“Humphrey! Are you sure? What will Isabella say?”
“That is my problem, Ernoul,” Humphrey told him solemnly.
“Humphrey, please don’t do this!” Ernoul begged.
“Are you going to help me or not?” Humphrey answered, his lips pressed together, with a determination on his face that Ernoul could not remember ever seeing there before.
Ernoul took a deep breath. “I’ll tell Isabella a tall tale—but I won’t lie to Lord Balian if he asks me where you are.”
“Fair enough,” Humphrey agreed with a short nod. Then he flung his arms around Ernoul and held him close for a moment. “Thank you!” he murmured. “I will not forget this. Ever.”
He released Ernoul and turned to stride toward the stables where his squire slept with the other visiting squires. Ernoul stood in the ward, stunned, half inclined to call the watch after all—or at least wake Lord Balian. Should he really let Humphrey go and ruin everything the High Court had decided? Should he allow Humphrey to make Guy de Lusignan king? Was civil war really worse than a bad king? A stupid, arrogant king? Ernoul wasn’t sure.
Humphrey emerged from the stables leading his palfrey, his squire stumbling behind him still half asleep, straw caught in his long hair. Humphrey swung himself up into the saddle and ordered the gate opened. Ernoul took a step forward, a shout on the tip of his tongue, but the gateman didn’t dream of saying “no” to the Baron of Toron. Already the gate was creaking open as the first sliver of orange announced the rising sun. A moment later, Humphrey was clattering out over the drawbridge into the town, spurring his sleepy stallion as he turned south for Jerusalem.
Chapter 16
Ibelin, October 1186
IT WAS DRIZZLING AND ALMOST DARK by the time Maria Zoë rode into the ward at Ibelin. While Dawit took her horse and the rest of her escort saw to their own mounts, a boy was sent bounding into the hall to tell the lord that his lady was back. Balian emerged on the landing to the hall before Maria Zoë had wearily reached the top. She fell into his arms, and as he turned to lead her inside he noted, “That feels like bad news. Did something go wrong with the birth?”
“Worse,” Maria Zoë told him with a heavy heart. “Elizabeth died giving birth to a tiny, weak little boy, but while we were focused on helping her, Godfrey came down with a raging fever. He’d been coughing and sniveling a bit when we arrived, but of course our attention was focused on Elizabeth. By the second night, however, we realized he was feverish as well. I told Eschiva to stay with Godfrey while I helped with the birth. Elizabeth delivered a very sickly-looking son just before dawn and died within the hour, exhausted from fighting to bring him into the world. Meanwhile, Godfrey’s fever had increased. We tried everything we knew, and Barry sent for the Nestorian doctor everyone swears by. However, Godfrey could not keep any food or water down. Just before noon today he died.”
Balian crossed himself, stunned. “How’s Barry—”
Maria Zoë shook her head. “You must go to him. I only came so I could tell you the news myself, but tomorrow we must return. Eschiva’s with him, but I’ve never seen a man grieve so, Balian. Never.”
“Barry is a man of great passion,” Balian remarked simply.
“Of course. I know, but . . .” she paused, “I fear he is on the brink of losing his sanity—if he hasn’t already.”
Balian looked at her questioningly.
“Eschiva and I had to drag him—literally—away from the altar. He had seized the cross and flung it across the room. Then he blew out the Eucharist candle and hurled the glass out the window, breaking the pane. He was cursing and screaming, vowing to convert to Islam, and—I honestly didn’t understand everything he said.”
Balian gazed at her in horror. “When will the funerals be?”
“I don’t know for sure. Barry was saying he would not put his son in the ground. He said Godfrey didn’t like the darkness. Godfrey had always wanted to fly, he said, so he declared his intention to build a kite for him and fly it over the ocean.”
“Mother Mary help him!”
“Eschiva’s at the end of her strength, too. She shouldn’t go through an ordeal like this in her state. I’m very worried she could miscarry this latest child—and that, after losing little Henri, her stepmother and half-bother, could be utterly devastating. When we return, we must take Beth with us. Eschiva was very generous to let her marry Dawit and join our household, but for this crisis she needs Beth’s support. I think—” She paused, unsure if she dared say this out loud, but then decided it had to be said. “It is particularly horrible for her to see her father so distraught—and to know he would not have grieved like this for her.”
Balian didn’t have an answer to that, but he noted, “We’ve been summoned to Acre, did you know?”
“No. By whom? What for?”
“Guy was crowned in the Holy Sepulcher last month, and most of us were pointedly absent. Now he has summoned all his vassals to Acre to take the oath of fealty—or forfeit our fiefs.”
“That’s just like Guy, isn’t it?” Maria Zoë observed cynically, but then she stopped and stared at Balian with a new thought. “Barry won’t do it! I’m sure he won’t. Not in the state he’s in.”
Balian admitted, “The timing couldn’t be worse, but I’ll have to reason with him.”
“There is no reasoning with him,” Maria Zoë muttered wearily, shaking her head.
Balian put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her. “I understand, but this state he’s in won’t last forever. He’ll burn himself out, and then I’ll have to be there to talk to him. Come, you need rest.”
Maria Zoë nodded. “I do—and your arms around me,” she admitted. Then she stopped and frowned, “But I’m sure Guy set a deadline. What was it?”
“The end of the month.”
“So, just over ten days,” she calculated with a sigh. “Well, we’ll have to try. The last thing we need is for Barry to refuse and for Ramla and Mirabel to fall to the Crown. We’d then be completely surrounded by Guy de Lusignan’s lands.”
“The knights and men of Ramla and Mirabel are not going to turn into our enemies just because they are technically tenants of Lusignan,” Balian reassured her, but Maria Zoë still didn’t like the idea. Sibylla hated her with a passion that was raw and violent. Guy, conscious of how dependent he was on his wife for all his honors, was inclined to indulge her. At least for once, Maria Zoë reflected bitterly, she needn’t worry about Isabella, whose spineless husband had secured the favor of Lusignan with his betrayal of his wife and the High Court. Yet she had four other children, and she was uncomfortable thinking that they might be surrounded by people who owed allegiance to her enemies. Maybe she should move them to Nablus? She was getting ahead of herself. Barry might yet be brought to reason in time.
They had passed through the hall and on into the solar. At once John and Helvis jumped up at the sight of their mother and ran over, with Margaret and the toddling Philip trailing uncertainly behind. Maria Zoë sank onto her heels to accept the hugs of her four children, feeling like a mother cat with four frolicking kittens around her. She could not fathom how she should be so lucky and have such healthy children while Barry had lost all but Eschiva; this latest sickly boy seemed unlikely to live long. Eschiva, too, had lost her second son, Henri, and she seemed to feel guilty about being pregnant again so soon, though it was hardly her fault.
“Shhh!” Balian admonished his rambunctious children. “Quiet down! Your mother’s very tired, and she has bad news for you all.”
Slowly they fell silent and looked back and forth between their mother and father. It was Balian who spoke. “Your Aunt Elizabeth and your cousin Godfrey have both died.”
“Little Godfrey?” Helvis gasped in a tone of innocent pity, while John frowned.
“You have a new cousin, though,” Maria Zoë added, in an effort to cheer them up a bit. “A little boy.”
“What’s his name?” Helvis asked.
“Well, he had
n’t been christened yet when I left, but we’ll soon find out.”
Ramla, October 1186
Balian rose before dawn, leaving Maria Zoë still sleeping heavily, and set out for Ramla with only Ernoul and his confessor Michael in attendance. It was a clear, warm day after the evening rain, and the freshly tilled fields smelled heavily of dung. They encountered few other travelers, as they were earlier than most, and they made good time, arriving at Ramla by midmorning.
Barry’s residence here was a large, imposing townhouse two stories high, with decorative crenelation on the flat roof. It had clusters of double-light windows supported by central pillars of marble on the upper floors, and square grilled windows on the ground floor. A large wooden door at street level gave access for people only; the stables were around at the back.
Balian turned Rufus over to Ernoul and was admitted with Michael into the marble-paved entry hall by a familiar servant. “Thank God you’re here, Lord Balian! Lady Eschiva is at her wit’s end. My lord has locked himself in his chamber, and we can’t get him to come out for anything. The chaplain had to christen the baby without my lord’s presence or consent, as he seems sickly and like to die any hour now. And—” He would have continued at some length, Balian suspected, if Eschiva had not appeared at the head of the stairs.
“Uncle Balian?” she called out uncertainly, her voice strained from lack of sleep. “Is that really you?”
Balian answered by turning to his confessor and ordering in a low voice, “See if you can find my brother’s chaplain and help any way you can,” then he took the stairs two at a time to join Eschiva.
She looked much too thin for the size of her belly, and the dark circles under her eyes had transformed what should have been a pretty young face into a ghoulish apparition. “Oh, Uncle Balian!” she gasped out in distress as he caught her hands in his own. “I don’t know what to do!” she confessed, tears brimming up in her red-rimmed eyes. “My father’s locked himself in his chamber with Godfrey’s corpse, and he won’t come out or even answer me. God knows what he’s done to himself in there! I’m terrified he’s killed himself!” she admitted. “He was cursing God and denying Christ. I’m sure he didn’t give a thought to his immortal soul in his grief. He just wanted to end it all. I pleaded with him through the door, but at first he just screamed at me to go away, then threw things at the door. After that there was a terrible crash and all went deathly still.”
“Eschiva.” Balian guided her to a chest and sat her down on it. “You need to rest and look after yourself. Where are your women?”
“I don’t know. I sent them to bed long ago,” she corrected herself. Balian frowned; it was now midmorning, and even if they had laid down to rest they should be up again by now, seeing to their mistress.
“When was the last time you ate anything?” he asked her next.
“Tante Marie forced me to eat, but I’m really not hungry.”
“You may not be, but that child of yours is,” Balian admonished, nodding to her belly.
“Uncle Balian, my brother Godfrey’s dead!” Eschiva wailed in anguish.
“I know. There’s nothing you can do for him but pray for his soul, but for the child under your heart you can do much more.” Eschiva’s hand fell to her belly, but her expression remained tortured; she found no joy in the life within her.
Balian changed the subject. “Maria Zoë said Elizabeth died giving birth to another son. Where is he?”
“With a wet nurse.” Eschiva gestured vaguely down the hall. “He’s very tiny. I don’t think he’ll live very long. We tried to get my father to tell us what he wanted to name him, but he just screamed at us that no one could replace Godfrey. We christened him Thomas, for Elizabeth’s father and brother.”
Balian nodded approval and then asked, “Now, where’s my brother?”
“Right down here.” Eschiva hauled herself to her feet to lead the way.
Barry’s chamber was accessed through an anteroom, where two frightened squires and a whining dog waited in nervous confusion. Balian strode past them and tried the tall, pointed door, but it was indeed bolted from the inside. He lifted his arm and pounded on the door with the side of his gloved fist so hard that Eschiva started as the hammering reverberated. “Barry! It’s Balian! Open the door!”
Everyone in the anteroom held their breath as they listened for some sign of life on the far side of the door. There was none.
“Fetch me an ax,” Balian ordered over his shoulder to one of the squires. Eschiva sank down on the arm of a chair, her hand over her mouth and her eyes wide with horror.
The squire ran, but it took him several minutes to find and return with one of his lord’s battle-axes. He was followed by Barry’s household steward, two other clerics, and Michael, as well as a gaggle of other staff.
Balian took the ax and weighed it in his hand, getting a feel for it, while the other occupants in the room drew back out of his way. Then he drew an audible breath and swung the ax. The head landed just beside the door handle with a crunching thwack, embedding itself several inches into the door. Balian had to brace a foot against the base of the door to yank the ax free again. He raised it and brought it down a second time, close to the first blow. With a cracking sound, one of the planks gave a little.
Abruptly from the far side of the door Barry roared, “You don’t have to vandalize my home! Damn you!” Then he wrenched open the door from the inside and glared out at the assembled company with wild, furious eyes. His haggard face was covered with stubble and framed by a tangled mane of dull gray-blond hair.
“Papa!” Eschiva jumped up and started to run to him in relief.
“Leave me alone!” he barked at her, gesturing for her to stay where she was, and then turned to shout at the rest of them. “What are you staring at? Get out!”
Balian did just the opposite. He moved into the doorway before his brother could close it again, and stared his brother down. “The priests have come for Godfrey’s corpse.”
“What are they going to do with it? Eat it?”
Balian didn’t bother answering, just gestured for Michael and his colleagues to come and get the boy’s body from behind Barry while he held his brother in place, the ax still in his hand. Barry made no move to stop them from taking the body away. He just stared at it listlessly, his whole form sagging with indifference born of despair. As soon as the priests were out, Balian moved deeper into the chamber and closed the door behind him to be alone with his brother.
“Godfrey,” was all Barry said.
“Godfrey is with Christ, but you have a tiny newborn boy who needs you.”
“I’ve lost count of how many newborn boys I’ve buried. Godfrey was the only one who lived long enough to be a son to me.”
“You didn’t know in the first forty-eight hours that he was going to live.”
“I did, though,” Barry told Balian firmly, if irrationally. “I could tell. But this boy won’t live. His mother’s dead.”
Balian said a prayer for Elizabeth, who even now to Barry was only the mother of his sons.
“This is the end,” Barry told him in a dull voice.
“What do you mean?” Balian asked in alarm.
“Can’t you feel it? Smell it? The vultures are gathering for Arma-geddon.”
“What I feel and smell is your grief, Barry,” Balian answered steadily.
Barry shook his head. “No. The forces of evil are on the move. They are gathering their troops and sharpening their weapons. And Christ—” Barry made a deprecating gesture and snorted. “Christ is as effective as that pathetic stepson of yours. A powerless man of peace, when the gods of war are about to devour us alive.”
Balian did not try to answer. He was certain that Christ would understand Barry’s grief and forgive him. Instead, he silently pulled Barry into his arms and let him cry.
Acre, October 1186
King Guy was holding court in the Hospitaller Quarter of Acre. Although built to accommodate hundreds of
knights and three times as many sergeants and serving brothers, it was still crowded to overflowing by the large number of barons who had come with their entourages to pay homage. King Guy even had the effrontery to fly his flag higher than the Hospitaller banner—a gesture the Templars would never have allowed, Balian noted mentally. Moulins had evidently trimmed his sails to the wind.
The approach of the Barons of Ramla and Ibelin side by side did not go unnoticed. Even in the streets outside the Hospitaller complex, the street urchins excitedly called out their names: “Ramla and Ibelin!” No doubt they made a game of it to see if they could identify everyone—and keep track of who came and who did not.
Inside the usually spacious courtyard they found themselves crushed and jostled by the other visitors, messengers, victualers, and tradesmen, not to mention the sick and their attendants. Yet even so, the arrival of “Ramla and Ibelin” created a ripple of excitement as the word spread that they had come. People turned to stare at them, dropping whatever else they had been doing.
Balian glanced at his brother warily. Barry was dressed at his most flamboyant, in a camel-leather cloak sewn with the red crosses of Ibelin and the ravens of Ramla, lined with fox fur. His boots were likewise soft camel leather, his surcoat silk with gold embroidery worn over gleaming chain mail trimmed with bronze links. His hair was freshly washed, but tousled by the ride, which made it fuller and more impressive. The long mustache disguised the fact that his lips turned down in a sour expression. His eyes were shaded, but when he felt Balian’s gaze he managed a wan, mirthless smile—like the angel of death, Balian thought.
Hospitaller lay brothers ran forward to take the bridles of their horses as they drew up, and a royal squire was sent scurrying to tell King Guy that his most inveterate opponent, the man he had snubbed and humiliated, had come to bend his knee.
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