The Religion (80 page)

That morning, after launching a number of skirmishes to cover its advance, Mustafa had deployed Abbas's second siege tower. This time the Turks had reinforced its lower half against cannon shot with gabions full of earth and stone, and sections of iron plate riveted to the stanchions and joists. They'd wheeled it up to the remains of the bastion of Castile and the overtopping janissary marksmen aloft had driven the garrison and workforce thereabouts to cower in the ruins and pray. After some hours languishing in this sorry state, and seeing a massing of troops on the heights that boded a major assault, La Valette had played a variation on the previous day's tactic.

They opened a hole through the undamaged wall some distance to the east of the breach, at a spot invisible to the musketmen in the tower. A raiding party went out under Knight Commander Claramont and Don Guevarez de Pereira. A dozen knights of the German langue had thrust themselves to the forefront of the volunteers and the raiders charged the tower like lathered fiends, a belated Turkish volley from the muskets high above striking sheets of sparks from their armor as they ran.

The detachment of Azeb infantrymen who guarded the ladders to the rear were hacked apart in seconds by the unhinged Northmen, who then clambered up the rungs and swarmed into the galleries and cleansed the tower of Turks one floor at a time. The whole colossal edifice swayed on its squealing guy ropes at the furious violence vented inside its frame. The bellows of rage and cries of agony were hardly distinguishable, and severed limbs and gutted bodies tumbled forth in crimson cascades, as if the structure were an entertainment at a carnival barbarous and wild. When the slaughter was done, the German brethren stood triumphant on the summit and waved blood-splashed
borks
on the points of their swords, and brandished severed heads and steaming fistfuls of viscera, and stomped the slithering boards with a maniac glee, the still-venting cataracts of gore swilling from the tiered platforms as if from a temple of the Mexica in the wake of atrocious rites. They hurled curses and taunts at the legions of Islam gathered on yonder hills, then they raised their faces to Heaven and sang praises to Jesus Christ for letting them know a moment of such rapture uncontained.

As preparations were made to burn the tower to ashes, Tannhauser
suggested that the engine be rather commandeered, and stationed near the wall, and used to the advantage of their own marksmen. His motive in this was to get a better view of the Turkish lines crisscrossing Monte San Salvatore, but La Valette adopted the plan with relish. The tower was emptied of corpses and rotated and repositioned, and a pair of cannon were installed on the lower tier, while arquebusiers were dispatched to occupy the rest. Tannhauser was among them.

The prospect from the top was of a sun-parched hellscape blackened by corpses and flies. The Turkish trenches to the east were many and interlaced. How Gullu Cakie had guided him through them he couldn't imagine. And the Turkish numbers were still huge. Any flight to the boat would have to wait on further decimation. But by now La Valette could muster barely fifteen hundred men still able to walk. Tannhauser squatted in the trodden and reeking offal behind the upper gate, deafened and choked in the brutalizing heat until his powder and ball were exhausted and his arm felt blue to the elbow, and at that he had taken leave of the tower of blood.

All this he was happy to forget as he lay in his tub. He congratulated himself on its institution. He'd had no idea at that time how vital to his sanity it would prove to be. Perhaps he would lie in the tub all night and watch the stars. Perhaps he would fall asleep and drown, and be found in the morning with a grin of contentment on his face. Then he recalled that Nicodemus had procured some loin chops of mutton for supper and he put all thoughts of dying to one side. He stirred as he became aware of a human presence. Amparo's face loomed over the tub's iron rim and his heart sank. Her eyes were swollen with shed tears and they looked at him with reproach. He knew at once that the little tranquillity he'd gleaned from the war-stunned evening was about to be stolen. He mustered a grimace of welcome.

"Amparo," he said, "why so sad?"

She turned her face away to the sky, the very picture of sorrow. With an effort he considered heroic he reached out to stroke her hair. She pulled her head away. He hadn't seen this aspect of her before, but it had only been a matter of time, since she was female.

"You have something to tell me," he said.

She didn't look at him. "You are in love with Carla, it's true?"

Tannhauser sighed windily. As with most of his tribulations, he had
only himself to blame. He was amazed that in the midst of so much turmoil matters so trifling could weigh this heavy. "Let's talk of this some other time," he said.

"Then it is true."

"Amparo, I've been three days mired in slaughter. A man could be forgiven for thinking that the world was come to its end. Have pity, then, on this poor soldier and leave him to his moment of peace."

She looked at him and her eyes filled. It had been too much to hope that his own woes might outweigh hers. She reached out to him like a child and he hauled himself up on his stiff and quavering legs and put a wet arm around her shoulders.

"He made me afraid," she said.

Tannhauser's sense of aggrievement vanished. "Who did?" he asked.

"Fra Ludovico."

His aches and pains were vanquished by a gust of rage. He felt his jaws and scalp tighten and the blood rush through his brain. "Did he hurt you?"

She shook her head, without conviction. He lifted her chin toward him with his hand. The memory of the fright Ludovico had provoked was replaced by the fear of whatever it was she saw in Tannhauser's eyes. He strove for an equanimity he didn't feel. He ran his fingers through her hair again and wiped the tears from her cheeks.

"You're my darling," he said.

"I am?" In an instant, her face was again aglow.

"You'll always be my darling. Now, tell me what Ludovico did. Tell me everything."

Ludovico sat in the office of Del Monte, in the Auberge of Italy, the admiral having granted him its use. On the walls hung portraits of past heroes of the langue and Ottoman banners captured in battles at sea. The red hand standard of the Sanjak Cheder, taken that day, enjoyed the place of honor. The admiral's chair was a good one from which to conduct his impending conference with the bailiffs of the French langue.

He'd yet to complete the commission entrusted him by Ghisleri. The succession of Del Monte to the Grand Master's throne wasn't yet secure. Yet of all the challenges he'd faced, this one had proved simpler than he'd dare hope. He'd rehearsed the argument for Del Monte's candidacy
with the heads of the other langues. The Castilians, the Aragonese, the Germans, and the Auvergnoise had already pledged their support. Replete with heroes though the Religion was, Del Monte's leadership of the defense of Saint Michel had been peerless. No one could match the respect in which he was held. More to the point, after ninety-two days of brutal attrition no one had the stomach for political maneuvering. He anticipated no problem in recruiting the French, though temperament would oblige them to give that appearance.

He wore the black robe and the freedom from his armor was a relief. His back and ribs pained him and he shifted in his chair. The bullet that had struck him two nights before had punched a divot the size of a hen's egg in his backplate and for several moments he'd believed himself killed. The experience had been disturbing. He'd felt no fear, no regret. He'd willed into his mind's eye an image of Our Lord on the Cross. He'd murmured the Act of Contrition. He'd felt at Peace. Then Carla's face had filled his brain, and his love for her had filled his heart, and then he'd felt fear. Fear that his love would never find expression. Such was the craven emotion he thought he would carry into eternity-until loyal Anacleto had crawled toward him, with his perfect face torn away, and he'd understood that death had not come calling after all.

The thought of Carla burned his entrails like a fire whose embers never cooled. But patience in this matter, as in most, would bear ripe fruit. The German wouldn't have the advantage for much longer. And Carla hadn't yet soiled herself in his bed. He heard footsteps pound down the corridor and knew at once to whom they belonged. He opened a ledger on the desk and feigned to study it. The door irrupted open. He stared at the page a moment longer, then raised his head.

"Captain," he said. "You're earlier than expected."

Tannhauser's face was stony. A long-barreled pistol was threaded through his belt, plus a dagger with Turkish jewelwork on the hilt and sheath. There was murder in his eyes.

Ludovico said, "Amparo must place great faith in you, to spill her tale so promptly."

Anacleto appeared behind Tannhauser, his hand on the pommel of his sword.

Without turning, Tannhauser said, "If your boy would hang on to the one eye he still owns, he should make himself scarce."

Ludovico gestured with his head and Anacleto disappeared.

Tannhauser reached into his brigandine and pulled out a package wrapped with waxed paper. He tossed it and it bounced on the desk. "A quarter of opium, with my compliments," he said. "A more than decent wage for bullying a girl."

"You have my gratitude."

"If you speak to either woman again-if you pass them in the street, if you espy them from afar, if one of them wakens from a dream and utters your name-then I'll make you dearly rue the day you left Rome."

"With better luck, we must hope, than your last attempt."

Tannhauser leaned across the desk. Ludovico felt his guts shift inside him.

"That would've been mere murder. Next time you will watch me as I bathe in your blood."

Tannhauser stared for a period of time that seemed longer than the battle that morning.

Ludovico held his gaze without a blink.

Tannhauser straightened and turned and walked for the door.

"Captain," said Ludovico.

Tannhauser stopped and turned.

"I'd rather not be your enemy."

Tannhauser emitted a short grunt of laughter.

"Carla's one woman among many," said Ludovico. "At least for you. If it's a title you seek, I can raise you to a rank of nobility that would make hers seem like a fishmonger's. Many a duke started out as a soldier and the Holy Father is generous to those who please him. Throw your hand in with me, man, and upon my promise you will prosper."

"Become one of your familiars?" said Tannhauser. "I'd rather swallow one of your turds."

"You'd be in august company, believe me."

"Then they have riper palates than I."

"Do you doubt my sincerity?" said Ludovico.

"No. I piss on it." Tannhauser pointed a finger straight at his face. The gesture was more offensive than his words. "But take my advice, and do not be so vain as to doubt mine."

Then Tannhauser turned and left, without shutting the door.

Ludovico picked up the opium. Not a common villain, after all. The
man had his own intrigues up his sleeve. Ludovico could smell it, as a sailor smells the gathering storm. Anacleto entered. His eye fell on the package in his hand. Ludovico tossed it to him.

"Go and find the Greek," said Ludovico. "Bring him to me here, after the French have left." Anacleto looked at him. Ludovico nodded. "Nicodemus."

Thursday, August 23, 1565

The Sacred Council-Castel Sant'Angelo

Oliver Starkey looked about the great council table and in the wavering light of the candles saw a black-robed company of noble old men, each mutilated by battle and resigned to death. Fresh scars disfigured their faces. Some were missing fingers; three of them a hand or an arm. Despair was not in their temper, despite their bleak situation, but no one among the Piliers, Bailiffs, and Knights Grand Cross of the Sacred Council expected the Holy Religion to prevail. Even La Valette, at whose right hand Starkey sat, seemed to share their gloom. The sense that this would be the last supreme assembly in the Order's history was palpable, and with it, like a threnody played but unheard, a poignant melancholy hung about the room. Never again would the world know men such as these, thought Starkey, for the world that had forged them was gone. They were the last of the true.

That day the Grande Turke had launched another all-out attack. No one present could remember how many such assaults they'd now endured and repulsed. The days of slaughter and exhaustion and anguish stretched back in every mind into a fiery infinity, as if war were the prime condition of all Creation, and privation was all that ever there had been. By dint of the Divine Will-for events had rendered military logic vain-the Moslem throng had once more been driven back across the blood-rutted wastes of the Grande Terre Plein. The council had been called in the aftermath by a majority of the Knights Grand Cross, who'd conceived a radical stratagem they wished to propose. It fell to Claramont, Knight Commander of the Langue of Aragon and at forty-seven the youngest of the grandees, to press the argument.

"Fra Starkey," said Claramont, "what do the latest roll calls tell us?"

Starkey didn't need to glance at the muster roll amongst the documents before him. "Two hundred and twenty of our brethren remain capable of bearing arms. Of the Spanish troops, gentlemen adventurers, and Maltese militia, perhaps nine hundred. All are wounded, some gravely. There are almost three thousand wounded unable to man the walls."