Hammer and Saw, followed with a shrug. “What else is there to do once the tour is over?” Saw asked. Like Savaric, they waved their wooden crosses, the crosses they had so roughly carved sitting on the back of the wagon.
“Ah, fook,” said Quickfinger, looking forlorn. Then he pushed past me and knelt at Bishop Reginald’s feet.
Will gazed at Mary with a plea in his eyes. She looked away. I saw him set his jaw, and then he too mounted the dais, which left only the Moor and me.
“They can’t hold you to it, can they, the vow?” I asked. I thought of all the criminals we sprang from gaol in Salisbury. I was willing to bet none of them was planning on taking ship for
Terra Sancta
.
“It’s your immortal soul,” the Moor said. He put his hands on my shoulders and regarded me steadily. “This is where our ways must part, John.”
I stared at him. “What? No! I don’t want to go to war. I want to go … wherever you are going.”
“You cannot come where I am going, John. You’re not ready for that. Stay with the troupe—they need you, especially Ezra. She’s not as tough as she thinks she is. Look after her.” He touched me lightly on the cheek. “We will meet again.”
Then he turned and walked away with all the dignity of a prince, leaving me exposed and alone, my knees trembling like the fool I was.
What could I do? I should have run after him in full sight of the crowd, should have caught him by the arm and demanded to accompany him, told him I loved him and cared about nothing else. But instead I stood silent, in desperate confusion, wailing inwardly, once more an abandoned child. The scent of roses bloomed all around me but there were no doors to Heaven opening before me.
As if in a trance, I found myself walking slowly up the steps and dropping to my knees before the bishop.
That night, on our return to the dormitory, thick in the head with the gallons of ale I had drunk to drown my desperation, I found tucked carefully beneath my drawing satchel a pouch of soft leather. When I picked it up, it lay heavy in my hand. Inside were about twenty silver coins, a small fortune. Surely this was all the money the Moor had amassed for his part in our unholy charades these long months.
There was something else in the bottom of the pouch. Wrapped in a square of green silk was a heavy length of crystal hanging from a leather thong. And inside the crystal was the Nail of Treves.
10
City of Akka
JULY 1189
Z ohra yawned and stretched out the crick in her back. She’d been up and working since before first prayer. She had prepared the day’s dough, taken it to the oven, made a sweet barley porridge, swept the downstairs rooms and watered the plants—all those small tasks that men could not be expected to do themselves. Then she had changed her mother’s linen, turned her, washed her, brushed her hair and smoothed rosewater over her face. Her father’s sisters had often come to offer their help with her mother, but Baltasar, too proud to admit to the extent of the disability caused by his old war wounds, had turned his face away from them.
Zohra propped her mother’s head up on the yellow silk cushion to help the water go down her throat. For the past week Nima Najib had stopped swallowing of her own accord, but just lay there, breathing through her mouth, her brow furrowed as if deep in dream she was concentrating on some insoluble problem.
She stroked her mother’s cheek, so dry and diminished, and suddenly felt a wave of anger. How could she deteriorate so quicklyand leave Zohra to do everything? Nima was not an old woman, was maybe in the middle of her fourth decade, but ever since catching that fever she’d been getting weaker all the time. Zohra sensed this new phase was no longer the normal exhaustion of a suffering patient. But she was too young to die. Wasn’t she? Zohra took one of the lax hands in her own and shook it in a sort of rage. But her mother did not stir.
The call
“Ah, fook,” said Quickfinger, looking forlorn. Then he pushed past me and knelt at Bishop Reginald’s feet.
Will gazed at Mary with a plea in his eyes. She looked away. I saw him set his jaw, and then he too mounted the dais, which left only the Moor and me.
“They can’t hold you to it, can they, the vow?” I asked. I thought of all the criminals we sprang from gaol in Salisbury. I was willing to bet none of them was planning on taking ship for
Terra Sancta
.
“It’s your immortal soul,” the Moor said. He put his hands on my shoulders and regarded me steadily. “This is where our ways must part, John.”
I stared at him. “What? No! I don’t want to go to war. I want to go … wherever you are going.”
“You cannot come where I am going, John. You’re not ready for that. Stay with the troupe—they need you, especially Ezra. She’s not as tough as she thinks she is. Look after her.” He touched me lightly on the cheek. “We will meet again.”
Then he turned and walked away with all the dignity of a prince, leaving me exposed and alone, my knees trembling like the fool I was.
What could I do? I should have run after him in full sight of the crowd, should have caught him by the arm and demanded to accompany him, told him I loved him and cared about nothing else. But instead I stood silent, in desperate confusion, wailing inwardly, once more an abandoned child. The scent of roses bloomed all around me but there were no doors to Heaven opening before me.
As if in a trance, I found myself walking slowly up the steps and dropping to my knees before the bishop.
That night, on our return to the dormitory, thick in the head with the gallons of ale I had drunk to drown my desperation, I found tucked carefully beneath my drawing satchel a pouch of soft leather. When I picked it up, it lay heavy in my hand. Inside were about twenty silver coins, a small fortune. Surely this was all the money the Moor had amassed for his part in our unholy charades these long months.
There was something else in the bottom of the pouch. Wrapped in a square of green silk was a heavy length of crystal hanging from a leather thong. And inside the crystal was the Nail of Treves.
10
City of Akka
JULY 1189
Z ohra yawned and stretched out the crick in her back. She’d been up and working since before first prayer. She had prepared the day’s dough, taken it to the oven, made a sweet barley porridge, swept the downstairs rooms and watered the plants—all those small tasks that men could not be expected to do themselves. Then she had changed her mother’s linen, turned her, washed her, brushed her hair and smoothed rosewater over her face. Her father’s sisters had often come to offer their help with her mother, but Baltasar, too proud to admit to the extent of the disability caused by his old war wounds, had turned his face away from them.
Zohra propped her mother’s head up on the yellow silk cushion to help the water go down her throat. For the past week Nima Najib had stopped swallowing of her own accord, but just lay there, breathing through her mouth, her brow furrowed as if deep in dream she was concentrating on some insoluble problem.
She stroked her mother’s cheek, so dry and diminished, and suddenly felt a wave of anger. How could she deteriorate so quicklyand leave Zohra to do everything? Nima was not an old woman, was maybe in the middle of her fourth decade, but ever since catching that fever she’d been getting weaker all the time. Zohra sensed this new phase was no longer the normal exhaustion of a suffering patient. But she was too young to die. Wasn’t she? Zohra took one of the lax hands in her own and shook it in a sort of rage. But her mother did not stir.
The call
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