Baldwin was not surprised. He said nothing and William continued, saying her nerves seemed ragged, but pregnant women were usually very emotional. “Moreover, it cannot be easy, carrying a child her husband will never get to see.” Pausing to sample some of the stewed eels, he coaxed Baldwin into trying them, too, before resuming.
“Several members of the High Court approached Sybilla last week about the need to find her another husband.” When Baldwin shook his head at that, William nodded in agreement. “I’d advised against it, yet they did not heed me. Sybilla not only balked, she reminded them sharply that our laws allow a widow a year of mourning. She said she is willing to marry again, but not until after her child is born.”
“I can hardly blame her for that.” Baldwin took a mouthful of the stewed eels to humor the archbishop. “I wonder who told her about her legal rights.”
“Joscelin, most likely. He has been very protective of her.” William tried to sound approving, though he was sure that Joscelin was as devoted to a future queen as he was to his niece.
Baldwin harbored the same cynical suspicions, but he supposed it was only natural that Joscelin would see Sybilla as a better investment. He still did not understand why the Almighty had let Guillaume die, a death as devastating to the kingdom as it was to his young wife. He’d made one attempt to discuss it with William, only to discover that even a prince of the Church could not explain the inexplicable.
They were finishing their meal when Agnes entered the chamber after a perfunctory knock. Although her gaze flicked to the uneaten food still on her son’s plate, she refrained from commenting. William rose to give her a package of letters from Joscelin and Sybilla, and because she’d pointedly left the door open, he made ready to depart. Before he could, they heard footsteps in the stairwell and one of Baldwin’s household knights appeared in the doorway, saying a message had just arrived for the king.
Breaking the parchment seal, Baldwin tilted the letter toward the light streaming through the closest window. He alarmed William and Agnes by drawing a sharp breath. But when he looked up, it was with a sun-drenched smile. “The Count of Flanders has arrived at Acre!”
As they exclaimed, he read the rest of the letter and then laughed, the first time they’d heard him laugh in weeks. “I’d about given up hope that he’d ever fulfill his vow. Yet he has even brought a small army with him.” Glancing up at his mother and chancellor, he laughed again. “Mayhap our kingdom’s luck has finally taken a turn for the better.”
* * *
There was great excitement once word spread that Count Philip of Flanders was finally in Outremer. It had been more than two years since he’d taken the cross and many had begun to wonder if he meant to honor it. The news soon spilled over the castle walls into the streets of the city, and by the day’s end the churches and taverns were filled with celebrants.
As the trestle tables set up for the evening meal in the great hall were taken down, William made himself comfortable on the dais. Snatches of conversation floated around him, almost all of them about the arrival of the Count of Flanders and what it would mean. William shared the general optimism, although he was not normally enthusiastic about crusaders, thinking they too often did more harm than good. They were filled with religious zeal but ignorant of the customs and history of the kingdom and too quick to pass judgment upon the Poulains for their willingness to make occasional alliances with the Saracens. They could not understand that the survival of the Holy Land depended upon such alliances, upon the ability of the Franks to pit one Muslim prince against another. And for more than seventy years, it had worked—until Saladin’s rise to power.
William had never seen these foreign, highborn lords as the salvation of his homeland, for they had no intention of staying; they came to fulfill their pledges to God, to visit the sacred sites, to kill as many infidels as possible, and then to go back to their own homelands, sometimes with stolen holy relics. Outremer needed men like Guillaume of Montferrat, men who’d be willing to put down roots. This was why he was so hopeful about the Count of Flanders, for there was a chance that he’d agree to remain for a while, at least until a new husband could be found for Sybilla. His family’s devotion to crusading could not be challenged; his father had made four pilgrimages and his mother had chosen not to return to Flanders after the last one, instead taking vows as a nun at the Bethany convent. Count Philip had also proved himself to be a very competent ruler, intelligent, ruthless, and bold. Of equal importance were his blood ties to the kingdom’s royal family; Amalric and Philip’s mother were the children of Fulk of Anjou, the Angevin count who’d become King of Jerusalem, so Baldwin and Philip were first cousins.
William was soon approached by the Bishop of Bethlehem. Neither Ascalon nor Jaffa had its own bishopric and both cities remained under the authority of Bethlehem, so Bishop Albert had been making frequent trips to Ascalon to visit their ailing king. They’d just begun to exchange pleasantries when they were interrupted by Abū Sulayman Dāwūd and, even before he said a word, William was warned of trouble by the grim expression on the physician’s face.
By the time they reached Baldwin’s bedchamber, William shared the doctor’s concern. As soon as they entered, they saw that the king’s mother was also alarmed, so much so that she was even willing to accept the archbishop as an ally. “Tell him,” she demanded. “Tell him how foolish it would be to attempt a return to Jerusalem on the morrow, how dangerous!”
Baldwin regarded the newcomers with resignation, saying reproachfully to the doctor, “I see you brought in reinforcements.”
“You would not heed me or your lady mother, my liege, so I hoped you might listen to the archbishop.”
Baldwin saw no point in continuing the argument with them and addressed himself to William. “I am not going to ride, will be using a horse litter, and I have promised that we will set a reasonable pace. No one runs races in a horse litter,” he added, showing a flash of impatience.
“Even if you do not ride,” Agnes interrupted, “a journey like that will be exhausting, one you are not ready to make!”
William was not sure his protest would help, for Baldwin seemed to have his mind made up, but he tried. “Your physician says that so much exertion could bring on a relapse of the lung fever. Why take such a risk? Summon the Count of Flanders to Ascalon.”
“I need to get to Jerusalem as soon as possible, William, so I can call the High Court into session.”
“Of course you’ll want to discuss the Count of Flanders’s arrival with them. But why the haste? The Egyptian invasion cannot begin until the Greek fleet arrives.”
“I have more in mind than the Egyptian campaign. I need to meet with the High Court so we can discuss turning the government over to the Count of Flanders.”
William blinked. “You mean . . . offer him the regency?”
“Yes, that is exactly what I mean.”
“Baldwin, no!” Agnes was staring at her son in dismay. “These past two months have been hard, I know, but you must not do anything impulsive. Naming Reynald as regent is understandable, for you need a commander to lead troops into battle whilst you heal. Giving power like that to the Count of Flanders is a much greater risk. Who knows what he’d do with it? Do you truly want to entrust the hunt for Sybilla’s next husband to a stranger?”
“Mother.” Baldwin said no more than that, but there was something in his tone that stopped her words in midflow. “I am not offering the crown to Philip. I do think it is necessary to discuss a regency, though. My illness has shown me I may not have as much time as I hoped. And whilst we look for a suitable husband for Sybilla, how long might that take? At least another year, mayhap two. Think what could befall our kingdom if I die ere that happens.”
“Baldwin, there is no reason why you cannot make a full recovery!”
“My doctor has told me that I am vulnerable to other ailments because of the leprosy. We
cannot know what lies ahead for me. I do know that Outremer would be doomed if a civil war erupted between my sister and my cousin Raymond. I will not let that be my legacy. Philip’s arrival seems like God’s answer to our prayers.”
Agnes was so worried that she appealed again to William for aid in changing Baldwin’s mind. He could not do as she asked, though, for Baldwin’s reasoning was as persuasive as it was unselfish. Time was not on their side.
* * *
Baldwin had never been so exhausted, but he was happier than he’d been in a long time, for as difficult as the trip to Jerusalem had been, it was all worth it. The members of the High Court had agreed that the Count of Flanders should be offered the regency and the command of the Egyptian campaign. If Reynald de Chatillon was angry at being replaced, he kept it to himself, saying that nothing mattered more than defeating Saladin. Philip had been welcomed enthusiastically by the citizens of the Holy City, who’d thronged the streets to cheer him and his men. The royal banquet given in his honor had been an unqualified success and now that it was over, Baldwin could at last yield to his urgent need for sleep.
After he let Anselm assist him in undressing, he climbed gratefully into bed. There he discovered that it was possible to be too excited to sleep, so he began to tell Anselm about the feast, knowing the squire would enjoy that. After he’d described the elaborate menu and the entertainment, Anselm asked him about the man whose future was soon to be inextricably entwined with that of their kingdom.
“I am told he is in his thirty-fifth year. Of all my male cousins, he most resembles me in coloring, although he is stockier than I am, and of course he has a golden beard, that being the fashion in his part of Christendom. French is his native tongue; I do not think he speaks Flemish at all even though half of his subjects do. He chooses his words with care and it is not easy to know what he is thinking. He is like my father in that,” Baldwin added, and agreed when Anselm suggested wine might help him sleep.
“Do you want the draught mixed in it, my lord?”
“No, I should not need it tonight.” Watching as Anselm bustled about the chamber, Baldwin found himself thinking how much his relationship with his squire had changed. At first, he’d been wary, unwilling to reveal too much to this stranger, and Anselm had been reticent, too, awed to be tending to the intimate needs of a king. Over time, though, Baldwin had slowly let down his guard, for he was desperately lonely, missing the friends he’d once had and never able to forget that he’d become an object of fear and revulsion to others.
With Anselm, it was different. He understood what lepers suffered, for he’d witnessed that suffering during his years with the knights of St. Lazarus. But he did not believe leprosy was as contagious as men thought, for otherwise why had he not gotten it, too? Once his initial shyness had ebbed away, he showed himself to be a talker, happy to ramble on for hours about past campaigns and skirmishes with Saracens before he’d joined the order. He’d even revealed why he’d joined it: because a cousin closer than a brother had been stricken with the disease. The cousin was dead. He’d offered no more information, though, and Baldwin had not pried.
As he became more comfortable with Anselm, Baldwin had slowly realized that the squire saw lepers in a way that others did not. William had often discussed the Church’s teachings on that subject, insisting that lepers were blessed by God in that they’d be spared Purgatory, having already endured its punishments here on earth. Baldwin did not find much solace in that, and doubted if William did, either. But to Anselm, theology did not even enter into it. Lepers were accursed with a truly vile disease, yet the leper knights he’d known had faced it bravely and were therefore deserving of respect and admiration. To Baldwin, that was much-needed proof that there were men—however few—who could look past a leper’s ravaged body and see into his unsullied soul.
He’d still been hesitant to trust Anselm with his own private anguish, for pride was his only defense. And then the terrible dreams had begun. Again and again, he’d be torn from sleep, drenched in sweat, his heart thudding like a Saracen war drum, his face streaked with the tears he would not shed during his waking hours. He’d even considered banishing Anselm from his bedchamber at night, shamed to be showing his fear so nakedly. The older man said nothing about these dreams. When they continued, though, he asked for leave to visit friends at the leper hospital run by the knights of St. Lazarus, and that night, he offered Baldwin a cup filled to the brim with a dark red wine that looked almost purple in the lamplight.
“Some of my brothers were prey to bad dreams, too. For those who wanted it, they could take wine mixed with these herbs to aid them in sleeping at night. It seemed to help.” Baldwin had taken the cup, understanding in that moment that Anselm would never reveal one of his secrets, no matter what the temptation or the threats might be.
Anselm had poured a cup of watered-down wine after Baldwin had refused the sleeping draught and carried it over to the bed. “Do you think Count Philip will agree to act as regent, my lord? And if he stays, what of his men? Will they stay, too, after the Egyptian campaign?”
“I hope not,” Baldwin confided. “They are horrified that I am both a king and a leper, which would be unheard of in Flanders. Philip is better mannered, but when he realized that he’d be expected to sit at the royal table during the feast, he looked truly greensick until he saw that I’d not be sharing any common dishes with the other guests.”
Anselm snorted, muttering that foreigners were God’s greatest fools, and Baldwin grinned, for he knew the squire was not saying that out of loyalty. Like many of the Poulains, he truly believed it.
“I think I can sleep now, Anselm, so you may make ready for bed, too.”
Anselm sometimes startled Baldwin with unexpected insights. He was not well educated, yet he’d occasionally shown that he could read other men as easily as William could read Latin and Greek, and he did so now, saying suddenly, “It sounds as if you think the Flemish count should make a good regent. But you do not like him much, do you?”
Baldwin turned to stare at the squire. “Have you ever been accused of having second sight?” he asked, only half joking. “You are right. I do not find Philip very likable, and not just because he disapproves of a leper king. There is a coldness about him that puts me off. When I asked if he wanted to make a trip to the nunnery at Bethany so he could visit his mother’s grave, it was obvious that had not even occurred to him.”
After a moment to reflect, Baldwin smiled. “But what matters is that he is courageous and quick-witted and knows how to wield power. It is not necessary that I like him, too. Hellfire, Anselm, I do not like my cousins Bohemond and Raymond, either!”
CHAPTER 14
August 1177
Jerusalem, Outremer
The High Court session had not begun yet, but the palace great hall was already filling up. The Count of Flanders was to occupy a place of honor on the dais, and several of his highborn companions—the Flemish Advocate of Bethune, his two grown sons, and the English Earl of Essex—had taken the seats set aside for guests. As Balian moved toward the dais, he was not surprised to see Agnes in conversation with Archbishop Eraclius of Caesarea, for she often attended the High Court, much to the dismay of those lords who resented her involvement in matters of state. It was the first time he’d seen Sybilla in attendance, although he was not surprised by her presence, either; it was recognition of her importance to the kingdom now.
She was attracting a lot of attention; the favor of a future queen was an irresistible lure. Balian was sorry to see Baudouin among those gathered around her. He did not want his brother to be hurt and that was sure to happen, for Baudouin sought more than Sybilla’s favor. He wanted to marry her and he’d convinced himself that such a marriage could happen, insisting to Balian that it made more sense to marry Sybilla to a Poulain when time was so urgent. A husband hunt abroad could take years, whereas he could wed her as soon as her baby was born. A
s Lord of Ramlah, he was one of the most important lords in the kingdom, a proven battle commander. Baldwin trusted him. And Sybilla liked him, so why would she not prefer to marry a man she knew rather than risk her future with a stranger?
Balian had stopped protesting once he saw it would accomplish nothing. There was just enough truth in Baudouin’s contentions to give them a patina of plausibility. Baldwin did trust him and he had many friends on the High Court, men who’d be pleased to see Sybilla marry one of their own. As for Sybilla, she did seem to like him; she was laughing now at one of his jokes, gazing at him coquettishly through lowered lashes.
The problem was that Balian could have refuted each and every one of Baudouin’s arguments without even pausing for breath. Baudouin had enemies as well as friends, above all his former sister by marriage. Agnes would never agree to wed her daughter to a man she despised. Nor would Baldwin reject the chance for a marital alliance with a highborn foreign lord, one that would benefit their kingdom diplomatically and militarily. And whilst Sybilla might be rash enough to marry for love—Balian did not have the greatest confidence in her judgment—he doubted that she harbored such feelings for his brother. She enjoyed flirting and might not have realized that she was giving him false hopes, but Balian thought it unlikely that she’d seriously considered Baudouin as her next husband. To make matters worse, as eager as Baudouin was to marry a queen, he liked the idea of bedding Sybilla, too, and that would make him all the more vulnerable when the inevitable disappointment occurred.
A sudden stir indicated that Baldwin had arrived and men hurried to take their seats. Balian was startled by the sight of the man accompanying the king and Count of Flanders, for Bohemond, Prince of Antioch, was not a member of the High Court and rarely paid visits to Jerusalem. Like his cousin, Count Raymond, he was in his mid-thirties, sharing the same dark coloring and lean build, their resemblance so pronounced that strangers sometimes guessed them to be brothers. But Raymond was known for his rectitude, deliberation, and self-control, whereas the stories Balian had heard of Bohemond indicated he had a very different temperament; he was said to be quick-tempered, impulsive, and too fond of the pleasures of the flesh.
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