The Last Crusade

by S. J. A. Turney

  Arnau had not been in a siege where sappers had been used before, and wondered how deep and far they would have to quarry before the walls were in any danger. His answer came around two hours into the night. None of the defenders had felt like sleeping this time, and though some had been forced to retire and rest by their commanders, the four men of Rourell remained in place on the tower, squinting into the darkness and watching their doom approach. It began as a faint glow. Then, after perhaps ten minutes of flickering golden light, there was a cracking noise and a roar like that of the wild sea or an enraged beast, and the sappers came pelting from their tunnel, bellowing in triumph and panic at one and the same time, racing for their lines. Two of them failed to make it. Even in the dark, the Frankish archers were ready.

  It mattered not. The damage had been done. That glow and flicker swiftly became a furnace beneath the wall, and the defenders worked feverishly dropping water and rocks and even dirt down to the position below, all with no success, for the fire burned inside the ground, underneath them where they could not reach.

  At a command from des Essarts, quickly and carefully the gates were opened. A small group of men with buckets of water ran from Pujol, emerging into the darkness outside, racing for the fire beneath the walls. That was when the defenders learned that the wily Count of Toulouse had taken the opportunity in the dark to move archers into position behind those remaining wicker screens. Not one bucket man made it to the mine, and the gates were swiftly slammed shut again.

  There was nothing they could do but wait and endure.

  Surely de Montfort had to be coming. He would be their only hope.

  It was an hour after midnight when the wall gave way. A huge and deep warning creak echoed out across Pujol, and the quick-thinking Pierre de Cissy ordered everyone off that wall top, and even cleared the bailey of men, goods and animals below it. Barely had the last man reached safety before a section of wall fifteen feet long suddenly moved with a strangely igneous tearing noise. As they watched in horror, it broke away from the ramparts to either side and leaned further and further out. Then, suddenly, it collapsed in on itself, the ground hollowed out beneath it by the fire. The defenders watched the wall fall in the darkness, and no man in Pujol could miss what that meant. The castle was doomed.

  They enjoyed a momentary respite then in the remaining hours of darkness, as the enemy waited for the light, allowing the collapsed wall to finish settling. Arnau remained in position on the tower with the others as the first golden strains threaded the sky in the east. It looked very likely that their third day of the siege would be their last.

  Before the sun had even shown its face above the horizon, new calls issued across Pujol. Des Essarts refused to admit defeat. The relief force would come, he was sure. All they had to do was hold. As such, he would move back the defence. The walls could no longer be held, which meant that the round tower that was their position was also to be abandoned. All the defenders would be called into the keep and a last stand made there.

  As the order was passed from officer to officer and men were withdrawn, grabbing their weapons and what supplies they could and making for that heavy square keep, the four men of Rourell reconvened upon the turret top with Henri d’Orbessan.

  The Frank looked exhausted, but then they all did. Yet Arnau was surprised to see that for the first time he could remember there was no malice in the man’s expression, just resigned sadness. As they stood amid the growing chaos, d’Orbessan scratched his head.

  ‘It is a small gesture this far into our fate, but I find I am forced to withdraw my accusation of cowardice. Any man who stands on these walls with us now is a hero and a man of God. You have my thanks for your help, impotent that it may have proved to be.’

  ‘There is a fight to be had yet,’ Tristán commented.

  D’Orbessan shrugged. ‘No, there is not. Des Essarts is a good man, and determined, but Guy de Montfort has not come, and his time is up. Once we are trapped in that keep, even if he arrives we will fall. The keep is strong, but it cannot deflect artillery for ever, and once they have the walls and this tower, no defender will be safe on its parapet. The fall is now inevitable. We enter the keep as brave men, because we know that what we are truly entering is our mausoleum.’

  Balthesar gave him a single, accepting nod. ‘Why must you go? There may be ways out yet?’

  The Frank shook his head. ‘Just as I demanded your obedience when we came here, I pledged mine to des Essarts. He calls me to the keep and so I go, even knowing what will happen. You… you do not need to do so. I release you from my service. Save yourselves any way you can, save flocking to the enemy banner.’

  ‘Such a thing would be unthinkable with their twin-god heresy,’ Arnau said flatly.

  ‘Then hide. Or run. Tell de Montfort what we did.’

  And with that, Henri d’Orbessan turned from them and stepped into the stairwell. The four men stood silent, watching. Behind them they could hear the enemy mobilising for the final push on Pujol. The last tatters of the castle’s defence were now flooding into the keep, where they would make their stand.

  ‘Perhaps we would be better with them?’ Tristán muttered.

  Arnau turned to him. ‘No. Whatever we do here, we must go on. We fight this war, but not for de Montfort. We fight this war to bring down a king and his pet thieves and liars. I will not die until those men who ruined Rourell are themselves sent to judgement.’

  Nods from the others sealed the matter.

  ‘Then we must hide,’ Ramon said. ‘We cannot run, for we are surrounded.’

  ‘The enemy must see that the defence has moved to the keep,’ Balthesar replied. ‘That is where they will concentrate their gaze now. It is possible that in the wreckage and chaos outside we might be overlooked.’

  ‘And I know where,’ Arnau said suddenly. With the others at his back, he ran for the stairs. Down flight after flight he leapt, two or three steps at a time, pausing only to collect the sword of Gombau d’Oluja on the way. When they reached the ground floor with its stores and bare stonework, they saw that the door to the bailey was open and could hear the keep being sealed shut. Tristán ran to close the door, but Arnau stopped him. ‘If they see it shut, they might think it holds something of value. If it lies open it will look abandoned.’

  Following Arnau’s directions, the four of them moved around the fireplace and into the deeply shadowed gap behind the entrance to the stairs. Moving some of the sacks and blankets, they excavated a hiding place, and then moved to the edge of the wall, where they tensely watched the open door.

  Half an hour they waited there, silent and unmoving. Then, finally, they watched through their narrow window of vision as the forces of Count Raymond of Toulouse entered the bailey of Pujol unopposed. Soldiers appeared in the doorway, and the four men ducked back into their hideaway, pulling sacks and blankets over them. They listened then as men began to search the tower. They heard the footsteps up the stairs to the upper floors, and they heard with increasing tension men ransacking the supplies in this room. Fortunately for the four of them, the stores here were of little interest to the invaders, and before they had got halfway across the room they gave up with snorts of disgust and moved on.

  Eventually, silence reigned once more in the round tower and, at their combined nods of agreement, they emerged from the corner and peered carefully around the wall once more. And that was when they heard an announcement being given in the bailey.

  Listening, they realised they had missed the start, but that this had to be the Count of Toulouse’s voice. He was offering clemency to the defenders in the keep. The nobles would be ransomed back to their families and the ordinary men stripped of their arms and valuables but allowed to walk free. He saluted the bravery of the men of Pujol, and advised them to accept his terms.

  Ramon turned a questioning look to the others.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Balthesar replied. ‘I have no intention of wagering my very life on the word of a heretic
with a proven record of atrocities, and I would hope that des Essarts is not foolish enough to do so.’

  ‘Then I fear you will be disappointed,’ Tristán muttered, as a white rag appeared atop the keep, waving back and forth.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Cathar clemency

  Pujol, 12th August 1213

  The four men watched from an upper window in the tower. The soldiers of Toulouse had searched the place swiftly and abandoned it as unimportant, and as soon as they had heard the last man leave the survivors had quickly moved up the stairs away from the door and to a better vantage point. They had then locked both the doors to the wall walk to prevent any nasty surprises and settled in to watch the surrender of Pujol to Count Raymond.

  Arnau had hoped that perhaps their subterfuge had been unnecessary, that both d’Orbessan and Balthesar had been wrong and that the surrender would go smoothly and without their anticipated wickedness. He had been wrong.

  The keep’s door had been opened once the surrendering force had agreed to the count’s terms, and the leaders had issued from it to the top of the staircase while Toulousain soldiers had pushed past them to secure the door and herd men out into the open, making sure to prevent any last minute change of mind and the keep being sealed once more. The moment they had the door under control and there was no further chance of the crusaders making a stand, things began to turn sour.

  Roger des Essarts had led the capitulating force, the first man out, and he had stopped half a dozen steps down, bowing his head curtly to the Count of Toulouse. The attackers’ commander gave a nod of his own in return, though not to des Essarts. In response, two men close by parted to reveal an archer with an arrow already nocked and aimed. The man released instantly, and the surrender of Pujol began with an arrow burying itself in Roger des Essart’s face. The nobleman, fully expecting mercy and to be ransomed back to his family, instead died in agonising moments as the arrow lodged so deep that only half of it remained visible, and he toppled backwards on to the stonework and there began to shudder.

  The crusaders reacted in an instant, hands reaching for weapons, but it became immediately apparent that the count was well prepared for the reaction. All around the bailey, archers and crossbowmen suddenly stepped out from behind other men or piles of supplies, all ready to loose, each one aiming and with death in their grip. Crusader hands hovered near sword hilts, weighing up their chances of managing to fight on without needlessly dying on the steps of the keep.

  ‘Stand down,’ barked Count Raymond, but suddenly Simon the Saxon, the second of the castle’s three commanders, stepped forth from the men.

  ‘What value is your clemency, Toulouse?’ he snapped, marching to the edge of the staircase and pointing down at the enemy leader. ‘Where are your vaunted morals, dog?’

  Unseen by the surrendering crusaders on the stairs, one of the enemy who had moved past them to secure the door suddenly appeared behind the Saxon and gave him a sharp shove. The surprised nobleman toppled from the staircase, falling fifteen feet to the dusty ground of the bailey. Before he could rise, bellowing in anger, they were on him. Arnau watched in shocked disgust as the gathered, leering men-at-arms of the Toulousain army hacked and stabbed and butchered the prone nobleman, one even coming away howling and victorious, clutching a severed arm.

  As the soldiers on the stairs glared in hatred at their captors, more and more of the count’s men moved into the keep to make sure no one was able to hide from them, another confirmation that the four men of Rourell had done the right thing by staying in the round tower.

  The violence had subsided and quiet settled upon the scene; Count Raymond of Toulouse stepped a pace forward. ‘I see in these bodies the colours of the man known as the Saxon, and of the cursed des Essarts. My information, though, tells me that this fortress was controlled by an unholy trinity. Where is Pierre de Cissy?’

  Silence greeted his demand, and Arnau could quite understand why, given what had happened to the last two men to speak out. Still, before the count could issue a second threat, de Cissy stepped in front of the growing crowd of men on the stairs. ‘I am here, Raymond of Toulouse. Whatever fate you choose for me, I shall meet God knowing that I remained true, while the fires of Hell await you.’

  Toulouse gave him a single nod, his expression unchanging.

  ‘Hang him.’

  As the crusaders roared in fury, three men grabbed de Cissy, holding his arms, and threw him off the stairs, where he fell, floundering in the dismembered remains of the Saxon. He was immediately grabbed by six more men and a rope looped around his neck. As it was pulled tight he clawed at it, eyes bulging. The men-at-arms threw the rope over the beam of the timber crane that had been used to lift cauldrons up to the wall top during the siege, while other men then grabbed the end and heaved. De Cissy found himself being dragged backwards across the ground, the rope constricted around his throat, slowly strangling the life from him. In moments he was being lifted, dangling, thrashing and kicking as he rose to a position six feet from the ground. There he continued to dance, clawing at his neck, eyes bulging and becoming pink as the blood vessels burst, face slowly turning bluish-purple. Arnau turned away and missed the moment the man finally stopped jerking and dangled still. In the horrified silence that followed, a low rumble of fury slowly arose from the throats on the stairs. Count Raymond turned an impassive face back to the gathered prisoners.

  ‘Still you defy? In the face of your commanders’ fate? You Franks are slow to learn lessons.’ He turned to a captain close by. ‘Hang five more.’

  The roar of fury began once again, but at a signal from the count half a dozen arrows were unleashed into the prisoners, hammering home the truth of their impotence. There was nothing they could do. Five men were dragged from the stairs by eager Toulousains and then across to the beam, where they were hoisted one by one to dangle a few feet below the level of their former commander.

  As the last man stopped kicking, the count turned back to the stairs once more. The roar had gone. There was only defeated silence from the prisoners. The vicious commander turned to his men. ‘Strip them of weapons and armour and bind their hands for transport to Toulouse. Have a small garrison begin shipping any gathered grain back to our stores.’

  Arnau watched the crusaders being brought down the stairs in small groups, disarmed and bound. He felt a small lurch in his heart at the sight of d’Orbessan among the descending men. Only a month ago, he might happily have handed the man over to the enemy. Something was different now, though. It was partly that the Frank had himself changed towards them, but it was also that suddenly, in the face of this horror and appalling inhumanity, d’Orbessan had begun to appear almost saintly by comparison. One thing Arnau was sure of was that he could only hope that d’Orbessan ended well. Somehow he didn’t see that happening.

  He watched as they were slowly taken away.

  Tristán was the first to speak. ‘We should take word of this to de Montfort.’

  Ramon nodded. ‘De Montfort will learn of it soon enough, but we are the only survivors.’

  ‘If we can get out of here,’ Balthesar added, looking down from the window. ‘They are leaving men to deal with the supplies.’

  ‘It will be chaos down there,’ Ramon replied. ‘Men assigned to all sorts of duties, and with an army that size not every man will be accounted for. They think they have all the defenders. We should discard our surcoats and any markings but the mail and the gambeson and simply slip out of the tower among them. No one will look at us twice.’

  Arnau, who had not taken his eyes off the vanishing crowd of prisoners, finally nodded. ‘We can do that. But we are not bound for Pamiers and de Montfort.’

  ‘We are not?’ Balthesar asked, turning to him with an arched eyebrow.

  ‘We are not. A year ago, I made a decision on the field of battle to follow the masters of the Temple into the fray, leaving d’Orbessan and the baron to their fate. For all I will deny the Frank’s accusations of cowardic
e, he was right in that it was a dark thing to have done, whatever the reason. I will not do it again.’

  ‘Arnau—’ Ramon began, placing a hand on his shoulder.

  ‘No. I go to Toulouse, even if I go alone. I may not be able to do anything useful there, but I will not walk away again. I will try.’

  Balthesar took a deep breath and straightened. ‘Then we do this together.’

  Ramon turned his frown on the older knight. ‘You agree with this?’

  ‘Not entirely, and I see no way to save him, but we have stood together and weathered every storm. I will not let Arnau go alone.’

  Tristán rolled his eyes. ‘Noblemen are all mad.’

  Toulouse, 16th August 1213

  The door to their room in the inn clattered open and Ramon bustled in, dropping his cloak onto a chair and sealing them into the room before sinking into a chair himself.

  ‘The prisoners are being moved,’ he said quietly. ‘The captives from the other forts they took have been brought to the city and sealed up in some huge building opposite a church in the north of the city, not far from here. Word is that the prisoners from Pujol are going to be moved in with them. All the rotten eggs in one basket, I suppose.’

  Arnau huffed. ‘Then with an increased number, there will be increased guards. Our chances of success have just plummeted.’

  Balthesar leaned towards him. ‘While I support you in this, Arnau, you must realise that our chances were never more than negligible anyway. We are in the wolf’s very lair here.’

  As silence fell, a scratching noise drew their attention and they turned to Tristán, who was seated in the corner, whittling at something with his legs crossed.

  ‘What are you up to?’

  ‘Making a reminder,’ Tristán muttered.

  ‘Of what?’

  The young man held up four half-carved figures that were slowly taking shape from the wood. ‘The men we came to Occitania to kill. I know why we’ve come to Toulouse, but it strikes me that we are in danger of losing sight of our goal.’