Templar's Acre

CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

There was an enormous shudder, and Buscarel came to, in time to receive a shower of grit in his eyes. Coughing, he rolled over, blinking and wiping at his eyes.

‘Wait, you fool. You want to shove sand tighter into your eyes?’

‘Where am I?’

‘In the undercroft of the Temple. You’re damned lucky, too.’

He at last managed to open his eyes and gaze about him. The chamber was an old storage room, with squat, solid pillars holding up the massive vaults of the ceiling. Sconces held candles which burned with sickly yellow flames, and there were some torches further away, set into brackets in the walls. Along the floor, palliasses were set out, and on all of them, men were lying. Some appeared to be asleep, but for the most part, the men were awake, listening to the thuds of the rocks hitting the ground overhead.

‘Are they hitting the Temple?’

‘What, with their rocks? No, these are all landing a long way away,’ the man said.

Buscarel glanced at him. He was a short, grizzled fellow with the arms of an archer — immensely strong shoulders and biceps. ‘Why are you here?’

‘I managed to get a splinter of rock on my head,’ the man said. ‘It took off my helmet, and I was bleeding so much, they thought I wouldn’t last long. Then someone noticed I was breathing. You were the same.’

‘You said I was lucky — why? How did I get here? I remember the ship sinking, and the sea washing me away. .’

‘A fisherman found you and brought you in. He thought you were too far gone but the brothers reckon you’ll be all right.’

Buscarel remembered. The water, lapping over his nose and mouth, the saltiness on his tongue, the desperate thirst, while he clung to the ship’s oar. Every so often he would see the battlefield and glimpse the rocks flying, the darkening of the sky as arrows were loosed at the walls of Acre. And then there would be a wave under him again, and it would pass on to the shore, while he was concealed from that world of pain and anguish.

He had thought of letting go. Of sinking, to drown slowly. Men said it was not so painful. But others talked of the monsters beneath the waves, the little fishes that would feast on a man’s flesh, the crabs that would pick at his eyes, the jelly-like creatures, the slugs, all eating his body. . and he knew he couldn’t submit. To do that would be to give away his entire body, and what would he then have on the day God called to the dead to rise again? So he had gripped that piece of timber, and refused to let go, while the shore slipped away, further and further, and the currents pulled him out to sea.

A man clad in brown robes moved along the palliasses, a bucket in one hand, a ladle in the other. He stopped, providing drink to those who needed it, and Buscarel realised he was parched. He swallowed, and called. The monk saw him and nodded, but continued his progress. One man did not move. The monk sighed, placed the bucket on the ground, the ladle inside it, and pulled the man from the palliasse, leaving him on the stone flags, then carried on.

There was a smell about the room, Buscarel noticed now. A fusty odour of old damp stone and mortar, overlaid with a thick, cloying stench. It was the smell of death.

Lucia was in the garden still when Pietro opened the door, and she rose with a start on seeing Sir Jacques helping Baldwin inside, an arm about his shoulders.

Sir Jacques still managed to smile with his ruined mouth as he released his patient and passed him to Pietro. ‘Take care of Master Baldwin,’ he mumbled. ‘He will need that wound seen to.’

‘What has the fellow done to himself?’ Pietro demanded, standing back and peering down.

He was pushed aside as Lucia reached him. ‘Oh, oh!’ She fell to her knees and pulled at his hosen, staring at his injured leg with her mouth curled in horror. ‘Quick, to his bed, and then fetch me a cloth and hot water!’

‘Eh? I suppose I don’t have enough to do already?’ Pietro muttered truculently, but did as he was bid, while Lucia turned to Sir Jacques.

‘Nay, child, not me,’ he protested quickly. ‘I am not permitted to be touched by a woman.’

‘You think you will lose yourself in passion for me?’ she said curtly.

He took a step away, a grin twisting his bloodied features. ‘Baldwin has, has he not? Go to him, child. He needs you more than I, and I have men who can see to my face. Go on! Go!’

She frowned quickly, but then turned and went back to Baldwin.

His leg was a mess. The cut had gone deep. It was fortunate that the bleeding seemed only slow, but he must surely rest it, she thought.

‘It was a dismal failure,’ Baldwin panted. ‘I should have warned them. I saw the Muslims fail in the same way when they attacked us in the desert.’

She placed a hand on his breast, and the gentle rumble of his voice made her hand tingle. ‘I prayed for you, and you returned, so I am happy.’

‘A hundred didn’t. They’ll remain out there. And what will become of us, I don’t know.’

‘Do not worry. You need to rest your leg, let it heal.’

‘No, Lucia, I can’t. I have to get back to the walls tomorrow. I have men to command,’ he fretted.

‘You must have a physician look at your leg,’ she insisted. Pietro had entered, for once silently, and placed a bowl of hot water at her side. She took a ball of muslin and soaked it, before beginning to wipe at the blood about his wound. The lips opened wide and she could see the blood moving thickly within, while the white flesh pulling away made it look strangely obscene. She dabbed and cleaned the gash as best she might, then called for Pietro.

‘Yes? Can’t a man get any rest?’ he grumbled as he reached the door.

‘I need some egg-white. Give the yolk to Uther, and bring me the white.’

‘And then, I suppose get used to watching over the man all day long,’ she heard him grumbling as he turned and walked back to his kitchen. Soon she had the egg, and could smear it all over the wound.

‘There! That is the best I can do for you,’ she said, wrapping his leg in a fresh piece of muslin. ‘You must rest now.’

‘I don’t want to rest. How is Uther?’

‘I think he will live. He will be better if I bring him in here. The two invalids may soothe each other,’ she added with a twinkle in her eye.

‘It will be some time before I can sleep with you again,’ Baldwin said sadly.

‘If that is all you can think of, you are already mending.’

‘Please, lie here with me.’

Fifteen minutes later, Pietro passed the chamber and saw the two lying together. Lucia was asleep, her head on Baldwin’s breast, and Pietro saw that Baldwin’s hand was clutching hers. It was enough to waken a pang of jealousy, but he refused to give in to that. He continued past them, recalling his own woman. Long dead now, of course. Along with his family.

‘Pietro! Get over here!’

He sighed, fitted the accustomed scowl to his face, and shuffled reluctantly to the man who had saved him then, and who was still the only man for whom he would willingly die. ‘Sir?’

‘Sir Jacques needs wine. Quickly, man.’

Pietro was soon back with a jug, and he set it down beside the two men, passing them cups before he bent, grunting, to serve them both.

Sir Jacques found it difficult to talk. His mouth was terribly battered and bruised, and Pietro could hardly take his eyes from the injury.

‘It was a man’s gauntlet,’ Sir Jacques said, seeing Pietro’s look. ‘A Brother Templar was lancing a Muslim, and his arm flew up and hit me. Hardly the kind of honourable injury I’d expected,’ he added wryly.

‘Master Baldwin, he said a third of the men were lost?’ Pietro said.

‘I think so. The knights returned, but of the sergeants and squires, I fear we lost many. It was a bad game. Very bad,’ Sir Jacques said.

‘What of Master Baldwin?’ Ivo asked.

‘He was as bold as a youth could be. He rode himself up with the rest of the force, and made his way to the front, and he saved the Marshal of the Temple, I think, when Sir Geoffrey was sorely pressed. He was a credit.’

‘I am glad,’ Ivo said. He stared up the garden to where Baldwin’s chamber lay.

‘But even with him, we’ll find it difficult to survive,’ Pietro finished for him.

‘You still here? If I need advice from a servant, I’ll ask for it,’ Ivo muttered, but without heat.

‘He is right,’ Sir Jacques said. He took an olive from the dish between them and carefully placed it in the right side of his mouth, away from his wound. ‘If we receive no more help, we will fail. There is food and water aplenty, and we have no lack of weapons, but we need more men. We cannot afford to lose almost a hundred in an evening.’

‘I know,’ Ivo said. ‘We shall have to hope that more men arrive.’

‘We must pray for our dead companions,’ Sir Jacques said.

‘Yes,’ Ivo replied gruffly. ‘Of course we must.’

* * *

Ivo walked with Pietro to the wall the next day. Baldwin wanted to join them, but Ivo threatened to have him restrained if he did not agree to remain with Lucia.

‘What, do you think that the city can afford to lose any more men?’ he demanded. ‘You have a duty to heal yourself. The city won’t fall this morning just because you have stayed back, boy!’ Ivo had taken a good look at his injury already that morning, and was sure that it was not a life-threatening one.

‘Come, Pietro,’ he said as he and his servant climbed the stone stairs to the inner walls.

Pietro’s face was hard as he took in the scene. Where the hoardings had stood only a week ago, now there were only shattered remains. The incessant bombardment had done its job in reducing them to firewood, and from the walls all could see the full sweep of the army facing them, and the machines working constantly. Even as Pietro took it all in, there was a thundering detonation behind them, and he span round, startled. It was only Ivo’s hasty grab for his sleeve that prevented him from toppling over the edge. ‘Careful!’

‘Yes, Master,’ Pietro said, staring at the orange flames and coils of thick black smoke that rose from the rubble.

There was a warning shout, and men dropped to their knees or cowered as a quartet of stones and pots of Greek fire slammed into the walls. Three hit the outer wall, but the fourth lazily swooped down towards them on the inner wall. Ivo thought for an instant it would breast the battlements, but at the last moment it dropped, and they all felt the stones beneath them shudder with the impact.

‘Christ Jesus! These whoresons are getting serious!’ Pietro managed after a moment.

‘Aye, that they are,’ Ivo said.

‘Master Ivo, this is not a war we can win, is it?’ Pietro said.

Ivo stared out across the plain. In his heart he was certain that this city must fail, like Tripoli, like Lattakieh, like all the cities which the Christian crusaders had taken over the years. There was no survival against such numbers.

‘God will save us,’ a man said from the wall nearby.

Pietro was staring at Ivo, almost like Uther staring at Baldwin, a pathetic look of hope in his eyes.

Ivo forced a smile to his face. ‘Of course He will,’ he said. ‘You seriously think God would allow us to lose His lands?’