Knights of the Blood (5 page)

The double act of sacrilege and desecration immobilized de Beq for just a stunned instant, as the cup brimmed to overflowing almost in an eye—blink and Hassad lifted it in mocking salute to the figure on the crucifix before draining it off at a single draught. As the Turk filled it from the source again and offered it to one of his followers, himself bending to the wound itself, de Beq ducked back sharply and half—fell to the ground, at the same time motioning to the men with the date palm trunk. Seconds later, backed by the weight of a dozen grimfaced men, the battering ram made short work of the chapel door on the first blow.

“The Sword of Christ!” Someone screamed, as the first of de Beq’s crusaders burst into the chapel, maces and axes clearing everything in their path.

Like men possessed, the Turks turned on the Europeans and began fighting their way to the door of the chapel. Hassad stayed back, a scimitar now in his hand, watching the progress and occasionally urging his men on. One of de Beq’s men lost his footing, went down in the rush, and was immediately seized by a Turk who stood on his chest and ripped his head off with his bare hands. Unable to withstand the pressure of the Turks in such close quarters, de Beq’s men tumbled back through the door and into the courtyard again.

De Beq rallied them. An iron mace pulped the skull of the first Turk to charge after them, while the next two were hacked to bits by knights rushing to de Beq’s side. One of the serjeants had run to the door of the chapel with his boar spear, ready to impale the next Turk through the opening. He reached the doorway just as a small Turk emerged brandishing a scimitar. The serjeant thrust at the Turk, who deftly parried the spear on his small round shield and then dashed back inside, the serjeant hot on his heels.

De Beq and his men raced after, but not in time to save the hot—headed serjeant, whose dying eyes reflected eternal surprise and disbelief as he sagged to his knees just inside the door, trying to gather up his entrails in his arms. De Beq nearly tripped over him, but recovered in time to avoid a similar fate as a fat Turk lunged at him with a dagger and missed.

The Turks had been momentarily stunned by the Europeans’ attack, but now they reacted with discipline as de Beq’s men renewed their offensive. The Turk who had cost the serjeant his life leaped forward, slashing at de Beq with his scimitar, but William of Etton parried the cut with his mace and swung hard at his attacker. The Turk brought up his shield defensively and managed to deflect the knight’s blow. William kicked out with all of his might and caught the Turk on the side of his knee.

The small man’s leg buckled under the impact and the Turk went down. Screaming imprecations, he turned his attention to William now, going for the knight’s leg, but the larger man was raining blows on him so hard that his attack had little effect. Eventually, William’s mace connected with the Turk’s elbow, turning the joint into shattered pulp. The Turk screamed in pain as his arm fell useless to his side, and the knight was able to sink his mace into his adversary’s conical helmet.

Martello held one of the Turks at bay with his spear as two more grappled with serjeants Joffre and Brandstadter. Joffre’s hand—and—a—half sword was too long to be used effectively in the confines of the chapel, and Brandstadter had to grasp his axe by the middle of the haft in order to wield it.

Joffre had his sword wrenched away in the struggle and was easily overpowered by his foe, who forced the stocky Breton to his knees as though he were a child, bashing his face to pulp with his bare fist. Joffre fought with all his strength to break free, but despite punching and kicking in every direction he could think of, he was unable to escape the beating he was receiving. As Joffre slipped in blood on the floor, he instinctively threw out his arm to catch himself. His hand found a conical spiked helmet, and picking it up, he rammed it into the Turk’s chest.

Joffre felt the Turk’s grip on his throat weaken as the spike drove into flesh, and the Turk staggered back. Winded, Joffre wrenched himself free, dropping to all fours, gasping for breath. As he looked up at the Turk in the dim light, one eye blinded by blood, he froze in astonished horror as the Turk reached up to his chest, grabbed the helmet with both hands, and slowly withdrew the bloody spike from his chest. Before Joffre could even throw himself to one side, the Turk rammed the spike of the helmet down on Joffre’s back, killing him instantly.

But with Joffre out of the way, de Beq was able to swing his sword in a round—house blow at the Turk’s neck. Sensing the motion, the Turk tried to duck, and instead of beheading the Turk, de Beq’s sword took off the top of the Turk’s head. The Turk screamed but kept coming, even with his brain exposed, dashing forward and tripping over Joffre’s body. De Beq slipped in the growing slick of blood on the floor of the chapel, but still managed to launch himself after the Turk and aim another slash at him, this time burying his blade deep in the shoulder of his opponent.

The Turk turned with such sudden ferocity that de Beq’s sword was torn from his hands. With the sword still deeply embedded in his shoulder, the Turk sprang at de Beg, his hands grabbing the edge of his chain mail coif, tightening it around the knight’s neck as he tried to choke him to death. The blood roared in de Beq’s ears, and a blackness seemed to be overtaking him, coming from far behind his eyes, as he twisted and struggled to break free of the Turk’s viselike grip. Repeatedly de Beq drove his knee into the Turk’s groin, but failed to loosen the Turk’s choking hold on his throat.

De Beq felt his legs begin to buckle as he started to lose consciousness. In desperation, he began to flail wildly against the Turk, his weakening blows pummeling the man’s back and sides without effect. The Turk pulled de Beq closer to his mouth, going for the jugular with sharpened yellow teeth. The intended bite became but a nip as de Beq flinched away, his iron—mitted fingers trying desperately to gouge the Turk’s eyes. The Turk reflexively turned his head aside, escaping the mailed mitt that tried to blind him, and de Beq’s fingers connected with his brain.

De Beq dug in harder as the pressure on his throat relented and he realized the Turk was going into spasms. He gritted his teeth and dug harder still, and the Turk let go with a deflated gurgle and collapsed completely, leaving the horrified de Beq holding a fistful of brain.

De Beq fell into a seated position, gasping for air as the roaring in his ears and the great blackness that had engulfed him both receded into the pain of his badly bruised throat. All around him, the battle still was raging. Flinging away what was in his hand, de Beq looked around to see who needed help next and saw Brandstadter’s axe methodically rising and falling—and for the first time was conscious of the German serjeant’s screamed curses as he hacked one of the Turks to bits. Struggling to his feet, de Beq staggered over to where Brandstadter was kneeling in a growing pool of his own blood, bringing his axe down on a nearly limbless form. The object of his attentions screamed in rage and pain as the serjeant hacked off his remaining arm and left him to squirm in the gore like an obscene worm.

But the dark pool around Brandstadter had grown larger with his exertions. The German serjeant’s face was a pale bluish white, and as he raised his axe for what was clearly the last time, de Beq could see the golden hilt of a Turkish dagger protruding from under his left arm, and the wetly glistening torrent of blood staining his surcoat a darker crimson.

For an instant, Brandstadter reared up in his final glory, the two—handed axe poised above his head at the apex of the swing, his coif pushed back and his thin blond hair matted with sweat and blood, a look of elation blazing in the pain—taut face. Then, with the supreme satisfaction of those who know they die in a just cause, if die they must, the axe flashed down, severing the head of the armless and legless Turk and embedding deeply in the floor. The light was already fading from Brandstadter’s eyes as he toppled forward across the torso of the Turk.

The fighting was almost over, though. Fresh men—at—arms had pressed into the chapel, beheading several more Turks with their two—handed battle axes and clearing a way for Martello and two more serjeants with boar spears, who now drove the Turkish chief to ground in an angle between the altar and the chapel’s back wall, using the spears to spar with his blade. Myles Brabazon had brought three of the archers into the back of the chapel, too, and roared for the men in the center of the chapel to stand aside as three heavy war bows were brought to full draw, barbed arrows aimed unrelentingly at Ibn—al—Hassad.

Suddenly, de Beq realized that all of the Turks were dead except Hassad. A hush descended as the men realized it, too, and weapons were guardedly lowered as all eyes turned fearfully to regard the trapped Turkish leader. There was still a danger so long as Hassad lived, and at de Beq’s signal, the knights Armand du Gaz and Hano von Linka pushed forward to join the three serjeants with more boar spears, unintimidated by Hassad’s glare. The other knights and serjeants pressed into the chapel as well, as many as would fit, all of them with weapons still at the ready, should Hassad try to escape.

Aided by one of the men—at—arms, de Beq dragged himself to his feet and made his way toward the profaned altar and Hassad, picking up a spear from off the floor and hefting it as he eyed the Turkish chief. Hassad still held a bloodv scimitar in his hand, but now he flung it away and glared at them with haughty contempt.

“You cannot harm me,” he declared in French. “I am eternal.”

De Beq was as much shocked by Hassad’s use of French as he was by what the Turk said. Some of the men shifted uneasily, as though instinct warned that if they stood too close, he could in some way destroy them. Some of the others crossed themselves. De Beq, however, stood his ground.

“Only our Lord is eternal, Turk,” he said evenly.

“I think not,” Hassad retorted, spitting on the altar beside him. “I have drunk the blood of your Lord, and he is nothing!
Nothing!”

There was something in Hassad’s voice, an evil that went beyond mere blasphemy. De Beq could sense the threat that it might affect his men, causing them to falter—possibly even causing them to weaken, giving Hassad an opportunity to escape.

“Pin him to the wall,” de Beq said, not even raising his voice.

Without the slightest hesitation, Hano von Linka and Armand du Gaz rammed their spears hard into Hassad’s shoulders, the blades sinking to the bars on the ricasso and the points digging deep into the wall as Hassad gasped. At the same time, the archers let fly arrows into Hassad’s thighs, three of the shafts slamming through the flesh and pinning him there as well.

“I shall kill you all!” the vampire roared, sweeping a forearm across the arrows and snapping them off like so many matchsticks, nearly pulling his thighs free as he arched his body away from the wall and wrenched at von Linka’s spear. “I shall kill you all and drink your blood before you die!”

Still pinned by the spears, apparently oblivious to pain, Hassad kicked out at the crusaders and continued trying to tear himself free. Other men rushed forward and drove more spears into arms and legs, putting their weight behind the hafts, two to a spear, as his superhuman strength threatened to overwhelm even these efforts.

De Beq had seen enough. Moving swiftly to the altar, with the dead priest’s body still staked out upon it, he bent down and retrieved the cup that the old man had died to protect–the cup that Hassad had used to drink the old man’s blood. Hefting his spear, he held the cup aloft for Hassad to see, righteous rage propelling him into vengeance.

“I will hear no more of your blasphemy, Turk! This holy relic is the cup of our Lord. You profaned it by drinking the blood of its keeper. Now we will purify this cup. The last thing you shall see before I send your soul to hell will be this cup resanctified!”

Without further preamble, de Beq moved a single step closer and plunged his spear into the Turk’s side. Hassad gasped, his head snapping back as he felt
this
wound, but he could do nothing to stop the blood gushing out of his side and down the shaft of the spear, to be caught in the cup which de Beq impulsively thrust beneath it.

“I curse you, Christian!” Hassad ranted. “You and yours shall live to regret what you do here! I call upon the nine demons of Hell to torment you, to smite you for your presumption! You cannot kill that part of me which is immortal! I curse you! I curse youuuu ... .”

At that point, de Beq had ceased caring about any part of Hassad, whether or not it lived forever. He was thinking of the horror Hassad had wrought upon countless hundreds, perhaps thousands–and in particular, of the blameless old priest still staked to the altar beside Hassad in the anguish of his death, whose tortured pleas for mercy had fallen upon deaf ears. De Beq’s ears were likewise deaf as he lifted up the blood—filled cup and, to astonished gasps from his own men, pressed it to his lips and drank, never taking his eyes from Hassad’s as he swallowed once, twice, again.

But eager hands were waiting to take the cup when he had drunk, passing the cup from man to man and back to de Beq each time it was emptied. Hassad’s cursing had given way to maniacal laughter. The gush of blood from the Turk’s side slowed—surely the wound was not closing of its own accord i—and de Beq had to twist the spear to make the blood continue flowing, until all who desired had shared the gory communion, even those in the yard pressing inside to partake–all save the archers, who had melted back to the courtyard murmuring among themselves when de Beg’s intention became clear; for their service to the Order was by contract, not as true members, and they did not share the other men’s thirst for blood—vengeance.

Hassad was still laughing weakly as de Beq set the little cup carefully on the altar, but reason no longer lit the dark eyes. De Beq almost pitied him as he took the sword that William handed him and, after kissing the holy relic in its hilt, struck off Hassad’s head.

His men’s shouts of approval reverberated in the little chapel as Hassad’s body arched once more, blood spraying them all in bloody baptism, then subsided on the spears that pierced it. The head came to rest on the floor at de Beq’s feet, and he shuddered, suddenly sobered, as he thought he saw a fleeting smile pass briefly across the dead Turk’s lips.