Jerusalem: The blood price E-Book

Mathias Wildt

• Herausgeber: Youcanprint
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

As a child, Conrad von Kronberg was taught what is worth killing for. As a general, he learned what is worth dying for. Now, as a man, he must discover what is worth living for. Haunted by his past and driven by duty, Conrad leads his crusaders to crush a Saracen rebellion threatening Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II's reign in Sicily. At his side are Rainhard, a scarred pagan, and Stelios, an epicurean secretary. As blood stains the island, their journey probes conscience, identity, and purpose. A noblewoman's defiance and a courtesan's allure test Conrad's heart in a clash of civilizations. Set amid the splendor and upheaval of Frederick's court, the most diverse and sensual of the Middle Ages, Jerusalem: The Blood Price is a sweeping historical epic of war, faith, love, and the search for meaning in a fractured world.

Leseprobe

PROLOGUE

Chapter 1. Murtada.

Chapter 2. The council.

Chapter 3. The tower assault.

Chapter 4. The sack of Damietta.

Chapter 5. The fleet arrives in Palermo.

Chapter 6. The banquet.

Chapter 7. Jus Gladii.

Chapter 8. The hunt.

Chapter 9. Eris, lady of pain.

Chapter 10. Segesta. Vae victis.

Chapter 11. Ravaging the Belice Valley.

Chapter 12. Dura lex, sed lex.

Chapter 13. Homo homini lupus.

Chapter 14. The Lady of Partanna.

Chapter 15. Hecatomb at Selinunte.

Chapter 16. The naked blade.

HISTORICAL NOTE

Mathias Nicola Federico Wildt

JERUSALEM:

THE BLOOD PRICE

Title | Jerusalem: The blood price

Author | Mathias Wildt

ISBN | 9791222784489

The cover illustration is from Gustav Klimt's Beethoven Frieze in Vienna's Secession building. It represents the ideal of the knight begged by the people to go forth and face evil.

© 2025 All rights reserved by the Author

No part of this book may

be reproduced without the

prior permission of the Author.

Youcanprint

Via Marco Biagi 6 - 73100 Lecce

www.youcanprint.it

[email protected]

For those we have loved, and those we have lost.

"For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers of the darkness of this world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."

Ephesians 6:12

PROLOGUE

Jerusalem, March 18, 1229.

Lord, Why here? Why this place?

The crusaders stood on Temple Mount gazing out over the heart of the city. That morning, in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the most sacred site in all Christendom, they had watched Frederick crown himself King of Jerusalem.

Was it worth it? Conrad wondered. He touched the large, white stone of a high wall. If you squeezed these stones they would cry tears of blood.

All around the holy city, spring danced her joyful return. She caressed awake fruit trees and sprinkled them with blooms. She breathed warmth into the valleys and covered the ground with rainbows of wild flowers. But she dared not enter Jerusalem.

Most of the Muslim population had fled. The crusader army moved with quiet awe. The city lay silent, as if holding its breath. It lay still, as if even the stones, its ancient bones, surprised, did not know what to make of this: For once, Jerusalem had been conquered peacefully. In this sacred land, where Christ had said, ‘I came not to bring peace but the sword’, Frederick’s army had entered with weapons sheathed.

“Jerusalem: The shortest path between heaven and earth,” Stelios intoned. “The center of the world in every map, where prophets have visions of peace and ascend to heaven; where zealots preach holy war and seek domination; where all others come to meet God, and to murder, rape and plunder. The city of peace, so often conquered, massacred and sacked.”

We have been told about this place since we were children. It has taken us years to reach it, Conrad thought. Was it worth all we have lost along the way?

Seated on a low wall, Rainhard cracked open pine nuts with the pommel of his dagger. “A small, dusty place surrounded by rocky hills, with expensive, filthy baths, too many muezzins and no brothels. The golden goblet full of scorpions they call it, and we’ve drained to the last.” He threw a dozen shelled pine nuts in his mouth. “Though they do have good pine nuts.”

Rainhard glanced at his general but Conrad was not taking the bait.

Conrad stared at the city, as if watching something no one else could see.

Was it worth all we have done? Brothers killed. Children buried. Lovers abandoned. Cities destroyed.

We plunged to such depths to reach such heights.

Conrad inhaled deeply and stood straighter.

We paid the blood price to be here.

We kept our oaths.

Agamemnon sacrificed his own daughter to conquer Troy. I would never have given up my Else, for what do we gain if the price of conquest is our soul? But in Your terrible jealousy you took her from me.

He tried to sigh away a deep pain in his chest.

Time heals all wounds, they say. They are idiots who should have their tongues cut off. Deep wounds never heal. The pain lessens in time, yes. Where at first it is a constant scream of agony, it wanes to a dull, pulsating ache. In time, the pulses slow down, so you have moments free of pain and thought of your wound. But then the torment returns. And you know it will never go away.

Never.

Every day the pain awakens you from the torpor of sensual pleasure and the banality of most activities. Every day it demands meaning.

Lucia reached out to fit her small hand in his. He squeezed it gently. She always sensed when to pull him out of his abyss. He smiled at the child and at his wife Aveline who watched him patiently with her gaze of calm, absolute acceptance. Francis had pointed the way to Conrad, but Lucia and Aveline renewed his willingness to march on it.

You must use the pain to spur you daily into living righteously. To find meaning in the pain: A purpose.

Rainhard stood up. “What now, general?”

PART ONE.

MEN OF GOD

Chapter 1. Murtada.

Ten years earlier: August 21, 1219, crusaders’ camp besieging the city of Damietta, Egypt.

“Damn this country,” Conrad muttered angrily when he woke at dawn. He felt as if an axe was grinding into his forehead with a dull blade. Blood pounded behind his eyes.

He threw open the flap of his tent to let in the early morning light, waking a slave girl who scrambled out of his bed and rushed to prepare him breakfast. He reached for a boot, shook it facing down, and put it on. He grabbed his other boot and shook it, startling a large yellow scorpion, which fell onto the ground and immediately prepared to fight, pincers open and stinger raised.

“Damn this country,” he growled as he brought his boot down angrily on the scorpion several times until it was reduced to a messy pulp.

He laced his boots and stepped outside, followed by his huge hunting dog, a blue-gray German mastiff that weighed as much as a large man and even on all fours reached Conrad’s waist with its head. A blood-red sun shimmered through the gray haze of hundreds of campfires, bathing the crusaders’ white tents and the stone walls of Damietta in a deceptively peaceful pink hue. The stench from the latrines clawed deep into his nostrils and thousands of flies buzzed incessantly around the camp. Conrad ignored it all as he stared at the city.

The slave girl warily offered him a bowl of palm wine but he waved her away. Drinking last night with his men had left his head throbbing and stomach burning. He reached instead for a pot of brackish water and looked at it suspiciously, then gulped it down greedily. The foul liquid no doubt contributed to the disease that had killed hundreds of men already as the siege dragged on while he and his men were stuck in this heathen desert, he thought bleakly. He longed for the forests of his native Germany, the cool, green woods of his youth, where he hunted deer and drank water from pure streams, and the smile of his daughter when he returned with the day’s kill.

But his youth was long gone. He had turned 26 while languishing for over a year beneath the walls of this cursed city along with 30,000 other crusaders, losing men to disease and skirmishes to no avail. They had gathered from across Christian Europe and sailed south to break open the way to Jerusalem and deliver the holy city from Muslim occupation.

Egypt controlled Jerusalem, so the Christian kings had decided to crush the sultan in Cairo. Damietta was the first step on that path, but it was very well defended. A strategic port controlling the main branch of the Nile just two miles from the Mediterranean sea, Damietta had high walls protected by swamps to the south and east, and by the Nile to the north and west. The Egyptian army was camped to the south, from where it could resupply the city without engaging the crusaders in a ranged battle. Conrad spat in frustration. With the river and marshes encircling the city, assaulting its walls would cost terrible casualties and likely fail. The only solution was to starve Damietta into submission and to do so they must gain control of the river and cut the city off.

To defend against just such a threat, the Egyptians had placed a massive iron chain, extending from the city walls to a citadel on an island close to the opposite bank of the Nile, denying enemy ships entry. For three months the crusaders had tried to storm the citadel by rowing ships to its walls and assaulting with ladders and grappling hooks, but the fortress’ battlements towered over the attackers and each attempt had been bloodily repulsed by a hail of arrows, stones and jars of Greek fire.

Somehow, the citadel had to be taken. To liberate Jerusalem they must capture Cairo, to capture Cairo they must cut through Damietta, to cut through Damietta they must break the chain blocking the Nile, and to break the chain they must take the citadel. Otherwise they would slowly rot away, mired in this godforsaken land.

He poured some water in a bowl for his dog and then looked up as a rider galloped across the camp and reined his horse in just in front of Conrad’s tent, kicking up dust that lingered in the still air.

The German knight bowed his head in salute and said urgently: “General, the foraging party was attacked near a village three miles away by a large group of cavalry. Four of our men were taken.”

Conrad grimaced. “How many of the bastards?”

“Two hundred, maybe more general,” the rider replied respectfully.

Conrad nodded, his face grim and set with purpose. Men were rushing out of nearby tents and gathering around him. Rainhard, his second-in-command, thirty years old and a hard-bitten veteran of the German wars, approached Conrad to hear his orders.

“Rainhard, infantry and crossbowmen stay. Everyone else prepares immediately to ride out.”

Conrad commanded 400 Germans, a mix of knights, men-at-arms and crossbowmen. To rescue the four prisoners he needed to move fast. He would lead only his 120 mounted men into battle.

Rainhard immediately barked orders, while Conrad went back to his tent to arm himself. First he put on a padded linen coat. Then came a full suit of mail made of thousands of interlinked and individually riveted iron rings: mail pants and boots, a mail coat with full sleeves that ended in mail gloves with the palm covered in leather for a better grip, and a mail hood. His squire helped him tie all the straps tightly. Finally, Conrad donned a surcoat, a light, sleeveless, white robe with the black imperial eagle on the chest and the German black crusader’s cross beneath the left shoulder. Still tying his sword belt around his waist, he marched out of his tent where a servant held his war horse, Arend, a massive brown destrier.

The mastiff whined and looked pleadingly at his master.

“No Karr, this is not a hunt. Stay,” he ordered. The dog obediently sat at the entrance of his master’s tent.

Conrad slung his shield over his shoulder and mounted the horse. An axe and great helm hung from the saddle’s side. He grabbed the lance his squire held out for him and looked about: the knights were ready. Less than half an hour after the rider’s alert, they rode out of the camp intent on rescuing their comrades.

Guarding the tent, the mastiff watched him ride away. The slave girl, too terrified to try to get past the beast, resigned herself to wait outside under the rising sun.

Conrad crested a low ridge and set eyes on the village that stretched along the valley below, about 100 yards away, while his men formed a line on either side of him. The morning sun behind them cast the knights’ dark shadows towards the village of Murtada: a score of brown mud-brick houses with straw roofs and walled courtyards, yellow fields parched by the summer sun, dotted with palm trees. Two hundred souls, he guessed, mostly farmers and goatherds. And about three hundred Egyptian cavalry watering their horses at the village wells, but no sign of Christian prisoners. He wondered if his men were being held inside one of the buildings and if he could ransom them.

He studied the village closer. A group of children were throwing rocks at...what? a blackened log? No. It was a limbless human torso. Nearby, two charred bodies were strung from a palm tree, dangling by their feet. Dogs were fighting over the remains of another man. In the middle of the village two peasants were parading about, each brandishing a severed head.

He was too late.

He had failed his men. He had led them on crusade to conquer Jerusalem or die in battle trying. Instead, heathen peasants decorated their hovels with their violated remains. He felt a familiar fury rise from his burning gut and constrict his breathing as pain drove away mercy and compassion, replacing them with a determined hatred. His face became a rigid mask, though inside he was raging. On his right, Rainhard cursed under his breath. Gasps of surprise and angry curses could be heard down the line as the men realized the fate that had befallen their friends.

Down in the village dogs barked, men and women started shouting. The line of German cavalry had been noticed and the village exploded with movement like an ants’ nest that’s been poked with a stick. People scurried everywhere. Screaming women dragged children into houses, men armed themselves with axes, pitchforks, hoes, anything they could use to defend their families. The Egyptian cavalry quickly rode out of the village, formed up on the hill on the opposite side of the valley and watched the crusaders.

“They won’t stand and fight,” Conrad growled with frustration. The Egyptians had learned not to pit their small horses and light armor against the crusaders unless they vastly outnumbered them. They could easily outrun heavy European cavalry when they wanted to avoid a fight.

“Damn this country. Damn these people,” Conrad snarled with seething, visceral hatred. “They put my men on display for their amusement. We’ll give them a sight to behold. Two lines!”

Rainhard and the men knew what the order meant. The first line would charge right through the village, break any resistance they might find, then reform to face the Egyptian cavalry. The second line would follow to systematically slaughter anyone left standing. The men lined up quickly, eager to charge, hungry for vengeance.

Conrad closed his eyes and bowed his head, then began reciting the psalm of David. “Lord, fight against my enemies, take up shield and armor, rise and come to my aid. Brandish spear and javelin against those who pursue me. Say to me, ‘I am your salvation.’ ”

He looked up from his prayer to see three men approach on foot, one wearing long white robes, possibly a village leader, the other two seemingly beggars. No doubt coming to beg him not to attack, as if the villagers’ savage cruelty deserved anything less. Peasants should know that what you sow you will reap tenfold. They had butchered four of his men. He would annihilate them all. And he would start with these three desert vermin.

The friar walked out of the village and strode confidently up the gentle slope towards the crusaders. He was followed timidly by a younger friar and the caid, the village chief, who hoped that with the help of the two holy men, infidels though they were, he could convince the crusaders to spare his village. From about 100 yards away the line of horsemen clad in metal and white, their armor and weapons glinting menacingly in the sun, seemed to quiver slightly like a mirage. But the friar had ridden to war twice in his youth, and as he got closer he understood what he saw: the nervous fidgeting of men and horses waiting impatiently for the imminent order to charge.

The friar headed straight for the one who had to be the leader, a tall, wide-shouldered man in the center of the line, with a rider bearing a flag standing just behind him. Other knights were looking to him for orders, but the leader was staring at the three men approaching and his unblinking glare was like a steel blade.

“Pax vobiscum!” Peace be with you, the friar cheerfully greeted the knights when he was just five paces away.

“Et cum spirito tuo,” Conrad replied out of habit, surprised to be addressed in Latin by this little man wearing only a threadbare peasant tunic.

“Brothers in Christ, my name is Francis. Brother Elia and I are friars from Assisi,” he continued cordially in Italian, a language that Conrad knew well having lived and fought for years in Italy.

Friars? Conrad had never seen clergymen so poorly dressed. He studied the man in front of him. He was in his late thirties, with an emaciated body wrecked by hard labor and hunger that made him seem older, an oval face framed by a dark beard and unkempt hair. He walked barefoot in the searing sand, yet his small, black eyes smiled with light. He stood unafraid and straight-backed in front of Conrad and addressed him in a gentle and cheerful tone. It was all so incongruous at that moment, in that place, that Conrad hesitated as if he had been about to crush a fly and the insect had started talking to him.

“We were traveling to your camp when we came across this village and we were begging the people here to let us give proper Christian burial to the deceased when you appeared.”

Francis’ words seemed to bounce off a wall with no effect.

Conrad ignored the sweat pouring from beneath his mail hood and down his forehead. He looked down at the friar with grey eyes as cold and cutting as broken glass. It was a stare that had reduced armed veterans to beg for their life, but the diminutive friar continued unbowed.

Francis pleaded in earnest. “I am a useless little worm of a servant of God, He has the power, and in His name I beg you brothers, do not attack this village. You can see the Egyptian warriors have withdrawn.”

The caid, who understood some Italian, the lingua franca of trade in the Mediterranean, decided this was the right time to try to negotiate. Perhaps the infidels would accept a blood price and be on their way.

“As salam aleicum,” peace be with you, he said in Arabic with reverence as he stepped forward and bowed deeply. When he raised his head again, Conrad thrust his spear through the caid’s mouth and neck, then ripped it back out breaking teeth. The Egyptian collapsed on the ground and died convulsing with a gurgling sound. Francis, his face and beard splattered with the caid’s blood, stood silent and still. Elia fell to his knees and began praying fervently.

Conrad handed his bloodied spear to his squire to hold while he reached for his flat-topped great helm. It had eye slits to see though and a score of small round holes on the cheeks for ventilation. Bronze strips riveted across the face of the helmet, over his forehead and nose, formed a cross that stood out against the gray steel. He kissed the cross and donned the helmet. He inserted his left arm in his shield’s loop and grabbed the handle firmly, then took back his spear. The two lines of heavy cavalry stirred. His stallion sensed the mood and kicked up dirt with his hoof in anticipation.

“No!” Francis shouted vehemently and stood with arms spread out like a cross to bar Conrad’s way.

Conrad raised his spear to signal his men.

“No prisoners!” he shouted, his voice hoarse with anger.

“No prisoners!” Rainhard echoed him eagerly.

Conrad lowered his spear and the lines moved forward. With an expert nudge of his knee he steered his war horse slightly to the side and galloped past Francis. The friar was spun around as the horse hit his outstretched arm, and then he could only watch helplessly as the heavy cavalry thundered down the slope, enraged, spears lowered reaching for revenge.

Conrad’s first thought had been to let his stallion crush the little man or bite his face off, as it was trained to do. He had killed clergymen before, but this friar’s dignified bearing and courage had gained his respect. And his clemency.

No one in the village could expect as much.

A gap between the walled houses led to the center of the village, and a knot of men had gathered there to hold off the attack and protect their families. They were farmers wielding axes, pitchforks, hoes, hammers. They sought comfort in staying in a tight group and formed a line of about ten men across and several deep. They faced the heaviest cavalry in Europe, men who had trained to kill since they were six years old. As the metal-clad knights charged down the hill, the villagers could feel the earth shake beneath their feet. Some lost heart and fled towards their homes. Some shat themselves in fear but remained next to their friends. The bravest moved to the front of the line.

And there they died.

The German charge struck and the small line of villagers shuddered with the impact, bent backwards and then crumbled as the cavalry punched through them like an iron fist through jelly. Conrad buried his lance deep into a man’s chest and drew his sword while his horse crashed into another villager throwing him back violently against the men behind. As his horse pushed forward trampling the fallen, he blocked an axe blow with his shield and hacked down, splitting open a turbaned head. Knights did the same to his left and right, slaughtering those left standing after the first impact of the charge. The surviving villagers turned and fled, trying to reach their homes and there make a desperate last stand. But the horsemen quickly overran and dispatched them.

Conrad rode through the village, passed one fugitive and slashed his blade back across the man’s face. The man screamed and fell to his knees covering his face with his hands. Conrad left him agonizing for the second line to finish off, and led his first line to the edge of the village where they reformed to confront the Egyptian cavalry.

The crusaders fired each house, burning alive those inside or slaughtering them as they ran out. There was no looting or rape. It was a grim, methodical annihilation to punish the village for killing their comrades and to draw the enemy cavalry. Flames or blades reached all those who had sought refuge in their homes: men, women and children. The crusaders threw the bodies into the burning houses and pillars of thick, greasy smoke slowly rose towards the sky. Dozens of women and children were allowed to flee across the desert. They would spread the news to the entire region.

Conrad could hear the Egyptians on the hill cry out in anger and horror as they watched his men massacre the village. He swore. The enemy were so tantalizingly close, maybe fifty paces away, but still the bastards would not attack, and they could quickly turn about face and outrun him if he charged them. He stared at them. For five hundred years they had invaded Christendom, and still they raided Italy and Sicily, burning cities, enslaving women and children, desecrating churches, bragged of having stabled their horses in Saint Peter’s when they sacked Rome.

He rode a few paces towards them, removed his helmet and hung it from his saddle. He glared at the enemy and shouted his rage.

“I am Conrad von Kronberg. You tore apart my men like the dogs you are, and like dogs I will kill you all. Now fight me! Fight me!” he roared beating his bloody sword on his shield.

Some of the Egyptians may not have understood his Italian, but there was no mistaking his hatred, nor his invitation to fight, and one horseman rode forward. His commander ordered him back sharply but the warrior walked his horse until he was thirty paces in front of the German. The Egyptian was clearly a man of worth, mounted on a splendid bay horse and fully armored with a suit of mail covered by a yellow silk surcoat, a conical helmet with a long nose guard, and a round shield with a bronze boss and decorative strips that shone in the sun. He lowered his spear, spurred his horse hard and charged shouting his war cry: “Allah Akbar!” God is great.

Conrad spurred his horse to meet the enemy’s charge, leaning forward and covering his body with his shield, while he extended his right arm holding his sword straight out in front of him. They connected. The Egyptian expertly rammed his spear into Conrad’s shield putting all the combined weight of his body and the momentum of the charge behind it. The spear point crashed through the wooden shield, burst the mail rings of Conrad’s arm and sliced into his arm until it slid against the bone. He was momentarily blinded with pain, but he felt his sword strike, the impact shot up his arm to his shoulder and then his horse took him past.

He turned and saw the Egyptian warrior scrambling to his feet, his horse on the ground kicking out in agony from the deep gash Conrad’s sword had cut in its forehead. The spear was still buried in Conrad’s shield. He cut off the shaft with his sword and groaned hoarsely from the excruciating pain through gritted teeth. Half a foot of spear blade and shaft still stuck out of his shield, but he could wield it now. He climbed off his horse to face his opponent who rushed him bringing down a long saber to cleave him in two. Favoring his wounded left arm, Conrad deflected the enemy’s blade with his sword. The Egyptian let his blade slide down Conrad’s and then sliced at his right leg. Conrad stepped back but not quickly enough and took a glancing blow, but his coat of mail stopped the sabre. He waited for the next assault. The Egyptian looked confident. He leaped forward, cutting down again. Conrad deflected the cut with his shield, ignored the terrible pain in his left arm, and with all his strength thrust his blade below the enemy’s shield, breaking through mail and plunging deep into the man’s belly, before wrenching the blade back to widen the wound. The Egyptian fell to his knees screaming with pain, dropped his sword and cupped his abdomen. Then he keeled over in the dust and lay there, moaning pitiably, trying to hold his guts in while blood welled between his fingers.

Conrad walked a few steps towards the wounded horse that lay on its side, eyes wide and teeth bared, breathing heavily, legs twitching. He killed the horse with a carefully aimed mercy blow of his sword. He walked back to the dying man who was trying to crawl back to his comrades. Conrad kicked him in the ribs to turn him on his back. Then he rested his mailed boot on the dying man’s throat, knowing full well how insulting the gesture was to the Egyptians. A few shouted angry insults but their commander was fully in control and none moved forward. The two lines of horsemen faced each other, and between them Conrad stood over the dying warrior. The general stared at the enemy line. He felt his blood trickle down his left arm and pool in his gauntlet. He heard the man’s groans below him and the fierce crackling of dozens of fires as the village burned behind him. Still staring at the enemy horsemen, Conrad lifted his right foot and brought his heel down crushing the man’s windpipe, then leaned on his foot and choked the man to death.

The crusaders erupted in a cheer and chanted his name: Kronberg! Kronberg! Kronberg!

On the hill, Emir Fakhreddin Ibn ach-Cheich raised his hand to keep his men at bay, and muttered, “Allah the merciful, what have we done to deserve such punishment?” Then he ordered his men to retreat and the Egyptian cavalry wheeled around and rode off.

Other than Conrad, the only other casualty in the attack was a knight who had a finger bitten off by a donkey. The general ordered the valiant donkey set free. He spared nothing else.

His men burned anything that would catch on fire: houses, trees, carts, fields. They killed anything alive, down to the donkeys, the goats, the chickens, the cats and the dogs. They threw the carcasses of animals and people down the wells to poison the water. When the fires in the houses had burned out, they used axes and maces to knock down the weakened mud walls until they had flattened Murtada. After gathering the remains of their four dead comrades to bury them in consecrated ground, they mounted to return to the camp.

Riding back up the hill, Conrad turned to take a last look at the village. He had reduced it to a black stain on the land. His men were avenged. In war knights fight and peasants feed them. The army needs order behind it so it can forage using a minimum of men and concentrate on defeating the enemy. This village had broken the rules and upset the natural order of things. And that only leads to chaos and horror. He doubted other villages would dare rise up against the crusaders now.

Such was his reasoning when he noticed the two friars were still on the hill, praying on their knees. As he rode passed he said tiredly: “Do not pray for this village friar, it no longer exists.” Don’t you know when it’s time to give up?

The kneeling friar raised his head and Conrad saw he was crying.

“It is for you and your soul that I pray,” Francis said with great sadness. “May the almighty forgive you for truly you know not what you do.”

“I know exactly what I am doing,” he replied with grim determination. “What must be done.”

Chapter 2. The council.

“Hurry,” Conrad huffed impatiently.

Rainhard lifted a sardonic eyebrow. “I can take the axe and just chop off at the elbow if you are in a hurry general,” he offered with mock concern. The veteran ignored the general’s impatience and continued to meticulously clean the spear wound on his arm. Wearing only his short breeches, Conrad sat on a rug, his arm stretched along a wooden chest, a tourniquet tied above the elbow to stop the flow of blood, while Rainhard used pliers and tweezers to pick out pieces of cloth and bits of chain mail driven into the flesh by the spear. Outside, the noon sun beat down, relentless. The tent’s flap let in a shard of light that illuminated the dust lingering in the stifling air. Sitting upright next to his master, the mastiff whined with concern as he stared at the wounded arm.

Conrad was restless. Upon returning to the camp he had paid silver to have the remains of his four men buried properly and for a priest to say a Mass for their souls. Then he had sent for the Venetian captain who had brought him and his force on his large merchant galleys from Sicily to Egypt. Conrad was tired of losing good men without getting any closer to Jerusalem. He had to take the strong citadel guarding Damietta, and the Venetian might be able to help him do just that.

A shrewd, weary sailor, the Venetian was surprised when two knights summoned him to the general’s tent, but he went willingly. He had come to like the German, mostly because he kept his word, paid on time and in gold. Reliability, at war and at sea, is a rarity. The two knights led the Venetian past the guards to Conrad’s tent and announced him. The Venetian entered and took a breath as he studied the scene in front of him: The general sitting down wearing only some white linen underpants, sun-burnt face frowning, lean, muscular body pale like a marble statue, glistening with sweat. On the left sat his monstrous dog. On the right his even more frightening marked man with cut-off ears, broken nose, a crown branded on his forehead, a dark cross tattooed on each cheek, and blue tattoos crawling out of his sleeves and onto his hands. Hands that were now tending to a serious wound on the general’s arm with a surprising delicacy in such a disfigured warrior.

“Ahh, general, you are wounded,” the captain said with genuine concern. “Is that why you need my services? You wish to return to Sicily?”

The German’s entire body seemed to tense, the cords of muscle on his chest rippled, the veins in his neck bulged. “Off course not!” he flared indignantly.

“Please forgive my presumption,” the Venetian bowed apologetically. “So many are sailing back these days...” he added, embarrassed. Many crusaders were breaking their vows and returning home, discouraged by the long siege and the weather.

Conrad waved the Venetian towards a stool, then turned to his dog.

“Karr.” The enormous mastiff bounded over and licked his master’s wound and the rest of the arm thoroughly.

The Venetian was glad to change the subject. “Ah yes! Langue de chien, langue de medecin, the Franks say. A dog’s tongue is a doctor’s tongue.”

“Good dog. Sit,” Conrad said softly. Karr stepped back and sat upright next to him again, paying close attention to the proceedings as if he were supervising.

Sitting up the dog towered over his seated master, looming over him with his huge jaws that could tear off a man’s face with one bite. But then, Germans like everything huge, their horses, their dogs, their swords and their kegs of beer, the Venetian thought. He also noticed the general was not drinking to ease his pain. Dog and master resembled each other. Both were long-limbed, very muscular, lean and hard, with a posture of coiled power ready to spring into action, and an appraising gaze as if at all times they were wondering whether to attack you or not.

“Garlic,” Conrad ordered. Rainhard rubbed crushed garlic over and around the wound to disinfect it. Then he told the squire to pinch the edges of the wound together and began stitching it with hemp string.

Conrad turned to the Venetian. “I have asked you here to tell me again about when you seized Constantinople,” he said calmly, his face and voice giving no sign of the pain he was enduring. “Tell me how you took the walls.”

The captain’s face lit up at the memory. Fifteen years earlier he had been part of the Venetian fleet that had transported the mostly French crusaders to that immensely wealthy city, and sacked it, bringing fabulous treasures home to Venice. He smiled with pride thinking of the ancient statues of the four horses carried off from the Roman amphitheater in Constantinople and now gracing the facade of Venice’s cathedral, his eternal floating city.

“It was marvelous general. The Greek army was arrayed outside the city. Our transport ships approached the coast until the water was shallow enough for a man to stand. Then we lowered the side bridges and knights in full armor rode straight out onto the beach. And the infantry and archers quickly followed them. Such a sight! The Greeks fled back into the city!”

Conrad listened impassively, masking his anger at the story. The Venetians and French had perverted a crusade aimed at reconquering Jerusalem and diverted it to attack Christian cities and sack Constantinople, the largest and most magnificent city in the Christian world and, more importantly, a stout defender against the encroaching Arabs and Turks. It was a disaster for Christendom. But what else could one expect when Venetian greed and French arrogance met corrupt Greeks who no longer fought for their land and relied on mercenaries? He despised them all, but he held his tongue: He needed more details from the Venetian captain.

“Tell me how you took the walls,” he persisted.

The Venetian was eager. “Yes! We rowed right up to the city’s walls in our galleys, and with ladders and ropes we climbed and took the city.” He nodded proudly.

“Teufel! Damn it!” Conrad shouted at Rainhard. “Place the stitches closer to each other.”

Rainhard lifted a sardonic eyebrow. “I’m not known for my needle work general. Shall I call for a seamstress?”

“Give it to me,” he snapped. He seized the large needle and, teeth clenched, he pierced his skin and flesh, tying two tight stitches very close one to the other. “Like that.” He handed the needle back to his second-in-command and turned again to the Venetian with a searching look.

“Ropes and ladders. But you also had some sort of floating siege towers, ja?”

“Yes, very ingenious.” To the Venetian it had all been an exploit to be proud of. “We lashed cross-spars together and hung them high on the masts, then nailed planks to them turning them into suspended bridges. Our men climbed up the masts and then ran across these bridges. The ships moved with every swell, and so they had to choose the right time and jump onto Constantinople’s walls. One by one they tempted fate. The first few died but then we conquered.”

Conrad shook his head grimacing with disappointment. “One by one you say. Not enough.”

The captain had guessed finally why Conrad was questioning him, so he warned, “The Greeks did not have much fight in them, unlike our friends here, high up on their stone citadel, the best of the garrison, ready to fight to the death.”

Conrad nodded pensively. “What if we tied two galleys together to have a larger base, and on that we built a tower with walls on only one side and a bridge on top that we dropped onto the enemy walls?”

“Si, si, that could work. It would have to be about 20 yards tall to reach the parapet of the citadel. It would be less steady than a siege tower on land, smaller and not as wide because otherwise it will weigh too much. So, more vulnerable, for sure. But it could work.”

It could work. Two generations earlier, Frederick’s grandfather, the Emperor Barbarossa, had taken the walls of Crema with a siege tower that dropped a swiveling bridge onto the city’s walls. Conrad had been taught its design. Now he would build a floating one. It could work. Such a contraption would get us on top of the citadel, but the casualties would be terrible, Conrad thought. The Egyptians had a lot of fight in them. Half the attackers would die. Yet it had to be done. He would have to convince the King of Jerusalem and the other crusade leaders to try.

August 22, Damietta.

Erected in the center of the crusaders’ camp, the King of Jerusalem’s rectangular pavilion was the largest and finest. Precious rugs covered the floor, colorful curtains decorated the side walls and entrance. Inside, an entire side was covered by a large flag of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Jerusalem cross in gold on a sky-blue field. The cross had equal arms that ended in T bars and four small crosses in each quadrant representing the four evangelists. Together, the five crosses represented Christ’s five wounds.

That morning the leaders of the expedition had gathered within the large tent for a war council requested by Conrad. Close to a hundred men sat on stools or lounged on the silk cushions that lined the sides of the pavilion while slave girls served them food and drinks. Conrad stood on one side, drinking a cup of water, greeting courteously those closest to him, nodding to those further away, but generally keeping to himself and studying the gathered men. Outside, hundreds of lower rank crusaders ringed the tent eager to for any news of the proceedings.

The Crusade had begun auspiciously with many great kings gathering in the Holy Land. But King Andrew of Hungary, after barely a couple of skirmishes, recovered the head of Saint Stephen, his country’s patron saint, and rode home with his precious relic. King Hugh of Cyprus died and his island kingdom collapsed into anarchy. The campaign had bogged down until a Frisian fleet loaded with German crusaders had come to Acre. Instead of pushing inland towards Jerusalem, the crusaders boarded the fleet and assaulted Damietta. Conrad could see the logic in attacking Egypt given that it controlled Jerusalem. But he also knew half of his allies under this pavilion had their own reasons not to fight in the Holy Land. The crusader states preached fiery death to the pagans but traded with them and their main objective was economic: Damietta had taken business away from the Christian ports of Acre and Tyre. Knocking out Damietta meant eliminating a competitor for lucrative trade routes.

The Italian crusaders from Genoa, Pisa and Venice agreed with them of course. Italians always put their own self interest ahead of anything, Conrad thought with contempt. The keys to Jerusalem are in Cairo, they said. But what they were really after were the extraordinary wealth of the Nile Delta and the trade routes of North Africa and to the East. Holding Egypt would strengthen the position of the crusader states, now barely clinging to a few coastal cities surrounded by enemies.

And then there was the sheer diversity of the crusader army. In addition to the crusader states of the Holy Land and the Italian merchant cities there were Germans, Frisians, two English earls and a bastard son of King John of England, Duke Leopold of Austria and the fighting religious orders of the Templars and Hospitallers. All crucesignati, all bearing the cross, all frustrated and bitterly divided, and many contingents had already departed. All had nominally accepted the leadership of John de Brienne, King of Jerusalem, but he was unable to hold them together. And now all had accepted the leadership of the Papal Legate, the Spanish Cardinal Pelagius of Albano. The mere thought of the inept legate having command was enraging to Conrad. It was a sign of how divided the crusaders were and how weak Brienne’s hand had become.

Brienne and Pelagius were late to the council they were to preside. Indulging in food and wine and girls while the rest of us wait, Conrad thought bitterly. But Conrad knew why. He had requested the council meet, and Brienne and Pelagius wanted to humiliate him with their delay and show their superiority. He was not a great lord, not even a baron. He was a German knight who had risen to become a general of his liege lord, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, King of Germany and Sicily. Then men that Conrad had led to Egypt were merely an advance party of the large army Frederick was assembling in Sicily for the crusade. But that army had yet to sail, for the emperor had chosen to build his own fleet to avoid being at the mercy of Pisa and Genoa who charged fortunes to ferry their fellow christians across the Mediterranean.

Finally the two leaders made their entrance, followed by several clergymen, and after greeting the most important noblemen took their seats on a raised platform on the far side of the pavilion. Brienne, a tall, large French count from Champagne, had become King of Jerusalem by marriage. He had a solid build, was still very fit in his mid-fifties and paid courtiers to spread the tales of his chivalrous valor. But Conrad knew Brienne had fought primarily in tournaments and was King of Jerusalem only in title since Saladin had reconquered the Holy City decades earlier. Brienne barely held on to a thin strip of coastal land that he ruled from Acre.

But at least Brienne had some understanding of military matters. Pelagius had clearly known what asses to lick in Rome to further his career. What knowledge he lacked in other matters he made up for with a level of arrogance and entitlement astounding even for a Prince of the Church. The Spanish cardinal had been sent on a diplomatic mission to Constantinople, where he closed Greek Orthodox churches and threw the clergy in the dungeons until the Greek population rioted and the city’s French rulers thought best to throw him out. And then Rome sent him to Egypt, probably in the hopes the Muslims or the climate would kill him, Conrad thought. He stared at the two men, unable to hide his distaste.

Brienne sat on his comfortable chair, looked around the room and saw Conrad standing rigidly and looking like he itched to kill someone. The German was a prickly bastard but he was Frederick’s representative in the camp and therefore had to be indulged. It was also best to avoid a confrontation with him that might lead to a duel.

Brienne sighed. “Von Kronberg, you have asked for this council...”

Conrad bowed his head slightly towards the king, “Your majesty, my lords..” and explained to the assembled men his plan to take the citadel. “It will be a hard fight,” he said grimly.

The crusaders listened carefully. Conrad had a reputation for being a capable leader and a hard fighter. And there was no doubting his determination. Everyone had heard of his wiping out an entire village to avenge his men and to keep the army’s supply lines open.

“The tower cannot hold much weight. The first ten attackers will have to fend off the enemy garrison while more climb up the tower. Most of the men in the first assault group will die,” he said with a convincing brutal honesty. “Most of the men in the second wave will die. But with fifty men we can take the citadel. We can break this stalemate. We can take Damietta and stop rotting in failure.”

Pelagius scoffed. “A tower on boats! Ridiculous. It cannot be built.” He looked towards the gaggle of priests that always surrounded him and they laughed with him, repeating his words as if he were the second coming.

“The Venetians built them to take Constantinople. You know the city do you not?” Conrad retorted acidly. “And our Frisian friends can build it.”

A stout Frisian took a step forward and shrugged his shoulders. “Ja,” he confirmed simply. He could build it.

“A suicide attack perched on a wobbly tower built on boats,” Pelagius mocked. “It reminds me of the mice who excitedly plan to tie a bell around the cat’s neck so they can hear it approach. They are all happy with their plan until one of them asks, ‘Who is going to tie the bell around the cat’s neck?’ And none reply, for not one of them is willing.”

Conrad wanted to wring the useless clergyman’s neck. But he replied with a calm, cold voice. He always appeared unperturbed when his anger reached the stage in which he was preparing to kill. “I will lead the attack.”

“But who would follow you?” Pelagius retorted in a shrill voice. “No one! You will not find a single man in the camp willing to follow you. What we must do is wait for Frederick, and then we will have enough men to push back the sultan and surround the city.”

The arrogantly familiar way this priest spoke about his emperor enraged Conrad. He would kill this insolent little bastard in the blink of an eye with his bare hands. He took two steps towards Pelagius then halted, the large flag behind the legate reminding him of his priority: Jerusalem. He had to find a way.

Just then a voice outside the tent began singing Jerusalem laments, a French composition born out of the frustration of the rank and file. Immediately dozens of men joined in and the tent walls seemed to shake with their protest.

"Jerusalem laments, as does the land where the Lord God suffered death most willingly, because this side of the sea it has few friends who offer it the slightest help. If each one remembered the Last Judgment and the holy place where He suffered torture..."

"Quiet!" Pelagius shouted.

"...he would not readily renounce his crusading vow; for whoever takes the cross with full consent for God’s sake denies Him on the day he gives it back, and like Judas will lose paradise."

"Enough!" Pelagius was enraged. The song was penned as a direct reproach of his leadership. It was utter blasphemy.

But the singers kept on.

"Our shepherds take little care of their sheep when each of them sells them to the wolf for money, but sin has so taken hold of them that they have forgotten God for the sake of silver."

Brienne stood up. "Peace! Let Kronberg speak."

The crowd outside quieted down.

Kronberg resumed, his voice betraying his anger. “It is not a matter of how many men we have. We must control the river. To do that, we must break the chain. And to do that we must take the citadel.” He hammered each point home more and more forcefully. Then he turned to address the entire assembly. “Tell your best men I seek only volunteers for this attack. Tell them I will address them at dusk in front of my tent. If fifty men will not follow me, I will desist. But,” he turned to Brienne and Pelagius, “if fifty men are willing to attack with me, we will build the tower and we will attack.”

Brienne nodded in agreement, eager to leave this confrontation. Pelagius smirked and gave his consent with a small wave of his bejeweled hand that was meant to appear magnanimous.

Conrad left the council, followed by two of his men, and made his way through the camp headed back to his tent. He walked by a gallows where three men hung by their necks, their eyes and open mouths covered by large, black flies. All armies attracted merchants, whores, artisans and all manner of men and women supplying goods and services to the fighting men. Crusades also attracted pilgrims of all ages and walks of life, their hearts heavy with the desire to reach Jerusalem or help Christ’s cause somehow, even by fighting the infidel, but their purses woefully light. By the time they had paid for the their sea passage, most became beggars, some ended up as thieves or whores. Weakened by hunger, many died of disease. Others were caught stealing or murdering and were strung up like these three, half starved and dressed in rags. The noose had probably been a relief for them, Conrad thought.

These at least would not bother anyone anymore. Groups of starving pilgrims often left the camp to pillage, rape and murder in the countryside, stoking the kind of reaction that had killed his men yesterday. If it were up to him he would drown the whole lot, keep the army lean. If only the emperor had given him 10.000 men, he would have taken Jerusalem already. But he had to achieve what he could with what he had. And that evening he had to convince fifty men to join him in a suicidal attack on the citadel.

He rehearsed in his mind the appeal he would make to the men that evening, and thus lost in thought approached a crowd gathering around a cart on which stood a small man. His black eyes seemed riveted on Conrad with great intensity and seemed to preach directly to him. It was the friar from the village.

“Brothers, repent,” the small friar urged with heartfelt sincerity. “Not the Muslims are holding you back from Jerusalem but your own devil, your hatred and your greed. You wear the cross. Wear it also on your hearts. Act in the spirit of love and the Muslims will see the error of their ways, they will break camp and leave of their own accord. I pray to God you do not enter the Holy Land until your souls are deserving. Purify your souls! Purify your souls!”

In the audience a few men crossed themselves. Others jeered and started pelting the friar with dung. Angry shouts rose from one corner.

“Treacherous vermin, Mohammed-loving spawn of the devil!” It was a very irate knight, making his way closer to the cart and shouting abuse at the friar. “We will open the gates of the Holy City to Christians again, not by loving the infidel dogs but by cutting them down with our swords.” He unsheathed his sword and raised it above him. “Our swords blessed by the Holy Father himself.”

The knight moved forward menacingly. A stone hit the friar on the chest and his companion tugged at the hem of his tunic and pleaded with him to jump down from the cart and leave. But the friar stood still and smiled with compassion at the knight. “Brother, how can you believe that such bloodletting will open the gates of the City of Peace to you, much less those of Heaven?”

Conrad sighed impatiently. The crazy little man was going to get himself killed. The general elbowed and shoved his way through the crowd, followed by his two men with drawn swords.

“Halt! This friar is with me,” Conrad shouted as he neared the cart. Most men knew him by sight or recognized the imperial eagle on his chest. His demeanor, and the two large men with swords drawn behind him convinced the rest not to oppose him.

“Down,” he ordered. The friar complied. Conrad waited a short while for the crowd to disperse, then looked at the friar with curiosity.

“Why are you provoking these men?” he asked bemused. “You preach peace with the Muslims to men who have taken the cross and sworn to fight them. Are you mad?”

The friar flashed a disarming smile. “Brother Elia and I will also walk to the sultan’s camp and beseech him to open his eyes to Christ’s word and love and lay down his arms.”

“You are mad. They will cut off your head for your efforts, as we would if one of theirs should be so insolent as to come preach to us.”

“The Lord provides me with everything I need. He will see me safely through the enemy lines and beyond. I will go where you cannot. Doors will open for me and I will enter where you would be unable to break in with 1,000 knights, for the Lord walks by my side and I do his will. I know this time I will succeed and reach Jerusalem.”

Conrad shook his head. “You will die. I cannot save you every day.” The friar intrigued him. Even fascinated him. His body was puny, but his spirit indomitable. Pity he would be killed soon, but Conrad could at least ensure he would not be killed by Christians in the camp. He ordered one of his men to provide food and water for the two friars and escort them to the edge of the camp. Without another word he walked away, followed by his one remaining bodyguard and the friars’ well-wishes, knowing he would never see them again.

That same morning, imperial hunting palace, outside Palermo, Sicily.

Stelios marveled at how cool the royal falcon mews were even in the middle of summer. Purpose-built for the emperor’s favorite hunters, in the shade of tall umbrella pine trees, the building was a large stable with small windows, ventilation holes near the ground to let cool air in from below, and slits close to the roof to let hot air out. The holes could be sealed in winter. Each bird had its own stall with ledges and perches, draft and smoke free, with just a little sand on the floor. A dozen falconers cleaned the stalls each day and attended to the birds’ every need.

Five men huddled around a falcon perched on a wooden stand. They were all dressed in the same green tunics and leather leggings of hunters. One of the more simply dressed falconers gently handled the bird. He was 24 years old, muscular, lean, with red hair and bright green eyes, and a gaze and gestures that exuded confidence and poise: Frederick, Holy Roman Emperor.

In a semicircle two steps behind him stood a bevy of prelates, lawyers, clerks and bureaucrats, for the emperor governed and discussed policy always and everywhere, even while hawking. Stelios studied these men. Many were old men the emperor had inherited and old prelates he had to tolerate. But as Frederick reshaped his kingdom’s administration he was replacing them gradually with men of his choosing. Men like the Lord Falconer, the second son of a baron, who was in charge of the imperial birds. The position was prestigious and it went, of course, to a man of noble birth. Yet Frederick had picked this man primarily for his ability and, most of all, for his love of the birds. Others he was elevating to posts of responsibility, regardless of their low birth, because they were competent. The old guard complained, insisting on a strict hierarchy of titles, but the emperor preferred merit to bloodlines. So he had chosen Piero della Vigna, a brilliant lawyer with a cogent prose. And he had plucked Stelios himself from the palace bureaucracy. ‘You bring me solutions instead of problems Stelios,’ Frederick had told him when he had included him in his inner circle of advisors.

Slightly aside from the courtiers stood an adolescent girl, a stunning Sicilian beauty on the cusp of womanhood, with lustrous black hair. Her blue eyes were fixed on Frederick with a mixture of admiration, awe and desire. The orphan of a Norman noble, she was one of several such youths being raised at court until they came of age and could inherit their family’s lands, which, in the meantime, were governed by the crown.

Carefully, very delicately, Frederick inspected the wing of his favorite gyrfalcon, a large, white female from Lubeck that cost as much as a farm. It had broken a feather in that morning’s hunt while bringing down a stork. He whispered tenderly to the hooded bird as he inspected each feather.

Stelios and the men around him turned to the door when Hermann von Salza, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, strode in. Salza eyed them all with cold disdain, ignored their silent greetings. Salza was Frederick’s premier diplomat, accustomed to discussing policy with kings and popes, Stelios knew. Clerks with ink-stained fingers such as himself were on the level of ants for the Grand Master. Salza acknowledged only the Archbishop of Palermo with a quick nod. Archbishop Berardo da Castagna had been handpicked by Frederick and, like Salza, brought into the emperor's inner circle of advisors, the familiares.

Frederick glanced at Salza as he approached. The emperor’s fiery green eyes warned you of his temper. “Hermann, tell me the latest bleats from Rome.”

Salza bowed his head. “