an unobstructed crossing over the Sa Porrassa peninsula for the final approach along level ground skirting the coast to –’ he jabbed his pointer into the ground ‘– the city of Medîna Mayûrqa!’
Further positive-sounding murmurs ensued.
‘How far from this Santa Ponça to the city?’ asked En Nunyo Sans.
‘Eleven miles, maybe twelve.’
And was the route overlooked by high ground, Remon de Muntcada wanted to know?
Indeed it was, for at least the final five miles, Pedrito informed him.
Pensively, En Guillen de Muntcada scratched his beard. ‘Hmm, the enemy on the high ground and our men on the low. Never the best of positions for engaging in battle.’
‘We’d be at the mercy of their archers,’ En Remon warned. ‘And with our backs to the sea at that.’
Mutterings of disapproval were exchanged.
‘Enough!’ barked the king. ‘The only way to gain the initiative in such a situation is to take the high ground from the enemy.’
‘Ah yes, but we could suffer heavy losses,’ Nunyo Sans advised.
‘And what in heaven’s name do you think waging war is all about?’ the king bristled, his patience stretched to the limit. ‘I expected more of my nobles than the girlish whimpering of nuns!’
‘That may well be, my lord,’ said En Guillen dryly, ‘but we’re already dangerously inferior to the enemy in numbers, so –’
‘So, we just have to fight all the more fiercely! Have you really so little trust in the succour of God for those who bear arms in His name?’
Heads were hung in silence for a few moments before Nunyo Sans plucked up the courage to tell the king that, although they all realised how committed he was to the holy cause, they, in their experience as generals, were only trying to ensure that no unnecessary risks would be taken. For to do so, he cautioned, would surely be to hand victory to the Saracens and to commit many good Christian knights and soldiers to a pointless death.
Despairingly, the king shook his head. ‘As our Lord Jesus Christ said, “Oh thou of little faith…”’
At that, a cry rang out from one of the galleys standing lookout to the seaward of Sa Dragonera island:
‘Vaixell a la vista! Look – a ship! A ship!’
And sure enough, approaching from the west was a sail, and another, then another, and yet another still. Soon there were twenty or more, making good headway towards Mallorca from the direction of mainland Spain.
‘It’s our fleet!’ one of the king’s squires shouted. ‘See, on the mast of the lead ship – the banner of the Knights Templar!’
‘Oh thou of little faith,’ a patently self-satisfied king repeated to his crestfalled barons. ‘Wherefore didst thou doubt?’ He then dusted off his hands and declared, ‘Now, gentlemen, I suggest that you, En Remon, take Master Blànes here aboard your galley and let him guide you along the coast so that you can assess his suggested landing place at Santa Ponça.’ He turned to his cousin Nunyo Sans. ‘And it’s best that you follow in your galley as an escort. Sí, and make sure both vessels carry the biggest complement possible of first-class crossbowmen in case of a Saracen attack.’ He paused to look directly at each of his senior nobles in turn. ‘Even our protector, the Lord God Almighty, is entitled to expect a little human assistance occasionally!’
*
As it transpired, the reconnoitering mission attracted no response whatever from the enemy. Indeed, not one Moorish vessel ventured forth from any of the small coves that nibble the coastline in that part of the island, nor was there evidence of the two Christian galleys being observed from the shore. It was taken for granted by the king’s two commanders, nevertheless, that their every move was being watched by countless pairs of dark eyes on the wooded hillsides bordering the sea.
While it was unnerving for King Jaume to know that the Moors were in the fortunate position of being able to play a waiting game, he was able to take considerable encouragement from Nunyo Sans and Remon de Muntcada reporting, on their safe return to the islet of Es Pantaleu later in the day, that Pedrito Blànes’ description of the Bay of Santa Ponça ha
d been absolutely accurate. It was indeed an ideal landing place, with the added advantage of being overlooked by a hill large enough to accommodate an advance party of at least five hundred knights and foot soldiers – sufficient, they calculated, to hold off any Moorish attack while the rest of the army was being disembarked.
The king’s rising spirits were elevated even more when, towards sunset, the last of the main body of the fleet finally dropped anchor in the channel between Sa Dragonera island and the bay of Sa Palomera. His faith in the benevolence of God had been totally vindicated. Every one of the vessels that had left the mainland with him four days earlier had now arrived at Mallorca, and not a single man, horse or item of battle equipment had been lost during the two great storms.
For Pedrito’s part, a feeling of melancholy tempered his gladness for the king and the successful start to his attempted reconquest of Mallorca. For, deep down, he had no real wish to be involved in this crusade, or rather in the bloodshed and destruction that would accompany it. He had been as happy as any boy could be when living and working with his adoptive parents on their little farm near the Andratx coast, and, as he had told the king himself, the fact that they’d lived under Muslim rule hadn’t been of any significant hardship at all. No more and perhaps even less, Pedrito privately mused, than might have been the case under the strict auspices of the Christian Church.
Yet it wasn’t so much these unfathomable religious contentions and the inevitable violence they spawned that was troubling him as he sat outside the king’s tent that evening. No, it was the fact that he was now so near his family that he could actually walk to them in under an hour from the beach opposite, on which that huge Moorish army was assembled. Even greater had been his urge to make immediately for home when sailing past the mouth of the Andratx inlet earlier in the day. In the distance, he had seen the two tall palm trees that stood guard over his parents’ little farmhouse on a rise just half a mile inland from the head of the cove. The temptation to jump ship and swim ashore had been almost overwhelming, particularly on the return trip, when the merits of the Santa Ponça landing place had already been confirmed by the king’s two barons. But what would have been the point? If he hadn’t been shot by the galley’s archers for desertion, he would probably have had his throat cut as a spy by one of the many Moorish soldiers who were doubtless lying in wait on shore.
How many times had he and his father welcomed the sight of those tall palms when rounding Sa Mola headland on their way home from a fishing trip? And how many more times had he longed to see them again during those five hellish years chained to the sweat-stinking ribs of an Arab pirate galley? Home. Now he was so close that he could almost smell the olive-wood smoke from his mother’s bread oven drifting over Es Tres Picons ridge across there to the right of the bay. Home. His mother, his father and his little sister Esperança. ‘Hope’ was her name, and hope was what the memory of her laughing eyes brought to him every time he was in danger of being drawn into the depths of despair while slumped gasping for breath in the reeking belly of that damned galley. Esperança. She’d be almost seventeen now. A beauty to break the hearts of many a young village lad, if she cared to put those eyes of hers to best use – as undoubtedly she would. She was a girl after all. Pedrito smiled wistfully at the thought.
‘Your thoughts are far away, amic. Surely you aren’t longing for your pirates and their barren shores of Morocco, when this Garden of Eden awaits you.’
Pedrito looked up to see the king gazing over the water of the bay towards that selfsame ridge of Es Tres Picons. Admiration was in his eyes, but there was also a trace of avarice. Pedrito was coming home, and he wanted nothing more, but King Jaume was coming to take, to conquer, to change and, in his own words, to destroy those unwilling to convert to his own faith. In the process, albeit in the name of God (or a god), something of the truly heaven-sent allurement of the island and the contented lives of its people would be forfeited for the material gain of relatively few. And all of them strangers – even the king.
‘All I’m longing for is home,’ Pedrito replied. ‘I can’t wait to see my family again.’ He then told the king how he had been tempted to swim ashore when passing the Andratx inlet earlier in the day.
‘Pah,’ the king scoffed, ‘Nunyo Sans would have given the order for you to be shot before you’d swum half your own length.’
‘Why do you think I didn’t dive in?’ Pedrito swiftly retorted.
The king stared at him for a sign that he might be joking.
Pedrito’s face remained expressionless.
King Jaume looked genuinely hurt. ‘Your allegiance to me is as fragile as that?’
Pedrito allowed a few strained moments to pass, then said, ‘Show me one man in all the thousands with you who’d rather have an arrow in the back than delay seeing his family for a few days.’
The king smiled awkwardly, not knowing quite how to take that.
‘But anyway,’ Pedrito continued, straight-faced, ‘it really wasn’t fear of En Nunyo’s bowmen that bolstered my allegiance to you.’
The king’s look of relief was tinged with uncertainty. ‘It … wasn’t?’ he checked.
‘Absolutely not, because with luck I could have swum underwater for long enough to get out of arrow’s range. No, no, what persuaded me to stay aboard the galley was the fear of having my gizzard slit by a Moor’s scimitar when I did make it ashore.’
The uneasy smile on the king’s face graduated into one of hesitant good humour. ‘I, ehm, I believe you may be teasing me, Master Blànes.’
Pedrito’s expression remained inscrutable. ‘No more, senyor, than you teased me about being called Little Pedro.’
A few more tense seconds passed, then, as a playful grin spread over Pedrito’s face, the king started to chuckle. Pedrito joined him, and soon their unbridled laughter was ringing out over the bay – an incongruous sound, which probably intimidated the encamped Moorish army as much as their own ghostly silence had disconcerted the king earlier in the day.
‘You’re a brave man, Little Pedro!’ he beamed, slapping Pedrito’s back.
‘Not brave enough, though, to risk a Christian arrow up my arse or a Moorish blade across my windpipe.’
‘No, but brave enough to take risks with your king’s sense of humour. What if I’d thought you were making fun of me, instead of having fun with me?’
Pensively, Pedrito stroked the lobe of his ear. ‘Well, I suppose I’d probably have had the honour of being the Reconquista’s first victim of your Majesty’s sword.’
‘Indeed you would, amic,’ the king chortled. ‘Indeed you would. And you’re all the braver in my eyes for admitting it, even though your opportunities for doing anything other than staying within the ranks of my troops appear to have been somewhat limited.’
Pedrito got to his feet, looked squarely at the king and said, ‘I’m not a brave man, senyor, but I am a man of my word, and I promised you I’d repay the favour you did me when you took a hand at the helm during that first storm.’
The king canted his head to one side. ‘And that repayment is?’
‘My willingness to do your bidding during this crusade … provided you don’t expect me to kill anyone, whatever his colour or creed.’
A little snort of disdain escaped the king’s nostrils. ‘Fine sentiments for a lady in waiting, perhaps, but of little value to a soldier. Sí, and if such grand principles withstand the heat of battle, as God is my witness I’ll eat my chain mail!’
‘Well now, that’ll take a fair pinch of salt, and no mistake,’ Pedrito quipped. ‘But don’t worry, Majestat, I know where the best salines on the island are, and I’ll happily take you there to season your hauberk when the time comes.’
‘And I’ll hold you to that, if the time comes,’ the king replied with an owlish wink. Then, ushering Pedrito a few paces down from his tent to the tiny beach where the impromptu council of war had gathered earlier, he said, ‘But I’ve summoned you here this evening for another
purpose entirely, and that’s to take my mind off what lies ahead by having that promised talk with you about what lies in the past – both your past and my own.’
5
‘FOOD FOR THOUGHT’
THE SAME EVENING – THE ISLET OF ES PANTALEU, IN THE SOUTH-WEST OF MALLORCA …
As bizarre as it was for the king of such a large realm as Aragon-Catalonia to be conducting an informal pre-hostilities conversation with a mere seaman, the location did at least match the occasion. The entire islet of Es Pantaleu would have fitted inside the walls of one of King Jaume’s more modest castles, though without the most basic of amenities. It was nothing but a turtle shell of rock with a few scrubby thorn bushes scattered about, and without even the simplest of moorings for a boat. For why would anyone want to tie up there anyway? After all, not even the lizards of Sa Dragonera Island had bothered to swim over and colonize Es Pantaleu. And the two boulders that had been selected by the king as makeshift seats for himself and Pedrito would never have been considered suitable stools for court milkmaids, far less the base of a royal throne. But the rocks were rounded by the age-old attentions of the sea, so were comfortable enough for the present purpose, while boasting the added benefit of providing an unobstructed view of the attendant Moorish army and any moves it might make.
‘I see they’re pitching their tents now,’ the king observed.
‘Making ready for a long stand-off?’ Pedrito suggested.
‘Then they’ll be disappointed. Tomorrow is the sabbath, so we rest, but then… Well, En Nunyo and the Muntcadas are finalising details for the invasion with the other leading barons on the ship of the Bishop of Barcelona even as we speak.’