Holy War (28 page)

‘The merchants and some of the rearguard thought we were defeated when the Franks breached our lines. They plundered our own men’s tents and fled. I tried to stop them, Father, but they would not listen. When our men saw what was happening, they abandoned the attack to retrieve their belongings.’

The stupid fools!
Yusuf’s jaw clenched, and he could feel the veins at his temples throbbing. He turned to where his emirs where gathered. ‘Saqr! Gather up the enemy dead and have them dumped in the river, downstream of our camp. Al-Mashtub, round up the thieves. Bring all that they have taken back to camp and see that it is returned to its owners.’

‘And the men who took it?’

‘I will have no thieves in my camp. They ran from the Franks; let them keep running. Take everything they own, including their clothes, and send them on their way.’

Rain drummed on the roof of Yusuf’s tent. He stared at the cup in his hand before draining it. The medicine left a bitter taste in his mouth, but it worked. His gut had been troubling him again. It felt as if there were coals burning in his stomach. The medicine extinguished them, if only for a time. ‘Shukran, Ibn Jumay.’

The Jewish doctor touched Yusuf’s forehead. ‘You are feverish.’ He poured another cup of water, to which he added several powders from his supplies. ‘Drink this as well.’

‘What is it?’

‘Crushed coriander seeds and anise with poppy extract. It will ease the pain in your head.’

Yusuf swallowed the draught and grimaced at the taste. He waved to Ibn Jumay, dismissing him, but the doctor did not leave. ‘May I speak with you, Malik?’ he asked, and Yusuf nodded. ‘You push yourself too hard. You are only human. Remember what happened at the siege of Aleppo. You almost died.’

‘I did not have you with me that time.’

‘I am no miracle worker. My medicines can ease your pain, but they cannot cure what ails you. Only rest can do that, Malik. Pull back, at least until the men of Egypt arrive.’

‘And let the Franks fortify their position even more?’

‘It is not the Franks you should fear, Malik. Sickness in the enemy camp is spreading. You must pull your men back or risk infection. Disease will kill more surely than the Franks, and you cannot fight it.’

‘I will think on what you have said.’

Ibn Jumay bowed and departed. Yusuf rose and the world spun for a moment, then steadied.
The air is too close in my tent.
He pulled on his cloak and stepped outside. After a few deep breaths, his head cleared. He could just make out the Frankish camp through the rain. Since the battle, they had spent their days digging a deeper trench before their bulwarks. They had also built a wooden wall around their camp. They had begun to extend it along their lines, starting at the river and moving north. Men were at work on it even now, despite the rain. Beyond them, Yusuf could see pyres burning in the empty piece of ground between the Franks’ two ramparts. The Christians were burning their dead.

Every day saw more bodies on those pyres. The Franks had pulled the bodies of their dead from the river, but too late. The flux was loose in their camp, and hundreds had died already. If the disease spread to Yusuf’s men, hundreds more would join them. Ibn Jumay was right to be afraid. Yet Yusuf could not retreat. Not now. If the Franks finished that wall, their siege would be that much harder to break. And their numbers were growing. For every one that burned on the pyre, three arrived from overseas. The spring would bring even more of them. And meanwhile, the German emperor Barbarossa had reached Constantinople. Yusuf had to strike now.

‘Saqr!’ he called. ‘My horse!’

Another wave of dizziness swept over him as Yusuf climbed into the saddle. He swayed but managed to straighten.

‘Perhaps you should rest, Malik,’ Saqr suggested. ‘One of your sons can inspect the lines.’

‘I am well enough,’ Yusuf grumbled and set off into camp. At the barricade, the men had erected canvas shelters and were huddled beneath them to keep out of the rain. Yusuf noticed that some were pale, with tight skin and dark circles under their eyes. He kept his distance. Had sickness already come to his camp? How?

‘Malik.’ Husam stepped out from beneath one of the shelters. He coughed – a deep, chest-rattling cough – and spat. ‘Three more men caught visiting the red tents last night.’

The red tents. That was it. ‘Show them to me.’

Husam barked an order and two of his men jogged off. They returned a moment later marching two men in tunics before them. The men were shivering in the cold. Their faces were drawn and their eyes red. ‘Where is the third man?’ Yusuf asked.

‘Too sick to walk, Malik,’ came the reply from one of the mamluks. ‘He collapsed in the mud, just outside the prison tent. I thought it best not to drag him here.’

‘You did well.’ Yusuf turned to Husam. ‘These men are to be placed in a tent on the edge of camp. Give them a guard and their own cook. No one else is to have contact with them. And the next man to be caught visiting the red tents will be beheaded. Let it be known.’

‘Yes, Malik.’

Yusuf continued down the line. He rode in silence, nodding at the men as he passed. His teeth were soon chattering. He drew his cloak more tightly about him. He was always cold of late. Near the middle of the line, he rode up the rampart to look at the enemy lines. The wall the Franks were building now extended along a quarter of their line. In a week, maybe less, it would be complete.

‘Saqr,’ he called. ‘Have the emirs gather in my tent. I will want to speak to them when I return.’

Yusuf rode back down from the barricade. His mind was busy planning as he continued up the line. He would strike tomorrow. Tonight, he would need to send a message to Qaraqush in Acre to coordinate the attack. One of Yusuf’s mamluks – a man named Isa – had already delivered several messages. Isa was a great swimmer. He would enter the sea to the south of the Frankish camp and swim under their ships and into the harbour of Acre.

Yusuf returned to his tent and dismounted. He had to lean on his horse for a moment to steady himself. Ibn Jumay’s medicine was wearing off. The pain in his gut had returned. He entered his tent to find his emirs waiting. He strode past them and sat heavily on the camp-stool.

‘We have waited long enough,’ he began. ‘Tomorrow, we will strike. We—’ He paused and his hand went to his head. The faces of the men before him blurred. He blinked, but they refused to come into focus.

‘Father!’ he heard Az-Zahir say, but his son’s voice seemed far away. The world was spinning again. He felt himself falling. Then everything went black . . .

C
hapter 15

December 1189: Tatewic

John sat at a simple oak desk, the accounts for the grange open before him. The previous overseer – a layman hired by the abbey – had kept poor records. John suspected the man had been stealing. If so, that was only one of the sins for which he was, no doubt, suffering in hell. John had learned from the miller – a talkative man who was happy to gossip so long as John bought his ale – that the previous overseer had died of an attack of apoplexy while fucking the blacksmith’s wife. Her screaming had drawn half the village, including her husband, who the miller assured John had been busy buggering one of the acolytes from the abbey.

John squinted at the rows of numbers and made a notation. He set the quill aside and rubbed his hands, trying to bring warmth back to his aching knuckles. It was no use. He rose and added another log to the fire. He poked at the blaze until it was roaring merrily, but still the chill in the room remained. The grange was a fine home with a study, a well-appointed bedroom, a great hall and a separate kitchen, but the thick stone walls made it as cold as a tomb.

Something howled outside. It sounded like a baby crying. John went to the window and pushed open the shutters. Snow was falling, and the square below was blanketed in white. On the far side was a pack of boys, some not yet old enough to help in the fields, others with downy cheeks. They stood in a semicircle before the wall of the miller’s house, where they had nailed up a cat by its tail. The poor animal was hissing and thrashing, its claws scrabbling against the wall as it sought to free itself. One of the boys stepped forward and head-butted it. He came away with a bloody gash on his cheek. The other boys cheered. The cat howled.

John closed the shutters. He did not need to see more to know how the boys’ sport would end. They would butt the cat until it died, and whoever killed it would be declared the victor. It was a savage game. John had played it himself when he was a child. He had been a savage, too. He grimaced. Since returning to England, he sometimes felt like a man living amongst beasts. A very, very cold man
.
He returned to the fire and his hands began to tingle as they slowly thawed. He had cursed the heat of the Holy Land more times than he cared to remember, but the cold was much worse. He closed his eyes and imagined himself standing on the sandy shore south of Acre and looking out over the clear turquoise waters of the harbour. He could almost feel the hot sun beating down, its warmth balanced by the cool sea breeze.

There was a tentative knock on the door. ‘Enter!’ John called.

It was his servant, Caesarius. The boy was a novice from the abbey, and he could hardly have had a more ill-fitting name. Caesarius was a gangly lad, forever tripping over his own feet, and he was so shy that he could hardly string together more than three words when in John’s presence. He set a bowl of stew down on the table and hurried from the room without a word.

John sat and poked at the stew with his spoon. Turnips, carrots and some sort of boiled meat were floating beneath a thick film of grease. He knew it was better than most of the villagers ate, but just looking at it made his stomach turn. He sometimes found himself dreaming of fresh mangoes and oranges, of spiced lamb and thin, crisp bread. If he had the coin to take ship, he would have returned to the East months ago, but he was not about to trek across Europe, not again. His trip north had nearly killed him.

This stew looked likely to finish the job. John pushed the bowl away and donned his heavy cloak. Outside, the air was so cold it burned his lungs. His boots crunched in the snow, and he left fresh tracks behind him as he crossed the square. The boys had finished their sport. Only one remained. He was furtively carrying the dead cat away.

‘You there! What are you doing?’

The boy froze. He looked to be no older than ten, with saucer-like eyes and smooth cheeks marked by the cat’s claws. ‘I – I was going to bury it,’ he murmured.

‘Bless you, son.’ John made the sign of the cross and continued to the door of the miller’s house. He knocked.

The fat-cheeked miller Edgar greeted him with a smile. ‘John! Come in, come in.’

John hung his cloak by the door and sat before the fire crackling in the hearth. The miller’s food was no better than John’s, but at least it was warm here. And Edgar’s wife brewed a fine ale.

‘Let me get you something to drink,’ the miller said.

‘That would be kind of you.’

‘Don’t mention it.’ Edgar stepped into the next room but continued talking. ‘I’m glad you came, John. My wife is visiting her sister up in Thurcroft. Mabil is pregnant.’ Edgar crossed himself as he returned with a tankard in hand. ‘A winter babe. God help it.’ He took a hot poker from the fire and dipped it in the ale, which foamed over the sides. He handed the tankard to John and sank into the chair beside him.

John sipped at the warm brew. It was rich and sweet, with a bitter aftertaste and a hint of spice. John raised his eyebrows. ‘Cinnamon?’

Edgar grinned. ‘And a touch of honey and ground ivy.’

‘Where on earth did you find cinnamon?’

‘I have my ways.’ Edgar’s smile faded. He took a sip from his own tankard. ‘Mabil’s child . . . if it dies early, will you baptize it, John?’

John nodded. Baptizing the dead was a common enough practice. No mother wanted her child to go to hell, so the babes were brought to priests who waited for a sign of life – sweating or movement – and then quickly baptized the child. The parents could then bury it with a clear conscience. John had seen enough dead men to know that the signs of life were nothing of the sort, but he was happy to provide what comfort he could.

‘Good, good. That will put my wife’s mind at ease.’ Edgar took another drink. ‘How is the grange, Father?’

‘Cold.’

‘
Hah
! That it is. The man who built it was a fool. I told him those glass windows were good for nothing.’ Edgar took up a poker and stirred the fire, sending sparks racing up the chimney. ‘Ah well, nothing a fire and warm ale can’t fix, eh?’

‘Amen.’ John took a long drink.

There was a knock on the door, and it swung open, bringing with it a swirl of snowflakes. Caesarius stood uncertainly in the doorway, shifting from foot to foot.

‘Don’t just stand there, boy!’ Edgar cried. ‘Get inside.’

‘What is it, Caesarius?’ John asked as the boy closed the door.

‘Your – your—’ Caesarius’s gaze fell to the floor. He licked his lips and started again. ‘Your brother has returned, father.’

‘He is in the castle?’

The boy nodded.

‘My thanks for the ale, Edgar.’ John retrieved his heavy cloak from beside the door. ‘Caesarius, see that the fire in my room stays lit. I want it roaring when I return.’