Beloved Pilgrim

by Christopher Hawthorne Moss

  “You can still do that. Later. And take Tacetin and me.”

  “Let me go on. Part of that vow is to help keep the Holy City from being retaken by the paynim. I am also fulfilling my brother’s vow.”

  Elias had told Maliha all about his brother. “You can—” Maliha started to say, but fell silent at a glance from Elias. “And there is one more reason, even more important than those.” Elias paused until Maliha looked up and into his eyes. “I must find our father or what happened to him.” He put a finger to the woman’s full lips to silence her for just a little longer. “No, no one else can do that. I know his knights. If I find them between here and Jerusalem, I will hopefully find Father or some news of him. If he is missing or dead or being held, it will most likely be in Turkish hands. Andronikos is influential and powerful, but not outside this empire.”

  Maliha took Elias’s hand and pressed a kiss into its palm. “I understand. You must find him. Just promise that when you do, you will come back to me. Promise you won’t be killed.”

  Elias leaned to put his lips to Maliha’s, turning salty with the newly shed tears that ran down her face. “I promise not to be killed and to come back to you.”

  However much the two jealously guarded their time alone, the Christian forces were preparing for their journey to the Holy Land. Elias was forced to participate in a most unpleasant task—visiting the Lombard camp to form the unruly mob into some sort of order.

  Less than a month since he had first seen the camp, he found it more crowded, filthier, and more fractious. He knew more about the disturbances that had forced the basileus to pen up the mix of pilgrims. All the way from where they first set foot in Byzantium to within sight of the imposing walls of the Sublime City, the rougher elements had run amok. Their winter journey had been miserable. They were only welcome at arm’s length as they traveled en masse through the Balkans. The months dragged by, the food was unreliable, and there was the inevitable outbreak of illness in such a multitude. Once in the empire, they appeared to believe they were in paynim lands and that plunder and rampage were authorized. It was all Anselm, the archbishop of Milan and their leader, could do to get them to understand that they were yet in Christian territory, and the plunder they stole was from Christians like themselves.

  Emperor Alexios was infuriated by the human pestilence. He had petitioned the pontiff and the Church of Rome for knights to come to help him hold off Kilij Arslan and his Turkish allies. Instead, the first arrivals proved to be rabble: poor, rowdy, not skilled at arms, and ignorant. At best he would have to house and feed them; at worst he had to defend his own people and territory from them. He sent soldiers to escort them to a camp built near the city walls. Under watch, they could wait for the more formal knightly forces to arrive and then go on their way.

  The various firebrands within the pilgrims were incensed at being imprisoned in the inadequate camp. All Anselm and his clerics and the few nobles with them could do was try to counsel calm and patience. One night, the Lombards overwhelmed the guards, broke through one of the great gates, and poured into the city. They tore through the streets, breaking into shops and even churches, stealing and smashing what they could not carry. They made their way to the great stone edifice of the Blachernae Palace. It took all the palace guards to subdue them and herd them out beyond the walls. Many of the people who had left Lombardy to make their way to the Holy Land never got any farther than the paupers’ graveyard in Constantinople.

  It was said that, after the rampage, Alexios knelt by the body of one of his precious lions. He could not even imagine the set of circumstances that had ended in the big cat’s killing. As he stroked the tawny face, it took all his restraint not to order the massacre of the Lombards, each and every one of them.

  Instead, he commanded Anselm’s presence in one of the looted churches. One of Andronikos’s friends told Elias what happened next as he sat with his goblet of wine on one of the eunuch’s brocade couches. “The arrogant archbishop nonetheless paled at the sight of the destruction as he entered. Not only were the precious and holy items stripped, the vessels containing sacramental wine lay strewn and empty and mostly shattered, the floor was further covered in refuse and human waste, and figures and decorations on the silent tombs of the dead were hacked off or simply obliterated.

  “The basileus would not speak, but his first lord spoke for him. ‘How will you pay for this destruction, Your Grace? How will you compensate the families of the dead who just yesterday enjoyed breathing the fragrance of life? Did your people forget where they were? Did they think they were in the palace of the Turk? Did they not know they were in the principal city of Christendom, greater even than Rome?’”

  Elias could guess that any impulse to abase himself fled from Anselm’s mind when he heard those last words. He had nothing to say.

  A few days later, the archbishop took to his sickbed and left punishment and reparations to the military leaders of the Lombard contingents.

  In the end, the Lombards found themselves in worse conditions in a camp in Nicomedia, far enough away from the city gates to make their return unlikely, and guarded by far more than a few guards. There the men, women, and children waited in the filth and degradation. Hundreds lay dead of knife fights, murder, and disease in a makeshift boneyard within the fence.

  The greatest shock was that, in spite of the emperor’s promises, no new camp had been provided for the soldiers and their families from the contingent with which Elias and Albrecht had traveled. The press of misery was simply pressed further.

  All this Elias learned as he went about the camp, talking to guards and inmates both, trying to find the happy medium between their accounts that was the closest to likely truth.

  With his nose and mouth covered with a scented scarf and his eyes averted from the worst of the filth, Elias marshaled a mostly dispirited mob into a semblance of order. As he went through the camp, he was surprised to hear his name called. He looked up to see the mercenary captain, Ranulf, smiling at him.

  “They held you in here?” Elias exclaimed, shocked. His eyes surveyed those nearby and picked out the three other mercenaries. “How did you know it was me?” he asked, pushing down the scarf and wincing at the rank smell.

  “I didn’t. I recognized Gauner. So I take it you have been in swankier quarters.” Ranulf hopped down from his perch and approached him. Elias tried not to let it show when the stench reached his nostrils.

  “We’ll be heading out in a day or two, east to Dorylaeum.” Elias thought a moment. “I am trying to make some order out of this chaos. If you and the others would help me, I will see what I can do to get you released and into some sort of lodgings in Nicomedia.” He eyed Leif, Thomas, and Sebastiano, who had come to stand arrayed behind Ranulf. “But you have to swear not to make any trouble.”

  Leif turned away in disgust. Sebastiano swore in Italian. Thomas fixed a baleful eye on him. Ranulf leaned his head on one side with a look of pure condemnation on his face. “My Lord Elias, you wound us. Have we not won your trust after all we have been through already?”

  Elias was ashamed. “I—I am sorry. You are right. I will go immediately and arrange for your release to help us.” He saluted sharply and turned and rode away.

  ON THE road to Dorylaeum, Elias looked up to see a smiling Ranulf riding alongside him. “Finally on our way. Where are your shepherds?” the mercenary asked.

  Elias scowled at him.

  Ranulf simply smiled the broader. “Hello, Albrecht. Happy to be back on the road? Ah, I see not. Losing heart, are we?”

  “Left their hearts behind, I would guess.” It was Sebastiano’s rough voice.

  The look on Elias’s face must have confirmed the supposition. Ranulf’s face softened. “Tough break, lad,” he said. “It happens to us all.”

  Leif snorted. “Speak for yourself. The heart not given is never broken.”

  Elias knew what had transpired between Albrecht and Andronikos. Just before they left Constantinople, h
e had spotted his squire sitting alone in the fragrant garden at dusk. He smiled at him as he sat wistfully sniffing some exotic flower. “So,” he said, “got anything you want to share with your lord and master?”

  Albrecht’s sardonic look quickly changed to a meaningful sigh. “Yes, and it is apparently something we truly share. Your eyes glow whenever the Turkish woman enters a chamber. You are truly in love, are you not?”

  Elias cast down his eyes over his reddening cheeks. “Yes, I am. I never thought this would happen to me. But,” he added as he looked into Albrecht’s face, “I think you may also have found love… again.”

  Albrecht nodded. “I have. Like you, I never thought it would happen to me, not a second time.” He smiled at a memory. “The very night your Maliha was brought back and you were in the tub, I went to leave you two alone.”

  Elias gave him a playful shove. “Yes, without telling me! How did you know she had guessed my little secret? We could have been undone—you, me, both of us.”

  Albrecht grinned. “I just knew. Trust me.”

  “Never again.” He laughed.

  Albrecht resumed his story. “I found Andronikos in the corridor, looking at me. He said something about whether my young lord was happy now. I almost said, ‘He is,’ but caught myself. He approached me and said in a soft voice, ‘I cannot help but think you are not so happy. You have a grief, a loss. I would like to help you heal. May I be so bold as to ask you to come to my private chamber? We can speak there with no prying ears.’ Of course, I assumed he planned a seduction.”

  “When is he not,” Elias retorted, but seeing a cautionary look on Albrecht’s face, he became serious and attentive again.

  “I told him that I had lost someone dear to me, and I said it would take a great deal of healing for me to get involved with anyone new. He assured me he only wanted to hear about me and my sorrow, so I took his arm and we went to his chamber.”

  Elias waited for more details, but Albrecht remained silent. “Well?” he prodded curiously.

  “Let me just say that Andronikos is a deeply caring man who understands loss and has waited a long time himself to find a new love.”

  “And, I take it, you are that new love?”

  Albrecht’s radiant face was his answer. “Funny, you know I have been in love before. I am learning now that there are all kinds of love, even within the boundaries of carnal attraction. I loved… your brother… deeply. I always shall. But with Andronikos, it’s different. The passion is there, but it’s a mellower passion. It does not steal any territory from Elias in my heart.”

  Elias put a hand on his arm and squeezed. “I guessed it had happened. And I will tell you that I did think about Elias but decided he would want this for you.”

  Albrecht’s voice broke as he said, “He would like Andronikos, don’t you think?”

  “I know he would. And he will be happy, wherever he is, to know you are loved. Have….” He hesitated. “Have you made any promises?”

  Albrecht’s look was wry. “You mean do I trust him? Is he going to forget about me the moment I ride out of the gates? Do you trust Maliha?”

  Warmth filled Elias at the thought. “I do. And you are right to remind me that, as singular as it feels, our love is not the only love in the world.” He frowned. “Nor are we the only lovers to be separated so soon.” He glanced at Albrecht. “I would not blame you if you chose not to continue. I would release you from your vow.”

  Albrecht stared at him. “You can release me from my vow to you, my lord, but not to myself, not to your brother, and certainly not to God. I am coming. Whatever will be will be.”

  Elias clasped his arm again. “Deus lo volt.”

  IN CAMP, Elias found himself drawn to the mercenaries’ fire. They welcomed him and his squire with no ceremony. As they sat on the blankets around the fire, Thomas handed them the wineskin the mercenaries shared. They drank gratefully and sat listening to the conversation around them. A brace of other soldiers sat in the group. One was gesticulating feverishly.

  “What have they got to say about it?” he was saying. “As if they haven’t already taken the wind out of this pilgrimage with their idiocy.”

  Elias took the cup of stew with meager vegetables and unknown meat and ate, listening carefully to learn what was amiss.

  “He is their big hero. He’s a Lombard himself, devil take him,” Sebastiano said, not hiding his disdain for all things Lombard. One of the other men glared in his direction, but the mercenary ignored him.

  “How did he get his Lombard arse captured anyway?” another man asked.

  “He’s not a Lombard. He’s a Norman,” a peevish voice corrected.

  “Who?” Elias managed to whisper to Ranulf.

  The man who had just spoken shouted, “Bohemond, that’s who. The Prince of Antioch,” he said mockingly.

  “Over Alexios’s dead body.”

  “And our valorous Raymond’s. No way Raymond will turn north to go save him.”

  Ranulf answered the man’s question like a priest lecturing small boys. “Bohemond made it his business to get to Antioch first, and being the leader of the pilgrims, he got his way. He claimed he had Alexios’s word that Antioch was his. Raymond of Toulouse did not think so. But in the long run, Bohemond set himself up for a nasty surprise. Raymond went on to Jerusalem, getting the credit in heaven with that move. Nobody could extract Bohemond from his principality, but last August, when one of his allies called for his help with an attack by the paynim, he ventured out of the city and got himself ambushed. He’s rotting in Nixtar up to the northeast.”

  Leif puffed out his chest. “He’s being held by Danish men!” He jabbed himself with a thumb.

  Ranulf rolled his eyes. “The Danishmend, Leif.”

  Leif elbowed the man next to him to indicate his mistake was no more than a jest.

  Elias ventured, “But won’t someone ransom him?”

  “How do we know all this, anyway?” the florid, gesticulating man asked.

  Ranulf answered, “He managed to send one of his knights to Baldwin of Edessa. And I have heard that Alexios will ransom him, but only if the Turks turn the man over to Alexios. He is vexed that the man acted in such ill faith.”

  “You seem to know a lot about this Norman fellow. Have you served under him?” the Lombard asked.

  Sebastiano, Leif, Thomas, Elias, and Albrecht all stopped eating and drinking and looked at him. Ranulf replied, “Not as such. But I met him when I fought for his uncle, Roger of Sicily, against the Amalfi rebels, the poor sods. He’s quite an imposing fellow. Taller than any man here. The very model of a heroic knight. Sharp as an adder’s bite. And definitely not in it for the glory of God.”

  “So are you all saying that the Lombard contingent wants to go rescue him?” Elias asked.

  Sebastiano grinned. “That’s exactly what they want, for us to turn north after we take Ancyra and overrun all of the Seljuk strongholds on the way. That should make Alexios happy. If we can pull it off, that is.”

  “And why wouldn’t we?” Leif demanded of his companion.

  “I’m not saying we wouldn’t. But it’s rather out of the way. We are supposed to be on our way to Jerusalem.” Several voices affirmed Sebastiano’s sentiment.

  “And as far as I am concerned, Alexios and Bohemond can go bugger each other.” This comment from the florid man was rewarded with general guffaws.

  Elias turned to Ranulf and said in a lower tone, “Raymond seemed pretty tight with the emperor. Will he overlook his resentment against Bohemond and go try to rescue him?”

  Ranulf took some time before he answered. “I don’t know. It may be less that he goes along with the idea than that he really won’t have a choice.”

  Elias gazed at him, astounded by the change in plans.

  ONE FACE that did not appear in the long line of pilgrims on the road was Archbishop Anselm’s. Elias knew he had fallen ill and remained so. It was said he would join the next contingent; that was, if he
recovered. Much of his entourage had stayed with him in Constantinople, but his military leaders rode very near the fore of the group. Needless to say, the Lombard rabble loaned their noise and stink to the procession, archbishop or not.

  As they rode, Elias had his eye on the large force of Pecheneg warriors the basileus insisted travel with the pilgrims. They were a squat race, with slanted eyes and drooping moustaches over clean-shaven chins, which made them look like they were always scowling. They wore chain mail like the pilgrim knights, but they also wore garish-colored coats with highly decorated bindings along the front and hems. Their outlandish helmets were conical and sported some sort of tassel or feather from the pointed top. They were remarkable riders who carried round shields like the English, long, narrow swords, and elaborately curved bows. Elias thought them the most exotic beings he had ever seen.

  Their leader, Tzitas, rode ever at Raymond’s side. Everyone knew Raymond was Alexios’s man now, and some wondered if the Pechenegs were there to enforce Raymond’s preeminence as leader of the pilgrim force. If it was so, his capitulation about going to free Bohemond seemed unexplainable.

  Elias asked Ranulf, who, with his men, now rode with Elias, “Where are they from?”

  Ranulf glanced over at the fierce body of the Pecheneg. “North of the Black Sea. They are all mercenaries.”

  His eyes wide, Elias repeated, “North of the Black Sea?” He pondered. “So, does the emperor want Bohemond rescued or not?”

  Ranulf shrugged. “I don’t know. My guess would be not. Perhaps the basileus does not savor setting his mercenaries on the Lombard rabble. And whatever hurts the Turks is his gain.”

  “So you are saying the diversion might actually play into the emperor’s best interest.”

  The mercenary captain smiled at him blandly in answer.

  Much of the journey from Nicomedia was through Byzantine territory, so supplies were plentiful. The crossing into Seljuk Turk-ruled lands was most noticeable when the supplies stopped coming. It would be nothing but plunder and foraging afterward. They had enough to last until they reached the stronghold at Ancyra, but not for a long siege. The leaders insisted with bombast that they would overrun the fortress easily. The more experienced knights were doubtful but said little.