by DAVID B. COE
“Where were you?” she asked in a breathy whisper.
“Acre.”
She raised her eyes to his. “Acre has fallen?”
Tancrede swallowed past a thickness in his throat. “Yes.”
“We’ve heard nothing of this.”
“It happened not so long ago. Not even a month.” It felt like longer, and also like yesterday. He cast a look over his shoulder. The Saracens were closer. “You say you have borage?” he asked, afraid to linger much longer. “Betony?”
“Were you… were you also at Tripoli?”
“No. You knew someone there?”
Her gaze dropped back to the red cross on his tabard. But she didn’t answer. After a few seconds, she roused herself with a start that ran through her entire form. “It doesn’t matter.” She stood, walked to a basket at the rear of her booth, and dug out two small leather pouches. She shuffled back to her table and held them out to Tancrede. They were fragrant, one cool and sweet, the other more pungent, biting.
He took them from her. “How much do I owe you?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Go. They’ll be here soon. They patrol in small units – twenty men or so. But there are at least a hundred of them in an encampment above the village. You don’t want them finding you.”
“Thank you. God keep you.”
“And you, Templar.”
Tancrede tied the pouches to his belt, covered himself with the blanket once more, and stepped out of the booth. He walked swiftly now, while trying to seem unhurried. The fourth booth was one he had looked at before. This time, though, he noticed what he had missed previously: a small array of herbs at the far end of a table crowded with olives, roots, and greens.
He held up the last of his silvers, catching the man’s attention.
“Madder,” he said.
Puzzlement.
“I need madder,” he said again.
The man opened his hands and shook his head.
He didn’t have time for this.
A footfall behind him made him spin and reach for his sword. But it was the old woman. She said something to the man that Tancrede didn’t understand, turned on her heel, and walked away.
The old man smiled and bobbed his head. He stepped to the herbs, sorted through them, and crossed back to Tancrede bearing a gnarled tuber. He held out his hand for the silver, which Tancrede gave him in exchange for the root. The man produced a worn purse and picked through it, apparently seeking to make change.
A cry from beyond the marketplace made Tancrede whirl again. He heard shouting and the clash of swords.
“Keep it!” he said to the man. He shoved the root into the bundle of food he’d bought and bolted from the booth, the provisions gripped in one hand, his sword in the other.
People streamed past him, fleeing the battle, fear in their faces. Tancrede fought through them, his blade held high to avoid inflicting injury. He shrugged off the encumbering blanket, chastising himself as he did. He hadn’t meant to steal, or deprive either horse or owner of the cloth. But this wasn’t the time for scruples.
Ahead of him, men fought in the lane. Saracens and his fellow Templars. The air around them was hazed with dust. Naked blades flashed and clanged. Bowmen stood nearby, arrows nocked, but useless in the bedlam.
One of the archers spotted him and shouted to his companions. All of them took aim, no doubt pleased to have a target. Tancrede ducked into a byway just as the bows twanged. A dozen arrows rained down on the street. A few stuck in the ground or thudded into building walls. A woman screamed, clutching at the back of her leg. A boy fell at the mouth of the narrow lane, an arrow in his back, and an old man collapsed near the lad, his neck pierced, blood staining his tunic.
Tancrede chanced a peek out at the street. The bowmen were already nocking new arrows to their bowstrings and running toward him. He slipped down the alley, away from the larger street. He needed to rejoin his fellow knights, but first he had to throw off the pursuit of these archers.
He hadn’t gone far along the byway, when he happened upon a shed filled with goats. He heard the bowmen behind him, but they had yet to enter the alley.
Clutching the food and his weapon, Tancrede dove into the shed and hastily covered himself with hay.
Seconds later the first of the archers sped past, shouting back at his companions in the Saracens’ tongue. More men ran by. Still, Tancrede remained hidden, until the slap of their feet on dirt had receded.
Only then did he climb out of the shed, brush off the hay, and sprint back to the mouth of the alley. Rounding the corner, he nearly ran headlong into two bowmen, apparently left there to watch for him.
The men stared at him for an instant, as if too shocked by his appearance to do more. Before they could call for aid, Tancrede dropped his parcel, grabbed the first man’s shoulder, and ran him through with his blade. The second man let fall his bow and grappled for his sword. Tancrede pulled his blade free of the dead man, and hacked at this second warrior. His first blow bit deep into the man’s neck. Blood fountained from the wound. A second stroke severed the Saracen’s head.
Tancrede didn’t even stop to wipe his blade. Blood dripping from the steel, he ran on to fight beside his brothers.
* * *
Gawain kept his back pressed to the white stone wall, his sword a gleaming blur of silver and crimson in the bright sun. He didn’t know what building he had chosen. A shop? A home? A temple? It didn’t matter. The wall protected his back and helped him stand upright. Beyond that… Well, it could have been a mausoleum for all he cared.
Pain radiated from his knee, shooting down to his heel and up into his groin. Every twist, every thrust and parry, every blow he blocked with his sword, made his body shudder and brought a new wave of agony.
And still he fought.
What choice did he have? Surrender meant death. His death would endanger the lives of his fellow Templars. This was unacceptable.
Already, two Saracens lay dead at his feet. Even hobbled, forced to fight on one leg, he remained a match for these warriors. Had he not been sweating like an overworked horse, he might have taken some satisfaction in that.
But this man – the third – was different. Bigger, stronger, older. That last might prove decisive. Gawain bled from gashes on his cheek, his neck, and his hand, all inflicted by this warrior. The first two had charged, heedless of his injured leg and the limitations it forced upon him. This one was canny. It had taken him mere seconds to see what the others had missed. He danced forward, struck, danced away again, beyond the reach of Gawain’s blade.
He wore a mocking grin, cruel mischief in his dark eyes. Now and again, he spoke. Gawain understood not a word of what he said. But he could guess at the man’s meaning. He cursed his own infirmity, his weakness.
The Saracen glided in again, hammered a blow at Gawain’s side. Gawain parried, ground his teeth together as anguish knifed through him. He aimed a strike of his own at the man, but already he had backed away. Gawain’s sword whistled through dry air.
Landry, Godfrey, and Nathaniel fought on one side of him; Thomas, Victor, Draper, and Brice on the other. All of them had wanted to keep him from this battle, but he had insisted that he be allowed to fight. Outnumbered as they were, the others could not argue for long. He propped himself against this building, and raised his sword, inviting attack. Now the wall was splattered with blood, like his tabard and his mantle.
He didn’t think any of his friends had fallen. Not yet. Likely he would be first to go down. The wall held him up, but it hindered his movements, limited what he could do with his blade arm, and kept him from backing away. It appalled him that he should be reduced to this, unable to advance or attack, waiting for mistakes from a foe who seemed unlikely to make any.
The Saracen leapt forward again, sword raised to chop at Gawain’s neck. Gawain lifted his weapon to block the attack. But at the last moment, the Saracen shifted his blade to his other hand, and aimed a strike at Gawain’s bad leg
.
Gawain wrenched to the side, reached across himself to meet the blow. The effort tore a snarl from his throat. He dropped to one knee. The warrior loomed over him, sword held high again. A killing blow. There was nothing Gawain could do.
But before the Saracen could strike, a blade burst through his chest from behind. Blood frothed at the man’s mouth. And Tancrede appeared at the Saracen’s shoulder, his teeth bared, blood from a wound over his eye making him look like a ghoul.
He pulled his blade free, allowed the Saracen to topple to the side. Then he held out a hand for Gawain and helped him up.
“Thank you,” Gawain said.
“You’re—”
“Behind you!”
Tancrede spun, deflected an assault from another Saracen. This man was joined by two others. Tancrede backed away, coming up against Gawain’s wall after two steps.
“I don’t recommend this as a tactic,” Gawain said.
Tancrede’s gaze flicked from one warrior to the next. “No, I don’t imagine.”
“They know I can’t fight them, that I can’t even step away from this wall.”
“Can’t you?” Tancrede asked.
Their eyes met for the span of a heartbeat, no more. But that was enough. Roaring with rage and the anticipation of anguish, Gawain lifted his sword and lurched at the man on the right. The Saracen fell back, eyes wide. He tried to counter Gawain’s blows, but clearly he had thought he battled a man crippled by his wounds. He wasn’t prepared for Templar skill, or the speed of a Templar blade. Gawain staggered after the man as he backed away, every step bringing torment. But it was the Saracen who tripped and fell, crashing onto his back. Before he could regain his feet or roll away, Gawain pounced. Grasping his sword with both hands, he drove the tip through the man’s chest, into the dirt beneath him. The warrior’s back arched and he screamed his last breath before his body sagged.
Gawain yanked his sword from the man, and turned on his one good leg, intending to help Tancrede. Instead, he watched his friend dispatch the second Saracen. One stroke hacked off the man’s arm. A thrust through the throat killed him. Gawain dropped to his good knee again, keeping his wounded leg straight.
Landry, Godfrey, Draper, and the others had prevailed in their battles as well. More than a dozen dead Saracen warriors littered the street, but the Templars were bloodied and exhausted.
Landry pointed toward the road leading up the ridge. “More are coming,” he said, panting the words.
“There are a hundred of them up there,” Tancrede said, retrieving several parcels from the ground near where Gawain and he had fought. “Perhaps more.”
At a questioning look from Godfrey, he added, “I talked to someone in the market. My point is, we can’t fight them all, which means we can’t stay.”
“Very well,” Godfrey said. “Back to the ship.”
Tancrede and Draper helped Gawain up, and supported him as they hurried toward the strand.
They hadn’t gone more than a hundred paces when the first arrow took Landry in the shoulder. He gasped, and fell. Barbs rained down on the knights, forcing them to scatter off the lane and seek whatever shelter they could find.
Gawain, Tancrede, and Draper ducked into a small recess at the front of another building. It offered scant protection.
“Do you see them?” Tancrede asked.
Draper scanned the street. “No. They could be anywhere.”
Gawain also searched, but the Saracens had hidden themselves too well. From behind him and above, he heard the footfalls of many men. They hadn’t much time.
“If we remain here, we’re dead.”
“And if we step out in the open, they’ll kill us,” Tancrede said. “Not the best of choices.”
Before any of them could say more, a new sound reached them. Shouts from the marketplace.
“What now?” Draper muttered.
Tancrede laid a hand on his arm. “Wait. Watch.”
A crowd of people came into view. Men, women, children even, walking in a tight pack. Gawain thought there must be at least two hundred. At their fore strode the most unlikely of leaders: a diminutive, white-haired woman.
“What are they doing?” Draper asked.
“Saving us.”
Gawain shook his head. “At what cost? They can’t fight these men.”
“I don’t think they mean to,” Tancrede said. “Be ready when they pass.”
Seconds later, the throng reached them. They didn’t stop, nor did they acknowledge the Templars in any way that would draw the attention of the Saracens.
But they opened a small gap in their ranks, revealing something Gawain had missed earlier. They appeared as a solid mass of people, but there was space at their center, room enough for the knights.
“Can you make it?” Tancrede asked him.
“I’ve no intention of remaining here.”
“All right, then. Let’s go.”
With Draper and Tancrede helping him again, they rushed from their place of concealment to that gap in the crowd, and then into the center of the mass. Gawain would have liked to search for the archers, but he and his fellow knights kept their heads low so as not to be seen. He hoped the Saracens wouldn’t loose their arrows into the throng indiscriminately. He hoped Godfrey, Landry, and the other Templars would know enough to join them in this human shelter.
The Saracens held their fire. The other knights scrambled in beside them. Landry gripped his shoulder, blood flowing between his fingers, the barb still embedded in his flesh.
Sooner than Gawain expected, the terrain underfoot changed from the compressed dirt of the road to loose sand. The smells of brine and fish suffused the air. Gulls cried overhead. They were on the strand.
At the same time, the horde began to shift, opening up ahead of the knights, closing ranks behind them. As they reached the front of the throng, Tancrede raised a hand, stopping his fellow knights and the men and women who accompanied them. He approached the white-haired woman.
“We owe you our lives.”
“Yes,” she said. “I suppose you do.”
Despite everything, Tancrede grinned.
“Go,” she said. “Get on your ship and sail from this place. Those bowmen will realize soon enough what we’ve done.”
“There will be a price to pay. You know this.”
She shrugged. “We would have paid a price for letting you die. A different sort, perhaps, but dear nevertheless.” Her smile made Gawain’s chest ache. “We chose with our eyes open, Templar. Now go. Don’t waste what we’ve given you.”
Tancrede knelt before her, before all the villagers who had saved them. The other Templars did the same. Even Landry, with an arrow in his shoulder. Even Gawain, for whom kneeling and standing were agony.
“God keep you safe,” Tancrede said.
The woman motioned for them to rise. “Remember us.”
The Templars stood. Draper and Tancrede supported Gawain once more. Godfrey put an arm out to steady Landry. The villagers made way for them, and the Templars strode over the firm, wet sand at the water’s edge, into the shallow surf, and finally to the Tern. Already, Simon and several of the other passengers, men and women, had readied the ship for departure. Somehow they had secured oars – who knew from where? – and had set them in the holes below deck. Tancrede and Draper helped Gawain aboard. Nathaniel and Thomas did the same for Landry. The knights settled the two wounded Templars together on the deck, and went below to take up oars with the passengers. Godfrey and several of the villagers pushed the vessel beyond the shallows. Godfrey climbed in and the others began to row.
Gawain strained to see over the rail and keep his eyes on the strand. Once their ship was away, the villagers scattered in every direction. Except one.
The old woman remained where she was, facing the sea, eyes on their ship. Behind her, some two dozen Saracens streamed onto the strand and converged on where she stood.
She pulled something from within her shift, her movement
s deliberate, unhurried. Only when Gawain saw the flash of reflected sunlight at her hand did he realize what she had done, what she was doing. By then, it was too late to stop her.
He cried out, but they were so far away, and clearly the woman had long since made her choice. As he watched in horror, the woman plunged the blade into her own heart. By the time the warriors reached her, she had collapsed to the sand.
Chapter 3
Adelina stares back at the sandy shore, at the soldiers with their curved blades and bows. At the woman who lies at their feet. A few of the men have stepped to the edge of the water and loosed arrows at the ship. But by now the men and women below have rowed them beyond reach. The arrows slip into the water with a whisper and little splash. Two of the archers try again, but the rest retreat to where the woman lies.
Adelina believes the old woman must be dead.
“What happened to her?” she whispers. “Why did she…” The question dies on her lips as she looks up for her father. He isn’t there. She remembers that he is one of those in the hold rowing their vessel away from the isle.
Two of the Templars gaze back at her, the two who saved their lives on the dock at Acre. One – Gawain – has a wounded leg. The other is Landry. Adelina has remembered his name since their first encounter. He’s handsome – dark eyes, dark hair and beard, large, strong hands – and he has been kind to her and her father. Now he has an arrow in his shoulder. Blood glistens on his tabard and on the linked armor that covers his arm.
“Does it hurt?” she asks. A foolish question maybe, but it has often struck her that adults don’t respond to pain as children do.
“Yes,” he says, in a voice as deep as the sea. “Very much.”
“I’m sorry.”
A smile flits across his face and is gone. “Thank you.”
She looks back at the strand again. The soldiers surround the woman now. Adelina can’t see her anymore.
She points at them. “What happened to her?” she asks again. “The old woman.”
“I’m afraid she’s dead,” Landry says.
“But how? I didn’t see any of the soldiers do anything to her.”