The Iron Lance (30 page)

He knew the Norsemen were making for the temple precinct, and decided that was where he would find them—and even if not, he stood a good chance of finding his father and brothers—so he hurried on, following the street where it led, hoping to reach a place where he could get a glimpse of the Temple Mount to know which direction he must go.

From the side streets he glimpsed grim evidence of the conquest: to the right, four crusaders standing to their knees in white-robed bodies were stabbing into the pile with their spears; to the left, two warriors holding an old man between them while a third executed him—the man was shouting in Latin as the spear sank into his stomach. Murdo averted his eyes quickly, and from then on looked only at the street ahead. The pathway turned and turned again, and grew narrower until it ended in an enclosed courtyard. There, Murdo halted.

Fresh corpses covered the entire surface of the square three and four deep, rising to two separate mounds stacked ten or fifteen high. Murdo stared at the bizarre welter of bodies—many of them battered and mutilated beyond recognition—unable to comprehend how such slaughter could have been accomplished. He decided that either they had taken refuge in the courtyard, or had been driven there by the crusaders who then blocked the narrow entrance and began butchering them. In
their terror, the victims must have climbed the ever-increasing heaps, standing on the corpses of their kinsmen in a futile effort to escape, while the crusaders struck them down, killing and killing as the mound grew ever higher.

He felt something damp seeping through his boots, and looked down to see that he was standing in a spreading pool of blood which was creeping slowly out into the street. Sickened, he turned and fled back the way he had come, shaking the vile stuff from his boots as he ran.

Upon reaching the larger street once more, he tried another way. This time, he struck a narrow pathway between large houses. Murdo could hear shouts ahead, and followed the voices to discover that the pathway led into a covered market. Holding tightly to his spear, he jumped over the bodies slumped at the entrance and entered the cool darkness of the suq. From somewhere amidst the maze of stalls and pathways, he could hear the triumphant shouts of the victors as they pillaged. Everywhere, goods and wares of all kinds were spilled and spoiled; in many places, what could not be carried off had been set on fire.

He looked down one dim pathway and saw a light at the end. The passageway was filled with what he took to be a multitude of stones strewn over the ground. Closer examination, however, revealed these to be loaves of bread, thrown down and trodden under foot. He started towards the light, but had not walked a dozen paces when, upon glancing into one of the many empty and ruined stalls, he saw a small huddle of bodies—those of a merchant family, perhaps, who had taken shelter in the suq.

The man had been gutted like a pig from navel to chin, his entrails pulled out and wrapped around his neck to strangle him. Two with long black hair—women, the man's wife and daughter, he supposed—had been beaten to death; their faces were a
squashed mass of splintered bone and blood, no longer recognizably human. A small boy and a dog had been decapitated and their heads exchanged on the bodies.

All this was glimpsed in a fleeting instant, but Murdo felt the gorge rise in his throat. Bitter bile gushed up into his mouth and he turned away, retching. He lurched a few steps, then leaned on his spear and vomited on the ground.

Steeling himself, he staggered on, looking neither left nor right until he emerged into the filthy light at the far end of the passage. Murdo paused to catch his breath and look around. Here, in this quarter, the houses were larger, and more substantial, the people obviously wealthier. Here also, it seemed the conquest was still in progress. A ragged scream echoed from inside one of the houses; further up the street, flames leapt from the upper windows of several others. The stone-paved street was strewn with broken objects—items of furniture, casks, chests, kitchen utensils, clothing—which had been stripped from the houses and thrown into the streets. Rising above the rooftops, Murdo saw the topmost section of a high-soaring wall some distance away; he scanned the length of stone curtain and caught the dull glint of a golden dome rising above the rim of the wall.

Picking his way around the debris, he moved on cautiously, keeping his eye on the upper wall. Upon passing a large stone house with two marble columns he heard a terrified shriek and froze in his steps. An instant later, a woman in a yellow robe broke into the street directly ahead of him, carrying a pale bundle beneath each arm. Right behind raced three pilgrims with white crosses on their mantles and red-streaked swords in their hands. One of them seized the woman by the hair and yanked her backwards off her feet. The bundles fell to the street, and Murdo realized they were babies. The infants lay crying, holding up their tiny hands, as the soldiers fell upon them and began
chopping with their blades.

The woman screamed and lunged at her attackers, begging for mercy. Heedless, the crusaders turned their blades on her. The swords slashed and slashed again, the sharp steel biting deep into the smooth, rounded flesh of her white arms, hewing through muscle and bone, opening wicked red gashes; one of the swords found her neck, releasing a torrent of blood. In a moment, the screaming stopped and all three lay silent. The soldiers glanced around at Murdo, wild glee dancing on their smoke-smeared faces.

One of them shouted at him in a tongue Murdo did not understand. He replied in Latin, saying, “I mean no harm. I am searching for my father.”

The pilgrims glanced at one another, and two of them stepped towards him. The first crusader spoke again, and pointed at him—thrusting his finger again and again insistently. He seemed to be demanding something, but Murdo could not tell what it might be. The two nearest took another step towards him, holding their dripping swords before them.

Murdo repeated his answer in Latin, stepping slowly backwards. The two muttered something to one another. Murdo took another backward step. His foot struck something and he fell. With a shout the three souldiers rushed upon him.

The two nearest reached him first. Murdo, flat on his back, slashed the air with his spear. The blade struck steel and one of the attackers leapt back with a yelp as his sword spun from his hand. Murdo jabbed the spear into the face of the other pilgrim, and the man darted aside, allowing Murdo to roll onto his knees.

The leader of the three gave a loud shout and charged with lofted sword—perhaps expecting the youth to turn tail and run. Murdo remained on his knees, however, and brought the
weapon up sharply as the man closed on him. Murdo did not feel the blade enter the man's belly, and probably his adversary did not feel it either—at first. For he took another step, and struggled for another, before glancing down to see the long haft of the spear protruding from his gut.

A bewildered look appeared on his face. He dropped the sword, and his hands fastened on the spear shaft. He turned his face towards his comrades, and uttered a loud cry. Gripping the shaft, he tried to pull it from him, but Murdo held tight. The man gave another cry, which ended in a cough as a gush of dark blood bubbled up from his throat and spilled over his teeth and chin.

Spewing blood, the man crashed onto his knees, gasping for breath. Murdo, terrified the other two would attack him, yet not daring to release his hold on the spear, tightened his grip on the shaft and held on. The two faced one another on their knees—both clutching the same weapon. Then all at once, the crusader gave a little whimper and slumped onto his side.

Murdo yanked the spear free and turned to meet the two remaining soldiers. He did not wait for them to attack, but charged into them, the bloody blade streaming before him. The two turned as one and fled, leaving their dead comrade behind. Murdo ran after them, and they disappeared around the corner of the nearest house. Murdo, not caring to come upon them unawares, halted. Only then did he realize he had been screaming at the top of his lungs.

He returned to the man he had killed, and stood over the body for a moment. The corpse lay on its side, face against the street; blood had pooled at the open mouth—not as much blood, Murdo thought grimly, as that shed by the poor woman and her babies. Murdo had no regret for what he had done—only that he had not done it sooner. Perhaps the mother and her children would still be alive if he had acted more swiftly.

Then again, maybe it would be himself lying empty-eyed in the street now with a seeping hole below his ribs. His mind squirmed at the thought, and he turned away. Even as he turned, he caught a glint of white out of the corner of his eye…the crusader cross.

It came to him then why the man had been pointing at him: he had no cross. With nothing to identify himself as a pilgrim, the soldiers had mistaken him for yet another infidel to be murdered.

Murdo regarded the crusader's mantle, and the bold white cross sewn onto the shoulder. He hesitated only a moment, then, fearing the man's two comrades might recover their courage and return at any moment, he stooped, heaved the body into a sitting position, and quickly began stripping off the corpse's mantle.

Murdo drew the dead man's mantle over his head. It was wet with sweat, and reeked. The lower front was sticky where the blood had soaked through around the ragged hole made by his spear. Using his discarded siarc, Murdo rubbed off as much of the stuff as he could, then wiped his hands clean, threw down the tainted garment and picked up his spear. He glanced at the white cross now emblazoned on his shoulder. No one now would mistake him for an infidel, he thought, and hastened on.

Further along, the street bent around, rising towards the Temple Mount. Murdo entered a wider thoroughfare and stopped in his tracks. The street was choked with bodies. There were corpses strewn everywhere, some dressed in the white of Turks and Saracens and some in the darker clothing of the Jews, and all of them lying each by other, so that the bodies of the slain appeared to be accompanied by their own dead shadows.

At the far end of the street, Murdo could see the wall surrounding the temple precinct and the ample eastern gate. The gate was open, the heavy doors splintered, battered off their huge iron hinges. Even as he stood looking, an enormous wailing cry went up; it was answered and drowned by a rousing shout that sounded like: “Deus Volt!”…
God wills!

As if drawn by the sound, he stumbled forth, slowly picking his way through the jumble of bodies, step-by-step. Upon reaching the gate, he stopped to look inside and saw a vast courtyard
filled with pilgrims, each one crying God's judgment upon the unbelievers. In the center of the courtyard stood a squat, square building with a bulging top. Far off to the right, he could see a much larger building with a round tower, and a great golden dome. A Frankish banner flew from the dome's pinnacle. This then, was what the monks called the Al-Aqsa Mosq; the smaller of the two buildings, he decided, must be the Dome of the Rock.

The shrieking wail was coming from inside the mosq.

Murdo crept through the gate and into the courtyard. His heart quickened with the hope that he might find his father here. That hope died as swiftly as it was born, however; for as he waded into the throng, he realized the futility of his task. There were simply too many people, too much confusion, too much noise. Even if his father and brothers
were
here, he would never see them in the crush of soldiers.

Overcome by the futility of his task, he faltered. Dazed, confused, the shouts of the screaming mob loud in his ears, he turned and struggled back through the tight-pressed crowd—only to be swept forwards by a sudden surge. He fought to keep his feet, and escaped being trampled by the use of his spear to hold himself upright against the tide-rush.

The mob seemed intent on the mosq; every face was turned towards the golden dome. At first Murdo could not discern what it was that held their attention so firmly…then, above the heads of the mob, he glimpsed pale yellow fingers of flame just beginning to creep up the walls of the temple; flames were also sprouting from the base of the tower.

The cries from inside the burning building grew louder and more urgent. Murdo put his head down and began elbowing his way along, pushing, shoving, thrusting himself through the crowd. This time he reached the perimeter of the courtyard, and squeezed past the last of the crusaders.

There came another battle cry behind him, and he looked back, catching a glimpse of the temple entrance; the tall narrow door cracked open and black smoke billowed out and up as a mass of white-turbaned Arabs staggered from the burning building and into the waiting swords and spears.

Murdo's stomach convulsed into a hard ball in his gut, and he shuddered with a spasm of revulsion as the crusaders hewed at the wretches trying to escape the fire. Some, choosing martyrdom rather than the flames, threw themselves upon the blades with cries of “Allah akbar!” Others crawled on hands and knees, whimpering, pleading for mercy. But there was no mercy. The mob stood jeering as they cut them down. Blood splashed upon the stones of the temple courtyard. The cruel blades flashed relentlessly, methodically, casually, carelessly, ceaselessly. The pilgrim soldiers roared with demented delight.

The flames burned higher and hotter. Beaten back by the heat, the mob retreated with a surge that carried Murdo towards the gate. He could feel the flames on his back as he fought free of the crowd.

Upon reaching the gate, he glanced back over his shoulder to see that the blaze had driven the throng into a wide ring around the burning building. Arabs still tried to escape, but those staggering through the smoke now were themselves aflame, their clothes and hair burning. They collapsed and rolled upon the ground in agony, much to the enjoyment of the crusaders.

The flames cracked and roared, forcing the onlookers back and back in an ever greater circle. There came a great groaning sigh from above, and the golden dome began to sag. The crusaders cheered as the mosq began to crumble inwardly upon the heads of the doomed Muhammedans whose dying screams rent the searing air.

Murdo could endure no more. He ran from the courtyard,
fleeing back the way he had come. The golden dome of the Al-Aqsa Mosq collapsed with a mighty crash that echoed down the street behind him, but he did not look back again.

The path by which he had reached the Temple Mount sloped sharply down, and Murdo was soon running, gaining speed with every step. He ran with no thought in his head but to get away from the atrocity he had seen. On and on he ran; his breath grew labored, and he could hear nothing but the dull thump of his own heartbeat in his ears. His lungs burned and his sides ached, but still he ran—flying down the hill as fast as his legs could move. The slap, slap, slap—quick and sharp—of his flying feet striking well worn pavements of Jesu's city mocked him. He felt afraid and ashamed.

The street grew narrower and began meandering sharply, bending away to the right and taking him with it. His breath came in ragged gasps and he tasted blood in his mouth, yet he ran on. He did not notice when the street began rising sharply once more, nor did he see the first wine-dark trickle of blood coursing down among the paving stones. He saw nothing but the dark faces of the Arabs screaming as they burned.

The steep incline of the path began to tell on him. He slowed his pace, but struggled on. It came to him that his last few paces had been accompanied by the sound of splashing. He took another step, lost his footing, and fell, sprawling forward on hands and knees. His spear skidded across blood-slick stones.

He jumped to his feet, his hands dripping, his sleeves and the knees of his breecs sodden now. He stood for a moment, staring at his bloody hands as dread stole over him. His empty stomach knotted and squirmed. The trickle of blood had become a very stream, coursing in frothy freshets down the footpath, pooling in bright red puddles and running on, branching and twining as it went, the meaty smell rich where it ran.

Desperate to escape, Murdo fled up another street. But there was no relief. Here, too, the well-worn path was awash in reeking blood. There were bodies, too—dozens, scores, hundreds—their white and yellow robes red-stained and dripping still. He kept his eyes on the path ahead, refusing to look at the blood.

But there was so much! Everywhere his eye happened to light there was blood, and still more blood—in such ghastly profusion, in such absolute abundance of quantity that he could not ignore it and began at last to see nothing else…blood pooling thick and black in the streets…spurting hot and dark from the wounds of the dying…blood stinking foul in the hot sun…staining stone and wood and dirt with its rich red-brown patina of extinguished life…blood oozing purple from neck stumps of headless victims…blood in glimmering puddles surrounded by six starving cats that crouched at their grisly feast with their tongues lapping, lapping…blood splattered on the walls of the houses, and on the steps, trickling from the windows, and out through the doors…blood sluicing in slow rivers down the dirty streets, a dusty gray membrane caking thick upon the turgid surface…blood sticky under foot and curdling in the fierce summer sun…blood wafting the sweet suffocating stench of death into the hot dead air…a never-ending flood-tide of blood gushing through the streets in wider, ever more prodigious streams…

The blood…God have mercy! There was so much!

Sickened, wretched, he turned his back and fled the sight. Heedless of all else save the need to escape, he ran until he could run no longer. When at last he stopped to look around he saw that the shadows stretched long across an empty square, and the pathways were dark. Corpses strewed the paths and byways, and lay heaped on the doorsteps of the houses—whole families, slain in defense of their homes and of one another.

Pressing a hand to his side, he moved across the square, and passed a building surmounted by a six-sided star of bronze. Someone had written “Isu Regni” in blood over the doorway. The words brought him up short. As he was standing there, he felt a feather-soft touch on his face and hair and looked up. Falling from the sky all around him, black ash, fine as snow was drifting gently into the silent streets.

Thirsty now, and sweating from his exertion, Murdo walked on. The further he walked, the thicker grew the ash. He saw gray smoke filling the street ahead, but continued on and soon came to the flaming wreckage of a huge building. The roof had fallen in and little remained of the walls; a few of the larger timbers yet burned, but mostly the flames had died to embers. The smoke was bitter, and stank of burning fat; it stung Murdo's eyes and made a putrid taste in his dry mouth.

He wondered at the reason for this, and then saw that what he had taken to be mounds of smoldering debris were in fact the charred bodies. Murdo looked with dull eyes upon the great mass of twisted, blackened husks, frozen in the rictus of death, limbs deformed by agony and fire.

The heat of their still-smoldering corpses parched Murdo's skin even as the ash from their clothes and flesh settled over him. The carcasses crackled as the fiery embers continued to devour them. The air was rank with the odor of scorched grease and burned meat; every now and then one of the corpses would burst, spilling its stewed internal organs into the embers to sizzle and stink.

When at last he turned away, his eyes were hot and his lips cracked. He walked on with aimless steps, and the sky overhead—when it could be glimpsed through the drifting tatters of smoke—took on the colors of a ruddy dusk. Murdo wondered how it was the sun yet continued on its accustomed round, moving through its course, undeflected and unchanged.

The strangeness of this occupied him until he arrived in yet another quarter. There were, he noticed without interest, domes on some of the buildings and these bore wooden crosses. By this he knew he had come to one of the Christian districts. Perhaps, he thought, this quarter had escaped the worst ravages of the fighting, and he might find water here. He licked his dry lips, and stumbled on.

After a while, he found himself in another yard—the courtyard of a grand house. Near the house stood a stone basin of the kind used to water animals; Murdo moved towards it, thinking he might get a mouthful of water there, and indeed the basin was full, but the body of a drowned child floated just below the surface. He stood and gazed at the little corpse, staring up at him through the water, its mouth rounded in a soundless word. A swirl of black hair framed the little face, and bubbles nestled beneath the tiny chin and in the corner of each wide eye.

Whether boy or girl, he could not tell, but Murdo marveled at the calm serenity in that small face. How could it be that the child should express a peace so greatly at odds with the violence of its death? He stood long, gazing at the child, and gradually became aware of screams and coarse laughter coming from around the side of the house. Probably, the commotion had been going on for a time, but, absorbed in his unthinking contemplation of the child, he had not attended it.

He walked to the corner of the house and looked: five soldiers were standing before a wall—two held an infant between them, and two others grasped a frantic woman by the arms; the fifth soldier stood behind the woman with a sword in his hand. The woman's clothing was ripped and rent, and she was screaming for her babe, which was squalling in the soldiers' grip. A man sat with his back against the wall, head down, unmoving, the front of his robe a solid mass of blood.

The soldiers holding the baby offered the infant to its mother. They said something to her and she struggled forward, but was held fast and could not move. Again they offered the infant, and again she struggled forth, only to have the babe snatched away. This time, however, the soldiers turned and, with a mighty heave, dashed the infant head first against the wall.

The babe slid silent to the ground.

In the same instant, the two brutes holding the mother released their grip. The woman lurched forward to retrieve her child. Even as she started forth, the soldier behind her swung his sword. The blow caught her on the back of the neck. Her scream stopped abruptly as her head came away from her shoulders. She crumpled in midstep, pitching awkwardly forward, her head spinning to the ground in a crimson arc, and rolling to a stop between the legs of her dead husband.

Murdo turned and ran from the yard, the sound of the soldiers' laughter grating in his ears. When at last he stopped running, he walked. But he moved like a man in a dream, heedless of his steps, seeing all, yet attending nothing, feeling nothing, stumbling forward, falling, picking himself up and staggering on, his heart a dull aching bruise inside him.

Sick to his soul at all he had seen, he thought:
This day I have walked in hell
.

Murdo carried the thought for a long time, listening to the words echo and reverberate inside his head. Some time later, long after nightfall, he finally reached the Jaffa Gate and made his way out of Jerusalem. As he stumbled out through the great doors, he paused to shed his borrowed mantle. He pulled the garment over his head and held it up to see the white cross glimmering in the pale, smoke fretted moonlight.