Текст книги "The Templar Knight"

Автор книги: Ян Гийу

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According to Count Raymond, much could be accomplished at once. First, he had to negotiate a new truce with Saladin, giving as justification the paltry winter rains, which would lead to poor harvests for both believers and unbelievers alike. And this time the plunderer Reynald de Châtillon could only acquiesce.

Looking ahead a bit, the king would undoubtedly soon be dead. But his sickly nephew and successor to the throne might not live long either, since he was clearly suffering from the aftereffects of the sinful life at court. Children who were born into such illnesses seldom lived to the age of ten, if they even survived their own birth.

And if the Pope, the German emperor, and the constantly bickering kings of England and France could not agree on a new successor, power would remain with the regent, Count Raymond for a long time.

So it looked as though the brave little king in his litter had managed to save the Holy Land after all; it was his last accomplishment in this life.

On that night in Jerusalem there was no other apparent possibility, no cloud in the sky despite the fact that all the men among Arn’s guests were far more experienced in the struggle for power than he was. Not even Agnes de Courtenay or her treacherous brother Joscelyn could do much to counter the unanimous oath given before God by the High Council.

For almost an hour they tried to imagine what possible or impossible intrigues the evil woman, her patriarch lover, and incompetent brother might dream up in their desperate situation. But Outremer’s most experienced knights could see no way out for her and her cronies.

Therefore they turned to the wine, which always runs more lightly down merry throats than gloomy ones, and the guests spent the rest of the night telling wild tales.

Prince Bohemund of Antioch knew everything about the man who more than anyone else threatened the peace: Reynald de Châtillon. Reynald was a man who carried destruction within him, like the genie in the bottle, Bohemund recounted. Reynald had come to Antioch from somewhere in France. He took service with Prince Bohemund’s father and proved himself so skilled on the battlefield that after only a few years he was rewarded with the hand of Bohemund’s sister Constance in marriage.

A wise man of normal ambition would have stopped there: prince of Antioch, wealthy and protected. But not Reynald, whose appetite had grown to insatiable proportions.

He wanted to go out on expeditions of conquest and plunder but did not have the money to do so, so he ordered the patriarch Aimery de Limoges to be bound naked to a stake under the blazing sun and smeared with honey. After a while the patriarch could no longer stand the bees and the sun, and he agreed to lend the rogue Reynald all the money he demanded.

With the funds of a war chest, all he needed then was to locate good plunder. And Reynald chose Cyprus, which was a province in the realm of the Byzantine emperor Manual Komnenos. Cyprus was harried more cruelly than ever before by Reynald de Châtillon. He had the noses of all Christian priests cut off and ordered all the nuns to be raped; he plundered all the churches, destroyed all the harvests, and returned to Antioch with riches. But not with honor.

Emperor Manual Komnenos flew into a rage and sent the entire Byzantine army against Antioch. It was of course unthinkable for Antioch to go to war with the emperor for the sake of a single fool, no matter that he was married to one of the princesses.

Strangely enough Reynald gained the emperor’s forgiveness by returning all the plundered goods still in his possession.

But he had not learned from his experience, and only two years later he set out on a new plundering expedition against the Armenian and Syrian Christians, who naturally did not expect to be attacked by fellow believers. There was ample rich booty to be had. And many Christians ended up dead.

Heavily loaded with loot on his way home to Antioch, Reynald was captured by Majd al-Din of Aleppo. And finally he landed where he belonged, in one of Aleppo’s dungeons.

Since everyone agreed that it was much safer to leave him there, and nobody would ransom the criminal, the story should rightfully have ended happily there.

Prince Bohemund now paused in his account, toasted his friend Count Raymond ironically, and explained that the rest was actually Raymond’s fault.

Count Raymond laughed and shook his head, ordered more wine which Arn supplied at once, and said that assigning the blame was probably both right and wrong.

It all happened during the war ten years before, he told them. Saladin was still far from uniting the Saracens, and in that respect it was important to throw as many poles into the spokes of his wheels as possible. At that time, in 1175, Saladin had an army outside the walls of Aleppo and another one outside Homs. The problem was to ensure that the two cities did not fall into his hands. Count Raymond had therefore sent his army from Tripoli to break the siege at Homs, forcing Saladin to release his grip on Aleppo and rush toward Homs. In this way Aleppo was spared Saladin’s power for several years.

So far everything had gone as they had hoped, Count Raymond said with an exaggerated sigh. But Gumushlekin of Aleppo now wanted to show his goodwill toward the Christians and decided to release a number of prisoners. He couldn’t have done the Christians a greater disservice. Or a greater favor to Saladin, for that matter. Among the prisoners that were now released were Reynald de Châtillon and Agnes de Courtenay’s incompetent brother Joscelyn!

The guests now doubled over with laughter when they heard what a misguided favor the atabeq of Aleppo had done his Christian friends.

Well, they all knew the rest of the story, Count Raymond went on. The now impoverished Reynald de Châtillon, deeply despised by all honorable men, accompanied Joscelyn de Courtenay to Jerusalem, and everything soon fell into their undeserving hands. First King Amalrik died, so that Baldwin IV became king, although still a child. Then his mother returned to the court, after years of being forbidden to show her face there, for reasons known to everyone. Her brother Joscelyn soon came into favor, and Reynald was able with the evil Agnes’s help to find a rich widow, namely Stéphanie de Milly of Kerak and Montreal in Oultrejourdain. And so the villain was a fortress master and wealthy once again!

The only question was: Who had benefited more from this play of caprices in life, the Devil or Saladin?

Both had reaped equal benefits, they all were quick to agree.

Furthermore the conspirators gathered in the Templar quarter believed on that night that they now had Reynald under control. Fortunately the sickly King Baldwin had mustered the strength to intervene against Reynald’s constant breaches of every peace agreement, and Guy de Lusignan, during his brief time as regent, had shown himself to be utterly incompetent. Count Raymond, much enlivened, assured them that with him as regent things would be very different in Jerusalem.

Now that they were speaking of incompetents, the question remained where Gérard de Ridefort had gone. Arn replied that the blessed Grand Master, Arnoldo de Torroja, had made Brother Gérard the fortress master of Chastel-Blanc.

Count Raymond then frowned and opined that that was a rather elevated position for someone with so little time in service. Arn agreed, but explained that as he understood the matter, it was the price Arnoldo de Torroja had been willing to pay to keep Gérard de Ridefort as far from Jerusalem as possible. Gérard was thought to have acquired some unsuitable friends at court, and it might be wise to keep him away from such people.

The lively conversation continued until it began to grow light outside, and that night it looked as though the Holy Land could be saved from the misfortune that bunglers, arch-sinners, and intriguers had done their best to bring about. King Baldwin IV died soon afterward, as everyone had expected. Count Raymond then took up his office as regent of Jerusalem. Soon peace prevailed in the Holy Land, pilgrims began to stream in anew, and with them came the longed-for income.

It truly did look as though everything had taken a turn for the better.

Then the new Grand Master of the Order of the Knights Templar, Gérard de Ridefort, came ashore at Saint-Jean d’Acre. He came by ship from Rome, where the Knights Templar had convoked a conciliumwith a sufficient number of high brothers present, including the Master of Rome and the Master of Paris.

From Rome Gérard de Ridefort had brought with him the group of new high brothers who would now take over the leadership of the Knights Templar in the Holy Land. They rode to Jerusalem at once.

Jerusalem’s Master Arn de Gothia was informed about his high-ranking guests only a few hours in advance. He had a few words with Father Louis about the misfortune that had befallen them, then he prayed for a long time in his inner sanctum, which was like a cell in a Cistercian cloister. But otherwise he had no time to do much except make the necessary preparations for the arrival of the Grand Master in Jerusalem.

When the Grand Master and his lofty retinue, with almost all the knights bearing a black band around their horse’s side armor and their mantles, arrived at Jerusalem they were received by two files of white-clad knights who stood lined up all the way from the Damascus Gate to the Templar quarter. There large torches burned at the entrance and the banquet tables were waiting in the great knights’ hall.

Arn de Gothia, who greeted them outside the grand staircase, fell to his knees and bowed his head before he took the Grand Master’s horse by the reins to show that he was no more than a stable boy for Gérard de Ridefort. It was thus prescribed by the Rule.

Gérard de Ridefort was in a radiant mood, pleased with his reception. He settled into his seat in the king’s place at the table in the knights’ hall and at once allowed himself and his high brothers to be served. He spoke loudly and at great length about how delightful it was to be back in Jerusalem.

Arn, on the other hand, was not in such a good mood and was having a hard time concealing his feelings. What seemed worst to him was not that he had to obey the slightest gesture of a man whom everyone described as illiterate, vengeful, and unworthy, and who had not served half the time that Arn had served as a Templar knight. The worst thing was that the Knights Templar now had a Grand Master who was a sworn enemy of the regent, Count Raymond. With that the clouds of unrest began gathering again over the Holy Land.

After the meal when most of the guests had been shown to their quarters, the Grand Master ordered Arn and another two men whom Arn did not know to accompany him to his private rooms. Gérard de Ridefort was still in a very good mood, almost as if he were looking forward with special joy to the rapid changes he now intended to implement.

He sat down with pleasure in Arn’s normal seat, pressed his splayed fingertips against each other, and regarded the three men for a moment in silence. They all remained standing.

“Tell me, Arn de Gothia…that is what you are called, is it not? Tell me, you and Arnoldo de Torroja were very close, I understand?” he said at last, in a voice that was so deliberately smooth that the hatred was quite audible.

“Yes, Grand Master, that is true,” replied Arn.

“And one might assume that was why he elevated you to Jerusalem’s Master?” asked the Grand Master, cheerfully raising his eyebrows as if he had just had a bright idea.

“Yes, Grand Master, that may have played a role. A Grand Master in our order appoints whomever he likes,” said Arn.

“Good! A very good answer,” said the Grand Master with satisfaction. “What pleased my predecessor in that respect will also please me. Here next to you stands James de Mailly. He has served as fortress master at Cressing in England. As you can see, he wears a fortress master’s mantle.”

“Yes, Grand Master,” said Arn without expression.

“Then I propose that the two of you exchange mantles; you look to be about the same size!” commanded the Grand Master, his tone still cheerful.

As was the custom of the Knights Templar, they had eaten with their mantles fastened around their necks, so that it took only a moment’s work to bow to the Grand Master as a sign of submission and exchange mantles and thus rank and position in the Order of the Knights Templar.

“So, now you’re a fortress master again!” said Gérard de Ridefort with satisfaction. “It pleased your friend Arnoldo to send me off up to the fortress of Chastel-Blanc. What would you say if you were to take over my old post?”

“As you command, so shall I obey, Grand Master. But I would rather take over my old post as fortress master in Gaza,” replied Arn in a low but steady voice.

“Gaza!” the Grand Master burst out, amused. “That’s merely an out-of-the-way speck compared with Chastel-Blanc. But if that is your wish, I shall grant it. When can you leave Jerusalem?”

“Whenever is convenient for you, Grand Master.”

“Good! Shall we say tomorrow after lauds?”

“As you command, Grand Master.”

“Excellent, then you can go. Jerusalem’s Master and I have a number of important affairs to discuss. I bless you and wish you good night.”

The Grand Master turned away from Arn as if he expected the man to vanish into thin air. But Arn remained where he was. Then the Grand Master feigned surprise at finding him still there, and waved his hand as if to inquire the reason.

“It is my duty to report one thing to you, Grand Master, a fact that I may not convey to anyone but you and whoever is Jerusalem’s Master, and that is now Brother James.”

“If Arnoldo gave you such instructions, I waive them immediately. A living Grand Master takes precedence over a dead one. So what does this concern?” asked Gérard de Ridefort with clear scorn in his voice.

“The instructions come not from Arnoldo but from the Holy Father in Rome,” replied Arn in a low voice, careful not to respond to the derisive tone.

For the first time the new Grand Master’s excessive self-assurance faltered. He gave Arn a doubtful look before he realized that Arn was serious, and then nodded to the third brother to leave the room.

Arn went to the archive located several rooms away and fetched the papal bull describing the fact that the patriarch Heraclius was an assassin, and also how this secret must be preserved. When he returned he unrolled the text and placed it on the table before the Grand Master, bowed, and took a step back.

The Grand Master glanced at the bull, recognizing the papal seal; he also realized that he could not read the text because it was in Latin. He therefore had no choice; he had to humble himself and ask Arn to read it and translate, which Arn did without showing a hint of surprise.

Both the Grand Master and his new Jerusalem’s Master James de Mailly lost their good humor immediately when they heard the bad news. Heraclius was the man who had campaigned harder than anyone in the Church for Gérard de Ridefort to become Grand Master. As a result the new Grand Master now owed a debt of gratitude to a known poisoner.

Arn was waved away, and he left the Grand Master at once after giving a deep bow. It was with an unexpected feeling of relief that Arn now went to seek lodging for the night among the guest rooms, for it had struck him that he had only a little more than a year left of his penance. He would soon have served nineteen of the twenty years that he had sworn to complete in the Order of the Knights Templar.

This was a new and foreign thought for him. Until the precise moment when he had been dismissed by the new Grand Master Gérard de Ridefort and for the last time walked through the high-ceilinged halls in the quarters of the Knights Templar in Jerusalem, he had avoided counting the years, months, and days. Possibly because it was more than likely that he would be sent to Paradise by the enemy long before he had managed to serve his twenty years.

But now there was only a year left, and a peace accord was in place for the next several years with Saladin. There was no war on the horizon in the coming year. So he might survive after all; he might at last travel home.

Never before had he felt such a strong longing for home. At the start of his time in the Holy Land the twenty years had seemed such an eternity that it was impossible to imagine himself living beyond that point. And in recent years he had been much too busy with his blessed work as Jerusalem’s Master to imagine another life for himself. On that evening, not long ago, he had sat in the rooms where Gérard de Ridefort now ruled, discussing the future of the Holy Land with Count Raymond, Prince Bohemund, Roger des Moulins, and the d’Ibelin brothers. On that evening all the power in the Holy Land and Outremer was together in the same room, and the future had looked bright. Together they had been able to conclude peace with Saladin.

Now the entire chessboard had been overturned. Gérard de Ridefort was a mortal enemy of the regent Count Raymond. All plans to bring the Templars and the Hospitallers closer together would now probably come to naught. As if he felt some warning about the future, Arn sensed that he was seeing only the beginning of evil changes that were in store for the entire Holy Land.

When he returned to Gaza he could at least look forward to seeing his Norwegian kinsman Harald Øysteinsson, who by this time was heartily tired of singing hymns and sweating all day long in a remote fortress in the baking sun. The little that Harald had seen of war in the Holy Land had not been to his liking; the tedious daily life time in a fortress during peacetime must seem even worse.

Arn then realized that as fortress master he would be able to order the brothers and sergeants who could swim and dive to continue practicing those skills. If Gaza’s harbor was ever blockaded by an enemy fleet and the city was simultaneously under siege, the ability to swim at night through the enemy blockade would be of great importance. Since Arn himself and Harald were the only ones who could really swim and dive, this new exercise would be more for their own private pleasure than any serious preparation for war. The Rule forbade them to practice together on Gaza’s jetties, since no Templar knight could show himself undressed before another brother, nor could anyone swim solely for the sake of pleasure. So they would have to take turns swimming, but their enjoyment in partaking of this alleged practice for war would surely be considerably greater than its military usefulness to the Knights Templar.

Some years earlier Arn would never have dreamed of twisting and turning the Rule so wantonly. But now that he felt his remaining time in service to be more of a waiting period than a holy duty, he surrendered much of the gravity that had previously marked his behavior. He and Harald began to speak of traveling together; as fortress master Arn could relieve Harald at any time from his duties as sergeant. They agreed that such a long journey to the North was something they would prefer to do together.

Yet it was difficult to imagine how they would get together enough funds for the journey. During his almost twenty years of being personally penniless Arn was no longer accustomed to thinking of money as a problem. On reflection, however, he found that he could certainly borrow enough traveling money from one of the worldly knights he knew. In the worst case, he and Harald might have to go into service for a year or so, for instance in Tripoli or Antioch, before they could afford to leave.

Once they began talking about the journey, it made them long for home even more. They dreamed of regions they had long ago pushed out of their minds; they saw faces from the past and in the silence heard their own language. To Arn a special image from what had once been his home grew stronger than everything else. Each night he saw Cecilia, each night he prayed to God’s Mother to protect Cecilia and his unknown child.

Occasionally he received news from travelers going between Gaza and Jerusalem, and his feeling was reinforced that everything was sliding downhill when it came to the Holy Land. Now in Jerusalem no prayers were permitted except by Christians, and no Saracen doctors or Jews could work for either the Templar knights or the worldly ones. The enmity between Hospitallers and Templars had grown worse than ever, since the two Grand Masters refused to speak to each other. And the Knights Templar seemed to be doing whatever they could to sabotage the peace that the regent, Count Raymond, was trying his best to maintain. One warning sign was that the Knights Templar had come to be close friends with the caravan plunderer Reynald de Châtillon of Kerak. As Arn understood the situation, it was probably only a matter of time before that man would venture out on new plundering raids. When he did the peace with Saladin would be broken, and that was what the Knights Templar clearly wanted to happen.

But nowadays Arn was thinking about his journey home and was more interested in counting his remaining days in the Order of the Knights Templar than he was concerned about the black clouds he saw looming over the eastern horizon of the Holy Land. In his own mind he defended this attitude by thinking that he could no longer do any useful work since God had taken away all his power within the Order. Nor could he blame himself for his new indifference.

During this uneventful year in Gaza he devoted more hours than necessary every day to riding his Arabian horses, the stallion Ibn Anaza and the mare Umm Anaza. They were the only property permitted to him; if he found the right buyer they would pay for both his and Harald’s trip home to the North several times over. But he had no intention of voluntarily relinquishing these two horses, because he judged them to be the best steeds he had ever seen, much less ridden. Ibn Anaza and Umm Anaza would definitely come home with him to Western Götaland.

Western Götaland. He said the name of his country to himself now and then, as if to get used to it again.

When he had ten months left of his service, a rider came with urgent news from the Grand Master in Jerusalem. Arn de Gothia was to ride immediately to Ashkelon with thirty knights to serve as part of an important escort.

Obviously he obeyed at once, and arrived with his knights in Ashkelon that same afternoon.

What had happened was momentous but not unexpected. The child king Baldwin V had died in the care of his uncle, Joscelyn de Courtenay, and the body now had to be accompanied to Jerusalem along with the funeral guests Guy de Lusignan and Sibylla, the apparently not very sad mother of the child.

On the road between Ashkelon and Jerusalem Arn had already realized that the import of the journey was much greater than grieving for and burying a child. There was a power shift in the making.

Two days later in Jerusalem, when Joscelyn de Courtenay proclaimed his niece Sibylla as successor to the throne, the plans of the conspirators of the coup were made clear.

In the Templars’ quarter where Arn was now living in the guest rooms for the lower knights, he met a dejected Father Louis, who told him everything that had happened.

First Joscelyn de Courtenay had come rushing to Jerusalem. There he met with the regent, Count Raymond, and told him about the death of the child king Baldwin. He suggested to Raymond that he summon the high council of barons to meet in Tiberias instead of in Jerusalem. In this way they could avoid interference from the Grand Master of the Templars, Gérard de Ridefort, who did not feel bound by any oath to obey King Baldwin IV’s last will, and the patriarch Heraclius, who also tried to get his fingers in everything.

Count Raymond had thus let himself be duped into leaving Jerusalem. At that point Reynald de Châtillon came thundering into the city with scores of knights from Kerak; then Joscelyn de Courtenay at once proclaimed his niece Sibylla the next successor to the throne. This would mean, if the plan were carried out, that the incompetent Guy de Lusignan could soon be King of Jerusalem and the Holy Land. Count Raymond, the d’Ibelin brothers, and all the others who could have prevented such a move had been lured away from Jerusalem. All the gates and walls around the city were guarded by the Knights Templar, so no enemy of the conspirators could slip into the city. It seemed that nothing could stop the evil that was about to befall the Holy Land.

The only one who made any attempt to avert this calamity in the following days was the Grand Master of the Hospitallers, Roger des Moulins. He refused to betray the oath he had given before God to the late King Baldwin IV. The patriarch Heraclius, however, did not feel bound by any oath, and the Grand Master of the Templars, Gérard de Ridefort, pointed out that he himself had never sworn such an oath; the promise that a dismissed Jerusalem’s Master had made on his behalf could not be considered valid.

The coronation took place in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. First the caravan plunderer Reynald de Châtillon gave a powerful speech in which he claimed that Sibylla was in truth the rightful successor to the throne, since she was the daughter of King Amalrik, the sister of King Baldwin IV, and the mother of the deceased King Baldwin V. Then the patriarch Heraclius crowned Sibylla. She in turn took the crown and placed it on the head of her husband, Guy de Lusignan, and then placed the scepter in his hand.

As everyone was filing out of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher to go to the customary banquet in the Templars’ quarter, Gérard de Ridefort shouted out his joy. With God’s help he had finally taken his great and absolutely glorious revenge on Count Raymond, who now sat far off in Tiberias and could do nothing but gnash his teeth.

Arn was present during the coronation because he had been entrusted with the responsibility for the guards that would protect the lives of the new king and queen. He found this to be a bitter task, since he viewed those he protected as perjurers who would drive the Holy Land to its doom. He steeled himself with the thought that his remaining time in the Holy Land was only seven months.

To add to Arn’s bitterness, Grand Master Gérard de Ridefort called him over to assure him that he did not bear a grudge. On the contrary, the Grand Master said that there was much that he did not know when he so hastily relieved Arn of his command of Jerusalem. He had now learned that Arn was a great warrior, the best archer and rider, and also the victor of Mont Gisard. So now he wanted to make amends to some extent by giving Arn the honored assignment of becoming commander of the royal guard.

Arn felt insulted, but he didn’t show it. He began counting the days until the 4th of July, 1187; it was on that day twenty years earlier that he had sworn obedience, poverty, and chastity for the length of his penance.

What he saw during his brief time as commander of the royal guard did not surprise him in the least. Guy de Lusignan and his wife Sibylla carried on the same indecent nighttime activities as did the patriarch Heraclius; Sibylla’s mother, Agnes; and her uncle Joscelyn de Courtenay.

Earlier in his service Arn would have probably wept to see all power in the Holy Land gathered in the hands of these sinners from the abyss. Now he felt more resigned, as if he had already become reconciled to the idea that God’s punishment could only be one: the loss of the Holy Land and Jerusalem.

Toward the end of the year, as expected, Reynald de Châtillon broke the truce with Saladin and plundered the largest ever caravan to be attacked on its way between Mecca and Damascus. It was not hard to understand that Saladin was furious; one of the travelers who had landed in the dungeon of the fortress of Kerak was his sister. Soon the rumor reached Jerusalem that Saladin had sworn to God to kill Reynald with his own hands.

When Saladin’s negotiator came to King Guy de Lusignan to demand reparations for the breach of the peace agreement and the immediate release of the prisoners, Guy could promise nothing. He regretted that he had no power over Reynald de Châtillon.

With that there was no salvation from the coming war.

Prince Bohemund of Antioch, however, quickly concluded peace between Antiochia and Saladin. Count Raymond did the same for both his County of Tripoli and his wife Escheva’s lands around Tiberias in the Galilee. Neither Bohemund nor Raymond considered that they had any responsibility for what the demented court in Jerusalem might do, and they soon informed Saladin of this fact.

Now a civil war amongst the Christians seemed imminent. Gérard de Ridefort persuaded King Guy to send an army to Tiberias to humble Count Raymond once and for all.

However, at the last minute Balian d’Ibelin managed to convince the king to listen to reason. Civil war would be the same as death, because they would soon be in a full-scale war with Saladin. What was needed now, argued Balian d’Ibelin, was reconciliation with Count Raymond; he offered to serve as the envoy and go to Tiberias to negotiate.

Appointed as negotiators were the two Grand Masters, Gérard de Ridefort and Roger des Moulins, Balian d’Ibelin, and Bishop Josias of Tyrus. A few knights from the Hospitallers and the Templars would escort them, including Arn de Gothia.

Meanwhile, Count Raymond in Tiberias had a difficult dilemma. As if to test the viability of the peace accord between them, Saladin sent his son al Afdal with a request to be allowed to send a large scouting party for one day through Galilee. Count Raymond agreed to this, under the condition that the force would ride into the region at sunrise and be out by sundown. So it was agreed.

At the same time Count Raymond sent riders to warn the approaching negotiation group not to end up in the clutches of the enemy force.