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  I commend you on historic success, Salah ad-Din.’

  ‘God and the future will judge it.’

  ‘You have dealt with Guy and his followers?’

  ‘Only with Reynald of Châtillon. A king does not kill a king, passes no hasty sentence on the nobles he captures. Plenty others remain to be butchered before our departure.’

  ‘It was my privilege to play a part in your achievement.’

  ‘I cannot deny your role. Yet to me you are a jackal even jackals would despise.’

  ‘You honour me, Salah ad-Din.’

  The Lord of Arsur gave a low and ironic bow. He spoke Arabic well, but was no Arab. He had counted himself among the Franks, and yet betrayed his race without scruple. A difficult course had been navigated with consummate skill and ease, but the Sultan seemed grudging in his praise. That was his prerogative. Still, he could not ignore the facts, overlook the truth that subterfuge and sleight of hand had delivered up the enemy. It was the Lord of Arsur who had secretly persuaded the crusader ruler of Antioch to avoid committing to this war, the Lord of Arsur who had influenced King Guy to bring his army by this murderous route to Tiberias. And it was the Lord of Arsur who had slipped away with his retainers from the plateau on the Horns of Hattin to the Saracen camp the previous night. A jackal even jackals would despise. The jackal required feeding.

  Saladin approached him. ‘What is it you desire?’

  ‘I ask solely for one thing.’

  ‘The object that is called by your kind the True Cross you shall have. I will not break my word. But I sense in you a darker purpose, a further intent for power and control.’

  ‘I seek merely to scavenge on the scraps of chaos.’

  ‘Let it remain so, my lord. There is no room in our new kingdom for those who oppose, no toleration for any who would undermine.’

  ‘I am aware of these conditions.’

  ‘Then take your fill and leave by the morrow.’

  Again the lightless form of the Lord of Arsur bowed. Such terms were acceptable. The Sultan was no fool, was right to feel unsettled, to have touched upon the possibility of hidden direction. A pact had been made with Satan, the aims and conclusion of which he would scarcely grasp. The Holy Land offered fine retreat for the unholy.

  ‘May festivities commence, Salah ad-Din.’

  A listless dusk of dancing shadows and undulating sound. By the light of fires and burning torches, Sufimystics whirled, muftis chanted, and the forces of Islam celebrated victory. Among the clamour, high above the clash of tambourines and wail of flutes, came the screams of captured turcopoles impaled on stakes. They were renegades, Moslem apostates who had denied their faith and crossed to volunteer for military service with the Latins. For them there was no pity. So their cries welled, mingling with the rest. It would be a long night, a lingering death, for many.

  Dawn broke, timid and grey on the horizon, threading illumination across the still-smoking battlefield. A haunting scene. Prayers were called and the faithful responded, offering thanks, promising obedience to the one God. There remained things to be done. In groups of ten, their wrists bound, their faces luminously pale in the gloom, two hundred and thirty Templar and Hospitaller knights were led out for execution. They were brought to a row of low boulders and forced to kneel. Around them the crowd jostled and jeered, ululating in frantic anticipation. This was sport, audience participation. The short sword-thrusts to the rectum, the necks of the victims rising in shock, the blades arcing downward, and the heads rolling to be hoisted on spears and paraded as trophies. A clean sweep.

  Mounted on horses and leading a train of pack mules, the Lord of Arsur and his cowled officers made their way out of camp. Their task here was complete. They would leave the Moslems to their entertainment, let Saladin prepare for the next stage of conquest. The baron turned in his saddle for a parting glimpse of the show.

  ‘Traitor!’

  As his hood slipped, eye-contact and recognition came. The Templar stood at his stone block, his chin tilted in defiance, his expression fixed with accusation and hate. At the hour of his death, he knew. A handsome man, the Lord of Arsur thought, doubtless a great warrior. But there was a time for everything, an end to everyone.

  ‘Judas. Betrayer of our cause.’ The Templar called out again, his voice carrying, silencing those about him. ‘I am happy to go to my Maker, glad to leave the earth on which you walk. A curse be upon you.’

  Last laugh upon him. The Lord of Arsur shrugged and spurred his mount on. He would not allow the boldness of a condemned knight to penetrate, would not be troubled by valedictory sentiment. His party quickened its pace. Behind, they were cheering once more, and the rocks coursed red with blood.

  In the weeks and months following, Saladin took many Christian towns and castles. Fifty-two of them fell. Surrounded, demoralized, their garrisons denuded of manpower for the army defeated on the Horns of Hattin, most offered only token resistance. Even those defended by the military Orders capitulated. For Saladin had sent envoys, the captured King Guy and Gérard de Ridefort, to parley and to order the laying down of weapons. The Templars had made solemn vow of obedience to their Grand Master. They could not refuse. The Latin kingdom of Outremer, land and forward outpost of the Franks – the Christian crusaders – seemed doomed.

  Saladin eventually turned his attention to the main prize, Jerusalem. It was almost a formality. Swamped by refugees, unable to muster more than a handful of troops, commanded by a motley band of dispossessed nobles and two knights, the city tried to bargain. Saladin demanded payment, a hundred thousand dinars as ransom for the populace; the defenders responded, threatening to raze the Dome of the Rock. An empty gesture. On 2 October 1187, anniversary of the visit to heaven by the Prophet Mohammed from Temple Mount, the forces of Islam entered the gates. The cross adorning the Dome was torn down and ritually beaten through the streets, the al-Aqsa Mosque was purified with rosewater and prayer, the cheering of Moslems could be heard in every quarter. Ownership of Jerusalem had changed.

  But the power of the Latins was not yet spent. Some clung on in their coastal redoubts, holding out, fighting back, depending for survival on resupply by sea. The cry went out to save Christendom. And it was answered. Knights and princes appeared from Europe, fired by conscience, inspired by faith to recovering Jerusalem and the lost relic of the True Cross. It prompted the next spasm of violence. In June 1191 the ships of King Richard I of England and a coterie of fellow sovereigns arrived off Tyre, and the Third Crusade began. Cœur de Lion did well, retook Acre, captured land, marched his army up and down. Yet he failed in his quest for Jerusalem. Others were to follow, their campaigns sputtering to ignominious conclusions, their efforts redirected to simpler ends. Few had the stomach or resources for war. Saladin, scourge of the Frankish empire, died on Wednesday 4 March 1193. He left unfinished business, a fractured dynasty, and an imperfect legacy to be fought over by lesser men.

  Outremer had become the most beset of states, a narrow strip of territory and string of bastions running some one hundred and forty miles from Beirut to Jaffa along the Syrian–Palestinian coast and backing a mere ten miles inland. Within this compacted enclave barons squabbled and plotted; from here the military Orders mounted occasional raids. A strange and uneasy kind of peace. Around them, banditry and skirmishing swirled, intrigue and murder prevailed. To the north, another fractious Christian territory, that of Antioch and its satellite possession Tripoli. To the east and south, the Moslems. To the west, the sea. Christendom had its back to it. The days of glory, of triumph and dominion over the infidel, were gone.

  A quarter of a century after the carnage at Hattin, Jerusalem remained a dream and the papal call to arms went unheeded. It was the turn of the children to try.

  Chapter 1

  JUNE 1212. THE RHINELAND.

  ‘We are called by God, my brothers and sisters, bidden by Him to right wrongs, to earn salvation, to count ourselves among the numbered . . .’

  He was only twelve o
r thirteen years of age, a boy preacher named Nikolas who stood on a cart and spoke with the fire of a demagogue, the fluency of a prophet. And the children listened. There were thousands of them, spellbound, their hands raised, muttering in tongues, crying out or laughing in ecstasy and joy. The Spirit of the Lord was come among them. It urged them on, forced them to sway and sing, to forget their troubles and discard their pasts, to dwell only on a future in which they would be saved. Behind the young orator, the great edifice of Cologne Cathedral loomed. It was a waypoint to crusade.

  The boy stared from his platform at the upturned faces. They responded well to his address. He could see their rapt attention, sense the tidal surge of love and expectation and commitment. They sought, and he would provide. He lifted his arm, and the crowd stilled.

  ‘Look upon yourselves, my brothers and sisters. You are the regiments of God, an army of innocence. And you have been betrayed.’

  They waited for explanation, their features suddenly taut with concern at thought of duplicity, their eyes shining bright with conviction that all would be well. Their leader would offer solution.

  ‘I say again, betrayed. By the princes and kings of Europe. By the haughty crusaders who lost our Holy Land to the Saracen. By the corrupt barons of Outremer, who even now revel in sloth and sin while Jerusalem and the True Cross lie abandoned. Must we let such wickedness and iniquity endure?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Shall we remedy the impiety of our fathers, seize back what is rightfully ours?’

  ‘Yes!’ Mesmerized, German youth replied as one.

  ‘As they used the sword against the infidels, so shall we use peace. The seas will part to aid our progress; the doubters will kneel in dread; the lamb will lie down with the lion. We are the pure at heart, and it is we who shall now conquer.’

  Their cheers rose in tumultuous roar, washing over the square, lapping at the cathedral walls. Nikolas, the boy preacher, took comfort and certainty from it. He had prayed for guidance before the shrine of the Three Kings; he had toured the Rhineland with his message of truth and light. Children had flocked. As the Magi brought gifts to the Christ Child, so he would present his gift of a restored kingdom on earth. God had a plan, and the world would tremble and bend its knee.

  A young priest bearing a hessian sack stepped up beside him on the beribboned and gaily painted cart. He reached inside the bag and withdrew the object nestled within.

  ‘Behold, it is the head of St John the Baptist!’

  It was indeed the severed head of a man, its embalmed Semitic features leathery and wizened with age. Sightless eye-hollows gaped at children who had fallen to their knees in reverence and awe. This was a sign, a symbol of what was at stake and what they would march for. Even the saints rallied to their cause.

  Nikolas took the head and held it high above his own. ‘The Baptist himself, my brothers and sisters. A saint who was sacrificed, who would have us voyage and be baptized in the holy waters of the river Jordan.’

  ‘Hallelujah . . . hallelujah . . . hallelujah.’

  ‘Do you search for paradise?’ They did. ‘Will you go on sacred mission?’ They would. ‘Will you come with me and take the Cross?’

  ‘We shall . . . we shall . . . we shall.’

  ‘Arise and make ready.’

  Mass fervour was a beautiful thing. Their eyes glistened; their mouths opened and sang out to the Lord. They believed, for they wished to believe. They would follow Nikolas, for he offered vision and hope. Once lost, now they were found. Others would join them, dancing and tripping merrily in their wake as the colourful cart paraded through villages and towns on its southward journey. Children everywhere were bewitched and on the move, a simple cross of cloth sewn to their tunics signifying their aim. From Vendôme in France, thirty thousand had already departed for Marseilles in company with their shepherd-boy leader Stephen of Cloyes. But here there were more. With faith in their hearts, a pilgrim purse on their belts, a staff in their hands, they would begin their trek. There would be hardship ahead, travails aplenty. Yet they would endure. Because Christ bled for them, and the Holy Land called.

  Kurt looked about him. He was bored with the sermonizing, with having to stand still and listen when he could be running, climbing, exploring, starting out on the expedition of his lifetime. Of course it would be an adventure. That was what he liked. What he hated were beatings from his father, enforced inactivity, finding nests whose eggs had already been taken. And Gunther. He detested him with all the passion a twelve-year-old could muster: despised his bullying nature, his greater height, his rotten teeth and mop of red hair. A year older than himself, this son of a woodsman was feared by the other village boys, who had often felt his fists. Mutual and lasting enmity was assured. So it made no sense that Gunther too came on peaceful crusade to Jerusalem. God most certainly worked in mysterious ways. Kurt would not drop his guard.

  He caught sight of his friends among the throng. They were happy to be there, consumed like the rest in the bliss of the moment. There were the ten-year-old twins Zepp and Achim, the latter blind, the former guiding his brother for a miracle cure at the foot of the True Cross. Zepp smiled and waved, and Kurt returned the gesture. This was reported to Achim, who beamed and signalled his welcome. Close by were others: Hans the goatherd, Albert the crow-scarer, Egon the son of the blacksmith, little Lisa crying softly and being comforted by her cousin Roswitha. The village had been generous, was shorn of a generation. Kurt watched the salt tears stream, remembered how his mother had wept at their parting. He tried to put it from his mind.

  His fall was sudden, the trip deliberate, and it caught him by surprise. Winded, his lip bleeding, he rolled on his back and peered up from the cobbles. Gunther gloated down.

  ‘A pilgrim who cannot even stay upright to the edge of the square.’ He planted his foot squarely on Kurt’s heaving chest. ‘Perhaps it is right you crawl to Jerusalem like a maggot.’

  The youngster tried to rise, but was pinned. He tasted the blood in his mouth, was aware of the pressure and fury pulsing in his temples. A sense of justice and a hot temper were forever earning him punishment. He did not care. This was wrong, a crime perpetrated at the hands, the feet, of his mortal foe Gunther.

  In vain he struggled. ‘Let me up.’

  ‘Is that a command, a whining plea? You belong where you are.’

  ‘You tripped me, coward.’

  ‘And I could crush you also.’

  ‘In fair fight I would put you down.’

  ‘What is fairness, Kurt? It is the strongest who rule, the weakest who submit. Do as others do, as I require.’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘I will hurt you, will get anyone I wish to hurt you.’ The shadow of his angular frame blanketed his victim.

  ‘Release him, Gunther.’

  It was Isolda, her sweet face suffused with trembling ire, her gentle brown eyes glowing in indignation. At fourteen, two years older than Kurt, she was protective of her younger brother.

  Laughing, Gunther slowly rounded on her. ‘He needs a girl to guard him. It will not save either of you.’

  ‘You would strike me?’

  ‘Whatever it takes to teach a lesson.’ He balled and raised a fist. ‘Step aside, sister.’

  ‘Samaritans do not walk away.’

  She did not flinch. Her duty was to Kurt and the younger children, her promise to her mother to care for him and bring him safe home. She could not allow unchristian menace to daunt her.

  Gunther grinned. He welcomed the challenge, the chance to stamp and punch authority so early in the mission. It was a mistake. His captive slipped free and scrambled to his feet, was upon him in a blazing instant. They were grappling, rolling blindly on the ground, Kurt flailing blows, Gunther desperate to shield himself.

  ‘I meant nothing by it, Kurt.’

  ‘I mean everything. You yield?’

  ‘Please, we can talk.’

  Kurt landed a hit. ‘Surrender first.’

  ‘Yes .
. . yes . . . Stop, I beg you.’

  Blood pumped from the nose of the woodsman’s son and mingled with his mucous tears. The younger boy sat astride him, panting in his victory. He knew that it was not the end, but merely a marker, a prelude to future battles and increased hostility. Gunther was a dangerous adversary.

  He became aware of the silence. Even the defeated Gunther had ceased his babbling. It was as though they were the focus of attention, at the centre of an arena in which a myriad eyes surveyed them. Self-conscious, Kurt twisted his head to see. His instincts had been right.

  ‘How may we spread devotion, draw the infidels to Christ, when we fight among ourselves?’

  Nikolas had descended from the platform to deliver his rebuke. In shame, Kurt hung his head and released his hold. He wanted to curl up in a tight ball of anonymity, wanted to crawl to oblivion through the dense forest of legs. But he was caught.

  His voice glottal and wheedling, Gunther lay on his back and pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘He attacked me without reason. Everyone knows he is a savage beast with no conscience or remorse.’

  ‘That is a lie!’ Kurt shouted in raw frustration.

  ‘It is the truth, as I lie here wounded.’

  ‘You shall be injured afresh for such falsehood.’

  ‘See how he speaks and threatens me.’ Gunther was garnering support, playing to his spectators. ‘I am wronged, Brother Nikolas.’

  ‘Then embrace him. Put resentment and childish things aside. Help and love each other. We have common cause, a single destination.’

  They did as he commanded, and the children shouted in accord. Hosanna! Hosanna! Hosanna! All would be well. Kurt dredged a smile from his distaste and clutched at the bony shoulders of his foe. And Gunther whispered in his ear. Depend on it, I will kill you.

  Isolda was fussing over him, tending his cuts, lightly chiding. He accepted her attention with sheepish good grace. After all, he had placed her in danger, exposed her to the perils of his personal feud. She had every reason to scold. But her exasperation would not last, was ever tempered by her kindness and sibling solidarity. They were inseparable: he the tousle-haired boy of energy and fire, she the thoughtful girl with brunette plaits and quiet ways. Together against the fates.