00 - Templar's Acre

by Michael Jecks

  There was a catapult still on the castle’s tower behind St Anthony’s Gate, and this kept up a regular barrage against the foe. One lucky shot slammed into an approaching tower, and shattered it to tinder, the men inside hurled outside, shreds of skin thrown in all directions, but one good hit could not detract from the overwhelming force to which the city was now exposed.

  Baldwin watched as they reached nearer and nearer. ‘They’ll not get here tonight,’ he said.

  ‘No. It’ll be an attack in the morning, I reckon,’ Hob answered. ‘They will want their towers in position, ready.’

  Baldwin nodded. ‘See to it that the men get their food ration tonight. They’ll need it. And plenty of wine, too. To fight like lions, they’ll need to have fed and drunk and slept.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Hob?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘You get some sleep too.’

  ‘What of you?’

  Baldwin looked out. ‘I’ll keep the first watch.’

  This was the day that would decide the fate of the city, Baldwin thought. The drums started as dawn threw a salmon-pink glow over the plain. Shouts could be heard, and then, while Baldwin blearily stared out over the flat lands before the city, he saw the Muslim army standing to. A massive, long line of men separated into cohorts, the sun sparkling on each wicked spear-point. As he watched, he heard the muezzins calling them to prayer, and the whole line sank to the ground, performing their obeisance, the ritual given a solemn significance on this day of all days.

  Glancing at the men standing along the walls, Baldwin saw they were all, like him, tired out. But their eyes gleamed with an unnatural fire at the sight of their enemy. And then there was a shout from one side of the wall, over towards the Temple’s ward, and the blast of a horn. Looking up at the wall behind him, Baldwin saw that Sir Otto was on the Accursed Tower, that which stood in the very point of the inner wall. The knight drew his sword and lifted it high, so that it caught the light from the sun, and Baldwin clearly heard his voice cry out: ‘Courage, my friends! You are Christian! We fight for God, for Jesus, and His saints! Be brave!’

  Baldwin’s heart was comforted by Sir Otto’s words. He turned to face the hordes with a renewed determination.

  ‘He doesn’t have to face ’em from this close,’ a man grumbled from along the line.

  Hob shouted, ‘Shut up there! By Christ’s bones, I’ll have your arse in gaol if I hear another word.

  Baldwin grinned to himself. There was no silencing an English peasant, crusader or not. The English fought because they believed in something, not because of foolish heroics.

  ‘I’ll be dead before you can get me there, Hob. You too, most like,’ the man retaliated.

  Today, they would fight for what? he wondered. For Outremer? For their lords here in the city? For business and trade? No, for none of those.

  ‘You can say what you want about Sir Otto,’ he told his men, ‘but he’s right. We’re here to protect our souls, not the city. We’re here because this is God’s last city in His Holy Land. Don’t forget that. If we fail, God fails. We fight for your souls, and those of your families.’

  The hecklers were silenced, but whether it was Baldwin’s brief speech or the sight of the enemy facing them, Baldwin didn’t know or care. He too was staring back at the Muslims, and now he heard a scream bellowed from their ranks. There was a deafening roar from all the men, and the Muslims began to march.

  Behind them, Baldwin saw the long arms of the catapults rise lazily, and their missiles rose yet again as the enemy broke into a run.

  ‘Archers! Loose!’

  From behind Baldwin, the ranks of archers on the walls let fly their arrows. Over the cacophony of stamping feet, shouting, rocks crashing into the walls, Baldwin could hear them hissing through the sky, two thousand at a time. As soon as the first flight was gone, the second was off, and he could see the Muslims falling before their terrible impact, but there were not enough arrows in the city to stop this army.

  A crunch.

  Baldwin felt his teeth slam together. There was an emptiness in his belly, and he looked about him, dazed. He was on his back, and Hob was beside him, shaking his head, a great rivulet of blood running from a gash in his brow, while Nicholas Hunfrey sat back at the wall, staring at his stomach. His trunk had been opened from his groin to his breast, and he had his hands clamped there, trying to hold himself together.

  There was a vast gap in the battlements a yard away. A rock had exploded into it, tearing it apart and flinging slabs and splinters of masonry into the men behind. Baldwin could see broken and bloody bodies lying scattered. His eye took in their faces, and he recognised many as the men from his vintaine. Only he, Hob, and Thomas remained whole. The rest were dying – or dead. The remains of another vintaine was nearby, their sergeant dead.

  Baldwin gradually became aware of sounds once more, but his legs were like jelly.

  Men came to help them, but Nicholas refused to be moved. He whimpered and moaned, but wouldn’t rise. There were drums, booming away in the distance, screams and roars, and then Baldwin saw a ladder at the wall where the hole had formed. Enemy soldiers began to appear. An arrow took the first, and then Hob was up, his sword snapped a foot from the hilt, and hacking at the men trying to force their way up. Another man joined him, and then Baldwin saw Nicholas, with an axe, hack at the foot of another Muslim. More men, and Baldwin climbed to his feet, and picked up his sword. It was bent, and he stared at it uncomprehendingly for a moment, before joining Hob.

  Below the wall, the ground was black with Muslims. It was almost impossible to see the sand between them, there were so many. Ladders kept being slammed against the wall, and now and again a grapnel hook was thrown. One caught a defender, and as the rope was pulled, the barb pinned him against the wall, his flesh ripped apart by that cruel hook while he shrieked.

  The Muslims were on the wall further to the right, near the German Order, but even as Baldwin glanced that way, they were hurled back by a rush from the knights. To the left of the ruined tower, he saw more running up ladders, and there was the sound of axes on the door holding them in. He wanted to reinforce it, but even as he had the idea, the first blows to penetrate the timbers began to show. They couldn’t hold this section any more. He bellowed at Hob and the others, and even as he rammed his sword into the face of a man appearing up the ladder again, he saw an axe flash at Thomas, and Thomas’s eyes widened as he slumped back, his breast gaping.

  ‘Back!’ Baldwin bellowed at the other troops, pulling Hob towards the Tower of St Nicholas. ‘Back, all of you!’

  It was stamp and slash the whole way. As they relinquished their section of wall, more and more Muslims appeared on the walkway, screaming in delight at their success, while Baldwin and Hob hacked and dodged, parried and stabbed, all the way to the Tower. There, at last, they managed to dart in and slam the door shut, a pair of bars dropped into place to hold it.

  Hob was panting, his face a reddened mask. The gash had opened his brow to the bone. Inside the tower, there were few who were unharmed. A sudden crash announced the arrival of Muslims with a ram.

  ‘Supports!’ Baldwin yelled, and baulks of timber were brought up and jammed against the door.

  The men leaned against them, and with each splintering thrust of the ram, felt themselves jerked in sympathy with the door, but somehow it was holding.

  Baldwin prayed it would continue to do so.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR

  Edgar and Ivo were at the ruins of the English Tower when they saw King Henry’s taken. Suddenly the enemy were everywhere on the walls, and Ivo took a bow from a man nearby and began to loose his own arrows, taking careful aim and wasting not a shot. More bowmen from the inner walls were plying their trade, too, and the Muslims who reached the walls paid for it.

  Alas! It was not only that section of wall that was in danger. When Ivo felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to look the other way, he saw that an all-out assault was being la
unched on the gate. Where the Tower of the Countess de Blois had stood, now the Muslims were clambering up the rubble and beginning to attack the gatehouse itself. More and more men were scaling the walls, helped by their towers and more ladders, and the defenders were hard-pressed.

  So this, Ivo thought, was how Tripoli fell at last.

  ‘We should leave,’ Edgar said calmly.

  Ivo shot him a look. ‘Get a move on!’ he bellowed, wondering whether this Edgar could ever show alarm. He always seemed so collected.

  They reached the inner walls just in time to escape being trapped by a second party of Muslims who had managed to come around behind them. That was when Edgar and Ivo realised that Baldwin and his men were still in the tower.

  Baldwin and Hob went together to the roof. There had been a catapult here, and its ravaged timbers lay broken beneath the rock that had demolished it. Peering over the wall, they saw a group of eight Muslims with a heavy timber, running along the walkway and ramming it into the door. They could feel the collision through their feet.

  ‘Help me,’ Baldwin snarled, turning to the catapult. In amongst its remains were the pieces of masonry which it had used as missiles. Now, the two began to roll one of the heavy lumps of stone towards the edge of the tower. With a heave, they managed to lift it to the battlement, and rested it there. The Muslims had retreated, and now they came on again, pelting over the walkway and onto the timbers of the entranceway to the tower. As they did so, Baldwin and Hob thrust at their rock. It fell, and Baldwin heard the screams and cries as it struck the men below, but then there was a terrible cracking sound, and when they peered over, they saw that the rock had crashed through the timbers of the drawbridge to the tower. There was little chance now that the enemy would break into their tower.

  Baldwin flinched as an arrow pinged off the stone near his head, and stared down into the gap between the two lines of wall. ‘Hob, we have to retreat. They’re in behind us.’

  Hob scratched his ear. ‘I think we’re too late.’

  ‘Perhaps so,’ Baldwin agreed. He cast an eye about him. Thousands of their enemy stood bunched up before them on the plains, and there was a thin sprinkling behind them. He looked up at the inner walls, and saw Sir Otto high on his tower, but then there was a bellow from the Tower of the Legate, and he saw a party of Christians making a sortie from the Tower’s gates.

  ‘Quickly!’ he shouted, running down the ladder to the main chamber in the tower. ‘We can make it to the inner line.’

  Hob scowled. ‘If we do, we lose all the outer walls. Shouldn’t we remain here and contest every section?’

  ‘If we do, we’ll die. We can’t hold them off. All they need do is keep battering us with their catapults, and we’ll be buried in the towers. Better that we go now, and can join in the last fights.’

  ‘Aye. Very well, Vintenary.’

  There was shouting outside now. Baldwin went to the door that led out towards the Legate’s Tower. Sliding open the bar, and drawing the bolts, he peered out cautiously. There were only Christians here. He pushed the door wide and bellowed at the men to evacuate the tower. There were steps further along, and he pushed and cajoled his men along the wall towards them. As he went, a ladder appeared at the parapet, and he thrust with his sword at the man who appeared. It was satisfying to hear his howl of pain as he slid down again.

  The stairs were clear, and they ran down them, heedless of the risks of falling. At the bottom, Baldwin took a quick look about him. There were small groups of Muslims fighting with members of the city’s guard further along, and he ran at them, Hob in his wake. The sight of so many reinforcements was enough to persuade the first group to flee, and the Christians joined Baldwin and his men, rushing to support the next group, but in a moment it was clear that they would be stranded if they remained. Baldwin heard a shout from the wall above, and saw Edgar high overhead.

  ‘I think you’ll find a postern-gate down here,’ Edgar called, jabbing a finger down below him. ‘It would be sensible to use it.’

  Baldwin took a quick look behind him at the growing number of Muslims, and bawled to Hob and the others to follow him. They pulled back, arrows from the walls covering their retreat, and when the last of them slipped in, Baldwin himself followed. He shoved the three bolts across, then dragged the bar across and stepped out of the way as men ran up with timbers and propped them against it. No one would get through there in a hurry, hopefully.

  ‘Master Baldwin, I think your men would be appreciated at the gatehouse,’ Edgar said.

  Ivo was already inside the second line of walls when the assault began in earnest.

  Until now, the enemy had concentrated their efforts on winning the towers and the remains of the wall at the outer ring, but now they brought up a ram and more men to attempt the gates. Two tall storming towers were rolled laboriously over the rough ground, their high platforms full of archers, who rained a storm of arrows on the poor fellows who stood at the gatehouse itself. More arrows plunged into the enemy towers themselves from two sides, and for a time it seemed as though the men on them must all die, but such hopes were short-lived. The attackers reached the gate, the drawbridge fell, and once inside, the enemy rushed, shrieking their unholy war cries, into the groups of defenders.

  Ivo saw the black-clad hordes overwhelm the men, and the spirited defence was gradually silenced. The Muslims had the outer gates, and their men opened them to the army outside. Soon, like a plague of locusts, the warriors gained the space between the walls.

  Ivo stared down at the men in the gap, but then he saw that more men were approaching the gate, and these had a ram with them. They ran it at the gates, heedless of the arrows and rocks that rained upon them, berserk in their desire to be first to break into the city. He wanted to go and join the men on the gatehouse, but he could see that already there was little enough space for the men who were there.

  As he watched, the cat was brought into the space between the inner and outer defences, and drawn over the heads of those at the ram. Arrows served no purpose now, but the heavier rocks did smash their way through the thick wooden roofing beneath the skins. A few tried fire arrows, hoping that the skins would have dried out by now, but they made little impression. The thunderous clamour of the men yelling inside the cat rose like the screeching and yabbering of demons, and the noise was enough to make Ivo’s heart quail. He glanced about him at the remains of his command, and saw too many men with faces drawn and petrified. It was enough to unman the noblest and bravest.

  A shout, and a cracking – and he realised that the gates were beginning to break already. Madness! They should have lasted much longer!

  If he was to die, Ivo decided, he would die with a sword in his hands, bellowing his defiance at his enemies. He would not go meekly into death. His poor Rachel deserved better. He had a sudden memory of her smiling at him, their son beside her, and the vision was like a dagger in his heart.

  ‘To me! To me, my vintaine!’ he roared, and ran for the ladder. He and his men would guard that gate until none was left standing. He ran along the road, until he was outside the gateway, and here he found many of the city folk, all prepared with their lances under their arms and butted against the paving, staring at the gate as it moved and creaked under the onslaught.

  ‘Here! To me!’ he shouted again, and found that Edgar and Baldwin were already with him. ‘How did you get here?’ he demanded, but before they could answer, there was a crash from the gates, and the ram pierced the timbers.

  Ivo leaped forward as the ram was withdrawn, but it was clear that the men could not hold the gates. Their enemy was too powerful. Looking about him, he saw the last remains of the timbers Baldwin had stored there all those weeks before. ‘Baldwin, Edgar! Fetch those timbers, get logs, carts, anything, to barricade this area. They’ll break the gates now, so we need a new line of defence!’ he roared.

  As the ram was withdrawn, bolts and arrows flew in. Archers fired back. The screams of the injured rose to Heaven,
but there was no diminution in the attack, and then the first men began to hack at the hole in the gates, axes flashing wildly.

  Ivo stared, appalled, but could do nothing to stop them. He felt pathetic, old and useless. And then he heard a joyous sound that would remain with him for the rest of his days. The brilliant, clear calls of military command, and when he glanced over his shoulder, he saw the gallant figure of Marshal Matthew de Clermont from the Hospital, and the Grand Master of the Temple, Guillaume de Beaujeu.

  Guillaume saw Ivo and smiled broadly. ‘All those horses you bought, and never time to use ’em, eh?’ he called, and then there was another order, and the knights with him and the Marshal drew into ranks. They marched before the citizens, and planted their own lances firmly, while Guillaume de Beaujeu stood with the Marshal, Hospitallers and Templars together.

  At the sound of a crack from the gate, de Beaujeu snapped a command. Two Templar sergeants ran forward with spears, and shoved them through the gap. A shriek came from the other side, and the two bellowed back. Instantly, as they stood aside, two archers fired into the gap again, but as soon as they did so, a flurry of arrows flew through, and one of the archers was struck and fell.

  The Marshal of the Hospital muttered under his breath. Ivo heard another creaking, groaning complaint from the timbers.

  ‘More supports!’ he called, and to his relief, he saw that the makeshift barricades were rising steadily behind him, as more lumber was brought to shore up the gates. Men were hurrying all over, ignoring the dangers of arrows from the other side of the gates, but then there came screams and cries from over the gates as the guards were attacked by more Muslims.