Roselynde (54 page)

Unfortunately the terms of surrender and the division of the city
were the only things Philip and Richard were able to agree upon. In everything
else they were at odds, the main bone of contention being the question of who
was King of Jerusalem, Guy of Lusignan or Conrad of Montferrat.

"And every time I hear either of their names," Simon
said bitterly to Alinor as they walked in the pleasant garden of the inner
court of the palace, "I feel like beating my head against a wall. Neither
is worth a bucket of horse droppings."

"Perhaps—" Alinor sighed, for this was not the first
time she had listened to his plaint "—Conrad will drink himself to death
and Guy will burst of his own pride."

"They had better do it soon," Simon remarked.
"Philip is growing more and more sulky. If he does not get his way in
this, he will go home."

"Good riddance," Alinor snapped. "Richard is black
inside and out every time he comes to my lady, and she, poor thing, cannot be
brought to see that if she would but prick him and let him rage he would feel
the better for it and love her the better also. Simon, I fear all is not well
between them."

"I am sorry for it. If she would let him spit out his bile he
would have
some
use for her. Tush! I should not have said that, but I
cannot trouble myself over what long I despaired of. Alinor, it is not good
riddance if Philip goes. Do you think he will sit still in France or keep his
Crusader's vow to respect the King's territory?"

"No. And I do not care." She looked around to be sure
they were too far from anyone to be overheard. "I hope Philip does make
trouble. Else we will rot here. I am not blind. It will take years to reconquer
this land—and to what purpose? Will Lusignan hold it? Or Montferrat? As soon as
the King sets foot aboard ship, it will fall again. If Philip attacks Normandy,
and it is there his eyes look, I am sure, the King will go home. Then, beloved,
we, too, can go home."

"Not before I have the promise of you," Simon growled.
"I thought I would have it when we took the city by storm, but they
yielded. And now is no time to ask for favors. You are right, Alinor, but I
wish I knew what was happening in England. I spoke to Robert of Leicester when
he came, although not long because the King was still sick then, but even his
news is four months old."

"I spoke with him also. You were right when you said the
Bishop of Rouen would draw in Lord John, and he has. Simon, will there be
war?"

"How can I know?" Simon snarled, snatching the
unoffending head off a flower and crushing it in his hand.

No one's temper improved. Philip left Acre on July 31 and a week
later sailed for France from Tyre. On August 11 the Saracen hostages were
brought to the agreed-upon meeting place, but neither the relics of the Cross
nor the noble Christian prisoners were offered in exchange. Richard raged.
Saladin sent soothing messages. Richard agreed to wait a few days more. On the
night of August 13, Richard came to his wife's chamber and stood in the
doorway.

Berengaria turned white. "What? What have I done?" she
faltered. "I will amend it. Only tell me, and I will amend it."

The King's eyes bulged so with fury that Alinor, withdrawn into a
shadowy corner, thought they would fall out onto the floor. Joanna rose from
her chair, but before she could move Richard turned on her.

"Sit you down and bite your tongue!" he shrieked.
"All we have failed in since we have come to this place is owing to sin. I
swore when I set out from France that there would be no women, only soldiers
vowed to God's work, on this Crusade. I broke that vow, and see how all is cast
into disorder. I will sin no more! I will take myself out of this city of lust
and luxury and do God's work."

With that, he was gone, leaving Joanna and Alinor to deal with his
hysterical wife. It took them hours to calm her, and their work was all to do
over again the next day when they heard that Richard had moved out of the city
and set up his tents on the plain beyond the walls. Then, nothing. Joanna wrote
to her brother and received no reply. Alinor, at her request, wrote to Simon,
describing Berengaria's distress and begging him to intercede with Richard to
send his wife a few lines of comfort. She received no written reply, but the
messengers bore back a few words.

"Be glad for Purgatory. Here is Hell."

A single horseman rode across the plain from the wells near Tell
al' Ayadiyya under the starlit sky. The watchmen on the walls paid him no mind.
Now and again starlight glinted on his steel-clad arms and even in the dark the
stained white tabard with its red cross could be distinguished. At the postern
near the gate, the horseman dismounted and drew his sword. He used the hilt to
pound upon the door.

"The gate is closed," the guard snarled through the
wicket. "None may enter until morning."

"I am Sir Simon Lemagne. Open. Now. Or you will break your
fast on your own lights and liver."

Guardsmen do not quarrel with the close companion of the King. The
postern opened. The knight led his horse through, remounted, and clattered up
the street toward the palace. In the stable he kicked a horseboy awake, dropped
his reins into the boy's hands, and stalked off. His gait was stiff, like that
of a man too long in the saddle or holding himself upright and still with
conscious effort. The palace guards, Alinor's men, knew him well and passed him
without challenge. Inside, the hard sense of purpose seemed to falter. Simon stood
irresolute, as if the dark and silence had brought a realization for the first
time of how late the hour was.

He started off again, but uncertainly, as if he had forgotten the
way. Then along the corridor came soft hurrying footsteps. Simon stopped and,
in a moment, a stripling page ran right into him and bounced off. Simon uttered
a short exclamation of pain while the boy gasped, "Who? Who?"

"You are full young to be playing night games in the maids'
quarters," Simon said drily, "but you serve my purpose, so I will
serve yours. Get you back there. Rouse Lady Alinor's maid Gertrude and bid her
tell her mistress that I await her—" Simon put a hand to his head as if to
run his fingers through his hair. The edge of the steel-sewn gauntlet clashed faintly
against his helm. He dropped his hand.

"Await her where, my lord? And—and who shall I say waits? I
cannot see."

"Sir Simon waits. Where?" Not the Great Hall. When it
was empty sound echoed through that marble vastness. Not the inner court. The
night air brought fever. "Where?" Simon repeated stupidly. "Oh,
in the outer chamber of the King's apartment. And bring me some lights."

The boy ran back the way he had come. Simon followed slowly,
dragging his feet a little. To an observer he would have seemed unendurably
tired, but when he came to his goal he did not seek out the benches along the
wall or the chairs near the table. He stood just inside the door, staring
blankly into the darkness so that the page nearly bumped into him again when he
came with a lighted taper. The boy drew in his breath sharply, partly with
surprise and partly because he saw the stains on the white tabard were neither
rust nor dirt but dried blood.

"Shall I light them all, my lord, and set them on the
table?"

Simon started as if wakened and turned his head away from the
light. "Yes. And wait outside. There may be more messages to carry."

The boy said nothing as he placed the tapers in holders and lit
them, but his face showed disappointment. He had thought he was assisting at a
clandestine assignation. The idea was delightful in all its aspects—being privy
to a secret, having a really juicy piece of gossip about the Queen's youngest
and prettiest lady, perhaps even having a piece of knowledge with which he
could extract a coin or two from the great one, although that was not a safe
idea for dealing with Sir Simon. In any case, his guess had been wrong. One
does not send messages out of a love nest. He took the chance of running to get
his cloak. Love tryst or conference on affairs, both were long and cold for one
who had no seat but the marble floor.

Alinor, shaken out of an uneasy sleep by her maid, could scarcely
credit her message. Simon, God bless him, was a creature of the utmost
propriety. He would be most unlikely to come visiting in the middle of the
night unless an unendurable pressure—The thought brought Alinor out of bed in a
leap. If it had not been for Gertrude's restraining hands, she would have run
naked down the corridors. No remonstrance could make her take time to dress, however.
She pulled on a bedrobe and with her hair flowing unchecked down her back and
her feet bare fled in the direction of the King's apartment. Snatching up a
pair of slippers and a taper, Gertrude pursued her mistress. She would be the
one to bear the blame if Alinor caught her death of cold or came to some hurt.

"Simon," Alinor cried, and then as he turned and she saw
the condition of his armor and tabard, "Oh, God! Are you hurt sore?"

His face was curiously blank. "No. I am a little cut about,
but nothing of consequence."

His voice was curiously blank also. Alinor came up closer, drew
him toward the table where the light was better. She reached up and pulled off
his helmet, unlaced the throat closure and pushed back his mail hood. He stood
quietly, docile as a babe being dressed by its mother. The helmet was undented,
his hair free of blood. It was no blow to the head that was making him appear
dazed.

"Simon, what ails you? Are you taken with a weakness from the
heat again?"

"No." He closed his eyes and swallowed. Even in the poor
light Alinor could see that he had paled and was fighting nausea.

He had taken the King's sickness, she thought. Her hand flew to
his face, but it was cold, not hot. He swallowed again, more easily.

"I have brought the letter you desired from the King to
comfort the Queen."

"The King has not taken any hurt, has he? He is not sick
again?"

"No, no. He is very well. Better than— Oh, God!"

He pulled free of her, staggered to the side of the room and
retched wrenchingly, supporting himself against the wall. Nothing much came.
There was nothing left. Alinor took a deep breath, choked down panic, and went
to the door, thanking God that Simon had had enough sense to come to her when
he was sick.

"You," she said to the page, "get some straw and
water and clean up that mess." She turned to Gertrude. "I want water
for washing and drinking, and wine, and cloth for bandages, and a needle and
silk for sewing flesh. Quick now."

Gertrude thrust the slippers into Alinor's hand and, after staring
at them as if she had no idea what they were, Alinor bent and put them on.
Simon was back near the table when Alinor came into the room. She fetched a
stool from the corner.

"Before you sit, let me pull off your hauberk."

"I must go back," Simon said.

"Not tonight," Alinor replied. "At least not until
I have washed you and seen to your hurts. Not even if I must crown you with
this stool to make you lie still."

A little light came into Simon's eyes, a smile that did not quite
succeed pulled at his mouth. For the first time since Alinor had entered the
room, Simon did not look like a walking dead man.

"When did this sickness come upon you?" Alinor asked.

"Sickness? Oh, that." He gestured to where the page was
wiping up the floor. "That is not a sickness of the body but of the
spirit."

His eyes went blank again. For once Alinor did not suspect Simon
of concealing a physical weakness to spare her anxiety. This hurt she believed
was not of the body. She said nothing, merely pulled off his gauntlets and
began to unlace the side of his tabard. It would be best if he could tell it in
his own way. She had removed the tabard, drawn off the hauberk and seated him
on the stool before he spoke again. When she came back from laying the armor
aside and began to unlace his shirt, he suddenly leaned forward, resting his
head against her and gripping her tight in his arms.

"Alinor, I cannot bear this place. I cannot bear the heaps of
pears and plums and figs, all soft and sickly sweet, that Saladin sends to the
King. I cannot bear the richness of the floors and walls, the soft rugs, the
silken hangings. There is too much of everything. Even hostages. Whoever heard
of three thousand hostages? Only, there are no hostages anymore."

He stopped to breathe harshly and Alinor stroked his hair,
puzzled. She knew Simon was offended by the lush luxury of these eastern lands.
He had said so before, but Simon was no religious fanatic like an anchorite who
could be driven hysterical by luxury. And if the hostages had been returned—
But if the hostages had been returned, why should Simon be all bloody?

"Beloved—" she began.

His arms tightened and he nuzzled his face against her as if he
wanted to bury his head or hide it. "I am hardened in war, Alinor. I have
taken keeps and put the defenders to the sword. 1 have raped and looted. I have
myself hung hostages as a lessoning to those who break treaty, but—but three
thousand? Three thousand, chained, slaughtered like a herd of pigs? It was
rightly done and fairly. We could not leave them behind. So many were
dangerous. And it soon became plain that Saladin had no intention of fulfilling
the terms he had made. He was using the hostages to delay us from beginning an
attack on his other strongholds. But three thousand? The men—our men—were
wetted with blood to the middle of their calves."