‘Few dare venture into the realm of the Tafur king. Fewer, perhaps, emerge. Who can tell? But I tread there. Christ is with me, and I fear no evil.’
‘Will you take me?’
The hermit cackled. Spit ran down his chin, but he affected not to notice it. ‘I will take you there, Greek. Whether they let you leave – that is in God’s hands.’
? ?
Accompanying Little Peter was an uncomfortable experience. We met near the palace, and within minutes we had plunged away from the main roads into a labyrinth of alleys and passages below the slopes of Mount Silpius. Wooden balconies hung crooked from the mud-brick walls; rubble and filth littered our path. Not so long ago it must have been a Turkish quarter; now their only relic was their absence. Their homes and streets had been filled with Franks, in such poverty as I had never seen even in the worst slums of Constantinople. Children ran naked around us, throwing mud and excrement at each other, while their mothers sat with breasts shamelessly bared in the doorways. I blushed, my eyes seeking in vain for a safe refuge, but Little Peter seemed immune to sinful thoughts and moved serenely on with his lolling, limping gait. We struggled to make progress. The alleys were barely wide enough for a dray cart, and wherever Peter went the Franks clustered so close that the narrow paths became impassable. Some were satisfied to feel the hem of his short cloak, but others fell on their knees before him and implored favours or benediction. With eyes shut and palms outstretched, his face turned in bliss towards the sun, he touched their wounds and murmured comforting words. He was like some shrunken, shrivelled effigy of the Christ, and his congregation of the desperate seemed to adore him for it. No wonder so many had followed him so far – and at such cost.
At a pinched crossroads, deep in shadow, we found a sign. It hung from the web of criss-crossed ropes that stretched overhead: a splintered plank daubed with the words
‘The realm of the Tafurs.’ Even Little Peter seemed cowed by the name as he spoke it.
‘Is there really such a man as the Tafur King?’
Peter shrugged his misshapen shoulders. ‘His name is often spoken.’
That much I knew. Early in the siege, around December, rumours had sprung up of a new leader among the poor, an impoverished knight who had made himself master of the dispossessed. It was said that their desperation knew no restraint: that they sliced open the bellies of corpses in search of swallowed gold, and pulled the dead from their graves to eat in times of famine. That they existed was beyond doubt: I had seen them, barefooted and shirtless, labouring on the siege works and fighting in battle, where their reputation for savagery was well earned. Most had vowed silence and would not talk to outsiders, but still the whispered stories of their king seeped through the army, and at night every howl and scream was believed to rise from their camp.
‘Have you seen him, this king?’ I asked. It was said that Little Peter was the only man allowed to pass their borders.
‘He sits on a throne of bones as high as a man and wears a crown forged from spears. He drinks from a cup made from the head of a Turk, and his tent is sewn from their skins.’ Peter’s voice wavered between horror and awe, and his eyes were wide.
I felt a kick of disbelief. ‘Surely those stories cannot be true?’
He frowned. ‘Why not?’
‘You have seen it?’
‘Perhaps. If I had, I would be sworn to secrecy. No one tells the Tafur king’s secrets.’
Unwilling to be questioned further – or perhaps reluctant to incur the Tafur king’s revenge – Peter hurried on. I kept close, for I did not want to be lost in that place.
I do not know how long we walked in the heat and the stink. Sometimes Tafurs passed us, staring at me with hostile eyes as they answered Peter’s brief questions. All were dressed alike in white loincloths and wooden crosses, which they hung around their necks on thick ropes like yokes. At last, after many turns, Peter stopped at a door. Waving me to be still, he rapped on the carved panel. It cracked open and I heard a short challenge, which Peter answered in the Provencal tongue. The door swung in and led us through a short passage into a central courtyard.
For all the tales of skeletal thrones and human cups, the reality of the Tafurs was at once far more ordinary and yet more terrible than I had imagined. The square was strewn with wood and stone where the surrounding windows had been hammered out, and half a dozen Tafurs, barely clothed, lounged on the rubble. One was sucking on a bone that might have been a cow’s. All were watching another of their number, who knelt in the centre of the yard, and the woman on all fours in front of him. The only sound was the regular slap of his cross as it swung against his chest: the man showed no more emotion than if he had been digging a patch of weeds, while the woman stared ahead, unblinking. From the blood crusted on the inside of her thighs and the bruises on her ribs and breasts, I guessed that every trace of feeling had long since been raped out of her.
I cannot say exactly what happened next. A hundred fractured pictures exploded in my skull: my wife Maria lying on her bed, her skirts soaked red; my baby daughter cradled in my arms as victorious legionaries sacked Constantinople; the silver cross that hung around my own neck, a symbol which had comforted me so often. Unthinkingly, I reached for the knife at my belt. All the Tafurs were watching me, and even before the blade was out of its sheath one had risen and thrown himself towards me. A fist swung at my face, struck my chin and knocked me on my back. As I lifted myself on my elbows, I tasted blood on my lip.
‘Demetrios!’ Little Peter whimpered with terror, darting about like a wasp. ‘Has the Devil possessed you?’
‘Perhaps he was jealous,’ said a voice above me. Would you like to take your turn with the Turkish bitch, Greek? Or is it only boys that rouse you?’ A bare foot planted itself in my groin and squeezed down; I tried not to moan. ‘Are you a eunuch? If not, I have a knife. I could make you so.’
‘Let him be,’ squeaked Little Peter. I had not expected him to have the courage to speak out. ‘He is a friend of the bishop, and I have sworn him my peace.’
‘But I have not – and I am no friend of the bishop.’ With a last, agonishing jab of his foot, the man stepped away. My eyes were clenched shut with pain, but above me I heard the voice asking Little Peter: ‘Why have you come?’
‘We . . . He seeks a man named Odard, a Norman. I have heard he joined your band.’
‘He did – though much use he has been. His senses have been torn away, and he jabbers nothing but riddles and nonsense. What does the Greek want with him?’
I opened my eyes. The man who had struck me now stood over me, watching with malicious interest. Behind him the Turkish woman had crawled into a corner and now lay curled up like a corpse while her assailant wiped himself with a cloth.
‘Two of Odard’s companions were murdered,’ I said, speaking slowly as the blood slid over my tongue. ‘I seek to know who killed them.’
‘Who?’
‘Drogo of Melfi, and Rainauld of Albigeois.’
The Frank disappeared through a broken door into the house. I staggered to my feet and seated myself on a lump of stone, clutching my groin where it still ached. A dozen dull eyes watched me. The hermit perched in the corner and made himself still, fixing his gaze on heaven and muttering unintelligible incantations. I hoped that he was praying for me.
The Frank emerged back into the courtyard. Behind him, shuffling reluctantly, came Odard. He too was naked to the waist, and though he could not have eaten any better than I had in the past months he seemed larger than I remembered. Perhaps it was merely that I had shrunk more. He still looked like a walking skeleton, his skin barely binding the bones within: I could have counted each one of his ribs, while his fingers had become talons.
‘What will you ask him?’ said the Tafur.
