by Hight, Jack
‘Return to what? The lord I had served, Reynald, betrayed me at Damascus. It was because of him that I was captured. And the Frankish soldiers I had fought beside were brutes. Yusuf was different. He was cultured and kind. He was my friend.’
‘So when you were captured at Butaiha, you were fighting for this Yusuf. He was your lord?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then I will argue that you merely did your duty as a liegeman.’
John’s forehead creased as he thought of the men who had died at his hands. ‘But I broke my crusader’s oath. I killed Franks, more than one. I deserve to die.’
‘We have all fallen short of the glory of God, John, but death will not wash away your sins. You can only redeem your soul through action.’
‘How?’ John demanded bitterly. ‘It is not only Franks that I killed.’ He paused, thinking back to his home in England, to the manor of his childhood. ‘I killed my brother.’
‘Surely you had a reason?’
‘He betrayed my father to the Normans in return for land. My father was hanged, along with a dozen other local thanes.’ John shook his head. The reasons seemed almost unreal now, so long had it been since John saw England. Yet the reality of his brother’s death was always fresh in his mind. ‘He was a bastard, but he was my brother. I killed him, and nothing I can do will bring him back. It will not bring any of them back.’
‘No, but you can save others. God has sent you to us for a reason. You have lived in both worlds, East and West. You have spent years at the court in Aleppo. You can speak to the Saracens as we cannot, understand them as we cannot. You can help to bridge the gap that divides us. That is your one true chance at salvation.’
‘And if I die? Will the fire not wash me clean, as Heraclius says?’
‘Look into your soul. Do you believe that suffering will save you?’
John thought back on his years in the Holy Land: the brutal march to Damascus; his capture and near death; the beatings he had suffered as a slave; his torture at the hands of Heraclius. None of it had washed away his guilt. He met William’s eyes. ‘Show me what I must do.’
‘First we must get you through this trial. You have but to answer truthfully any questions that are asked of you.’
‘What are my chances?’
‘God does not deal in chance. We must trust in Him. I will come for you tomorrow, when it is time.’ William turned to leave.
‘You did not answer my question, Father,’ John called after him. ‘What are my chances?’
William looked back and shook his head. ‘Not good. Heraclius has stacked the court against you. And the punishment for treason is death.’
The bells of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre were ringing to call the canons to morning prayers as John hobbled after William into the audience chamber where the High Court was meeting. He was barefoot, and the thick rugs that carpeted the floor were a blessed relief to his blistered feet after the hard stone pavement of the courtyard. The members of the court waited on the far side of the room. King Amalric sat on a simple wooden throne, the dome of the church visible through the window behind him. He was young, perhaps John’s age, but whereas John was lean and fit, the king was heavy-set, pudgy even. He had a ruddy complexion, straight hair the colour of straw and a slightly darker beard. His piercing blue eyes met John’s across the hall, and the King laughed suddenly, a clipped laugh that sounded loud against the silence of the hall. With a start John realized that he had met him before. When he first arrived in the Holy Land, John had attended a meeting of the High Court, and Amalric – only a child at the time – had been there. John had never forgotten that peculiar boy with his clear blue eyes and strange laugh. Now Amalric was king.
Two men framed the throne, and Heraclius sat beside two others on one of the benches that ran along the side walls. A single man sat on the bench opposite them. ‘This is the High Court?’ John whispered to William. ‘The last time I attended there were hundreds of men.’
‘Only four are needed for a quorum.’ William gestured to John’s right, where a dour, bony man dressed in gold-embroidered robes sat beside Heraclius. ‘That is the Patriarch of Jerusalem. He is the one who turned you over to be tortured.’ Next to the patriarch was a dark-haired man with a thick beard and unruly eyebrows that met in the middle. Over his mail armour he wore a black surcoat bearing the Knights Hospitallers’ distinctive cross: four white arrowheads, all touching at the tips. ‘Gilbert d’Assailly is Grand Master of the Hospitallers. He is an Englishman like you, but don’t expect any mercy from that quarter. He hates the Saracens with a passion. I have more hope for that man there.’ William pointed to the opposite side of the hall where a man with steel-grey hair sat straight-backed, wearing a white surcoat emblazoned with a red cross. ‘Bertrand de Blanchefort is Grand Master of the Knights Templar, and he is a man of reason. As for the King, his constable Humphrey and the seneschal Guy’ – he waved to the two stern, middle-aged men flanking the throne – ‘I do not know where they stand.’
They stopped a dozen feet from the throne, and John and William both knelt. ‘Rise,’ Guy commanded in a harsh voice. Judging from his olive skin and slight build, John guessed he had Saracen blood in him. As seneschal, it was Guy’s duty to preside over the court. ‘Present yourselves.’
‘I am Iain of Tatewic, called John.’
‘Silence!’ the seneschal snapped. ‘You have been accused of oath breaking. You are not to speak before this court.’
John opened his mouth to reply, but William shot him a warning look. ‘I am William of Tyre. I will speak for the accused.’
‘Very well.’ The seneschal nodded towards Heraclius. ‘The accuser will present his case.’
Heraclius rose, bowed to King Amalric and then stepped to the centre of the hall. He cleared his throat. ‘This Saxon, John of Tatewic, has betrayed his crusader’s oath, betrayed his faith and betrayed the Kingdom. He served the Saracens of his own free will. By his own admission, he fought with them at Banyas and Butaiha, killing dozens of his fellow Christians. He has committed treason against the Kingdom and sacrilege against the Holy Church.’ He paused to look each judge in the eye. ‘For justice and for the salvation of his soul, he must die for his crimes.’ Heraclius bowed again and returned to his seat.
The seneschal looked to William. ‘What does the accused say to these charges?’
‘He pleads innocent to treason and sacrilege.’
The seneschal looked to Heraclius. ‘I understand you have a witness?’ Heraclius nodded. Guy raised his voice to address the armed men at the far end of the hall. ‘Guards! Bring the witness.’ A guard stepped out and returned a moment later with a short man in a loose-fitting burnoose. He had close-set eyes and a turned-up nose that gave him a piggish appearance. A gruesome gash ran along the left side of his face from his hairline to his jaw. The wound was recent, still angry and red, oozing blood near his temple. The man passed John and bowed before the throne. ‘Present yourself,’ the seneschal ordered him.
‘I am Harold, a sergeant and vassal of the King.’ Sergeants were Frankish warriors who, in return for title to their lands in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, served as foot-soldiers in the armies of their lord.
‘Do you swear by God that you will speak the truth?’ the seneschal asked.
‘Aye, I do.’
The seneschal nodded. ‘Heraclius, you may question the witness.’
Harold did not wait to be questioned. He pointed at John. ‘That whoreson killed my brother! And he did this to me.’ Harold touched the wound on his face.
‘Where was this?’ Heraclius asked.
‘Butaiha. We had routed the Saracens. My men were mopping up, taking captives for ransom, when he arrived on horseback like some demon out of hell. He rode into a company of over one hundred men to rescue a Saracen lord. They killed seven of us, and the two of them rode out again unscathed. I have never seen the like. He is a man possessed, a demon in human flesh.’
‘A man possessed,’
Heraclius repeated. ‘A demon who kills his own. Let us consign this demon to the fires from which he sprang!’
John noticed that the patriarch and Gilbert the Hospitaller were both nodding their heads in approval. King Amalric was listening carefully, but his expression remained neutral. William addressed the King. ‘John is no demon, sire. He is a warrior who fought in defence of himself and of the lord to whom he had sworn allegiance. His honour was at stake.’
Heraclius shook his head. ‘It was not honour that led him to kill his fellow Christians, but his depravity. What are the Saracens but the hand of Satan made manifest in this world? When the Saxon killed for his Saracen master, who was he killing for?’
‘He fought for his lord, nothing more,’ William insisted. ‘How many of you here have killed your fellow Christians in France or England? Gilbert and Bertrand, you have faced one another in battle. There was nothing heretical about that.’
‘Yes, but I was not under a crusader’s oath,’ Gilbert replied. ‘I had not sworn to fight only the Saracens and to aid my fellow Christians.’
‘John’s crusade was long over,’ William replied. ‘It ended at Damascus when our army was routed and he was captured fighting for Christ. Now, at long last he has returned to the fold. Let us welcome him back. He has suffered enough.’
‘He has not!’ Heraclius shouted. ‘His soul is at stake. Only fire can purify it!’
William’s nose wrinkled in disgust. ‘Torturing this man further will only stain your black soul, Heraclius. It will not save John.’
There was a moment of silence, and then the constable Humphrey stood. He was barrel-chested and had a handsome, broad face. ‘This court is not fit to decide the fate of this man’s soul,’ he said, his voice low and rasping, like the sound of steel on a whetstone. ‘That is a matter for the Church. We are here because the safety of the Kingdom is at stake. I fear that if we let this Saxon live, more men will join the enemy. We all know of the Saracens’ wealth. If there are no consequences for betraying the Kingdom, what will stop them from buying the allegiance of our sergeants? We will find our own people turned against us.’
‘Hear, hear!’ Gilbert agreed.
‘But John did not join the Saracens of his free will,’ William pointed out. ‘He was captured and enslaved.’
Humphrey shook his head. ‘He still chose to fight for them.’
‘He chose to serve his lord, who was a Saracen. John is a man of honour: he could not do otherwise.’
‘I too am a man of honour,’ said the grey-haired Templar, Bertrand. ‘If this man fought in the service of the lord to whom he was bound, then I am inclined to be lenient.’ Bertrand turned to John. ‘Tell me truly, John: why did you fight our men?’
‘I owed my life to Yusuf. I fought to repay that debt.’
‘And if you had it to do again?’
‘I would do the same.’
Bertrand looked to Amalric. ‘I cannot fault him for that. If John will swear an oath to never again take up arms against the Kingdom, then I say we pardon him.’
‘An oath? I do not trust the word of this Saxon,’ the Hospitaller Gilbert protested.
John spoke quietly. ‘I am a man of my word.’
Gilbert snorted. ‘You have already betrayed us once. If we free you, how long will it be before you betray us again?’
‘I am no traitor! It was Reynald who betrayed me in Damascus and left me to die.’
‘Prince Reynald?’ the seneschal demanded. ‘The former ruler of Antioch?’
John nodded.
‘You see!’ Gilbert declared. ‘He besmirches the honour of a brave man in order to save himself. How can we trust this deceiver?’
John’s hands balled into fists. He took a step towards Gilbert.
‘Do you wish to strike me, Saxon?’ the Hospitaller sneered. ‘Come. You need to be taught a lesson.’
‘That is enough, Gilbert!’ Amalric’s voice was sharply authoritative. ‘I have heard enough.’ He looked to Heraclius. ‘Do you have anything to add?’ The priest shook his head. ‘William?’
‘I ask only for lenience. If John has done wrong, let him earn his forgiveness in service to the Kingdom.’
Amalric nodded to the seneschal Guy, who addressed them in a loud voice. ‘The accused can only be found guilty by a clear majority – four or more votes. If guilty, John shall suffer the fate of a traitor. He will be crucified and hung from the Jaffa Gate for one week. At the end of that time, his body shall be burned.’ The seneschal paused to allow his words to sink in. ‘Patriarch, what is your verdict?’
The patriarch stood stiffly. ‘Guilty.’
Gilbert rose next. ‘Guilty.’
‘And you, Bertrand?’ the seneschal asked.
‘Not guilty!’ the grand master of the Templars declared firmly.
The seneschal looked to Humphrey. ‘Guilty,’ the constable said gravely. John felt his mouth go dry. That was three guilty verdicts. He held his breath as the seneschal cleared his throat.
‘I pronounce him not guilty,’ Guy said. ‘King Amalric will cast the deciding vote.’
John met Amalric’s blue eyes. The king hesitated for a moment before looking away. ‘Guilty.’
John felt suddenly faint, and William held his arm to steady him. John stood with his head bowed as the seneschal delivered the verdict. ‘John of Tatewic, you have been pronounced guilty of treason. Tomorrow, you will be crucified before the Jaffa Gate.’
The guards came forward and took hold of John’s arms. They began to escort him from the room.
‘Wait!’ William called. He went to John and spoke in a low voice. ‘There is a way to save yourself. You can challenge the judgement. Fight to prove your innocence.’
‘Fight? I can barely stand.’
‘God favours the innocent, John.’
‘God does not play favourites,’ John muttered. But if he were to die, he would rather do so with a sword in hand. He raised his voice. ‘I challenge the judgement. I will fight those who think me guilty.’
The judges turned to look at him wide-eyed. ‘But this is ridiculous!’ Heraclius sputtered. ‘The court has decided.’
‘Our laws grant him the right to challenge those who condemned him,’ the seneschal declared. ‘But to prove his innocence, he must defeat all four of them – or their chosen champions – in a single day.’ He looked to John. ‘Are you certain?’
‘Yes.’
‘Very well. We will meet in the courtyard at noon tomorrow, and John of Tatewic will fight to prove his innocence.’
John stood in the palace courtyard and looked up at the dome of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Its top had disappeared into the fine, misting rain that beaded on John’s mail armour. He felt William’s hand on his shoulder. ‘It is almost time,’ the priest said. John nodded and lowered his gaze to the courtyard. The stones that paved it were slick with moisture. That would work to John’s disadvantage. His feet were a mess of torn skin and burst blisters; he had almost fainted from the pain when he pulled on his boots. The slick footing would further limit his mobility.
Across the courtyard, King Amalric, Gilbert and Humphrey stood in their mail. The seneschal was there too, along with Heraclius and the patriarch, who had brought a champion to fight for him – Harold, the man with the long gash on his face. The men drew straws to see who would fight first, and the sergeant Harold selected the shortest straw. He grinned and looked to John. ‘Now you will pay for what you did to my brother.’
John did not reply. He exaggerated his limp as he walked to the centre of the courtyard. Anything he could do to make Harold over-confident would help. It was the only advantage that John had.
William handed John a three-foot sword with a grip of worn leather and a wide blade of dark-grey steel. John slashed it side to side, testing its balance. The priest offered John a shield. John tried to lift it, but a blinding pain tore through his shoulder. ‘’Sblood,’ he growled and dropped the shield. ‘It’s no use. Find something to bind
my arm to my body. I don’t want it getting in my way.’ William untied the cord about his waist and looped it around John, cinching it tight to pin John’s left arm to his torso. ‘My helmet,’ John said.
William slid the open-faced, iron helmet over John’s head. John turned to face Harold. The sergeant was a squat, thick-necked man. He, too, had opted to fight without a shield. He held his sword with both hands.
The seneschal stepped between the combatants. ‘The swords have been dulled to prevent serious injury. You will fight until one of you yields or cannot continue.’ He stepped out of the ring. ‘Touch swords and begin.’
John turned sideways to protect his vulnerable left side. They touched swords, and Harold attacked immediately, charging and hacking down with a mighty, two-handed blow. John parried and stepped to the side and knelt, raking his sword left to right and catching Harold in the shins. With a cry of pain the sergeant fell forward, losing his sword and landing hard on the stone pavement. As Harold rolled on to his back, John knelt on top of him, slamming his knee into the man’s chest. He pressed the edge of his sword against Harold’s neck. ‘Yield!’ Harold spat in John’s face. John smashed his sword’s hilt into the sergeant’s face, splitting his lip. He hit Harold again, spattering the stones of the courtyard with blood.
‘Enough! Enough!’ Amalric roared. ‘John is the victor.’
John used his sword to push himself up, wincing at the pain in his feet. He hobbled towards William, who was staring at him wide-eyed. ‘God is surely with you, John!’
‘God had nothing to do with it. Harold was angry and over-confident. That won’t happen twice.’
Across the courtyard, Harold had been dragged to the side, and now sat cradling his face in his hands. The other men were again choosing straws. The constable, Humphrey, held up the short one. Without a word he pulled on his helmet and picked up the sword that Harold had dropped. Humphrey was about John’s height and size, but a few years older.
‘Careful of this one,’ William warned. ‘The constable commands the King’s armies. He is a formidable warrior.’
John faced off across from Humphrey. The two men touched swords, and Humphrey began to circle around the edge of the ring, forcing John to turn in order to keep his opponent in front of him. Each step brought a sharp pain in John’s feet. Humphrey kept circling, refusing to close. ‘Come on, you bastard,’ John growled under his breath.
