by Mark Butler
After what seemed an eternity, the door in the ceiling of the compartment opened up, spraying sunshine on the terrified crusaders. They crawled out tentatively, as if the storm might come back at any minute and sink their ship. The crew who had been out in the lightning and rain were grim-faced and soaked. Artois looked out to the fleet. There was the same number of ships as there had always been. That was good. Artois looked up at the bird's nest, thinking of the brave man who stood on that unsteady, rocking piece of wood and saw danger before anyone else could. He had saved lives with his job, with his attentiveness to the weather. Artois thought that man was a real king, a sea warrior if there ever was one. But when he peered through the blinding sunlight, he couldn't see the man in the bird's nest. Artois grabbed the nearest crew member.
"Where is the one who was in the bird's nest?"
"Lost his grip when the ship listed hard. He went over during the worst of the storm. We'll never find him," the crew member said, pulling away from Artois.
Part Two
The Seventh Crusade
Chapter Nineteen
THE ANCIENT CITY OF DAMIETTA, EGYPT, rests on a series of islands, shallows and shifting sandbars on the Mediterranean coast. The city was built at the mouth of the mighty Nile River, which passes through the heart of the city and continues south for thousands of miles, providing an artery of food, water, and trade to untold millions. The city of Damietta is the preeminent entry point for any and all who wish to enter Africa from the north.
In the past hundred years, Damietta had been repeatedly assaulted by European crusaders. The Fifth Crusade actually captured the city and held it for months, though the mighty Ayyubid forces under Sultan Al-Kamil eventually recaptured it. Thus, Damietta's citizenry are the wary kind, always keeping one eye on the horizon, always expecting the white-faced devils to resume their violent mischief.
On the morning of May 14, 1249, the city of Damietta was quiet and tranquil. Fishing vessels lolled in the waves, their angler masters relaxing while their nets collected fish. Women crouched in groups on the beach, gossiping and washing clothes with lime and smooth rocks. Their children ran up and down the sandy coast, letting the early sun darken their skin while they gathered seashells. Seagulls squawked at the wharfs, covetously eyeing the writhing boatloads of fish that were being unloaded. The air was fresh and clean, the odors of the people of Damietta being swept away nightly by the sea breezes from the west. With the minor exceptions of the language spoken and the tone of the peoples' skin, Damietta could have been any other European port city, with its picturesque scenery and healthy, glowing residents.
It all went away in an instant.
"Infidels! Infidels!" the lookout, in the ruins of the tower of Damietta, screamed until his voice fractured into a hideous screech. The lookout's commander was at the top of the frail, wooden tower in an instant. He encircled his fingers and put them over one eye, an old scout's trick, and saw the flags of the nation of France. His breath caught in his throat and sweat broke out on his forehead. "Run and tell Salah-diste! Tell Alak-ma! Tell everyone!"
The terrified lookout leaped from the top of the tower and broke his ankle on landing. It didn't matter. He bit back his tears and clenched his teeth, leaping on his horse with a cry of pain and frustration. He was at the Damietta provincial garrison in minutes, the words pouring out of his mouth in a jumble of fear and confusion.
They were back. After twenty years of peace, the Europeans were coming from across the ocean, dozens of war ships. Each ship was fully equipped for war. Thousands of tons of wood, steel, flesh, and pseudo-religious anger were bounding across the mighty Mediterranean. They were like a great axe, ready and eager to fell the mighty oak tree that was the Ayyubid Empire. Damietta would be the first strike, when the blade was at its sharpest and the wielder at his freshest.
"You all have your orders! Steady now! Breathe, boys! Breathe!" Christof was standing in front of a formation of thirty, yelling and waving his sword in the sky. "Archers in back! Look for the other ships' archers and form up with them! Infantry, follow me! Keep your shields close and wait for my signal! We don't want to be hit by our own artillery from the ships!"
Raul stood behind Christof, nodding calmly at the familiar orders. They had been drilled into the men's heads time and again since Aigues-Mortes, and Raul knew the young Frenchmen would make them proud. The fleet was in a reverse wedge, with a line of eight ships in the front, followed by a line of six and so forth. Their ship was second from the center, which was the king's vessel. They would be landing on Egyptian soil within the hour, and all of the drills, all of the training and speculating would finally reconcile with the reality of war.
"Everyone has water in their canteens?" Christof asked. A chorus of "ayes"' responded, and Christof nodded and patted his own canteen. Water was one of the most important weapons on a battlefield, when an exhausted, thirsty man was as vulnerable as a newborn babe. The soldiers were well-fed, too, and rested.
Raul took a deep breath. It was a beautiful day to start a war. The spring was in full blossom, and he could smell the strange vegetation and odors of the Egyptian coastline. The desert had a dry, clean redolence that mixed with the brackish waters, creating a calmative effect. If it weren't for the impending battle, Raul felt he could fall asleep. The sun was bright, though, illuminating the tiny Egyptian figures on the horizon, scrambling as they prepared their defenses.
"Ten men to a rowboat! Two archers, eight infantry!" Christof said. He had become a bit of an enigma on the voyage from Cyprus. He was a perfect soldier, capable of besting almost any other man in hand-to-hand combat and knowledgeable about all styles of warfare. He had an air about him, a confidence that other men sensed and warmed to. But there was the other side, Raul knew, the side of Christof that needed large amounts of private time and no questions from anyone. Raul thought Christof might be homosexual, or bisexual, or perhaps he was just predatory, but Raul thought Makel, the urchin, was terrified of Christof. It may have just been a hunch, but Raul had learned to trust his hunches after years as a fugitive hunter.
The king's vessel lowered its colors, a signal for the other ships to do the same. The oars dropped in the water after the sails came down. The ships began to slow as the Seventh Crusade neared the coast. They would stop a quarter mile out, because they didn't want the ships to bottom out if there were hidden sandbars. A quarter mile was plenty of room, and easily rowed by a group of young, fit men. After the oars pounded in reverse for a minute, the ships all stopped together and the rowboats were lowered into the water.
"Load up! Load up! We can't have the king's pretty soldier boys beating us to the coast, can we?" Christof yelled. He was in full form now, overseeing the men as they scrambled down the ladders on the sides of the ship. When they were all down, Christof gestured for Raul to take the front rowboat on the port side, and he took the front rowboat on the starboard.
The first wave of crusaders touched the Egyptian shore with their shields high, bows drawn. They leaped off their rowboats onto the soft, mushy sand and held tight formations as they advanced inland, with more crusader boats landing behind them every moment. The Ayyubids were there, two hundred yards off, watching.
"Why don't they attack now?" Raul yelled to Christof, "We are at our most vulnerable during the unloading!" It was a time-tested and well-known aspect of attacking any nation by shore: the moment when you leave your ships and have not yet gotten your legs underneath you is the time to attack, the place to repel invaders. But the Ayyubids weren't attacking, they were just watching, and to Raul's eyes, slowly retreating.
"Where are they going?" Christof yelled, echoing Raul's thoughts.
A few arrows were fired, but without hand-to-hand combat to combine with the arrow attacks, they were completely ineffective. No men were killed or even wounded, and more crusaders continued to arrive every minute. After claiming 300 yards of beach and enough coast line to land every ship in the fleet, the crusaders stopped advancing.
"What's going on?" was the question on every soldier's lips. This was not the bloodbath, not the violent response they were expecting.
"They've fortified," Francois said to Olivia that night on the beach, while she arranged their few possessions in their personal tent. It was actually a former possession of the poor German boy with the worm in his gut, and none of his comrades wanted to claim the thick, velvet tent. It was a fine thing to own, but the soldiers feared their comrade's mysterious illness, and only wanted to part with everything that he had ever touched.
"Fortified?" Olivia asked.
"They abandoned everything they can't defend well. All the people have either gone back to Cairo or moved behind the high walls of the fortress of Damietta. They took everything from their homes that they could carry—food, clothing, tools, and even earthenware."
"Smart."
"That's one theory," Francois responded. It was a dangerous game for the Ayyubids to play, giving the crusaders a foothold on their nation's soil and a bit of confidence to go with it. But if they were truly just biding their strength, the crusaders could be in for some very tough, close battles in the weeks and months to come.
"Doctor Francois?" a voice came from the flap of the tent. Olivia and Francois smiled at each other; with Francois' rapidly developing abilities, common soldiers were mistaking him for something that he wasn't . . . yet. Olivia went to the flap and flung it back, revealing a sallow, middle-age sailor.
"Yes?" Olivia asked. The sailor stared at her for a moment, probably not expecting to see such a beauty as she answering his calls.
"There is a boy on my ship, and I think he's unwell."
"How so?"
"You must talk to him, please. He won't talk with me, but—"
"Okay, where is he?" Olivia interrupted. Francois was going to object, to say that there was an established process to see the overwhelmed medical staff, and that the boy would have to go through proper channels first. When he took a close look at the sailor, though, he noted the man's gold bracelets and markings on his tunic. Stripes on his shoulder, fine weapons on his belt—this was no ordinary sailor. He was not a high commander, but deserving of some degree of respect.
"I'll bring him in," the sailor said.
He went around the side of the tent and emerged a moment later with a small, dark-skinned child of eleven or twelve. He was scrawny, with a huge head and eyes that were black holes surrounded by bright, white sclera. His teeth were very white.
"Come in," Francois said. He took the boy over to his personal cot, the only furniture already set up in the tent, and he sat in front of him on a stool. "What's your name?"
"Makel," the boy said. His voice was very small, but Francois detected firmness behind his words.
"And what is wrong today, Makel?"
"It's not just today."
"Okay, how long have you had this problem?"
"Ever since we left France."
"If you don't tell me what has happened, or what is happening, I can't help you."
"Can she leave?" Makel pointed to Olivia, who was standing with her hands on her hips while Francois interviewed the boy. Francois nodded and looked to Olivia, nodding toward the door. Before she made it out, Francois said, "Get Henry for me, please?"
"Okay."
They sat in silence until Henry arrived, and he sized up the boy with a practiced eye—healthy skin, clear eyes, no visible injuries, awake, alert, and oriented. He did note that the boy sat with his legs pressed together and his shoulders drawn and tucked, like he was trying to disappear into himself.
Finally, after staring at the two men with a mixture of distrust and embarrassment, Makel finally said, "He got inside me."
"Who is he?" they asked in unison. The boy didn't answer and realization dawned on Henry's face. It was an absurd expression, with his eyes wide and mouth drawn up into a disapproving smile at his own slowness in recognizing the situation.
"You were raped," Henry said. "We need to have a look at you without your clothes. We're doctors, it's okay."
Something broke in Makel at that moment, and he convulsed into a fit of tears. He fell off the cot and hugged himself, crying and shaking his head no. Henry had seen his fair share of rape victims, and it was sadly not uncommon for a boy on a ship to be assaulted by the older men. The truly strange circumstance was that Makel had been able to hide the truth for as long as he had.
The fortress of Damietta was a simple construction. There were four high walls, towers at each corner, and a gate at the front entrance. The walls were too high for ladders, but just barely, and that option was unattractive for other reasons, too. There were men on the parapet: archers, stone droppers, and groups of villagers with cauldrons of boiling tar.
A battering ram at the gate was the best option, and King Louis ordered the hammering to begin immediately. While the battering ram did its work, scouts were sent far and wide to map out the area. They returned every two hours, with bits of information about what they had seen; all combining to create a picture of the area that Louis would use to plan his crusade. Behind the fortress of Damietta was a long line of refugees, most with camels carrying all their worldly possessions away from the drums of war. Louis chose to ignore those people. They were not a threat, he said, and their presence would tax the economy of Cairo when his army finally reached that city.
When the cracks in the gates of Damietta were large enough for a man to put his hand through, Louis rode his horse, surrounded by his bodyguards, to the walls of the besieged city. It was ridiculously dangerous; one sharpshooter on the parapet could send a shaft down the king's throat, ending the crusade before it had truly begun. But the arrow never came, and the gate crumbled slowly, each strike of the battering ram sending wood chips flying.
The gate fell backward, breaking the iron-and-stone hinges and crashing into the courtyard behind it. The crusaders, led by King Louis and his bodyguards, surged through the opening. Artois rode on Louis' left, holding his shield high while he feverishly sought out enemies. But no attack came.
The whole courtyard was quiet, practically deserted. A bucket fell off a nearby roof, causing a loud clang and three archers sent shafts that direction in the blink of an eye, their fear making them jittery. There was nothing there, though, just a white cat lying on the roof. It didn't react to the arrows, but looked at them with an expression of boredom.
"Where are they?" Trunk asked.
The world exploded. Three dozen warriors burst out of the nearby buildings, waving their swords and screaming in their strange language. The Ayyubids on the parapet turned their fire inward, hammering the crusaders. Everything was chaos, but the crusaders stayed calm under the eyes of their king, and they calmly met the blitz attack.
The Ayyubids were slender men, with light armor or bare skin, to allow for mobility and agility. They carried long sabers and swung them with hatred, snarling as they searched for European throats and bellies. The Europeans were fully armored, though, and were naturally larger men. They let the Ayyubids attack, and then they countered, eviscerating the Muslims where they stood. After two minutes of intense battle, all of the Ayyubids were dead.
"That was easy," Artois said afterward, panting. He had killed two men with his blade, and, strangely, he had never once felt in any real danger.
"They were covering the retreat for the rest of the populace of Damietta. These men expected to die. They didn't expect to defeat us, only delay us. A brave tactic," Louis said, hearing Artois' words.
"Yes . . . my king," Artois said. Like that, the Seventh Crusade captured Damietta, the mighty port city that controlled the mouth of the Nile River. They officially had a foothold in Egypt, and the time had come to settle in and figure out how to overrun the rest of the nation.
Chapter Twenty
"YOU STAND ACCUSED OF INDECENCIES with this child, Makel. What say you?" the judge asked Christof. They were in a field outside the city, burning under the hot sun. Christof's hands were bound and h
e was on his knees. In front of him was a raised platform with three judges. They were generals of different nations, older men, with greying hair and cold eyes. Behind Christof were hundreds of spectators, witnesses and his family.
"I say the child lies. Prove my guilt!" Christof roared. He had been beaten the night before. Soldiers hate sodomites, especially pedophile sodomites. His hair was dirty and his beard caked with blood. One eye was closed from punches, and he was hunching on one side, like he had broken ribs.
"Are you certain?" Francois whispered to his father, who nodded grimly. Henry was there, too, along with Artois and Olivia. It was the first time they had all been together in over half a year.
"I am certain; I've done this exam before. I can't say that it was your uncle who did the damage, though," Henry responded.
"Father?"
"It was him, Francois. The trapdoor, the looks, the mood swings. I know you may feel loyal to your uncle, but you don't really know him. He's cold inside," Raul answered.
The group lapsed back into silence. The wind picked up and they pulled cloths over their faces, to avoid inhaling the sand and dirt. They had only occupied Damietta for one week, but the men were quickly acclimating to the environment. Drinking copious amounts of water, even when not thirsty, was the toughest habit to develop. Checking your boots and clothes for scorpions and spiders was also a new routine, one that Francois followed religiously.
