The clerk was unperturbed by the sarcasm. “Those are all possibilities,” he said, “although you left a few out. We could encounter bandits on those mountain roads. You could end up in a Viennese dungeon, too, if we stray across the Austrian border, for their duke is said to bear you a bitter grudge.”
Richard had heard that, too, and was puzzled by it, for his quarrel with Duke Leopold had been a minor matter, not worthy of a vendetta. “Tell me, Fulk, do you ever allow yourself to believe that the worst is not a certainty? Just for a change of pace?”
“We balance each other out, my liege, for you can never conceive of defeat.”
Richard didn’t deny it. “Well, you know what the Romans said. ‘Fortune favors the bold.’ And the lucky. You will admit that I am lucky, Fulk?”
The older man glanced up from the coffer. “Aye, you’ve been lucky, my liege,” he agreed, before adding, “so far.”
Richard shook his head, torn between amusement and exasperation. But they both knew he valued the dour Poitevin for the very trait that could be so irksome—his candor. He always got from Fulk de Poitiers what kings were rarely given—unsparing honesty.
BY NOVEMBER 11, the Holy Rood was approaching the island of Corfu. The sight of its mountains and lush greenery was both welcome and disheartening. The men were thankful to have crossed the open waters stretching between Sicily and Greece, but they could not help remembering that they’d landed at Corfu just a few weeks ago, never dreaming they’d see it again so soon. On their earlier visit, they’d dropped anchor at Kerkyra, where a small town had grown up around the castle; this time they meant to avoid the Corfu Channel and sail up the west coast. Corfu, notorious as a pirate’s den, was also honeycombed with spies and they did not want word to spread that the English king’s ship had been seen in the Ionian Sea.
They would have to stop hugging the shoreline before they reached the castle of Angelokastro and the ship’s master decided to halt in a small cove and replenish their supply of fresh water. The anchors were thrown overboard and as their longboat rowed toward the beach, the passengers took advantage of this brief respite from the waves and wind to amuse themselves. Martinmas in their homelands was usually chilly and wet, offering a foretaste of the coming winter, and so they were all enjoying the warm sun and mild air, many of them stripping off their mantles as they watched Guillain de l’Etang take on another challenger. A trestle table had been set up on deck and the Norman was locking arms with Hugh de Neville, an English knight. The wagering had stopped, though, for Guillain had already defeated two of the Templars and a burly sailor and now no one was willing to bet against him. Hugh put up a valiant fight, but his hand was soon forced inexorably down onto the table. It ended quickly, as the other matches had done, and Hugh mustered up the unconvincing smile of a man trying to be a good sport.
Glancing around for another contender, Warin Fitz Gerald grinned as his eyes lit upon the man leaning against the gunwale. “What of you, sire? Why not teach Guillain a lesson in humility? We do not want him to get too puffed up with pride, do we?”
Richard was tempted. But he’d learned that few men were willing to defeat a king, be it at chess, arm wrestling, or jousting, and the only thing he hated more than losing was being allowed to win. Deciding that Guillain was too honest and too honorable not to give his best effort, Richard was reaching for his mantle’s clasp when their lookout yelled, “Sail ho!”
The game forgotten, the men squinted and shaded their eyes against the sun’s glare until they spotted the galleys heading their way. The ship’s master spat out an oath, for no merchant would choose a galley to carry his wares; they were seagoing weapons of war. There were three of them—sleek ebony hulls riding low in the water, triangular sails the color of blood, bronze spurs meant for ramming glimpsed each time they rode the crest of a wave. No flags flew from their mastheads and they were close enough now for those on the Holy Rood to see that the men on deck were holding crossbows, swords, axes, and grappling hooks. But Richard had already given the command, “To arms,” for one glance had been enough for him to discern their predatory intent.
His young squires, Jehan and Saer, were awaiting Richard in their tent, and hurried to help him don his gambeson, the padded tunic worn under his hauberk. Other knights were crowding into the tent to retrieve their armor, carefully packed away in coffers to protect it from the corrosive sea air. Once he’d buckled his scabbard and fastened his helmet strap, Richard snatched up his crossbow and hastened back on deck.
The anchors had been hauled up and the sailors were unfurling the sails; on the beach, the stranded crewmen were dragging the longboat onto the shore, apparently hoping to hide from the pirates if the Holy Rood was taken or sunk. Richard’s arbalesters were awaiting his orders, their crossbows spanned and bolts aligned. Some of the knights had not taken the time to put on the mail chausses that protected their legs, although all were wearing their hauberks and helmets. They were combat veterans, but unlike his sailors, they had no experience in sea warfare. Glancing around at their tense faces, he pitched his voice so all could hear. “Defending a ship is no different from defending a castle, lads . . . aside from the risk of drowning, of course.” As he’d hoped, that dispersed some of the tension; soldiers usually responded well to gallows humor.
Morgan pushed his way toward the king. He was still fumbling with his ventail, seeking to draw it across his throat. He usually felt more secure once he was clad in mail; now, though, he could not help thinking that if he slipped on the wet deck, it would drag him down like an anchor. Richard was studying the pirate ships as intently as he studied battlefields, and Morgan hoped he was formulating a strategy for another unlikely victory; the odds were not in their favor.
He reached his cousin just as Richard beckoned to the ship’s master, saying that he needed a man who spoke Greek. The Pisan nodded, for that was the native tongue of half a dozen members of the seventy-five-man crew. Before he could summon any of them, Hugh de Neville offered another candidate. “What of Petros, sire? You remember—the sailor from Messina. He acted as translator when your ladies were shipwrecked on Cyprus and proved to be very useful. He might even know some of those cutthroats, for I heard him boasting that he has a cousin on a pirate ship out of Kassiopi.”
“Get him.”
The words were no sooner out of Richard’s mouth than a youth materialized as if by magic before him. Petros’s black eyes were shining, for he was never happier than when he was the center of attention. “You ask for me, lord king? I speak Greek from the cradle, but my French . . . it is very good. When we were in Cyprus—”
“I need information about these pirates. Do they know about Saladin? The war in the Holy Land?”
“Of course they do, lord! They care about the recovery of Jerusalem, too. Why, some have even taken the cross. A man can be a pirate and a good Christian.”
“Have they heard of me?”
Petros grinned. “I daresay they’ve heard of you in Cathay, lord. After what you did at Jaffa—”
Richard usually enjoyed hearing his battlefield prowess lauded, but now he cut off the sailor’s effusive praise with a gesture. “I hope you are right, Petros. I want you to tell them that this is the Holy Rood out of Acre, commanded by the English king.”
Petros blinked in surprise. He obeyed at once, though, calling out to the closest of the pirate galleys. A reply soon came echoing across the waves. “They ask why they should believe that, lord.”
Richard had expected as much. Turning to the ship’s master, he told the man to raise his banner and, within moments, the royal lion of England was fluttering proudly from the masthead. The knights were murmuring among themselves, uneasy about the king’s decision to reveal his identity. “Now tell them this, Petros. Say the English king is called Lionheart because he does not know how to surrender. He will never yield to them. To take this ship, they will have to fight to the death.”
For the first time, Petros hesitated. “They are proud
men, lord. I do not think they can be—”
“Tell them,” Richard said, and Petros did. His message appeared to stir up a lively debate among the pirates. Richard waited a few moments, and then nodded again to Petros. “Now tell them this—that it need not come to that. There is a way by which we both benefit and with no blood being shed. Tell their chieftain that I would speak with him.”
As Richard had anticipated, that was a challenge no pirate could refuse, and Petros was soon negotiating a meeting, while the knights clustered around their king, the bolder ones expressing their misgivings, fearing that he would agree to meet the pirate chieftain on his own galley, for they well knew Richard was quite capable of such a reckless act. He shrugged off their protests, and it was eventually agreed that he and the pirate would meet at midpoint between the two vessels. Their longboat was summoned from the beach, and much to the dismay of Richard’s men, he and Petros were soon being rowed out toward the approaching pirate longboat.
Morgan and Baldwin de Bethune stood at the gunwale, never taking their eyes from the tall figure in the prow of the longboat. They’d both been loyal to the old king, Richard’s father, had stayed with Henry until he’d drawn his last anguished breath at Chinon Castle, and while they were pragmatic enough to recognize Richard as their lawful king, they’d been wary at first of this man they knew only by repute. But that was before they fought beside him in Messina, Cyprus, and the Holy Land. Now they watched anxiously as he conferred with the pirate within range of the latter’s crossbowmen; that the pirate was taking the same risk was no comfort to them. The conversation was an animated one and Petros was kept busy translating from French to Greek and back to French again. It was not long, though, before a reassuring sound drifted back on the wind—laughter. Morgan and Baldwin exchanged glances, marveling that once again Richard had managed to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.
CLIMBING THE LADDER, Richard swung himself over the gunwale and grinned at the men crowding the deck. “It is all settled. I have hired two of their galleys and crew for two hundred marks.”
There was an immediate outcry, exclamations of shock and alarm and bewilderment. Raising his hand to still them, Richard explained that he was known to be sailing on the Holy Rood and his enemies would be on the lookout for it. Switching to the galleys was one way to throw them off his trail. That made sense to his men, but they did not find it as easy to trust in the word of a pirate chieftain as Richard apparently did. None voiced objections, though, for kings were not to be questioned.
Richard headed for the tent, with Baldwin and Morgan right on his heels. The others watched, hoping that a highborn lord and a kinsman might dare to do what they could not: express their misgivings about this new alliance with sea rovers. Jehan and Saer had already begun to remove the king’s hauberk. He was in good spirits and answered readily enough when Baldwin asked how he could be sure these pirates could be trusted.
“Petros was right. They do care about the fate of the Holy Land, and for the past few months, soldiers have been passing through Corfu on their way home, all of them carrying tales of the French king’s perfidy and the battles we fought against Saladin. At the risk of sounding immodest,” Richard said with another grin, “I come off well in those stories and Captain Georgios and his men are eager to hear my own account of them. They still want the two hundred marks, mind you, but they also want to help us escape our enemies. Georgios was actually indignant to hear of my plight, pointing out that men who’d taken the cross are under the protection of the Church. Ironic, is it not, that a pirate should have more honor than kings or emperors?”
Baldwin’s qualms were assuaged, for he believed Richard to be a good judge of character, a survival skill for those who wore crowns or commanded armies. Morgan was still shaken, for he’d just spent an hour fearing for the king’s safety and wondering how he was going to tell Joanna that he’d merely watched as her brother went off alone to meet with pirates. “But you did not know this Georgios was a man of honor when you got into that longboat,” he blurted out. “Are you never afraid for your own life?”
Richard’s eyebrows shot upward in surprise. “Surely you’ve not forgotten that Good Friday storm that scattered our fleet after we left Sicily? Need I refresh your memory, Morgan? The wind keening like the souls of the damned, the waves higher than church spires, all of us sure we’d breathed our last. Or the tempest we encountered in the Gulf of Satalea, where our ships were blown backward by the force of the wind. You show me a man who claims he was not afraid during those storms, and I’ll show you a liar.”
That wasn’t what Morgan needed to know; he’d taken it for granted that Richard feared storms at sea, not being insane. He’d gone too far to retreat, though. “But what of the battlefield? I’ve seen you take chances that . . .” He paused, then said simply, “Do you never fear for your own safety?”
Richard was quiet for a moment, considering whether that was a question he wanted to answer. He suspected it was one many a man had long wanted to ask, although the only person who’d ever dared had been his wife. It was easier just to brush the query aside. But he liked his Welsh cousin and knew that Morgan’s concern was genuine. “Well,” he said at last, “when a man’s blood is running hot and his heart is racing, it can be difficult to tell excitement from fear.”
There was a silence and then Baldwin said, very dryly, “Passing strange, for I have no trouble at all telling them apart.”
Richard laughed, handed his gambeson to one of his squires, and then made one final effort to explain what seemed to him quite obvious. “It is simple, really. In a storm, we are utterly helpless, at the mercy of the wind and waves. But on the battlefield, my fate is in my own hands. What happens is up to me.”
Morgan agreed that a lack of control would be frightening to any man, especially a king. But he was convinced that Richard was surely the only one on God’s earth who felt in control of events on the battlefield. Seeing that there would be no satisfactory answer to a question he ought not to have asked in the first place, he changed the subject and asked when the switch from the Holy Rood to the pirate galleys would occur.
“On the morrow. I need to provide our men with enough money to make their way home. The Holy Rood will take them to Brindisi, where they can choose to travel overland, pass the winter in Sicily, or even take passage on a ship sailing for one of the ports that are barred to me. They are not the quarry in this hunt, after all.”
Seeing that Baldwin and Morgan were confused, Richard explained that he was only taking twenty men with him, heading off any objections with some blunt speaking. “We do not have enough men to keep us safe, just enough to attract unwanted attention. The only chance I have to reach Saxony is to travel as fast and as inconspicuously as possible.”
Their first reaction was to protest, horrified by the very thought that their king would be venturing into enemy territory with only twenty men. Their second was a reluctant realization that Richard was right. Their third was to insist that they both be amongst the twenty men. Richard feigned displeasure that they were overstepping themselves, but he was touched that they were so willing to follow him into the frigid, far reaches of Hell, the German empire of Heinrich von Hohenstaufen.
THE MASTER AND CREW of the Holy Rood were obviously relieved that they’d be spared a harrowing voyage along the Adriatic coast. But Richard’s knights and crossbowmen and men-at-arms responded as Baldwin and Morgan had done, all clamoring to accompany him. “You are daft, the lot of you,” he said huskily, “for no man with his wits about him would choose snowdrifts and bad German ale over Palermo’s palm trees and bawdy houses.” But he did not let sentiment influence his selection of the twenty men, hardening his heart against the tearful pleas of his own squires and choosing those who he thought would be most formidable in a fight, calmest in a crisis. He made exceptions only for his chaplain, Ancelm; his clerk of the chamber, Fulk de Poitiers; and—much to the boy’s delight—Arne, whose ability to speak German was sur
e to be an asset. The others chosen were Morgan, Baldwin, Hugh de Neville, Warin Fitz Gerald, his admiral Robert de Turnham, Robert de Harcourt, Guillain de l’Etang, Walkelin de Ferrers, four Templars, and his five best arbalesters. They would be facing dangers, hardships, deprivation, and possible death, but they reacted as if they’d been given a great honor, any fear they may have felt firmly tethered by pride.
Of all those who’d not been chosen, none were as devastated as Guilhem de Préaux. While the other men lined the gunwales to watch as Richard sailed away on a pirate galley, Guilhem retreated to the tent to rage and pace, tearful one moment, cursing the next. “How could he have left me behind?” he cried as his brothers, Pierre and Jean, followed him. “How could he ever have doubted my loyalty?”
“He did not, you fool,” Pierre said, and left it to Jean to console Guilhem, for Richard had entrusted them with the care of his squires and they were now in need of solace, too. As Pierre withdrew, dropping the tent flap to give them a small measure of privacy, Jean rummaged around until he found a wineskin and tossed it to his brother.
“Pierre is right. The king would never doubt your loyalty or your courage. You ought to know better than that.”
“Then why would he not take me with him?”
“Why do you think, Guilhem? Your loyalty cost you nigh on a year of your life, and whilst you rarely talk of it, we know you had no easy time in confinement. It is true that we owe a debt of fealty to Richard, our liege lord. But he would not have you pay that debt twice over.”
Guilhem studied his brother’s face, then took several deep swallows from the wineskin. “I would have paid it gladly.”