Tom Harper - Siege of Heaven

We did not delay; we might have lost our nerve. As we marched through the camp many called that we were going the wrong way, that Jerusalem was behind us. When they realised our purpose their shouts became angrier. They lined the road to watch us go, hurling abuse: we were traitors, cowards who did not dare look upon Jerusalem for fear of God’s judgement. He would find us, they warned. One or two of them threw rocks, and I feared for a moment that in their fervour they might stone us to death, but a few glares from the Varangians cowed them enough and they soon lost interest. They had better things to do that day.

By mid-morning we had gone several miles down our road, unpicking the threads of the previous day’s journey. Nikephoros rode at the head of our little column; the rest of us walked, for I had sold my horse the night before to a Provencal knight who had lost his. The Franks would have reached Jerusalem by now, I thought. I wondered what they had found there.

‘Twenty-thousand Egyptians waiting to massacre them,’ said Sigurd, when I voiced my question aloud.

A fresh stab of betrayal lanced through me and I glanced ahead to Nikephoros. I had not repeated what he had revealed to me, not even to Sigurd. He loved the emperor he served and he loved his honour: I could not imagine how he would accept the ignoble truth of our mission. As for the others, how could I tell them that everything they had suffered for had been a lie? Thomas had not spoken a word since Nikephoros announced we were going home; his face was hard and still as stone. White knuckles clenched the haft of his axe, and several times I saw him angrily kick out at pebbles in the road. I think he would have deserted in an instant if it had not been for Everard, Helena and her unborn baby.

Just before lunch, the road turned into a steep-sided valley. A stream-bed meandered along the bottom of the embankment, though nothing but dust flowed there now, and on the far bank the flat ground was planted with many fruit trees. It seemed an arid sort of garden, but water must have lingered somewhere in the recesses of the earth, for many of the trees had blossomed. Some already even bore fruit. We called a halt and scrambled across the stream, into the welcome shade of the orchard.

Once again, I saw what secret miracles lingered in this land. June was only a week old, but the fruits had swollen so ripe you could not tell if they would break free of their branches or burst from their skins. Anna plucked a pomegranate from a gnarled tree and cut it open. The seeds glistened inside like a cupful of rubies; she scooped them out and fed them to me, and afterwards I licked the red juice from her fingers. Zoe and Helena gathered dates and apples in their skirts, while the Varangians laughed and shied rotten figs at each other.

I could have stayed all afternoon in that drowsy orchard. Leaning against a tree, Anna’s head cradled in my lap, I realised that what I really longed for was not to go home, nor to Jerusalem, but simply to not go anywhere: to lie down and rest and be still. I swatted away a wasp that was buzzing around my ear and closed my eyes, wishing I could stay there for ever.

Anna lifted her head. ‘Did you hear that?’

‘What?’ I stroked the skin on the back of her neck, still smooth and pale where her hair had covered it against the sun. ‘I can’t hear anything.’

She shook my hand away. ‘Listen.’

I listened. The wasp buzzed as it hovered over a fallen apple; further off, I could hear Sigurd’s men laughing, and the enthusiastic babble as Everard chattered away beside Helena. And further still, from up the road, I heard a low rumble, like wind gusting through a rocky cleft. But the day was still, and there was no wind.

I clambered to my feet and stepped out from under the tree, shading my eyes. To my right, Nikephoros had stood up in his stirrups and was waving impatiently, signalling we should be on the march again. Despite the heat, he had chosen to wear his full imperial regalia: the heavy dalmatic embroidered with gold, and the jewelled lorum sparkling in the sun. A few of the Varangians had already answered his summons; others were slowly drifting back through the trees. To my left, Thomas was walking with Helena and Zoe: Everard sat on his shoulders and snatched at butterflies. And beyond him, where the road came around a turn in the valley, a plume of dust was rising into the blue June sky.

‘Demetrios.’ Sigurd’s voice called me from somewhere to my right. ‘ Get down! ’

Wrapped in the dust they churned beneath their hooves, a company of horsemen swept around the bend in the road. I could hardly see them at all through the cloud — little more than flashes of spears and armour in the billowing dust — but there was something terrible and hungry in their speed, like an eagle hastening on to devour its prey. I crouched low, frantically waving Thomas and the girls to do likewise.

Perhaps, in their haste, the horsemen might have missed us if not for Nikephoros. He sat on his mount beyond the cover of the orchard, tall in his saddle and shining like a beacon. Even the most casual traveller would have seen him and gawped — these men were looking for him. They reined in on the far bank of the dry stream and pulled around into a loose line opposite us. I counted about twenty of them, and as the dust settled I saw that every one was dressed for battle. They seemed to be Franks, though they carried no standard.

‘Who are you?’ Nikephoros’ challenge echoed out — imperious and aloof, but strangely dead in the arid valley. No one answered. At the end of the line, the knight who had led them drew his sword and lifted it over his head. Instinctively, I looked to his shield to see if it bore any tell-tale device.

He did not carry a shield — could not have, for his left arm ended in a grotesque stump barely inches from his shoulder. That told me more than any insignia. His eyes were hidden in the shadow of his helmet, but in my mind I could almost see their bulging stare looking down on us in triumph, the veins livid with the joy of revenge.

‘Traitors!’ he shouted, and the valley walls chorused his words so that wherever I turned the accusation bombarded my ears. ‘You abandoned me to the Ishmaelites once before. You will not do it to the Army of God.’

He waved his sword forward. The row of spears swung down. Opposite them, Nikephoros raised a single arm as if he could somehow hold them back. And, for a moment, it seemed that he did — on either side of the dusty stream, not a man moved.

The dark note of a horn blasted through the silence, but not from the Franks. It sounded from high on the hillside opposite, behind us. I turned to look. At the top of the northern slope, facing the noon sun, a new line of horsemen had appeared. The spikes on their helmets and the bosses on their shields glittered like knives. One of them angled forward a spear, and the black banner of the Fatimids unfurled before him.

The horn sounded again.

‘Christ preserve us,’ murmured one of the Varangians beside me.

Perhaps this was the battle we deserved. For so many months Nikephoros had schemed to bring the Franks and the Fatimids into the same place, to destroy each other for his benefit. Now, in that dry valley, they would meet at last — and we would be nothing more than dust to soak up their blood. A cloud of arrows flew up into the June sky and dipped into the valley, gathering deadly speed as they fell. The Egyptians plunged after them, leaning far back in their saddles as they spurred their horses through the gorse and scree, nimble as goats. They might have managed to surprise us, but the Franks were no strangers to ambush. With shouts of ‘ Deus vult ’ they kicked forward, down the embankment and across the dry stream to the orchard.