They reminded him of the pair of young Tartars, who had dogged Hugh’s footsteps from the borders of eastern Anatolia to Aleppo. Hugh had thought he would have to kill one or other of the Tartars, but the Mamluk ambush put paid to that. Now he waited for an opportunity to kill the Saracens.
That wouldn’t be easy. These two were like snakes, fast and sinuous, forever on their guard. When one slept, the other stayed awake to watch their captive. They followed the same routine every day, and their discipline was iron. Neither spoke to Hugh, who eventually gave up trying to make conversation.
If not for his training, he might have gone mad. The sense of isolation was relentless, along with the knowledge that he would, in all likelihood, never leave this valley alive. He might as well have been locked in the deepest of dungeons; memories of his brief incarceration in the oubliette at Harbottle Castle, in northern England, stalked his dreams.
Hugh fought against despair. As time passed, the possibility of Maymun’s return became ever more remote. His guards seemed increasingly baffled by their master’s long absence. They spoke together more often, and Hugh could tell they were agitated. Once, he woke to find just one sat on guard at the cave mouth, cross-legged, hands rested on his knees. The other came back two days later, to greet his companion with a brief shake of the head. He had obviously gone out in search of Maymun and had no joy.
There was also the problem of food. Maymun had seen to it that the cave was stocked with enough water and rations for about three months. With three men to sustain, the stocks rapidly dwindled. About February – Hugh’s best guess, though time was hard to gauge in such a desolate, changeless spot – he broke his silence.
“One of you will have to go to market soon,” he said mockingly. “Else we shall be reduced to eating our boot-leather. You boys had little enough flesh on you to start with.”
As usual they sat cross-legged either side of the cave mouth, staring at him. They hardly ever blinked. Hugh had found their constant vigilance unnerving at first, but had grown used to it.
“Your master isn’t coming back,” he added. “Tell me, where did he go?”
There came no reply, so he spread his hands. “Come, lads. Where’s the harm? I can do nothing with the information. The secrecy is pointless.”
Silence. Then, the man on the left slowly lifted a hand and peeled away his scarf. The face beneath was all hard planes and angles, with a mouth like a trap and a dark layer of stubble.
“Maymun went to Damascus,” he said in slow, deliberate English. “To confer with al-Malik al-Ẓāhir Rukn al-Dīn Baybars al-Bunduqdārī.”
This was the sultan’s full name in Arabic. “He went to discuss his next mission,” the man continued. “Shall I tell you what it was?”
His mouth widened into a savage grin. “To kill your master, Sir Edward.”
Hugh didn’t react. It came as no surprise to discover Baibars wanted Edward dead. Assassination was a common tool in the east; several Christian princes had fallen victim to poison before now. He could only pray that Edward was on his guard and had good people about him.
When it was obvious that nothing could be got out of Hugh, the Mamluks wrapped the scarf over his mouth again.
There was no more talk. Another four days passed. They were down to biscuit now, and the last barrel of water. Hugh waited for one of the Mamluks to leave to get fresh supplies, but they left it as long as possible.
They are wary of me, he thought. As soon as one leaves, they think I will try and overpower the other. They are right!
He suspected they weren’t very intelligent, possessed of little initiative. These men were born footsoldiers, in need of a captain to tell them what to do. Without Maymun, they were lost. Perhaps he could play on that. Plant seeds of doubt in their minds, even turn them against each other. If only he could grab a weapon…
One morning Hugh was woken by a cry. After so long in a world of tomb-like silence, the noise was alien and terrifying, and woke him in an instant.
He had been asleep in abed on the sandstone floor, carved by some ancient hermit, when he heard the sound. Hugh rose on his elbow and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. His gaolers stood together in the cave mouth. Each had drawn his kilij, and naked steel glittered in the grey light of dawn.
One had cupped a hand round his mouth. He had uttered the cry that dragged Hugh from the pit of dreams. Now he shouted again, at something outside the cave.
There was no response. Hugh was perfectly still. He hardly dared to breathe. Had Maymun returned at last?
The Mamluks, usually so composed, were ill at ease. They shifted from one foot to another and exchanged nervous glances.
All of a sudden, one uttered a great cry and sprang out of the cave. His comrade hesitated and looked back at their prisoner. Hugh read fear, uncertainty and anger in his eyes.
The ring of steel echoed outside. Hope and excitement surged in Hugh’s breast. He fought to contain it.
“What to do, eh?” he said with forced calm. “Stay here and guard me, or go out and help your friend?”
He idly plucked a bit of soil from the ground and rolled it between his fingers. “Make your decision. I advise you to be quick about it. It sounds like things are getting heated out there.”
The Mamluk looked from him, to outside, then back again. At last, he spat a curse at Hugh and plunged out of the cave.
Hugh got up and looked around for something, anything, he could use for a weapon. The clash of swords from outside grew louder.
His eye fell on the water cask. He upended it, tipping out the last drops, and carried it to the entrance.
Outside a three-way duel was in progress. The Mamluks fought side by side, stabbing and hacking at a slim, athletic figure. Their opponent, like them, was dressed all in light grey silk. He moved with fluid grace, dodging their blows with ease. Nor did he fight entirely on the defensive; Hugh was almost moved to applaud as the stranger darted forward and cut at a Mamluk face. His target leaped back just in time, the lethal steel point whipping inches past his face.
This was his chance, while his guards were distracted. He clattered down the steps, lifted the barrel above his head and heaved it at the nearest Mamluk.
They were not agents of the Qussad for nothing. His target sensed the danger and jumped aside, just as the barrel sailed past his head. Hugh roared in frustration and dived at the man. His shoulder smashed into the Mamluk’s hip and flung him to earth.
The two men grappled in the dirt. Hugh was strong, but his opponent seemed to be made of liquid steel. After a few seconds of frantic clawing and struggling Hugh found himself flat on his back. The Mamluk sat astride his chest, sword raised.
Hugh grabbed his wrist with both hands and gave a sudden jerk, forcing the other man to hit himself in the face with his own sword hilt. He cried out, and blood started from his nose.
Gasping, Hugh scrabbled around for a rock. His world turned red. Hot blood had just sprayed over his face.
He wiped it off and squinted upwards. The Mamluk still sat perched on his chest but was missing his head. More blood gushed from the neatly carved stump of his neck. The mysterious swordsman had decapitated him from behind.
Hugh pushed the headless corpse off him. His rescuer was pressing the second Mamluk hard, forcing him back against a wall of the valley. His kilij moved almost too fast for the eye to follow; a bloody, flashing streak of metal.
The dead man’s kilij still rested in his hand. Hugh picked it up and weighed the blade. It was much lighter than his falchion, with a razor cutting edge.
After months spent cooped up in a stone cage with a couple of monosyllabic killers for company, Hugh wanted blood. He stalked over to the duellists.
Too late. With a flourish, his rescuer knocked the Mamluk’s blade from his hand. He then fell to one knee and drove the point of his sword through the unarmed man’s breast, puncturing his heart.
Not to be denied, Hugh stepped forward and thrust his sword into the dying man�
��s chest as well. He gave it a sharp twist, just to make his victim howl. Then he released the sword and stepped back, leaving it stuck in the body.
“That was ill-done.”
The stranger’s voice was deep and with an unfamiliar accent. Hugh swung round to confront him.
“Perhaps,” he panted, “but I mislaid my manners some time ago.”
The stranger flowed to his feet. Hugh warily looked him up and down. Had this man truly come to save him, or was he some wandering brigand, out for what he could get? Hugh had just dropped his sword, and after months of captivity was in no condition to fight anyway.
“Well,” he said. “Let’s have a look at you.”
After a pause, the stranger ripped off his headgear. The face underneath was oval and light brown, with long black hair tied back into a braid, full lips, a long nose and lustrous green eyes.
It was also female. Once, Hugh might have been surprised, but nothing about the Holy Land surprised him any more.
“So did you come to rescue or rob me?” he asked. “If the latter, you will be sorely disappointed. I have nothing of value.”
He gave the dead Mamluk a kick. “These swine took all my money.”
The woman’s brow creased into a frown. She was in her twenties, and her lithe, boyish frame only came up to Hugh’s chest.
“I am no thief,” she said. “My name is Sybilla. Pleased to meet you at last, Hugh Longsword. Now I have found you, all my labours were not in vain.”
She knew his name. That did shake Hugh a little, as well as make him cautiously relieved.
“So you were sent to find me,” he said. “By Edward?”
“No,” she answered. “Or not directly. My master is Hethum, King of Cilicia. He sent me, at Sir Edward’s request, to look for you.”
Sybilla gave Hugh a slow, appraising look as she wiped blood from her sword with a cloth. “It seems Edward values you very highly, Longsword. I was recalled from Damascus, where I had managed to infiltrate the Qussad. That was no easy task either.”
She slid the blade back into its sheath. “I even went up to Maragheh in search of you. Your friend, Brother John, was still there. He told me you were last seen riding east with the Tartars.”
“How was John, when you left him?” Hugh asked. He hadn’t thought about the young Franciscan for a long time and was genuinely interested.
“Well enough, but I doubt you would recognise him now. He has put aside the garb of the Franciscans for the white robes of the Magi. The fire temple has him now.”
None of this was unexpected. Hugh could only wonder what Father Godfrey would say, assuming the old man was still alive.
“My thanks,” he said, with an awkward bow. “But for you, I would have rotted away here, unless the Mamluks cut my throat first. Their master, Maymun, was supposed to come back for me. Do you know of him?”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Yes. I did not know he was a traitor. That news must reach Sir Edward at Acre, and quickly. My horse is tethered nearby. Where did these Mamluk pigs keep theirs?”
“In another cave,” said Hugh. “I’ll go and fetch them.”
He turned and sprinted for the cave. Excitement coursed through his veins. A fresh lease of life. He was alive, and whole, and a free man again.
Then the words of one of his slaughtered guards came back to him. Maymun had gone to Acre to kill Edward.
Hugh’s blood turned cold. He could only pray Maymun had failed.
16.
“Madam, it is best you should weep, rather than the whole of England.”
Blinded by tears, Eleanor was shepherded out of the room by Othon de Grandson and John de Vescy, lord of Alnwick. She wailed and babbled prayers in her native tongue of Castile and would have crumpled to the floor without Othon and Vescy to support her.
Othon continued to try and soothe her until they were out of the room. Then he handed Eleanor to two of her ladies, who helped her away.
Inside, Edward had been stripped and tied down to a bare board. His knights clustered around him, along with the masters of the military orders. They were drawn and anxious, their faces gaunt with worry.
Edward was barely conscious. On the advice of the Grand Master, Thomas Bérard, a holy stone had been fetched from the treasury of the Knights Templar and ground up into power. The powder was then poured into a hot drink, mixed with narcotics, and given to Edward to drink. He had slopped it down with a shaking hand. His entire body was wracked with pain. The flesh around the knife-cuts on his left arm, and under his armpit, had started to turn black.
Without something to dull the pain, Edward could not have remained conscious. If he was to die under the knife, he wanted to have his eyes open to the very end.
“If I do not survive,” he croaked, “you will all swear fealty to my wife and eldest son.”
His followers murmured their assent. Most had tears in their eyes; a few openly wept.
The operation was to be conducted by Father Godfrey. He was the most skilled surgeon to hand, and there was no time to send for a better. Godfrey had just minutes before the poison finished its work.
The old Franciscan leant over his patient with a leather strap in his hand.
“Bite on this, lord,” he murmured. Edward obediently opened his mouth and let Godfrey place the strap between his jaws.
The Franciscan gingerly tested the edge of his knife. There had been just enough time to heat it up in a brazier. The blade was good and hot, and as sharp as he could make it. He puffed out his cheeks, wiped beads of sweat from his brow.
“Begin, in heaven’s name,” gasped Edward. “Get it over with, man.”
Godfrey set to work. The first touch of hot steel on Edward’s flesh made him stiffen Even the narcotic he had swallowed could not guard him against the pain that followed. The friar had to saw away the tainted flesh, like slicing meat from a joint of beef for supper. Blood flowed freely from the cuts into a wooden bowl held by one of Godfrey’s assistants.
Soon Edward’s body was filmed in sweat. He jerked and shuddered and bit down hard on the leather strap, eyes screwed shut. His efforts at prayer deteriorated into one long, drawn-out howl of agony inside his skull. The pain was unbearable, yet he had to bear it. Godfrey’s knife was slow, remorseless, precise.
Time lost its meaning. Edward fell into a drug-fuelled haze. Fractured images of his past spun before him, only to splinter and fade into the next. The first time he saw Eleanor at Burgos in Castile, a thin, frightened-looking girl of twelve, peering out at him from behind a pillar; the taste of revenge in his mouth at Lewes, where he drove the London rabble before him like sheep; the piles of mangled, crow-pecked corpses strewn across the muddy, rain-swept vale of Evesham, knights and common men and horses, mingled together in their blood; armies and priests and castles and abbeys and marching rows of banners, the faces of his family, parents and kinsmen, all faded into a meaningless blur of colour and noise.
They dwindled into the blank rawness of space. Edward was left alone with the Almighty. This is what he truly craved, more than Eleanor, more than anything.
“There is nothing but you,” he screamed. “O Lord my God!”
He slowly came back to the world. Darkness faded, as did the presence of God. Edward didn’t want to return, but others clawed him back. Sound and light penetrated the thick gauze of his pain, a babble of voices, the touch of hands on his flesh.
“Lord. You are awake. Can you hear us? Speak, lord, we beg you.”
Edward’s eyes flickered open. Othon’s face loomed above him, full of concern. Others – William de Valence, Hamo Lestrange, John de Vescy – crowded behind the Savoyard.
“Eleanor,” the prince murmured through dry, cracked lips. Othon gave a sigh of relief and stepped back a little.
“She is with her ladies,” he said. “We thought it best until the operation was over. Shall I send for her?”
Edward looked down. His left arm was wrapped in bandages, already soaked in his blood. More bloo
d was smeared over his naked chest and legs.
“Not yet,” he mumbled. “I don’t want her to see me like this.”
He spotted Father Godfrey perched on a stool. The friar looked to have aged about twenty years, his face grey and seamed with perspiration. He sat hunched over, one hand resting on his knee, the other supporting his brow. The bloodstained knife he had used to cut away Edward’s poisoned flesh lay at his feet.
“You have my eternal thanks, Father,” said Edward in the same hoarse, voice. “You saved my life and with it, the crown of England.”
Godfrey looked up. There was a faraway look in his deep-set eyes. “I did my duty, lord,” he replied quietly. “God grant I am never faced with such a task again.”
The sense of relief, even joy, was palpable. Edward’s knights clapped each other on the back, laughed, called for wine to celebrate. He drank a little himself, then ordered the room to be cleared so he could rest.
“Let me sleep for a while,” he said, “and then bring Eleanor to me.”
In the following days he received many visitors. Envoys from King Hugh, Charles of Anjou, John de Montfort and Count Bohemund, warmly congratulating Edward on his survival. Though he couldn’t rise from his sickbed, the prince greeted them all with courtesy. In truth he would have cheerfully strangled most of the other Christian leaders, but nothing would be gained from abusing their servants.
Even so, his temper almost snapped when a party of three Mamluk envoys arrived. These old men, white-bearded and richly dressed, announced they had been sent by Baibars. Edward, who could scarcely believe his ears, admitted them to his presence.
The trio repeatedly salaamed before him. “Praise be to the Most High,” said their leader in halting English, “who has preserved you, noble Lord Edward, from this most vile attack.”
This was too much for Edward’s uncle Valence, who stood guard at his nephew’s bedside. “You cursed hypocrites!” he cried. “We all know your filthy master was behind the attempt, and yet he has the sheer gall to send you here to make soothing noises?”
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