Siege of Heaven (36 page)

The light on Peter’s face burned brighter than ever. Still holding his fist aloft, he turned to survey his congregation. Wherever he looked, the noise seemed to redouble.

‘The way of truth is a thorny path. Will you receive this vision? Will you hear the words the Lord spoke to me, and believe them?’

I thought I felt an edge to his words, a sharpness like the mouth of a trap. But my thoughts were drowned by the commotion around me, thousands of voices all crying out that they
would
hear Peter’s vision.

Peter bowed his head. Behind him, for the first time, I noticed his lieutenant, the self-styled prophet John. I scanned his face for signs of what was to come, but could read nothing in it except pride.

‘I saw the Lord,’ Peter declared. ‘Last night, while I prayed.’

Several in the crowd shouted ‘Amen’, though the majority stayed still and silent, their heads lowered and
their hands clasped before them, as if they could not trust themselves to let go. Many of the women swayed with eyes closed, transported by mystic rapture.

‘A black cross stood before me, its wood rough and ill fitted. I trembled to see it, but the Lord commanded me: “Look up on the cross you seek.”’

His far-seeing eyes stared up as if he could look through the vault of the sky all the way into heaven itself.

‘And suddenly, there upon the cross, I saw the Lord stretched out and crucified, just as in the gospel. He hung naked, save for a black and red linen cloth tied around his loins, bordered with bands of white, red and green. Saint Peter supported Him on the right, and Saint Andrew on the left.

‘Then the Lord spoke to me in a voice as deep as thunder. “Why do the Franks fear to die for me, as I died for them? I went to Jerusalem; I did not fear swords, lances, clubs, sticks or even the cross. Why do they fear to follow me?”

‘I had no answer to give.’ Peter’s voice was desolate; he stood stooped and hunched like an old man. ‘But the Lord said, “The army is riven by doubters and unbelievers. The covetous, the jealous, the cowards and the wicked. They have forgotten their calling: pretending caution, they corrupt even the bold and tempt them away from the righteous battle.”’

Peter raised his head defiantly, staring straight ahead at a point in the crowd. I could not see who stood there, but I could guess.

‘“But these evil men infest the body of this army like maggots,” I said. “How can we root them out?”

‘Then the wounds of Christ reopened, and blood gushed out from his hands, his feet and his side.’ Peter waved the hand that still clasped the fragment of the lance. ‘He asked, “Do you see my wounds?” And by some divine power my hand was stretched forward so that my fingers penetrated the wound. My arm became sticky with blood; within I could feel the bones of his ribs and the soft flesh of his intestines.’

His face lit up with sickened wonder. At the back of the crowd, I heard someone retching.

‘The Lord continued, “As you see these five wounds, you must command Count Raymond, Duke Godfrey and all the princes to order their army in five ranks, as if for battle. Then the heralds will shout the war cry,
Deus vult
, three times, and the Holy Spirit will move across the face of the army, dividing them. And in the first rank you will see the best men, those who do not fear swords or spears or the torments of battle. They reside in me, and I in them, and at their deaths they will take their rightful places by my side.

‘“In the second row are the auxiliaries, a rear-guard to protect the front rank. They are the apostles, who followed me and ate at my table. Behind them come their servants, who bring food and weapons to the front line – they are like the ones who pitied me on the cross but did not have the courage to act. All these men, I tell you, are worthy to be saved.”’

Peter surveyed his audience, breathing in their adoration. Then something changed: the beatific smile vanished, and anger clouded his face.

“‘In the fourth rank are the cowards and hypocrites, those who shut themselves up when the war comes because they do not trust in my strength to bring victory. It was they who crucified me, who said I deserved death because I claimed to be king, the Son of God. I
am
the Son of God.”’

Peter seemed to rip those last words from the very depths of his soul, shouting with such adamant defiance that you might have forgotten he was merely recounting the words of a vision. He breathed hard as if pressed down by a great burden, and his face was wet with sweat. His whole body convulsed with a raging energy.

With a visible effort he calmed himself. ‘“At the back, in the last rank, you will find the worst of men. Men who are not content to flee the battle themselves, but who use their guile to seduce others, braver and better, to abandon their duty. They are snakes, poisoning the army against me. They are the true brothers of the traitor Iscariot, the heirs of Pilate, and I will show them no mercy.’”

Once again, Peter’s burning gaze was trained on that place in the crowd to my left, where Duke Godfrey’s knights were gathered thickest.

“‘What shall we do with them?” I asked.’

Peter raked his eyes over the audience, revelling in their dread anticipation. He licked his lips – his throat must have been parched from the effort, but when he spoke
again his voice was deep and vivid, a terrible sound that seemed to come not from within him but through him, like a great wind funnelled through a doorway.

“‘Kill them all.’”

A shocked silence fell upon the crowd. Eyes downcast, they began to edge away from Peter like a receding tide, while the princes pushed their way forward and gathered in front of him for a council. I attached myself to Nikephoros and watched discreetly from the margin.

‘Does God say that I should massacre the fifth part of my army?’

The Duke of Normandy, normally reserved, stamped his foot and pounded a fist into his palm. ‘Have I mortgaged my birthright, left all I held dear behind, and come so far through such torments, only to be told that my men are not worthy?’

From high on his rock, Peter Bartholomew stared back implacably. ‘Not the fifth part of your army – only those
the Lord knows as traitors. He did not say there would be equal numbers in all the ranks.’

‘I say there is only one traitor we need to be rid of – the sooner the better.’ Tancred touched one hand to his sword hilt, while the other sliced a gruesome gesture across his throat.

‘Why?’ asked Peter. ‘Are you afraid of justice? You will stand in the front row when the army assembles, but where will you find yourself when God has winnowed His field?’

‘Enough!’ Raymond stepped to the front of the princes and swung around to face them. ‘God has already showed the high favour in which He holds Peter Bartholomew. It was through him that He revealed the holy lance.’

It was not the definitive argument he had hoped. Several of the princes sniggered audibly, and at the back I heard a voice that sounded like Tancred’s muttering something about a roofer’s nail. Raymond’s single eye glared at them, but the insult was too much for Peter Bartholomew. He leaped down from his boulder, almost shouldering Raymond aside in his haste to confront his doubters.

‘Does anyone dare question the sanctity of the holy lance? You all saw it – you witnessed these very hands dig it from the ground. If any man doubts me, let him say so to my face, so that I may know my enemies.’

‘Nobody doubts the lance.’ Raymond made to lay a soothing hand on Peter’s arm, then thought better of it. ‘We all saw the miracle it brought at Antioch, our Godgiven victory against the Turks.’

‘Nobody denies that God granted us the victory at Antioch,’ Duke Godfrey agreed.

‘Through the lance,’ Peter insisted.

Godfrey shrugged. ‘He works in mysterious ways. I do not presume to read them.’

Another man, a priest with bright orange hair who stood beside Godfrey, spoke up: ‘Even Bishop Adhemar, bless his memory, doubted the authenticity of your iron splinter.’

That was almost true: he had certainly doubted the authenticity of Peter Bartholomew. Perhaps Peter knew that, for the priest’s charge only inflamed his temper further.

‘It is not an iron splinter,’ he raged. ‘It is a fragment of the lance of Longinus. That
splinter
touched the living flesh of our lord Jesus Christ. It was there on Golgotha when the destiny of the world was remade with His blood, and it has come back to us now, after a thousand years buried in the mud of Antioch, to show that the consummation of that destiny is at hand.’

More than once, then and afterwards, I wondered if God – or some other power – truly did speak through Peter Bartholomew. How else to explain the transformations he underwent, the sudden energy that could illuminate his mean body like the sun coming from behind a cloud? One moment he was a braying peasant, the next a pillar of righteousness effortlessly dominating his audience.

‘Did God strike you deaf when I preached my vision?
Were you so blind to its meaning? The Lord is not coming to winnow our army, but to reap the whole world. You know what is written: when the Son of Man comes in His glory, He will separate the people one from another as a shepherd divides the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep at His right hand and tell them, “Come and inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” But the goats He will send into the eternal fire.’

Such was the force and conviction of his words that it was impossible to tell if he was reciting the Gospels, recounting a past dream, or witnessing the horrors he foretold even as he spoke them. The priests and princes drew back, cowering from the assault of his vision. Raymond seemed bewildered; Godfrey looked shocked, while the other faces watched with doubt, fear, hope and guilt.

The red-haired priest stepped forward tentatively. ‘I did not mean to question the truth of your vision.’

‘Or of the lance?’

‘Or of the lance.’

Peter’s face still blazed with righteous fervour. ‘Does any man?’

None did.

‘Besides,’ said the priest, ‘you were not the only man to dream of the lance. There was a priest at Antioch named Stephen of Valence who also received a vision of it, before we uncovered it.’

‘Stephen of Valence received a vision that promised deliverance to come,’ Peter corrected him sternly. ‘He did not see the lance. That was confided to me alone.’

‘But it corroborated your story.’

Peter sniffed. The radiance had departed again, and he seemed diminished. ‘For most men, my word was enough.’

‘But none doubted Stephen. He was so sure of his truth that he willingly offered to undergo the ordeal of the air or the ordeal by fire to prove it.’

‘I would have done the same if anyone had demanded it. Who says I would not?’

‘Nobody,’ said the priest. He spoke reasonably, earnestly. ‘I only said that Stephen
volunteered
to suffer the ordeal.’

All the men in the crowd stood silent, watching Peter Bartholomew. A new fire pulsed in his face, different and angrier than the celestial glow when he prophesied. He moved towards us, his arms twitching.

‘Is that what you want? To see me thrown down from a high tower or set on a pyre? Do you think you will see my body destroyed, broken on rocks and burned in flame? You seek to test me, as the scribes and Pharisees tested Christ once before. But I will have the victory. I will fly through the air and walk through fire – let any man who doubts me come and witness it. But let him be warned that when the trial is over, it will be visited on him tenfold for his disbelief.’

Raymond looked appalled. ‘That is not necessary. No man doubts you. We have your word.’

‘And soon you will have the word of God. You know what is written in the psalms:
He will command His angels to guard you in all your ways. They will bear you up on their hands so that you do not dash your foot against a stone
.’

‘It is also written, in the same place:
Do not put the Lord your God to the test
,’ said Raymond’s chaplain severely.

‘And you should heed those words. Any man who doubts me doubts the Lord himself. Anyone who tests me, tests God.’

Godfrey looked ready to hit him for his audacity. ‘That is blasphemy.’

‘Light the fires and we will see.’

‘No!’ said Raymond. Godfrey rounded on him.

‘Do you have so little faith in your tame peasant that you fear to put him to the ordeal? Do you fear that your authority might die with him, when all men see that the lance was a hoax concocted by charlatans, connived at by princes who should have known better. If you truly wished to preserve your authority you would not be trying to protect this peasant from roasting himself on his own pride – you would lead your army from Arqa this very afternoon, and not halt until you were at the walls of Jerusalem.’

The corner of Raymond’s dead eye-socket twitched, but before he could answer Peter had shouted, ‘Count Raymond protect me? Why should I need it, when I am robed in the armour of God? Build your pyres, stoke them up as high as you can. Two days from now I will pass through the flames and not one hair on my head will be singed. The flames will burn away your lies. The heavens will part with thunder, every element will be dissolved with fire, and all things will be revealed.’