Beloved Pilgrim (24 page)

In Elisabeth's chamber she lay on her bed, a
naked Maliha lying in her arms. She traced the outline of each
nipple with her finger, making the luscious body quiver. She looked
at Maliha, devouring the ample breasts with their large dark
areolae, the rounded belly that was as soft as velvet. The dark
tangle of hair in her groin was beaded with moisture that came in
part from Elisabeth's own mouth. Maliha had brought her to climax
in the tub. "I do love you, my lioness," she sighed.

Maliha nestled into her long lanky body. She
put a hand to a muscular shoulder and kneaded it. "I love you,
Elias. Is that really your name?"

Elisabeth chuckled. "No, it's Elisabeth. But
you should keep calling me Elias. It's safer."

"You must hide your sex?" Maliha asked,
putting her mouth on one of Elisabeth's breasts.

Elisabeth's voice was unsteady as she
replied, "Not from you, and I shall never believe how wonderful
that is. But I do, yes, from others. They must not know I am a
woman." She wriggled with the sensation of fire that leapt from her
nipple straight into her nether lips.

Maliha did not push for more explanation.
Instead she let her hand stray across her beloved's flat belly and
slipped two fingers into the cleft at its base. She began to stroke
the hard nib between the inner petals. Elisabeth writhed and made a
deep moan. She surrendered herself to the woman who stroked her to
climax, all the while nipping and kissing whatever of the woman she
could reach.

When they basked in the warmth of their
lovemaking she thought suddenly of the child. "But what of your
son?"

Maliha had been drifting into slumber but
woke now at the mention of her child. "He is here. He will live
with me here."

Elisabeth lifted her head so she could look
into the honey-colored eyes that were mellower now. "He will live
with you? But I had not had a chance to ask it!"

The woman in her arms shrugged. "Just after
you left, the manservant here came to where I live and asked me to
bring my child and come back here. He said you wanted me."

Smiling broadly, Elisabeth said, "Oh I do, I
do. Over and over and over." She pressed her mouth on Maliha's
again.

"What is his name?" she asked when she came
up for air.

"Tacetin. He is just three years old."

Elisabeth's face grew more somber. "And his
father?" There was a tinge of fear in her voice.

Maliha sighed. She touched her lover's cheek,
brushing the shorn locks from her temple. "His name is Yakup. Or
was. I really don't know. He went to join Kilij Arslan's fighters
just before Tacetin was born. That was his mother you saw,
screaming at me. It is her house."

In the dimming light of long-burned candles,
Elisabeth looked into Maliha's eyes. "I see. So she saw you kissing
me and to her you were betraying her son."

Maliha nodded. "She will not admit that he
may be dead."

"Was she not aware of the expectations of you
in this house?"

"She condemned me for that as well, but she
did not condemn the coins I was able to take her for our lodging
and her care of Tacetin. But seeing me in the arms of a Frankish
knight and clearly loving it was too much. If the man the master
sent had not come just then, she may have called for me to be
stoned."

"My God, how close that came." She clasped
the woman to her tightly. Then hesitantly she went on. "Did . . .
do you love him? Yakup, I mean?"

Maliha took Elisabeth's face in her hands and
looked stormily into her brown eyes. "I love you. I have never
loved anyone until I met you. You are my beloved."

Elisabeth gazed back. "Marry me," she said
almost desperately.

Maliha smiled ruefully. "I do not see how we
two can do that."

"There must be a way. I love you and don't
want to have anyone else but you in my life and me in yours."

Maliha was thoughtful. "You could buy me. I
am not a slave, but I could become one."

The shorn head drew up abruptly. "No, I don't
want you to be my slave or anyone else's. We will find a way to be
together." Suddenly her face paled. "God help us," she moaned.

Maliha pulled herself up on her elbows. "What
is it, my love? What is wrong?"

Elisabeth's face was pained where it had been
tender before. "I have to leave in a couple weeks. The pilgrims are
leaving by the end of this month for the Holy Land. I have to go
with them. I have no choice. I am pledged."

Searching her lover's face, Maliha frowned.
She drew the precious head to her breast. "Then you will leave, I
will stay here in this house, the master said I may, and then you
will come back to me." Her voice broke. "Please tell me you will
come back to me."

The two pilgrims from Winterkirche rode along
the dry, dusty road with faces so long their chins almost scraped
another rut. The three knights, Black Beast, Alain and Gerhardt,
hurried their mounts to ride up alongside them.

"I know why Elias looks like someone died,
but your squire, why does he?" Alain prodded, a playful look on his
face that was repeated on the other two knights'. "Lovers'
quarrel?"

Elisabeth gave Alain a baleful look. Albrecht
would not meet the man's eyes.

"Ho, calm yourself. Nothing meant by it."
Alain's hands were up, one with his mount's reins draped between
the fingers loosely.

Black Beast rode closer to the Frank.
Slapping him on the back, he bellowed, "Come now, mon ami, you must
remember what it is like to be so young and in love for the first
time."

Gerhardt counseled, "Leave them alone. We
have enough misery to deal with ahead of us. Why start it out worse
than it already is?"

For an answer, Elisabeth called, "Come,
Albrecht. The wind is too hot here." She urged Gauner into a trot
and moved away from the knights. Albrecht followed.

"I was just trying to get them to lighten
up." Black Beast frowned. "He doesn't really think he is in love,
does he? She was just a kept whore."

Alain studied his fingernails.

Gerhardt quipped, "Better not say that to
Elias. You will be sorry you taught him so many of your fighting
moves."

"Hmmm," the big man acknowledged. "Say, did
you hear he clobbered one of the guards on the gate?"

Alain looked up at that. "It was when he went
to find that wench. I understand that Andronikos smoothed it all
over. And lo and behold the girl was back and with a brat in
tow."

Riding along further up the column, Elisabeth
shook her head. "They can be such arse holes sometimes."

"Sometimes?" Albrecht responded.

The two settled into the companionable
silence of a long day's journey, each lost in thoughts of his or
her own.

Thoughts of Maliha lying beside her, so soft,
so fragrant and so loving filled Elisabeth's mind. They had done
their best to make what they could of the few days they would have
together. To her joy, Elisabeth was able to spend time with
Tacetin, who was shy at first. They decided he should not see her
as anything but a man, if only to avoid slips of the toddler's
tongue. The boy with his tousled dark hair and huge black eyes
studied her from the safety of Maliha's arms until finally he
reached out a small hand and touched Elisabeth's cheek. He said
something in baby Turkish. Maliha replied in Greek, "Yes, Mama
loves Elli."

Elisabeth looked up questioning. "Elli?"

"That is what he called you. It's rather
nice, isn't it? It can be for Elias or Elisabeth. I think I would
like to call you that." She smiled into her lover's eyes.

Elisabeth put her arms around them both. She
nestled her head so that both Maliha's and Tacetin's foreheads
touched hers. "I should like that. I will love being your
Elli."

If it had been up to her, the pilgrim knight
would have spent all day and all night closeted in her chamber with
those honey-colored eyes to gaze into. Andronikos made no demands
of either of the women. They were as free as they could be for a
time, considering all the preparation that went into the impending
departure of the pilgrims.

The two women did have their evenings and
nights to themselves. They remained in bed, touching, kissing,
tasting. They played a game of "twins," taking turns comparing
parts of their bodies, and then applying the desired attention to
them. It was hard to keep at bay the awareness of being separated
almost as soon as they had come together, but each did her best to
distract herself and the other.

It took Elisabeth a couple of days to realize
that she had hardly seen her squire since Maliha's return. She
happened to see him and the eunuch arm in arm on their way to the
pavilion where the Byzantine had made his advances on her and
understood. She let a brief thought of her brother cross her mind,
and then decided that Elias would have wanted this. She let
Albrecht have his time with a new lover, knowing she could ask him
how it had all come about later.

On one languid evening Elisabeth tried to
explain why she just did not leave the crusade and stay in
Constantinople. "I have three reasons," she began.

Maliha replied, "You have two to stay, and
three if you count the fact that Albrecht seems to want to stay as
well."

Elisabeth's eyes begged her lover to allow
her to go on. "There is my vow made in Mölk to make my way to
Jerusalem. . . . "

"You can still do that. Later. And take
Tacetin and me."

"Let me go on. Part of that vow is to help
keep the Holy City from being retaken by the Paynim. I am also
fulfilling my brother's vow."

Maliha knew all about Elias now. She started
to say that Elisabeth could fulfill Elias's vow later, too, but she
thought better of it.

"And there is one more reason, even more
important than those." Elisabeth paused until Maliha looked up and
into her eyes. "I must find our father or what happened to him."
She put a finger to the woman's full lips to silence her for just a
little longer. "No, no one else can do that. I know his knights. If
I find them between here and Jerusalem I will hopefully find Father
or some news of him. If he is missing or dead or being held, it
will most likely be in Turkish hands. Andronikos is influential and
powerful, but not outside this empire."

Maliha took Elisabeth's hand and pressed a
kiss into its palm. "I understand. You must find him. Just promise
that when you do, you will come back to me. Promise you won't be
killed."

Elisabeth leaned to put her own lips to the
lips turning salty with newly shed tears. "I promise not to be
killed and to come back to you."

However much the two jealously guarded their
time alone, the Christian forces were preparing for their journey
to the Holy Land. She was forced to participate in a most
unpleasant task, visiting the Lombard camp to get the unruly mob
into some sort of order.

Less than a month since she had first seen
the camp she found it more crowded, filthier and more fractious.
She knew more about the disturbances that had forced the Basileus
to pen up the mix of pilgrims. All the way from where they first
set foot in Byzantium to within sight of the imposing walls of the
Sublime City, the rougher elements had run amok. Their winter
journey had been miserable. They were only welcome at arm's length
as they traveled en masse through the Balkans. The months dragged
by; the food was unreliable; there was the inevitable outbreak of
illness in such a multitude. Once in the empire they appeared to
believe that they were in Paynim land and that plunder and rampage
were authorized. It was all Anselm, the Archbishop of Milan and
their leader, could do to get them to understand that they were yet
in Christian territory and the plunder they stole was from
Christians like themselves.

Emperor Alexios was infuriated by the human
pestilence. He had petitioned the Pontiff and the Church of Rome
for knights to come to help him hold off Kilij Arslan and his
Turkish allies. Instead the first arrivals proved to be rabble,
poor, rowdy, not skilled at arms, and ignorant. At best he would
have to house and feed them, at worst he had to defend his people
and territory from them. He sent soldiers to escort them to a camp
built near the city walls. Under watch they could wait for the more
formal knightly forces to arrive and then go on their way.

The various firebrands were incensed at being
imprisoned in the inadequate camp. All Anselm and his clerics and
the few nobles with them could do was try to counsel calm and
patience. One night they overwhelmed the guards and broke through
one of the great gates and poured into the city. They tore through
the streets breaking into shops and even churches, stealing and
smashing what they could not carry. They made their way to the
great stone edifice of the Blachernae Palace. It took all the
palace guards to subdue them and herd them out beyond the walls.
Many of the people who had left Lombardy to make their way to the
Holy Land never got any farther than the paupers' graveyard in
Constantinople.

It was said that after the rampage Alexios
knelt by the body of one of his precious lions. He could not even
imagine the set of circumstances that had ended in the big cat's
killing. As he stroked the tawny face, it took all his restraint
not to order the massacre of the Lombards, each and every one of
them.

Instead he commanded Anselm's presence in one
of the looted churches. One of Andronikos's friends told Elisabeth
what happened next as he sat with his goblet of wine on one of the
eunuch's brocade couches. "The arrogant Archbishop nonetheless
paled at the sight of the destruction as he entered. Not only were
the precious and holy items stripped, the vessels containing
sacramental wine lay strewn and empty and mostly shattered on the
floor, the floor was further covered in refuse and human waste, and
figures and decorations on the silent tombs of the dead were hacked
off or simply obliterated."