Beloved Pilgrim (25 page)

The Basileus would not speak, but his first
lord spoke for him. "How will you pay for this destruction, your
Grace? How will you compensate the families of the dead who just
yesterday enjoyed breathing the fragrance of life? Did your people
forget where they were? Did they think they were in the palace of
the Turk? Did they not know they were in the principal city of
Christendom, greater even than Rome?"

Elisabeth could guess that any impulse to
abase himself fled from Anselm's mind when he heard the last words.
He had nothing to say.

A few days later the Archbishop took to his
sickbed and left punishment and reparations to the military leaders
of the Lombard contingents.

In the end the Lombards found themselves in
worse conditions in a camp in Nicomedia, far enough away from the
city gates to make their return unlikely, and guarded by far more
than a few guards. There the men, women and children waited in the
filth and degradation. Hundreds lay dead of knife fights, murder
and disease in a makeshift bone-yard within the fence.

The greatest shock was that in spite of the
Emperor's promises, no new camp had been provided for the soldiers
and their families from the contingent with which Elisabeth and
Albrecht had traveled. The press of misery was simply pressed
further.

With her nose and mouth covered with a
scented scarf and her eyes averted from the worst of the filth,
Elisabeth marshaled a mostly dispirited mob into a semblance of
order. As she went through the camp she was surprised to hear her
brother's name called. She looked up to see Ranulf, the mercenary
who had bought her night with the delicious Giuliana, sitting on a
stack of crates smiling at her.

"They held you in here?" she exclaimed,
shocked. Her eyes surveyed the others nearby and picked out the
three other mercenaries. "How did you know it was me?" she asked,
pushing down the scarf and wincing at the rank odors.

"I didn't. I recognized Gauner. So I take it
you have been in swankier quarters." Ranulf hopped down from his
perch and approached her. She tried not to let it show when his
stench reached her nostrils.

"We'll be heading out in a day or two, east
to Dorylaeum." She thought a moment. "I am trying to make some
order out of this chaos. If you and the others would help me, I
will see what I can do to get you released and into some sort of
lodgings in Nicomedia." She eyed Ragnar, Thomas and Ruggiero who
had come to stand arrayed behind Ranulf. "But you have to swear not
to make any trouble."

Ragnar turned away in disgust. Ruggiero swore
in Italian. Thomas fixed a baleful eye on her. Ranulf leaned his
head on one side with a look of pure condemnation on his face. "My
Lord Elias, you wound us. Have we not won your trust after all we
have been through already?"

She was ashamed. "I-I am sorry. You are
right. I will go immediately and arrange for your release to help
us." She saluted sharply and turned and rode away.

Now on the road to Dorylaeum, Elisabeth
looked up to see a smiling Ranulf riding alongside her. "Finally on
our way. Where are your shepherds?" the mercenary asked.

She scowled at him. He simply smiled the
broader. "Hello, Albrecht. Happy to be back on the road? Ah, I see
not. Losing heart, are we?"

"Left their hearts behind, I would guess." It
was Ruggiero's rough voice.

The look on Elisabeth's face seemed to
confirm the supposition. Ranulf's face softened. "Tough break,
lad," he said. "It happens to us all."

Ragnar snorted. "Speak for yourself. The
heart not given is never broken."

She knew now what had transpired between
Albrecht and Andronikos. Just before they left Constantinople, she
spotted her squire sitting alone in the fragrant garden just at
dusk. She smiled at him as he sat wistfully sniffing some exotic
flower. "So," she led, "Got anything you want to share with your
lord and master?"

His sardonic look quickly changed to a
meaningful sigh. "Yes, and it is apparently something we truly
share. Your eyes glow whenever the Turkish woman enters a chamber.
You are truly in love, are you not?"

She cast down her eyes over reddening cheeks.
"Yes, I am. I never thought this would happen to me. But," she
inserted as she looked into Albrecht's face, "I think you may have
found love . . . again."

He nodded. "I have. Like you I never thought
it would happen to me, not a second time." He smiled at a memory.
"The very night your Maliha was brought back and you were in the
tub, I went to leave you two alone."

Elisabeth gave him a playful shove. "Yes,
without telling me! How did you know she had guessed my little
secret? We could both have been undone, you, me, both of us."

Albrecht grinned. "I just knew. Trust
me."

"Never again," she laughed.

He resumed his story. "I found Andronikos in
the corridor, looking at me. He said something about whether my
young lord was happy now. I almost said, 'She is,' but caught
myself. He approached me and said in a soft voice, 'I cannot help
but think you are not so happy. You have a grief, a loss. I would
like to help you heal. May I be so bold as to ask you to come to my
private chamber? We can speak there with no prying ears.' Of course
I assumed he planned a seduction."

"When is he not," she retorted, but seeing a
cautionary look on Albrecht's face, she became serious and
attentive again.

"I told him that I had lost someone dear to
me, and I said it would take a great deal of healing for me to get
involved with anyone new. He assured me he only wanted to hear
about me and my sorrow, so I took his arm and we went to his
chamber."

She waited for more details, but Albrecht
remained silent. "Well?" she prodded curiously.

"Let me just say that Andronikos is a deeply
caring man who understands loss and has waited a long time himself
to find a new love."

"And, I take it, you are that new love?"

His radiant face was his answer. "Funny, you
know I have been in love before. I am learning now that there are
all kinds of love, even within the boundaries of carnal attraction.
I loved . . . your brother . . . deeply. I always shall. But with
Andronikos it's different. The passion is there, but it's a
mellower passion. It does not steal any territory from Elias in my
heart."

She put her hand on the man's arm and
squeezed. "I guessed it had happened. And I will tell you that I
did think about Elias but decided he would want this for you."

Albrecht's voice broke as he said, "He would
like Andronikos, don't you think?"

"I know he would. And he will be happy,
wherever he is, to know you are loved. Have . . . " She hesitated.
"Have you made any promises?"

His look was wry. "You mean do I trust him?
Is he going to forget about me the moment I ride out of the gates?
Do you trust Maliha?"

Warmth filled her at the thought. "I do. And
you are right to remind me that as singular as it feels, our love
is not the only love in the world." She frowned. "Nor are we the
only lovers to be separated so soon." She glanced at him. "I would
not blame you if you chose not to continue. I would release you
from your vow."

Albrecht stared at her. "You can release me
from my vow to you, my lord, but not to myself, not to your
brother, and certainly not to God. I am coming, whatever will be
will be."

She clasped his arm again. "Deus lo
volt."

In camp Elisabeth found herself drawn to the
mercenaries' fire. They welcomed her and her squire with no
ceremony. As they sat on the blankets around the fire, Thomas
handed them the wineskin the mercenaries shared. They drank
gratefully and sat listening to the conversation around them. A
brace of other soldiers sat in the group. One was gesticulating
feverishly.

"What have they got to say about it?" he was
saying. "As if they haven't already taken the wind out of this
pilgrimage with their idiocy."

She took the cup of stew with meager
vegetables and unknown meat and ate, listening carefully to learn
what was amiss.

"He is their big hero. He's a Lombard
himself, devil take him," Ruggiero said, not hiding his disdain for
all things Lombard. One of the other men glared in his direction,
but the mercenary ignored him.

"How did he get his Lombard arse captured
anyway," another man asked.

"He's not a Lombard. He's a Norman," a
peevish voice corrected.

"Who?" Elisabeth managed to whisper to
Ranulf.

The man who had just spoken shouted,
"Bohemond, that's who. The Prince of Antioch," he said
mockingly.

"Over Alexios' dead body."

"And our valorous Raymond's. No way Saint
Gilles will turn north to go save him."

Ranulf answered the man's question like a
priest lecturing small boys. "Bohemond made it his business to get
to Antioch first, and being the leader of the pilgrims, he got his
way. He claimed he had Alexios's word that Antioch was his. Raymond
of Toulouse did not think so. But in the long run, Bohemond set
himself up for a nasty surprise. Raymond went on to Jerusalem,
getting the credit in heaven with that move. Nobody could extract
Bohemond from his principality, but last August when one of his
allies called for his help with an attack by the Paynim, he
ventured out of the city and got himself ambushed. He's rotting in
Nixtar up to the northeast."

Ragnar puffed out his chest. "He's being held
by Danish men!" He jabbed himself with a thumb.

Ranulf rolled his eyes. "The Danishmend,
Ragnar."

Ragnar elbowed the man next to him to
indicate his mistake was no more than a jest.

Elisabeth ventured, "But won't someone ransom
him?"

"How do we know all this, anyway?" the florid
gesticulating man asked.

Ranulf supplied, "He managed to send one of
his knights to Baldwin of Edessa. And I have heard that Alexios
will ransom him but only if the Turks turn the man over to Alexios.
He is miffed that the man acted in such ill faith."

"You seem to know a lot about this fellow,
Norman. Have you served under him?" the Lombard asked.

Ruggiero, Ragnar, Thomas, Elisabeth and
Albrecht all stopped eating and drinking and looked at him. "Not as
such. But I have met him when I fought for his uncle, Roger of
Sicily, against the Amalfi rebels, the poor sods. He's quite an
imposing fellow. Taller than any man here. The very model of a
heroic knight. Sharp as an adder's bite. And definitely not in it
for the glory of God."

"So are you all saying that the Lombard
contingent wants to go rescue him?" Elisabeth asked.

Ruggiero grinned. "That's exactly what they
want, for us to turn north after we take Ancyra and overrun all of
the Seljuk strongholds on the way. That should make Alexios happy.
If we can pull it off, that is."

"And why wouldn't we?" Ragnar demanded of his
companion.

"I'm not saying we wouldn't. But it's rather
out of the way. We are supposed to be on our way to Jerusalem."
Several voices affirmed Ruggiero's sentiment.

"And as far as I am concerned, Alexios and
Bohemond can go bugger each other."

This comment from the florid man was rewarded
with general guffaws.

Elisabeth turned to Ranulf and asked in a
lower tone, "Saint Gilles seemed pretty tight with the Emperor.
Will he overlook his resentment against Bohemond and go try to
rescue him?"

Ranulf took some time before he answered. "I
don't know. It may be less that he goes along with the idea than
that he really won't have a choice."

She gazed at him, astounded by the change in
plans.

One face that did not appear in the long line
of pilgrims on the road was Archbishop Anselm's. She knew he had
fallen ill and remained so. It was said he would join the next
contingent; that was, if he recovered. Much of his entourage stayed
with him in Constantinople, but his military leaders rode very near
the fore. Needless to say, the Lombard rabble loaned their noise
and stink to the procession, Archbishop or not.

As they rode, Albrecht had his eye on the
large force of Pecheneg warriors that the Basileus insisted travel
with the pilgrims. They were a squat race, with slanted eyes and
drooping moustaches over clean-shaven chins, which made them look
like they were always scowling. They wore chain mail like the
pilgrim knights, but they wore garish colored coats with highly
decorated bindings along the front and hems. Their outlandish
helmets were conical and sported some sort of tassel or feather
from the pointed top. They were remarkable riders who carried round
shields like the English, long narrow swords and elaborately curved
bows. The squire thought them the most exotic beings he had ever
seen.

Their leader, Tzitas, road ever at Saint
Gilles's side. Everyone knew Raymond was Alexios's man now, and
some wondered if the Pecheneg were there to enforce Raymond's
preeminence as leader of the pilgrim force. If it was so, his
capitulation about going to free Bohemond seemed unexplainable.

Albrecht asked Ranulf, who, with his men, now
rode with Elisabeth and himself, "Where are they from?"

Ranulf glanced over at the fierce body of the
Pecheneg. "North of the Black Sea. They are all mercenaries."

His eyes wide, Albrecht repeated, "North of
the Black Sea?" He pondered. "So, does the Emperor want Bohemond
rescued or not?"

Ranulf shrugged. "I don't know. My guess
would be not. Perhaps the Basileus does not savor setting his
mercenaries on the Lombard rabble. And whatever hurts the Turks is
his gain."

"So you are saying the diversion might
actually play into the Emperor's best interest."

The mercenary captain smiled at him blandly
in answer.

Much of the journey from Nicomedia was
through Byzantine territory, so supplies were plentiful. The
crossing into Seljuk Turk-ruled lands was most noticeable when the
supplies stopped coming. It would be nothing but plunder and
foraging now. They had enough to last until they reached the
stronghold at Ancyra, but not for a long siege. The leaders
insisted with bombast that they would overrun the fortress easily.
The more experienced knights were doubtful but said little.