Prince of Legend

CHAPTER TEN

‘These people,’ Bohemund insisted, ‘are no longer there to be plundered by us. Just as we cannot starve, neither can they.’

If food had ceased to be scarce it had not become so plentiful that it could both feed the local Armenians as well as the warriors and pilgrims of the Crusade. Now that Antioch and the whole of Northern Syria was effectively in Latin hands, the people they had previously exploited to survive had been transformed into a future source of tax revenue and so a responsibility for which they had to care, notwithstanding that who would benefit was still in dispute.

Shortage imposed the burden of payment for expensive supplies brought in from distant territories, while any early local harvesting had been severely curtailed by both the presence and needs of Kerbogha and his host. After such an extended period of military occupation by two armies, the whole region was suffering.

In the first months the Crusaders had quickly consumed the kind of surplus that grew over years of peaceful agriculture, then thanks to their own self-indulgence they had lived, or was it survived, a winter of dearth that had not spared the people who lived there. Fertile the Antiochene plain might be but to keep the army fed prior to the harvest would impose too much of a burden, and to forage in the old manner — to take what they wanted without payment — was no longer fitting.

‘What do you suggest, Count Bohemund?’ Raymond asked, his smile one of scorn. ‘That we all move away and leave you behind?’

‘No. I think that our good Bishop, with enough men, can hold Antioch and control both the city and the immediate countryside with a few hundred lances, for there is no threat to speak of. For the rest, we should disperse and maintain our forces in lands that have suffered less deprivation, which will also go some way to asserting our right to rule over the littoral.’

‘Which,’ Godfrey de Bouillon added in a deeply serious tone, ‘will also help to keep our lances from mischief.’

To the pious Duke of Lower Lorraine that meant temptations of the flesh as much as anything else — he was strong against debauchery and forceful in imposing piety — yet it was a sound notion without those activities: if they were not going to march on to Jerusalem for near to four months, then to leave their men idle in the region was asking for trouble, an inactive army being a unmanageable one.

The longer they were not employed in fighting the more harm they would do and not just by waywardness. Morale would plummet, inter-nationality rivalry would increase and what were now minor grievances would grow in the telling to become a collective difficulty.

‘I am happy to accept my part of the Count of Taranto’s proposition,’ said Ademar.

‘My nephew, Tancred, had some success in Cilicia and holds title to the city of Mamistra. Good sense dictates, given that the Emperor has abandoned and scorched the region to the north of his possessions, that such an area be made secure for us all, not just my own flesh and blood.’

If Bohemund’s expression was one of bland unconcern, that fooled no one. The intentions of Alexius Comnenus were unknown: yes, he had retired to Nicaea but that was bound to be before he heard the news that Antioch had been secured. This would not be long in reaching his ears, with Vermandois, accompanied by the Lord of Hainault, well on the way to conveying information of their astounding victory.

What would he then do, march south at once to stake his claim to what they had captured? If he did, Bohemund would be in a strong position to both take control of events and either prevent further progress or negotiate; he could block the narrow pass known as the Cilician Gates and, if he lacked the strength to hold it, extract from the Emperor personal concessions to allow him through so that the Byzantines would avoid a lengthy circular detour.

‘Count Raymond, you controlled the Ruj Valley before we besieged Antioch and in that region you have interests which you might see the need to enforce.’

‘I see many things that need to be enforced, Count Bohemund.’

‘The pity being, My Lord, that what a man wants he does not always get, even if he feels he has a special blessing from God.’

That was a reference to the way Raymond was exploiting the Holy Lance to his own ends, the effect of which, among the superstitious elements of the soldiery, would be diminished by dispersal.

‘I could take the road to Edessa,’ Godfrey interjected quickly.

This was done as much to prevent the insults flying as to agree the wisdom of a move to the north-east, yet he too was being disingenuous. His younger brother held Edessa and his power and influence had grown by first defying a siege by Kerbogha, added to his tightening grip of the surroundings, for if Baldwin was a man of doubtful morals — many said none — he was a good fighter, had a sharp brain and he knew how to exploit a thriving region; if there was luck in his prosperity there was also ability. For the Crusade, Godfrey moving into his lands would secure the whole north-eastern flank.

The discussion was not brief, it could not be with so many competing interests, made more telling by the mutual dislike of Raymond and Bohemund, but eventually it was resolved. Robert of Flanders would join with Raymond, taking with him the bulk of his brother-in-law’s Normans. The Duke himself would stay with the small garrison and aid Ademar in the administration of a city much ravaged by recent events, albeit the Apulians would garrison the citadel and Toulouse would continue to hold those parts of the city and outside he had seized after Bohemund’s victory. Thus the lines of their dispute remained unresolved.

To get away from Antioch and the rest of the crusading army, riding north into a country unravaged by war, where food was plentiful for a sizeable but not massive force, was in itself a blessing. It was not just the magnates who had quarrels: petty many of them might be amongst knights, but they were prevalent and would fester if the men were not kept apart. Shared blood did not soothe Norman rivalry and the men from Apulia were wont to tease their northern brethren about being backward, the Lombard levies of foot soldiers assuming airs with both.

The high-and-mighty French hated any who bordered on their lands, for they had been fighting them all their days, and were quick to condescend to everyone, Normans, Angevins, Provencals and the Lotharingians, while no contingent could ever be content that others had fought as hard in the Great Battle of Antioch as they. Naturally, each wanted to lay claim to the victory and sometimes it went as far as accusations of some folk being shy of a real contest.

This slight was mostly aimed at the Apulians who had formed their leader’s reserve; with their fiery blood that was not an accusation to be taken lying down. Distance was the best remedy to prevent a war of words descending to a contest with weapons and that went higher than the ordinary lance; several captains had nearly come to a contest, the tale of one such being related to Bohemund now.

‘It started as a jest,’ Tancred exclaimed. ‘But it did not stay that way and Reinhard of Toul has come to be near insufferable since he did your bidding. I was sore tempted to beat my sword about his swollen head.’

‘Then may the good Lord send him a reverse to dent his pride,’ Bohemund replied in a soothing tone, well aware that his nephew was upset, having fought as hard as anyone in that desperate battle and with many a cut and bruise to prove it. ‘There is nothing like it to bring a man down to earth. The Greek word is “hubris”, as I know to my cost.’

No man likes to recall his failures and Bohemund was no exception, but the word left him no option. He lapsed into silence with his nephew who, knowing him well, was sure he had fallen, as he did sometimes, to reviewing every one of his reverses, some of them imposed on him by his own uncle, Roger of Sicily, which if they had never been bloody routs had been disappointments. More often the occasion of uncomfortable parley, they had led to him having to give up lands he had conquered.

Worse in memory were those occasions when Alexius Comnenus had bested him in the previous decade, during the two Apulian invasions of Byzantine territory set in motion by his father. If Alexius had never driven the Apulians from his soil by military ability, the Emperor, with his bottomless chests of gold, had managed to fend off his enemies. Twice gold was sent to the Duke of Apulia’s contentious subjects to encourage them to rebel, thus forcing the Guiscard to depart the campaign to control his own rebellious barons.

On the second invasion Bohemund had been left in command and had pushed forward through Macedonia and on to the borders of Thessaly, inflicting several defeats on the Byzantines. Yet the deeper he forced his way into the lands of Romania the greater his problems became: supply, losses to fighting and disease, not to mention the odd desertion from a host that was fighting for personal gain, not loyalty to the cause of the de Hautevilles.

In the end that was how Alexius vanquished his enemies: the Apulian captains, weary of campaigning for a whole year without much in the way of plunder and while their leader was absent from the camp seeking reinforcements, accepted bribes to abandon the campaign and go home.

Bohemund had never made any secret to Tancred that he thought of Alexius as an enemy with whom he had a score to settle, a man who had dented the lustre of a reputation of which he was proud. Although not a victim of vanity, it could not be anything but pleasing to know that your fame as a warrior had spread well beyond the confines of Southern Italy. Maybe it was something to do with his outstanding physical dimensions as well as his fighting skill, but the name of Bohemund of Taranto was spoken of with awe across Christendom.

‘Do you intend to fight him again?’

‘Who?’ Bohemund asked, though he could hardly fail to be aware of what Tancred was driving at.

‘Or is the task to get from Alexius more than he wants to give? Title to Antioch, for instance.’

‘Do you never tire of probing?’

‘No,’ came the reply, ‘and if you wonder at it, I am curious to know how far you will go to secure possession of the city. And I would be obliged if you did not, as you usually do, take defence in an unknown future or our shared blood.’

Being close-mouthed, never showing your hand unless it was absolutely necessary, was a de Hauteville trait, which some called deceitful — usually those who were the losers in any dispute with the family. Yet it had even been termed that by those who had loyally supported and fought with them. Bohemund’s father had often given the impression of not knowing his own mind on the very good grounds that if you appeared to be confused, that surely must apply to your enemy, while all those who supported you had to do was follow your directives.

‘Am I being challenged?’

‘I think I have the right, if not to challenge, to seek to be informed.’

The time was long past when Bohemund could reply to that with severity. Tancred was grown to full and puissant manhood now, was a fine and competent commander of men who had stature; he had fought too many battles, both with his uncle and independently, to just be dismissed. At the heart of his enquiry was his own future: if his uncle was planning to stay in Antioch, whatever his status and regardless of who was suzerain, what did that mean for a nephew needing to make his own way in the world?

‘The truth?’

‘Nothing less would please me.’

That led to another silence and a backward look at the long line of mounted men and milities in their wake. Bohemund dismounted — it was time to walk the horses to ease fatigue and his lances did likewise — so it was at a steady walking gait that the reply finally came.

‘I will seek to hold Antioch under my own title …’

‘It is not just Alexius who will dispute that.’

‘No.’ There was no need to name Raymond. ‘But that is my aim.’

‘And if the Emperor denies it?’

‘Toulouse must be dealt with first, but even with what he holds, not having the citadel puts me in a better position than he.’

Tancred listened as his uncle outlined, in what was for him an uncharacteristically detailed way, both the problems and advantages of the prevailing situation in terms of supply, the possibility of having to fight Raymond’s Provencal knights for possession of the Bridge Gate and Mahomerie — to be avoided unless impossible — and most importantly the value of time.

‘Toulouse has alienated all my peers by his high-handedness and I think even Ademar is sick of his pretensions with the Holy Lance.’

‘You do not mention Jerusalem,’ Tancred said in a deliberate way; he felt he was being fobbed off with discussion about matters of which he already knew.

Getting his innermost feelings out of Bohemund was like drawing blood from a stone; it went against his whole nature to be utterly open and it took some time and a certain amount of rumination to conclude that only a straight answer would satisfy.

‘You must have realised by now, Tancred, that Jerusalem holds no attraction for me. I would want it to be wrested from Islam for the glory of our faith but …’

‘Without your efforts?’

‘We spoke of this before, nephew, do you not recall, and I advanced the notion that there would be as much dispute over the title to Jerusalem as we are now having regarding Antioch.’

‘And you favour de Bouillon, I know.’

‘I do, for the very good reason that he has only the restoration of Christianity as his purpose. There are no other ambitions to distract him.’

‘Raymond will claim it, despite your partiality for Godfrey, and he will use the Holy Lance to further his cause.’

‘You mean the Holy Fraud,’ Bohemund replied bitterly, ‘and if that offends you, I do not care.’

‘Fraud or real, the mass of our charges believe in it.’

That got a snapped response. ‘Without knowing the truth of how it was found!’

‘Jerusalem?’

‘Let others have the glory of rescuing the Holy City. I will be content to guard their rear and give what assistance I can. You once asked me if I had Antioch marked as a prize before we ever set out from home. The answer is no, but I did tell you that I had no intention to do for Alexius or Byzantium that which they could not do on their own. Antioch is the richest prize in this part of the world and one Alexius forfeited by failing to come to our aid when he had sworn to do so.’

‘And if he comes now?’

‘Then he had best do so with his sword raised.’

‘And do you think that will happen?’

Bohemund slowly shook his head. ‘In time, perhaps, but not soon. Would a man who could not take Nicaea, only three days’ march from his capital, and in fear of losing everything, undertake a three month advance into what could be enemy territory just to get to the walls of the most formidable fortress in the whole of Asia Minor when it is held by me?’

‘He need not march, Uncle, he could come by sea. Byzantium still has a fleet even if it is much diminished.’

That brought forth a smile. ‘So might I,’ to be followed by an enigmatic silence, this time accompanied by a sly smile, until Tancred had to finally ask how that could be?

‘I have sent offers of trading concessions to both Pisa and Genoa, both of whom are a nightmare for Byzantium. Their fleets are larger, their vessels are better, their fighting ability proven and they stand to make fortunes from trading through Antioch, a city under the Turks that was denied to them. With naval support from such city states Alexius will not dare to seek to get to Syria by sea, for he risks destruction on water just as he fears he might also do on land. Likewise he will not be able to supply his army by sea and we both know that a land march through Cilicia without that has many difficulties. And what will the Turks do then, with Constantinople bereft of defenders?’

‘And in all this, Uncle, what do you have in mind for me?’

‘The true purpose of your probing.’

‘I will not deny it and neither will I seek to excuse it.’

‘There is no need why you should, Tancred, you are my nephew and as close to me as would be a son. You may demand of me things that others cannot and if I can give of them, I shall.’

‘And if I seek the freedom to act for myself?’

Bohemund replied with real feeling. ‘That, of all things, is the easiest to grant. Did I not say you would need at some time to strike out on your own?’

‘Not as easy to do as to say! Every command I have held, bar one, has been under your banner and leading your lances.’

‘Some of our Apulians will follow you.’

‘How many?’

Bohemund laughed. ‘If you are intent on Jerusalem, that should guarantee those with the most sins to repent, and besides that you have the men from your own fiefs of Lecce and Monterone.’

‘Will you release some of your men to my banner?’

‘I will allow that you may seek to detach them to your service and I think that will suffice, but I will not go so far as to diminish myself to further your ambitions if it does not.’

‘But-’

‘Be satisfied with that, Tancred,’ Bohemund interrupted softly, ‘for I can offer you no more.’

The weeks following were spent in taking control of the lands of Southern Cilicia, which involved cowing some fortified towns and making alliances with others, not least those held by Armenians. Wealthy and important Tarsus, which had been taken and garrisoned by Baldwin of Boulogne, now became an Apulian fief, the men the new master of Edessa had left behind sent east to tell him of his loss, with a message that the city was a price to be paid for the massacre of Bohemund’s men outside these very walls.

If taking a string of towns created a buffer for Bohemund it was not one he could expect to impede the army of Byzantium if it did come this way; to do that would require that he be present and in force, but it did help to secure his northern flank, enough to provide ample warning of any difficulties.

The mountain passes that narrowed the road from Constantinople were the key, the Cilician Gates and, further south, the Belen Pass; those he could hold with less men than had sufficed at Thermopylae, which would, if Alexius knew of his presence and wished to avoid him, force a long march through the Anti-Taurus Mountains to the east.

‘If he is coming,’ Bohemund said, standing atop a high peak of the Taurus Mountains and looking north to the lands of Anatolia, ‘he will be marching by now.’

Alexius Comnenus was, in fact, residing in his Imperial Palace of Blachernae, as yet unaware of what had happened at Antioch. When he thought of the Crusade, which he did in between the travails of running the empire, he saw that it had been of benefit to him in the reduction of the closest threat to his capital city — he held Nicaea again, which acted as a serious buffer to anyone wishing to attack Constantinople — while it had made safer the hinterlands beyond by driving back the Turks so they had to concentrate on defeating the Latins and not making further incursions into imperial lands.

Sure they had perished he had, as was his duty as a Roman Emperor and secular head of the Orthodox Christian Church, ordered that Masses be said for their souls — this also helped to appease those who had come east too late to join their confreres in the annihilation, like Bohemund’s half-brother, Guy of Amalfi, now on his way back to Italy.

Yet with a complicated and difficult empire to run it was not at the forefront of his thinking until it was brought into sharp focus by the arrival at the city gates of a dishevelled Count Hugh of Vermandois, quickly shown into the imperial presence and Alexius sat on his throne.

‘My Lord of Hainault and I were attacked on the way here, robbed and left without horses, which delayed our bringing to you the news from Antioch.’

‘And where is Hainault?’ Alexius asked in Latin, which Vermandois had used, unwilling to hear that these two men might be the only survivors of an action which he did not think of without a twinge of guilt. If he had been given no choice but to leave the Crusade in dire straits it had not been a comfortable decision to make.

‘Dead, Your Eminence, from wounds he took fighting off our assailants. That too delayed me as I sought to care for him.’

Alexius signalled that Vermandois, whose voice was hoarse, be given something to drink, which was brought to him and greedily consumed. ‘I fear the news you have for me, but I beg you not to be hasty. What has occurred is only a measure of God’s will …’

‘Such a victory can be nothing else!’ Vermandois exclaimed, cutting right across Alexius, which would have got him a glare had the words he used not shocked his listener. ‘Praise be to God.’

Count Hugh began to babble, speaking so quickly that the Emperor, despite his knowledge of Latin, struggled both to keep up and make sense of what was being said. How could it be that the Crusaders had beaten Kerbogha’s mighty host? Was this man before him suffering from too much exposure to the sun? By calming Vermandois down and posing a series of sharp questions he came to realise the truth and it was not news that pleased him, even if those he thought perished were in the main still alive.

Antioch was held by the Crusade, which might have been good; Bohemund held the citadel, which was not, especially when Count Hugh, albeit reluctantly, admitted that the Count of Taranto had felt abandoned, indeed betrayed. The fact that all the lords had felt so was glossed over, for Count Hugh was no partisan of the Apulian leader, even if he had given him an opportunity to add lustre to his name, one he was keen to not only relate but to massively embellish.

‘You do not tell me that your Crusader lords are eager that I should claim my rights to Antioch?’

‘Count Raymond of Toulouse has defended those most assiduously, as do I, which is why I came to inform you that the city is now secure.’

‘But not, it seems, Count Bohemund?’

‘I fear he has ambitions of his own.’

‘Count Hugh, you are weary and in need of rest, not to mention a more fitting set of clothes. I beg you retire to a chamber I shall provide for you to bathe and take sustenance. Then, later, we will speak more of this and you can describe in detail to me this Battle of Antioch and how the crusading army, under your command, achieved your victory.’

When Vermandois had left, Alexius remained in a contemplative state on his throne, yet none of the courtiers observing him could doubt the train of his thoughts, for if they had not, being Greeks, initially understood Count Hugh, the import of his words had soon been made plain.

Antioch was in the hands of the Crusade, the vital citadel held by a man he knew to be an enemy and in abandoning them to their fate he had given that adversary an excuse to repudiate his vows. He would hear tell of the battle and the surprising victory and would nod sagely when Vermandois told him of his astounding generalship, not a word of which he would believe, for if Count Hugh did not know of his limitations, Alexius, a fine commander himself, did.

Perhaps those waiting for their emperor to speak did not quite comprehend the meaning of what had been said, but Alexius had no doubts whatsoever: if he wanted to have control of Antioch it would not be achieved by demanding or even pleading that it be handed over. If he wished to press his claim he could only do so by the threat of force.