Knight Assassin

by James Boschert

  “We have much to talk about, my brother,” Talon said quietly. “I have much to tell you.”

  “The baby is your little sister, Talon. Her name is Ermessenda and she is two years younger than Guillaume,” his mother said.

  Talon turned and gazed back at the wide-eyed child partly hidden behind Aicelina’s skirts. Still kneeling, he once again held out his hand and waited for the shy child to touch his and then smiled at her. She continued to look at him solemnly without smiling.

  “She is afraid of you,” Aicelina said quietly. “She will be better in the morning.”

  He nodded and stood up. His mother reached for his arm and held him tightly, as though to prevent him from disappearing, and led them all into the hall. The bright fire in the middle of the smoky building was surrounded by a low wall of stones to contain it and put out a welcoming glow for the visitors. The light gleamed off the few iron shields hanging on the walls and flickered off the great black beams that held the roof together, creating huge dark shadows.

  Sir Hughes was in a joyful mood. The arrival of both his brother and his son was an occasion for great celebration. It was too late to prepare much of a meal for them tonight but his father promised them that on the morrow there would be a great feast for all and they would honor their arrival as custom dictated. In the meantime, they should drink some good wine and eat from the already prepared cheeses and meats that were available.

  It was inevitable that Talon should be the guest of honor. He would much rather Philip had been placed in that position, but his uncle was eager to ensure that Talon was accorded the honors due. The questions from his father and mother were continuous and probing.

  The questions came thick and fast that evening. By the light of the flickering torches and dancing black shadows along the wooden walls of the great hall the people of the fort crowded near to hear the tale of the long lost son. There was silence as they waited.

  Talon’s mother and father, impatient to know what had happened to him, barely touched their supper while he, tense with the newness and sudden demands made upon him, ate sparingly.

  “The last we heard of you was when Philip came back to the castle and told us of the ambush,” Sir Hughes said. “I went back the next day to investigate, but there were no clues as to whether you were alive or dead.”

  “The Templars,” his mother said. “Remember, Hughes? They came and told us that you had been taken by the Assassins for reasons we shall never know to far off Persia and not to expect to see you ever again, Talon. It was cruel news for me and I fear that I did not believe them at first. I could not believe them. Dear Lord be praised, He has delivered you back to us safe and sound.” She wiped another tear from her eyes with the hem of her apron.

  “Talon, tell us what happened to you.”

  “I will, Mother, but it is a long tale to tell.”

  “I don’t care,” Sir Hughes growled. “Tell us what happened to you in that barbarous place.”

  “They first took me to Castle Samiran, which is deep in the mountains of Persia. The journey was long and took months. They did not treat any of us well and several died along the way,” Talon started. “But for Jean, I do not think I could have survived.”

  “Jean de Loche? The priest? What happened to him?” Sir Hughes asked.

  “Later, some years later, he helped me to escape from their main castle, Alamut, which is the secret lair of the Agha Khan and is even deeper into the Alborz mountains, a sinister place and bad for him, but he stayed behind and they killed him for it,” Talon said harshly, looking down at the table.

  “God have mercy on his soul. The poor man to die so far from home in that barbarian country,” Marguerite exclaimed.

  “He was my friend and mentor, Mother. I miss him sorely even now. Mother, Father, in that country the mountains scrape the heavens and the plains are so vast that it takes weeks to go from one end to the other with barely a tree to be seen. I have seen cities that glow in the sunlight! Isfahan is a sight so beautiful that the people there call it ‘Half of the World.’ I was placed in this great castle called Samiran, first. They trained us to kill with stealth, quickly and suddenly, by night or day. Some boys could not do well enough and they, too, died.”

  “Why? Why did they do this?” his mother asked, looking horrified.

  “These are the Ismaili, the Hashashini, or, as you know them, the Assassins, who are feared across the Moslem world. Their master, the Agha Khan, is feared by all and hated by sultan and prince alike. He uses the trained young men to kill his enemies by stealth, often in public places, and no man is safe from him. They made me into a fida’i, a member of the brotherhood, and prepared me to kill someone, any enemy that the Agha Khan might command me to slay, either at night or in front of many people.”

  “Yes, these are the people that that Templar knight, Sir Guy, told us about,” Sir Hughes exclaimed.

  “It was Sir Guy, brother, who knew of these people and understood what they were about,” Philip said. “He told us then that these people were creatures of darkness and were to be feared by all men, and that they could be invisible to their enemies before they slew them.”

  “Did they make you as one of them?” Sir Hughes asked, somewhat apprehensively.

  “Yes, and more; it was the only way I could survive, and Jean told me that I needed to make sure that I came back to my people one day.”

  “So you lived among them for all these years? Were you not afraid that they would kill you?” Marguerite asked.

  “They nearly did, both on the way there and once there; they were not kind to me. There were many other boys of my age all being trained to kill with the knife and other weapons. My friend, Reza, who was one of the boys in training, and I became among the best. It was sometimes very painful to practice with him; he is a ferocious fighter.” Talon grinned ruefully at the memory.

  There was hesitant laughter at that from the listeners. Even the Welshmen were listening, trying to follow the language, sitting in the dark behind the others in the crowd.

  “So how did you escape, Talon? The Templar told us that few if any ever came back. You were not then a slave?” Sir Hugh asked.

  “No, I was a fida’i, a full member of the brotherhood and therefore I belonged to them just like any other. I eventually had to escape because while I was in the castle called Alamut, I and my broth... friend, Reza—who became like a brother to me over time as we shared many dangers and hardships together—discovered a plot to kill the Agha Khan. All the same, we were not allowed to move around the country freely, especially as he and I were the guards of the Agha Khan’s sister. She was a virtual prisoner in the castle because her uncle was plotting to kill the Agha Khan and did not want her to be free to move about in case she suspected something. Which we did in the end, and then we had to get away as we discovered that she was in mortal danger, too. We escaped and made our way back to Palestine where the Agha Khan was staying, to warn him of the danger.”

  “Did you succeed?” his mother asked.

  “We did. Uncle Philip, you might remember me telling you about it when you came to release me from the chains the Templars put on me.”

  “I do, indeed,” Philip mumbled, speaking with his mouth full after tearing a piece of meat off a bone. “You should have seen him, brother; he was so changed and the Templar had beaten him badly. I was hard put to recognize him.”

  “What do you mean, Philip? The Templars beat him and chained him?” Sir Hughes asked incredulously. “Why in God’s name would they do that?”

  “Because he looked like a Saracen when they captured him and his story was so incredible that no one believed him,” Philip replied, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “They locked him up and waited for me to come and clear his name. Talon, for the life of me, if you had not spoken up I would not have recognized you.”

  “I’m glad that you came, Uncle Philip, but it was too late for my friends.” He turned to his mother. “We, my friend Reza, Rav’an his sister
and I did save the life of the Khan. For which he released me to go back to the Franks. I had wanted to bring Rav’an with me despite the dangers and was trying to get to her when the Templars captured me. Their lives were in danger but the Templars refused to believe me and locked me up until Uncle Philip came with Sir Guy.”

  “I pray to God that your friends still live, Talon,” his mother said kindly, putting her hand on his arm.

  “Yes. So that’s the story, and here I am with you today.”

  He had left much out, but gave a good enough story to his impatient parents to satisfy them for the evening. Indeed, it was very late when he had finished. The fire was low and the hounds were quiet but not a soul in the great hall was asleep. They were spellbound by his story and talked among themselves late into the night about his miraculous return. His mother wept again and gave thanks to God often while his father nodded vigorously at the tale of Talon’s adventures and frequently wiped tears from his eyes, too.

  “Not so fast, Master Talon, you have not finished your tale, for there is more to tell of the journey here,” Max said, wagging a finger at him and laughing. He looked around at the company.

  “This young man was indeed well trained. I and Sir Philip here have seen him at work.” He paused for effect, glancing at Philip, who nodded with a grim smile. “The knight who imprisoned Talon was too eager to teach the ‘boy’ a lesson. They fought with knife and stick and the knight died. I have never seen such a display of skill. The man never stood a chance! Talon danced rings around him and then slew him in front of everyone! For that they put Talon back in chains.

  “Sir Guy had to get us all onto a ship before we were allowed to release him again so that he could not get into more trouble.” He smiled at the silent Talon. “I have rarely seen such a thing, Talon, and then you saved us from the pirates. Sir Hughes, your son is already a knight in all but name.”

  “Pirates?” Marguerite and Hughes exclaimed together.

  Philip thumped the table gleefully. “We were attacked by pirates, brother, and this young scamp burned them out before they could set foot on our ship.”

  After that there was much loud talk back and forth about the event at sea; even the Welshmen were brought into the discussion and Talon was able to relax while everyone else talked. He felt he was being watched and turned his head to see Aicelina looking at him appraisingly. He attempted a smile and received a cool dimple in return. She turned away and then got up and bustled his young brother off to bed.

  Finally it was time for everyone to retire for the night. Talon was shown to his lodgings by his mother, who held the candle high for him to see by. It was nothing more than a closed off area with a pallet and some warm furs. There were rough cowhide skins on the floor, along with the rushes. A far cry from Isfahan, he decided, but he was too tired to care or to quibble over the sleeping conditions by then. He was exhausted from the day’s ride and the emotional reception and he went to sleep quickly.

  Talon woke to the sound of bustle and activity outside. A cock was crowing and hens clucking, while people rattled metal pans and gossiped. He lay there listening to the new sounds of the fort waking up and starting the day’s business. There were all the sounds of a farm community, cows lowing, and horses stamping and snorting into their food, while people chattered and bustled about in the cool of the morning.

  He wondered again at the ominous atmosphere they had experienced on their arrival at the village. He was puzzled but decided that his father could probably shed light upon that. He got up and, only wearing his breeches and his linen shirt, looked about for some water to wash with. There was none.

  He gave a resigned shrug, pulled the leather curtain aside, then walked out into the short corridor toward the Hall. Three maids were clearing the old rushes off the floor and brushing at the dirt floor. They all greeted him politely with a curtsey but they whispered and giggled as he walked by. Servants were bringing logs inside and stacking them for the night fire and there was his mother just coming through the main doorway carrying some linen.

  She stopped halfway into the hall about ten feet away and looked at him. Then she beamed, laid aside the linen and came forward to embrace him. He opened his arms and once again they held one another without words. Then she stood back to look at him in the poor light of the hall. He was wearing his shirt loosely over his shoulders. She gave an exclamation and stared at him. The long scars of the old lion wounds drew her attention.

  “Talon, what happened to you? Did they torture you?”

  “No, Mother, I won a battle with a lion. It happened a long time ago, but it left its mark on me. I would not have lived but for the skills of the doctor who came and looked after me. He later became like an uncle to me. There are good people in those lands, despite our enmity.”

  “Praise be to God that you survived, my son. This is a story that you must tell tonight at the hearthside. Your father will want to hear all about it. But you look as though you could do with some breakfast. I shall get Aicelina to provide you with some food. You are not dressed for company,” she said reprovingly.

  “I want to wash. Is there no water I can bathe in? I have not bathed since I left Palestine and I swear I am getting fleas.”

  She looked at him in some surprise. “There is well water and there is water from the small river nearby.” Then it dawned on her. “Ah, you want to bathe. Well, I shall have to arrange for some water to be heated, I suppose.” She looked at him curiously. “I remember the times in Palestine. It was a rare event when we got you bathed then, you were such a restless boy.”

  “I learned to bathe, Mother,” he said simply, smiling at her.

  “Very well, I shall have the maids heat some water for you. Perhaps you can teach that brother of yours to like bathing, too, some day. He smells worse than a badger even for this rude place.” She chuckled dryly.

  She bustled off and he made his leisurely way out of the front door of the hall and out into the yard, where a flock of woolly sheep were being driven out of the gates. There was much bleating and scrambling as they all tried to get out of the narrow gateway at the same time, driven by two small boys dressed in very ragged clothes of homespun wool. Talon assumed they were being driven out to graze in the pasture that surrounded the fort.

  He had a chance to look around and see the layout of the fort. That was all it could be called to his now-practiced eye. His father used to run a castle, but now he owned this small fortress of wood pilings deep in a valley of the Languedoc. Talon was unimpressed with what he saw; this was a far cry from the castle of Montfort in Palestine.

  The smells of the yard struck his nostrils like a blow. He was quite unused to the odor of cattle and pigs, which was predominant. The smell of horses and goats and sheep in small wattle corrals mingled with the stink of the dung heap. This was not just a fort; it was a farm as well with all that went with it. He noticed the crude living quarters, stables, and barns arranged around the inside of the defensive timber walls. Their roofs provided a broad walkway along the battlements. He looked hard at the walls themselves. They were more of a palisade with platforms along the inner wall upon which men could stand and watch over the fields beyond. The high wall of timber would not stop him should he wish to enter. He recalled how he and Reza, his fida’i brother, had climbed rock walls twice as high in the dark and managed to get into people’s rooms undetected. Nonetheless, it offered space inside and protection for the village folk to take refuge in bad times from marauding bands of men.

  The hall where he had slept the night was a thatch-roofed, wattle-and-brick-walled structure located almost in the center of the yard. Now that it was daylight he could tell that it was a large building with huge wooden beams supporting another story above the one he had slept in. He assumed that his parents slept there with Aicelina and his brother and sister. He had noticed some crude wooden steps toward the back behind the alcove where he slept. Behind the hall were the sleeping quarters of the maid servants and the butteries�
�the place where the cooks carried out their work—and the storerooms where there seemed to be a lot of activity this morning. The steep roof of the huge wooden structure was covered with a thick layer of thatch that looked well maintained.

  He was absorbed in the inspection of the fortress when his father walked up.

  “Talon, good morning. I trust you slept well?” Then he exclaimed, “My Good Lord God! Where did you get those scars? Did they torture you?”

  “Good morning, Father. No, I had to kill a lion to get these,” he said dismissively, grinning.

  “I want to hear about that tonight. In the meantime, I want breakfast and I don’t doubt that you do, too. It is almost Terce and still no food. What is that good woman doing that I must always wait when I am hungry?” he growled, but it was with good humor.

  Talon noticed that his father’s hair and beard were streaked with gray, but he still seemed fit and strong, carrying himself as though still on military business. There were a few more lines etched into his face, however; he looked careworn.

  He put his arm over Talon’s shoulder and led the way to the kitchens where he harangued the cooks to make a meal of eggs and meat for them both. Talon realized that he enjoyed the casual closeness his father was bestowing on him. He had not felt this kind of feeling with another for some time now. He ignored the curious looks from the cooks and the maids as they hurried by on various errands. There were several appraising looks from the maids.

  They sat at a rough table outside near the back of the hall where the kitchens and pantries were located. They tore pieces of bread off a huge loaf and dipped them in fresh, cool milk while they waited for the cooks to complete their work. While they were so occupied Philip sauntered up and then Max. They both had slept well and were hungry. Talon looked around for the archers. They were squatting in a corner over by the gate as though waiting for instructions; they looked somewhat lost.