The Last Emir

by The Last Emir (retail) (epub)

  A panicked and fading scream suddenly arose behind him and to his right, and he realised with grim satisfaction that the small group of civilians following him had tipped the other surprised guard over the parapet. The doomed Almohad soldier landed with a crunch some distance below, raising a cry of alarm from the other enemies down near the gate, but Arnau had his own issues to deal with.

  He hit the guard at the tower’s centre hard with a shoulder, knocking him back. His left hand came up as the two men fell back, seeking his difficult target. The tip of the sharp knife found the opening he sought fast, though, and he stabbed. The standard form of the chain veils worn by such guards was a flap that was an integral part of the chain hood, and could fold across the lower face and tie to one side. It was as protective as any other area of chain against a standard attack, but a strike launched carefully from so close was a different matter. The tip of the blade slipped easily between the veil and the hood, into that narrow opening, and sank into the throat beneath. The guard choked mid-cry, white eyes almost glowing in the dark space between veil and helmet.

  Arnau let go, momentum still with him. The mortally wounded Almohad solider fell away, knife still lodged in his neck, blood spraying out around the weapon and between the folds of mail. But Arnau had not stopped moving. He had hit the guard hard, knifed him, and kept going.

  The odds had changed in an instant, thanks to a combination of surprise and the civilians in his wake. There had been two guards here protecting the Lion of Alarcos. Arnau had swiftly despatched one, and the slaves had dealt with the other. Now only the Almohad lord himself, and the nobleman in the corner, remained.

  Arnau pointed at the unarmoured courtier, and heard the footsteps of the others behind him veer off as they went to deal with the man, leaving just Arnau and the Lion.

  He slowed.

  This was not about a swift kill, utilising surprise, like the attack on the guards. As they had planned at Al-Fabia, the Lion had to die cleanly, honourably, and preferably in a public place in full view of anyone whose opinion made a difference. For just a moment, though, Arnau contemplated keeping going, picking up the pace once more. He knew what had to be done, and how it had to be done, but the sight of that man as he turned, his baleful face so emotionless, inflamed Arnau. This man who would see Balthesar suffer an agony of anguish and loss through his dotage, and in doing so would kill Arnau, and Ramon, and Ermengarda and Titborga, and anyone about whom the old knight cared. This man who had taken Arnau and restrained him in a cellar, torturing him and inflicting pain and humiliation. This man who sought to ruin what had proved to be the last bastion of the tolerant Moor in Iberia and usurp it on behalf of the hated Almohads. This man deserved to die badly, but also quickly, to be despatched from the world as swiftly as possible to halt the sickness he and his kind spread.

  It would be so easy to kill him, too. All the young Templar had to do was run and hit him hard. The two men would tip over the parapet in the blink of an eye and fall to the courtyard below, where their skulls would crack like eggs. He would die horribly. Arnau would die too, but it would be worth it to save everyone. To save even Mayūrqa. And he was fairly sure that in the eyes of Saint Peter, in whose hands lay the keys to heaven, such a thing would not be considered taking one’s own life. In fact it would surely be more along the lines of blessed martyrdom. Lord, he might even be able to stop himself following the bastard over the top.

  No.

  They had discussed everything for hours at Al-Fabia, and that was not how it had to happen. The Lion of Alarcos had to die not unseen and for revenge, but openly and for defying and usurping the Emir of Mayūrqa. Arnau wore the emir’s colours. He represented the rightful ruler of the island, and he had to put that ahead of himself.

  Resisting the urge to speed up and thunder into the hated man, he instead stopped, facing the Lion as the man unfolded his arms, his fingers dropping to rest on his sword hilt. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the courtier waving his arms madly in panicked defiance as four slaves closed on him.

  ‘You have more lives than a cat, Templar,’ the Almohad lord said quietly.

  ‘And you are at the end of your only one,’ Arnau replied in flat tones of finality.

  ‘I do not fear you, Templar, for Allah guides my hand.’

  ‘Odd, for the emir down there seems to think the same of himself, and I cannot picture God favouring two enemies. I fear you live under the same delusion as all Almohad fanatics: that God loves a monster.’

  ‘Are you done with your prattling?’ the Lion said, sliding his blade from its sheath with a metallic sigh. Arnau wondered for a moment whether this place could be considered public enough to finish it. There were a few witnesses, though they were the wazir, who needed no persuasion, and slaves, whose opinion would count for nothing anyway.

  As silence fell in the wake of the various scuffles and the verbal sparring of the two men, Arnau became aware of a commotion below. Keeping a wary eye on the Lion, who was shifting and testing his grip on his sword, Arnau edged around towards where the nobleman was busy being mercilessly beaten by four slaves, his cries little more than muffled gasps in the press. Ignoring him, Arnau reached the parapet and glanced sharply down, just long enough to see what was happening there but not long enough to put him in danger from the Lion.

  He felt his spirits buoyed by what he saw. Green-clad figures fought and struggled with black-and-white ones in the courtyard. Against all odds, the gate had fallen and the emir’s men were in the palace now. Even as he tore his eyes away, he saw the emir himself ride into the courtyard through the archway, returning to his place of rule. All was falling into place, and at least a dozen pairs of eyes were locked on the tower top, now aware that something was happening up there. Witnesses. Perfect.

  ‘It’s over,’ Arnau said. ‘The islands remain under the emir’s control. Your play for power has failed. Your men fight like wild animals, but they cannot win now, and when you die in front of them, that fight will go out of them.’

  ‘Overconfidence is a flaw I have noted in Christians,’ the Lion replied, and brought up his sword into a ready stance.

  Arnau remained where he was, preparing, lifting his own blade. Standing so close to the parapet was, of course, asking for trouble, but here they were visible to soldiers, courtiers and the ordinary folk of the palace, and that was paramount to what had to happen.

  He remembered those times standing in the dust outside the walls of Rourell with the German knight trying to teach him. Arnau had been confident that his skills were adequate, that he could face any man with a reasonable chance of victory. Then he had met Lütolf, and been swiftly disabused of that notion, as the German put him down in the dust repeatedly with remarkably little effort. He had learned hard that such a fight was more about readiness, control and reaction than about strength and speed. And he had discovered that while he was strong and fast, he had been unprepared and lacked control.

  His gaze strayed over the Lion of Alarcos, seeking a clue. Like Lütolf in his time, the Almohad lord seemed to be devoid of any tells. Arnau couldn’t anticipate what the man would do. He felt the tension rising once more, and forced himself to relax. He needed to be calm, prepared, to clear his mind of the many worries and thoughts crowding in on him and concentrate solely on the man before him.

  ‘Blessed be my Lord God, that teacheth mine hands to war and my fingers to battle,’ he said in a calm, clear voice.

  The attack came without warning. The Lion suddenly swung his blade wide at Arnau’s left side. The young Templar bore no shield, his left hand empty, but his reaction came swiftly and instinctively, given speed by his calm mind and observation of his foe. He dropped to a crouch as the Moor’s blade whispered over his head, but by the time he rose, advancing as he did so, sword lancing out in a riposte, the Lion had already dropped his weapon into a guard and he turned that blow aside easily.

  The Lion of Alarcos stepped back.

  ‘You are faster than I anticipated
. Rare skill for a man of so few years.’

  ‘And you are just as fast as I anticipated.’

  Without warning, Arnau thrust his blade forward, leaping into a lunge, knowing that his chances of penetrating the man’s mail shirt were small, but that great damage could be done without even breaking an iron link. He had thought it a good attack. He had moved without warning, and had been as careful as possible to give no indication of what was to come, but the Lion was still somehow ready for him, slapping his sword aside as he ducked to his left. In a continuation of that same move, the Almohad spun, his sword rising from a parry into a slash. As it came round in a deadly arc, Arnau thrust his own blade into the way, feeling the shockwave of the two weapons meeting with impressive force reverberate all the way up his arms and into his shoulders. Damn it, but that hurt. His backside was causing him little trouble now, and apart from a little hoarseness, his throat was fine, but his shoulders still ached whenever he was not distracted by something else, and swinging the sword and meeting blade to blade was causing enough pain to make him wince and gasp.

  As the two men separated again, the Almohad lord gestured at him with his free hand.

  ‘You cannot hope to win. Perhaps if I were tired and you in full health you might best me. But I am well rested, and your shoulders still pain you from the cellar, if I am not mistaken. Every blow we trade makes me a little more weary, but every blow robs you of your strength at a much greater pace. Soon your shoulders will seize and you will find that you no longer have the strength to raise your sword from the ground. Then I shall have to take your head. I had hoped to extract from you the names and locations of everyone for whom the Qātil wariʻa cares, but I shall simply have to bend more effort to that quest, and start by making you an example. I shall hack off that smirking face and drop it to the cobbles for your master to look upon.’

  Arnau narrowed his eyes. From a man like della Cadeneta this would have struck Arnau as a boast or a threat, delivered with malice and intent to shake him, to push him into making a mistake. From the Lion of Alarcos, it came over as an emotionless statement of fact. Abd al-Azīz was making no boast; he was simply informing Arnau of his intentions. And the horrible thing was that Arnau could see just such a sequence of events coming to pass. The Almohad was right. While the Lion might tire a little with each exchange, Arnau was still suffering the ill effects of what had been done to him in the cellar. He had told himself that he was sufficiently recovered for this, but the truth was entirely otherwise, and the Lion had recognised that instantly. Arnau would weaken fast and be unable to finish this. His only hope was a swift resolution to the fight. He had to take the Lion down, and he had to do it now.

  Steadying himself, he sized up his opponent once more. The Lion wore a chain shirt with sleeves that continued to the wrist. Like Arnau his hands were bare, and also like Arnau he wore no helmet or coif, his head covered with just a hat that would save him from nothing. His chain shirt hung down to his knees, and beneath that he wore some sort of colourful trousers, and no mail. Arnau stood precious little chance of punching through the mail, and delivering enough of a blow to the chain to damage the body beneath took an awful lot of strength. The weak spots, then, were the head, the hands and the lower legs. Of course, the Lion knew that too.

  It had to be unexpected.

  He struck swiftly and decisively. Dropping as he leaped forward, he swung the sword in an arc at the Lion’s left knee, which would shatter under the blow, especially with no chain protection. Predictably, the Almohad’s own sword came down in a block, the man deftly stepping to his right to allow space for Arnau’s blow to miss.

  But the knee was a feint, and one that was outlandish, relying upon just such a response. As Arnau’s blade swept through the air, the angle of attack changed and it rose, coming up to meet the Lion’s arm as it descended to put the block in place. Arnau felt the thrill of victory coursing through him. He had done it. He had tricked the Lion into exposing a weakness. He would win, and all would be right.

  His shock and dismay as the Lion’s arm seemed to fold out of the path of his blade like a closing hand fan were absolute. He had been certain he had got the best of the man, but the Lion of Alarcos had simply managed to pull himself out of the way in time, and Arnau’s sword cut up through empty air, carrying much of the young Templar’s remaining strength with it. In the blink of an eye, Arnau realised just how good this man was, and with that epiphany came the knowledge that he couldn’t win. He had used almost everything he had in that one attack and yet it had still been so easy to avert. He could see no way he could manage anything better, while the Lion seemed to have barely broken a sweat.

  Worst of all, as Arnau’s sword flew up harmlessly, cleaving only air, the Lion reacted with astonishing speed, his own blade coming down unexpectedly from somewhere. Arnau had no choice. It was an inelegant response, but the only one available. He threw himself to the side, slamming into the parapet of the tower, and teetered there for a perilous moment, almost tipping over it and plummeting to his death.

  He gasped, and shivered. He had almost died there. He was shaking and leaning on the battlements, his shoulders screaming at him, his strength ebbing, and unable to think of a way out. By comparison, the Lion of Alarcos returned to a calm stance, sword gripped tight, a light sheen to his forehead the only real sign of exertion. The man was too good. Arnau couldn’t beat him.

  Therefore take ye the armour of God…

  Arnau slowly lifted himself from the battlements and straightened. He took several deep breaths, keeping his gaze locked on the man before him. Faith, Balthesar always told him. Have faith, Vallbona.

  ‘Therefore take ye the armour of God,’ he said suddenly in a clear, if slightly scratchy, voice, ‘that ye may stand in the evil day, and in all things stand perfect. Therefore stand ye, and be girded about your loins in soothfastness, and clothed with the habergeon of rightwiseness, and your feet shod in the making ready of the gospel of peace. In all things take ye the shield of faith, in which ye may quench all the fiery darts of him that is the most wicked, and take ye the helmet of health, and the sword of the Ghost, that is, the word of God.’

  ‘Your heathen prattlings are nonsensical,’ sneered the Lion.

  ‘These words are like arrows in my quiver,’ Arnau responded. ‘They are links in my chain shirt. They are strength in my muscles and hope in my heart.’

  ‘You are a fool. A blind fool.’

  And Arnau made his final attack. His shoulders were so painful and his strength failing, and he knew for certain that after this he would be lucky to lift the tip of the blade from the ground. But he had summoned up every ounce of spirit and strength in his being, wrapping them in the words of the Holy Scriptures, and forcing them into his arm and the blade it held.

  He swung.

  The Lion at first smiled a horrible smile, but the corners of his mouth came back down and his brow creased in concern and surprise as Arnau’s last effort came. The blade in the young sergeant’s hands swung round in a powerful back-handed slash, and the Almohad managed to drop his own sword into a parrying position once more with relative ease, but Arnau’s blow was infused with the power of desperation, of need, of righteousness, and of God. Despite his own strength and energy, the Lion stared in shock as his sword was knocked aside, his hands going numb from the strike, and the Templar’s blade slammed into his left arm. Both men heard the limb snap beneath the mail.

  Arnau fell back. He was spent. He knew he had used up everything in that last blow, and his sword fell now, his fingers throbbing, his shoulders afire. He collapsed against the parapet and began to slide down to his knees.

  The Lion of Alarcos stared in shock. He managed to retain his sword in tingling fingers, and he was upright, but somehow this pup who was sorely injured, weak and tired had managed to deliver a blow substantial enough to pass through his guard and snap his arm like a twig.

  Fury and determination flooded into the Almohad’s face now.

&n
bsp; Arnau knew it was over. He had done all he could. He had at least wounded the man and with luck the bastard would contract a sickness in the wound and die of it, soaked in sweat and pus and agony. It was a nice thought, but the Lion would probably survive this and escape to find one of the many excellent Moorish doctors, who would likely be able to help him.

  Arnau heaved in a breath, and then another.

  The Lion was recovering. Arnau could see the man gritting his teeth against the pain in his arm, but it was not his sword arm and he still had plenty of strength. The Almohad lord took a step towards him. In desperation, Arnau shuffled backwards, using the wall for support. The Lion swung, and it was only by a miracle that the young Templar managed to scramble back swiftly enough to avoid death. The Almohad sword rent the empty air and came back up, readying for a second blow. Arnau continued to hurry backwards along the wall, but knew the game was up as his painful shoulders bumped into the other wall and he knew he was cornered, quite literally.

  The Lion advanced on him implacably, a Satanic figure in red and silver, his sword rising for a final blow. Arnau almost choked with shock and panic as a shadow suddenly fell across him and the wazir stepped between him and the advancing Almohad.

  He had no idea what it was that the emir’s man said to the enemy lord, but all it seemed to do was anger the Lion of Alarcos. It was with an almost dismissive, careless swipe that the Almohad lord cut the old man’s throat with the edge of his blade and pushed him out of the way.

  The last droplets of the wazir’s falling blood spattered onto Arnau as he leaned back against the stone parapet, cold and miserable, awaiting the descent of death upon him. So many good men had died, and now it seemed more were fated to do so.

  A new voice suddenly cut across the scene, and the Lion of Alarcos stopped dead in his tracks. The words were Arabic, but even with his complete lack of comprehension, Arnau could feel the fire and the hatred within them. He turned his weary, beleaguered head to see Balthesar emerging from the doorway onto the tower top, sword in hand, eyes cold and full of determination.