"Count Simon was reported coming down the east coast of Italy," said Friar Mathieu. "He could have joined our army if King Charles had been able to wait for him in Rome."
"King Charles did not choose to wait in Rome," said de Verceuil.
"Oh, I think he did," said Friar Mathieu. "I think he would have been happy to stay in Rome if his supporters, such as his marshals and yourself, had not pressed him to move southward when you heard Manfred was on the march."
"I did not know that you ragged Franciscans were experts on military strategy," said de Verceuil.
"We are not. Indeed, war greatly grieves us. But we do possess common sense."
What if there were a battle and Manfred won? Rachel thought.Would Manfred's soldiers kill John? Would they treat her as one of the enemy? Would they rape her, steal her treasure? She had always hoped to escape to the kingdom of Sicily, and now she was in the camp of Sicily's enemies.
"Will there be a battle?" she asked timidly of no one in particular.
De Verceuil's head swung around toward her. "Do not worry about the battle, little harlot," he said in an unpleasantly syrupy voice. "Yes, I expect we will be too busy tomorrow and the next day to concern ourselves with you. After that, perhaps we will have some Ghibellino prisoners to help us find out what you have been up to. And you will furnish our weary troops with diversion."
Rachel felt as if her body had turned into a block of ice. Was he saying that he would let the troops have her? That would kill her. After something like that, she would want to be dead.
"Please—" she whispered.
"Yes, diversion," said de Verceuil, reaching down to take her face between his hard, gloved fingers. "It has been many a year now since I have seen a Jew burn. And when you go up in flames, it will mark a new beginning for this Sicilian kingdom of heretics, Jews, and Saracens. You will be the first, but not the last."
He let go of her face just in time to avoid being pushed away by John. He took a last swallow of wine and turned and strode out of the tent, followed by Sordello, who turned and gave Rachel a last leering, gap-toothed grin.
"Is that a great man among your people?" John asked Friar Mathieu, his face black with rage. "Among my people he would be sewn into a leather bag and thrown into the nearest river."
Rachel sat on her traveling box, her hand pressed between her breasts to quiet her pounding heart. She could hardly believe what she had heard, that de Verceuil wanted to burn her at the stake as an agent of Manfred's after the coming battle.
Oh, God, let Manfred win, please.
His name was Nuwaihi, and he was so young that his beard was still sparse. He came riding with his two companions out of the blue-gray hills to the north, and brought his pony to a skidding stop beside Daoud. He turned his mount and they rode on together, side by side, in Manfred's vanguard.
"I saw the army of King Charles, effendi, I and Abdul and Said," he said in Arabic, gesturing to include his comrades. "The Franks are on the road that leads from Cassino to Benevento. They are about two days' ride from here. We hid behind boulders close to theroad, and we counted them. There are over eight hundred mounted warriors and five thousand men on foot. They have many pack animals and wagons and merchants and priests and women following them. Just as our army does." His breath and that of his pony steamed in the cold air.
Daoud felt a prickling sensation rise on his neck and spread across his shoulders. Two days' ride. The armies could meet tomorrow. Tomorrow would decide everything.
Now, if only Manfred could conceive a plan for outmaneuvering Charles. If only he would take Daoud's advice. He knew Europeans preferred to fight pitched battles, and he prayed that Manfred would not choose that way.
"Did you see a purple banner with three gold crowns?" Daoud asked.
Two weeks ago a courier from the Ghibellini in northern Italy had brought word that Simon de Gobignon's army had passed through Ravenna, on the Adriatic coast. It seemed unlikely to Daoud that de Gobignon would catch up with Charles in time to take part in the coming battle.
"No purple banner. They fly the white banner with the red cross." Nuwaihi turned his head to the left and spat. "And all the soldiers have red crosses on their tunics." He spat again. His fierceness pleased Daoud.
At one time, he thought, he would have been sorry to learn that Simon de Gobignon was not with Charles's army. He would have longed to meet Simon on the field and fight and kill him. But now he understood that he had hated Simon because Simon resembled the Christian David that he might have been. It did not matter to him that he would not meet the French count again. Instead, he could feel relieved that Charles would not have Simon's knights and men as part of his army.
Nuwaihi went on, "Their Count Charles, he who would be king, was at the head of the column. I knew him because he wears a crown on his helmet. His banner is red with a black lion rearing up on its hind legs."
Daoud looked over his shoulder and saw Manfred not far behind him, on a white horse with a black streak running from forehead to nose. The king of southern Italy and Sicily, in a cloak the color of springtime leaves, was the center of a mounted group of his favorite courtiers. One strummed a lute, and they were singing together in Latin.
A brave spectacle. Manfred rides into battle singing Latin sonnets.
A Mameluke army on its way to war would have mullahs praying for victory and a mounted band playing martial music on kettledrums, trumpets, and hautboys.
The young blond men around Manfred, Daoud knew, were nimble dancers, witty talkers, skilled musicians, and expert falconers. How well they could fight he had yet to see. Manfred was the oldest of them, but right now he looked as young as the others. He had on no visible armor, though Daoud knew he regularly wore a mail vest under his lime tunic.
Behind Manfred, all on glossy palfreys and wearing mail shirts, rode his Swabian knights, Lorenzo Celino and Erhard Barth in the first rank. The Swabians' grandfathers had come to Sicily to serve the Hohenstaufens, and they still spoke German among themselves. Like their king, they wore no helmets, but most of them had fur-trimmed hoods drawn tight around their heads to protect them from the February wind. Above them fluttered the yellow Hohenstaufen banner with its double-headed black eagle.
The column of knights, four abreast, stretched westward down this main road. The lines of helmets and pennoned lances disappeared over the crest of a pass cutting through the bleak mountain range that formed the rocky spine of Italy. Snow outlined the crevices in the rocks that towered above the army of Sicily.
Manfred's host moved at a leisurely rate Daoud found typically European. The march west, after they had assembled at Lucera, had taken two weeks. The mounted warriors were held to the pace of the foot soldiers. Twice the army had been struck by sleet storms that changed the road into a river of mud. Rather than press on, as Baibars would have, Manfred had ordered his army to halt and seek shelter in hillside forests.
In some of the valleys the army had been able to spread out and march briskly over frozen fields and pastures. But then, along a mountainside or through a pass, the road would close down again, and the flow of troops would slow to a trickle.
Daoud turned back to Nuwaihi. "Were you close enough to the road to see the Tartars I told you of? Two small brown men with slanted eyes?"
"Yes, effendi, they were riding near the head of the Franks. Just as you told me, they had eight mounted men wearing red cloaks guarding them. And before and after them marched many men carrying crossbows."
Their people are such masters of war. How they will laugh at the idiotic way Christians fight each other.
Daoud wondered whether the enemy army were mostly Frenchmen,or as mixed a host as Manfred's troops were. Manfred's thousand knights and four thousand men-at-arms included Swabians, south Italians, Sicilians, and Muslims.
If only, instead of three scouts, we had three hundred men lying in ambush along that road, we could have broken Charles's attack and perhaps killed him and the Tartars then and there.
Daoud thanked Nuwaihi, Abdul, and Said and sent them to join the Sons of the Falcon, riding today as the rear guard. He rode back to Manfred, hoping he could persuade the king and his commanders to use wisely the great army they had assembled.
Soon Manfred, Erhard Barth, several of Manfred's German and Italian commanders, Lorenzo, and Daoud were dismounted and gathered in a field beside the line of march. Manfred's orderly had brought a map of the region and spread it out on the ground, weighting the edges with rocks.
As Manfred crouched over the map, his five-pointed silver star with its ruby center hung over a town, represented on the map by an archway and a church surrounded by a wall. The drawing was marked with the Latin name "Beneventum."
"We can be in Benevento by nightfall," said Barth. "And Anjou's army will probably arrive at the same time. There is but one road they can follow." He pointed to a brown line that ran down from a large oval, at the top of the map, drawn around a collection of buildings and marked "Roma." Between Rome and Benevento was a series of towns, each indicated by a drawing of one or two buildings surrounded by walls. Mountains were shown as rows of sharp little points.
"Benevento is a Guelfo town," said Manfred, "and deserves to have us move in on it and quarter our troops there. The town is at the end of a long valley that runs north to south. The opening at the north end of the valley is a narrow pass. Anjou's army must come through that pass. They will find it easier to get into the valley than to get out, because we will be waiting for them."
Daoud felt a surge of exasperation, and quickly pushed it back down. Anger would not help him.
"Waiting for them?" he said. "If we are making war, we do notwantto meet them."
Manfred frowned. "If we drive them up against the north end of the valley, we will have them trapped." Manfred smashed his fist into his palm. "There will be nowhere for them to escape to."
He is getting tired of my giving advice that contradicts the way he thinks things should be done. After all, he did win battles before I came here.
But to simply meet Charles's army face-to-face, like two bulls butting heads, seemed lunacy to Daoud.
"Such a battle will be bad for both sides," he said. "We will butcher each other."
Perhaps I should have spent less time training my men and more trying to teach Manfred.
"We do outnumber them," said Manfred testily.
"And if every one of their men kills one of ours and every one of our men kills one of theirs, there should be a few of our men left at the end of the battle. Do you call that a victory?"
"Show some respect for your king!" a Neapolitan officer snapped.
"No, be still, Signore Pasca," Manfred said to the Neapolitan. "I want to hear Emir Daoud out. What can we do, except meet them and fight them?"
Daoud remembered how he had wished that instead of scouts he had set men to ambush the Franks. He studied the map.
"Let us send men into the mountains around here and here." He ran his finger over the angular shapes the mapmaker had drawn around Benevento. "Then, when Charles's army is in the valley, we will fall upon it from both sides and destroy it."
No one spoke for a moment. The younger Swabian officers were looking at him with mingled horror and disgust. Manfred stared at the map with embarrassed intensity.
Erhard Barth broke the silence. "Such an ambush would not be according to the customs of chivalry, Herr Daoud. Even if we were to win the battle in such a fashion, the victory would bring us so much infamy that it would be better had we lost."
"We are not in Outremer, thank God," said a Swabian with a long scar on his cheek.
"And we are not Saracens," said the one called Pasca. "Most of us."
"In other words, our noble commanders would refuse to fight?" said Lorenzo, glaring angrily at the other officers.
How would Baibars deal with these men, Daoud wondered. He might cut off a head or two and lavish gold and jewels and robes of honor on the rest. But Daoud had placed himself under Manfred's orders. And Manfred's army was not disciplined as Islamic armies were. European armies were made up of bands of warriors led by men who might or might not choose to take orders from their overlord.
"You cannot turn my men into Saracens," said Manfred firmly. "Even my Saracens fight like Europeans, because they have livedin Sicily for generations. You have trained two hundred men in your Mameluke methods of fighting, and I have seen that they are a brilliant unit, but you would need many years to teach your ways to thousands of knights and men. And I must give my Germans and Italians a plan that will be acceptable to them."
Erhard Barth's mouth drew down in an apologetic grimace. "It is the way we are used to fighting, Herr Daoud."
It was infuriating. Daoud felt rage burst in him like Greek Fire. With a silent inward struggle, he brought it under control. For good or ill, his destiny was bound to Manfred's.
When the conference ended, Daoud's horse picked its way among the shrubs and rocks beside the road, retracing the line of march back to the supply caravan. Daoud felt a powerful need to spend a few moments with Sophia. She had insisted on coming with him. He had wanted her to stay out of danger. Now, tormented by misgivings about the coming battle, he feared for her even more. But nothing now could spare them from tomorrow's peril and it lifted his heart to know that she was here.
Daoud woke to a discreet scratching on the curtains of his bed. Somewhere in the street a drum was beating, sounding farther, then nearer again, as the drummer marched up and down the streets of Benevento, waking the fighting men quartered there.
"I am awake," he rasped.
"May God look with favor on your deeds this day, my lord," came the voice of his orderly, Husain, through the heavy curtains.
Sophia's back was warm against his chest. His left arm, on which she had been sleeping, was numb. She wriggled her shoulders and then turned over to face him. He freed his arm and rubbed his face against hers, his beard brushing her cheek.
She wrapped one arm around him and twined her legs around one of his. Her free hand moved down, fondling him. His hands glided over her body, trying to memorize the feel of her. She murmured with pleasure into his ear.
She opened her eyes suddenly. "Will it be bad for you to do this with me?"
"What to do you mean, bad?"
"Deprive you of strength for the battle?"
He chuckled softly. "If you made me stop now, I would be filled with such a rage that I would slay all of Charles's army single-handed."
Her hand stopped pleasuring him. "That would be good. Then we must stop."
"No," he said. "I would rather go into battle with a beautiful memory and a clear head. As for my strength, God will restore it moments after I spend it. He always has, I assure you."
"Then let us not wait." She pulled him over on top of her and accepted him into herself, tightening around him. A flood of breathless Greek endearments filled his ear.
He had never been with a woman who cried out as Sophia did during the act of love. Try as she might to muffle her sounds, she was certain in the final surge to lose control. He was sure Manfred's other officers quartered in this house must hear her.
Well, let them hear her, and envy him.
She let him rest upon her, happily released, until his body withdrew itself from her.
A shadow crossed his mind.
That may have been the last time for us.
They lay side by side. A faint light penetrated the bed curtains from somewhere in their room, and by that light he could see her smiling. He smiled back, but his body was growing tense. Fear of what he would face in the hours to come was building inside him.
The face he loved, the warmth of her body so close to his, made him wish he need never leave this bed. His arms and legs felt heavy, rebellious. If he commanded them to move away from her, they would not.
In truth, I would have to be mad to want to go out and butcher infidels rather than stay here with Sophia.
But he could not stay with her. Today would decide everything. He forced his reluctant limbs to push him away from her. She did not try to hold him.
Outside the heavy bed curtains, the air in the room felt cold as death.
Standing alone in the middle of the floor, he felt a sickening void of apprehension in his belly. As Sheikh Saadi had taught him, he faced his fear. He was terrified of death and defeat. Probably there had never been a warrior anywhere in the world who had not feltthis way on the morning of a battle. Probably the Prophet himself, before battle, had feared for himself and for those he loved.
I cannot control today's outcome, for myself or for the men I fight beside. But I can dedicate my mind and heart and will and limbs to God. I can fight for Him to the uttermost of my strength. Passive toward God, active toward the world.
Naked, he walked to the door leading to the balcony and pushed it partway open. A draft of even chillier air made his skin prickle and fluttered the flame of the candle Husain had lit when he woke them. The sky was still black and full of stars. Dawn was a long way off.
He was on the third story of this house in Benevento and could see over the roofs of most of the surrounding houses. Men hurried through the streets swinging lanterns. The drum was still beating a rapid tattoo in the near distance, joined now by horses' hooves clattering on the cobblestones. Here and there a candle glowed behind shutters. Far away, probably in the main camp of Manfred's army, north of town, a trumpet called.
He shivered, and closed the shutter against the winter wind.
Sophia had pushed the bed curtains aside and was sitting on the edge of the bed with a blanket wrapped around her, watching him.
On the bedroom table, Husain had carefully laid out a pitcher and basin and Daoud's underclothes. Daoud took the tawidh by its thong and tied it around his neck. Next he picked up the silver locket and turned the little screw that opened it.
The magic was still working.
But when he looked into the locket, he saw the same face that was looking at him from across the room. A feeling of happy relief filled him, driving out the foreboding that had darkened his mind earlier in bed with Sophia.
He was sure now that whatever connection the locket had with Blossoming Reed was lost. Love had changed the image. He had been testing it ever since he arrived at Lucera, and it always showed him Sophia's face. He could hope that whatever spell Blossoming Reed had placed upon it, when she warned him,your love will destroy both her and you, was now broken. He closed the locket and set it down on the table.
He had said good-bye in his heart to Blossoming Reed sometime during these years in the land of the infidel. He had loved Blossoming Reed, but he had never known love in all its fullness and completion until Sophia. And, knowing that he had violated the one commandment Blossoming Reed had laid upon him, and carrying her threat in the back of his mind, his love for her had withered.She was still as vivid in his mind's eye as she had been in the locket before Sophia supplanted her. But his feeling for her now was one of sad renunciation. Whether or not he survived this war, they must be forever parted.
He filled the earthenware basin with water from the wooden pitcher and began a ritual washing, first his hands, then his face, then forearms from wrists to elbows, then his feet up to the ankles.
"How can you stand the cold?" Sophia said.
Daoud shrugged. "I have to." He did not want to talk now. He wanted to empty his mind for prayer. He tied the drawstring of his braies. Then he pulled on red silk trousers, flaring below the knee and tight at the ankles, and drew a cotton shirt over his head.
He went to the balcony again to check his directions. There was Venus. That was east, then. He took a small rolled-up carpet out of his traveling chest and laid it over the rug on the bedroom floor. He oriented the prayer carpet toward the southeast and stood at the end of it.
He began the salat, bringing his hands up to the sides of his head and saying, "Allahu akbar, God is great."
He repeated his prayers, the bowing, the kneeling, the prostrations, with great care and full attention. With his forehead pressed to the rug, he submitted himself and this day utterly to the will of God.
Finished, he looked over at Sophia. She was still sitting on the edge of the bed, watching him silently. He looked long at her, drinking her in. It weighed heavily on his heart that he had to leave her, and even more heavily that she would be terribly frightened for him until he came back.
As he feared for her.
Compassionate God, Cherisher of Worlds, protect her.
He began to dress for battle.
Husain had spread out his armor and weapons on top of his traveling chest. Daoud's breastplate was made of many rectangular pieces of steel laced together with leather thongs and overlapping each other. Two larger plates, side by side, were attached over his heart, inlaid with the spiraling gold design that marked him a member of the halkha, the sultan's personal guard. Worked into the design were verses from the Koran. On the left plate, "He succeeds who purifies the soul," and on the right, "And he fails who corrupts it." The breastplate was divided at the sides, where it could be strapped together. Baibars himself, after Daoud returned to Manfred, had arranged for a bribed Genoese sea captain to smuggleit to him. Daoud was proud of it, and the men of the Sons of the Falcon would be proud to see their leader wearing it.
He pulled on a quilted tunic of embroidered red silk, its padding stuffed with linen. Then he dropped the breastplate over his head. He heard a movement behind him, and then felt Sophia fastening the breastplate at his sides.
The storehouse of Manfred's Muslim armorers offered blades of the finest Hindustan steel, and from it Daoud had selected a saif for himself. It gleamed in the candlelight as he drew it from its sheath. He examined with pleasure the gold inlay near the hilt. There was not a nick or a scratch anywhere on the blade. He took a heavy silk scarf from the clothing on the table and tossed it in the air. He held the blade under it, edge up. The scarf fell on the blade and then dropped to the floor in two parts.
He sheathed the sword and buckled it on. He put on his bayda, his egg-shaped helmet, and wrapped the silk of his turban around and around it, and when it was properly tied, pinned it with an emerald clasp.
"Someday you must do that slowly for me, so I can learn how to wrap your turban," said Sophia. "I would like to do that for you." A pang of sorrow for her struck his heart as he realized she was speaking of their future together to convince herself that there would be one. He wished he could free her from fear.
While he dressed, she had quietly been dressing, too, in a long blue gown and a fiery orange woolen mantle.
He looked down at the weapons laid out on the chest, selected a dagger, and stuck it in his belt. Next to the dagger lay the Scorpion, the tiny crossbow, assembled, with a box of finger-length darts beside it. Surely not a weapon for a battle, he thought.
"Here." He turned to Sophia and handed her the crossbow. "I know you have a dagger, but you can use this to protect yourself too. Sometimes I coat the darts with a drug that makes a man unconscious, sometimes with deadly poison. These darts are poisoned—be very careful with them. Most people have never seen a weapon like this, so it will surprise them. And you do not have to get close to your enemy to use it."
"I do not need protection," said Sophia. "You will be out there protecting me."
"If you take it, it will put my mind at ease," said Daoud.
"For that reason only," said Sophia, dropping the tiny crossbow and the box of darts into a leather bag on top of her own traveling chest.
Daoud picked up the locket. Its hammered silver outer surface glowed softly in the candlelight.
"Please take this too," he said. "You have seen me wear it many times. After I have left you today, open it. I believe you will see a picture—an image—of me."
She lowered her head and rested her hands on his armored chest as he hung the locket on its silver chain around her neck.
He unfolded his forest-green linen cape and draped it over himself, clasping it at his throat with a gold chain.
He took her in his arms, carefully, so as not to hurt her with the steel breastplate, and pressed his lips against hers for a long time.
A knock at the door broke their kiss. "My lord, your horse is ready," said Husain's voice.
At the door of the house, Ugolini and Tilia, both of them heavily cloaked against the cold night air, were waiting for them. In the light of the single small oil lamp burning beside the doorway, they were two short, bulky shadows, Tilia much bulkier than Ugolini.
"We heard you moving about," said Tilia. "We came down to wish you victory."
"What do the stars say about today?" Daoud asked Ugolini.
"Yesterday, the twenty-first of February, the sun moved from the house of Aquarius the water-bearer to the house of Pisces, the fish." Ugolini shook his head dolefully. "The fish is the sign of Christendom."
"Adelberto, you are a poor astrologer," said Tilia heartily. "A good astrologer would find something encouraging to say. For example: It would not be good for Christendom for Charles to win. The French would dominate the Church and corrupt it. True Christianity will triumph if Manfred wins."
"Do not use the word 'if,' Madama Tilia," said Daoud with a smile.
"I know Manfred is going to win," said Ugolini. "Otherwise I would not have followed his army all the way to Benevento. I believe he will go on to the Papal States and will persuade Pope Clement to restore me to my rightful position."
"If Pope Clementwaitsfor Manfred after Charles is defeated," said Tilia dryly.
That was Ugolini's explanation of why he had come north with Manfred's army. Daoud wondered what Tilia's was. Both risked being imprisoned and probably executed should Manfred lose and Charles capture them.
"Did you see Lorenzo leave?"
"Moments before you came down," said Tilia. "That big dogof his, Scipio, is inconsolable. I can hear him keening in the stable. I think Adelberto and I will take him up to our room and comfort him."
Daoud said, "It is a rare moment when Scipio is not at Lorenzo's side. And I think, too, he can sense when his master is in danger. As we all are today. It would be kind of you to care for him."
With a tremulous attempt at laughter, Sophia said, "And who will care for me?"
Tilia laid her small hand on Sophia's arm. "We will stay with you, Sophia, if you want, until Daoud returns." She pulled Ugolini inside the door and it closed behind them, leaving Daoud and Sophia alone.
Sophia moved close in the lamplight outside the entrance of the merchant's house and looked up at him, her eyes large and solemn. "Nothing but you matters to me. Come back to me."
Daoud still wished he could convince her that she had nothing to fear. But that was foolish. She knew all too well that there was much to fear.
"I don't want you to be frightened," he said.
"I will try not to be."
"I will come back." There was so much he wanted to tell her, so much he realized now he had not said about how he loved her as he had never loved another woman in his life since—
Since his mother.
They were two people who had been utterly alone in the world, who had both lost everyone precious to them. All they truly had was each other.
Oh, God, let me come back to her. I ask this not for my happiness, but for hers.
"I know I will see you again." She smiled suddenly. "Can you find your way to me?"
He looked up at the building and then at the street. Bulking large against the stars was the huge square shape of an arch, which had been built over a thousand years ago, he was told, by a Roman general to commemorate his conquest of Jerusalem.
With this talk of stars and portents, he felt it must mean something that this victory arch should be here in Benevento. Were not these wars of Muslim and Christian that had shaped his destiny wars over Jerusalem?
He said, "I will ride through that arch, and you will be on the third floor of the house with the carving over the door of San Giorgio slaying the dragon."
She smiled, her teeth white in the lantern light. "That is the Archangel Michael overcoming Satan."
"How am I to tell one Christian idol from another?"
She pushed at him. He saw the tracks of tears glistening on her cheeks. His own eyes burned.
"Go quickly now."
He turned, fearing the sight of his tears might break her heart, as hers had broken his. He set his foot in the stirrup and vaulted into the saddle of the brown Arabian Husain was holding. He waited for Husain to mount his own horse and then started down the street. He kept his face set toward the triumphal arch. He dared not look back.
In her room, Sophia went through her chest and found her icon of Saint Simon Stylites. She kept the icon hidden when Daoud was around. He believed that praying to saints' images was idolatry, and she especially did not want him to see her praying to a saint named Simon. She knelt, clasped her hands, and prayed to the desert saint.
Oh, holy Simon, bring him back to me. You who dwelt in the desert, you who know what it is to be alone on your pillar, keep safe this man who came alone out of the desert. Protect him from the swords and spears and arrows of his enemies. He is not of our faith, I know, but I love him so, and is not Love another name for God?
She pressed both hands flat against her belly and doubled over, weeping.
Daoud had just ridden through the northern gate of the town when he heard his name called from above. He saw a pale blond head, gleaming in the first rays of sunrise, looking down at him through the battlements of a square gate tower.
"Up here, Daoud, come up!" Manfred's voice.
"This is the best vantage point we could ask for," Manfred said when Daoud arrived on the tower platform. "Unless we were to climb those mountains over there."
Lorenzo was on the tower roof with Manfred, and Landgrave Barth, and six or so of Manfred's blond young noblemen, all in splendid cloaks of peacock blue, sunset orange, and blood-red. They wore glossy silk surcoats over mail that covered them from chin to fingertips. Manfred was in mail, covered by a knee-length yellow and black surcoat. He held his bronzed helmet, decorated withthree nodding ostrich plumes dyed emerald green, tucked under his arm.
"Have they come?" Daoud asked.
Manfred nodded, his face sterner than Daoud had ever seen it. "Anjou is in the valley."
Daoud looked out from the tower. Like a field of wildflowers, hundreds of their own multicolored tents, each one tall and pointed at the top, spread out over the rolling brown landscape just beyond the town wall. In front of the tents the divisions of Manfred's army were forming up in squares. The faint notes of a military band came to Daoud's ear. It was European music, which sounded jagged, harsh, and disconnected to him.
He saw the Sons of the Falcon now, over on the left, their rows straight, sitting quietly on their horses, moving little. They all wore red turbans wrapped around their helmets; he had insisted that they dress alike so as to be easily recognizable. They, too, had their band, a dozen men who played kettledrums, trumpets, hautboys, and cymbals from horseback. The band was silent now, but would play when the Sons of the Falcon rode into battle.
"Long ago the Romans called this town Maleventum, bad wind," said Manfred beside him, "because they believed that the winds from the north brought pestilence down from the swamps around Rome."
Just the sort of thing Manfred would know, Daoud thought.
"Even though the people who live here chose a more attractive name," Manfred went on, "we see that the ancients were not wrong. Look what plague the wind has blown down from Rome today."
Daoud's eyes followed Manfred's pointing arm to the narrow north end of the long valley in which Benevento lay. The road from Rome entered the valley at the north end and ran through it to the gate above which they were standing. Rows of tents filled the northern opening of the valley, and the tiny figures of horsemen and foot soldiers were forming dark lines across the light brown fields.
Last night peasants from that end of the valley had come flocking into Benevento with cartloads of possessions and stored crops. Even though they were supposedly supporters of the papal cause, the people who lived around Benevento felt safer under Manfred's protection.
But this valley was a stone coffin, Daoud thought. Hills on either side, squeezing together at the top of the valley, the town lying across the bottom end. In this box, how could he use the Sons of the Falcon well? He pummeled his brain.
One thing he could at least achieve. He remembered Nuwaihi's report that the Tartars were with Charles's army. He turned to Lorenzo.
"It falls to you to finish the Tartars. Make your way into Charles's camp while the battle is on."
Lorenzo's mouth turned down under his thick mustache. "It will take time. I can take a wagon and go around through the hills and pretend to be a peasant offering to sell wine and food to Anjou's people."
"Take some men with you."
Lorenzo shook his head. "That would arouse suspicion. If I go alone, whoever is guarding Charles's camp will see no reason to fear me."
"I went alone into the Palazzo Monaldeschi to kill them, and I could not do it."
"And I, with my poor Sicilian skills, cannot be expected to succeed where Daoud ibn Abdallah, who was trained by the Old Man of the Mountain himself, failed. Is that what you are thinking?"
Daoud smiled ruefully. "Well—"
Lorenzo frowned at him ferociously. "You have given me the task. Let me carry it out as best I can."
Daoud gripped his arm, feeling muscle like oak. "Go with God, my brother."
"May your Allah bless your struggle today, Daoud." One last, long look from the dark brown eyes, and Lorenzo turned away.
Again, as he had with Sophia, Daoud felt anguish that he had not told Lorenzo enough of his gratitude, his respect, his love.
And if Lorenzo dies an unbeliever, I will not meet him in paradise.
Manfred was standing at the battlements, staring north at his enemies, looking, it seemed to Daoud, more sad than angry.
"Sire," Daoud said, "I know what you plan for today's battle. But I beg the favor of one change. Let the Sons of the Falcon be the first of your warriors to strike at your enemies."
Manfred turned toward Daoud, and as he did the melancholy vanished from his face. He looked cheerful and spoke briskly.
"Let us review the plan. My heaviest cavalry, the Swabian knights, will hit them first. The Swabians will try to break the enemy and drive them back up the field. Our foot archers will form up before Benevento and protect it from any Frenchmen who might evade our cavalry charge. Daoud's Sons of the Falcon will ride incolumn up the west side of the valley, turn, cut the French knights off fromtheirfoot soldiers, and attack them from the rear."
Erhard Barth nodded. "Excellent, Sire. But, if I may, Herr Daoud has a good suggestion. We have seen the skill of his archers and lancers. Let them lead the way, forming a screen for us. Let them fill the air with arrows. The French will falter. Then the Sons of the Falcon will move out of the way." He spread his big, square hands apart to show how the Sons of the Falcon would part to left and right. "And we will hit them with a wedge."
A better plan, Daoud thought. He had underestimated Barth. And perhaps the king he served.
Manfred nodded. "Go to your men, Daoud. You will have my orders shortly."
Looking into the faces of the two hundred men he had picked and trained over the past year, Daoud felt a great weight on his chest. He could even read the expressions of some in the front. Mujtaba, earnest. Ahmad, fierce. Omar, determined. Nuwaihi, who had first sighted Charles's army, eager. It was frightful enough to face one's own death in battle, but to know that he was leading to their deaths men he knew and loved—the burden was great. These men were like his children, and they would follow him to destruction, and he wished before God that he did not have to think about that.
Gathered in a semicircle, the Sons of the Falcon listened silently as Daoud spoke to them from horseback. He made his voice big, so that it echoed from the walls of Benevento, behind his men.
"You are fighting not only to help King Manfred keep his throne," Daoud shouted. "Not only to protect the kingdom of Sicily from conquest by these greedy foreigners."
That was ironic, in a way, because, to be sure, the Hohenstaufens were not native Sicilians. Nor were these Muslims. But both they and the Hohenstaufens had lived in Sicily for generations, and surely that gave them more right to rule here than the French.
"You are fighting for Islam!" he cried. Their wild cheering rang in his ears.
"You are fighting that you and your families may profess the faith and live by the faith. This right, your wise rulers of the house of Hohenstaufen have granted you. But if Charles d'Anjou rules this land, your mosques will be turned into churches, your mullahs will be hanged, your Korans will be burned, and your children's children will never hear the sweet words of the Prophet, may God commend and salute him. They will be raised as Christians andwill never know they were anything else. For us this war is jihad! Holy war!"
The waves of their cheering swept over him, and their scimitars flashed in the rising sun. He had told them the truth, but there was an even greater truth he had not told them. They were fighting, not just for Islam in Sicily, but for Islam everywhere. If Manfred won this battle, it would end, for this generation at least, the threat of Christians and Tartars uniting to destroy Islam. But how to explain that in these few remaining moments? Enough that they knew that they were fighting for the faith in their own land.
Seeing their eagerness, he felt proud of them, and proud of himself. The weight of sadness he had felt when he first faced them was lifted, and his heart beat strong within him.
The cheering faded quickly, replaced by a murmuring. Men were pointing past him. A faint rumbling came to his ears.
At the north end of the valley a long line of horsemen was moving forward, bright banners fluttering above them, and creamy clouds of dust billowing up behind them.
Barth rode up to him, his eyes bright, his thick lower lip curving upward in a smile. "King Manfred has agreed to let you attack first. The Swabian knights are now ready. We will be behind you. Slow their charge, and then we will smash them." He struck a mailed fist into a mailed palm.
Exultation bubbled up within Daoud like a desert spring. Dizzy with joy, he thought Baibars must have felt like this when he alone led the Mamelukes against the Tartars at the Well of Goliath.
A certainty that the battle was as good as won spread through him.
"If we leave you any Frenchmen to smash," he said to Barth, who laughed, saluted, and rode away.
Have a care, he warned himself.What happens today will be as God wants. I want only whatever God wants.
He jerked on the reins of his brown Arabian to turn toward the French charge. They were still far away. The valley was long. He called Omar and Husain to him.
"Bows and arrows. Spread out in a line. When we are formed up, advance at a trot on my signal."
He unstrapped his bow from his saddle and slung it over his shoulder and across his chest.
The five flag men lined up behind Daoud. On their right rode a naqeeb holding high the green banner of the Sons of the Falcon, inscribed in dazzling white lettering with a verse from the Koran:HAVE THEY NOT SEEN THE BIRDS OBEDIENT IN MIDAIR? NONE UPHOLDETH THEM SAVE GOD.
Omar rode down the line relaying Daoud's orders to the officers and flag men. When all was ready, Daoud raised his hand and brought it down. A single line of two hundred horsemen, they moved out at a trot. While his men could fire arrows from a galloping horse, the slower the horse was moving, the more accurate the shooting.
He could see what was coming at him much more clearly now. The middle and rear ranks of the crusaders were obscured by dust, but in the front ranks a hundred or more helmeted heads bent over the armored brows of their huge horses. The long poles of their steel-tipped lances pointed at him.
To be hit by one of those knights galloping at that speed, with all that weight of steel and horseflesh, would be like being hit by a boulder from a stone caster. If the Franks got much closer, there would be no stopping them.
Daoud unslung his bow. From the corner of his eye he saw the flag men, whose duty it was to watch his moves and signals, lift five red pennants high. He did not need to look to know that the Sons of the Falcon had all dropped their horses' reins, guiding their horses with their knees, and were drawing their bows.
His bow, like those his men carried, was double-curved, made of multiple layers of horn and hardwood. His arrow had a thick steel tip that could punch through mail armor like a spike driven by a hammer. He took aim at a big Frank in the middle of the line. The intersection of the limbs of the red cross on the Frank's white surcoat made a perfect spot to aim at. Between two beats of his Arabian's hooves, he loosed his arrow.
The flight of Daoud's arrow was the signal for the red flags to go down. Two hundred arrows whistled across the rapidly narrowing gap between crusaders and Sons of the Falcon.
Daoud saw the man he had fired at throw his arms wide. His lance dropped as he leaned sideways from his saddle. He crashed to the ground and disappeared under the hooves of the horses behind his. His lance fell across the paths of the oncoming crusaders and another of the big war horses tripped over it, dumping its rider.
All along the crusaders' front, knights were spilling from their saddles, horses were falling, lances were flying.
Over a hundred years they have fought us, and they have never learned to use the bow from the saddle.
Many riders in the crusaders' front rank were still galloping toward them. And more in the rear ranks were dodging or leapingthe fallen knights and horses. Daoud whipped a second arrow from the quiver hanging at his side, nocked it, and took quick aim.
His arrow went true again. He saw the targeted man fall. And the Sons of the Falcon were pouring volleys of arrows into the Franks. Every third crusader, in the front ranks at least, must be a dead man.
Daoud heard himself yelling in triumph. If they broke this first French charge, the rest of Manfred's army could sweep the field clear of the enemy.
The charge was slowing down, but it was still coming on.
"Split ranks! Pass them on either side!" Daoud called to Omar, who relayed the order to the flag men.
Daoud heard a sound like an earthquake behind him and looked around. The elite of the German knights, Manfred's Swabians, were galloping on in an arrowhead formation. If the French knights and their horses were big, the Swabians looked even bigger. He saw the nodding green plumes of Manfred's helmet at the very point of the wedge. The surcoats of knights and horses were ablaze with red and blue, orange and yellow.
Beyond Manfred's knights Daoud saw lines of crossbowmen formed up before the walls of Benevento. Sophia was there in that little town. He wanted to keep himself between Sophia and the French.
But Omar had relayed his order to the flag men and the yellow and green flags had gone up, and, disciplined as any of his men, he rode off to the left, turning the side of his Arabian toward the onrushing crusaders.
When he reached the right flank of Charles's knights, he turned again so that he was riding past them. He fired arrow after arrow as he went, as fast as he could and still hit his mark.
He saw a tall figure in a red surcoat with a red helmet shaped like a bishop's miter. Almost certainly de Verceuil. The cardinal brandished a club with an iron ball at the end of it. Daoud loosed an arrow at him, but de Verceuil lifted a red shield bearing a painted gold cross that caught the arrow and sent it spinning away.
I wonder if he recognizes me.
Looking north, Daoud saw Anjou's foot soldiers with spears and crossbows advancing at a run, but they were far behind the last of the Frankish riders. Charles must have thrown all his knights—eight hundred of them, Manfred had said—into this first charge. He, like Manfred, must have hoped to end the battle—even the war—with a single charge.
Farther to the north, beyond the foot soldiers, a dozen or sohorsemen in yellow and purple cloaks gathered under a red banner bearing a black figure. It was too far away for Daoud to see clearly, but he knew that a black lion on a red background was the standard of Charles d'Anjou.
Now Daoud and his left half of the Sons of the Falcon were beyond the French knights. He ordered the flag signals that would turn his wing to ride back the way they had come.
Dozens of Franks had died under their arrows. The charge had slowed, with confusion on the front and confusion on the sides. Daoud felt ripples of triumph course through his body. They had done the very thing Manfred said no Saracen cavalry could do.
We stopped the charge of the Frankish knights.
But looking toward Benevento, Daoud felt triumph turn to dismay. The flying wedge of Manfred's knights had pushed itself deep into the French line, but then had come to a stop. Even though the Sons of the Falcon had hurt them and halted them, the French had held their formation. They had not broken under the Swabian attack.
Daoud groaned in anguish. Both sides had stopped in their tracks, and where they faced each other their formations had crumbled into a hundred individual combats.
This was just what Daoud had feared and warned against. Endless butchery, futile bloodletting, a battle that would go as badly for the winner as for the loser.
There must be another way, Daoud thought desperately.There must be a Mameluke way to win this.
Thierry reined his horse to a stop and doffed his helmet in salute to Simon. From the wild look in the young knight's eye Simon sensed at once that he had seen something extraordinary.
"What is it, Messire?" he demanded. "Did you see Manfred's army?" Papillon, the brown and white mare Simon used as a palfrey, stood still while Simon patted her neck.
"Manfred'sandCount Charles's," Thierry panted. "Both armies. They're already fighting, Monseigneur!"
"Merciful God!" A battle meantthebattle. One battle must surely decide this war. Manfred would have brought together all the fighting men of southern Italy and Sicily. And Simon knew, from the series of urgent messages he had received from Charles on the road, that the count had left Rome with every man he could muster, and that there was no more help on its way to him.
Except for this army.
Simon glanced up at the sun. Halfway up the eastern sky. Some big clouds, but it was going to remain a clear, cold day. If the battle had started at dawn, it could be over by midday.
"Pass the word to advance at a trot," he told de Puys. "Foot soldiers to proceed by forced march."
Antoine de la Durie spoke up. "Monseigneur, should we not call a halt and rest and plan? We cannot plunge blindly into the midst of a battle."
"We will have to plan as we ride, Messire," Simon said brusquely. "King Charles is outnumbered, and needs usnow."
He felt a small inner glow. He was getting to be quite practiced at putting older men of lower rank in their place—the sort who formerly intimidated him.
He turned to Valery de Pirenne. "Tell Friar Volpe to join me here. And you, Thierry, come with me. You can tell the friar what you saw."
Simon pulled Papillon's head over, jumped the narrow ditch along the side of the road, and took up a position on a rocky hummock, Thierry beside him. Looking over the long column of his army never failed to make his heart beat faster. A dozen banners in front, led by the red and white crusader flag and the purple and gold of Gobignon. Mounted knights two or three abreast followed by files of foot soldiers and baggage trains and strings of chargers and spare horses. The mounted rear guard so far back it was usually out of sight.
He could see the rear guard because the army was traveling along winding mountain roads, as it had been the day before and the day before that. They were crossing the center of the Italian peninsula. They had been through the highest of the Apennines yesterday and were now descending the western slopes.
A chill anxiety enveloped his body. To have come all this way only to be too late—what a calamity that would be! He could not allow it.
Friar Volpe came galloping up on the back of his big mule. Howwise of Charles to have sent this friar to meet Simon at Ravenna. The Dominican had spent most of his adult life wandering all over Italy preaching, and he made an excellent guide. It was he who brought the news that Charles was no longer in Rome and there was no need for Simon's army to go there. A more direct route to Anjou's army would follow the Adriatic coast, then turn southward into the Apennines on entering the Abruzzi, the northernmost reach of Manfred's kingdom.
Friar Volpe was a fair-skinned man with a sharp nose, large lips, and round brown eyes. His thick reddish-brown hair fell over his forehead and ears, growing luxuriantly everywhere except for the tonsure on top, where it was just a red stubble.
"Benevento," he said when Simon told him about the battle, and glanced up at the sun. "We could arrive in the valley of Benevento well before noon. There is a high ridge along the east side of the valley. Benevento is a crossroads town. The roads meet at the south end of the valley."
"That was where I saw Manfred's camp," said Thierry.
"I have to see this valley myself," Simon said. "Could we climb this ridge you spoke of?"
"Shepherds and their flocks go up and down the hills all year round," said Friar Volpe. "There are many paths."
"Many paths," Simon echoed. "Excellent. Be good enough to lead us there."
Simon ordered the army to continue along the main road to Benevento until they reached a roadside shrine to San Rocco. Farther than that, Friar Volpe said, and they might be seen from Benevento.
Friar Volpe led Simon at a fast trot till they were out of sight of the army. Thierry and Henri de Puys had insisted on coming along, arguing that Simon might meet some of Manfred's outriders. They turned onto a zigzag track that sometimes disappeared altogether over bare rocks as it climbed to the top of a long ridge.
They came out of a stand of wind-twisted pine trees to the bald top of the ridge. The ringing of steel on steel, the pounding of horses' hooves, and the cries of men drifted to them from below.
"Hold the horses, Thierry," Simon ordered. He and de Puys and Friar Volpe moved forward at a crouch. When he could see the battlefield, Simon lay down and crawled, his mail scraping over the rocks, the tip of his sheathed sword bumping along.
Is this what a battle looks like, then?
He was reminded of times when he had stepped on anthills in the woods and thousands of the little creatures milled about in confusion under his feet. Masses of men below heaved and struggled.Dead horses lay by the score, large dark lumps. Smaller objects lying about the field like rocks might be dead men; it was hard to tell from this distance. Much of what he saw was partly veiled by clouds of gray dust.
He felt a breath of fear on his neck at the thought that he must take his army into that cauldron. He tried to make sense of what he was seeing. Where were the leaders?
The half of the field nearer him was hidden by the trees growing lower down on this ridge. Ignoring de Puys's whispered warnings, he crawled farther forward for a better view.
Now he saw the town of Benevento at the south end of the valley, a city of moderate size whose walls were fortified by a dozen square towers. And before it a smaller city of many-colored tents. Above the tents, a yellow banner with a black splotch in its center. That would be the Hohenstaufen eagle.
Then those tents at the other end of the valley, where the road entered from the north, must be the French camp. Simon saw many more banners, too far away to recognize, on poles in the center of that camp.
He saw no fighting at the north end of the valley. Closer to the battle, a small group of horsemen sat on a low hill, apparently observing. Above them a red and black banner hung from a long pole. That could only be Charles himself, and his chief commanders, under the banner of the black lion. Lines of foot soldiers screened them from the main fighting.
I should go down there, or send someone, to find out what Count Charles wants me to do. But there is no time.
Again Simon's gaze swept the battlefield. The innumerable small struggles, mostly in the center of the valley, told him that neither side was winning. Again the Saracen warriors with the turbans caught his eye. They were the only group of mounted men acting together. Moving in a V-shaped formation with the center back and the tips of the two wings well forward, they advanced slowly across the field. But with such confusion around them, where could they effectively attack?
Never mind that. Where can I effectively attack?
He lay on his belly, his chin resting on his intertwined fingers, his breath steaming in the air in front of him. Thierry, de Puys, and Friar Volpe were waiting behind him. And behind them, the army he had brought here. A sudden terror froze his limbs. The day was cold, but he felt colder still, staring at the swirling fury below him, listening to the shouts and screams, the thundering and clanging.
There would not be time to get orders from Count Charles. Therewould hardly be time to consult with the experienced men—de Marion, de la Durie, de Puys—among the barons he had brought with him. The plan, the decisions, would have to be his alone.
At what place, at what moment, should he throw the Gobignon army into the battle? If he just led them into the present confusion, his columns of knights and files of archers would at once fall apart into more knots and whirlpools of combat like those he saw below. His army could be wasted, ground up like wheat in a water mill. The turmoil in his mind was as bad as the chaos he had seen on the field.
The floor of the valley was uneven, and rolling hills hid the battle from Lorenzo's eyes, but the clash and clamor of the fighting carried to his ears as he approached the French camp. It was empty except for about ten sentries, some armed with crossbows, others with pikes, who stood at its perimeter. They were all turned to watch the battle, their backs to Lorenzo despite the creaking of his wagon and the clip-clop of his horse's hooves.
The tall tents were dusty, stained, and patched, their colors faded.
Lorenzo spotted a party of horsemen in bright cloaks atop a hill outside the camp. One helmet was topped with a gilded crown.
Charles was being sensible, standing back from the battle and watching it—unlike Manfred, whom Lorenzo had seen just as he was leaving the Hohenstaufen camp, riding into the fray waving his great broadsword. Lorenzo shook his head sadly.
What my king needs is less gallantry and more ruthlessness.
Holding up a parchment covered with elaborate handwriting and a large seal of green wax with long ribbons, he pulled his cart up to the nearest guard, a stout, white-haired man with bleary eyes. Naturally, only the least able-bodied would be left to guard the camp this day. And the worst they would be expecting would be attempts at thievery by the whores and traders whose tents and wagons lay a short distance up the road from the camp.
"Here is my safe conduct from King Charles's ally, the bishop of Agnani," said Lorenzo briskly. He held his breath anxiously while the guard stared at him.
"We are in the middle of a battle, man. You can't just drive your cart in here. What do you have in it?"
The guard barely glanced at the document Lorenzo had spent a precious hour forging. Lorenzo was relieved. He was not at all sure the scroll would bear close scrutiny, although only one soldier in a thousand could read. And any clerics who might be along withCharles would probably be on the edges of the battlefield, succoring the wounded and dying.
"I bring a gift of wine from the Bishop of Agnani to the ambassadors from Tartary."
"I will have to taste the wine," said the white-haired guard importantly.
"Of course," said Lorenzo with a grin, and as the guard climbed into the dark interior of the cart, almost fully occupied by two big wine casks standing on their bottoms, Lorenzo unhooked a tin ladle from its wooden wall and handed it to the stout man.
Stupid as well as unfit this guard was, thought Lorenzo. He could stun him with the sack of sand and stones hidden under his tunic or slit his throat with the dagger in his boot. But then he would have a body to get rid of. This particular body would be more of a problem dead than it was alive and conscious. Lorenzo turned a spigot and let some of the red wine flow into the ladle.
The guard smacked his lips and grunted. "Too good for those slant-eyed barbarians."
"Right, my friend," Lorenzo agreed. "But the bishop cultivates their friendship because he finds them interesting. These high-horse folk have no common sense."
"If you want to know what is interesting," said the guard, "what is interesting is the pretty little putana the older Tartar travels with. They say she's a Jewess. I have often wondered if she would be partial to other older men."
Rachel! That pig of a Tartar dragged that poor child here to this damned war.
"That is interesting, all right. Now, where the hell do I find these Tartars?"
The guard poured himself another ladle full of wine without bothering to ask, and drained it with more loud lip noises. Then he and Lorenzo climbed out of the cart.
"Their tent is the one with blue and yellow stripes in the center of the camp. You see it? But I do not think you will find them there."
Lorenzo had suspected that the Tartars would not stay in their tent. If they were out watching the battle with Charles's commanders, it would be well-nigh impossible to kill them in full view of so many of the enemy. But that had occurred to him before he left Manfred's camp. He had thought of another way to carry out Daoud's orders. Along with the casks, he had brought one jar of a very special wine, laced with enough belladonna to kill a whole army of Tartars. He would leave that to greet them on their returnfrom the battle. Then he would unhitch his dappled brown and white gelding, a good riding horse, and scout around the edges of the battle to see if there was some way to get at the Tartars more directly.
A crossbowman sat on the ground at the entrance to the blue and yellow striped tent. He picked up the bow that lay on the ground beside him and jumped to his feet when Lorenzo drove up. Lorenzo remembered seeing him guarding the Tartars in Orvieto, and his heart beat heavily for a moment, but the man gave no sign of recognizing him.
Lorenzo held up his splendid parchment and explained his mission.
"They are not here," said the guard sourly.
"Well, the Bishop of Agnani is an important ally of your King Charles. Help me unload this wine." Lorenzo went around the cart and pulled the back down to make a ramp.
"It is good wine." Lorenzo continued, "and you can drink your fill after we get it into the tent. The Tartars will not miss a few cupfuls."
Grumbling despite the promised reward, the guard helped Lorenzo manhandle the cask to the back of the cart, tip it, and roll it down to the ground. Then they unloaded the other one.
The guard stood back to let Lorenzo roll the first cask by himself through the loose flap into the Tartars' tent.
"Stay away from the girl," he growled at Lorenzo's back. "His Eminence the cardinal says she's under arrest."
Lorenzo stiffened, and a chill gripped him. What danger was Rachel in now?
As Lorenzo straightened up, he heard a gasp.
The tent was lit by a single candle and the daylight that filtered dimly through its silk walls. It was held up by two center poles and an oblong framework from which the sides were hung. Around the edges were camp beds. Between the center posts was a table. Charcoal glowed in a brazier, warming the interior of the tent.
A shadowy figure rushed toward him. Lorenzo backed away, his hand reaching inside his tunic for the sandbag.
"Lorenzo!"
"Rachel." His voice was choked.
Her arms gripped him as tightly as if she were drowning. He felt warmth flood through him.
"Ah, Rachel." He had not seen her since he had taken her to Tilia Caballo's, and not a day went by that he had not cursed himselffor doing so. She looked well, her face pink, but thinner than he remembered. She was, he realized suddenly, very beautiful.
"I thought your name was Giancarlo," said a dry voice. Lorenzo looked up to see the old Franciscan monk who traveled with the Tartars standing near him.
"What is going on here?" The Venetian burst into the tent. "Get your hands off that woman." He drew the shortsword he wore at his belt.
Lorenzo instantly let go of Rachel and stepped back. He bowed low, spreading his hands in a courtly gesture.
"Forgive me, Messere," he said in a placating tone. "A long-lost cousin." His hand darted for his boot and seized the handle of his dagger.
"I don't believe that for a—" the Venetian began, but his guard dropped slightly, and his words were cut off when Lorenzo's blade plunged into his chest.
"Jesus have mercy!" said the old Franciscan. The Venetian dropped to his knees and fell on his face on the carpeted wooden floor of the tent.
"Try to give an alarm and you are dead too, Father," Lorenzo growled.
"No, Lorenzo, no!" Rachel cried. "Friar Mathieu is a good man."
"Perhaps that would not matter to Messer Lorenzo," said Friar Mathieu, his eyes fixed on Lorenzo with a penetrating stare. "If, as I suspect, he serves that elegant blasphemer Manfred von Hohenstaufen."
Lorenzo gave a short bark of a laugh. His heart was galloping.
Friar Mathieu knelt and whispered prayers in Latin over the dead Venetian. With his thumb he traced a cross on the man's forehead.
"You think there is no good to be found in King Manfred's camp?" Lorenzo said. "I am not surprised. You Franciscans pride yourselves on your ignorance."
Rachel's hand rested lightly on Lorenzo's arm. "Lorenzo, I beg you, do not insult Friar Mathieu. He has been my only friend since John took me from Madama Tilia's house. What are you doing here?" Her face lit up with hope. "Have you come to take me away?"
Lorenzo's mind was working rapidly. Apparently, Friar Mathieu was a decent sort, and Lorenzo had no desire to kill him. But what to do with him? Rachel might have given him the answer. This was, in fact, a God-given chance to get her away from the Tartars. And Daoud, he knew, would bless him for it.
"Where are the Tartars, Rachel?" he said.
"They put on mail and took bows and arrows and swords, and they have joined the fighting."