The Templar Magician

Chapter 5

Ascalon, which rejoiced in its grandiose titles, ‘The Bride of Syria’, ‘Southern Door to Jerusalem’ and ‘Gateway to the Sea Lanes of the East’, was under siege. At the heart of the magnificent city rose a mosque, its columns of gleaming black marble supporting cavernous stone. It was approached by a lofty colonnaded walk of white limestone with archways and a floor of shimmering marble. The walls around the inner courtyard were exquisitely decorated with mosaics of gold and silver. Fountains of pure water splashed into basins where visitors could slake their thirst. In the shadowy corners of this inner sanctum, the Turkish governor’s Mamelukes, fierce warriors clad in black and silver cloaks, watched the pilgrims throng to worship. All came here: desert wanderers in their camel-skin robes; Turkomen in dark hides; Nubians in flaming crimson; sombre mercenaries with shields slung across their backs; leather-clad kadis shuffling under their parasols; merchants in gaudily striped robes; fly-infested beggars, their spindly legs dependent on their staves, their bellies swollen, wooden begging bowls slung around their necks. Veiled women slipped by like ghosts. Holy men squatted in the shade. Prophets, courtesans and couriers, the arrogant and the woebegone, all flocked to Ascalon before travelling on to Frankish-held Jerusalem, to visit the Dome of the Rock, gather in the Cavern of Souls and worship in the Holy Place of Ascent. Now they were trapped, as were the men and women of the bazaars, where the carpets of Persia were stacked high next to bales of hemp, vases of olive oil, chests of spices and caskets of pearls. All had been caught up in the siege: the Jews in their blue robes, as well as the Armenians and Venetians, who had to wear a noose around their necks to distinguish them as foreigners.

The governor of Ascalon had been astounded. The Franks had abruptly stirred themselves, emerging from their bleak fortresses, a stream of men under their coloured standards, all flocking to the banners of Baldwin III, who was determined to take this vital sea port. The spies and scouts of the governor, riding the swiftest mounts of Arabia, had galloped in swirling clouds of dust up through the great Gate of Jerusalem with the dire news. The cruciferi, the cross-bearers, were on the march again! The hideous mailed cavalry of the Franks was gathering, readying itself to deliver a thundering charge to sweep away any opposition. Hordes of archers, long columns of trudging men-at-arms, hobelars and infantry followed. Behind these trundled a heavy siege train, mangonels, catapults, battering rams and war carts crammed with pitch, tar and firebrands.

Ascalon was to be ringed, battered, breached and torched. Worse, the house of the Temple, those vengeful warrior-monks in their long loose robes of white samite, stole caps on heads now shaven for war, faces masked by rough beards, had joined the siege. Grand Master Tremelai had summoned his veterans, and had emerged as the fiercest of Baldwin’s supporters. The Templars had pitched camp, their dark hide tents grouped tidily around the sacred enclosure containing the blue pavilion of the Grand Master and the scarlet and gold chapel tent, which held the altar and a host of sacred relics. Ascalon was to be stormed. Dominus Tremelai had insisted on this. He’d answered the summons of King Baldwin, stripping the Holy City of virtually every fighting member of his order, as he had the great castles and outposts throughout Outremer. The Templars pressed the siege. Ascalon was blocked, sealed in, and its garrison had no choice but to raise the black banner of war from its towers and walls. The governor had issued his defiance of the cruciferi to rolling kettle drums, clashing cymbals and booming gongs. Already the ground between the city walls and the outlying pickets of the cruciferi was littered with corpses rotting in the heat. A relentlessly scorching sun burned the cream and grey stonework of Ascalon, as it did the tents of the besiegers. The cruciferi hoped for a swift, savage resolution. Ascalon, however, proved stubborn. The besiegers chafed under the ferocious heat, their irritation worsened by a persistent desert wind that wafted in its own feverish restlessness.

Edmund de Payens had also joined the siege. He sat in the shade of a hide awning over the entrance to the tent he shared with Mayele and Parmenio. He was dressed in a simple white linen gown, beside him a pouch of water from a nearby spring as he moodily watched a straggle of skinny black goats being tended back to their pens. A dust haze hung yellow in the air, muffling sound and coating everything with a fine shimmer of sand. De Payens snatched up the waterskin and took a gulp as he recalled his meeting with Tremelai. The Grand Master had received them deep in his blue tent. He’d almost snatched the sealed pouches sent from the Assassins before listening intently as de Payens and his companions delivered their report. The Grand Master’s glistening red face had creased into a smile when he opened the casket and glimpsed the precious stones heaped there. Pleased, yet quietly angry, de Payens concluded, as if their mission to Hedad had not accomplished everything the Grand Master had wished. During the meeting, Tremelai had refused to look him directly in the eye, but seemed distracted by the letter Nisam had dictated. De Payens had kept a close watch on both his companions. They did not know about his secret meeting with Nisam, whilst he had urged them not to reveal what they had discovered at Hedad about Walkyn or the blood feud between the Assassins and the de Payens family. Both Mayele and Parmenio had agreed to this.

Once they had delivered the report, all three were dismissed, given this tent and ordered to be ready for the next assault. That had been five days ago. Rumours were now rife that an all-out attack was imminent. De Payens, Mayele and Parmenio had been ordered to join an advance party shortly after the ninth hour, when the day’s heat began to cool. De Payens unlaced the pouch on a cord around his neck, and took out the parchment Nisam had given him. He studied the neatly transcribed numbers, the message hidden in a secret cipher he could not break, at least not yet. He scratched the sweat on his cheek and curbed his irritation as a page, dirty and dishevelled, screamed at a pup he’d befriended. Then he put away the parchment and stared at the shifting yellow haze, his stomach unsettled, bubbling with agitation. He’d been in the camp for almost a week, yet he remained anxious. He accepted that the comfortable horarium he had woven for himself, the hours of the day intertwined with his duties as a Templar, was now rent like some tapestry drenched with water. Tremelai had to be questioned, but how? To whom could he turn? On his arrival at the camp, he had learned about the sudden death of Trussell. The great hero had contracted a fever and died within a day. De Payens, his mind teeming with suspicion, wondered if the Englishman’s death was by natural causes.

‘It’s time!’

De Payens glanced up, shadowing his eyes. Parmenio and Mayele stood staring down at him.

‘It’s time.’ Mayele patted him on the shoulder.

De Payens joined them deep in the tent. He put on his mail chausses and hauberk, looped his war belt over his shoulder, put on his conical helmet and picked up his kite-shaped shield. He rinsed his mouth with a gulp of water as he waited for Mayele and Parmenio. Once ready, he muttered a prayer for protection, then all three left the tent and entered the main camp.

The afternoon haze hung more thickly here. They passed a huge cart tipped to the front, its handles being used as a makeshift gallows for two felons caught, tried and hanged that morning. The stench of the rotting corpses had already attracted camp dogs, which were only kept away by an old man, toothless and bleary-eyed, who sat on an overturned basket waving a club. On the other side of the cart, a black-garbed Benedictine monk crouched on the ground, hearing confessions. A group of camp women in their tawdry finery swirled by, shouting and singing. The rich smell of horse manure mingled with the sweaty odour of thousands of unwashed bodies and the strange fragrances from the cooking pots. The three men avoided the glaring heat of the forges and smithies, picking their way carefully around the refuse and impedimenta of the camp. A dream, de Payens thought, a nightmare full of eerie scenes: a man and a woman coupling noisily under the awning of a tent; a preacher standing on a broken tub singing a psalm; relic-sellers offering medals as sure protection in battle; great lords on their gaudily caparisoned destriers trotting by, hawks on their wrists, lurchers yapping noisily around them. A muffled, misty, grotesque world.

De Payens was already bathed in sweat; his sword arm felt heavy. Behind him, Mayele and Parmenio were chattering. They called out to him, but he ignored them. Other figures garbed for war were also making their way to the edge of the camp, climbing the slight rise crowned with sharpened stakes, most of these decorated with the severed heads of executed prisoners. De Payens tried to ignore the dryness of his throat and lips. He followed the path between the stakes along which the waiting mangonels, trebuchets, battering rams, catapults and towers would be dragged for an all-out assault on the city. He stopped for a moment and studied these terrifying engines of war, their keepers busy about them, greasing axles, strengthening ropes, loading the nearby carts with pots of fire, rocks, bundles of hemp and cloth tarred and ready for burning. Ox hides from the siege towers were being stretched out across the ground to be drenched in vinegar, the only protection against the devastating Greek fire the defenders of Ascalon would use.

‘It will happen soon,’ Mayele observed, ‘a full assault on the city.’ He came alongside de Payens. ‘Perhaps tomorrow, or the day after. Tremelai is insisting on that.’

De Payens grunted in agreement. They breasted the rise and went down the steep slope towards the grim walls of Ascalon. The area stretching up to these was bleak and grisly as any dream of hell. The yellowing rocky ground was littered with stinking corpses and the tattered remains of battle. Hordes of vultures, hyenas and the occasional slinking fox or jackal came to feast at night. An empty, soul-harrowing stretch of earth dominated by the battlements of the city, festooned with banners, armour twinkling in the sunlight. Black trails of smoke curled up against the sky, a sure sign that the governor and his troops were preparing the defences against sudden attack.

‘One of the five cities of the Philistines,’ Parmenio declared, ‘a city of the plains, steeped in blood, constantly fought over, seized, captured and recaptured.’

On either side of the Jerusalem Gate, now bricked up, rose lofty, massive towers. Common rumour amongst the troops claimed that despite its formidable appearance, the gate had been weakened and forced. De Payens stared through the heat haze. Templar engineers were busy constructing a giant siege tower, the wood being supplied from the masts of ships. Gossip had it that the tower was now ready and this present foray was to spy out the terrain in preparation for the all-out assault. De Payens joined the rest as they gathered together with engineers and stonemasons behind the great pavise, a lofty barrier on wooden wheels under the blue and gold standard of King Baldwin. About sixty men from various retinues had assembled under the command of a royal knight whose shield boasted a silver griffin on an azure background. A veteran of many sieges, the knight swiftly explained how they would approach the Jerusalem Gate as closely as possible. They were to try and discover the number of siege engines mounted on the walls and check how many guard posts lurked amongst the rocky outcrops that peppered the land between the besiegers and the city. De Payens breathed in, wetting his mouth, pinching his nose at the sandy breeze. He peered through an eyelet of the pavise. The ground ahead seemed empty, the only movement being the great winged vultures sweeping backwards and forwards. He murmured in agreement at the royal knight’s hissed warnings about a possible ambush. The buzzards and vultures kept well clear of the outcrops that dominated the approach to the city gates.

‘Be careful.’ Mayele spoke up. ‘The mounds are fortified.’ He punched the pavise with his fist. ‘I hope this holds true.’

‘Deus Vult!’ the royal knight shouted. ‘Deus Vult!’ The cry was taken up as they all leaned against the pavise, its creaking wheels screeching. De Payens pushed with the rest, ignoring the heat, the curling dust that laced nose and mouth. He glanced over his shoulder. Crossbowmen, Templar serjeants, were following, slightly edged away on the flanks, to watch both the walls and those mounds. Behind the archers, a horde of mounted knights massed ready to charge. De Payens wondered why he and the rest had been chosen for this duty, but then dismissed the thought. Others had also borne the brunt of the siege. He whispered verses from a psalm about walking through the valley of darkness. The pavise reached the bottom of the slope in a rattling clatter, inching its way forward, bumping over rocks and holes. One of de Payens’ companions cursed as his boot became entangled in the rotting remains of a corpse, its bones snapping and cracking under the crashing wheels of the pavise. A serjeant shouted a warning. De Payens peered through the eyelet again. Thick smoke now billowed from the ramparts. Again the warning shout. A whooshing sound split the air, followed by a fire storm of burning pots, flaming tar bundles and oil-drenched boulders. These smashed on to the ground in sheets of fire and dancing sparks. A wall of fiery heat raced towards the pavise, making the men behind it cough and splutter. More missiles followed. Most fell short or on to the flanks. One of them shot over the pavise, crashing into the line of crossbowmen, turning three of them into living torches who screamed and danced in terror until other arbalestiers cut them down as an act of mercy.

The pavise rolled forward again. Another hail of fire. One of the tar bundles hit the side of the pavise, scorching a man’s face, rippling his skin, turning his eyes to water. He sank to his knees, screaming for relief. The royal knight urged them to push faster so as to distract the aim of the watchers on the battlements. They were now approaching the first mounds. Warning cries rang out as those hidden behind the rocky outcrops sprang out, racing towards the pavise. De Payens and the rest staggered away, pulling out their swords to meet the enemy. The crossbowmen hurried forward, knelt and loosed a volley. Some attackers fell; the rest swirled around the pavise. De Payens moved to meet an assailant, a Turk, robes billowing, face and head almost hidden by his spiked helmet with its chain-mail lacings. Armed with a studded spear and rounded shield, the Turk moved to de Payens’ right, lunging crosswise. He missed. De Payens crashed into him, using both shield and sword to batter the man against the pavise. A sweeping blow to his attacker’s face, then he sprang away. Other attackers were being beaten off. The dust swirled. Kettle drums rolled from the battlements, to be answered by the call of Frankish trumpets. De Payens leaned his face against the wooden boards. He turned, and as he did so, a crossbow quarrel struck just above where his head had been.

He glanced around. The battlefield fury was dying, the enemy retreating; nothing but cloying dust. The royal knight roared out orders and the pavise moved forward. The mounds were now deserted, their defenders fleeing back to a postern gate high in one of the towers flanking the Jerusalem Gate. Some reached the lowered ladder; others were caught by the Frankish horse, to be trampled down before being clubbed or speared. Once again screams, yells, battle cries and the scrape of steel shattered the air. Trumpets from the camps sounded the recall. The leather-clad engineers and stonemasons, their heads protected by sallets, had approached as close to the gates as they could. Now, apparently, they had the information they needed. The pavise was pulled back even as de Payens tried to control his terror and panic, so intense he felt as if his throat was closing up. He could not confess his fear. The stark realisation of how the crossbow bolt might have shattered his skull had all but drained his courage. On the one hand he was certain he’d been deliberately marked, but by whom? The Turks did not carry crossbows, whilst he had been in the centre of the pavise. The enemy had appeared only on the flanks before swiftly retreating; none had broken through to the rear. And yet, de Payens blinked away the sweat, his mysterious assailant had waited for him to move away, aiming slightly too high. Why?

‘No accident,’ he murmured.

‘What was that?’

De Payens glanced to his right. Mayele, grasping the bar of the pavise, was staring quizzically at him. There was no sign of Parmenio. De Payens shook his head. ‘The snares of the tomb surround me,’ he whispered, ‘the deep pit of death yawns.’ This was not the life he’d yearned for. Nisam was right. Everything was an illusion, a phantasm: no white-robed paladins on swift destriers, no chanting of the psalms during the cool grey light of dawn, no true friendship or camaraderie. This was more a valley of death, a glade of pits and traps he had to pass through. De Payens was determined he would.

They reached the bottom of the ramp leading to the camp. A hot breeze licked up the dust. Cries of help for the wounded rang out; stretcher-bearers ran forward gathering these up, dragging them back like battered sacks. Three serjeants brought wicker baskets containing the severed heads of the enemy; these were thrust on the tips of the forest of stakes to the wailing of bagpipes and yells of defiance towards the walls of Ascalon. Men lowered their breeches and performed obscene dances, taunting the city defenders. The enemy gave their bleak response. A mighty roll of kettle drums echoed across the gory remains of battle. A black banner was hoisted. Figures moved along the parapet and a cluster of naked bodies were flung over to jerk and dance as the nooses tightened around their necks. The Franks replied. Prisoners were hustled forward, struggling, and stripped and impaled alive on stakes. Blood spurted amidst soul-raging screams. Buzzards and vultures swooped low, only to drift away to wait for the carrion.

De Payens scrambled to his feet and staggered back into the stinking camp. When he reached his tent, he pulled back the flap and collapsed on the pile of sacks and blankets that served as a bed. Images, memories and thoughts swept his soul like a blizzard of sand: turning to meet those assassins back in Tripoli; Nisam’s cynical gaze; the secrecy of Tremelai, the Grand Master’s sly, watchful smirks. He felt the small pouch around his neck containing the cipher Nisam had given him. He found it impossible to translate the Arabic numbers, but he suspected their secret. Had Tremelai, knowing of the blood feud between the Assassins and the de Payens family, deliberately sent him to Hedad to be killed? Had he also been marked down for slaughter in Tripoli? But why?

He was awakened from his sweat-soaked sleep by an anxious Parmenio. De Payens peered at the tent flap: the light was dying; the evening breeze provided a welcoming coolness. Outside echoed the creak of ropes, the rumble of wheels, the screech of axles, shouts and cries, the harsh crack of a whip.

‘What is the matter?’

‘The siege tower is ready.’ Parmenio paused at the blare of trumpets. ‘Edmund, the Grand Master has summoned us. An all-out assault on the Jerusalem Gate is imminent. Everyone is summoned to the standards.’

Cursing and muttering, de Payens pulled himself up. Still dressed in his mail, he was sore, sweat-drenched, parched with thirst, his lips sticky, his tongue slightly swollen. He grabbed a waterskin, splashed his face and drenched his mouth. Mayele came in. Both knights fumbled around for sword, helmet, shield and dagger, then followed Parmenio out, the Genoese looking slightly ridiculous in the pot helmet squeezed on to his head. They gathered before the armour stand and altar outside the Grand Master’s gold-fringed tent. Tremelai stood in a cart from which fluttered the order’s sacred standards. He bellowed for silence. Serjeants imposed order. The great six-storey siege tower, open at the back, its other three sides draped with vinegar-drenched ox-hides, lumbered to a halt. Looking around, de Payens also noticed the siege sheds, trebuchets and catapults; behind these stood the carts of war, crammed with pots of tar, bundles of hay, wool, rope and wood-shavings ready to be fired. The smell of oil and pitch thickened the air. Parmenio was right: this was going to be a great assault during the cool of the evening. Tremelai confirmed this, explaining how all the Franks’ great siege engines, monsters dubbed with names such as ‘Bad Neighbour’, ‘God’s Vengeance’ and ‘The Fires of Hell’, had been entrusted to the Templars. They would force a breach in or around the Jerusalem Gate, and establish a holding line whilst the rest of the Frankish army poured in. A weakness in the fortifications had been observed; they would concentrate on that.

Tremelai’s speech was greeted with a roar of approval, followed by the blare of trumpets. The order’s black and white banners and pennants were solemnly unfurled and blessed, the incense smoke rising in thick grey clouds. A hymn was sung, ending with the order’s great battle paean to God: ‘Non nobis, Domine, non nobis.’ War horns brayed. The Templar host formed a broad, deep phalanx with archers out on the flanks. They began their march, trudging across what de Payens privately called ‘The Land of Deep Shadow’. He still felt weak after that first attack, his body aching, his belly frothing like a cauldron. On either side, Mayele and Parmenio were lost in their own thoughts. They paused for a moment to drink water and loosen weapons in scabbards. Then they were ready. The great engines of war breasted the rise in a fearful clatter and rolled towards the walls of Ascalon.

De Payens glimpsed the shimmering glare of the enemy awaiting them. Smoke poured up from the fires boiling the tar, oil and other incendiary materials. The tops of catapults and mangonels could also be seen, black against the sky. The coolness of the evening breeze was now offset by the swirling sand stirred up as the Templar host made its way towards the Jerusalem Gate. They were protected by the great siege tower trundling ahead. Orders were shouted. The keen-eyed reported how the defenders had thrown thick rolls of cordage and rope over the walls as protection against the tower. De Payens gripped his sword and shield as the final orders were issued. The attack would be a feint. Tremelai had chosen the narrow postern door in the tower flanking the Jerusalem Gate as his real target. The attack earlier in the day had provided information that the door was weakened and could be forced. De Payens tried to distract himself with more peaceful memories: of walking with Theodore through the woods of Lebanon, his grandfather describing the various trees and shrubs, marvelling at the majesty of the myrtle or the strength of the oak.

A scream shook him from his reverie. The siege tower and other engines of war were now close to the walls. The evening sky was seared by flashes of flames, trails of smoke and an ominous orange glow as the defenders launched a fire storm at the approaching enemy. There was the screech of cord, the whoosh of projectiles, and boulders, hay, tar and linen bundles smashed around them, as if the fires of hell had broken through the crust of the earth. Men died in a myriad of grisly ways, scalded, burned or struck by arrows, boulders or flying metal. The screams, shouts and battle cries conjured up the burning landscape of hell. In de Payens’ eyes, they were no longer men but creatures of the dark massing in their mailed might, ready to force, plunder and kill.

The Frankish engines of war crept closer, and they loosed volley after volley to sweep the parapets above them. At last the siege tower reached the gate, crashing against the thick curtain of protective cordage. Templars climbed the ladders within the tower, ready to reinforce those fighting on the two top platforms. De Payens and his companions, however, stayed outside; protected by the tower, they could only witness the horrors of the attack. Men reeled away, drenched in oil, engulfed by fire, which melted their bodies so that mail and flesh became one. Soldiers, blinded by bags of lime, staggered back to be struck by arrows or stones. Bodies fell as if from the heavens to bounce on the ground. Ladders were tipped or ravaged by bursts of crackling Greek fire. A stifling blackness descended. Smoke curled about. Mayele was cursing Tremelai’s stupidity even as engineers brought up a battering ram alongside the siege tower to hammer the wall to the right of the postern gate. The gate had been blocked from the inside, but a weakness had been found in the masonry alongside, some flaw in its construction. Tremelai, helmet off, bellowed that those on the third storey pound the postern gate, whilst the battering ram under its shield-shaped roof thundered against the wall. The attack was now spreading to both sides of the Jerusalem Gate. The distracted defenders did not know which way to turn, and still Tremelai shouted his orders. De Payens, sheltering in the shadows, could only watch, tense and fearful at the death and destruction swirling about him.

‘Deus Vult! Deus Vult!’ The war cry greeted a thunderous rumble of stone and masonry. The wall next to the postern gate had been holed and breached, and there was a great fall of masonry, followed by a gust of thick dust, which thinned to reveal a gap about three yards high and the same across. Tremelai came running back, helmet now on, his sword scything the air, and pointed at the waiting Templars, screaming at them to follow. De Payens was pushed and shoved around the tower as he and the rest, their shields raised against the missiles raining from the walls, rushed towards the waiting ladders and clambered up into the gaping black hole, where dust and smoke billowed like a fog, flinging themselves in, gasping and panting. Waterskins were produced and quickly emptied, then they were up, shields to the front, swords out, a mailed mass of about forty men edging along a paved passageway, its murky darkness lit only by flickering lamps and cresset torches.

‘We came through a chamber!’ Parmenio gasped. ‘We must be in a passageway leading out of the tower. We …’

The rest of his words were drowned, as a host of men appeared as if out of nowhere to block their way. The Templars, giving vent to their fury and fear, burst forward in a savage melee of stabbing and clubbing. Men clutching wounds fell screaming to their knees. The ground grew slippery with blood. Then they were through, out of the tower, gasping the cool night air. They hastened down steps, spreading across the cobbled area stretching down to the alleyways leading into the city. An ominous rumble echoed behind them. Parmenio clutched de Payens’ arm. The Templar tried to shake him off. He was still blood-crazed from that ferocious clash in the passageway, where his sword had hacked flesh, the hot blood of his enemies spurting against his skin; haunted by fierce dark faces, whirling steel, the stench of gore and sweat, the pervasive odour of burning.

‘Edmund, Edmund, here!’

They had now reached the bottom of the steps. The Templars were forming an arc, ready to advance. De Payens heard his name being shouted, but Parmenio was pulling at him, pushing him across the cobbles. De Payens stumbled away. He did not know why, but he had caught Parmenio’s sense of dread. They reached the mouth of an alleyway. A cool breeze swept along it, chilling his sweat. Parmenio was tugging at his shield.

‘Edmund, Edmund, for the love of God, take it off.’

De Payens let his shield fall; his sword slipped from his hand. He took off his helmet and, like a sleepwalker, stripped off his hauberk even as Parmenio’s hissed warnings alerted him to danger. He stared across the cobbled expanse. The other Templars, about thirty in number, had drawn together, shields locked, no longer an arc but a circle. Parmenio’s whispers calmed his battle-crazed mind. They were alone, cut off. De Payens recalled that second rumble of masonry. The walls had collapsed further, sealing off the breach; the Templars outside could no longer help. The distant sounds of battle carried. The attack would be beaten off, and then the Turks would deal with the enemy within.

De Payens watched in horror. The Grand Master and his lieutenants who had led the foray realised they were trapped: they could not go back, whilst further advance was futile. The small phalanx tightened even further, a ring of steel, shields locked. There were shouts and cries. De Payens made to go forward.

‘Foolish!’ Parmenio whispered. ‘Foolish,’ he repeated, ‘another death for nothing!’ He grasped de Payens, pulling him back, and the two men stood watching. Ominous speckles of light appeared. Torches were thrown, shadows shifted. The city garrison, surprised by the savage turn of events, could not believe what had happened. The breeze carried the fading sounds of the grand assault. The Franks outside the walls were retreating. More torches were lit and hurled at the waiting Templars. De Payens leaned against the filth-strewn wall as a powerful Frankish voice intoned the De Profundis — ‘Out of the depths, O Lord, I have cried to thee. O Lord, hear my voice.’

More torches were flung. The singing became intense, the sheer power of men hurling their defiance back in the face of certain death. Templars would never surrender. They would ask for no quarter and be offered none. Arrows whipped through the air as the shadows moved. The shafts clattered against shields, the war cry ‘Deus Vult!’ rang out and the phalanx retreated, shields still locked, up the steps, back towards the tower. Now a river of men poured out of the darkness, racing up the steps, hurling themselves against the phalanx in a whirl of steel and strident war cries. The shield hedge remained unbroken; the Turks in their spiked helmets and heavy cloaks were beaten off. More torches were hurled, followed by a fresh assault. In the light of the darting flames de Payens, cold-eyed and tense, glimpsed blood dripping down the steps. A gap was made in the shield wall, but again the attackers withdrew. Templar corpses littered the top steps. No more cries or psalms; just a watchful silence. The attackers swept in afresh. A great war cry echoed as the shield hedge was finally broken. The Templars were dispersed, one man against many in solitary fights to the death. The attack faltered; the enemy retreated. Archers sped forward, horn bows strung; one volley after another was loosed, whilst the master archers chose individual targets. Templars fell, weapons slipping from their hands. Another horde of men rushed up the steps with axe and club, sword and dagger, then at last it was over.

The Turks searched amongst the corpses. The occasional glint of steel flashed, followed by a coughing sound as they finished off the wounded. Tremelai’s lifeless body was hauled up, stripped and hung from an iron bracket fixed on to a wall. The exultant Turks danced in glee as they realised that they had trapped and killed the Grand Master of the Temple. Trumpets sounded. City dignitaries in red and white robes hurried across the bailey to inspect the dead. Orders were given. Torches were placed beneath Tremelai’s hanging corpse. De Payens glimpsed the straggling red hair of his once proud lord, his dirty-white cadaver streaked with blood from the gaping wounds in his head, neck and stomach. The rest of the corpses were now stripped and gibbeted, the Templars’ clothes and armour piled together in a basket.

‘They’ll hang those from the battlements.’ Parmenio’s breath was hot against de Payens’ face. ‘And they’ll do the same to the corpses.’

De Payens flinched as the point of the Genoese’s dagger dug into the soft part of his throat.

‘Master Edmund,’ Parmenio whispered, ‘this is not the time for brave and noble charges. We’ve had enough of those for tonight, and see what has happened. Do not be a fool. If you reveal yourself we shall both die, slowly, so come.’

De Payens followed Parmenio deep into the darkness, then paused and turned. He could not go, not yet; he had to watch. The bodies of the dead Templars, now stripped naked, were being lashed with ropes, ready to be dragged through the city. Already the trumpeters were proclaiming the news along streets fastened shut against the attack. Ascalon was coming to life, even in that stinking alleyway. Lamps were being lit, windows unshuttered, doors opened. Parmenio scooped up de Payens’ cloak, helmet and armour, and thrust them into a midden heap, kicking the dirt over them. A voice called, strident and querulous. Parmenio answered in the same language, then, grabbing de Payens by the arm, pushed him into the blackness.

For the next few days they lived as beggars. Parmenio told de Payens to act the mute as they sheltered amongst Ascalon’s swarming legions of poor, who lurked in the shadows during the day and slunk out at night. Parmenio, a master of tongues, acted the part, whining and wheedling. He begged or stole bread, rotting fruit, a pannikin of water and on one occasion a bulging wineskin. No one bothered them. Dirty and dishevelled, they were simply two of the despised. Moreover, the city thrilled with the news of how the attack had been repulsed, the Grand Master of the Temple killed, his corpse and those of his company gibbeted naked over the walls. The citizens rejoiced that all who had entered the walls had died.

De Payens felt as if he was in a dream. Any shame at not dying with Tremelai soon disappeared. In truth, he reflected, the Grand Master had acted maliciously towards him, whilst the foray into the city had been hasty and ill planned. He wondered what had happened to Mayele. Parmenio informed him that his brother knight had been behind them; he’d either been killed in the attack or fortunate enough to retreat. Such conversations were carried out in hushed tones in the corners of filthy recesses. For the rest, they had to survive. Parmenio continued to be adept at begging; a consummate actor, he could weasel scraps of food and present himself and his companion as two more beggars in a city of beggars. He also listened carefully to the chatter of the bazaars and tawdry markets. How the Templar corpses had been dragged through the city at the tails of horses before being gibbeted on the battlements. Such humiliation, however, had only made the Franks more obdurate. They were now pressing the siege harder. Even more dangerous, they had beaten off a fleet sent from Egypt carrying much-needed supplies for Ascalon.

‘“Put not your trust in Pharaoh,”’ Parmenio quoted from the psalms, ‘“nor his horses, nor his power.” Listen, Edmund, we must remain hidden here. Act as we do now until the siege ends, either way.’

Parmenio insisted that they keep to the poorest quarter of the city. It was like a vision of purgatory: black-mouthed alleyways snaking between crumbling houses; trackways crammed with ordure; hot, dusty tunnels of reeking stench. No rest, no shelter, each mouthful of food and water gratefully acknowledged. De Payens recovered from his shock and grew more vigilant. Parmenio he now trusted. If he’d wanted to, the Genoese could have killed him a hundred ways. Instead, he ensured the Templar ate and drank carefully, even sharing his takings after being hired as a temporary porter in the oil bazaar. At the same time he comforted de Payens, insisting that Tremelai had brought his own death on himself. They continued to live like scavengers, mixing easily with a myriad of races; as Parmenio remarked, ‘Who really looks at the poor, especially at a time such as this?’

The siege was now being pressed with a fury. The Franks brought forward their trebuchets, siege towers and catapults and unleashed a veritable storm against the city walls. Fresh fears swept the bazaars. The intense, constant volleys were clearing the parapets. The dead had to be dragged away and stacked on funeral pyres; the flames and smoke curling up from these became a constant, sickening reminder of the terror lurking beyond the walls.

The mood of the city changed. The grumble of the bazaar became a constant moan that swept through Ascalon. The citizens were losing all appetite for battle. They wanted to sue for terms. Fearful of a revolt in the city, and deeply alarmed at the Franks edging their war machines even closer, the governor hoisted boughs of greenery over the battlements and asked for a truce. The volleys immediately ceased; a welcome relief, as the last hail of boulders had crushed more than forty men. Later that day, heralds proclaimed the jubilant news. The Franks would accept the conditional surrender of Ascalon!