Crusade (30 page)

Garin was fascinated by how quickly the alien became familiar. He had come to the covered street just over a fortnight ago and had been back five times already. The same men played chess, the same woman beckoned to him. The same smell of oranges and lemons greeted him as he passed a fruit seller’s and came to the store where the Arab outside saw him and smiled.

Garin nodded in return, unsmiling.
“Qannob.”

But the Arab was already disappearing into the store, knowing what he wanted. He reappeared through the curtain and handed Garin a small parcel of dark green leaves, bound with twine. “You sleep well now?” he asked, taking the coins Garin handed to him.

“Better.”

“I see you again soon,” the Arab called as Garin moved off.

When he reached the royal palace, he went straight to his room. The drapes were closed to keep out the heat, and the chamber was cool. He had told the servants not to come in, and his bed was crumpled and unmade, the silk sheets damp from another fitful night. Cushions were scattered on the floor in front of a low table on which stood a pair of iron tongs and a clay censer, its bowl blackened. Empty stone pots once filled with wine were amassing in a gray congregation under his bed.

Closing and bolting the door, he kicked off his boots and walked barefoot to the table, where he took the leaf parcel from his pouch. Taking the tongs, he dug them into the brazier, the white ashy charcoal flaking and disintegrating. As the top layer was disturbed, an amber glow was revealed. Carefully, Garin caught one of the smoldering lumps in the grip of the tongs. Placing the charcoal in the censer’s bowl, he sat cross-legged on the cushions and opened the parcel. The sticky, sharp smell that leapt out at him filled him with the thrill of anticipation. Taking a small amount of the dried, pale green flower heads, ground up with hard, brown seeds between thumb and forefinger, he moved his hand over the censer, leaned forward and dropped the mixture in.

Hemp, cultivated from the stalks of the plant, was used throughout the Eastern and Western worlds for rope, twine, paper and cloth. But the leaves, resin and flowers were used for other purposes: as medicine; incense; drug. Years ago, in Paris, Garin had spent several months in the company of the mistress of a brothel in the Latin Quarter. Adela was a healer and had told him of people who ate the leaves of the hemp plant, who would have beautiful dreams and fabulous visions, how it made a man more virile, how it soothed and calmed the most restless spirit. Garin had never tried it, until seventeen days ago, when he had been searching the Pisan market for a potion to help him sleep through the hot nights and had been pointed to the Arab’s store. Sultan Baybars had banished the use of the plant for all Muslims, although the Sufi mystics still ingested it during their religious ceremonies. Now the men who grew it were forced to sell it, more and more, to Westerners and other nonbelievers.

That first day, Garin had been given several round, pale brown sweetmeats, which smelled deliciously of honey, nutmeg and something he didn’t recognize. He ate one that evening and waited for the promised sleep to claim him. When nothing happened, he finished the rest of them, disappointed. Almost an hour later, he was lying facedown on the rug in his chamber shaking with uncontrollable laughter, so violent that he was hardly able to force air into his lungs. He lay there, thinking he was going to die and finding it hilarious for some thirty or so minutes, before collapsing into a sleep, the like of which he had never known. Four days later, he returned to the store. Telling the Arab he found the sweetmeats too potent and asking if there was a subtler dose that would only induce the sleep he craved, he had been sold the censer and the dried flower mixture and told what to do.

As the mixture hit the hot charcoal, it burned instantly, the seeds crackling and popping, a plume of bluish smoke curling into the air. Garin leaned over the table, like a priest at an altar, and drew the smoke into his mouth, then on into his lungs. The first few times had made him cough horribly, but he had quickly grown used to it and had learned how much to imbibe. He took long breaths as the chamber filled with the smell of the plant and his vision grew hazy. Just a little of the mixture and he would experience the kind of calm he could never find at the bottom of a jug of wine. It felt like being caressed. A little more and he would find sleep.

As the last of the flowers burned up and turned to ash, Garin leaned back against the cushions, eyes half-lidded. He had run out of the
qannob
two days ago and had slept badly without it. The meeting with Will had further drained him. Will’s self-righteous aloofness had made him want to throw himself across the table and slam a fist into his face, and it had been an effort to keep that pleasant, asinine smile on his face through the probing questions.

Garin recalled Will as a wet-nosed boy back in New Temple, crying over how his father blamed him for his sister’s death, and took some small satisfaction from the image. Will had been a good swordsman, but a poor sergeant, flouting the Rule on an almost daily basis and yet somehow always managing to get away with it. Indeed, when Will had misbehaved, it had often been he, Garin, who had taken the blame and the beatings, a pattern that continued when he had rescued Everard’s Book of the Grail and was given four years in a cell as a reward. Will, who betrayed the Brethren when he attempted to have Baybars murdered, had been forgiven. Garin’s satisfaction faded into sour self-pity. Now Will had a place in the secret brotherhood he was supposed to have been a part of, and a commandership. No matter what he seemed to do wrong, he always came out on top. But the thing that really stuck in Garin’s throat was the fact that when all was said and done Will was nothing but a commoner, only a few generations removed from hill-dwelling barbarians, whatever he now wore to disguise it. His father might have been a Templar, but his mother was little more than a peasant and his grandfather had been a wine merchant! It made Garin itch with fury to think of it. He was a de Lyons, the last of a noble line that stretched back to the glory days of Emperor Charlemagne. His father and brothers had died fighting for King Louis, and his uncle had been one of the Brethren. Now he was a nobody. No, worse, a
dogsbody
that Edward, Will, Everard and the rest of them thought they could order around as they saw fit.

What they all seemed to have overlooked was the fact that he was the one man standing between the Anima Templi and their guardian: the one man who knew the secrets and weaknesses of both sides. There was power in that. He just had to work out how to use it. At least Will seemed to believe the answers he had given. Fool that he was. Garin’s eyes closed, his hand falling limply into his lap.

The sound of someone hammering relentlessly on his chamber door woke him. He came awake with a jerk, then rose stiffly. As he slid back the bolt and opened the door, he was startled to see King Hugh glaring at him.

“Your Majesty,” Garin said, recovering his composure and covering his surprise.

Hugh pushed into the chamber, forcing Garin to move aside. The king’s eyes were angry slits as he surveyed the room, still hazy with smoke. “I have seen pigs living in better order,” he remarked, stepping over Garin’s discarded boots. “Tell me, does King Edward let you treat his castle so?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “You were supposed to come to me this afternoon, de Lyons. Why did you disregard our appointment?”

“I’m sorry, Your Majesty, I fell asleep.”

“Perhaps from the effects of too much wine,” muttered Hugh, looking balefully at the stone jugs peeping out from under the bed. He gave the air a keen sniff. “I presume you have been burning that incense to cover the filth in here. The servants could smell it down the hall.” He sniffed again.

“What did you wish to see me about, Your Majesty?” Garin asked quickly. “If you give me a moment to dress, I will follow you to the throne room, surely a more seemly environment for you to discuss your affairs in.”

“I will decide where is seemly for me to discuss my affairs,” said Hugh, turning to him. “We will talk here. I am impatient and will wait no longer. You said that you would conduct your other business here in the city and return forthwith to England. Edward must intervene before d’Anjou buys the rights to my throne from my dried-up hag of a cousin, Maria, or I will loss my crown!”

“My other business is almost concluded, Your Majesty,” Garin replied. “But before I leave, I still have need of your agreement. You have signed the document?”

“No,” snapped Hugh. “I have told you, Edward demands too much. He can have the use of my lands in Cyprus as a base for a new Crusade. But I will not pay him the sum he has asked for. Just for him to speak with the pope?” Hugh shook his head adamantly. “It is outrageous. How do I know that Edward will even succeed?”

“If he cannot, Your Majesty, then no one can. But I do believe Edward will be able to help you in this matter.”

“No,” said Hugh again, shaking his head. “No, it is too much.”

Garin nodded. “Then I will leave today.”

“What do you mean? You will not speak with Edward?”

“I will, of course, tell him what you have told me, but as I explained, Edward has difficulties of his own. For him to take the time to help you with yours, he must be compensated adequately.”

Hugh turned away, his frame tense. “I would pay it if I knew it would work.”

Garin gave a sympathetic shrug. “It is a risk. But what else can you do, Your Majesty? How much is your throne worth to you? What lengths are you willing to go to, to keep it from your enemies?”

Hugh’s gaze was fierce. For some time, he didn’t answer. When eventually he did, his voice was low. “I will sign the document,” he said through gritted teeth. “It will be my heirs,
my
sons, who will rule Outremer, not d’Anjou’s. I will give Edward what he wants.”

“Then my business here is almost done,” said Garin, his smile lost in the chamber’s smoky shadows.

THE JEWISH QUARTER, ACRE, 26 MAY A.D. 1276

A line of golden bells that hung from a nail on the back of the door tinkled delicately as Will stepped inside the bookshop. The musty interior offered a welcome respite from the feverish heat. It was a fair walk from the Pisa Road to the Jewish Quarter, and sweat trickled down his back beneath his thick garments.

At the sound of the bells, a man appeared from a doorway at the back of the cramped store, the walls of which were lined with books. There were books of all sizes on shelves, covering the top of a counter, rising in teetering piles like haphazard towers from the tiled floor. The man was in his late sixties and was short and stooped with wavy, grayish-black hair and a wiry beard. His skin was weathered and brown, and his eyes squinted keenly at Will. “Sir William. I was wondering when you would return.”

“How are you, Elias?”

Elias chuckled and waved his hand. “Pleasantries are for the young, William, and for those who have time to spare. I know what you have come for.” Before Will could answer, he went to the counter and bent down. He rose with a wince, clutching his back and a thin book, bound in faded red leather. “Here.”

Will took the book. It looked old and the bindings were loose. Inside, he saw that most of the pages were filled with a faint Latin script.

“A traveler from Rome wrote it years ago,” said Elias, peering over Will’s shoulder. “It isn’t any great work, a rather flaccid treatise commenting on the customs of the people of Syria. But it does contain what you need.” He held out his hand. “May I?”

Will returned the book, watching as Elias thumbed through the pages, his brow creasing as he struggled to read the text in the dim light.

“Ah, here we are. This should help you.”

On the page Elias had opened were two blocks of text, one on either side. One was Latin and the other was a language that looked a little like Arabic, but wasn’t. Will recognized it. It was the language from the scroll. “This is it,” he said, a note of excitement in his voice.

Elias nodded. “Everard was almost right. It is Syriac, although it is the Jacobite rather than the Nestorian form. But both are very similar and it was an easy mistake to make.”

“The language of the Syrian Christians,” said Will, glancing at him.

“Yes, although it was derived from Aramaic, the ancient language of my people. The dialect branched in two when a schism occurred within the Eastern Christian church, which formed into two sects under Nestorius of Persia and Jacob of Edessa.”

Will nodded. “Hence the names.”

“It took me a little while to find this, but as you can see the writer has translated the Jacobite script from a simple poem into Latin.” Elias leaned over and turned the page for Will. “He also notes the letters of the Jacobite alphabet and the corresponding letters in Latin, where applicable. Within Syriac there exist no actual numerals, so wherever numbers are used in your scroll they will show as letters, each of which has its own numerical value.”

Will looked up from the book. “Thank you.”

Elias smiled. “Oh, yes,” he said suddenly, bustling back to the counter and fishing a piece of paper out from under a pile of books. “You’ll be wanting this back.”

The paper had a few lines of text from the copy of the scroll that Will had given Elias to check against a source book, after Everard had concluded what language it was written in.

“What is it that has you and Everard so excited?” asked Elias, watching Will slip the paper inside the book to mark the page.

Will hesitated.

Elias laughed and shook his head. “Perhaps it is better that I do not ask, yes? Then you will not be betraying any confidences and I will most likely sleep better at night.” He smiled. “Just tell the old devil to visit soon. I have plenty of new books that I am sure he would be very interested in, that may help your cause.” He paused, then added, “
Our
cause,” in a quiet, earnest tone. “Tell him, William, that I have a drop of Gascony left in my cellar and the need of good company to share it with.”

Will smiled slightly. “I will.”