by Robyn Young
The raiding party rode swiftly across the bridge and into the outer enceinte, archers on the ramparts firing down at the Syrians and Mamluks who followed them from the camp. When the last man limped in, the bridge was raised, the gates shut and barred. The wounded were helped or carried back through the Gate of St. Lazarus, where they were tended by physicians or priests. Some of the men had captured Mamluk drums and shields, which would be hung on the walls to demoralize the Muslims. But these tokens were small victories that had come at a high price. Of the 152 cavalry and foot soldiers of the Orders of St. Thomas and St. Lazarus who had entered the camp of Hamah, 27 hadn’t returned. The Templars had lost four sergeants and eighteen knights, a terrible loss.
And at dawn, when word came to the Templars’ camp that the other sorties sent out had suffered similar losses, morale sunk lower still.
46
The Docks, Acre 18 MAY A.D. 1291
Garin pushed through the crowds, ignoring the angry calls of those he forced his way past. One bulky woman with a beefy red face refused to be moved by him.
“Wait your turn,” she said, wrinkling her nose as she looked him up and down; his worn, stained clothing, his glazed eyes.
Garin leaned toward her, lip curled in a snarl. “Move, you hag.” He attempted to elbow his way past, then felt someone grab his cloak. Whipping around, he saw an old man.
“How dare you speak to my wife in this way!” exclaimed the man. “I’ve a mind to—!”
Garin punched him in the face, sending him rocking back. As the beefy-faced woman cried out and went to her husband’s aid, Garin thrust past her and on through the press of bodies that packed the dockside.
It was approaching dawn, and the inky sea beyond the western mole reflected the first pale shades of morning. The calls of sailors echoed above the fretful murmuring of the restless throng, punctuated by the whimpering of infants. Most of the people on the harbor wall were women and children. There were few adult men, and those that were present were either very old or very rich. There was a sense of agitation, barely held in check. It was apparent in the panicked eyes of Acre’s last refugees, who crammed together, jostling and shivering in the morning air, all waiting for a boat to take them to safety. The young men, soldiers and knights now joined by farmers and laborers, were behind them on the walls, still fighting for the city, but over the past month hope had dwindled.
After several more night sorties had attempted to breach the Mamluk camp, none of which had been successful, Acre’s gates had been shut for the last time. Spirits lifted briefly when the young king of Cyprus and Jerusalem, Henry II, arrived by ship with two hundred cavalry and five hundred infantry. But when his attempts to negotiate with Sultan Khalil proved fruitless and the daily attacks continued without abate, the people’s newfound optimism began to fade. Since then, two of Acre’s twelve towers—the English Tower and the Tower of the Countess of Blois—had collapsed under the continuous bombardment, along with three sections of the outer wall, by the Gates of St. Anthony and St. Nicholas, and the King’s Tower. Yesterday morning, the rulers of Acre, those who hadn’t fled to Cyprus, had met in the council chambers of the royal palace and called for the final evacuation of the women and children.
After word had gone around, Acre’s last citizens made their way down to the docks, carrying what possessions they could. Their numbers had been swelling since the previous afternoon, most of them queuing on the dockside, waiting through the night. A trickle of boats had pulled out of the harbor, crammed with people, most of whom had lost everything and had no idea what they would do for food or shelter when they reached whatever shore they were bound for. Many had lived their whole lives in Acre. Leaving husbands, fathers and sons on the walls to hold back the ravenous horde that was clawing its way, brick by brick, through the defenses, these wives, daughters and mothers climbed into the boats, some clutching babies. Looking around for friends or neighbors, seeking comfort, they found only strangers with the same dust-streaked, haunted faces as their own. Now, as the sky lightened, turning from gray-white to pale pink, shedding light over the harbor, it was painfully clear that there were simply too many people and not enough ships.
Garin, panting for breath, finally reached the harbor wall, where the first rows of women were being helped into a Venetian merchant vessel. Paying no attention to those who called to him to move back and to wait his turn, he wrestled his way to the front, knocking into a small child, who began to cry. “Hey!” he shouted to one of the crewmen. “You!”
The crewman scowled at him, reaching out to take a woman’s arm as she stepped gingerly across the planks. “What do you want?” he said gruffly, his accent heavy and coarse.
“I need to get on your boat,” Garin shouted over the child’s wails.
The crewman laughed and turned to one of his fellows. Nodding his head toward Garin, he called to his comrade in Italian. Some of the women on the harbor wall, obviously Italians themselves, glanced at Garin and smirked; one giggled.
“I say you are funny-looking woman,” the crewman repeated in scornful English for Garin’s benefit. He started whistling a tune and helped another woman across.
Garin glared at him. “I’ve got money,” he growled, reaching into the bag that was slung over his shoulder and pulling out a shabby drawstring pouch.
“Then go buy yourself some courage and get back to the walls where you belong.”
The laughter and calls of agreement from the onlookers stung Garin’s ears. Rage shuddered inside him, but he could see he was wasting his time. Shoving the pouch into his bag, he stared down the dockside to where several more boats were lined up along the wall. One, not too far away, had men on board. It was a small vessel, barely more than a pinnace, but there was still room for more. He guessed it was probably a carrier, taking its passengers out to one of the few remaining larger galleys moored in the outer harbor. Leaving the jeers behind him, Garin pushed his way toward it. There were more women here, lingering around the wall, looking hopefully at the boat, but several men were standing in front of it with swords drawn, watching the shifting crowds warily. As Garin approached, the crowd ahead of him parted and a stooped old man with white hair, dressed in a black robe, came into view. He was aided by two men clad in purple and gold silks, bishops by the look of them; they were dripping with jewels. Garin recognized the man in black as the patriarch of Jerusalem, Nicholas de Hanape. He hastened along the wall as the patriarch was assisted into the vessel. When Garin reached it, one of the guards halted him with a firm hand in the chest.
“Let me buy passage,” Garin pleaded with the guard. “They’re not letting any men on board the others. I’m wounded.” He gestured vaguely to his leg. “I cannot fight.”
“You’re not getting on board,” said the guard firmly.
“For Christ’s sake, I’m begging you!”
The guard shook his head. “There’s a Templar ship, the Falcon,” he pointed along the dockside to where a large galley sat in the outer harbor, just off the crumbled eastern mole, alongside several others. “The captain’s done away with his mantle and has commandeered it. He’s accepting money for passage, so I’ve heard. But you’re going to need a lot to persuade him.”
“More than five gold?”
The guard arched an eyebrow. “Much more.”
Leaving the guards to push the desperate crowds back as the half-empty pinnace, with the white-faced patriarch and bishops on board, pushed off from the wall, Garin forced his way through the crush. Heading back into the city, he jogged through the streets, his mind working furiously. A lot of the people he was passing were obviously poor folk, unable to afford passage in the earlier evacuations. It would be pointless, he knew, to rob any of them. He cursed himself savagely for leaving it so late.
He had been drinking himself into a stupor for the past few weeks in a vain attempt to block out the horrendous noise of the attack; the thuds and crashes of stones, the war drums and battle cries, the fevered prayers, clanging
bells and screams. But he had dug in to wait it out, believing, as many had, that the walls would hold. Last night he had surfaced from a drunken haze in a subdued brothel in the Pisan quarter to discover that the call for a citywide evacuation had gone out. Sick to his stomach, he gathered his few belongings and, with thoughts of France, of building a new life, crowding up his mind, had made his way to the docks. It hadn’t entered his head that he might not be able to leave.
Plumes of black smoke curled into the air from fires that burned untended. In the distance, Acre’s walls were jagged and scarred. The crumbled remains of the English Tower, just a broken spur of stone, pointed like a thin finger into the dawn. Pigs and goats, masterless, crowded the alleys in frightened packs. Houses stood empty. As Garin stumbled through the streets, three carts trundled slowly by, piled high with bodies, some burned and blackened, others missing limbs. Streams of people were hastening past him in the opposite direction, all heading for the docks. One woman, her hair flying loose and disheveled around her face, shouted at two children to keep up. Both were crying.
The woman, who held a baby bundled in her arms, dashed back to them. “You have to walk faster,” she snapped.
One, a small blond boy, cried harder. “I want Papa!”
The woman looked stricken for a moment, then crouched down. “Papa will follow us soon,” she said gently. “But we’ve got to find a boat first.” She kissed them both. “Now help Mama and be good boys.”
Garin watched them head off, the two boys hurrying behind her. He thought of calling out to the woman, of telling her that it was no use; she was too late and all the boats would soon be gone. But before he could open his mouth, they disappeared in the throng. He stood there, staring after them, considering their fate. If the walls broke and the Saracens came through, the woman would most likely face rape and death. She was too old to be enslaved and wouldn’t fetch a worthwhile sum in the markets. Her baby would be killed; it would die anyway without a mother to suckle it, and the boys would be taken as slaves. It would be the fate of thousands like them. Garin found little emotion in the thought, until his mind filled with an image of Rose.
He was almost certain she was still in the city. He had seen Elwen only two days ago, in a line of women hauling buckets of water and sand to help quell the fires, which sprang up daily as the Mamluks shot flaming arrows and Greek fire over the walls. She had been flushed and looked exhausted, dark circles under her eyes, her gown stained. She hadn’t seen him, but he had watched her for a while. Will and Elwen had done everything they could to keep him out of their lives. But that hadn’t stopped him believing that he was Rose’s father, or hoping that, one day, he could prove it to her. He wasn’t sure why he had this need; perhaps it was nothing more than spite, a simple wish to see Will suffer, as he himself had suffered. But he liked to think it was because he could love a child, and be loved in return.
Were Rose and Elwen still in Acre? Or had they found a boat? If they were here, Garin seriously doubted that Will, however occupied, would leave them without hope of escape. No doubt he had secured them passage, possibly even on board a Templar ship. An idea forming in his mind, Garin turned down one of the side streets, heading for the Venetian quarter.
TEMPLAR HEADQUARTERS, MONTMUSART, ACRE, 18 MAY A.D. 1291
Will rode swiftly through the ruined streets of Montmusart, steering his destrier around piles of rubble and the burned-out shells of houses. The dawn air was filled with smoke. He could feel it scratching at the back of his throat, taste it where it coated his lips in the same powdery gray dust that covered everything. Far above him, torches flared on the walls, the men on guard casting huge shadows as they passed through the pools of yellow light. Will rode on, through the camp of the Hospitallers, the knights in their black mantles with the splayed white cross moving ghostlike in the half-light. Wounded men huddled on the back of a cart as it bounced over the uneven ground on the way to the infirmary, past a train of slow-moving mules loaded down with arrows in bundles on their backs. All along the walls, he had passed similar scenes. Only the colors of uniforms and banners changed. The subdued sense of apprehension remained the same. The old songs of the West that soldiers had cheered themselves with during the eerily silent nights of the siege had stopped several days ago. There wasn’t much to sing about anymore.
Mamluk sappers, known as nakkabun, had been busily undermining Acre’s twelve towers over the past month, each mining team made up of one thousand men. Tunnels were dug from within the Mamluk camp all the way up to the walls, and when they arrived beneath the towers, a large cavern was excavated. The foundations were held up with timber, which was set alight, causing the tower wall to collapse into the cavern. Three days ago, after one such excavation, the whole outer face of the King’s Tower had collapsed in on itself. The rubble had fallen into the fosse, making it impossible for the Mamluks to pass, but the Crusaders’ relief was short-lived when they had awoken the next morning to find that the Mamluks had erected a giant cloth screen in the night, from behind which they were clearing a path through the debris. Arrows and stones were repelled by the screen, and the Christians on the walls could only look on as the Mamluks took the remaining section of the King’s Tower.
When he reached the Templar headquarters, set up in a now abandoned church with a hole in the roof, Will dismounted. He handed the reins to a nearby squire. The area was still fairly quiet, the men catching as much rest as possible before the daily assault began. “Have you seen Simon Tanner?” he asked the squire.
“Last I saw him was in the stables by the hospital of St. Lazarus, Commander.”
Will paused, torn by the choice, looking to the doors of the church, where two knights were posted on guard. The stables were at least five minutes away on foot and he didn’t have that much time. Cursing, he strode to the church. The knights nodded respectfully to him as he pushed open the doors. Inside, he found Guillaume de Beaujeu and Peter de Sevrey bent over a drawing of the walls laid out on two barrels. Torchlight threw their silhouettes up the sides of the lofty chamber, the floor of which was littered with shards of stone.
Guillaume looked round. “Ah, Commander. That was quick. What news is there from King Henry’s camp?”
“I didn’t make it to the king’s camp, my lord,” replied Will. “Before I reached it, I was alerted by Teutonic Knights near the remains of the English Tower. The Mamluks are on the move.”
De Sevrey frowned. “Already?” He gave a rough sigh. “The Saracens intend to wake us early today.”
“You misunderstand me, Sir Marshal. They are all moving, every camp from the Patriarch’s Tower to St. Anthony’s Gate. The largest concentration of them is massing in front of the Accursed Tower.”
“You are certain?” demanded Guillaume.
“I went onto the ramparts and saw it for myself. They obviously began moving during the night, under cover of darkness. They are almost up to the base of the walls.”
“Have the other leaders been warned?” asked the marshal swiftly.
“Word was being sent out as I left. I expect the other camps will all know within the next few minutes.”
“Wake the men, Peter,” said Guillaume, turning to the marshal. “Tell them we are expecting an all-out assault. Gather them here immediately.”
“My lord,” said the marshal, bowing and moving out.
Guillaume, his face haggard in the torchlight, turned to Will. “This could be it, Commander,” he said after a pause.
Will’s jaw tightened. He nodded.
Guillaume looked to the chancel, where a silver crucifix, suspended above the altar, gleamed dully. His brow furrowed. “Will you pray with me, William?”
“My lord,” said Will, hesitant, “I should go to the barracks. Help ready the men.”
“Of course,” said Guillaume, shaking his head. “Prepare yourself. We will pray with our brothers when you return.”
Forcing himself to turn away from the grand master, Will hastened out of the church a
nd into the streets, where the camp was already waking, word going around.
Will found Simon in the stables next to the Hospital of St. Lazarus, looking scared but grim, overseeing the saddling of the knights’ destriers.
Simon looked relieved to see him. “Have you come for a horse?” He stuck a hand through his dusty hair. “People are saying there’s going to be an attack, a bigger one than usual.”
“I need to speak to you,” said Will, steering him into the yard, away from the pages and grooms around the stalls.
“What is it?” asked Simon worriedly. He had lost weight over the past few weeks and his usually broad and ruddy face was hollow and pale. “Will? What’s wrong?”
“I need you to do something for me.”
“Anything.”
“I need you to go to Elwen. I want you to make sure she and Rose get on board that ship. I told her to leave yesterday, but she said she had to pack some things. She promised to get to the harbor by this afternoon.” Will paused, staring hard at Simon. “But I don’t think we’ve got that long.”
Simon looked shocked, but he nodded. “I will, of course. Although I don’t reckon the stable master will be too happy with me leaving my post this minute.”
“Tell him I’ve reassigned you.”
“I’ll come back as soon as she’s on the ship.” Simon went to head into the stables, then turned back and grasped Will’s hand in both of his own, which were rough and callused. He squeezed hard. “God be with you,” he said in a tight voice.
