The iron lance

TWENTY-NINE

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 judgement upon the unbelievers. In the centre 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 Prankish 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 laboured, 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 grey 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 defence 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 grey 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 smouldering 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-smouldering 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 odour 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 colours 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 marvelled 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.

Overcome by revulsion, he wadded the garment between his hands and hurled it away from him with all his might. He then stripped off his breecs and boots as well, and threw them away, too, before walking free from the Holy City.

He did not sleep that night, but roamed the darksome valley outside the walls, moving from camp to camp, restless in his search. However, Murdo no longer remembered why he searched, no longer knew what he hoped to find.