‘Where are they?’
‘Where no one can find them but me. Now pull me out of this foul mire.’
Walter had sunk to his chest. Cries floated down the wind. A smear of flame appeared through the reeds.
‘Help!’ Walter shouted. ‘Help!’
The cries came closer. Torches flickered.
‘Oh thank God,’ Walter gasped. He stopped struggling. ‘Now you’ll pay for your treachery. What I did to your family is nothing compared to the punishment I’ll deal out to you.’
Four figures shoved out of the reeds.
‘Wayland?’ Vallon called.
‘He led me into the bog,’ Walter cried. ‘He tried to murder me. For the love of God, help me!’
Vallon edged towards Wayland, Hero following. The other two men were Seljuks, carrying poles and rope. They took in the situation and unlooped the rope.
‘Don’t struggle,’ Vallon told Walter. ‘We’ll pull you out.’
‘Oh, thank God!’
Hero pushed forward. ‘Where’s the gospel?’
Vallon slapped him. ‘The man’s in peril of death.’
‘He won’t tell us otherwise. Once he’s safe, he’ll turn against us. Walter, tell us where you’ve hidden the documents.’
‘You swear to save me?’
‘You’re wasting precious time,’ said Vallon. ‘Of course we’ll save you.’
‘They’re in a Roman bastillion on the eastern shore of Salt Lake. Hurry!’
‘We camped near the fort. Where will we find the gospel?’
‘The top of the staircase. Behind a stone carved with a lion. Hurry before it’s too late.’
Vallon ordered the Seljuk to throw the rope. ‘Reach for it carefully. Don’t move more than you have to.’
Walter clung to it. Vallon and Hero and the two Seljuks heaved. Vallon turned to Wayland. ‘Help us.’
They strained and grunted until sweat broke on their brows. Each heave raised Walter half a foot, but all their efforts couldn’t break the bog’s grip.
‘Take your hauberk off,’ Vallon called. ‘You won’t sink if you rid yourself of your armour.’
Walter clawed at the slippery mail with icy, mud-coated hands. ‘I can’t. Every movement pulls me deeper.’
‘Send one of the Seljuks for more men,’ Hero said.
Vallon wiped his forehead. ‘It’s no use. It would take a team of horses to drag him loose, and the strain would tear him in two.’ He raised his head. ‘Walter, you have to break the suction. Paddle with your legs.’
Walter had sunk to his shoulders. ‘I can’t feel them,’ he whimpered.
Vallon seized the rope again. ‘Another effort.’
They hauled first in one direction, then another. Something popped and the rope sprang loose, sending them tumbling backwards.
‘My shoulder!’ Walter screamed.
Vallon picked himself up. He cast the rope towards Walter. ‘Take hold of it. At least we can keep you from going under.’ He turned to Hero. ‘Send one of the Seljuks to fetch a team carrying ladders.’
‘He’ll freeze to death before they get here.’
Walter’s left hand groped for the rope. His fingers closed on it. When Vallon drew it taut, it pulled straight out.
‘I can’t hold it. All feeling has gone.’
The bog was above his shoulders. Vallon doubled over, hands on knees. ‘Walter, there’s nothing more we can do. Make peace with your maker.’
The surface was up to Walter’s chin. ‘Oh mother of God, save me in my hour of need. Oh merciful mother of God … ’ He broke off with a sob.
They watched in horror as Walter sank deeper.
‘What a terrible way to die,’ he said, his tone remote. He called out in Turkic to the Seljuks. ‘I’ve told them what happened here. The Emir will make you pay for your crimes.’ His voice rose to a shriek. ‘I curse
Wayland! And I curse you for bringing him here and I curse Drogo! I’ll be waiting for you in hell!’
Water closed over his mouth and he delivered his final curse as a gargling scream. Wayland’s flesh crept, but he remembered his family massacred in their home and didn’t regret his crime. Bubbles erupted from Walter’s mouth. He heaved up as the water rose above his nose. He sank again and more bubbles burst. His eyes still showed, rolling with terror, and then they went still and glazed over. They sank from sight. Slowly his head disappeared. The surface quaked one last time and went still.
Vallon was down on one knee. He turned his head. ‘Is it true? Did you lead him to his death?’
‘He slaughtered my family. Father, mother, brother and sister, grandfather … He raped the women and cut their throats.’
Vallon looked at him for a long time. ‘That’s why you joined us. I set out to rescue Walter, and you were planning to kill him.’
‘Only at first. Once I met Syth, once I saw how gallantly you led us, I swore to bury my hatred. I haven’t even told Syth what Walter did. But then he threatened to kill me. He gloated about it. I know the Emir will probably execute me for disobeying his orders. I know I won’t see the child Syth’s carrying. Walter followed me into the marsh and revenge was all I had left. Even then I gave him a chance. I would have tried to save him if only he’d confessed his crimes and repented.’
Vallon heaved an exhausted sigh and stood. ‘The Seljuks don’t know what happened. We’ll tell the Emir it was an accident. At least you recovered the falcon. That might go some way to assuaging his wrath.’
Wayland broke down. It wasn’t fear of Suleyman’s punishment that overwhelmed him. It was the stress that had built up in him from the moment chance presented him with the opportunity to kill Walter. It was despair at the thought of what would happen to Syth.
Hero put his arm around him. ‘Come on. Let’s leave this awful place.’
They picked their way out of the marsh. About twenty men remained with the Emir, rags of flame whisking from their torches. Suleyman rode forward, hunched and malevolent. Vallon and Hero stepped in front of Wayland and pleaded for mercy. Half a dozen Seljuks dragged
them out of the way at swordpoint. The Emir stopped in front of Wayland and gave an order. Ibrahim approached. From the pitiful expression on his face, Wayland knew that the Emir wouldn’t show mercy. Ibrahim took the falcon. He held up a hand, showing Suleyman the pigeon. The Emir dashed it to the ground.
Wayland raised his eyes. ‘Let me see Syth one last time.’
Drogo spoke out of the dark. ‘They took her back to the camp.’
‘I’ll take care of her,’ Vallon said. ‘I promise she won’t come to harm.’
The Emir raised his mace. Wayland stared at the twin peaks. The torches guttered.
One of the underfalconers threw himself down and scooped up the pigeon. He thrust his hand up. The Emir’s stallion flared its nostrils and side-stepped.
Ibrahim grabbed the pigeon and called for light. Two torchbearers ran up to him. He held the pigeon towards the flames and Wayland glimpsed something gleaming on its leg. Suleyman looked down at it and waved his hand. Faruq dismounted and hurried up. Ibrahim cut the object off the pigeon’s leg and handed it to him. He held it between thumb and forefinger.
A tiny cylinder. Wayland had no idea what it meant.
‘A messenger pigeon,’ he heard Hero say.
‘I know,’ said Vallon. ‘The Moors used them in Spain. Wayland, stay where you are and don’t say a word.’
Nobody was paying any attention to him. Everyone was leaning into the cluster of torches, intent on what Faruq was doing. He prised a cap off the tube and extracted its contents. He called for the torches to be brought closer and unrolled a tiny piece of fabric. From the way his lips worked, it must have contained writing. He gasped, collected himself with conscious effort and beckoned the Emir closer. Suleyman leaned down until Faruq was able to speak into his ear. What he said made the Emir sit bolt upright. His gaze roamed through the night. When it returned it settled on Wayland. He squeezed his horse’s flanks, rode forward and ruffled Wayland’s hair. He threw back his head and laughed.
The other Seljuks were as baffled as Wayland. They spread their hands at each other, hitched their shoulders.
‘What’s going on?’ said Drogo.
‘A miracle, that’s what,’ Vallon answered.
Suleyman unslung his quiver and passed its contents out among his company, pointing in a different direction as he handed over each arrow. One after the other the Seljuks galloped into the night, heading to all points of the compass. When the last of them had gone, the Emir grinned at Wayland, shook his head in fond amazement and turned his stallion. The remaining riders formed up around him and they raced off, their horses spraying gravel.
Hero watched the torches dwindle into the dark. ‘What’s the meaning of the arrows?’
‘Suleyman’s summoning his army,’ said Vallon. ‘He must be mobilising for war.’
‘He doesn’t seem dismayed by the prospect. In fact he was so excited by the message that he didn’t even notice Walter’s missing.’
‘What’s happened to him?’ Drogo demanded. ‘Where is he?’
‘You two go on,’ Vallon said. He waited until Hero and Wayland had left. ‘Walter’s dead. He lost his path and fell into a bog. We couldn’t pull him out and the weight of his armour dragged him under.’
Drogo looked back at the marsh. When he turned his head, he was smiling. ‘Wayland.’
Vallon’s eyes narrowed. ‘You knew, didn’t you?’
‘I found out the day you fled from the castle. He led my men into the wood and killed Drax and Roussel. They’d taken part in the killings.’
‘Think yourself lucky that you weren’t party to the crime.’
‘Slaying the family wasn’t a crime. I would have killed them, too, just as I would have killed Wayland if it had been me who’d found him in the forest.’
‘Your answer to everything.’
Vallon set his horse into the crosswind, masking his face with his cape. Bits of dry scrub skipped and tumbled across his path. The
whole plateau seemed to be on the move. Overhead the stars clumped in swirls and blotches of phosphorescence.
Drogo caught up. ‘Droll, isn’t it? Walter kills Wayland’s family and then adopts him as a pet. He was genuinely fond of him. I wish I’d been there when Wayland told him who he was. I’d have given anything to see his face.’
Vallon quickened his pace.
Drogo laughed. ‘All this way to save a man who didn’t need saving, and then it turns out that Wayland only joined you for the chance of murdering Walter.’
Vallon whipped out his sword and laid the blade against Drogo’s throat. ‘It was an accident. Say different and I’ll kill you.’
‘Don’t excite yourself. Accident or murder, Walter’s dead and I’ve got what I want.’
‘Have you?’
‘Nothing stands between me and my inheritance. My father’s sick. I don’t expect to find him alive by the time I return to England.’
‘A lot can happen between now and then.’
They jogged on. The Emir’s encampment appeared as a faint red pulse on the plain.
‘What about you?’ Drogo said. ‘The money’s gone and you’ve got nothing to show for it.’
‘Don’t be so sure.’
‘You mean Caitlin.’
‘I’ll escort her to the capital if that’s what she wants.’
‘You’ll find her affections have cooled now that you’re penniless. If you enlist with the Varangians, you’ll probably be posted to some backwater in Greece or Bulgaria. Caitlin’s too fond of her comforts to enjoy life as the wife of a field captain.’
‘I never said I intended marrying her.’
Drogo seized Vallon’s bridle. ‘Then let me have her.’
‘It’s not me who stands between you and Caitlin.’
‘Who are you speaking of?’
‘If you understood Arabic, you’d have heard the Emir asking to take her for his wife.’
‘Caitlin wouldn’t make a match with that bandy-legged dwarf.’
‘Why not? You’re the one who says she covets luxury and status. Suleyman rules a fief larger than England. He probably possesses more
wealth than your King William. Did you see how much silver he threw at the archer who killed the jackal?’
Walter was silent for a while. ‘What did you tell him?’
‘I told him that Caitlin was my woman. That we were lovers.’
Drogo flinched. ‘That’s not true. I’ve been watching her close. You haven’t had any opportunities.’
‘Drogo, if a man and a woman want to satisfy their lust, they’ll always find a way to avoid prying eyes.’
Drogo’s hand fell on his sword.
‘Go ahead,’ said Vallon. ‘You’ll never possess Caitlin. She despises you. In Constantinople she can take her pick of rich and noble suitors. A woman as beautiful as Caitlin could snare an emperor in the making.’
‘By God, Vallon, if I thought that you and Caitlin had lain together …’
Vallon ignored him and rose in his stirrups. ‘Whatever message the pigeon was carrying, it’s caused a mighty stir. The encampment looks like a wasps’ nest that someone’s poked with a stick.’
Seljuks raced hither and yon. They were striking camp. Pack animals jammed the lanes. A group of nomads loaded baggage onto a train of camels. A dismantled tent dragged away downwind, towing a dozen men behind it. Vallon reached his quarters and turned to Drogo.
‘This is where we part for good. From now on, you make your own way.’
‘Vallon—’
He jumped off his horse and pushed through the entrance. Only Hero was inside.
‘Where’s Wayland?’
‘He went to see Syth.’
‘Have you discovered the cause of the upheaval?’
‘Not yet. All I know is that all non-combatants are returning to Konya. Faruq told me we can expect a summons before midnight.’
‘That will be interesting. Is there any food? I’m famished.’
‘Even the servants have gone. By tomorrow the camp will be deserted.’
Vallon pulled off his boots. He found some bread and a conserve of apricots and ate sitting on the edge of his pallet. ‘A strange day. From the heights to the depths, and now we’re suspended somewhere in between.’
‘Were you shocked by what Wayland did?’
‘Shocked but not surprised. I always wondered about his reasons for killing Drax and Roussel. Then more than once I saw him and Drogo exchange odd looks. I quizzed him about it and he denied hiding any secrets. I should have realised the truth when he didn’t press charges after Drogo released the falcons, but I always thought that Wayland was incapable of deceit. It just shows the wisdom of taking no one at face value.’