I opened my eyes. It was still night. I had fallen into a deep ravine, far below the level of the road. My back was twisted against a tree and I could barely move. A wound ached horribly on the side of my head.
Again, I heard the deep rumbling from the woods.
“Who’s there?” I called. “Who is it?”
There was no reply. I focused on the spot in the darkness, trying to make out any shape. Who would be out here in the night? Not anyone I wanted to meet.
Then, I focused on a set of eyes. Eyes not human at all, but large as prayer stones: yellow, narrow, fuming. My blood froze.
Then it moved! I heard the brush crunch under its feet. The thing took a step out of the forest and came clear.
Dark, hairy . . .
Blessed Jesus Christ! It was a boar! Not twenty paces away.
Its yellow eyes were trained on me, inspecting me as if I were its next meal. I heard a snort. Then it was deathly still.
The thing was about to charge! I was certain of it.
I tried to clear my head. I could not possibly fight such a beast. With what? Its breadth alone was twice mine. It could slash me to pieces with its razory tusks.
My heart was pounding, the only sound I heard other than the beast’s low growl. It took another step toward me. The boar’s murderous eyes never left my own, deliberate and tracking.
God help me, what could I do? I couldn’t flee. It would run me down in my first steps. There was no one to shout to for help.
I searched for a strong tree to climb, but I didn’t want to move, to set it off. The beast seemed to study me, bucking its head, snorting its deadly intent. I could smell its fierce, hot breaths, the blood from past conflicts matted in its hair.
I grabbed the knife at my belt. I didn’t know if it would snap against the beast’s hide.
The boar snorted twice and flashed its teeth at me, its jowls red and dripping. I did not want to die. Not like this . . . Please, God, do not make me fight this thing.
I felt so incredibly alone.
Then, with a last deep snort, the beast seemed to understand that — and it charged.
All I could do was leap behind a tree, barely escaping the first violent gnash of its fearsome teeth.
I stabbed wildly at it with my knife, tearing at its face and neck, doing everything I could to repel its snarling jaws. The beast lunged viciously. It came again and again. I clawed with my knife, backing around the tree. The boar’s jaws ripped into my thigh and I cried out. The air emptied from my lungs.
Good Lord, I was pierced.
I had no time to inspect the wound. The beast slammed into me again, this time goring my abdomen. I screamed in pain.
I kicked at it and slashed my blade. It backed and lunged. Its teeth clamped on my thigh and it shook its head as if to tear my leg out of its socket.
I kicked myself away from the boar. I tried to run, but my legs had no strength. Blood was spattered everywhere.
Somehow I limped across the clearing, my strength nearly sapped. My abdomen felt as if it were on fire. I was done here. I fell to my side and backed myself against another tree, waiting for the end to come.
Beside the tree, I saw my staff. It must have toppled there in my fall. I reached for it, though it wasn’t much of a weapon.
I stared at the angry, snorting boar. “Come at me, offal. Come at me! Finish what you started.”
My mind flashed to the Turk who had spared me, a world away. This time, no laughter would save the day. I held the staff like a spear. “Come at me,” I shouted at the boar again. “Do me in. I am ready. Do me in.”
As if to oblige, the beast made another charge.
My breath was still. I offered no defense except to raise the staff at the shape flying toward me. Harnessing all my remaining strength, I thrust the rod with all my might at its eyes.
The beast let out a blood-chilling cry. I’d actually hurt it. The staff stuck in one eye. The boar staggered and shook its head madly, trying to rid itself of the staff.
I grabbed my knife and with whatever strength I had, stabbed at its throat and face, at anything I could strike.
Blood seeped out of its fur, each knife thrust striking home. Its growls diminished. It stumbled, still swinging its head to free the rod, while I continued to slash, tearing at its coat.
The beast’s blood mixed with my own. Finally its hind legs crumpled. I took the staff and forced it deep into the boar’s skull. A dying snarl came out of its awful tooth-filled mouth.
With a crash, the monster fell on its side. I just knelt there, depleted of strength. And amazed. I let out an exhausted shout.
I had won!
But I was badly wounded. Blood ran freely from my stomach and thigh. I had to make it out of the ravine or I knew I would die here.
Sophie’s face appeared in my mind. I know I smiled; I reached out to touch her. “Here is the way,” she whispered. “Come to me now.”
Chapter 28
IT WAS QUIET, like any sleeping town. The dark riders brought their panting mounts close to the edge. A few thatched cottages with post fences, animals sleeping in their sheds. That was all there was.
This would be easy, mere sport for such men. The leader sniffed, shutting his visor. His helmet bore a black Byzantine cross. He had chosen only men who killed for pleasure, who hunted for spoils as others hunted for meat. They wore only the darkened armor of battle, no crests, visors down. No one knew who they were. They strapped on their weapons — war swords, axes, and maces. They looked at him, eager, thirsty, ready.
“Have your fun,” Black Cross said, a bit of laughter coming through his command. “Just let us not forget why we are here. Whoever finds the relic will be a rich man. Now, ride!”
The night was split asunder by the explosion of charging hooves.
The clang of a warning bell sounded. Too late! The first thatched dwellings went up in flames. The sleeping town came alive.
Women screamed and ran to cover their children. Aroused townspeople struggled out of their homes to protect themselves, only to be struck down by swords or trampled in the melee as the riders stormed by.
These pathetic peasants, Black Cross mused, they run up and die like swatted flies, protecting their tiny clumps of shit. They think we are invading soldiers, come to take their cattle and steal their bitches. They do not even know why we are here!
Fire and mayhem raging, Black Cross trotted unconcerned through the street to the large stone home, the best in the town. Five of his riders followed.
Panicked sounds came from inside — a woman screaming, children being roused from bed.
“Break it in.” Black Cross nodded to a cohort. A single ax blow shattered the door.
A man in a white-and-blue shawl appeared in the doorway. He had long gray hair and a heavy beard. “What do you want here?” the cowering man asked. “We’ve done no harm.”
“Get out of my way, Jew,” Black Cross barked.
The man’s wife, in a wool sleeping shawl, rushed out and spoke fearlessly. “We are peaceful people,” she said. “We will give you whatever you want.”
Black Cross pinned the woman by her throat to the wall. “Show me where it is,” he demanded. “Show me, if you have any regard for his life.”
“Please, the money is in the courtyard,” the panicked husband whined. “In a chest under the cistern. Have it. Take what you will.”
“Search the house,” Black Cross screamed at his men. “Rip down every wall. Just find it.”
“But the money . . . I told you . . .”
“We did not come for money, filth.” Black Cross leered. “We are here for the jewel. Christendom’s precious relic.”
His henchmen stormed inside. They found an old man, his arms around two cowering children. A boy, perhaps sixteen, already with the locks of his race, and a girl, maybe a year younger, with dark, fearful eyes.
“What do you mean?” The father crawled on his knees. “I am a merchant. We have no jewels. No
relics.”
Piece by piece, the house was torn apart. The raiders smashed their swords into walls, dug with axes at stone, broke into chests and cupboards.
Black Cross pulled the husband up by the throat. “I will not trifle any longer. Where is the treasure?”
“I beg you, we have no jewels.” The trembling man gagged. “I trade in wool.”
“You trade in wool.” Black Cross nodded, glancing at the man’s son. “We shall see.” He took out a knife and pressed it against the boy’s throat. The boy flinched, revealing a line of blood. “Show me the treasure unless you want your son to die.”
“The hearth . . . underneath the tiles on the hearth.” The father bowed his head in his hands.
In a rush, two of the knights ran to the fireplace and, using axes, crashed through the floor tiles, unearthing a secret space. From it, they raised a chest, inside of which were coins, necklaces, brooches of gold and silver. And finally, a gorgeous ruby the size of a coin, in a gilded Byzantine-style setting. It gave off a luminous glow. The knight held it aloft.
“You have no idea what you hold.” The Jew blinked back tears.
“Don’t I . . . ?” Black Cross grinned. “It is the seal of Paul. Your race is unworthy to even hold it. You will steal from our Lord no more.”
“I did not steal it. It is you who does that. It was sold to me.”
“Sold, not stolen . . . ?” Black Cross’s eyes glittered. He turned back to the son. “Then it is only a small loss, compared to what your race has taken from us.”
In the same instant, he pushed his knife into the boy’s gut. A gasp emerged from the boy; his eyes grew wide and blood dribbled from his mouth. All the while, Black Cross smirked.
“Nefrem . . .” The merchant and his wife screamed. They tried to rush to their son but were held back by other raiders.
“Burn the place,” Black Cross said. “Their seed is dead. They can foul the earth no more.”
“What of the daughter?” a knight inquired.
Black Cross yanked her up and looked at the girl measuringly. She was a pretty specimen. He ran his gloved hand along the smooth skin of her cheek. “Such a pretty pelt, wool merchant . . . I wonder what it’s like to be wrapped in such a cloth. Why don’t you tell me.”
“Please, you have taken everything,” the father begged. “Leave us our child.”
“I’m afraid not.” Black Cross shook his head. “I must have her later. And no doubt the duke’s mule cleaner will want to do the same. Take her with us.” He threw the girl to another knight. She was carried out of the house, screaming in horror and fear.
“Don’t be so sad, Jew,” Black Cross addressed the sobbing man. He tossed a coin at him from the chest of treasure. “As you say, I do not steal your daughter, I buy her.”
Chapter 29
“IS HE DEAD?”
A voice crept through the haze. A woman’s voice . . . I opened my eyes. But I couldn’t make out a thing. Only a shifting blur.
“I don’t know, my lady,” another said, “but his wounds are grave. He doesn’t look far from gone.”
“Such unusual hair . . .” remarked the first.
I blinked, my brain slowly starting to clear. It was as if there were a shimmering veil reflecting my sight. Was I dead? There was a lovely face leaning over me. Yellow hair, braided densely, tumbling from under a brocaded purple cloak. She smiled. It warmed me like the sun.
“Sophie,” I muttered. I reached to touch her face.
“You are hurt,” replied the woman, her voice like the delicate trill of a bird. “I’m afraid you mistake me for someone else.”
My body felt no pain. “Is this Heaven?” I asked.
The woman smiled again. “If Heaven is a world where all wounded knights resemble vegetables, then, yes, it must be.”
I felt her hands cradle my head. I blinked again. It was not Sophie, but someone lovely, speaking with the accent of the north. Paris.
“I still live,” I uttered with a sigh.
“For the moment, yes. But your wounds are serious. We must get you to a physician. Are you from here? Do you have a family?”
I tried to focus on her questions. It was all too fuzzy and hurtful. I just said, “No.”
“Are you an outlaw?” the second woman’s voice intoned from above.
I struggled to see a lavishly robed lady, clearly royal, atop a stunning white palfrey.
“I assure you, madame,” I said, doing my best to smile, “I am benign.” I saw my tunic matted with blood. “Regardless of how I look.” Sharp pangs of pain now lanced my stomach and thigh. I had no strength. With a gasp, I fell back once more.
“Where do you head, Monsieur Rouge?” the golden-haired maiden asked.
I had no idea where I was. Or how far I had traveled. Then I remembered the boar. “I head to Treille,” I said.
“To Treille,” she exclaimed. “Even if we could take you, I fear you will die before you reach Treille,” the maiden said with concern.
“Take him?” the older lady questioned from above. “Look at him. He is covered with the blood of who knows whom. He smells of the forest. Leave him, child. He will be found by his own kind.”
I wanted to laugh. After all I’d been through, my life was being bargained for by a couple of bickering nobles.
I replied in my finest accent, “No need to fret, madame, my squire should be arriving at any moment.”
Then the young maiden winked at me. “He seems harmless. You are harmless, aren’t you?” She looked into my eyes. A lovelier face I hadn’t seen in a long time.
“Only to you.” I smiled faintly.
“See?” she said. “I vouch for him.”
She tried to lift me, appealing to two guards in bucket helmets and green tunics for help. They glanced toward their lady, the older of the women.
“If you must.” The grand lady sighed. She waved and the guards responded. “But he is your charge. And if your concern is so great, child, you will not mind giving up your horse.”
I tried to push myself to my feet, but my strength was not there.
“Do not struggle, red hair,” the blond maiden said. One of the accompanying guards, a big, hulking Moor, lifted me by the arms. The lady was right. My wounds were severe. If I slipped back into unconsciousness, I didn’t know if I would ever wake up again.
“Who saves me?” I asked her. “So I will know who to bless in Heaven should I pass on.”
“Your own smile saves you, redhead.” The maiden laughed. “But should the Lord not feel as favorably . . . I am called Emilie.”
Chapter 30
I AWOKE, this time with a sense of peace and the warmth of a fire about me. I found myself in a comfortable bed, in a large room with stone walls. A bowl of water sat on a wooden table to my right.
Above me, a bearded man in a scarlet robe shot a satisfied grin at a portly priest at his side.
“He wakes, Louis. You can go back to the abbey now. It seems you are out of a job.”
The priest lowered his flabby face in front of mine. He shrugged. “You have done well, Auguste . . . on the body. But there is also the matter of the soul. Perhaps there is something this blood-spotted stranger would like to confess.”
I wet my lips, then answered for myself. “I am sorry, Father. If it’s a confession you’re looking for, you might get a better one out of the boar that attacked me. Certainly a better meal.”
This made the physician laugh. “Back among us for only a second, Louis, and he’s sized you up.”
The priest scowled. It was clear he didn’t like being the brunt of mockery. He threw on a floppy hat. “Then I’m off.”
The priest left, and the kindly-looking doctor sat down beside me. “Don’t mind him. We had a bet. Who got you — he or I.”
I raised myself up on my elbows. “I’m glad to have been the subject of your sport. Where am I?”
“In good hands, I assure you. My reputation is that I’ve never lost a patient who wasn’t t
ruly sick.”
“And where am I?”
He shrugged. “You, sir, I’m afraid, are truly very sick.”
I forced a weak smile. “I meant the place, Doctor. Where am I taken?”
The physician gently patted my shoulder. “I knew that, boy. You are in Borée.”
Borée . . . My eyes widened in shock. Borée was among the most powerful duchies in France. Three times the size of Treille. Borée was also a four-day ride from Treille, but north. How had I ended up here?
“How long . . . have I been in Borée?” I finally asked.
“Four days here. Two more along the way,” the physician said. “You cried out many times.”
“And what did I say?”
Auguste wrung out a cloth from the bowl and placed it across my forehead. “That your heart is not whole, though not from any boar wound. You carry a great burden.”
I did not try to disagree. My Sophie lay somewhere — at Treille. And Treille was a week away on foot. I still felt her alive.
I pushed myself up. “You have my thanks for tending my wounds, Auguste. But I have to go.”
“Whoa.” The physician held me back. “You are not yet well enough to go. And do not thank me. I merely applied the salve and cauterized the wounds. It is the lady Emilie who deserves your thanks.”
“Emilie . . . yes . . .” Through the haze of my memory I brought back her face. I had thought she was Sophie. All at once, flashes of my journey here came to me. The Moor constructed a harness for me. The lady gave up her own mount for me and walked behind.
“Without her, pilgrim,” the doctor said, “you would have died.”
“You are right, I truly owe her thanks. Who is this lady, Auguste?”
“A soul who cares. And a lady-in-waiting at the court.”
“Court?” My eyes bolted wide. “What court do we speak of? You said you were commanded to my care. By whom? Who is it that you serve?”
“Why, the duchess Anne,” he replied. “Wife of Stephen, duke of Borée, who is away on the Crusade, and second cousin to the King.”
Every nerve in my body seemed to leap to attention. I could not believe it. I was in the care of a cousin to the King of France.