Standard of Honor

The unfortunate part of that was that no one could say how long that might take. The two Kings, Richard and Philip, were both laid low with leonardia, which the soldiery called scurvy. Richard’s condition was far worse than the affliction visited upon Philip, and perhaps because he could see for once that he looked physically better and more attractive than his English rival, whose hair was falling out in clumps and whose teeth were rotting and visibly loosening, Philip fought off his own infection uncharacteristically and made frantic preparations to attack Acre with his own army and bring an end to the siege once and for all through his own unsupported efforts. The major portion of Richard’s fleet, no longer under the command of Sir Robert de Sable, was still locked in Tyre, unable to sail because of the troublesome and dangerous winds known as the Arsuf, and stranded there with them was more than half of Richard’s army from Normandy. Philip wanted to press home his advantage and seize whatever glory he could in Acre while his rival was still sick and before these reinforcements could arrive from Tyre, and so he fought on alone, hammering relentlessly at the cornerstone of Acre’s defenses, the Accursed Tower, while Richard was rumored—the entire campaign in Outremer appeared to run on rumors— to be yet abed but negotiating fruitlessly with Saladin’s envoys over the terms of surrender for Acre.

However, according to a report that Andre passed on to Alec from Ibrahim towards the very end of June, Saladin was playing a game of his own and was consequently happy to buy time by whiling away days and weeks overseeing pointless comings and goings between envoys from both armies. The Sultan, it appeared, was daily awaiting the arrival of a fleet from Cairo and an army supposedly approaching overland from Baghdad, confident that the advent of either one would be sufficient to deflect and disarm Philip’s army and its attacks on the walls of Acre. Alec took that information directly to his superior, Sir Robert de Sable, Grand Master Elect of the Order of the Temple, only to have it set aside as unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

That night, after dining with his cousin for the first time in more than a week, Alec passed those tidings back to Andre as they sat atop the defensive rampart above the Trench, staring out over the calm emptiness of the desert beyond.

They had been disappointed on their arrival, for they had brought their arbalests along in hopes of finding something to shoot at. But the ground across from them that had been thronged with Saracen horsemen mere hours before lay empty and desolate, and their crossbows lay unused in the sand at their feet.

Now, piqued by what his cousin had said, St. Clair turned to look at him sidelong. “It’s unimportant that we know what Saladin is thinking? That is insane.”

“No, not so. I reacted that way, too, at first, but Sir Robert told me they already had that information and had planned accordingly. In the meantime, he said, he has larger fish to fry.”

“Like what?”

“Cyprus.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“I’m not surprised … Richard wants to sell Cyprus to the Templars.”

“To sell—? What kind of folly is that? Cyprus is a place, an island. You can’t sell a place!”

“Of course you can, if it’s yours and if you can command a worthwhile price. And you may remember, Richard made Cyprus his when he deposed the idiot Comnenus and took control of his so-called empire. And now he has changed his mind. He no longer wants the place and so he is looking to sell it to a suitable purchaser … the Order of the Temple.”

“And why, in the name of anything resembling sanity, would he think the Templars might be even remotely interested in such a hare-brained idea?”

Alec Sinclair looked at his French cousin and raised his eyebrows high, rounding his eyes and pursing his lips comically. “Perhaps because he believes they are covetous of such a place. Perhaps because he has been a close friend of the new Grand Master for many years and he knows, because the Grand Master has told him, that the Order yearns for a stable, solid base of operations, far removed from interference by the kings and popes of Christendom and close enough to the Holy Land to serve as a launching area for future wars and campaigns. And perhaps because the coffers of his war chest are depleted and he knows the Order would be happy to pay a premium price for precisely such a place as he has to offer for sale … Think you any of those reasons might suffice?”

Andre shook his head in rueful wonder, as though surprised that he had allowed himself to be surprised. “And the negotiations are in hand as we speak?”

“No, they are complete. The agreement has been made, the sale concluded.”

“I see. Well, I suppose it makes some kind of sense. What was the price, can you say?”

“Aye, I can tell you. But you can’t tell anyone else. Agreed?” Andre nodded. “One hundred thousand gold pieces—Saracen bezants. Forty thousand initially, as a down payment, and annual payments of ten thousand for six years, once they have established their Rule there.”

Andre whistled softly. “Richard did well … Forty thousand gold bezants is an admirable return on an investment less than three months old and that cost him nothing in the first place. And how long will it take the Temple to establish their Rule there, as you say?”

“Not long, it seems. They are prepared to move without loss of time. I have orders to sail for the island at once, to scout out a potential headquarters and report back to de Sable. I will leave the day after tomorrow.”

“Will you, by God? Where will you start? Will you visit Famagusta? If you do, I should like you to find my father’s grave and tend to it for me. Will you do that?”

“Come, Cuz, you don’t even need to ask that. Of course I will. And even if my travels don’t take me there, I’ll make the journey anyway, on my own. Rest assured of that. Now, what about you, what are you up to these days?”

Andre grinned. “Soldiering, what else? Ever since finding you, I’ve lost my special status. As long as I could claim to be the Official Seeker of Sir Alexander Sinclair, I was privileged to come and go as I pleased. Now that you’re found and safe, I’ve become an ordinary grunt again, albeit a knighted grunt … I am now a plain Templar knight-at-arms, responsible for a forty-man squadron of sergeant brothers from Anjou, which means I am now permitted to rise for prayers throughout the nighttime hours, in addition to which, as a squadron leader, I am at liberty to conduct daily patrols of the sector of enemy territory facing, and sometimes almost encircling, our southeastern salient. But I have no time to be bored. Saladin’s lads attack us every day, determined to breach the Trench, and sometimes it’s all we can do to hold them off.”

Sinclair cocked his head. “You said Saladin’s lads … do you think of them that way? Without malice?”

“Without malice? I suppose I do, if and when I think of them at all. I think of them as simply being there, like the sand flies and the scorpions, part of this landscape. I certainly don’t hate them as infidels or ravening, blood- drinking demon’s spawn. As far as I have seen for myself, along with what you have told me, they are people much like ourselves, save that they adhere to different beliefs. They are men, like us, with problems of their own and tribulations we would recognize and acknowledge could we but see them. What made you ask me that?”

Alec grunted and stood up. “I don’t know. Perhaps the hope of hearing you say what you said. Particularly the piece about not hating them. It’s too easy to hate out here, and too many people are doing it, on both sides.” He tightened the cinch about his waist and stretched up on his toes. “What’s the difference between Jesus and Muhammad, Cuz, can you tell me?”

St. Clair grinned again. “No, I can’t, but I have a feeling you are going to tell me.”

“No, not I, for I don’t know. That’s too deep a conundrum for me. But even though I be not Christian in the proper sense, I would still support Jesus, as a man, for the difference between those two, it seems to me, lies rooted in power and the way, as men, they sought it. Jesus did not. He never did. He simply lived his life as he saw fit, and it was men, thereafter, who shaped him into the deity he has become. But Muhammad? Muhammad dealt in power from the outset, seeking to control men’s minds and actions in the name of God. He might have been divinely and genuinely inspired by Allah, but that is beyond my ability to determine. All I can say, from my own viewpoint as an observer of men, is that I distrust mortal men who claim a personal relationship with God that requires them to tell others how to think and behave. And I find it enlightening that none of those men, be they sultans, emirs, caliphs, popes, cardinals, patriarchs, archbishops, or bishops, ever appears to be impoverished. And damnation, I am still hungry. Can you credit that?”

“You can’t be. We ate but an hour ago. It’s the excitement of thinking about your coming trip to Cyprus that is making you feel hungry.”