A Fall in Antioch
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A Fall In Antioch free porn video
An historical mystery written by request of my editor.
August 1098
‘God’s Wounds, it’s hot!’
The grizzled soldier removed his leather cap and mopped his brow with a filthy rag. His younger companion at the sentry post nodded by way of reply. Below their vantage point in the gatecastle, the city sprawled, baking in the heat, although it lacked an hour to noon. Looking away to the west, where the remains of the army’s siege camp could still be seen, the air shimmered and the distant images danced, as though upon a sea. The two guards moved slowly along the walls. The younger man, a Welsh man-at-arms named Cadfael, paused to drink at the water butt. It could hardly be called refreshment, he mused, the blood-hot liquid carried the rank taste of the vinegar added to purify it, plague was rife and one couldn’t be too careful.
Cadfael stood up, rubbed his aching back with both hands and adjusted the yew bow that was slung over one shoulder. Horseshoes clattered in the courtyard below. A knight arriving or leaving the Council. The young soldier sighed. It was the horses he pitied most. They, poor beasts, had no say in the matter and too many destriers had left their bones in the wastes to the north of Antioch. He wondered again at what had led him to this place. Oh, it had sounded fine enough back home. The priests blessed them when they left to join God’s army. This rabble! The Normans hated the Franks and the Italian followers of Count Bohemond hated everyone. He, a Welshman of Gwynedd, had found himself with the English contingent under the command of Robert, Duke of Normandy. Robert was a brave warrior but a remote and ineffectual leader. He clung to dreams of glory, even in the face of the squalid reality that this great crusade had become.
What had started as a great and wondrous adventure had collapsed into bitter ashes of acrimony and mistrust. The battle cry of ‘Onwards to Jerusalem’ now sounded hollow even to the most dedicated ears. The army was suffering badly. Supplies were poor and infrequent. The Genoese merchantmen that brought goods from Europe to the port of St Symeon had hiked their prices fourfold. What little plunder that filtered down to humble soldiers like Cadfael was soon spent. The hot, stony deserts had taken their toll on man and beast and there was always the constant fear of plague that seemed to afflict them wherever they made camp for too long. Some things never changed, though. The arrogance of the chevaliers, for instance. Any man who couldn’t speak French was considered worthless, even though many of the so-called ‘flower of chivalry’ were now reduced to foot soldiers. Most of the knights were penniless, younger sons sent on the crusades because their fathers’ estates could not support them. Yet they still comported themselves as if at Court. Cadfael found all of this difficult to understand for a son of Wales.
He was short and square of build with the heavy musculature around the chest and shoulders that is witness to many hours spent pulling on the yew bow. His countenance might be best described as open, comely enough, a good Welsh face with much bone and heavy brows beneath the russet-brown hair. He was perhaps barely twenty but it was difficult to judge, his skin burnt teak-brown by the strong sun of the Holy Land.
He was roused from his reverie by a shout, a high, panicked sound that ended abruptly. Cadfael and his companion raced along the walls in the direction of the noise. There was a small gap in the parapet where stones, weakened in the recent siege, had been dislodged. The two soldiers regarded each other with wary eyes. Both had heard the commotion yet neither wished be the first to question the other. Cadfael stooped and examined the dusty stone fragments by the broken inner parapet. He rose slowly and leant out to peer over the edge. There, some forty feet below, was the body of a man. It was clear, even from that distance, that the poor unfortunate had departed this world. The limbs lay every which-way and the unnatural angle of the head revealed a broken neck.
As happens when such disaster befalls, a crowd gathered swiftly. Cadfael and his companion stared down from their vantage point until a peremptory voice, much used to command, summoned them down from their eyrie. They made a reluctant descent. It is not the way of soldiers to seek the company of their betters and in this Cadfael was no exception. He would give best to no man but rather preferred to go his own way in life. He could recognise and submit to authority readily enough if the case demanded such but otherwise he was content to be left to discharge his duty in a manner he thought fit, and he was never one to shirk.
‘You there! What happened here? How came this man to fall?’
The two guards regarded their interrogator solemnly with the blank faces of those who do not understand the question or, at least, why such should be addressed to them. The older soldier, one Godred of Gloucester, a Saxon, merely shrugged. The nobleman was unknown to him and, furthermore, the thought of any involvement in this event suggested blame and blame was something Godred would avoid. Cadfael, meantime, was eyeing the corpse. He thought he recognised the man slightly. As he looked, he could not shake the feeling that all was not as it should be. He knelt beside the body to look more closely.
In the time since he had fled his native hearth, and, truth be told, his unfortunate betrothed, Cadfael had become well acquainted with death in all its sordid and unseemly forms. What he saw now puzzled him. With a grunted ‘by your leave’ he turned the body over and made a low clicking sound with his tongue. The back of the skull showed a deep, circular gash but with little bleeding. He felt under the lank, greasy hair along the neck from the base of the skull to the shoulder. The shattered vertebrae were obvious. He turned his attention to the rest of the body, noting the same sort of patched homespun as clothed most of the army. But why was the man wearing a cloak? It was hot as Hades.
The knight grew impatient.
‘Get up man, he’s beyond your help.’
‘That he is,’ Cadfael replied slowly, rising from his knees. ‘But I can tell you that he did not die here.’
‘Nonsense, man. That fall would have killed anyone.’
‘It would, My Lord, anyone living. This man died elsewhere. I think we are meant to believe otherwise, mind.’
‘And do you say so?’ There was a certainty about this young archer that pricked the man’s curiosity.
‘Look here. He took this blow from the bastion as he fell.’
‘So?’
‘It didn’t bleed. My Lord, you have seen such wounds. It is not unlike that made by a blow from a mace. Headwounds bleed freely, as you will own.’
‘I see. Yes, truly, there has been no bleeding. What else?’
‘He wears a cloak, My Lord. On such a day in the blaze of noon? Yet we all sweat like pigs his skin is dry. And there’s more.’
‘Go on.’
‘The leather of his boots has been scuffed, not on the soles or heels, we’re all in that case. No, My Lord, look you here. The back of the boot. That’s fresh scarring to my eyes.’
The knight looked down where Cadfael’s thick finger indicated a fresh looking gouge in the leather, above the heel and running straight upwards, to the boot top. He nodded vaguely, already regretting his involvement.
‘So tell me what you believe happened.’
‘I would say, although there can be no certainty, that he met his death last night. The cloak was worn against the cold. Someone decided to cast his body from the wall, hoping it would be thought an accident. The scrape on the boot occurred when the body was dragged up the stairs or else, along the battlements.’
‘A murder, then, you say?’
‘No, that I do not say, only that he died last night and some place else.’
‘But, if not murder, why go to the trouble of playing out an accident?’
‘Ah. There is that.’
T
he assembled idlers listened to the exchanges agog. A low hum of muttered speculation rose. The knight spun on his heel and eyed them.
‘Does any here know this man?’
A tall, skinny, ill-favoured individual pushed himself to the front.
‘That’s Walter Veritas, groom to Sir Lionel de Blois, or was before His Lordship died.’
Cadfael nodded. He remembered then. The man had come, seeking to join the company of archers after his master’s death. The captain had refused him on grounds of a lack of skill. ‘And we’ve no mounts to tend,’ the captain had told him. Walter had made no complaint but left to try his fortune elsewhere.
‘Oh well, there’s little to be done here now. Take his body to the infirmary. ‘And you,’ this to Cadfael, ‘attend me later. I am Mercier de Longueval, aide to Count Bohemond. You will find me at his quarters. Come at curfew.’
Cadfael nodded stoically. He had little appetite for the task but accepted nonetheless. Godred jerked his thumb upwards in a gesture that suggested that they had best be getting back. He gave Cadfael a grimace of commiseration and puffed out his cheeks.
‘Perhaps it would have been better if you had let it go,’ he muttered as they walked away.
‘That I could not do, in all conscience. A man is dead and, whether by fair means or foul, I cannot say. But I do know that it merits more than a passing thought.’
‘So you said! Ah well, on your head be it.’
The relief came late in the afternoon and Cadfael made his way somewhat wearily back to the archers’ camp. He sought the captain and explained all that had transpired and of his summons to attend Sir Mercier de Longueval. The captain offered no comment but signalled his agreement and Cadfael found himself with an hour or two to kill before the curfew bell sounded. He found his footsteps taking him into the market quarter though, God knew, he had little enough silver with which to make any purchases. The worst of the heat was gone and, although the air lacked that freshness of the morning, Cadfael felt a blessed relief as he made his way down the close-packed alleys that led to the main square. The stallholders were packing up their goods for the night and Cadfael could see their offerings were sparse. Leatherwork and cloth, brass pots and gimcrack jewellery with here and there a vendor of unappetising food. The siege had gone hard with the city and no caravans had arrived bringing spices, silks and frankincense for many months now. Once-wealthy merchants now stood listlessly by half empty booths, hollow eyed and ill-fed.
Cadfael turned into the Street of Sailmakers and wandered idly among the booths. A voice hailed him by name and he advanced smiling to greet his friend, Salah the apothecary. Salah was tall but stooped and his weathered features bore the unmistakable stamp of the desert.
‘Salaam aleikum, Cadfael. Peace be unto you.’
‘And to you, Salah bin Mugrun.’
‘And what brings you to the bazaar, my friend? You seek some remedy or unguent, perhaps?’
‘No, Salah, I was simply walking, following my feet, and they led me to your door.’
‘Come then and take refreshment with me.’
The apothecary beckoned Cadfael into the interior of his booth and clapped his hands. A slim, dark-eyed girl appeared and Salah called for coffee and sweetmeats. She made a slight bow and withdrew, her eyes regarding Cadfael with open curiosity.
‘My niece, Mariam,’ the older man explained and urged Cadfael to sit with an expansive gesture. ‘She is learning my art.’
Cadfael merely nodded and breathed in the intoxicating mixture of scents that pervaded the interior of the apothecary’s booth. Bunches of wild herbs hung up to dry and there were shelves filled with oils and infusions, pots of ointment, vials of powders and liquids of every hue and description. The store never ceased to fascinate the young soldier. He had met Salah by chance the previous month. Cadfael had been looking for some physick for an infected cut on one foot. Salah had seen him limping and almost dragged him into the booth. The treatment had been effective and Cadfael felt he owed the apothecary a debt of gratitude. He had seen too many men’s wounds turn morbid and had feared the worst in his own case. He returned to Salah’s booth a few days later, bearing a gift of olive oil, and had stopped for an hour or two to talk. Since then, he had visited the man on perhaps a dozen occasions and, through assiduous questioning, was starting to learn the basics of the herbalist’s art. If Cadfael had a motto it would be ‘nothing learned is ever wasted.’
He recognised many of the plants used as being common weeds that grow everywhere from Aber Menai to Jerusalem but there were more that he could not put a name to. Salah answered all his questions with patience and corrected many of Cadfael’s misapprehensions with a ready smile.
‘No, my friend, wearing a sprig of rosemary will not ward off the plague. For that, you must drink a decoction of butterbur and the blessed thistle. But it must stand for two days after the brewing.’
They conversed easily for many hours. Salah wanted to know all about the Western lands that sent such soldiers to his city. When Cadfael related his tale of the crusade. Salah simply looked puzzled.
‘But are we both not people of the Book? There is but one God and if you believe that Jesus is His prophet….’
‘We believe that Jesus is His son, Salah.’
‘But how? Surely that is blasphemy?’
‘I’m no scholar, Salah, I simply tell you what we believe. Yet I have seen more Christian charity among the supposed infidel than I have had from many of my own kind.’
‘I do not understand, Cadfael, my friend. Is there not but one God? And he is your God and mine, I think.’
‘So I believe.’
‘And yet each calls the other ‘infidel.’ A strange world, my friend.’
Meanwhile, Cadfael perfected his knowledge of Trade Greek, the lingua franca of the Levant, and learned a little of the language of the Syrians. He had a facility with languages and could converse with equal fluency in Welsh and English as well as hold his own in Langue d’Oui – the Norman tongue.
Mariam, the apothecary’s niece, returned with a brass tray and set the coffee and sweetmeats before the men. Cadfael gave her a smile of thanks and her eyes widened slightly but she said nothing and withdrew behind a curtained door.
‘Beware, my friend. My niece is a headstrong girl. Her mother, my only sister, sent her to me a year gone. Her husband died of the cholera. He had no family so she returned home. It was not a happy arrangement. Mariam can be… difficult. There was some trouble over a young man. He was importunate. Now he walks with a limp.’
Sensing Salah’s unease, Cadfael smiled.
‘I do believe you are trying to tell me something.’
‘A wise man needs no telling. I like you, Cadfael. You are an honest man and have a subtle mind.’
‘But?’
‘You are not of our faith or our race, my friend.’
‘I understand.’
But as he walked towards the castle where Bohemond’s banner flew in defiance of Count Raymond, Cadfael could not quite manage to expunge the image of the dark-eyed slender girl. He cursed himself for a fool and turned his mind to the meeting with Sir Mercier de Longueval. He did not stop to wonder that he had become involved. The dead man had cried out to him for justice, he could not act otherwise. He ran through all he had seen once more, the cloak, the lack of blood, the scuff marks on the boots. The tale they told was limited enough. Questions formed in his mind to which he had no answers. Something worried him, like a burr under a blanket: unseen but irritating for all that.
Sir Mercier de Longueval did not keep him waiting. The young aristocrat ushered Cadfael into a small chamber containing a simple wooden table and chairs and a low bed. An hauberk of fine mail rested on a rough frame and a costly sword lay
upon the blankets. Cadfael took in his surroundings at a glance. He guessed, correctly, that these were Sir Mercier’s quarters and wondered why he was afforded such intimacy. The knight had a harassed look and seemed barely in control of his temper. Spots of anger suffused his cheeks and his movements were jerky and anxious. He motioned Cadfael to a chair, poured out two goblets of wine and drained one of them at a single draught.
‘Your name, soldier?’
‘Cadfael ap Meilyr of Gwynedd.’
‘Duke Robert’s man?’
‘Of his band but I owe him no oath. I’m sworn to Eilwynn of Worcester.’
‘An archer, then. So tell me, Cadfael ap Meilyr, do you know how it lies between My Lord and Count Raymond?’
‘There has been some talk.’
‘And what is your opinion of the matter?’
Cadfael considered. Count Raymond and the other Nobles who led the Crusade had sworn an oath to the Emperor Alexis in Constantinople that they would return any lands of Byzantium liberated from the Turk. This, by rights, should include Antioch. But Bohemond and his nephew, Tancred, had captured Antioch where others failed. Further, when the Crusaders had, in turn, been besieged within the city, the Emperor had turned his army away, refusing to come to their aid. Although most blamed the craven Stephen of Blois for this abandonment, Bohemond declared his oath to the Emperor annulled. He had sworn, he said, in return for the promise of aid and succour when at need. In this, Alexis had failed. To Bohemond’s mind this very failure released him from his own oath and the turbulent Count now clamed Antioch for his own Kingdom, supported by Tancred. Cadfael gave a quiet sigh and replied.
‘My Lord, it is one to me whether Alexis or your master rules Antioch. I came to free the Holy Sepulchre and the other places dear to us as Christians. The disputes of princes are beyond me to understand.’
Mercier de Longueval regarded the stocky soldier shrewdly before giving a shrug. He doubted much was beyond this man’s understanding but he was pleased by the answer. He did not doubt Cadfael’s assertion that he had come to liberate the shrines. Mercier had observed more honest piety among the men at arms than he witnessed from those of his own rank for whom plunder seemed the prime motivation.
‘The dead man served Lionel de Blois, Stephen’s vassal?’
Cadfael nodded by way of reply.
‘And this same Lionel died before Stephen’s desertion?’
‘So I believe, My Lord.’
‘What else do you know of him?’
‘Little enough. He came seeking a place among our band but the Captain would have none of him. I never saw him again until today.’
‘Then that is where we must start. I charge with you discovering whom he next served. That may tell us why someone thought it necessary to do murder. And if we know the motive, may we also not find the man?’
‘May I ask, My Lord, why me?’
‘You chose yourself, man. Others were content to believe he fell yet you were not. May I ask you why?’
‘I cannot give you a ready answer, My Lord. It was plain to me that a dead man fell from the wall. And whether he met his end by fair means or foul, do we not owe him a reckoning?’
Sir Mercier gave a thin smile. ‘Too many of this host care less. There would be more consternation within these walls for a horse deliberately lamed. I laid the matter before Count Tancred and he laughed it off, saying what is one more death to this band of butchers? Count Bohemond took notice, however, and has ordered me to resolve it, come what may. Do you know my lord, the Count?’
Cadfael shook his head. What he knew of Bohemond was little. The foot soldiers held the Count in high regard as a General, careful of their lives and shrewd in battle. Bohemond was a giant among men, his blond head stood tall above the throng of Nobles and he must have been over a foot taller than Cadfael. Only his nephew, Tancred, matched him in height and breadth of chest and shoulder. It was said he had sworn a vow of chastity and was a pious man, but he also had a reputation for an evil temper and a rough tongue. All this was hearsay and opinion and Cadfael set little store by either.
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