Tom Harper - Siege of Heaven

Raymond heard all this in silence. The light from the flickering torches did not reach his empty eye-socket, which loomed like a hole bored through his face.

‘Come,’ he said at last. ‘Let us see what disaster Peter Bartholomew has worked.’

We rode on into the ruins of Ma’arat. Perhaps, before the Franks arrived, it had been a middlingly prosperous place on this lonely plateau; now it was a ruin. A ghoulish amber light filled the air like dawn, and by its glow we could see the devastation the pilgrims had wrought. At first sight, the destruction seemed wild, indiscriminate: some sections of wall were all but intact; in other places gaping holes rent the stone like cloth. Wisps of smoke rose from beneath the rubble, as though the very earth burned, and long stretches of the moat had been filled in with the debris.

Aelfric, riding beside me, gestured to the ruined defences. ‘Frenzied peasants didn’t do this.’

‘No?’ I was paying little attention, for I had other concerns. Tancred’s taunt still echoed in my mind. What if Anna was somewhere in this smouldering chaos?

‘Not unless the devil possessed them with the spirits of siege engineers. It takes more than zeal and a hammer to collapse ten-foot-thick walls, and I never heard of a wild crowd taking it into their heads to dig sapping tunnels. Look.’ Aelfric pointed ahead of us, to where a felled gate now made a makeshift bridge over the moat. The towers that had flanked it were dissolved completely, and even the rubble had been carted away or used to fill in ditches.

‘They couldn’t have done that alone. Whatever the count’s steward protests, they had help from men who knew what they were doing.’

‘Bohemond’s agents, do you think?’

Aelfric shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’

A sense of dread began to build in me as we approached the centre of the town. The streets were eerily empty, but the sounds of ruination were all around us: long screams abruptly choked off, shouts of alarm, the crackle of fire and the crash of tumbling stone. Somewhere near by we could hear singing, a sad sound like a lament for the ruined town. We followed the noise, listening to it swell as we rode down deserted streets. Where was Anna? I scanned every alley, every window and every door, desperate for a glimpse of her, but the shadows were too deep.

We came around a corner into the main square of the town. Suddenly, all the life that had been hidden in the empty town was thrust before us. A host of pilgrims packed the square, singing the mournful song that now engulfed us, staring at the church on the eastern side where two bonfires burned brightly. The flames played over the stone like sunlight on water, while a tall figure dressed all in white stood on the roof and stared down at the congregation. His hands were folded into his sleeves and his head was turned to heaven, as if it were he whom the pilgrims hymned.

Not one of the pilgrims turned around as Raymond rode in, yet they parted before him like waves before a ship’s prow. Their song grew louder, almost deafening. I could not make out the words — perhaps it was a psalm, thought it might have been the tongue of angels for the fervour with which they sang it. On the dais at the front, Peter Bartholomew stood in a white robe.

Raymond had ridden to within about twenty yards of the church when suddenly he found the crowd would yield no further. He looked back, but that path had vanished. The pilgrim ranks had closed in, and he was marooned in their midst.

The man on the church stretched out his hands. For a moment it seemed that he did not have the mastery of the congregation I had expected, for they persisted with their song, rendering it louder still until the noise was almost deafening. And then, with a discipline so abrupt it left me breathless, they stopped, and there was nothing but an overwhelming silence.

A thousand pairs of eyes turned to Count Raymond.For a moment I feared he would buckle under the weight of their stares, but he recovered himself enough to call out in a ringing voice, ‘Peter Bartholomew, what have you done?’

The man on the church stared down at him as dispassionately as an icon — though not nearly as beautiful. He had let his hair and beard grow long; his nose was misshapen where it had once or twice been broken, and the erratic firelight could not soften the hard pox marks on his face. Even so, he had climbed a long way since he crawled out of the pit at Antioch clutching the fragment of the holy lance.

‘What I have done is God’s will,’ he declared. His voice was deeper than I remembered it, echoing off the surrounding walls. ‘ For lo, I will send a man to make straight the way of the Lord …’

Raymond sat up straight. ‘That is blasphemy.’

A quiet sigh carried through the crowd, and they seemed to press closer around the count. He looked down uncertainly.

‘It is prophecy,’ Peter answered calmly. He seemed to be clutching something in his right hand: a tablet, or maybe a book. ‘Look around you. The Lord has sent these men out as sheep among wolves, and now their shepherd has abandoned them. You have tried to make your kingdom here, and forsaken the celestial kingdom that awaits us in Jerusalem.’

‘I have not forsaken Jerusalem,’ Raymond protested. His voice was brittle. ‘I have the unity of the Army of God to consider.’

‘Listen to your people. They are crying out to go to Jerusalem. You built your house here and they tore it down, stone from stone, because it was not built on the rock of faith. If you will not lead us to Zion then we will leave you here, abandoned and defenceless, for your enemies to pick over.’

‘The time is not right,’ Raymond murmured, almost to himself. ‘It is madness to campaign in winter. None of the other princes will support this folly.’

‘Then your glory will be all the greater.’ Peter’s voice was warm, the coaxing voice of a sympathetic friend. ‘But if you do not go, your name will be ignominy, and your reputation dust.’

His hold on the crowd was astonishing. When he spoke kindly they stood there as docile and comforting as sheep, but as soon as he uttered a threat you could almost feel the anger ignite. I began to wonder what would happen to me if Count Raymond provoked Peter Bartholomew to violence.

Raymond looked away from Peter, scanning the crowd in the desperate hope of allies. Among the peasants’ hoods and straw-brimmed hats I saw a good number of armoured helmets, but none of them showed the least impulse to help their lord.

‘You have disobeyed my laws and offended against my authority,’ he said, addressing the crowd directly. ‘But disperse now, remake what you have broken and yield up the wicked men who led you astray and I will show mercy.’

It was a brave gesture from an old warrior, but he had been lured into a battle he could not win. Peter Bartholomew did not even need to reply: the sea of impassive, upturned faces around Raymond was all the answer he needed. From somewhere near the back a voice whispered ‘Jerusalem’, and very quickly the word spread until it resounded through the host like the crash of waves.

Raymond pressed his hands together as if in prayer, and bowed his head. At a sign from Peter Bartholomew, the pilgrims fell silent.

‘Ready your arms and gather up what food you can find.’ His voice trembled, perhaps from piety, though it sounded more like the edge of tears. ‘In three days, we will march to Jerusalem.’

The chains of tension that had bound the crowd fell away, and all at once they erupted in a frenzied outburst of cheers, hymns and wild prayers. Banners waved in front of the fires, fanning the flames; Count Raymond was carried from his horse and lifted up to the church roof, where he stood beside Peter Bartholomew to receive the jubilant acclaim of the crowd. All memory of his reluctance was forgiven in an instant. Even those around me, at the very fringe of the gathering, had tears of joy glistening in their eyes as they prostrated themselves before Raymond and Peter.