remained calm. The light from above was completely masked by the smoke; I could not see where I worked but tried to trace the loose ends back through the whorl of the knot.
At last my finger slid through the knot and emerged the other side. I groped for the loop of cloth beside it, tugged, and felt it slither free. The tension relaxed; with one binding released, the others began to uncoil themselves. I pulled on them again, and they came apart. Perhaps it had been a feeble bond, but it had been strong enough for a feeble prisoner.
I swung myself off the bed and staggered forward. After two days lying supine my legs were weak and unsteady, but the joy of my freedom and the desperation of my predicament impelled me forward. I staggered through the smoke, trying not to breathe, kicking over unseen relics left by the fleeing pilgrims. My hands were on the ladder. I stepped onto the lowest rung, felt firm wood beneath my feet, and climbed. It seemed to me that the air should have been clearing as I rose, yet the clouds around me remained as thick as ever. My head came through the trapdoor opening; I was in a wooden hut or shed, and through its open door I could see daylight and a dusty courtyard. I hauled myself onto the ground, picked myself up, and ran outside. I was free.
It was scant relief. Enough of the artemisia lingered in my veins that for a moment I wondered if I had climbed into Hell itself. The air was as stifling as it had been in the confines of the cave, and an enormous pall of smoke hung over the city as far as I could see, so that the sun’s light turned to rust and bathed us in an eerie, infernal twilight.
A small gate led out into a street, where dark figures scurried past. I was about to make for it when a grating, rumbling noise erupted behind me. I turned. The timbers of the hut that I had come from must have been burning over me; now they gave way, and the roof crashed down into the shell of the walls. The trapdoor and the cave were buried beneath, while a plume of dust and ash rose over it.
In the street I met a new world of confusion. Frantic pilgrims fled by in every direction, wailing prayers and screams. Many had had the clothes burned from their bodies, their skin shrivelled and blackened by the fire; others, whose legs had been crushed in falling buildings, dragged themselves through the dust by their hands. I saw one frenzied woman running past with her baby still sucking her breast, heedless of the consuming calamity.
I looked to my right. Through the smoke I could see shreds of flame burning in the air, so high that it seemed they must have descended from the heavens. A hot wind stroked my cheek, and I felt my skin tightening as the blood seethed under it. The thunder of the fire was everywhere: the crackle of the flames, the roar of buildings tumbling over on each other, the howl of the wind gathering itself in to feed the blaze to yet greater heights. Against that the beat of hooves was nothing; I did not hear it until it was almost upon me.
A horse charged out of the red smoke, a sword in its rider’s hand. Too late, I thought to wonder how the fire had started, whether Kerbogha was laying waste the city. I was unarmed, though in that inferno even the strongest shield would have burned free of my arm. Yet the horseman did not look Turkish: the coned helmet silhouetted against the red smoke was Norman. Was he part of a rout, the remnant of a broken army?
Whether he did not recognise me as an ally, or whether he did not care, he had no mercy for me. He saw me standing transfixed in the road, swerved towards me and drew back his sword arm. A fresh gust of wind fanned my face as the beast rushed past, inches away; I did not even have the wit to duck. The sword swung forward and struck against my shoulders. I fell to the ground.
Though I was almost too numb to care, I did not die. The Norman had not hit me with the edge of his blade but with the flat, using it as a cudgel or a drover’s stick. My back smarted, and there would be a livid weal rising under my tunic even now, but if that was to be the worst injury I suffered that day I would count myself blessed.
As I rose to my feet, the knight wheeled his horse and trotted back towards me. Reflected flames danced on his helmet as though it still sat in the armourer’s furnace.
‘Worm! Provencal coward! How dare you cower in dark holes when the defence of the city commands every man to the walls?’
‘Kerbogha?’ I mumbled. ‘Has Kerbogha taken the city?’
‘He will if you delay. Seek out your lord, and offer yourself up to his service.’
The Norman turned his horse away, spurred its side and galloped down the street. Through the swirling haze, I saw other fleeing pilgrims suffer the brutal touch of his sword and tongue as he passed.
His words had only increased my confusion, but I ignored it. The fires were raging hotter and closer, and if I did not fly before them my bones would be burned to embers. I turned after the Norman, away from the heat, and ran.
I knew little of Antioch, and had lost myself so many times already that I had no idea where the cave had been. I had to trust to the instincts of the crowd and follow them blindly through the smoke. I felt as though I had almost ceased to be human, but ran like a brute animal, my only instincts escape and survival. Norman knights on horse and on foot snapped at our heels and flanks, wraiths in the choking fog driving us on. I did not try to withstand them. They could have herded us towards the abyss and I would not have resisted.
Gradually, from the corners of my eyes, I began to recognise landmarks. A tavern sign, a crooked house, an empty fountain befouled by birds – they seemed familiar. I had passed them with Little Peter on my way to the Tafur kingdom, whenever that had been. Two days ago? It did not matter. I must be in the south-eastern quarter of the city, near the palace; from there I could find my way to the walls, to Anna and Sigurd and sanctuary.
The crowds around me were thicker now, but the air was clearer and cooler. Like a host of rats people poured from the corners and crannies which had hidden them, scurrying to safety. And suddenly, sooner than I had expected, I was out of the narrow alleys and into the wide expanse of the square by the palace. The throng was no less, for the tide of the dispossessed stretched clear across its boundaries, but for the first time in three days I knew where I was. On the edges of the square I could see knights with spears trying to push the fleeing pilgrims onwards towards the walls, while at the centre, like steadfast trees in a river in flood, two men sat on horseback, arguing. In silhouette, the knight’s helmet and the bishop’s mitre were almost identical but I could see just enough to recognise the men beneath. I pushed towards them.
An invisible circle of deference seemed to surround the two nobles, an island of space, so that the crowds flowed around them at a respectful distance. Even in the chaos of the moment, I needed a fresh draught of courage to break through and approach.
‘I had no choice.’ Soot had stained Bohemond’s skin dark as a Saracen’s, but the unyielding bite of his words was as clear as ever. ‘All Kerbogha’s strength is concentrated on the citadel – our line is almost broken. We cannot suffer cowards to cringe in hiding, when every arm that can carry a spear is needed.’
Opposite him, Adhemar’s horse moved nervously from side to side. ‘Burning down the city to keep Kerbogha from taking it is no answer.’
‘The vermin had to be smoked from their holes. I am not to blame if the wind fanned the flames too high.’
‘You are to blame for everything – you have brought ruin upon us.’ I had never seen the bishop so wild. Streams of sweat and tears flowed down his grimy face; he hunched over in his saddle, and abused Bohemond like a prophet of old.
‘Do not provoke me, priest. I am the only man who may yet save us.’
‘Look around you!’ Adhemar stretched out his hands, waving them at the fleeing hordes. ‘Look in their faces. They are broken, defeated; they are fleeing the city. Stone walls and locked gates will not hold them. Our army will be routed, and you will be to blame.’
‘For three days I have contended with Kerbogha. I have not slept, I have not eaten, I have not even got down from my horse to piss. These worms are your flock, Adhemar: if you and your dwarf hermit cannot rouse them to battle, I will. If you cannot deliver them, let them flee or burn. I need men – not noble men or skilled men or even strong men, but men with the spirit to fight, to battle against our destruction. If you cannot summon these men, then come to my mountain yourself and put your spear in Kerbogha’s path. If you dare.’
He kicked his horse, and rode into the melee. From the edge of the circle, I saw another knight spur after him.
Adhemar looked down. ‘Demetrios.’
‘Your Grace . . .’ After so long in the cave, and now caught up in the consuming panic, even familiar faces looked strange to me. ‘Has . . . has Bohemond done this?’
