Knights of the Black and White

by Jack Whyte

  “The other night, you were about to tell me how you came to Outremer again,” Hugh began, grinning. “But it must be a very dull story, because the mere thought of it sent you to sleep.”

  St. Omer smiled back at him, a shadow of his former irreverent and irrepressible grin. “I will not do that to you tonight, I promise … not for some time yet, at least.”

  “What did happen over there, Goff? Why did you come back? I thought you never would.”

  St. Omer grimaced. “I could not settle down. I was like a fish out of water in Amiens from the moment I returned. And then after Louise died, I lost all will to live without her … much like your father after your mother’s death. I never knew how much I loved my wife until she grew sick and I lost her, and then I was burdened with guilt over all the years I had spent away from her, playing at being a knight when I could have been with her instead. I tell you, Hugh, I wanted to die. I thought I would never recover from the grief and the guilt … I even thought of killing myself. But I couldn’t. I had inherited everything, against all odds, all my elder brothers having gone before me, one way or another. I had become the paterfamilias, responsible for my entire damned clan and all its holdings. I never wished for it and God knows I never sought it, but it happened anyway and I wanted no part of it. And so I sought advice and assistance from … a trusted friend.” The hesitation was barely perceptible, but Hugh had seen the flickering glance towards Arlo and knew that the friend had been the Order of Rebirth.

  “I see, and what came of that?”

  “Excellent advice, and assistance from my own resources. I wished I had consulted my friend earlier, because the solution, once pointed out to me, was self-evident. As soon as my official year of mourning reached its end, I signed over my entire inheritance, lands and holdings, to my closest relative, a younger cousin from Picardy, from the town of Rouen, retaining only sufficient funds to cover the expense of arming and re-equipping myself and a small group of retainers and mounted men-at-arms to return to Outremer. My farewells were few, so there was nothing to detain us from leaving immediately. We went directly from Amiens to le Havre, then by ship to Marseille, and from there we set sail for Cyprus and eventually Outremer.”

  He grunted deep in his chest, a derisive sound, as though he were sneering at his own folly. “We never came near to Cyprus. We were severely damaged in a collision with a sister ship during a violent summer storm in the Straits of Gibraltar, and less than a day after that we were attacked and sunk by corsairs. They didn’t want to sink us, of course. They wanted our cargo, but the ship went down. I suspect it might have foundered even without their attack, for it was badly holed. Anyway, I was one of only three survivors.”

  “Only three?” Hugh’s voice showed his surprise. “How many died, then?”

  Once again, St. Omer’s headshake was barely discernible. “It shames me to admit that I have no idea, because I paid no attention to such things, too tied up was I in my own problems to take note of what was happening around me. And then, when I needed to know, it was too late. But there were a lot of them. I had a score of men-at-arms, and half as many again of servants, cooks and the like—I had no intention of starving in Outremer this time. Then there were a score and a half of horses and mules, so it was a large ship, with a large crew … perhaps a score of seamen, perhaps even more. But they all died. I was taken at the outset, struck down from behind and then dragged aboard their vessel and chained to the mast, where I could see everything. My men-at-arms fought well for a while, until the deck went down beneath them, and they were armored, so they sank like stones.

  “They took us ashore somewhere in Africa and I never saw the other two prisoners again. My captors could tell from my dress that I was wealthy, so they held me for ransom. One of them spoke our tongue, and so I told him how to contact my fortunate young cousin in Rouen.

  “A year passed by, and then I found out that my cousin had suffered a grievous loss of recollection and had no knowledge of my name or who I was, swearing that he had never known or heard of me.”

  “Aha—” Hugh caught himself on the verge of commenting that the cousin was obviously not a member of the Order. He had completely forgotten that Arlo was sitting there listening. He managed, however, to recover well, he thought. “Tell me, if you will, why that leaves me disgusted but not surprised? Am I becoming cynical? Hmm … So what happened then?”

  “They sold me, as a galley slave. I spent the next four years shackled to an oar. Four years of never having enough food and always having too much work. Four years of whippings, of pain and despair, and of having no friends. Galley slaves have no friends, you know. That’s something you never think about until you find yourself chained to an oar. Their entire life is focused upon staying alive, and their survival depends absolutely upon their own efforts and their own inner strength.”

  He sighed, his eyes focused on some distant point. “One day I fell sick, and I grew worse from day to day. Finally, when I was too weak to stand up and be shackled to my rowing tier, they decided I was finished. One night they picked me up by the wrists and ankles and threw me over the side.”

  He ignored the shocked reactions of his two listeners, his attention still focused on whatever it was he could see in his mind. “That should have been the end of me. But it wasn’t, as you can see … The thing I have never been able to understand is that they threw me overboard with my wrists still manacled together, still wearing chains. They should not have done that. I’ve seen it half a score of times: a man dies at his oar; they strike off his leg irons, to get him away from the oar so his place can be taken by another slave; then they strike off his manacles, because the rusted iron is worth more than the dead man, and only then do they throw the man over the side. It didn’t happen that way with me, I don’t know why … it might have been because I wasn’t shackled to the tier, so they didn’t have to strike off my leg irons. Or maybe they simply didn’t care, or didn’t notice, but whatever the reason, they threw me over wearing iron chains, and against all logic, that saved my life.”

  Now his gaze sharpened and he looked at both his listeners, drawing them into his story. “It was dark, remember, so none of them had noticed that there was a dead log floating alongside. I must have landed right on top of it and knocked myself senseless, but somehow—and I only worked this out later, when I had time to think about it—those chains snagged on or around a stubby projection on one side of the log. The weight of my body must have shifted the balance of the thing and made it roll, because when I woke up I was lying across it, one wrist trapped beneath the water on one side and my legs trailing on the other, but my head was above the water …”

  “What happened then?” Arlo was leaning forward, his face avid.

  St. Omer grunted again and his body moved, as though he were stretching beneath the covers. “I remember I woke up in agony. My arm was twisted up behind me and stretched as though it must break, and once I had regained consciousness I screamed with the pain of it. And then I began to struggle. That was a mistake, for I upset the balance of the log again, and it rolled over. I almost drowned then, but without knowing what I was about, I managed to throw the chains around the log and make it roll again, and that’s when I saw the roots. It was an old tree, not a cut log, and I worked my way along it until I could wrap some chain around the roots and float with my head above water again.

  “And then I spent a full day in the water, feeling the salt crusting on my skin and suffering the agonies of Hell while I fought against the temptation to drink the salt water. I swear there is no greater torment on God’s earth than thirst, but to suffer thirst while immersed in water is unimaginably painful. I knew I would do it, sooner or later—drink the water, I mean—but I fought it for a long, long time and I think I must have gone out of my mind at one point, for I woke up suddenly with my head underwater, and I panicked. But even as I began to kick and flail I heard a shout and felt hands pulling at me, at my hands and arms and hair, and dragging me ou
t of the water. And that, my friends, is when I began believing in miracles.

  “I had been saved by a fishing vessel out of Malta. My tree had drifted towards an islet where they had been fishing. They only saw me when their vessel bumped against my tree. But having saved me, they fed me and tended me until I was strong enough to work, and then they kept me working, ceaselessly but not cruelly, for more than a month. By the time we returned to Valetta, their home port, thanks to good food and simple labor, I had regained much of my health and former strength.

  “I stayed in Valetta for another month, working as a cobbler’s assistant and fighting a congestion in my lungs, and then I picked up a berth on an Italian trader out of Ostia, sailing to Cyprus. I worked my way from there to Jaffa, but I had little money for food and I was growing weaker again by the day. By the time I reached Jericho, where someone had told me I would find the new hospital, I was barely strong enough to walk. The monks took me in, and when I was able to talk again and tell them who I am, they sent word to you.”

  De Payens sat silent for some time, his mouth pursed in a thoughtful moue, and then he inhaled sharply and spoke almost to himself. “Aye, they did … They sent word to me.” He sat straighter. “You’ve been on quite an odyssey, Goff, but it’s over now. You’re safe among your friends … or perhaps I should say between your friends, since there’s only Arlo and myself. But our sole priority now is to have you back on your feet, with meat on your bones and the fire back in your eye. After that, we’ll put you back atop a horse and have you swinging a blade with the best of us, as is your right. I spoke with the brother preceptor today and he told me you should be able to leave here within ten days. By that time, Arlo will have found a place for us all to live … a decent place, with some space and plenty of light and a spot where we can exercise and drill and practice swordplay.

  “In the meantime, you have to work on winning free from here, so sleep and eat well and rebuild your strength. One of us, at least, will visit you each day, to keep you from being too depressed, but I have to ride out tomorrow to escort a group of pilgrims to Jericho. I will be gone for four days, and I will see you as soon as I return. Sleep well, my friend.”

  BY THE TIME de Payens and St. Omer spoke again, five more days had elapsed and Godfrey had improved beyond all Hugh’s expectations. He could get up from his bed and move around easily, leaning lightly on a walking stick, and his voice was full and strong. His eyes were bright and sparkling again, and his skin had taken on a healthy, ruddy glow simply from spending an hour or two outdoors each day.

  After the dinner hour that night the two men were finally alone, sitting on folding chairs by the side of one of the cooking fires, with no one close enough to hear what they were saying.

  St. Omer massaged the palm of his right hand with his left thumb, wiggling his fingers and watching them move. “I’m stiffening up,” he said. “I’m growing old.”

  “All of us are, Goff. No one ever grows younger.”

  “Arlo tells me you went back to your old solitary ways as soon as you returned here, and now you are famed as the knight who never speaks. Why is that?”

  Hugh was momentarily thrown off by the non sequitur, an unexpected challenge, but he merely shrugged. “We’ve been through all this before, Goff.”

  “Aye, but that was years ago. You were angry then—with reason, I agree—over the sins committed in Jerusalem.”

  “There are no buts, Goff. Nothing has changed, despite the passing of the years. The men, the godly knights who are here now, are the same men who were here before. They have different names, and many of them are younger, but, given the opportunity, they would behave in exactly the same way the others did, screaming ‘God wills it!’ as they slaughter women and children.”

  “I doubt that, Hugh.”

  “You doubt it?” De Payens’s voice was low, pitched little above an angry whisper, but his face was twisted into a grimace. “Look about you, Goff, and listen when these people speak of who they are and what they are resolved to do in God’s high, holy name. Because of them, and what they are and what they have done, the name Christian stinks in my nostrils. I have been looking since we came back here, Arlo and I, and I have seen but little Christianity among our allies, or even among our own ranks. There is no love or tolerance, forgiveness or enlightenment among the Christian armies that come here. And believe me, my friend, I searched high and low for months, among leaders, lords, barons, counts, knights, and men-at-arms. I found nothing but greed and avarice, cupidity and lust. I saw men everywhere paying tribute with their voices to the All-High and belching forth prayers of humility and gratitude, while all the time grasping and clutching at anything and everything they could find to steal, and fighting among themselves to win power and position here in this new world they were creating.

  “We came here in the beginning, all those years ago, to free God’s Holy City, and those of us in the Order came to seek God’s truth as it is laid out in our Lore. Instead, we founded kingdoms for ourselves. The Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Principality of Antioch, the County of Edessa! We have set up an empire of our own among the holiest places on this earth, and there is precious little of our God or of the Christian Jesus to be found in any part of it.”

  De Payens lapsed into silence, aware that St. Omer was looking at him from beneath raised eyebrows.

  “Tell me, if you will, why that should surprise you,” the sick man asked.

  Hugh blinked at him. “I don’t understand. Why should what surprise me?”

  His friend was unfazed by his lack of comprehension. “That our Christian brethren should be the way they are? You know better than to be surprised at that, Hugh. You’ve spent years studying the mysteries of our Order. Have you stopped believing in the truth you’ve learned?”

  “No, I have not.” Hugh’s response was instant and indignant. “But the rites I studied were arcane, and those truths were hardly relevant to this world in which we live nowadays. That has been borne out to me since my return by the silence from home, from the Order itself. We expected—I expected—instructions, guidance on what to do, how to proceed. Instead we have heard nothing.”

  “Strange, but I have been thinking quite the opposite, these past five years and more.” St. Omer shook his head gently and smiled at his friend. “While I was shackled to that oar, it seemed to me that the lessons the Order taught us, back in our youth, concerning how we ought to live and what we might expect to learn from our devout Christian brethren were the closest thing I have ever found to the real truth—the truth that prevails in the world in which we have to live. And while much of what we learned back there in our homeland was based upon the Order’s accepted Lore, even more of it was based upon supposition … upon what we might expect, if this and that transpired. Now our entire world is changed, Hugh, and what we were warned to look for has occurred.”

  St. Omer paused, regarding his friend levelly from sunken eyes. “How long has it been since you last had any real communication with our brethren?”

  De Payens shrugged. “Too long, at least five years … But I doubt they have been trying to reach me, for I have not been in hiding.” He thought for a moment, and then went on. “But it has been a long time since I spoke with a brother, other than yourself. There was a time, back when I first returned here, when I would sometimes meet others of our Order, and we would invariably talk of gathering together to rehearse our rituals at the very least, even if we were too small in numbers to celebrate them. Rehearsal was even more important than performance, we all knew, for the rites themselves would survive without us, and could pass for years without being celebrated. But the brotherhood, the brethren themselves, relying as we do on memory and repetition to retain the words and format, need to practice the rituals constantly—the content of them, if not the form. Most of us managed, over the years, to remain close to at least one of the other brothers, so that we could act as catechizers to each other. I kept close company at that time with a knight called Ph
ilippe of Mansur. Philippe and I fought together and practiced our ritual work together until he was killed in a skirmish on the road to Jaffa, about a year after I returned. Since then, I have done nothing. My disillusionment began soon after that …

  “But then there is another thing to consider. I can read and write—I am one of the few people around here who can—so that made the task of revising and relearning words far easier for me than it could be for any of the others. And so, for a time in the beginning, as I told you, we tried to foregather from time to time. But you know what it’s like as well as I do, to try to arrange something for personal motives while on active duty in the middle of a war. The men I knew in those days were all contemporaries, and we had all known each other before the Pope’s war. But then we came to Outremer with our different liege lords, and that alone kept us all far apart from one another. And men were constantly dying, too, so that where there had been a few score of us in the beginning, there were soon less than one score, and reports kept coming in of yet another and another who had fallen in battle or succumbed to one of the plagues and pestilences that thrive here.”

  St. Omer watched him closely as de Payens sat with lowered head, rubbing the bony bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. In a moment, however, Hugh sat erect again and resumed where he had left off speaking.

  “Then, for another while, there came a succession of new faces, eager young men, hungry for glory, with shining eyes and peeling, sunburnt faces, who had come out from France and went about shaking hands with everyone they met until they received a correct response. Those ones were always eager to meet elder brethren and spread the word from home. We almost made it once, nine of us, but on the very day we were to meet, a caravan was attacked within three miles of where we had assembled, and we spent the ensuing night scouring the desert and rescuing hostages.” Hugh’s eyes narrowed to slits as he remembered.