Knights of the Cross (39 page)

Peter Bartholomew did not think so. ‘Suddenly, it seemed that the saint led me through the city and into the church of the apostle Peter. He reached his hand into the ground – stone and earth were like water to him – and drew forth the lance and gave it into my hands.’

Reliving his vision, Peter had stabbed a fist down and then raised it above his head, brandishing his invisible relic to the crowd. All stares were fixed on it.

‘The saint told me: “Behold the lance which opened Christ’s side, whence has come the whole world’s salvation.”

‘I held it in my hands and wept. I asked to take it to the Count of Saint-Gilles, for at this time we were still hard pressed outside the city walls, but the saint said, “Wait until the city is taken, for then your need will be greatest. At the hour I appoint, bring twelve men to this place and find it where I have hidden it.”

‘He plunged his hand back into the ground, before the steps which lead to the altar, and the lance was gone.’

I looked around. Whatever his failings, Peter Bartholomew was a convincing preacher. His vision seemed to have surpassed even the priest’s in the crowd’s estimation.

‘You said this happened while we were still camped before the walls,’ Adhemar probed.

Peter tilted his head defiantly. ‘It did.’

‘Why, then, do you only tell us now?’

‘Because I was afraid. Because I was poor and you were mighty. “Counts and bishops will not listen to a humble pilgrim,” I told myself. “They will think I tell lies to win favour, or food.” But the saint persisted. Twice more he visited me, commanding me to reveal this miracle, and each time, after he had gone, fear restrained me. Then, yesterday, he appeared again. His eyes flashed, and his red hair burned like fire. “Why do you contemn the Lord your God?” he demanded. “Why, when Christians suffer, do you hold back the words of salvation?”’

Peter’s head was bowed in shame, his hands clasped penitentially before him. ‘As soon as I could, I came to you, my lords, and confessed all. And I will swear it,’ he added, ‘by any holy relic or ordeal you demand.’

If Adhemar was tempted to demand such proof, he did not show it. ‘It is not necessary,’ he declared. ‘Yesterday, in the depths of our distress, as the city burned’ – he glanced significantly at Bohemond – ‘and the Turks assailed us, our Lord granted two visions to the faithful. Hearing them together, we cannot doubt His divine purpose. To this pilgrim He promised the great gift of the holy lance, and to Stephen relief four days hence. This is how it will come to pass. We will wait three days in fasting and prayer. On the fourth day, in accordance with Peter’s vision, we will take twelve men to the cathedral and open the ground where the saint prophesied. There, if we are true, the Lord will fulfil His promise and grant us His miracle.’

‘What if they find nothing but earth and stone?’ Sigurd whispered in my ear.

‘But first,’ Adhemar continued, ‘this holy revelation should rekindle the flame of God’s purpose in our hearts. Who can doubt that the Lord is with us? Though we are bloody and embattled, besieged by enemies and beset by suffering, He shares our torments and sustains us. We are His people, the sheep of His pasture, and He does not forget us. Therefore let every prince and noble, and every knight, pilgrim and servant, reconsecrate himself to our holy cause. Swear by the sacrament of Christ that you will not leave Antioch until we all leave Antioch together, in triumph or defeat as Christ wills it.’

Bohemond stepped forward, drew his sword, and held it before him with the hilt upright like a cross. ‘I swear by the cross, by the sacraments and by the saints, that I will remain in Antioch until death takes me or victory is assured.’

Count Raymond, eager to match this piety, knelt behind his own sword. ‘We are the fellowship of Christ. By one bread and one blood, we are made one with Him. I will not forsake Him.’ He rose and put his arm around Peter Bartholomew’s misshapen shoulders. ‘As for the herald of the Lord, I will take him into my camp and honour him.’

One by one, the other princes sank to their knees and made similar vows. Then Adhemar turned to the massed army and had them do likewise.

‘Our three days of fasting and penance have begun,’ he said. In the middle of the kneeling hordes, he alone remained standing. ‘Confess your sins, make clean your hearts, and prepare your souls for the eternal victory.’

A chant rose from one of the priests behind him. ‘
Tradiderunt me in manus impiorum, et inter iniquos proiecerunt me
 . . .’

‘
Congregati sunt adversum me fortes et sicut gigantes steterunt contra me
 . . .’ the army answered.

Sigurd and I slipped away, back down the mountain.

For three days we suffered fasting and penance as Adhemar had ordered. It needed little effort, for there was not a crumb of food to be had in Antioch. And although it was a time of prayer there was no respite from fighting. Each day Kerbogha attacked the Frankish defences, and each day Bohemond repelled him. At night I could see the watchfires burning on the mountain, and during the day the plumes of smoke where they cremated the dead. I did not return to the battle but spent my days pacing my short stretch of wall, looking out over the plain and the river, though I knew that no help would come.

On the third night Sigurd and I sat with Mushid on the top of our tower. The swordsmith was a curious presence who came and went to his own inscrutable schedule, but he had become a frequent guest during our time in the city. It was one of the few places where he could be safe, and I enjoyed his company. Though Anna thought him unsettling, I found that his talk diverted me from the evils which surrounded us. And I valued the morsels of information his travels occasionally unearthed.

‘All is not well with Kerbogha’s army,’ he was saying. ‘For almost a week, he has poured out his troops against Bohemond. Many Normans have died, but even more Turks have perished and the city has not been taken.’

‘It can only be a matter of days.’ Sigurd was in a foul humour, as he had been since we had returned from the mountain. ‘Our army is besieged by Turks on one side, and famine on the other. They cannot fight two enemies for long.’

Mushid nodded. ‘But Kerbogha has his enemies too. Thirst, for one. He has ten thousand men camped on that mountain, where there are no springs or streams to feed them. It is a week until midsummer, and every day they fight another battle. Each day they lose diminishes their strength.’

‘Each day we win diminishes ours.’

‘But Kerbogha’s army is a fragile creation. The Emir of Aleppo will not fight with the Emir of Damascus, because they have had their own war too recently. The Emir of Damascus looks over his shoulder, because in the south his lands are under attack from the Fatimids of Egypt. The Emir of Homs and the Emir of Menbij have a blood-feud, so they do not speak. The Saracens despise the Turks: they ask why they should fight so far from home when it is the Turks who will claim the spoils. And Kerbogha, whose rank is not so great as his reputation, must yoke these unruly beasts together to pull his chariot. If they continue to bite each other and pull apart, soon the axle will snap and the charioteer will be left helpless.’

‘That is not the Ishmaelites you have described,’ I said. ‘It is the Franks. Bickering princes jealous of each other’s glory; different races divided against themselves. If Kerbogha’s army thirsts, it can retreat to the Orontes to drink. In our hunger, we can do nothing but starve.’

‘And why does an Ishmaelite care so little for the fate of his brethren?’ Sigurd asked. He did not dislike Mushid, but he did not trust him. He preferred the lines of battle to be clearly drawn; the presence of an Ishmaelite who was not an enemy unsettled him. ‘Whose side do you take?’

‘The side of war.’ Anna had climbed the stair below and emerged onto the tower, her pale dress stained with blood. ‘As long as nobody wins, his swords will keep gobbling up lives.’

‘How is the patient?’ I tried to deflect the conversation from the awkward direction she had sent it. ‘Has Quino spoken yet?’

Anna sat beside me. ‘Nothing has passed his lips save air – and little enough of that. He is dying quickly.’

‘He would be dead already if you didn’t waste your time on him,’ Sigurd complained. ‘Why should a murderer and a heretic live when worthier men die?’

Anna did not answer but looked at me for justification.

‘Because every life is precious to God.’ I glared at the others, trying to mask my discomfort. The truth, as they perhaps suspected, was that everything which mattered was beyond my grasp. My life was balanced on a sword-edge, whose hilt was in the hands of Franks who cared nothing for me. I would survive or fall as an unthought consequence of their destiny. Only in pursuing the truth of Drogo’s death did I have any mastery of my fate. Or perhaps I deceived myself.

‘Look there.’ Mushid had leaped to his feet and was pointing at the stars like some magus of old. ‘There – in the north.’

I stood. For a moment I saw nothing but the constellations, as fixed and immutable as ever; then, following Mushid’s outstretched arm, I saw a new star imposed on the heavens. In brightness it dimmed all the others, and its light seemed to grow broader and brighter as I watched.

‘It’s falling over Kerbogha’s camp,’ said Sigurd.

It fell from the sky, passing across the canvas of stars behind and growing ever larger in our sight. Falling from heaven like Lucifer, I thought.

‘Look.’

Through some divine magic, the star was no longer whole. It had split into three, branching out like the prongs of a trident as it plummeted to the ground. Each fragment still glowed with the residue of its starlight and behind them I saw little tails, like cloaks billowing in the wind.

‘
The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, blazing like a torch
,’ murmured Anna.

‘The Triune God descends on Kerbogha’s camp,’ said Mushid. ‘There is hope for you yet, it seems.’

‘Or else the star of Bohemond falls from its firmament,’ Sigurd countered. ‘Its ruin comes from the north.’

Mushid smiled. ‘What was it that the angel said at the birth of the prophet Jesus? “Be of good cheer.” Your god has spoken to your peasants, to your priests, and now He gives a sign to every man in this city that He is with you. The time of dreams and miracles is upon you.’

I stared at him. In those last words his mild voice had strengthened, deepened, as if resonating to some deeper truth. He sounded almost like a prophet, or an oracle.

‘Little less than a miracle will save us,’ said Sigurd.

Anna looked at him, her gaze impenetrable. ‘You had better pray, then, that God does not disappoint when they excavate the church tomorrow.’

Later, while the others slept, I descended the tower and crossed the road behind the wall. We had commandeered one of the houses here: a low, square building set around a courtyard. Under the Varangians’ hammers, the doorway had been enlarged to admit a horse and the courtyard turned into a makeshift stable. Only three of the animals survived, gaunt and weak, but their warm scent on the night air comforted me. As I passed, I heard one of them huffing in his byre.

Beyond the horses, in a long room whose furniture had long since become firewood, Anna had set up her infirmary. I spoke a few quiet words with the Varangian who guarded it and let myself in through the open door. I walked hesitantly, afraid lest I should step on the wounded who lay on the floor, but my eyes were well used to the dark and I disturbed no one.

At the far end, a little removed from the others, I found Quino. He lay wrapped in a white blanket, an indistinct bundle like a butterfly in its cocoon. His head was raised on a balled-up tunic, and he breathed in short, ragged bursts. I feared that Anna was right, that it would not be long before even that was too much effort.

‘What do you know?’ I asked softly. ‘Who led you into your impiety? Was it Drogo?’

Quino did not answer, and without another miracle I feared he might never speak again. Anna had said he had a fever; the bandages around his belly were soaked with the blood and bile which oozed from his wound, and there was no food to feed his strength.

The guard had come over, and joined me looking down on Quino.

‘Has he said anything?’ I asked. ‘In his dreams, perhaps?’

‘No.’ The guard poked Quino with the toe of his boot. ‘Nor will he. He’ll die tomorrow, I think.’

I remembered Mushid’s words.
The time of dreams and miracles is upon you
.

‘Perhaps his life will return.’

But even in the realm of miracles that had only happened once.