His words were greeted with joy by the congregation, promising as they did a healing of the rift between Empire and papacy. Berard, glancing about, told himself that pessimism must be a sign of old age. He alone seemed untouched by the euphoria. Gregory, he knew, would never sue for peace, and Frederick wouldn’t rest until Gregory was either dead or so humiliated that he would be deprived of power forever.
On his way out, Frederick paused in the pillared vestibule before the tomb of Godfrey of Bouillon. As he looked at the simple stone slab under which lay the first Christian king of Jerusalem, he felt a chill premonition.
AFTER INSTALLING a garrison in Jerusalem and ordering the reconstruction of her walls, Frederick left the city two days later with a small escort. His aim was to return to Sicily as quickly as possible. He intended, he had told his lords the night before, to sail from Acre in two weeks’ time.
The emir accompanied the imperial cavalcade for several miles outside Jerusalem. On a bleak hill they embraced.
“Farewell, Frederick. May the blessing of Allah always be with you.”
“Farewell, my friend.” Frederick smiled. “One day you’ll come again to my court and we’ll play chess till late into the night!”
Fakhr-ed-Din looked at him. There was sadness in his dark, expressive eyes. “I do not think so, Frederick, but I will wait eagerly for your tidings.” He swung himself into the saddle and raised his hand in a last salute. Turning his mount abruptly, he galloped back to Jerusalem, the red cloaks of his guard billowing on the horizon.
Taking a shortcut through the mountains, they rode through wild, uncultivated country. The March sun stood at its zenith, burning down on the riders in their heavy armor. Frederick guided his mount along a narrow, stony path, more suited to goats than horses. The horse, an Arab stallion named Dragon, had been a gift from Fakhr-ed-Din.
They entered a narrow, rocky ravine. A brook, swelled by recent spring rains, ran along its rocky bed. In the distance, beyond the gorge, rose a bare brown mountain whose crest was still sprinkled with snow. A pair of goshawks hung in the cobalt blue sky, ready to swoop down on their prey. A few stones rolled down the steep side of the defile.
Frederick tensed. He looked up and saw that his Saracens, riding in single file ahead, were looking around uneasily, too. Suddenly a hail of arrows whistled down on them. One bounced off Frederick’s helmet. Armed riders in brown tunics and chain mail skidded down the steep slope toward him in an avalanche of soil and stones. Turning his head, he saw that the same was happening behind him. His horse reared in fright. He pulled the animal away from the path, down into the river bed, yelling to the soldiers in front of him to do the same. If I can lure them across to the other side, he thought, provided they don’t have reinforcements, they’ll be out in the open and will provide a target for my men.
With his back against the other side of the gorge, he faced the attackers. A giant of a man galloped toward him with his couched lance, uttering bloodcurdling cries. Hemmed in by boulders, Frederick ducked. The lance flew through the air and splashed into the water beside him. The two horses were side by side. Frederick plunged his sword into the brown cloak. Blood bubbled from the man’s mouth before he fell off his horse into the river. Hermann appeared, still on his charger but without his helmet. There was a nasty gash above the grand master’s right arm. A lance had torn through the chain mail that hung in metal shreds. Despite his injury, he gripped his bloodied sword, ready to defend Frederick.
The gorge echoed with the clanking of swords and the terrified whinnying of horses. Frederick’s Saracens had rallied around him in a protective circle. The attackers, fewer than he had at first thought, having lost the advantage of surprise, turned and scrambled back up the hill. Faceless brown shadows, unreal under the broad noseguards of their steel helmets, they melted away as swiftly as they had come. An eerie silence descended on the gorge. The hawks still glided in the blue sky.
Frederick leaped off his horse and waded to where his dead assailant lay facedown in the shallow, crystalline water. With his foot, he turned the man over. A young, aristocratic face with a thin nose, pale now in death. With a start, he recognized him. It was the French knight who had so rudely interrupted him at the meeting in Acre. A Templar.
Hermann bent over him. “Armand de Coucy. It is as I thought. They have plotted to assassinate you.”
“At the instigation of the pope? Aided by Jean de Brienne? So that I would never return to defend my realm?” Frederick spat the words.
Hermann looked with disgust at the dead man. He nodded. “Aye, my lord.”
The rest of his escort, some injured, others merely disheveled, waded toward him. Berard’s tunic was torn and smeared with mud. He had been unhorsed. The archbishop, up to his ankles in water, stared at the dead man. He looked at Frederick, arching his brows.
“Templars,” Frederick kicked the corpse contemptuously. “Take this vermin along as evidence.”
I’ll stamp this evil out forever, he thought as he swung himself back into the saddle. Not just in Acre, but at its very roots, in Rome.
APULIA, JUNE 1229
The sentry in the watchtower peered over the parapet into the darkness. The faces of the riders at the gate were blurred shadows dancing in the torchlight. Their banners hung limp and unrecognizable.
“Open in the name of the emperor!” a voice bellowed.
The sentry shook himself awake. The emperor? The emperor was on crusade in the Holy Land. He had died there, some said. In these dangerous times, betrayal and subterfuge were commonplace. None of the Pope’s accursed mercenaries had yet penetrated this far into the Apulian mountains, but they might well employ such a ruse.
“The emperor is in the Holy Land. Show me the emperor, if he’s here!” he called down.
A rider threaded his horse through the others. Taking a lantern from one of the soldiers, the horseman held it up to his face.
The sentry stared down. “It’s the emperor!” he cried to the other guards. “Open for the emperor!”
THE DOOR WAS flung open. The old nurse sleeping at the foot of the bed was instantly awake.
“My lady!” she screamed, “my lady!”
Bianca stirred in the bed, its curtains left undrawn because of the heat. “What is it, Peppa?” she asked, sitting up slowly. Then she saw the figure in the doorway, outlined by the light in the passage behind. “Frederick!” Bianca threw off the sheet and flew toward him.
He caught her halfway across the room. “My beloved, my precious,” he murmured as he held her to him, kissing the top of her head. He could feel the sobs that racked her while her arms encircled him. She raised her face, streaked with tears, and smiled up at him. “You’re back!”
“So I am, my love, but alas, I have to leave at dawn.” He kissed her wet cheek. “I’m on my way to Capua.” Peppa, after lighting the candles on the table, tiptoed from the chamber, closing the door.
They sat down beside each other on the bed. In the dim light Bianca could see lines of fatigue etched on his face. He still wore his riding tunic and dusty boots. She rubbed his forehead where the steel of his helmet had left a red weal.
He caught her hand. Turning it over, he kissed the inside of her wrist, the white skin untouched by the sun. He looked up. “I’ve come here just to be with you for a few hours, when I should be riding through the night.”
“Is it true that you have won Jerusalem?”
He nodded.
“The whole of Europe will pay homage to you!” Her eyes glowed.
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” he said with a twisted smile. “The pope has done all he can to blacken my name.”
“Can you prevail against the pope?” she asked.
“Yes, but it will take time. He has freed Naples, Gaeta, and other southern cities from their allegiance to Sicily, and promised them autonomy under his suzerainty. The March of Ancona is occupied by papal troops. But for Manfred, they would have advanced even further.”
�
�My brother had us all brought to this mountain fortress in secret. Conrad cries for his wet nurse. He hates goat’s milk … But Manfred’s wife thought she couldn’t be trusted.”
Frederick’s eyes lit up. “How is my son? And Enzio? And Catherine? We’ll have to wake them at first light. Wait till they see the toys I’ve brought them. Mechanical marvels from the East …”
She smiled. “Conrad is growing like a mushroom. The others are fine. But what about you? You look tired.”
“I’ve never felt better.” He grinned. “All I need is sleep.”
“You know that the pope’s agents were spreading the word that you were dead?”
He nodded. “An old trick. But he was hoping it was true; he had set the Templars to assassinate me. I had their grand master arrested in Acre and their treasury confiscated. Some extra gold will come in very useful.”
“Men are torn between loyalty to you and fear of the pope. Many are afraid that they’ll be damned if they resist soldiers who wear the keys of Saint Peter on their tunics. Is that not a weapon more powerful than the strongest army?”
“Once the people see that I am alive, and recognize the pope’s lies for what they are, they’ll rally to me, some out of loyalty and others out of self-interest. The threat of earthly retribution is for more immediate than the heavenly kind! After I landed in Brindisi, the people danced in the streets. The news of my recovery of Jerusalem is spreading like wildfire, further undermining Gregory. Fear not, I’ll rout the papal mercenaries. And then I’ll wring Gregory’s shriveled neck with my own hands!”
He slipped the nightgown from her shoulders. Bending his head, he murmured, “Tomorrow, we’ll worry about the pope. Tonight, let us be in paradise.” With the hunger of a man long starved, he closed his lips around one delicate nipple. Bianca pressed his head against her in a gesture that was both voluptuous and protective.
He’s mine, he’ll always be mine, she thought, as her body dissolved under the onslaught of his.
AS THE FIRST rays of the sun tinged the horizon, Bianca stood beside Frederick in the lichen-covered courtyard. After he had hugged his sleepy children, she had insisted on staying with him until the last moment. “I may never see you again. This time you won’t deny me as you did when you left for the Holy Land.”
He swung himself into the saddle. Bianca reached up to touch his horse, her eyes moist. “Frederick, may God watch over you.” With the stubborn pride he so loved about her, she shook her head, determined not to weep.
He leaned down. “Don’t cry, beloved, no harm will befall me, I promise you.”
Her right hand lay small and pale on the black stallion’s neck, as if to ward off any evil from him. He laid his hand on hers for an instant before reaching for his reins.
With a last look at her slight figure in the mulberry cloak, he wheeled his horse around and clattered across the drawbridge.
SORA, AUGUST 1229
Mahmoud removed Frederick’s coat of mail and unbuckled his steel knee-guards. Clad only in his padded gambeson, he let himself fall into a camp chair. A page knelt and began to pull off his boots while Mahmoud left to prepare hot water.
A bath, Frederick thought, a bath to wash off the blood and the grime. So much blood …
“Ah, there you are.” Manfred walked into the tent. He waved a rolled parchment. “I’ve got the list of papal prisoners. Some noble names. The ransoms will be substantial!”
“Pour us some wine. My throat’s parched.” Frederick wiped the sweat off his face. The heat had not abated with the setting sun. All day it burned down on men stifling in armor as they breached the walls and took the town street by street. It seemed as if the very soil, soaked in blood, had absorbed the rays of the sun.
Manfred mixed wine and water in two silver cups and handed one to Frederick. Pulling up a stool, he sat and waited for Frederick to speak. He’s aged in the last year, Manfred thought. He felt a stab of sadness. Somehow, he had never thought that Frederick could ever change, grow old, die … There were two lines now running along his nose and his hair was touched with gray. The last months had been tiring, but also exhilarating. Frederick had reconquered town after town. Jean de Brienne was routed. Most soldiers of the Keys fled back to Rome. The pope had taken refuge in the Castel Sant’Angelo.
It was strange that Frederick never took pleasure in his martial success. He was often glum after a battle. Unlike most princes, whose passion for war was bred into them, Frederick disliked bloodshed. He saw the slaughter of men as a waste of resources. A competent general, he organized his campaigns with great attention to detail. Cool-headed and valorous in battle himself, he nevertheless lacked the strategic brilliance of his grandfather Barbarossa, whose soldiers had loved him with a legendary devotion. Frederick, instead, paid his soldiers well, and on time.
Through the open tent flaps, Frederick stared at the city burning against the darkening sky. It was a spectacle of dread beauty. He had ordered Sora razed to the ground and all male citizens of fighting age put to the sword. Sora, close to Montecassino, was one of the Sicilian towns that had yielded to the Pope’s blandishments of autonomy.
From the camp came the usual din of a victorious army. The noise of men, thousands of men. Raucous song, and laughter too, the laughter of men drunk on wine, blood, and pillage … Why did perfectly normal men turn into raging animals during war? They killed and maimed and raped in a frenzy of destruction. What had happened today had been a necessary lesson. Yet, as he watched the women and children and old men depart the city in long lines, carrying their miserable bundles, he had felt sad. Afterward, the soldiery had been allowed to pillage the town before setting fire to it.
The one thing he wouldn’t allow was rape, on pain of death, no matter how much his lords argued that it was the common soldiers’ right, an inevitable evil of war. He’d never forgotten, as a young man, during a raid on a rebel stronghold, the sight of a peasant girl, beaten and torn, being mounted by a line of men in the village square. As they rolled off her with their bloodied members, he had felt such disgust that Alaman had to restrain him from rushing at them with his sword.
Recently, he had a nightmare about Bianca, a dream so horrible that he woke in a cold sweat. He rubbed his forehead with both hands. He had moved her and the children, with Manfred’s family, to the safety of Palermo. He yearned for her as he had never yearned for anyone. Manfred had been to Palermo, but had not said a word. He turned to him now. “How is Bianca?”
Manfred stared at him. He knew that every courier to Palermo carried letters from Frederick to his sister. Despite this, he still hoped that Frederick would tire of her after his long absence in Palestine. Bianca’s reputation had already been destroyed. Sooner or later, her heart would be broken, too. Frederick’s own troubles were exacerbated by his infatuation with her. His adultery had figured prominently in the pope’s catalogue of outrages at the time of the excommunication. Manfred, too, was affected. The more privileges Frederick heaped on him, the more jealous tongues wagged. Yet he loved them both. He shrugged. “She was well.”
“You don’t know how often I think of her.”
Frederick’s candor riled him. He didn’t want to hear more. He was about to make a curt reply when Hermann strode into the tent. Manfred, relieved, rose to bring another camp chair.
“Some wine, my lord von Salza?”
The grand master smiled. “Please, Manfred, but do not forget to mix it with water!” Hermann never drank unwatered wine.
“We’ll strike camp tomorrow,” Frederick said. “We should reach the papal lands by noon.” For weeks, Hermann had resisted marching on Rome, pleading with him to find an alternative solution.
The grand master regarded him from under his bushy eyebrows. “Frederick,” he said, “will you grant me a request?”
Frederick looked at him. “If you want me to abandon my intention to teach Gregory a lesson, I can’t.”
Hermann leaned forward, his big hands on his knees. “Frederick, I beg y
ou, let me make one last attempt. I’ll go to Rome while you remain here. You have nothing to lose. If he still won’t make peace, then you will have no reason not to invade his territory.”
“You’d be wasting your time. The German princes, the Sicilian bishops, even his own cardinals have all pleaded with him. Louis of France has written to him in vain. Gregory will only change his mind when he feels the tip of my sword at his throat!”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Then he’ll be dead and I can have a sensible man elected in his place!”
“You’d kill the pope?”
Frederick smiled. “Well, perhaps I’ll just have him incarcerated and declared insane, which obviously he is.”
“Please let me try once more. I’ve been Gregory’s friend for many years; this time he may listen to me. He knows he has lost; if one offered him an honorable way out, he might accept. In his obsessive hatred of you, he has lost his senses. I think I can make him regain them.”
Frederick studied his hands.
“For your sake and his, let me try,” Hermann said. “It’s a terrible thing to make war on the vicar of Christ. Christendom will condemn you.”
Frederick sighed. “Very well, Hermann. I give you one week. If in seven days you have not returned with a written peace proposal, I march on Rome.”
ANAGNI, AUGUST 1230
Through the mullioned windows of the papal summer palace the sun could be seen setting over the green vineyards in the valley below. A pleasant breeze fanned the three men dining at a long oak table. The servants had been dismissed. They were alone.
The Falcon of Palermo Page 36
