Envoy of Jerusalem

by Helena P. Schrader

  His face impassive, he dismounted from his young bay palfrey and surrendered the reins to Georgios, whom he ordered to stay with the horses while he followed his escort into his brother’s expropriated home. At least the fact that Salah ad-Din was using it meant that it had not been subject to wanton destruction, as with some of the other buildings. The architectural substance appeared fundamentally intact. The marble-paved entry hall was gleaming as if freshly washed down, as were the stairs leading up to the main living quarters. In the courtyard the fountain gurgled as happily as ever, while the potted palms had survived defeat and conquest without harm, Balian reflected morosely. The escort indicated that Ibelin should follow him up the stairs, and with an inward sigh he did.

  At the top of the stairs was a long hallway paved with glazed tiles. Once it had been lined with carved trunks containing his brother’s household goods. Now it was lined with Mamlukes, sentries guarding access to the Sultan. Ibelin was led between the sentries toward his brother’s chamber, remembering that horrible day after Barry’s son had died and he’d locked himself in his chamber with the corpse in a fit of grief. The anteroom to his brother’s chamber was, however, no longer easily recognizable. Frankish chairs and tables had been replaced with rugs, cushions, and low tables. Ibelin was told to wait while his escort whispered to the Mamluke guarding the inner chamber and then withdrew.

  The Mamluke rapped on the door in what appeared to be a signal and then resumed his immobile stance, leaving Balian feeling like an awkward intruder. He wondered if the Sultan knew that making him wait here was sheer torture. How could he forget that in this house his brother, crazed with grief, had predicted: The forces of evil are on the move. They are gathering their troops and sharpening their weapons, and Christ is a powerless man of peace while the gods of war are about to devour us alive. Balian had not wanted to believe him, but now he stood in his brother’s house and the Sultan of Damascus was occupying his brother’s bedroom.

  Finally the door opened, and a completely veiled woman scuttled out of the room and started down the corridor with her head down and eyes averted. Was it to avoid even the slightest eye contact with a Polythiest? Or was it from shame, because she had been raised to see herself as the embodiment of man’s baser instincts, a less worthy soul than all males even in the eyes of God? The sultan emerged, drying his hands on a linen towel, and Balian smiled cynically, thinking how inconvenient Frankish architecture was the maintenance of a harem.

  “My dear Balian Ibn Barzan,” the Sultan greeted Ibelin with a smile, “please.” With a gesture he indicated cushions beside a beautifully carved table inlaid with ivory. “You will appreciate that since it is Ramadan I cannot join you, but I’ll have sherbet and refreshments brought for you at once.” He snapped his fingers, and a young boy jumped up from a wooden stool in the corner by the door to do his bidding.

  The boy was gone too fast for Balian to get a good look at him, but his skin tone had been fair. Balian’s stomach wrenched at the realization that he might be one of the many Frankish children who had ended in slavery.

  Unaware of what was going on in Ibelin’s mind, Salah ad-Din remarked in a pleasant tone, “You are looking much better than the last time we met.”

  “I should hope so,” Ibelin retorted, trying to force levity into his voice; “last time we met I’d been fighting off assaults by your troops for nine days.”

  The Sultan laughed lightly. “Indeed, but it did you no serious harm, as we see. I seem to find you every place I attack: Tyre, Acre, Arsuf.”

  “I surrendered Jerusalem; I did not promise not to take up arms against you again,” Ibelin reminded the Saracen leader evenly. Balian had nothing to reproach himself with—and if he incidentally disparaged Guy de Lusignan with his words, so much the better.

  “Indeed, and I left you your arms.” The Sultan indicated with an elegant gesture the sword at Balian’s hip, its prominent enamel pommel bearing the arms of Jerusalem on one side and the arms of Ibelin on the other. “But given your unwavering hostility, I was very surprised to hear you had requested an audience.”

  “It is a very poor general who does not attempt to achieve by other means what will cost him a great deal of blood to achieve by force of arms.”

  Salah ad-Din laughed. “Who are you talking about? You or me?”

  “I am no longer a commander,” Ibelin reminded him.

  Salah ad-Din only raised his eyebrows in disbelief.

  “I am here at the behest of Conrad Marquis de Montferrat, the husband of my stepdaughter, Isabella Queen of Jerusalem.”

  Salah ad-Din’s expression did not change. It was obvious to him that Ibelin controlled his son-in-law, and he found it disingenuous to pretend otherwise. He could only suppose that his pose had something to do with faranj laws that allowed titles to pass through females.

  The return of the slave boy interrupted further discussion for the moment. The boy was burdened with a large silver tray laden with bowls overflowing with pistachios, almonds, raisins, figs, and dried apricots. A silver chalice already covered with condensation contained crushed ice and a carved ivory spoon. As the boy set the tray down, Ibelin looked at him more closely. He had blue-gray eyes and light brown hair, his skin was coppery red, and he had freckles. He was almost certainly a Frank by birth.

  The Sultan saw Ibelin’s interest and announced, “Ahmed was born Christian, but he has now converted to the True Faith and hopes to be a Mamluke one day—don’t you, Ahmed?”

  The boy dropped to his knees and banged his forehead on the floor. “If Allah, praise be to his name, so blesses me, your Excellency!” His voice was more a breathy whisper into the carpet than an affirmation of faith, or so it seemed to Balian. Furthermore, Balian did not see anything particularly praiseworthy in converting orphaned children taken by force from their homes. The boy had been baptized, and he felt certain that Christ would have pity on him. He therefore refrained from giving the Sultan the satisfaction of looking scandalized or upset.

  Seeing that Ibelin was not going to react, Salah ad-Din dismissed the boy with a wave of his hand, and he withdrew backwards to resume his station on the stool in the corner by the door, awaiting the next order. Balian reminded himself that life as a page was not much better, and that Eschiva’s son Hugh now served King Richard.

  “Please, go ahead!” The Sultan urged Ibelin to partake of the refreshments he could not enjoy himself until sundown. “Where were we?”

  “I’ve come to you, your Excellency, with a proposal of peace from the Marquis de Montferrat.”

  “Ah, yes. Please proceed.” The Sultan sat back in his cushions and made himself comfortable. Ibelin mentally noted that the Sultan had gained a lot of weight in the last four years and looked much older than he had at Jerusalem, which seemed odd, given his unbroken series of victories until Acre and now Arsuf and Jaffa.

  Ibelin laid out Montferrat’s proposal. He included the return of all captives, knowing it was a maximum demand that would have to be negotiated downwards to something more reasonable. The Sultan listened with an impassive, almost disinterested expression, and with each passing moment Ibelin’s hopelessness grew. The Sultan, he sensed, was not the least bit interested in his peace terms. Probably not in any peace terms, he reflected in discouragement. Not once was there a flicker of interest in his amber eyes. When Ibelin could think of nothing more to say, he fell silent.

  Just then the muezzin started the call to prayers. The Sultan excused himself and withdrew into his inner chamber to pray, while the slave boy prayed in place by his stool—bowing, kneeling, standing, and kneeling again in answer to the calls of the muezzin. Ibelin remained sitting, but crossed himself and recited the Lord’s Prayer until the voice of the muezzin fell silent. He completed the prayer twice and started a third time before the muezzin fell silent. He finished the prayer in the ensuing silence.

  Salah ad-Din returned and settled himself again on his cushions. “Allah has inspired me with wisdom and an answer to your off
er,” he announced with a smile and hard eyes. “Tell the Marquis of Montferrat that I will gladly acknowledge his title to Tyre, Sidon, and Beirut and withdraw my troops and garrisons from the entire territory between the mountains and the sea that once made up the associated lordships—after he has control of Acre and is in a position to surrender it to me.”

  Ibelin did not react, because now that the Sultan had spoken, it seemed so obvious. Why had he allowed himself to be sent on this fool’s errand?

  “As for the captives,” the Sultan continued, “we will return one captive for each Saracen prisoner you return to us. A simple exchange, one for one—minus, of course the twenty-five hundred that the English King slaughtered at Acre. In short, we’ll start counting and return one Christian captive for each Muslim prisoner you return to us only after you return twenty-five hundred prisoners to us to make up for the hostages slaughtered so barbarically by your Malik Rik.” There was real bitterness in that statement, Balian noted inwardly.

  Outwardly, Ibelin nodded, and remarked, “I understand your position, your Excellency. I will report it back to the Marquis de Montferrat faithfully.” He bowed his upper body toward the Sultan. “Thank you for receiving me so warmly and for your hospitality.” He bowed again, and then uncrossed his legs and began to get to his feet.

  A flicker of surprise crossed the Sultan’s face. Ibelin’s reaction struck him as far too calm, and he began to doubt his earlier assumption that Ibelin spoke for himself. Was it possible he was playing some other game? His spies reported that Ibelin opposed the English King, but he had fought beside him at Arsuf and again at Jaffa. It was very much in Salah ad-Din’s interests to keep the Franks divided among themselves. He wavered, wondering if he should offer Montferrat something a little more palatable.

  Ibelin was already on his feet and bowing again. “Thank you again for receiving me. I wish you a blessed and peaceful Ramadan, your Excellency.”

  The parting speech sounded so natural in Ibelin’s fluent Arabic that Salah ad-Din found himself on the brink of wishing him the same. He caught himself just in time and, smiling somewhat embarrassedly, admitted, “I find myself wishing we were on the same side rather than enemies. I would have rewarded you far better than your kings. You would be master of a province by now if you were only a Believer.”

  Ibelin bowed deeply again. “You flatter me, your Excellency—for were I worthy of so much power, then God would surely have seen fit to bestow it upon me.”

  Salah ad-Din shook his head in bemusement. He wished more of his emirs had so much faith in the Almighty! It was a good thing, he noted with a prayer of thanks to Allah, that this man was not the king of the Franks, because he would have been a far more formidable adversary than either Montferrat or the mad Englishman. Malik Rik was a terrible opponent—untrustworthy and deceitful in negotiation, yet ridiculously brave and indifferent to his personal safety on the battlefield. The combination left Salah ad-Din baffled and uncomfortable, as he found he could neither risk battle nor trust negotiations.

  Ibelin did not wait for someone to send for his horses but, familiar as he was with the house, strode around to the back himself. Georgios jumped up at the sight of him and began saddling the horses in such haste that Ibelin asked him, “Is something wrong?”

  “I don’t like it here. It gives me the creeps,” the loyal Greek squire answered simply.

  “We can ride another two to three hours before dark,” Balian assured him. They could make Lydda, in fact, but he was reluctant to see what had happened to the shrine of St. George, and he didn’t want to subject Georgios to that, either. Georgios naturally felt a particular affinity to St. George.

  The horses were ready, and Ibelin took his own horse by the bridle and led him out into the street to mount up. He found it satisfying how many of the Sultan’s men cast admiring glances at the young stallion. He was aware that the Saracens generally scorned Frankish horses as hulking, ponderous, and lacking in spirit. He had introduced some captured Arab mares into his stud, however, and the cross-breeding produced highly satisfying material for palfreys that did not need to carry the weight of armor or withstand the impact of joust and battle. This particular colt, a fine-boned bay he had named Hermes after the messenger of the Greek gods, was a bit of a showoff who liked to arch his neck, lift his tail, and prance about.

  One of the Mamlukes assigned to see them out of the city asked half in jest, “What price do you want for your horse?”

  “Five hundred gold bezants,” Balian answered instantly, harvesting a laugh at such an outrageous sum.

  They passed the Cathedral of St. John, converted now into a mosque, and were on the main thoroughfare leading toward the west when they were confronted by a large troop of Mamlukes coming the other way. Ibelin’s party squeezed closer together and moved nearer the houses on their right so the two parties could pass. As they came abreast of the other troop, Ibelin’s gaze fell on the blond man riding in the middle of the Mamlukes, and he started violently. Humphrey de Toron recognized him in the same instant. They stared at one another, their escorts oblivious to the tension that burned the air.

  “Tiberius warned me you were a traitor, Toron,” Balian snarled at the younger man.

  “Traitor? What makes me more of a traitor than you? We’re both in the Sultan’s camp!” Toron shot back, his face flushed with sheer hatred. He had never hated anyone so much as he hated Ibelin—not even Reynald de Châtillon. The Lord of Oultrejourdain had been a brute who had humiliated, scorned, and bullied him, but he had never betrayed him, never stabbed him in the back, never taken from him the thing he loved most. (Now that he had lost her, that was how Humphrey had come to see Isabella.)

  “I’m only here as an envoy for the Marquis de Montferrat—”

  “A bigamous, lying usurper!” Toron interrupted to fling back. “What could be more traitorous than that? I represent the legitimate Kings of England and Jerusalem!” Toron was shouting in agitation, while the astonished Mamlukes looked from one faranj to the other, uncomprehending, because the exchange was in French.

  Ibelin already regretted speaking to Toron. It had been completely unnecessary. He could only excuse his stupid behavior by the inner agitation provoked by his disastrous meeting with Salah ad-Din and the emotions stirred by seeing his brother’s home occupied by the Saracens. He shook his head as much at himself as Toron, then looked away and continued riding.

  Tyre, October 1191

  The Ibelin family was not expecting the return of their lord so soon, and the great hall of the little merchant residence was overcrowded and alive with domestic activity. While Alys and Ernoul practiced a new song in the solar, Helvis and her betrothed Reginald de Sidon were in a window seat playing chess. As an unmarried woman, Helvis did not cover her hair, but she wore it bound up at the back of her head, making her look older than her thirteen years, while her figure was decidedly nubile. Reginald appeared quite taken with her and was happily explaining to her the intricacies of chess. Margaret, on the other hand, had taken a rag, tied a knot in one end, and was wrestling with her new puppy in a rough-and-tumble game that would not have disgraced her brothers. The fact that she had a puppy after all her siblings had been consistently denied dogs due to “lack of space” was evidence (they felt) that Margaret was shamelessly spoiled. Helvis didn’t care anymore, because Reginald had promised her “as many dogs as she liked” as soon as they were married, and the boys no longer cared because they were more focused on horses, swords, and jousting. John, particularly, had started training in the lists and was being fitted for his first chain-mail hauberk, while Philip looked on jealously, lying flat on his belly and waving his feet around in the air.

  Balian had resisted buying a hauberk for John, arguing that he grew so fast that he’d need a new hauberk every few months, but Godwin Olafsen had offered to exchange each hauberk he grew out of with a new one at no extra cost for the next three years. It was an offer Balian couldn’t refuse—although he had first checked with
Olafsen whether he could truly afford such a gesture.

  “Believe me, my lord,” the Norse armorer answered, “the orders for hauberks are unending. I can’t keep up with them anymore, and need at least two more apprentices. But ensuring Lord John has proper armor while he’s learning his trade is a debt I owe you.”

  “You owe me nothing, Master Olafsen. God forgive me, you would have gone into slavery if I had not happened to catch sight of you.”

  “But you did secure my freedom, and you also vouched for Mariam, my lord, even though she was not my wife and you knew it. Now, with her at my side, I’ve made a new life and I’m not a near-starving armorer, but one of the wealthiest burghers of Tyre.” This was true. Ever since the crusaders had started flooding into the Holy Land, Olafsen’s fortunes (under Mariam’s canny guidance) had taken a turn for the better. He had built a large smithy in the new town outside of Tyre, with a courtyard onto which both his own workshop and Mariam’s bakery backed. On the second story, over the shops, he had a substantial residence for his own family, his two journeymen, and four apprentices. Mariam employed a nursemaid for her infant daughter and several serving girls in the house, as well as the girls in her bakery. Meanwhile Sven, reconciled by the birth of a daughter rather than a son, was now her principal assistant. Altogether their establishment provided employment to nearly twenty people, and Olafsen had been elected an alderman of the armorer’s guild. He was, in short, an established and affluent member of Tyre society.