by S A Monk
When their meal was finished, Lucien dropped a bit more brush on the sputtering fire, then pushed to his feet.
“I’m going to check the horses,” he informed her as he extended a hand to help her to her feet.
Gabrielle understood that he also wanted to give her a bit of privacy if she needed to relieve herself before going to bed. “Once I’ve taken care of a bit of personal business, I’ll clean up since I was no help earlier.”
“Do not go far,” he warned, sweeping the darkness with a worried scan.
Her smile reassured him she would not. “Just on the other side of the clearing.”
When Gabrielle finished with her private ablutions, she returned to their campsite, coming to a sudden halt in the shadow of the boulders. Lucien stood near the fire pit, confronted by two strangers. One had a scimitar drawn, pointed at his midsection, and one was ruffling through their belongings, looking for valuables, Gabrielle assumed.
She looked around, but failed to see any horses or camels. It appeared they had just walked into their campsite, probably drawn by the light of the fire in the moonless night.
To her dismay, she was quickly spotted.
“Aha, what have we here?” the bandit with the scimitar snickered in Arabic. “It seems we have stumbled upon two fine horses and an even finer woman.”
Gabrielle looked toward Lucien and saw his jaw clench. “Genna, come here.”
They had agreed to call one another by Arabic names when they were in front of strangers. Lucien had become Latif. Keeping the initial letter of their Christian names made them easier to recall.
As she walked toward him, the brigand standing before Lucien reached out to grab her, but Gabrielle nimbly danced out of his grasp. Lucien instantly pulled her to stand behind him. When the Arab rummaging through their bedrolls and packs found something he deemed worthwhile, he called out to his companion.
The momentary lapse of attention allowed Lucien to whisper the word mercenaries to Gabrielle. She flinched. Simple bandits would have been preferable. They might have robbed them and left them alone. Mercenaries were not likely to leave them anything but dead.
When the thief kneeling on their blankets held up the gold chain and necklace Gabrielle’s mother had given her, she cried out softly. The pendant dangling from his dirty fingers was a crescent moon carved delicately out of gold, set with a brilliantly clear stone that Simone had told her was very rare and priceless. Because of its worth, both monetarily and sentimentally, she usually wore it around her neck, beneath her clothing. Its loss would break her heart!
Lucien squeezed her hand, and while the sword-wielding Arab took a step away from them to inspect his companion’s find, he carefully and slowly withdrew a long blade from his boot. Gabrielle saw him and took a step backwards, prepared to get out of the way.
With a lightning quick lift of his arm, Lucien threw the misericord at the man, hitting him squarely in the side of the neck. The mercenary dropped like a stone. Lucien charged the second man before he had a chance to draw the sword at his waist.
He had him on the ground and was fighting him for his shorter sword when the man called out and a third mercenary appeared. Gabrielle spun around just as he emerged from the thicket of bushes the horses were tethered to.
She tried to run, but the soldier grabbed her around the middle and pulled her tight up against his chest. In the next second, a knife appeared at her throat.
“Get up or I cut her throat!” her assailant called out to Lucien in Arabic.
Lucien had no choice but to release the man beneath him and push to his feet. The downed mercenary rolled swiftly to his feet also with a dagger in his hand. Gabrielle screamed as she watched him throw it at Lucien.
Lucien ducked and spun away. The commotion distracted her captor enough to allow her to bring her elbow up and back and then jam it, with all her might, into the man’s ribs. It was only by some miracle that she was not beheaded in the process.
As the brigand behind her doubled over, she picked up the scimitar lying on the ground, called out, and tossed it to Lucien, then heeded his shout to run.
She got only to the edge of the firelight before she collided with another male body.
Only this time, she recognized him as a friend. Nephrim stood before her, with Omar a step behind. After assuring themselves she was all right, they hurried to assist Lucien, who was now fighting off both of the remaining mercenaries.
With the odds in their favor, the fight was over swiftly. In a matter of minutes, all three mercenaries were dead, sprawled on the ground around the campfire. Gabrielle hurried to Lucien’s side. He wrapped his arms around her, and she held him as tightly as he did her for a few moments.
When they broke apart, she checked him for injuries. Besides a few minor cuts and scratches, he was whole and well.
He passed his fingers tenderly over her throat, noting a small rivulet of blood and a tiny cut. “That was incredibly reckless, Gabi,” he breathed out, shaking his head. “You could have been killed.”
She smiled at him ruefully. “I couldn’t let you stand alone against those men. You could have been killed.”
He hooked an arm around her shoulders and laughed, though there was more relief than humor in it. “I think I can let my heart start beating now.”
Gabrielle looked to Nephrim and Omar. “Where did you two come from? I thought you had gone back to Jerusalem.”
“They’ve been shadowing us,” Lucien supplied. “I have had them out doing more scouting.”
“We have stayed close enough to watch your back,” Nephrim, who was the eldest, corrected. “You are on dangerous ground out here, behind enemy lines.”
Lucien laughed mockingly. “I’m always on dangerous ground.”
“Nevertheless, we are here to help. We’ll go home when you do.”
“Aw, my friends, that may be longer than you hoped for.”
Omar walked over to one of the dead bodies, pried something from the man’s fingers, and returned with it. “Hazir would have our hides if we let anything happen to either of you,” he advised with a smile. “Here, Lady Gabrielle, I believe this belongs to you.”
Gabrielle took her mother’s pendant and chain, grateful that it was not blood-stained.
“Thank you, both of you.”
“Let’s get rid of the bodies,” Lucien suggested, eyeing them with a scowl. “Afterwards, we will share what remains of our dinner, then take turns on watch for the remainder of the night. Tomorrow, we leave early for the city.”
Lucien took first watch that night, but when he was relieved by Omar and crawled onto his bedroll, Gabrielle, who had waited for him, scooted closer and laid her head on the rock solid plain of his chest. “I was so terrified for you tonight, Lucien,” she whispered into the dark.
He slid his arms around her to hold her against the length of his fully clothed body. “I have escaped death many times, Gabi, and I plan on doing so many more times. Don’t you know we have a lifetime to spend together yet?”
Wrapped snuggly in his arms, she threw a muslin clad leg over his, and listened to the steady drumming of his heart. “Oh God, I hope that is so, Lucien! For without you, I do not want to be here.”
“Our timing may be lousy, sweet Gabi, but I promise you I will do everything in my power to be right here with you for a very long time.”
She lifted up on one elbow and stared at him worriedly. “But when we return, you must go to fight alongside the king.”
His knuckles caressed her satiny smooth cheek. “We will face that when the time comes, and we will get though it together.”
He sounded so certain. Gabrielle wished she could be as certain.
Seeing her continued distress, Lucien cupped her head and pulled her to him for a long meltingly hot kiss. Beneath the tender assault of his lips and tongue, she reminded herself that he had lived a long time in this war-torn land and survived. He had worked in more dangerous situations than most men as a spy, and he had undou
btedly lived with a price on his head as a spymaster.
He would survive to love her for a long time, she reassured herself over and over as she returned his passionate kiss with all the adoration she felt for him.
CHAPTER 15
Damascus was reputed to be one of the oldest cities in the world, having been inhabited for over 4,000 years. Built at the base of a mountain range, its steady source of water from the Barada River fed extensive irrigation systems that kept the land and its people well supplied with water and food.
Referred to in the Bible as an oasis city, it was located at the crossing of two ancient trade routes known in antiquity as the King’s Highway and the Way of the Philistines. Strategically located, it was the capital city of Syria and the primary seat of Saladin’s Caliphate.
Whether coming from the Mediterranean coast, Egypt, or the Far East, caravans crowded the roads entering the city with their camels, mules, horses, and wagons. Damascus was a destination and a gateway city for merchants in the Middle East. For centuries, Greeks, Romans, Jews, Christians, and Arabs had passed through its high stone walls to trade within its marvelous markets. And despite its diverse cultural and religious population, it served as Islam’s political hub.
Gabrielle, Lucien, Omar, and Nephrim had traveled beside the numerous caravans on the old Roman road into the city which was still paved in thick slabs of stone. At a stable several miles outside the metropolis, they paid to have their fine Arabian horses boarded to avoid drawing undo attention to themselves. In their places, they rented a sturdy little donkey, on which they loaded their water skins, rucksacks, and baggage.
They entered the northwestern gate, along the city wall that paralleled the river, on foot, leading their donkey behind them. At the entrance, they were stopped by a guard who inspected their travel documents. Gabrielle clutched Lucien’s hand nervously as he calmly presented his impeccably forged papers and explained they were in the city to visit relatives.
The line of travelers ahead of and behind them all had to do the same thing, and yet Gabrielle had dreaded this moment. Lucien, and of course Omar and Nephrim, could all easily pass for Muslims.
Lucien needed no hooded robe to hide his face. He looked every bit the half-Bedouin he was with his dark sun-bronzed skin, coal-black hair and beard, and deep brown eyes. But Gabrielle, while dressed as a Muslim woman, was not so sure her lighter skin and hair coloring or her dark blue eyes would go unnoticed. She was heavily veiled, and little could be seen of her face or hair. Nevertheless, she worried that she would not blend in. Hoping that he would simply consider her a properly modest wife, she kept her eyes diligently lowered, even when one of the guards looked at her.
Lucien had told her not to worry. They were disguised to blend in perfectly, and they both spoke flawless Arabic. He assured her no one would suspect them of being Christian Franks. Between them, they possessed a fairly sound understanding of Islam, enough to know what to eat, when to pray, how to act and dress. Lucien’s knowledge of the Koran and other Islamic texts was far superior to her own, she had learned, due partly to knowledge his mother had shared with him and partly to his own quest to understand the culture in which he worked.
Still, Gabrielle was grateful that her face was veiled as they passed through the guard station and came up alongside the mighty Syrian military citadel in Damascus.
It was a massive, forbidding structure with its multitude of round, crenellated towers and heavily fortified walls. Infidel soldiers manned the garrison in great numbers, especially now that war with the Franks was so close. The closer they had gotten to the Syrian capital, the more soldiers and mercenaries they had seen on the roads. Too frequently they had been assembled in large regiments.
But even after that exposure, it made Gabrielle uneasy to look up and see so many on the walls high above them. They looked down on the line of travelers entering the city with a watchful eye. Inside, she suspected, were many imprisoned Franks, especially after the battle at Cresson a month ago. The garrison at Damascus contained a prison as large and dreaded as the one at Aleppo. From Reynald, Gabrielle had heard more stories than she cared to remember concerning the atrocities that went on in the bowels of both prisons.
She shuddered as they passed by the great fort, praying fervently that Lucien never had cause to see the inside of the stronghold. Chilled by the thought, she shivered noticeably, feeling as if something had just crawled across her skin.
Despite the fact that it was unseemly to show demonstrations of affection in public in Muslim communities, Lucien looked over at her and drew her into the half circle of his arm. “Are you ill, love?” he murmured in Arabic against her indigo silk kufiyya.
She shook her head negatively and turned into him. “No, but walking by that garrison was frightening. Men you know might be inside the dungeons.”
“We should have come in through another gate, but this one was the closest, and I worried that you were tiring.”
“I will be fine now that we have passed it.”
“Passing through the gate and having our travel documents inspected was the hardest part.”
“Omar does good work,” she responded and offered him a smile finally.
“Impeccable, as always.”
The short Arab beside them heard his name and grinned. His taller brother halted. “We will split up here. I will let your contacts know of your arrival.”
Lucien nodded to Nephrim. “Find Farouk Mansur and tell him we will be arriving tomorrow to stay with him for the remainder of our visit here. Be sure to tell him I have brought the lady from the orphanage to see him also. He will understand, as I have already sent him a message by carrier pigeon. I did not give him an exact date of our arrival, so we will be staying at a hostel near the Christian quarter tonight.” Lucien gave the name of the inn to both men, and they nodded.
“We will keep in touch, and you know how to reach us if need be,” Nephrim stated. “Be sure Lady Genna also knows how to reach us.” At the use of her pseudo name, Hazir’s nephews both grinned. “May Allah be with you, Latif.”
Lucien dipped his head and touched a curled finger to his forehead, then to his lips in farewell as the two young men turned to leave.
In the distance a bell sounded, alerting the faithful that the hour of prayer was not far off. Lucien turned back to Gabrielle and urged her to continue their journey through the streets of the city, which were so crowded, people were nearly shoulder to shoulder.
He knew his way through the thoroughfares extremely well, Gabrielle noted, recalling that he had lived here for two years and had returned many times to gather intelligence for the Order. Despite the maze of corridors, lined on both sides by three-story buildings, many of which were pleasingly plastered in pink and white limestone, she felt safe with him at her side. Safe enough to relax and enjoy the sights and sounds of the ancient Oriental city as she followed a step behind him, as was deemed proper.
Above her, flower decked terraces and wrought iron covered windows overlooked the stone paved streets. Occasionally, she could catch a glimpse of the rooftop patios atop some of the buildings. They were adorned with colorful silk draperies and awnings, and giant potted palms that were a splash of green against a sea of beiges and pinks.
Below, the stone paved streets were amazing clean. Compared to most sectors of Jerusalem, Damascus was pleasantly devoid of the normal garbage and debris that littered so many streets.
At one point, they passed the Great Mosque of Damascus. Its porcelain tiled walls were beautiful with their silver, blue, and green designs. The great arch that housed the door to the mosque was splendidly carved and inlaid with gold-etched symbols. Beside it, stood a minbar, where an imam would preach. Behind the blue-domed building, two minarets towered, overlooking the spacious public square in front of the mosque. Soon, the faithful would gather for one of the five daily prayers.
Bathhouses constructed of stone that formed bands of white limestone and dark grey basalt lined the next block. In
these, the faithful could wash before they prayed. There Gabrielle took note of the fact that there were bathhouses for women and men, separately. Every good Muslim knew of their location.
Beyond the Great Mosque was the largest open air market of Damascus. Several blocks away stood the Jewish Quarter of the city. They skirted the market, then the quarter, taking an alternate street to their destination. Gabrielle was a tiny bit disappointed that she had not gotten a glimpse of the fabled market that was reputed to sell whatever in the world one could wish for, though Lucien promised her they would end up going to several of the most patronized markets before they left. The taverns, bathhouses, and markets were some of the best places to gather information, he informed her as he tugged on her hand and brought her up alongside him.
“But today, we are finished traveling. You look exhausted, and I am hungry, so….” he announced, indicating with a pointed hand that they were at their journey’s end. “Here is where we will spend the night.”
They had stopped short of entering the Christian Quarter at an inn which proclaimed itself a haven for good Muslim travelers. It was a pink-plastered, three-story building with a rooftop patio, wrought iron windows, and even a couple of rooms with small balconies off of them. Gabrielle smiled in delight.
They entered through an arched doorway, into a cool tiled foyer that was blessedly free of a tavern. Gabrielle had no wish to eat while being ogled by questionable patrons.
The Muslim behind the high counter was dressed in an immaculately clean white robe and a red turban. He greeted them with warm hospitality and a friendly smile.
Lucien introduced himself and Gabrielle as husband and wife in need of a room for one night. Using the names they had adopted for their disguise, they each signed a ledger, then were greeted by a young boy who had been called to collect their things and their donkey. A small stable in the back was used for travelers’ animals, and Lucien gave the boy a few deniers for his assistance. It was enough to insure the lad’s continued cooperation should they need it.
