The Black Sheep

by Peter Darman

  Beyond the temples were the mansions of the wealthy, all guarded by their own walls and surrounded by gardens. Luca turned when he heard the sound of iron-shod hooves clattering on the paved road, catching sight of Bernat de Rocafort riding beside a man with a mass of lazy blonde curls and ringlets that appeared molten gold in the sunlight. Arcadius Drogon looked even more magnificently attired than the last time Luca had seen him, though now his face wore a scowl rather than a smile. Behind the pair were around a score of Catalan horsemen, looking rough and unsophisticated compared to the Kephale of Magnesia.

  ‘Good morning, governor,’ said Sancho tersely.

  ‘What is the meaning of this outrage?’ Drogon demanded to know.

  Sancho debated whether to wrench the boy-lover from his saddle but decided against it. He wanted to be away as quickly as possible.

  ‘Money, governor, or rather lack of it. Your emperor hired the Catalan Company to lift the sieges of Philadelphia, Tire and Magnesia, which it has achieved. I will concede we did not have to battle for your beautiful city, which I am sure your emperor would wish to know more about.

  ‘It is now August and we have received no pay for eight months. So, I am here to receive payment from your treasury.’

  Drogon’s face became contorted with indignation.

  ‘Is this how you treat allies? Is this how you repay an emperor who has placed faith in fellow Christians?’

  ‘The emperor has not paid us at all this year,’ said Sancho.

  ‘We are mercenaries, governor,’ smiled Bernat beside him. ‘We fight for pay, which we have not received.’

  ‘We are allies only as long as we are paid,’ added Sancho.

  ‘I have no authority to enter into financial arrangements on behalf of the emperor,’ remarked Drogon dismissively.

  ‘Well, be that as it may,’ said Sancho casually, ‘if you do not order your treasury to pay us, I will order my men to burn this fine city, to kill every one of its citizens, and plunder those fine houses nearby that have caught my eye.

  ‘We will strip this city of every item of gold and silver, including crosses and icons in churches, requisition horses and other livestock, empty Magnesia of all food, lay waste to the fields, orchards and vineyards around it, and finally, pour molten gold down your throat while the garrison of your palace watches.’

  Drogon swayed in the saddle. The last threat emphasised these base barbarians in their rags and ugly faces would indeed destroy his city and, more importantly, put him to death.

  ‘Or, we can be paid what we are owed, nothing more, nothing less,’ said Sancho, ‘and we will be on our way.’

  ‘The emperor will hear of this outrage,’ threatened Arcadius, an ethereal light around his head as the sun reflected off his golden locks.

  ‘I hope so,’ said Sancho, ‘because he can then understand the ramifications of hiring a mercenary company and failing to pay it. Oh, and perhaps you could remind him that despite not being paid, the Catalan Company has smashed three Muslim armies since it marched from Artake, a feat beyond his own armies.

  ‘But we are wandering from the point. Do you agree to my terms, or will you see this fine city burn?’

  ‘I want the slaves,’ sniffed Arcadius.

  Bernat laughed. ‘The slaves?’

  ‘You brought them here as a present for me,’ snapped Arcadius. ‘Or are you going to default on your promise of a gift to me?’

  Sancho was bemused. ‘The slaves were a ruse to lure you out of the city, governor. The rest you know.’

  Arcadius curled a lip at the brutish Almogavar.

  ‘Nevertheless, they are here. I will agree to your terms if you leave the slaves here.’

  Bernat looked at Sancho, who shrugged.

  ‘Very well, you may have the slaves. Now, where is your treasury?’

  ‘In the palace,’ replied Arcadius, his face a mask of smugness.

  The governor’s eyes settled on Luca and Jordi standing next to Sancho.

  ‘If I paid you an additional amount, would you leave those two with me?’

  Luca was enraged. ‘What? Get off your horse and face me, man to man.’

  The Almogavars within earshot raised their spears and cheered, urging Luca to fight the preening Roman peacock, chanting ‘Black Sheep, Black Sheep’ in encouragement. Jordi pointed his spear point at the governor.

  ‘You may die today.’

  ‘Silence!’ hollered Sancho, his patience rapidly wearing thin.

  The cheering petered out and an icy glare from his father convinced Jordi to lower his spear. Arcadius Drogon was leering at Luca and his friend, delighted to have caused a slight ruckus among the Almogavars. His arrogance was breath-taking and for a moment Sancho considered plundering Magnesia and burning it afterwards.

  ‘You will ride to the palace gates, order them to be thrown open and command your treasurer to open his coffers,’ he said to Arcadius.

  ‘My coffers,’ the governor corrected him.

  ‘Do it,’ shouted Sancho.

  He was surrounded by hundreds of enemy soldiers who had taken control of his city, but Arcadius Drogon was smiling when he nudged his splendid stallion forward towards the gates of his palace, to the accompaniment of hymns coming from every church surrounding it.

  Sancho worked out as precisely as he could with the city treasurer, a shrewish man with a wispy beard and meticulous manner, the amount owed to the Catalan Company.

  Luca had never seen so much wealth when he, Sancho, Jordi and two score other Almogavars were finally allowed into the palace to oversee the loading of small chests filled with coins onto carts, under the watchful eye of palace guards and archers and recorded by treasury officials. One frowned when Angel open one of the chests and sifted through the coins inside it with his hands. They looked gold but were in fact made from electrum, an alloy of gold and silver. The coins, hyperpyrons, had entered circulation two hundred years before and were in wide use throughout the eastern Mediterranean, as well as being the standard coinage of the empire.

  ‘As rich as Croesus,’ he purred.

  ‘Lord?’ said Luca.

  Angel closed the lid.

  ‘Hundreds of years ago, this city was part of a kingdom called Lydia,’ explained Angel. ‘Its ruler, King Croesus, was rich, very rich. He possessed gold mines and his servants sifted for gold in the rivers. My guess is that our friend, Arcadius Drogon, has discovered one of his gold mines and uses its riches to bribe the Turks to stay away from his city.’

  ‘He is not my friend,’ hissed Luca.

  Angel put an arm round his shoulders.

  ‘Don’t be so hasty, Black Sheep. You could swap the hard, sometimes brief life of an Almogavar for the comfort of a long life, silk sheets and the lavish gifts of the Governor of Magnesia. Some might say a sore arse is a small price to pay for such an easy life.’

  ‘I have always lived a hard life and prefer to keep it that way.’

  Sancho left the slaves behind in Magnesia. As they had to be fed it was a blessing they could be left behind to the tender mercies of Arcadius Drogon, who would probably sell them on to authorities in Izmir for a tidy profit. The carts heaving with coins also represented a tidy sum, though one that would diminish by the day once the company had returned to Philadelphia. Weapons, specifically javelins, needed replacing and others needed mending. Links in mail armour needed replacing, spears purchased, saddlery repaired and horses re-shoeing. To say nothing of the great quantities of food required to feed upwards of seven thousand soldiers and the new servants and horse archers acquired by the company.

  Ioannes Komnenos was furious with Grand Duke Roger when he learned of the extortion of money from Magnesia, though his citizens were relieved when the Catalans paid in full for the goods they purchased in their city, rather than plundering Philadelphia and the surrounding countryside. But his anger was tempered by the knowledge that the Catalan Company had saved his city, as well as the town of Tire. Roger’s mercenaries had achieved more in
six months than the imperial army had done in six years. Nevertheless, he was glad to see the red and gold banner disappearing to the north when the Catalans quit their camp and headed back to Artake in the third week of August.

  Chapter 17

  ‘We are all powerless and feeble, and yet Allah has provided us with a remedy for the predicament we find ourselves in.’

  Izzeddin Arslan, dressed in rags, his hair and beard straggly and matted, walked around the open courtyard where the dignitaries sat in opulent chairs arranged in a circle. The surrounding palace still had walls decorated with Christian images and mosaics depicting past emperors of Constantinople. The new ruler, Mehmed Bey, had instructed his architects to make the palace more fitting for the resident of a Muslim emir, but his immediate priority was to be polite to the religious fanatic whose army was camped outside his city.

  That city was Anaia, a prosperous settlement positioned between the Aegean coast and the edge of a fertile plain of the Büyuk Menderes River. For generations, the farms on the plain had produced wheat in abundance, which in the days when the Romans had controlled the area had been exported to foreign lands. Now the Aydin Emirate controlled Anaia and the surrounding area.

  Mehmed Bey, a middle-aged man with a sharp nose and beard, was a canny individual. A man who used a combination of veiled threats and charm to achieve his goals, he had watched with immense satisfaction as Christian mercenaries had recently savaged the armies of his rivals, the Karesi Emirate, the Germiyanid Emirate and the upstart Saruhan Bey, who fancied himself as a ruler in his own right, though bandit would be a more accurate description of him and his followers. He viewed the arrival of the deranged Izzeddin Arslan and his fanatics with horror, though went out of his way to accommodate the Sufi fanatic and his ten thousand ghazi warriors. The memory of Bergama had instilled fear not only in Christian but also in Muslim hearts.

  ‘These mercenaries the Romans have hired are not to be underestimated,’ cautioned Karesi Bey, still smarting from the loss of his governor of Soma, for which he blamed Izzeddin Arslan.

  After the battle, the Sufi had taken himself and his army east, and Karesi Bey had hoped that was the last he would see of him and them. But three months later he was back, appearing at Anaia with a large army and requesting the presence of himself and other emirs for the final offensive that would establish the ‘caliphate’. He had to admit he was tempted by the offer, because to be made a ‘caliph’, which meant ‘successor’ to the Prophet Muhammad himself, meant becoming a religious and political leader of immense power and prestige in the Muslim world.

  The Sufi rounded on him.

  ‘The mercenaries are nothing but instruments of Allah’s displeasure.’

  The holy man walked slowly around the courtyard of bubbling fountains, statues of Roman emperors in niches and ornamental flower beds. He stopped and pointed at Karesi Bey.

  ‘You still employ infidel horsemen in your army?’

  ‘I do,’ replied the emir, ‘and may I remind you under Sharia law I am entitled to do so, as all my Christian horsemen pay the jizya.’

  Christians living in lands conquered by Muslims were exempted from automatic execution as long as they did not resist their new government. Indeed, they were permitted to live as long as they acknowledged their subjugation and paid a special tax call the jizya.

  ‘It would be a foolish warlord who got rid of his best troops,’ grunted Sasa Bey, the leader of the Germiyanid Emirate, a huge brute with a large head and enormous beard.

  Izzeddin Arslan regarded him with barely concealed contempt.

  ‘You can have the best soldiers in the world and it will avail you nothing, Sasa Bey, not if you do not follow the laws laid down by the Prophet.’

  ‘What laws do you speak of?’ demanded Sasa.

  ‘When you laid siege to Philadelphia,’ said Izzeddin, ‘did you destroy the crops in the fields and poison the city’s water supply?’

  Sasa threw back his head and roared with laughter.

  ‘Are you mad? I wanted to take the city and the valley around it, not create a wasteland. What is the point of taking a dead city?’

  Izzeddin pointed a bony finger at him.

  ‘Did not Muhammad say that when you are in the land of the kuffar, all crops should be destroyed and the water poisoned? By turning a blind eye to the al salaf al salih, you diminish your chances of victory.’

  The al salaf al salih were Islam’s ‘pious forefathers’, which were the Prophet himself and his earliest adherents. They were the models for all Muslim behaviour and to deviate from their teachings was to walk down a road that led to apostasy.

  ‘If we unite our forces, then we can defeat the Romans and their allies.’

  All eyes switched to Saruhan Bey, the youngest present who had the most in common with Izzeddin Arslan, in that he and his thousand followers had no land to speak of and relied on the charity of others to subsist. Though unlike the Sufi and his ghazis, none of the other emirs viewed him as much of a threat.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Izzeddin with relish. ‘We must wage offensive jihad to forcibly remove the infidels from the few lands that remain to them in Anatolia.’

  He observed Mehmed Bey coolly.

  ‘And we must not enter into agreements with infidels.’

  The ruler of the Aydin Emirate frowned at the holy man dressed in rags, in stark contrast to the expensive brocaded garment covering his own body.

  ‘I am fully acquainted with Sharia law and was quite within my rights to sign a peace treaty with the governor of Magnesia.’

  Izzeddin allowed a wry smile to crease his lips.

  ‘The Koran also states the devout must not rest or they will fall into a state of sin. Those who persist in supporting non-Muslim governments, after being duly warned and educated about their sins, are considered apostates. I am warning you, Mehmed Bey, against tolerating the presence of Romans and their kafir ways.’

  Mehmed Bey jumped from his chair. As the ruler of a large swathe of land in western Anatolia, he was unused to being talked to in such a manner.

  ‘Watch your mouth, Arslan.’

  ‘Or what, you will cut off my head?’ sneered Izzeddin.

  Karesi Bey also rose from his chair.

  ‘If we argue among ourselves, the laughter of the Romans will be our only reward. We came here to listen to your proposals, Izzeddin. What are they?’

  The holy man was still holding the angry stare of Mehmed Bey but turned away to address the man he had installed as ruler of his own emirate.

  ‘We unite under a single banner, as suggested by Saruhan Bey, after which we capture Tire, Magnesia and Philadelphia, before marching north to link up with the army of Osman Bey for the final assault on Constantinople itself.’

  Karesi Bey nodded and spoke a few quiet words with Mehmed Bey to persuade the Aydin emir to retake his seat.

  ‘That is an ambitious plan, Izzeddin,’ said Sasa, ‘though not impossible if we unite. But what happens after we have conquered Constantinople? Who then becomes caliph?’

  The Romans were on their last legs, even the most feeble-minded could see that. And when their last outposts in Anatolia had been conquered, a caliphate would be established to unite all the emirates under a single leader. But which leader? Of all those present, the dishevelled Izzeddin Arslan had the strongest claim to be caliph. This was because true caliphs had to be descended from the tribe of the Prophet – the Quraysh. He dressed in rags, had no horse, no land and no wealth, but Izzeddin Arslan possessed something more precious that elevated him above the great majority in the Muslim world: he was of Quraysh descent. That was why he commanded such respect and wielded so much power in Anatolia. It was why thousands flocked to his banner, that and the fact he promised free food, clothing and weapons for all who joined his ghazis. Charity was one of the central planks of Islam, to offer food and housing to impoverished strangers. The Prophet himself stated: ‘You will not believe until you love for your brother what you love for yoursel
f.’ Of course, the sudden appearance of a horde of ghazis persuaded local rulers to gladly provide food, clothes, tents and anything else the fanatics required to hurry them on their way.

  ‘Until we have removed the infidels from the whole of Anatolia,’ said Izzeddin, ‘everything else is just speculation, which will promote vanity, which encourages sin.’

  The others looked at Karesi Bey with envious eyes, for he was, or had been, Izzeddin’s protégé, the emir earmarked for great things. But their falling out after the disaster at Soma may have damaged the brooding Karesi’s prospects. In any case, he was not of Quraysh descent and so could not be a true caliph. Neither could they, or Osman Bey in the north for that matter. One thing they could all agree on, though they would never state it openly. No one wanted the fanatic Izzeddin Arslan to be caliph.

  ‘Send word to your commanders,’ said the holy man, ‘to bring all their men here, to Anaia, from where we will march to finally rid all Anatolia of the kafir.’

  Resigned nods greeted the ‘suggestion’. Only Saruhan Bey was enthusiastic. Unlike the others, he had nothing to lose and everything to gain.

  *****

  The Catalan Company maintained a leisurely pace returning to Artake. Count Michael Cosses, though grateful it had lifted the sieges of Philadelphia and Tire, smashing two enemy armies in the process, was aggrieved the Almogavars had plundered the imperial treasury at Magnesia. In addition, and perhaps much worse, they had humiliated Arcadius Drogon, friend of the emperor’s son who had been appointed by Andronicus himself. He had no doubt an angry letter was already making its way to Constantinople.

  None of this concerned Luca, who had a spring in his step after tasting nothing but victory with the Almogavars. Now he was making his way back to Artake and his beloved Ayna. The days were hot and dry, the hills and valleys verdant and teeming with wildlife, mostly brown bear, wolves, lynx and wild cats. Most of the forests were pine, though there was also a sprinkling of oak, hazel, alder, maple and hornbeam.