Deus Le Volt

by Jon de Burgh Miller

  Reynald was shouting loudly as the rain bombarded him. ‘The people will cry out in worship! Your name will become legend. My name will become legend!’

  The blue light filled Lechasseur’s vision and he felt himself slipping into unconsciousness. The last thing he remembered was Reynald turning to him, his voice scraping and maniacal, his eyes a fiery red, his face covered in blood. ‘Everyone will bow before me,’ Reynald croaked. ‘Everyone will bow before my masters. Everyone will tremble when they hear the name Fendahl!’

  11

  Emily had expected to find the city gates defended by soldiers from one side or the other, but they were deserted and she was free to walk back from the city. It would be a long trek down to the camp unless she could find a horse, but she had to discover if Simon was still alive. He was the only one who could lend soldiers to fight Reynald.

  As soon as she turned out of the city, Emily saw the body of a crusader. Young, no more than seventeen, he was clothed in the sketchy rags and filthy boots of an imbellis, one of Godfrey’s cannon fodder. Ahead she could see more bodies, a number of riderless horses and several men on horseback patrolling the area.

  As she neared, she could see that these weren’t crusaders. She held up her hands to show she meant no harm. One of the riders noticed her and galloped over, speaking urgently in Arabic. The words were alien, but Emily understood what was being said. If she didn’t want to be slaughtered, she would have to return to the city.

  ‘I’m not a Frank,’ she called. ‘I come from the city to bring word to the Frankish prince Godfrey that his men have been slain on the altar of Saint Peter.’

  The Arab soldier looked suspicious. ‘Word has reached us by pigeon that Yaghi-Siyan is dead. It is the Franks who are the encroachers in our land, the Franks who chose to come here. If they suffer and die, it is no more than they deserve.’

  ‘Please, let me through. I will beg the Franks to surrender to you.’

  The soldier nodded. ‘Kerbogha has told us to spare the women. Be on your way, but remember, before the day is out, the Franks will be known for nothing but the amount of their blood that has been spilled.’

  Emily snagged the reins of one of the riderless horses and swung herself into the saddle. She galloped as fast as she could over the crusader bridge across the Orontes and soon reached Godfrey’s camp. Clearly the forces of Kerbogha had attacked with ferocity, and a great battle had taken place. Emily surveyed the aftermath. The air was acrid, the ground treacherous, smoke and blood and ruin spread across the devastated camp.

  The atmosphere was oppressive, a cloud of death hanging over the camp. Emily was disturbed to realise that she found it not so much uncomfortable as fascinating. The air of death was fresh, she could almost smell it. There was something so familiar about it; something under the surface that made her feel like she’d been in a situation like this before. She shuddered and hoped that all the things she’d seen whilst travelling with Honoré weren’t immunising her to the emotional impact of such horrors.

  Emily arrived at Simon’s camp and dismounted. Simon was sitting outside the main tent with several of his advisors. Presumably they were discussing battle strategy. She went over to the group, and Simon smiled as he saw her approach.

  ‘Simon, you have to help me,’ she said, as soon as she was within earshot.

  Simon looked bemused. ‘What is it, Emily?’

  ‘It’s Honoré. He’s found your murderer. He’s a knight. Reynald of Marseille.’

  Simon shook his head with resignation. ‘Why am I not surprised?’

  ‘He’s trapped in the church inside the city. We’ve got him held down, but he’s powerful. Honoré wants you, Godfrey, as many people as possible to come and help stop him. I’m not sure exactly what he’s doing, but something big is happening, and I don’t know how many of us it’s going to take to end it.’

  A rumble of thunder reverberated through the sky.

  ‘Aimery!’ Simon called to one of his vassals. ‘Prepare my horse. I’m going to the city.’

  The vassal hurried over and handed Simon a large cloak.

  ‘Shouldn’t you talk to Godfrey?’ Emily asked.

  ‘There’s no time,’ Simon said as the rain began to fall. ‘Everyone’s occupied fighting Kerbogha. I’ll need to see this Reynald for myself before the strongest soldiers will come with me.’

  Simon apologised to his colleagues and disbanded the meeting, before standing up and looking Emily in the eye. ‘You shouldn’t worry,’ he assured her. ‘I will deal with this knight and bring your friend home.’

  They both looked up suddenly as a terrifying screech echoed all around them. There was a rippling in the air, and a monstrous creature resembling a giant snake appeared out of nowhere to tower above the tent. It had rippling rings of flesh encompassing its body, and a saliva-dripping jaw at its upper extremity containing several rows of piranha-like teeth ringed by a mass of writhing tentacles.

  ‘What the hell is that?’ Emily cried.

  ‘The Devil’s work!’ said Simon grimly.

  One of Simon’s vassals drew his sword and lunged forward to fend off the creature. But the creature quickly reared its head and plunged it down on the back of the man’s neck. He shrieked in pain as the life was literally drawn from him. Emily watched in horror as his skin wrinkled and clung to his bones in an instant. The snake creature released the man’s body, which fell to the ground a mummified corpse. Another vassal approached, but ducked out of the way just in time, the creature’s attack grazing across his body. The man fell stunned to the ground. The creature turned, shrieked again, then rose up into the air and plunged down head-first into the ground, boring through the soil and disappearing like a mole, though it was clear from the increasing transparency of its flesh that it was really disappearing more into thin air than into the ground.

  The creature was gone. Emily and Simon looked at each other in astonishment.

  ‘What was it?’ Emily asked again.

  Simon shook his head. ‘It looked like one of the creatures of myth that captured Turks used to talk about. These myths strike fear into many of my men, but I don’t know...’

  The rain was now falling in torrents from the storm clouds above.

  Simon ran over to where his injured vassal lay. He turned the man over and checked his eyes and his pulse. The man was somewhat wizened, as though even his minor contact with the creature had been sufficient for it to start to suck him dry, but he was still breathing.

  ‘You will survive,’ Simon whispered to the man. ‘Please, stay with us.’

  Emily saw the fearful expression on Simon’s face and knelt down beside the injured man. ‘We have to get him out of the rain.’

  Simon nodded, and together they moved the man into Simon’s tent and lay him down on a bed. The people in the tent had been huddled together, too afraid to investigate the noises from outside. They gasped as they saw what had happened to the vassal. ‘Fetch him some water,’ Simon called. ‘And everyone stay inside. There are beasts of unspeakable danger on the prowl out there.’

  Simon and Emily knelt down beside the vassal and did their best to comfort him.

  Simon gripped the man’s hand tightly, urging him to stay conscious. Emily was both touched and impressed by the devotion that he seemed to be showing to his follower. The crusaders faced death many times a day, yet Simon appeared far from resigned to it despite that. Emily found it hard to believe that he cared this much for every one of his friends who was injured, but looking at his eyes, she realised he did. The crusaders as a whole were a boorish people, but it seemed that inside every box of bad apples there was one good one; and, as she saw a tear run down Simon’s cheek as he held his dying compatriot, she suspected she’d found it.

  Simon turned to look at Emily. ‘If those monsters are something to do with Reynald, then he might be more powerful than even you believed.
I will warn your friend if I can find him. Please, stay here with Aimery, look after him.’

  Emily moved close to Aimery, picked up a cup of water and put it to his lips.

  ‘Bring Honoré back safely, will you?’ she asked.

  Simon nodded. ‘I will be as quick as I can.’ He looked over at Aimery. ‘Goodbye, my friend.’

  Simon left the tent and Emily turned back to her patient.

  Several minutes later, another victim was brought in. Someone else attacked by a monster. Moments later, another. Then someone who had not been attacked by something unearthly, but who had been wounded in one of the battles with Kerbogha’s forces. As more and more wounded soldiers found their way back to their camp, the pressure and tension in Simon’s tent rose.

  After almost an hour of doing all she could to make him comfortable, Emily saw Aimery shudder and pass away. She looked down at his body and wiped away a tear as she covered his face with a scrap of sheeting.

  ‘I’m sorry, Simon,’ she muttered under her breath. ‘I did the best I could.’

  She stood up and looked around the tent at the other soldiers being treated, some presumably also close to death. She had to do something to stop this. It was not in her nature to do nothing while other people took charge.

  ‘I need to borrow some armour,’ she called to one of Simon’s other vassals. The man looked at her quizzically, but having seen the close regard Simon held for her and her angry temper, he clearly realised there was no use in arguing with her. He handed her a chain mail vest and she headed outside the tent, where the downpour of rain continued, and located the horse she had arrived on earlier. She was going to find Simon and Honoré, and together they were going to stop this madness.

  12

  Lechasseur woke to find a lizard perched on his face. He sat up quickly and the lizard tumbled to the ground before scurrying away. Lechasseur was immediately struck by the blood red sky, the constant splatter of rain on his face and the distant noise of what was either a thunderstorm or a battle being fought. For a moment he thought he was back in Normandy, but then he remembered Reynald’s red eyes, burning into his soul.

  Something swooped overhead, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. Had Lechasseur just seen an aircraft? No, not in the 11th Century. A meteorite, perhaps?

  There was a hissing sound, and Lechasseur looked up to see a giant creature undulating through the sky above. It was part dragon, part snake, and left a sizzling band of flame behind it.

  Lechasseur looked around. He was still in Antioch. He could see the Church of Saint Peter in the distance, but the streets around him were bathed in red light, giving them the appearance of being washed in blood. The heat was overwhelming. Lechasseur heard voices and turned to see a nearby arcade, which was covered with a tattered canvas roof. He struggled to his feet and darted under the canvas, to find a street scattered with broken carts and market stalls. He could see no-one there, and wondered whom he had heard. Was he going mad?

  Returning to the rain-soaked main road, he saw a row of half-demolished stone houses, smoke pouring from several of them. As he passed by, the stench of rotting flesh assailed him. A deafening screech suddenly filled the air, and Lechasseur was almost knocked over as a large, horse-like creature with scaly brown skin galloped down the street, closely followed by a horde of rampaging knights. But these were knights like no others he had ever seen before. Their armour was constructed from bone and sinew, and Lechasseur saw that they had skulls for faces and a ghostly blue aura flickering around them.

  He pushed himself as far as he could into the shelter of the wall of one of the houses as the fearsome group passed by, praying that they would not notice him. He hoped there was a sensible explanation for all this. He just had to keep searching until he found out what it was. He glanced down at his leg. It still gave him pain, but at least the bandage appeared to be holding.

  Lechasseur’s thoughts were interrupted by the scream of a young girl. He hurried toward the sound and found a child crouched sobbing beside the bodies of two civilians.

  ‘Hey, easy there,’ Lechasseur said, trying to comfort her. She turned to face him, then turned back to the bodies and continued to cry.

  Lechasseur wondered what to do now, and looked up and down the road. A strange silence seemed to hang over everything, but then he heard the sound of something large being dragged slowly over the cobbled streets. There was a sucking, slurping sound too, something that raised the hairs on the back of his neck. He had heard that noise before.

  He grabbed the girl’s arm and pulled her to her feet.

  ‘We need to get out of here,’ he said, and made to move off. His legs seemed rooted to the ground, however, and he remembered this feeling from before... this feeling of being trapped and helpless.

  The girl suddenly screamed again, and Lechasseur looked up to see a massive, snake-like creature glide effortlessly around the corner in front of them. It was muscular and heavy, and exuded some form of slug-like ichor upon which it slid forward. Its head swayed hypnotically from side to side, and Lechasseur could see the ring of barbed teeth within its maw, surrounded by hundreds of seeking tentacles. The creature moved to the side of the street and smoothly up the wall of one of the houses there, sticking to the upright bricks and defying gravity. Its snout twisted toward Lechasseur and the girl, who were both struggling to break free of the paralysis that had overtaken them, and glided back down to the roadway, approaching them with an almost casual ease.

  Lechasseur closed his eyes and concentrated on trying to make his legs move. He managed to get one, then the other, to stumble forward, and slowly, with the girl dragging behind him, he started to move haltingly down the road, away from the creature.

  He heard the galloping of a horse, distant at first but drawing rapidly closer. There was a cry and the sound of hooves scrabbling on cobbles, and then suddenly Lechasseur found that he could move freely again. He looked around to see a horse and rider trying to spear the snake-like creature with a lance. The rider was struggling to control the horse, which was trying to bolt in terror. The rider managed to fling the lance at the snake, but even as it hit home, so the creature faded from sight, leaving nothing but a slug-trail of gently hardening slime to mark its passage.

  The young girl pulled herself free of Lechasseur’s grip and raced away down the road, vanishing into a side alley some way down. Lechasseur staggered over to the horse’s rider, and recognised the man. ‘Simon. Thanks!’

  Simon nodded formally. ‘Lechasseur. We were worried you might be dead. We haven’t seen you since this morning.’

  Lechasseur put his arms to the horse and began stroking its neck, trying to calm the skittish creature. ‘What was that thing?’

  ‘A Fendahleen. It feeds off fear. Only when it sensed that I wasn’t afraid of it did it disappear.’ Simon motioned for Lechasseur to get on the back of his horse. ‘Come. We should find shelter from the monsters before they return.’

  Darkness had fallen over the city, and Simon and Lechasseur had made a small fire inside an abandoned house. Keeping his voice low so as not to attract attention, Simon told Lechasseur of the terrible events that had occurred while he had been unconscious.

  ‘We need to keep quiet. The forces of evil are everywhere, listening. This morning, our knights took the city and all seemed well, but the Turks had a nasty surprise waiting. The armies of Kerbogha descended on the city, and the ensuing battle has claimed many lives on both sides. But we’ve all seen things – strange, ungodly things. There’s more than just an Earthly battle being waged here.’

  ‘I don’t remember any of it,’ Lechasseur said. ‘I was in the church in the morning. There was a storm, in the church. I mean, inside the building.’

  Simon looked into the middle distance, remembering. ‘Yes, there was a storm. It was as if God himself was crying out for his people to stop their fighting, to stop the killing. You m
ust have been thrown away from the church by the storm. It was more ferocious than any I’ve ever seen. But that storm was just the start of things.’

  Lechasseur could hear the distant sound of people screaming, always on the threshold of his hearing. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Those monsters...’

  ‘What are they?’

  Simon shook his head. ‘The minions of Hell. That’s what everyone says. But... I don’t know, I think there’s something else. Emily told me what Reynald was doing –’

  ‘Is she okay?’

  ‘She’s safe.’

  Lechasseur stood up and walked over to a window. ‘I remember something, the last thing Reynald said before I passed out. He was summoning his god, and he called it... he called it Fendahl.’

  Simon nodded. ‘The Turks call the monsters the Fendahleen. It’s what they cried when they first saw them. It’s a word meaning minions of hell, servants of this Fendahl of which you speak. The creatures appeared in the midst of the storm, as if the rain was God’s rage and this was Hell’s answer to it.’

  Lechasseur shook his head. ‘Reynald must have summoned them, whatever they are. But where do they go when they disappear?’

  Simon shook his head. ‘No-one knows for sure. The Bishop thinks that they’re all connected, all linked to Reynald, the core of his Fendahl god. They’re his eyes and his ears, and they seek out victims whose souls will be absorbed by Reynald’s master. They’ve been killing without mercy. Christian, Jew, Muslim... they don’t discriminate. There was death enough in this place as it was: we didn’t need any more!’

  ‘Why haven’t more people left, if things are that bad?’

  Simon shook his head. ‘Many have, but many others see the tribulations we face as being proof of the Devil’s desperation, tests from God himself. Stronger confirmation than ever that we are doing God’s work, that this is God’s will. “Deus le volt!” they cry. God wills it.’