The Secret Crusade

46

Limassol was much as he’d had left it, rife with Templar men and soldiers, a resentful populace carrying on as normal, discontent on their faces as they continued with their business.

Wasting no time, Altair located the new Resistance safe-house, a disused warehouse, and entered it, determined to confront Alexander with what he had learned in the conversation he’d overheard between Bouchart and Shalim. But when he entered the building it was Alexander who reacted to him.

‘Stay back, traitor. You have betrayed the Resistance and sold out our cause. Have you been working with Bouchart all this time?’

Altair had been prepared for a confrontation with Alexander, perhaps even to meet him in combat, but the sight of the Resistance man in such a state calmed him, made him think that he had misinterpreted what he had seen. All the same he stayed cautious.

‘I was about to ask the same of you, Alexander. I overheard Bouchart mention your name. He delivered a package to you, did he not?’

With narrowed eyes, Alexander nodded. The furniture in the safe-house was sparse but there was a low table nearby and on it the small sack Altair had seen handed to Shalim by Bouchart in Kyrenia.

‘Yes,’ said Alexander, ‘the head of poor Barnabas in a burlap sack.’

Altair walked to it. He pulled the drawstring on the sack and the material fell away to reveal a decapitated head, but…

‘This was not the man who met me in Kyrenia,’ said Altair, staring sadly at the severed head. It had begun to discolour and emitted a powerful, unpleasant smell. The eyes were half closed, the mouth hanging slightly open, the tongue visible inside.

‘What?’ said Alexander.

‘The real Barnabas had been murdered before I arrived, replaced by a Templar agent who did much damage before he vanished,’ said Altair.

‘God help us. The Templars have been equally brutal here, with captains roaming the market, the ports and Cathedral Square arresting anyone they see fit.’

‘Don’t despair,’ said Altair. ‘Kyrenia has already shaken off the Templars. We will expel them from Limassol, too.’

‘You must be careful. Templar propaganda has turned some of my men against you, and most others are wary.’

‘Thank you for the warning.’

Altair conducted a fruitless search of the city for Bouchart, but when he returned to share the bad news with Alexander he found the safe-house empty except for a note. It sat on the table and Altair picked it up. Alexander wanted to meet him in the courtyard of the castle. So the note said, anyway.

Altair thought. Had he ever seen Alexander’s script? He didn’t think so. Anyway, the Bureau man might have been coerced into writing a note.

As he made his way to the rendezvous, all his instincts told him that this could be a trap, and it was with a sinking heart that he came across a body in the courtyard where they were due to meet.

No, he thought.

Straight away he looked around him. The empty ramparts surrounding the courtyard stared emptily back. Indeed, the whole area was far quieter than he would have expected. He knelt to the body, his fears realized as he turned it over to see Alexander’s lifeless eyes staring back at him.

Then from above him came a voice and he straightened, spinning to see a figure on the ramparts overlooking the courtyard. Dazzled by the sun he put up a hand to shield his eyes, still unable to make out the face of the man standing there. Was it Bouchart? Whoever it was, he wore the red cross of the Crusader and stood with his legs slightly apart, his hands on his hips, every inch of him the conquering hero.

The knight pointed at Alexander’s corpse. His voice was mocking: ‘A friend of yours?’

Altair hoped soon to make the knight pay for that scorn. Now the man shifted slightly and Altair was at last able to see him clearly. It was the spy. The one who had called himself Barnabas in Kyrenia – who was probably responsible for killing the real Barnabas. Another good man dead. Altair hoped to make him pay for that too. His fists clenched and the muscles in his jaw jumped. For the time being, though, the spy had him at a disadvantage.

‘You,’ he called up to him. ‘I didn’t catch your name.’

‘What did I tell you in Kyrenia?’ chuckled the knight – the spy. ‘Barnabas, wasn’t it?’

Suddenly a great shout went up and Altair turned to see a group of citizens enter the courtyard. He had been set up. The spy had put out the word against him. Now he was being framed for the murder of Alexander, the angry mob having been timed to arrive at exactly the right moment. It was a trap and he had walked straight into it, even though instinct had told him to exercise caution.

Once again he cursed himself. He looked around. The sandstone walls loomed over him. A set of steps led to the ramparts but there at the top stood the spy, grinning from ear to ear, enjoying the show that was about to start in earnest as the citizens came running towards Altair, their blood up, the need for revenge and justice burning in their eyes.

‘There’s the traitor!’

‘String him up!’

‘You’ll pay for your crimes!’

Altair stood his ground. His first impulse was to reach for his sword but no: he could not kill any citizen. To do so would be to destroy any faith they had in the Resistance or the Assassins. All he could do was protest his innocence. But they were not to be reasoned with. Desperately he searched for the answer.

And found it.

The Apple.

It was as though it was calling to him. Suddenly he was aware of it in the pack at his back and he brought it out now, holding it so that it was facing towards the crowd.

He had no idea what he was trying to do with it and was not sure what would happen. He sensed that the Apple would obey his commands; that it would understand his intent. But it was just a sense. A feeling. An instinct.

And it did. It throbbed and glowed in his hands. It gave out a strange diaphanous light that seemed to settle around the crowd, which was immediately pacified, frozen to the spot. Altair saw the Templar spy recoil with shock. Briefly he felt all-powerful, and in that moment he recognized not only the seductive allure of the Apple and the godlike strength it bestowed, but the terrible danger it posed – in the hands of those who would use it for ill, of course, but also with him. Even he was not immune to its temptation. He used it now, but he pledged to himself that he would never use it again, not for these purposes anyway.

Then he was addressing the crowd.

‘Armand Bouchart is the man responsible for your misery,’ he called. ‘He hired this man to poison the Resistance against itself. Go from this place and rally your men. Cyprus will be yours once again.’

For a moment or so he wondered whether or not it had worked. When he lowered the Apple, would the angry crowd simply resume their lynching? But lower it he did, and the crowd did not move upon him. His words had swayed them. His words had persuaded them. Without further ceremony, they turned and moved out of the courtyard, leaving as quickly as they had arrived, but subdued, penitent even.

Once more the courtyard was empty and, for a few heartbeats, Altair looked at the Apple in his hand, watched it fade, feeling in awe of it, frightened by it, attracted to it. Then he tucked it safely away as the spy said, ‘Quite a toy you have there. Mind if I borrow it?’

Altair knew one thing: that the Templar would have to take the Apple from his dead body. He drew his blade ready for combat as the Templar smiled, anticipating the fight ahead, about to climb down from the ramparts when…

He stopped.

And the smile slid from his face like dripping oil.

Protruding from his chest was a blade. Blood flowered at his white tunic, mingling with the red of the cross he wore. He looked down at himself, confused, as if wondering how the weapon had got there. Below him in the courtyard Altair was wondering the same thing. Then the Templar was swaying and Altair saw a figure behind him. A figure he recognized: Maria.

She smiled, shoved the spy forward from the courtyard wall and let him tumble heavily to the ground below. Standing there, her sword dripping blood, she grinned at Altair, shook it, then replaced it in her sheath.

‘So,’ she said, ‘you had the Apple all along.’

He nodded. ‘And now you see what kind of a weapon it could be in the wrong hands.’

‘I don’t know if I’d call yours the right hands.’

‘No. Quite right. I will destroy it… or hide it. Until I can find the archive, I can’t say.’

‘Well, look no further,’ she said. ‘You’re standing on it.’