The Falcons of Montabard (25 page)

Annais spent the day familiarising herself with her surroundings. It was an enormous task, for Montabard was almost twice the size of Tel Namir. The great wall clinging to the precipice surrounded a complex that was in effect a small and almost self-sufficient village.

Letice showed her the bins that housed the grain store, its environs patrolled by sleek, feral tabby cats. Stretched in the

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sun, washing ears and paws, they watched her through indolent leaf-gold eyes. 'We have little problem with rats,' Letice said. 'When times are lean the cats are fed scraps from the kitchens, but mostly they fend for themselves. There is enough grain stored to withstand a year-long siege - not that it has ever been necessary, but living so close to the border of Frankish territory, it is best to err on the side of caution.'

Annais murmured agreement and followed Letice to the amphorae of wine, the jars of olive oil, the crocks of honey and barrels of pickled fish. They came to the kitchens. Although wheaten bread for the castle had been baked earlier in the day, the heat from the ovens was still like a hot wind on Annais's face. The cook and his assistants were preparing a spicy broth into which balls of minced pork coloured and flavoured with saffron were to be cast. Annais was offered a taste, and nodded her approval, even if the heat of pepper did explode in her mouth. More to her preference were some small raisin pasties, bursting with fruit and flavour. With a disarming smile for the cook, she filched a couple from the serving platter on her way out.

Letice took her to every part of the keep. Annais followed her guide through dark cellars containing indeterminate shapes that resolved themselves in torchlight to more barrels and sacks of supplies. Here too were the cisterns of the castle's water supply. The hem of her robe powdered with dust, a white net of cobwebs clinging to her bosom, Annais left dark for light and climbed the stairs to the battlements, her lungs heaving and her legs burning under the effort. From here, once she had recovered her breath, she could walk the perimeter of Montabard and gaze for miles upon a terrain of fields, mountains and water meadows. Such was the feeling of possession that she wanted to strike a pose and place her hand on a nonexistent sword.

Letice watched her with amusement. 'Yes,' she said, 'that is how I felt when I first arrived here — as if the world was mine.'

Lips parted in a smile of pure delight, Annais wondered how

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many others had stood like this down the ages. Perhaps these battlements had existed at the time when Christ walked the earth. A shiver rippled down her spine.

'You are not afraid of heights?' Letice asked as they progressed along the wall walk.

Annais shook her head. 'When I was a little girl I used to slip away from my nurse, climb to the top of my uncle's keep and sit in the crenel spaces. It wasn't as high as this, but I would send my nurse and my mother frantic. They needed eyes in the backs of their heads too, for I was cunning and determined. The slightest chance and I was off.'

Letice chuckled. 'Not a seemly way for a girl child to behave,' she said.

'Indeed not,' Annais said with a reminiscent grin. 'The first time I did it, I wanted to see over the battlements like any curious child. I loved the sight of the hills in the distance and how all the people and animals below looked so small. Also the crenels were exactly the right size for me to sit m.' She patted her haunch ruefully. 'It would be more of a squeeze these days. After I was scolded and warned how dangerous it was, it became a challenge. The more I was chastised, the more I wanted to go there.'

'You have a wild and stubborn streak then,' Letice said with a sly smile.

Annais drew breath to deny the statement, then realised she was condemned out of her own mouth. 'Tempered, I hope, by experience.' She laughed. 'I would hate it to become common knowledge in certain quarters.' She could imagine the sardonic glitter in Sabin's eyes should he learn of her escapades.

'My lips are sealed,' Letice said.

They walked on, pausing at intervals to study the different angles of the scenery. Above their heads, a falcon flashed in the blue air, its flight so graceful and swift that it took Annais's breath. 'What did Gerbert's first wife think of this?' she asked.

'She never ascended the battlements as far as I know,' Letice answered in an expressionless voice. 'She was afraid of heights

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and she did not think it a woman's business to roam far beyond the bower.'

From other things that had been said, Annais was receiving the impression that her predecessor had been a timid creature, incapable of fulfilling her role as lady of the keep. 'So the burdens have fallen to you in the meantime,' Annais said, wondering how to approach the delicate question of authority. She needed Letice to be her ally, not her rival.

'My shoulders are wide.'

'I am glad,' Annais said. 'For there is much I do not know, and I will need your help and friendship.'

Letice looked pleased. 'I will do whatever I can,' she said.

They had reached one of the towers with steep stairs winding down to the outer bailey. Pausing, Annais looked at Letice. '1 thought that, with the men absent, we could spend the rest of the day engaged in personal business,' she said.

The woman raised her brows in polite question.

'The bedchamber,' Annais said. 'I desire to make it truly mine, instead of a musty place of limbo.'

Letice's hazel eyes brightened. 'That seems like a fine notion,' she smiled.

'It does, doesn't it?' Annais gave a sigh, replete with anticipation.

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Chapter 15

Spring, 1122

Sabin cocked an eye to the sun and wondered whether to ride for Montabard or make camp. They had been on a hard patrol and out in the field for more than a week, hunting Arab raiders. A Saracen army was active to the north around the town of Zerdana, and skirmishing parties were as numerous and irritating as the flies that came to drink from every exposed human and animal orifice.

Sabin shaded his eyes against the sun. It was late spring, hot by the standards of England and Normandy but a mere lizard -basking pleasantness in Outremer. Black buck and gazelle grazed the lush grass, their tails switching vigorously. It was deceptively peaceful, but all the time Sabin was drinking in his surroundings, he was also listening and watching for that shadow out of place, for the sinuous line of a leopard's back as it wove noiselessly through the grass, for the flash of harness or armour.

'Do we make camp, my lord?'

'No,' Sabin said. 'Montabard is within reach and there is a full moon tonight. We take a respite and then we patrol again. After that we go home.'

The serjeant, a Syrio-Frank named Malik, said nothing, but Sabin sensed his relief. It had been a gruelling week. Sabin asked nothing of the men that he did not ask of himself, but since he was out to prove that he was of sufficient calibre to lead them and not just a soft newcomer, he had pressed them hard. A

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shred of common sense and a spark of empathy with the men, however, meant that although he held them on the edge, he had not pushed them over. They thought him a severe taskmaster, but he had earned a degree of respect.

'Sir Thierry and Lord Gerbert have little success when chasing raiders too,' Malik sympathised as Sabin reined around from the knoll where he had been studying the lie of the land. 'Such men have the art of disappearing like ghosts.'

'While we stand out like sore thumbs.' Sabin glanced around at the soldiers in their quilted tunics and rivet-mail. 'We are targets for them either to attack or avoid.'

Malik nodded. 'One of the reasons they do not attack us except by ambush is that we would flatten them with our heavier armour and weapons, if we take to their ways, they can outfight us because they have the skill and we do not.'

The sun slipped westwards, lighting the flanks of the hills so that they shone crimson as if in bright firelight. The deep green of the cypress and cedar trees shimmered with gold in the evening wind, tranquil and fierce at the same time. Sabin felt a longing deep within him, as if he was drawing both sustenance and pain with each breath.

Lucifer quivered and stopped so abruptly that Sabin's spine was jarred. He had been riding the stallion on a relaxed rein, but now he drew the leather tight and raised his right hand to halt the troop. Rapidly he scanned the shadow-washed ground for snakes or scorpions, but there was nothing. Still the horse baulked and snorted, threatening to rear, plunging aside when Sabin tried to heel him forward. 'Weapons drawn,' he snapped and drew his sword. Even as the westering sun flashed on the metal, a second shard of light dazzled out of the darkness and had Lucifer not danced sidelong, the arrow would have sunk shaft-deep in Sabin's breast. Instead, it skimmed past him and lodged in the ground.

'Shields!' Sabin snarled, swinging his own down and forward. His men rapidly followed suit and closed ranks. The manoeuvre took seconds, and in those seconds that first arrow,

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loosed from an over-eager bow, was followed by a shower of hissing deadly rain, and the horsemen came galloping in, fresh arrows nocked, tasselled lances piercing the sunset.

'Hold firm!' Sabin roared with a swift arm signal to the troop. 'Don't chase them!'

The Saracens released their second volley of arrows and, whooping, sped away. One soldier was hit in the arm and a horse was struck in the shoulder but not killed. Sabin saw the enemy wheel and turn, watched them come galloping in and fretted Lucifer, holding, judging the precise moment. 'Now!' he bellowed and spurred the grey. His target was an archer, crouched over his mount's shoulders and withers, his loosened turban streaming in the wind as he approached at speed. The arrow flew from his bow but the shot went awry and low, the very tip slicing into Sabin's tough calfhide boot. The blow did little to slow Sabin's impetus and, before the Saracen could rem away, Sabin had him. The last rays of the sun gilded sword and scimitar as they clashed, but the sword was faster, the back-swing more efficient. The Saracen tumbled from the saddle, his turban ribboning down with him like a long strip of bloodied winding sheet. Sabin reined about, seized a tasselled lance that was quivering upright in the ground and spurred to join the fray.

The battle was brief but fierce and bloody, with no quarter given on either side. Once the Franks closed with the Saracens, their heavier, superior armour tipped the balance, but not without the cost of several deep wounds and one death. There was a single escapee among the Saracen ranks. A youngster who had been tending the stolen horses fled on one, and cut the others loose. They milled, whinnying and distressed at the scent of blood, but drawn by the herding instinct to stay with the saddled animals.

'Let him go,' Sabin said. 'Round up the horses and bring them with us.'

'What of the dead?' Malik asked. One-handed, he was binding a scimitar cut to his forearm; it was not mortal, but in need of stitching.

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Sabin had dismounted to tug the arrow from his boot. A sawing pain and a hot trickling feeling told him that the edge had sliced flesh as well as leather. 'Bring them with us,' he said. 'There are horses enough to carry them.'

By the time Sabin and his patrol arrived at the gates of Montabard, it was full night, although a brilliant white moon lit their way. When they entered the middle courtyard and came to the stables, they found the stalls occupied by the mounts of strangers and they had to take their own to one of the open-sided overflow barns.

Sabin's foot was throbbing painfully and it was difficult to walk. Using one of the tasselled spears to lean on, he saw to it that the more seriously wounded were given immediate succour and the dead man was borne to the chapel.

As the news of their return arrived, Gerbert hastened from the hall, accompanied by a tall, powerfully built man in early middle age. The latter gazed with interest on the bodies heaped across the Turkish horses.

A fine haul,' he said in a voice that was husky, as if he shouted a lot.

'We were lucky, Sabin said with a shrug.

The stranger's smile revealed several missing teeth, although those he had left were large and strong. 'Give me a lucky man every time,' he said. 'Your name, sir?'

'Sabin FitzSimon ... my lord.' Sabin bowed and used formal address, for he could tell from the man's rich garments that he was more than an ordinary knight. The amount of horseflesh cramming the stables suggested at the least a baron with a large entourage.

Gerbert said, 'Sabin, this is Joscelin de Courtenay, Count of Edessa and cousin to King Baldwin.'

Sabin bowed again, more deeply this time - as much in honour of the man's reputation as his rank. Joscelin of Edessa was one of the foremost warriors in the kingdom, but also known as a man of wide vision and tolerance.

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Gerbert said, 'Sabin is here on pilgrimage, sir, and spending some time in my service. His father was an English earl and he has been fostered in the households of King Henry and Prince David of Scotland.'

'But just now I look more like a brigand who has been dragged through the mire,' Sabin added lightly with an irritated glance at Gerbert.

Count Joscelin looked amused. 'You do indeed,' he said. 'Although not in as bad a case as those you have brought back.'

Sabin grimaced. 'Not quite,' he said, 'but few of us have come away unscathed.'

Joscelin regarded the corpses heaped across the Saracen mounts. 'Common bandits do you think, or outriders from Balak's army?'

'If you were to press me, I would say that they were bandits, but perhaps in the pay of a greater lord for the time being. They stole horses and made petty raids on several homesteads, but we found them close to Montabard and I think that they had been told to spy. Otherwise why risk themselves? Why not melt away with their spoils?' He rubbed a weary hand over his face, feeling light-headed with the aftermath of battle and the cumulative fatigue of several days of travelling rations and little sleep. His foot was throbbing as though there was a large drum lodged in his big toe.