Brethren: An Epic Adventure of the Knights Templar (46 page)

They entered Orléans behind a small trade caravan, whereupon the gates were closed at their backs for the night, the guards waving them along. Everard led them through the streets. The sky above the maze of rooftops, towers and spires was gray-green in the fading light and it had begun to rain by the time the priest brought them, after several wrong turns, to the city’s Templar preceptory. It was a small compound overlooking the Loire, but it had its own chapel and stables and was well appointed inside. The Master came out personally to greet them when their arrival was announced. Will was taken immediately to the infirmary with Everard, and Simon was shown to quarters.

He waited anxiously in the tiny room, staring out through a window-slit, through which came a cold wind and the brackish smell of the river. Other than a stool, there was only a narrow pallet and a toilet bucket in the chamber. Simon realized that he would be bedding on the floor tonight.

When Everard entered a short while later, Simon rose. “How is Will, sir?” he asked tentatively.

“What?” said Everard, sitting heavily on the stool. “Oh. Not good.”

“Was…was it the whore, sir?” Simon managed to ask.

“No, I do not think so. He has a bad fever. The infirmarer thinks it will abate in a few days. The moon is in the appropriate phase and they have begun the bloodletting.”

Simon nodded, some of his fear subsiding.

“You will have to follow the book alone.”

Simon’s mouth fell open. “Sir…!”

“We have to get it from the Hospitallers,” Everard cut across him. “If de Navarre leaves these shores with it, I’ll never see it again!” He opened one of the leather bags he had brought up to the chamber and pulled out a fat pouch and a long hunting knife. “Take these,” he said, thrusting the pouch and the knife into Simon’s hands. “There is money enough in that purse to see you to La Rochelle and back five times. Go straight to our base there and tell the knights that Hospitallers have stolen an important book from the Temple in Paris. Tell them you had to ride on ahead of your party and that they must arrest Nicolas and his brothers, and also de Lyons and this companion of his if they are there. Will and I will follow as soon as we can.”

Simon stared at the pouch and the knife, then back at the priest. He couldn’t speak the native tongue and his Latin was dreadful. He could hardly write his own name, or count to ten and he had only ever wielded a weapon in the Paris preceptory’s stables when Will had been teaching him. Now, this wild-eyed priest wanted him to take more gold than he had seen in his life and go chasing after two groups of armed men? Simon thought of all the distance that lay between him and the coast and although he didn’t know how many miles it was, Everard might just as well have asked him to walk to Jerusalem for all the despair he felt. “I…I don’t think I can do it, sir,” he stammered. “You could go, sir? I could stay with Will and then ride with him when…”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” snapped Everard. “You would be far quicker than I would. We’ve already been delayed. You must get to La Rochelle before Nicolas leaves. Will and I will not be far behind.” His voice quieted, became insidious. “There is no one else, Simon. If you do not do this de Lyons will never be punished for the injustice he has done to Will. And if that happens, Will shall never find peace.”

W
ill watched the line of women passing down the hill toward the cathedral. With cupped hands they sheltered the lighted candles that they held against the raw wind that ruffled the dark waters of the Loire. It was the Festival of the Purification of the Virgin and all those who had given birth in the previous year would take their candles to church to ask the Holy Mother for good health to attend their babies. Priests, monks and clerics throughout Christendom would tonight purify all the candles that would be used during Mass over the coming year.

As he turned from the window, Will caught a glimpse of himself in the basin of water that was placed on the table beside his pallet. His cheeks were gaunt, his eyes sunken and his ribs were craggy ridges over the cave of his stomach. Over the past three months, he had lost almost a third of his body weight. What had started as a fever had become a sickness of the lungs that had almost taken his life. Alongside the scars on his back where Everard had whipped him were a series of fresh cuts, made by the infirmarer’s knife to release the bad humors from his chest. The tiny room stank of the rue and laurel oil that had been used to dress the wounds. For weeks, Will had lain in a sweat-drenched stupor, while pints of blood were drawn from his veins and as all that warm life-liquid had drained from him, so too had his rage, his grief and his guilt, leaving him an ashen-skinned husk who could neither feed, nor dress himself, let alone feel.

But, gradually, over the past fortnight, his cough had started to decrease. The bloodletting had been halted because of the new moon and the color had started to return to his cheeks. With it had come memories. And the stirrings of anger. It was a colder, more intense anger than he had ever experienced. It had kept him awake for the past few nights; overwhelming even the deep pangs of sorrow he had felt when he had started to think of Elwen.

The door opened.

“Have you seen the procession?”

Will didn’t look around at Simon’s voice. “Yes.”

Simon, ignoring Will’s flat tone, kept smiling. He was carrying a bowl of steaming broth and a cup of lamb’s wool: a drink made of roasted apples, ale, sugar and nutmeg. “Here,” he said, pushing the door shut with his foot. “Why don’t you sit. I’ll help you with your dinner.”

The only outward sign of Will’s irritation was the twitch in his jaw. “I can manage.” He was finding the groom’s coddling increasingly annoying and the claustrophobically small room he had been confined to wasn’t helping matters. He was sick of his own smell that had saturated the blankets he slept in and the air he breathed, sick of the square of gray sky in his window. Taking the bowl, Will sat on his pallet and sipped at the broth. The heat ran down the back of his throat and spread through his chest, easing the tightness.

“Brother Jean thinks you will be well enough to travel by the end of the month,” said Simon after a long silence, which was filled by the singing of the women in the streets.

Will nodded. Brother Jean, the infirmarer, had told him as much that morning. Everard, who had come to hear the diagnosis, had been delighted. The priest, Simon had said, had been like a man possessed and had spent the last few weeks in his room, pacing like a caged tiger and consulting all the maps he could find that showed the different routes to the Holy Land—by land and sea.

Will had been tightly enfolded in the fever’s tenacious arms by the time Simon had returned from La Rochelle just before midwinter. The groom’s journey to the port had begun well and he had made good speed, following the Loire down to Blois. But late one evening, just before he reached Tours, his horse had stumbled on a rock. He had walked the lame beast to the city, where he had been forced to spend Everard’s money on a new one. The delay, combined with several days of bad weather, had meant that he had arrived in La Rochelle much later than planned. He had seen nothing of Garin, but had had less difficulty tracking Nicolas’s whereabouts.

When Simon had informed the Templars that a Hospitaller had stolen a valuable book from the preceptory in Paris, the Marshal had sent two knights to the Hospital to demand that Nicolas be handed over. The Hospitallers, who had denied any knowledge of a book, had coolly informed the Templars that four knights had recently arrived from Paris, but that they were no longer there. Three of them had returned to Paris and one, a man named Nicolas de Acre, had left on one of their ships, bound for Acre, six days before. The Templar Marshal, unwilling to further sour relations with the Hospitallers, had told Simon that there was nothing he could do and that it would be up to the Visitor in Paris to pursue the matter further.

When Simon had returned to Orléans, Everard had wanted to leave for the port immediately. But Will had been far too ill to travel and Simon had informed the frustrated priest that no more vessels would be heading that far east until the spring. One of these would be a Templar warship, the
Falcon
; one of the first of the fleet due to leave in the wake of Baybars’s attack on Safed. Everard had sent a message to the Visitor in Paris to inform him that they would be traveling to Acre, himself to make a pilgrimage and Will and Simon to aid in the city’s refortification.

Simon watched Will drain the lamb’s wool. “I’ve been thinking. Maybe we shouldn’t go to Acre. What about the war? I can’t even hold a sword right, you know that.”

“I’ve made up my mind,” replied Will, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He glanced at Simon. “You don’t have to come.”

“Yes I do. Everard won’t take care of you.”

“I don’t need taking care of.”

Simon sighed heavily. “You can barely walk. It will take weeks to get to La Rochelle, then months and months on a ship. And if we get to the Holy Land, how will we find Nicolas, or Garin, if he’s even there?”

Will rose and went to the window. He put his hands on the ledge and closed his eyes, taking in thin breaths of icy air. For several days he had been thinking of Outremer: his father’s burial place. His pale, chapped skin craved the imagined heat of that Eastern sun. His mind craved revenge. The Saracens had taken away his father and Nicolas de Navarre had taken away his one opportunity to redeem himself, to do the one thing he knew his father would have wanted. If Nicolas succeeded in bringing down the Anima Templi and the Temple with it, his father’s death would truly mean nothing and the war would continue unchecked. And Garin? His old friend? The boy who had once made the shadow disappear? He had taken away the one thing Will had left. Elwen. He opened his eyes. “I will find them,” he said, as much to himself as to Simon.

I
t was a cool day in the city of Acre, although warm in comparison to a day of the same month in France or England. In the distance, south of the city, the foothills below Mount Carmel were crowned with indigo clouds, dark against the bleached whites and yellows of the coastal plain. Ethereal bands of rain hung like veils from the sky. In a light, airy chamber in a tower of the Hospital of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, Nicolas de Acre watched the rain drift steadily westward. Through the windows came the clamor and stench from the cattle market that lay outside the compound’s walls. The compound itself was busy. Nicolas spotted two men, pilgrims he guessed, being led across the courtyard to the hospice, one leaning on the other for support. Growing up in Acre, he remembered the hospice, founded, like their Order, for the care of Christian travelers, had always been busy. Now, most of the beds lay empty. A blessing in one sense, Nicolas supposed, but a sign that fewer Christians were here to be treated.

Turning from the view, Nicolas glanced again at the mahogany desk upon which lay the product of ten years of his life. The vellum-bound book had been pushed to one side to accommodate the parchments and inkwell of the clerk who was diligently transcribing a letter that the Grand Master of the Order of St. John, Hugues de Revel, was dictating. The Grand Master, a tall, slender man of middle years with a neat mustache and beard, was sitting upright in a high-backed chair. The clerk was perched awkwardly on the edge of a cushioned couch, as if concerned not to look too at ease on the comfortable furniture. Nicolas, hiding his impatience behind a cool, self-possessed expression, turned back to the window.

He had been waiting for this meeting for almost five months, since his arrival in Acre the summer before. As soon as his ship had docked, he had gone to the Hospital to hand the Book of the Grail to the Grand Master, who, when Nicolas had assumed the name de Navarre and left for Paris, had been a knight like himself. But a few weeks after his arrival a dispute over control of the city’s harbor between the rival Venetian and Genoese merchants had erupted into a civil war that had run on into the autumn. De Revel, one of the many rulers, both assigned and self-appointed, of Acre, had been too busy with negotiations, parleys and the aftermath to see him until now.

“And so, in conclusion, I am sending you twenty knights to bolster the garrison at our preceptory in the noble city of Antioch.” The Grand Master paused and patted his neat beard with his forefinger. “I wish to God that I could send more, dear brother, but these past few years have left us diminished.”

The clerk raised his head at these last words, the point of his quill hovering over the parchment, then wrote, the quill scratching at the skin.

“End it with my regards and send it with the company,” finished de Revel.

“Yes, my lord,” said the clerk. He gathered up his parchments, quill and inkwell, and left the chamber, his feet silent over the rose and jade silk rugs that carpeted the white stones.

De Revel’s eyes flicked to Nicolas. He motioned to the couch. “Sit, Brother de Acre.”

Nicolas did so, not sitting quite as stiffly as the clerk, but not relaxing either. He met the Grand Master’s gaze. Hugues de Revel, although slight of build, was a man of rigidity, like a willow with a rod of iron running through it. Nicolas had seen that steel in the man’s eyes when he had first come to these chambers five months ago and he saw it again now. “I couldn’t help but overhear, sir; we are sending troops to Antioch?”

The Grand Master clasped his long-fingered hands in his lap. His black mantle, with the white cross on the chest, fell expansively around him. “We are sending troops everywhere. I’ve received word from one of our spies in Cairo. Baybars plans to begin his new campaign against us this month, only the sultan, it would seem, has drawn in his net and we cannot get any reliable information as to where he proposes to strike first. For the last few years, Acre has been his primary target, but each time we beat him back from our walls, he turns aside and wreaks bloody vengeance upon our less defensible settlements, although these are becoming fewer with every year that passes. Antioch is of particular concern to me, though. It is one of the more desirable targets left and I doubt, with Baybars leading this campaign, that Prince Bohemond would be able to pay for his preservation a second time.”

Nicolas agreed. A fellow knight had told him of the Mamluks’ attempt on Antioch, fourteen months ago. When Baybars’s commanders had appeared beyond its walls, its ruler, Prince Bohemond, had sacrificed ten wagons filled with gold, jewels and young girls to save his city. Placated by the offering, the commanders had retreated to Aleppo, leaving Antioch untouched. Baybars, it was rumored, had been incensed.

“The sooner King Louis’ Crusade arrives, the better,” muttered the Grand Master. “Although there is still no firm word on when that will be. He took the Cross last year, but the last tidings I received from the West said that the king has been in discussion with his brother, Charles, Count of Anjou, who was recently appointed King of Sicily. De Anjou has apparently been attempting to persuade Louis that Tunis should be taken before any advance on Egypt can be made effectively.”

“Tunis?” said Nicolas with a doubtful frown. “Louis and his men are needed here, in Palestine.”

“I do not disagree, brother. There are those in Acre who believe de Anjou desires to broaden his newly established kingdom. His ambitions for an empire of his own in the East may affect Louis’ plans. We may find ourselves alone in this still, come the king’s arrival. I do not think we can count on him to aid us. However,” said the Grand Master, leaning forward to pick up the Book of the Grail, “these are troubles for another hour and not why you are here.” He opened the book and flicked through the first few pages. “I read it some weeks ago,” he explained. After a moment, he returned it to the table. “You have done well, brother. You have sacrificed much in pursuit of this and undertook this action selflessly in the interests of our Order.”

Nicolas inclined his head respectfully. “It was my duty, sir. I undertook the task gladly. I admit, for a time, I worried that my quest might prove fruitless; that the book might not be able to do the irreparable damage to the Temple that Grand Master de Châteauneuf had hoped when we first learned of it. But, having read it myself, I see that this hope was not unfounded.”

De Revel’s expression was grave. “Yes. It is without doubt the work of heretics and blasphemers. I was sickened reading it. The pope would be outraged were he to discover what the Templars are involved in. But I do not believe that the book would be enough, alone, to compel him to dissolve the Order.”

To Nicolas, the words were a blow, but one he recovered from quickly. “If I may explain, sir, it is not simply its heretical nature that could be leveled at the Order. I was told by my informants that the book also contains the plans of the Anima Templi hidden within the allegory. Plans, they assured me, that could bring down the Temple were they exposed. Grand Master de Châteauneuf hoped, by sending me to retrieve it, that we could use the book to do just that.”

“Even if that is so, brother, any strategies hidden within the narrative would only be clear to those who already know explicitly what they are. The Temple itself launched an investigation into this group years ago and found nothing. We will need more proof if we are to make firm accusations. Do you have any idea as to the exact nature of the Anima Templi’s plans?”

“I have suspicions.” Nicolas sat forward, his gaze intent. “I know that the Anima Templi exists, sir. After the Temple’s attack on our Order, they disbanded, but the priest, Everard de Troyes, is continuing with the aims Armand and the rest were working toward originally. I know this for a fact.”

“I am not disputing what you say. But we will have only one chance to do this and we must make sure that our strike is targeted accurately. Our enmity toward the Temple is well known. We might be chastised for causing trouble needlessly when Outremer is so unstable. The pope is counting on the Temple, just as he is counting on us, to hold back the Saracens. I believe that we should gather more information on this group and their plans before we take any action. The testimonies of those formerly involved, your informants, would greatly strengthen our case.”

“The man who told me about the book died several years ago. He was the only one willing to testify against the Anima Templi and only then when we had possession of it. The others I have had contact with are too scared of the consequences of their betrayal to come forward.”

“Could you persuade them?”

Nicolas was silent for a few moments. “It may be possible using the right means, yes.”

“Good.” De Revel sat back. “Then this may well be of great use to us in the future.”

“The future, sir?” Nicolas frowned. “Shouldn’t we move on this as soon as possible? The sooner we act, the sooner the Temple falls.”

De Revel didn’t speak for several moments. “When Grand Master de Châteauneuf told me of his plan, I admit I thought it a hopeless cause. He was, I believed, chasing rumors. After he died and you wrote and told me of the book’s disappearance, my own interest in your infiltration of the Temple lay more in the possibility of discovering more about their assets: funds; properties; holy relics. When you came to see me a few months ago, you gave me a fairly comprehensive list of what they own in the Kingdom of France, but I had hoped to be able to make reasonable calculations of their financial worth in its entirety.”

“And I still don’t know the reason for that, sir. Can I ask why you wanted to know this?”

The Grand Master pursed his lips, as if deciding whether to answer. “My interest in their worth is due to a proposition that I, and others in our Order, have been considering for some time now.”

“Proposition, sir?”

“We have been discussing whether to attempt to ally ourselves with the Temple.”

Nicolas stared at the Grand Master. “That surely cannot be a possibility, sir?”

“I have no love of the Temple, brother. What Armand and his knights did to us was unforgivable. But Baybars’s Jihad has left us little choice. If we pool our resources, we may be able to withstand his army long enough to regain some of our territories. If not, both our Orders,
all
of us stand to lose everything.”

“With all due respect, sir, you weren’t here when Armand and his knights lay siege to this compound. You have no idea what we went through during those months.”

“You will keep a civil tongue in my presence, brother.”

Nicolas didn’t speak. To have the products of his efforts so brusquely abandoned by another man was upsetting; to have them used for the opposite of the original purpose was nothing short of devastating.

“If the Temple falls now, brother,” said de Revel, “so do we all. Only by allying with them can we hope to continue our dream for a Christian Holy Land. As I said, you have already sacrificed much, but we must now make an even greater sacrifice and work with our enemy for the greater good, or face the very real possibility that we may not live to see another winter in these lands.” Nicolas went to protest, but de Revel continued before he could speak. “I must to do what is in the best interests of our Order and, for the moment, any attempt at undermining or destroying the Temple would run counter to this. If we survive this war and reclaim enough territory, we may find ourselves in a strong enough position to move against the Templars without damaging ourselves. But until such time arises, I will not jeopardize our Order by continuing with de Châteauneuf’s plan, however damning this book may prove. For now, we must concentrate on winning this war. Then, when we are in a position of strength, we can strike.” De Revel picked up the Book of the Grail and rose from his chair. “Until that time, you are finished with this business.” He went to a large iron locker that was set into the wall behind his chair. Taking a key, which hung on a chain from his belt, he unlocked it and put the book inside. “In the coming months, the citizens of Outremer will be relying heavily upon us all.” De Revel nodded to Nicolas. “You are dismissed, brother.”

Nicolas rose and bowed. “Sir.” He turned on his heel and left. In the passage outside, the tall arched windows provided a magnificent view of the city. Nicolas’s gaze skimmed the vista of towers, churches and marketplaces, and came to rest out on the bay where six Templar warships, surrounded by a cavalcade of smaller vessels, were drawing steadily toward the harbor.

THE
FALCON
,
THE BAY OF ACRE, JANUARY
18, 1268
AD

The decks of the thirteen ships were crowded with people: sergeants, knights, pilgrims, merchants, all trying to catch their first glimpse of the city that was slowly taking shape on the horizon. To the north and south lay mountains and dark, clouded skies. In the foreground, stretching from the high city walls to the distant hills, was a sweep of yellow-white emptiness. As the ships drew closer and the detail in the land became clearer, the people on board began to discern pockets of green that marked the barren plain: fields, orchards and hills watered by blue rivers. Some fell to their knees at the sight. This was Palestine: the Holy Land and birthplace of Christ.

On board the
Falcon
, at forty-five yards the longest in the fleet, Will stood on the rembata, leaning against the parapet. Below him, the sides plunged dizzyingly to the water and before him, the iron-tipped ram extended from the bowsprit like a fist. The two-level platform that was built onto the bow also housed the ship’s trebuchet: a similar weapon to the mangonel, only more accurate and using a sling to toss stones rather than a scooped-out beam. Now that they were in friendly waters the catapult was unloaded, its sling swinging loose. When they had passed through the Straits of Gibraltar it had been primed and ready, a comfort when they had seen the first Saracen ships off the coast near Granada. But, in the end, it hadn’t fired a single stone. The six Templar warships, recognizable by the red crosses on their mainsails, had been deterrent enough.