by Hight, Jack
John handed over the coins and shuffled forward with the crowd. The bridge was wide enough to accommodate sixteen men abreast, but the sides were lined with merchants’ booths and pedlars hawking their wares. In between, singers, fire-eaters and jugglers were entertaining the crowd. Near the middle of the bridge, John passed a barber pulling a man’s tooth before a crowd of onlookers. The barber was a bear of a man with muscled shoulders and meaty forearms covered in thick black hair. More hair protruded from the collar of his thick wool shirt. He grabbed hold of the man’s tooth with iron pinchers and jerked it free in one pull. His patient fell forward, blood dribbling from his mouth, while the barber held up the tooth for all to see.
After crossing the stone portion of the bridge, John entered the city. Narrow wooden houses crowded close on either side, casting the street in dark shadows. He stopped at the first intersection. A small stone church sat at the south-west corner. At the far end of the street to the right, he could make out the walls of the Tower of London. Ahead, the road ran straight through the city for as far as he could see. The street to his left curved slightly so that he could only see a short way up it. He had no idea where to go. A man with a white crusader’s cross sewn on his cloak stepped out of the church. He wore boiled leather beneath his cloak. A soldier. The man was clean-shaven and had a broad nose and full lips.
‘God keep you, good sir,’ John greeted him.
‘And you, sir,’ the man murmured as he made to pass on by.
John fell in beside him. ‘I see you have taken the cross. I also wish to join Richard’s crusade. Might you tell me where his army is gathering?’
The man stopped. He examined John and frowned. ‘I’ll tell you, but I don’t think they’ll take you, old man. Richard is looking for warriors – young, strong men.’ He nodded towards the street that curved away to the left. ‘Follow Watling Street out past Newgate. The army is camped north of the city on the banks of the Fleet.’
‘You have my thanks.’
The soldier grunted and continued on his way. John turned up Watling Street. Patches of melting snow dotted the way, and a mixture of night soil and God knows what else drained down the middle. John caught his reflection in a pool of murky water. His hair, more grey than blond now, had receded at his temples. Crow’s feet stretched out from the corners of his eyes and his forehead was marked by deep creases. When had he grown so old? He still remembered arriving in the Holy Land as if it were yesterday. He had been sixteen. That was forty-two years ago.
He continued up Watling Street and crossed a wooden bridge over a stream. The waters smelt foul, but women were washing clothes in them. A child scooped up a pail of water and lugged it away. Further on, the road branched. To the left it ran to a massive, half-finished church, the nave open to the elements at one end. He took the right branch and soon came to a vast square with half a dozen streets leading from it. In front lay a grain market where merchants haggled with farmers who had brought carts loaded with wheat or barley. John was halfway across the square when he heard a loud scream behind him, followed by shouting. He turned to see another market at the far end of the square. Four of the houses that bordered it were burning. A crowd had gathered before each of them, but the people were not attempting to extinguish the blaze. They were shouting at the occupants. One particularly strident voice reached John. ‘There’s a taste of hell for you, Jew!’ A man ran from one of the houses. His hair was on fire. The crowd closed on him, and he disappeared amidst swinging fists and kicking feet.
John turned away and went to the stall of the nearest grain merchant. Its proprietor was a thin, bald man with long fingers that had thick, red knuckles. He sat on a stool, huddled beneath thick furs. ‘What is happening?’ John asked.
‘The Jews.’ The merchant spat. ‘They sent men to the King asking to have their portion of the Saladin tithe decreased. The King turned them out. Someone at the palace gate struck one of the Jews, and a crowd gathered. I saw them parade by with one of the Jew’s heads. Bad for business, that.’ The merchant spat again. ‘The crowd isn’t content and has come looking for more Jews. They’re burning them out of their homes.’
John watched the buildings burn. The crowd was growing louder, shouting taunts. Suddenly, a man jumped from the second storey of one of the houses. He landed in the crowd, knocking three men down, and was up instantly and running. He managed to get free and sprinted down the street towards John. The crowd gave chase. The man flashed by. He was young and had a short black beard. He turned sharply and ducked into a church. The crowd gathered outside and shouted for him to come out. Finally, four men headed in after the Jew.
John thought of his friend, Ibn Jumay. The Jewish doctor had saved John’s life more than once. John would likely never see him again, but perhaps he could return the favour. He pushed through the crowd and into the church.
The interior was dim, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. He walked forward between shadowy pews. There was the Jew, crouching behind the altar as the four men approached. Two of them wore leather armour and carried clubs. One wielded a cleaver. The fourth was in mail and held a sword.
‘Leave him be!’ John shouted. ‘That man has sought shelter in a house of God.’
The man with the sword turned. He was a handsome youth with long blond hair that framed an angular face. He was a lord. Over his mail he wore a velvet doublet emblazoned with the arms of his house: a field of ermine bordered with a band of scarlet containing six gold horseshoes. ‘This is no business of yours, old man,’ he snapped in French.
‘I am a priest, ordained by God. What happens in His house is my business.’
‘God don’t care about his sort, father,’ the man with the cleaver said. He wore a bloody butcher’s smock.
John took his mace from his belt. His voice was hard and edged with menace. ‘You will not shed blood in the house of God.’
‘Do not make us hurt you, grandfather,’ the young lord scoff ed.
‘You are welcome to try.’
The lord smirked. ‘I shall do quite a bit more than try.’
The butcher held back, but the other three advanced together, the lord flanked by the men in leather. John let them come. The man on the right swung his club for John’s head. John sidestepped the blow and grabbed the man’s arm. The lord lunged at John, and he swung the man he held on to the lord’s sword point. The man in leather screamed and fell to the floor, blood seeping between his fingers where he clutched his gut.
The young lord stood wide-eyed, staring at the blood on his blade. ‘I am a king’s man,’ he hissed. ‘You will pay for that with your life.’
John’s only response was to raise his mace.
‘Stop! This is a house of God!’ someone called behind him. He turned to see a thin man in white priest’s robes. John saw a flash of gold as the priest swung the heavy cross that he had taken from the altar, and then pain exploded in his temple and the world went black.
‘Get up!’
John started awake as the toe of a boot dug into his side. A man in mail stood over him; he was holding a torch. John squeezed his eyes shut against the light. His head was pounding. He felt just above his ear, where the priest had struck him. His hair was sticky with blood.
‘Get up!’ the guard said again. ‘The King wants to see you.’
John pushed himself to his feet. He was in a windowless room with smooth stone walls and a thick, iron-banded door. The guard led him out into a dim hallway. They went up a flight of stairs and down another hallway, this one with windows looking out on the Thames. John could see London in the distance, a haze of wood smoke hovering above it. He followed the guard up more stairs. The halls here were covered in thick carpets that swallowed up the sound of their footsteps. The guard stopped at a door decorated with flowery steelwork. He knocked. A square-jawed man with curly auburn hair and hard grey eyes answered.
‘The prisoner, milord,’ the guard said.
The man nodded and opened the door. John st
epped into a small room with a beamed ceiling and walls hung with tapestries that depicted hunting scenes in bright colours. The room was dominated by a large table, which left barely enough space for the crowd of courtiers. A young man with a sparse red beard lounged against the window embrasure to John’s left while a stooped old man with pale, sagging skin leaned on the side of the table. The rest stood. They were hard men in the prime of life. Two were dressed in bishop’s robes. The others were lords with arms embroidered on their doublets. Amongst these last, John noticed a man with the same arms as the young lord he had confronted in the church. His hair was more white than blond and his cheeks more hollowed, but he had the young man’s same angular face. John guessed that this was his father.
Behind the table sat a man so handsome that he might be called beautiful. He was clean-shaven and strong-jawed, and had reddish gold hair that fell to his shoulders. His eyes were the blue of Acre harbour on a sunny day. He wore a thin circle of gold on his head. This was King Richard.
The man who had let John in took his arm and pulled him forward to stand before the table. ‘The prisoner you wished to see, Your Grace. The one who tried to save the Jew.’
‘And killed one of my son Henry’s men,’ the hollow-cheeked man said.
‘Your son killed him,’ John replied.
‘Liar!’
‘Enough, Walchelin.’ Richard’s voice was a rich baritone, and he spoke in the curt tone of one accustomed to command. The king looked to John. ‘You heard Lord de Ferriers. He claims you killed one of his men and threatened to kill his son in order to protect a Jew. He has asked for your head.’
‘The Jew had taken shelter in a church, Your Grace.’
‘What does that matter? Young de Ferriers was doing my bidding, and God’s work. I need gold for my crusade. I’ve already sold every lordship and parcel of land that I can find buyers for. I’d sell London itself if I could, but no one wants this shit-hole. So I need the Jews’ coin. I have asked for twenty-five per cent of what they own. They came to me wheedling and pleading that they be allowed to give less. Such impertinence must be punished. You can be sure the Jews from the rest of my kingdom will pay readily enough now.’
‘Evil done in God’s name is still evil, Your Grace.’
Richard smiled at that, showing even white teeth. ‘You are either a bold man or a fool to speak thus to your king. How are you called?’
‘John of Tatewic.’
‘From near Yorkshire, Your Grace,’ said the wrinkled old man leaning on the table.
‘And what brings you to this stinking cesspool of a city, John of Tatewic?’
‘I wish to join your crusade.’
The young man by the window laughed, though his green eyes showed no sign of mirth. Richard smiled again. ‘A crusader who loves Jews and an old man at that. What use would I have with you?’
‘I have spent most of my life in the Holy Land, Your Grace. I fought in King Louis’ crusade. I was at Hattin and at Jerusalem when it fell. I served as Archdeacon of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and as Abbot of Mount Sion. I lived among the Saracens. I know the enemy you will fight and the lands on which you will fight them.’
Richard’s blue eyes narrowed. ‘Perhaps I shall have to spare you after all.’
‘He is no abbot,’ Walchelin put in. ‘And I doubt if he has ever sailed beyond our shores. He lies to save himself, Your Grace.’
‘We will know the truth of it soon enough.’ Richard nodded to the stern man who had opened the door. ‘De Chauvigny, bring Heraclius.’
While they waited, Richard poured himself some wine. He filled a huge goblet – gold and encrusted with jewels – that held half the pitcher. He had drained it and poured another by the time Heraclius entered.
The patriarch wore his ceremonial garb: gold-embroidered robes of white silk; a stole of shimmering golden silk around his shoulders; and atop his head a mitre encrusted with jewels that glittered in the candlelight. His eyes widened when he saw John.
‘Patriarch Heraclius,’ Richard addressed him. ‘Thank you for attending me. Do you recognize this man?’
Heraclius weighed his answer for a moment before he shook his head. ‘I have never seen him before.’
‘You bastard!’ John growled. He lunged for the patriarch, but two men held him back. One of them twisted John’s arm painfully behind his back.
Heraclius’s full lips curled into a sneer. ‘Whoever he is, he seems quite the savage.’
Walchelin’s hand went to the dagger at his belt. ‘Let me kill him, Your Grace.’
‘Not yet.’ Richard studied John. Their eyes met. ‘Leave us, all of you.’
‘Your Grace!’ Walchelin protested.
‘Go! I wish to speak with him alone.’ When the courtiers had shuffled out, Richard rose and came around the table to stand before John. The king was a big man, half a hand taller than John and with broad shoulders and strong hands. ‘I know a liar when I see one,’ he said. ‘How long did you spend with the Saracens, John of Tatewic?’
‘Fifteen years, Your Grace.’
‘How did you come to be amongst them?’
‘I was captured at the siege of Damascus and sold as a slave. I served in the household of Najm ad-Din. I was the personal slave of his son, Saladin.’
‘The same Saladin who took Jerusalem? You know him well?’
John nodded. ‘I was the captain of his private guard. We were like brothers, once.’
‘God has sent you to me for a reason, John.’ Richard clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I have need of you. Heraclius is a prating fool. He has travelled across Europe begging men to take up the cross, but he cannot tell me one useful thing about the enemy we will face. One thing I learned from my father, may the devil piss on him, is to never move forward without knowing the lay of the land. With you at my side, I will not be marching blind.’
‘I will serve you as I am able, Your Grace.’
‘You will be my secretary. The march to Palestine will take months. I expect you at my side every day. By the time we arrive, I will know everything there is to know about our enemy.’
‘Your Grace, if I may?’ Richard nodded, and John continued. ‘You speak of marching to the Holy Land. I have trod that road in the army of King Louis. The emperor in Constantinople gave us little help, and in Anatolia the Turks harassed us day and night. We lost more than half our men before we reached Acre. You would be better served taking a ship.’
‘You prove your worth already, John.’ The king grabbed his goblet and took another drink. ‘But ships are damnably expensive. We’ll need to kill more Jews.’
Chapter 16
April 1190: Acre
Yusuf sighed as he sank into the pool. When his feet touched the bottom, the steaming waters came up to his chin. A bath attendant poured a bucket of hot water over his head. Yusuf brushed the wet hair from his eyes and leaned back, resting the back of his head against the edge of the pool. Sunlight filtered through the cracks in the wooden roof. Where the rays passed through clouds of steam, they looked almost tangible, as if one could reach out and grasp them.
Ibn Jumay had prescribed frequent baths to help him recover from the illness that had laid him low last autumn. For weeks he had been confined to bed, racked by terrible pain that felt as if someone were twisting a dagger in his gut. His shit was red with blood. Ibn Jumay had prescribed him a diet of only water, boiled wheat and, once a week, a rich broth made of drippings from roasted meat. Slowly, he had recovered. By the time the winter rains ceased, he was able to resume his daily inspection of the lines. Still, he was weaker than he would have liked. The ride down the lines left his legs aching and his shoulders tight.
Yusuf closed his eyes and concentrated on breathing slowly and steadily, like in one of the drills he had done as a child, back when he was struggling to overcome the suff ocating fits that had afflicted him. The tense muscles in his shoulders relaxed, and the sounds of the camp seemed to fade away. He could have been anywhere – in Damas
cus or even in his favourite palace, the one in Cairo, with the windows that looked out over the city to the Nile and the pyramids beyond. He could almost hear Shamsa’s voice calling to him from the next room.
‘Saladin! Malik!’
Yusuf’s eyes snapped open. Saqr stood at the edge of the pool. ‘Az-Zahir has seen something from the tower,’ the mamluk said.
‘More Franks?’
After the winter storms had passed and the seas had become navigable again, the Franks had begun arriving in the hundreds – Danes, Frisians, Flemings, Frenchmen, Germans, Lombards and Hungarians. Two weeks ago, Conrad had returned from Tyre, where he had wintered, with yet more men and supplies to build siege engines. Yusuf had written to the caliph asking for men or money to fight the infidel. The response had come three days ago. The caliph sent two loads of naphtha, a few spear shafts, five experts in Greek fire and a letter of credit authorizing Yusuf to borrow twenty thousand dinars in his name. Such a paltry sum would pay his army’s expenses for no more than a week.
Saqr was shaking his head. ‘This is something different. The messenger Az-Zahir sent was most urgent.’
Yusuf climbed from the bath, and the flesh on his arms and legs prickled in the morning cool. He towelled off and dressed: leather breeches and boots; a padded vest; a mail hauberk that reached to his knees and wrists; over that his vest of golden jawshan; a coif to protect his neck; and lastly his gilt helmet, a golden eagle at its crest. He buckled his sword and dagger about his waist as he stepped outside.
Seagulls shrieked and wheeled overhead, riding the cool sea breeze. The camp was already full of life. A long line of men waited outside the bathhouses; another, longer line stretched away from the clay ovens where the army’s bread was baked.