Crusade Read online

  Table of Contents

  About the Author

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Acknowledgements

  PART ONE

  Chapter 1 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre, The Kingdom of Jerusalem 28 SEPTEMBER ...

  Chapter 2 - The Genoese Quarter, Acre 13 JANUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 3 - The Citadel, Cairo 17 JANUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 4 - The Temple, Acre 17 JANUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 5 - The Docks, Acre 17 JANUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 6 - The Temple, Acre 17 JANUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 7 - AL-Bira, Northern Syria 26 FEBRUARY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 8 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre 12 MARCH A.D. 1276

  Chapter 9 - The Citadel, Cairo 12 MARCH A.D. 1276

  Chapter 10 - The Genoese Quarter, Acre 12 MARCH A.D. 1276

  Chapter 11 - The Genoese Quarter, Acre 12 MARCH A.D. 1276

  Chapter 12 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre 16 MARCH A.D. 1276

  Chapter 13 - The Docks, Acre 15 APRIL A.D. 1276

  Chapter 14 - Kabul, The Kingdom of Jerusalem 15 APRIL A.D. 1276

  Chapter 15 - The Venetian Market, Acre 14 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 16 - The Citadel, Cairo 25 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 17 - The Pisan Quarter, Acre 26 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 18 - The Citadel, Cairo 26 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 19 - Assassins’ Stronghold, Northern Syria 26 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 20 - The Street of St. Anne, Acre 27 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 21 - The Royal Palace, Acre 27 MAY A.D. 1276

  Chapter 22 - Fustat-Misr, Cairo 17 JUNE A.D. 1276

  Chapter 23 - The Temple, Acre 8 JULY A.D. 1276

  PART TWO

  Chapter 24 - The Royal Palace, Acre 17 FEBRUARY A.D. 1277

  Chapter 25 - The Docks, Acre 25 FEBRUARY A.D. 1277

  Chapter 26 - The Royal Palace, Acre 26 FEBRUARY A.D. 1277

  Chapter 27 - The Plain of Albistan, Anatolia 15 APRIL A.D. 1277

  Chapter 28 - The Road Outside Mecca, Arabia 15 APRIL A.D. 1277

  Chapter 29 - Damascus, Syria 9 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 30 - The Temple, Acre 14 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 31 - The Temple, Acre 14 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 32 - The Citadel, Damascus 17 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 33 - The Citadel, Damascus 17 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 34 - The Road from Damascus, Syria 17 JUNE A.D. 1277

  Chapter 35 - The Temple, Acre 10 JULY A.D. 1277

  PART THREE

  Chapter 36 - Outside Bordeaux, The Kingdom of France 24 APRIL A.D. 1288

  Chapter 37 - The Citadel, Cairo 31 AUGUST A.D. 1288

  Chapter 38 - The Sands, Acre 20 OCTOBER A.D. 1288

  Chapter 39 - The Docks, Acre 13 NOVEMBER A.D. 1288

  Chapter 40 - The Citadel, Cairo 14 NOVEMBER A.D. 1288

  Chapter 41 - Tripoli, The County of Tripoli 1 APRIL A.D. 1289

  Chapter 42 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre 20 AUGUST A.D. 1290

  Chapter 43 - The Citadel, Cairo 7 SEPTEMBER A.D. 1290

  Chapter 44 - The Citadel, Cairo 20 OCTOBER A.D. 1290

  Chapter 45 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre 30 MARCH A.D. 1291

  Chapter 46 - The Docks, Acre 18 MAY A.D. 1291

  Chapter 47 - The Venetian Quarter, Acre 18 MAY A.D. 1291

  Chapter 48 - The Temple, Acre 25 MAY A.D. 1291

  Author’s Note

  Character List

  Glossary

  Select Bibliography

  Prologue

  A PLUME BOOK

  CRUSADE

  ROBYN YOUNG is the author of the internationally bestselling Brethren trilogy, which includes Brethren, Crusade, and the forthcoming The Fall of the Templars. She has traveled extensively in Europe and Egypt and has a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Sussex. During an eclectic career, she has been a creative writing teacher, financial advisor, folk singer, and music festival organizer. She lives in Brighton, England.

  Praise for the novels of Robyn Young

  “A terrific thirteenth-century thriller.” —Midwest Book Review

  “Intricate but wonderfully written, a romp of a read and an exhilarating ride . . . [Crusade] evokes the atmosphere of the times brilliantly.”

  —The Birmingham Post (UK)

  “One of the best historical debuts in recent memory. Exciting and enthralling.”

  —John Connolly, bestselling author of Bad Men

  “Swords clash in the first sentence of Young’s latest and go on clashing throughout . . . Plenty of action . . . [and] attention to historical detail offset by pacey dialog.” —The Times (London)

  “Crusade is a sweeping historical adventure.” —Financial Times

  “Pacey but intricate . . . this book will not disappoint those wanting to dive into an epic story of war.” —News of the World

  “Richly worked and captivating . . . an epic story of war, intrigue, and heroism.”

  —The Good Book Guide

  “Pacey and well-written, with vivid, convincing characters, Brethren captures your interest until the last page. I eagerly anticipate the sequel, knowing I will not be disappointed.”

  —Alison Weir, author of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry VIII

  “Engaging and enjoyable—Robyn Young brings the tumultuous medieval world to life with pace and flair.” —Tom Harper, author of Siege of Heaven

  “If you love the Templars, the Crusades, and the Middle Ages, this is the book for you. Robyn Young is an exciting new voice that speaks loudly.”

  —Sharon Kay Penman, author of Prince of Darkness

  “An intricate, compelling, captivating, and above all, believable story. Brethren is a brilliant piece of sustained imagination.”

  —David Boyle, author of The Troubadour’s Song

  PLUME

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. • Penguin

  Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a

  division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL,

  England • Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books

  Ltd.) • Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Published by arrangement with Hodder & Stoughton Limited.

  Published by Plume, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Previously published in a Dutton edition. First Plume Printing, August

  Copyright © Robyn Young, 2007

  Excerpt from The Fall of the Templars copyright © Robyn Young, 2008

  Map © Sandra Oakins

  All rights reserved

  REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

  The Library of Congress has catalogued the Dutton edition as follows:

  Young, Robyn, 1975-

  Crusade / Robyn Young.

  p. cm.

  eISBN : 978-0-452-28960-4

  1. Crusades—Eighth, 1270—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3625.O97C78 2007

  813’.6—dc22 2007016163

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

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  Acknowledgments

  Once again, I find myself indebted to a large number of people, without whom this book, or at least my sanity, may not have prevailed.

  Love and thanks to my parents for their constant encouragement and unfailing support. Special thanks also to Sue and Dave for the roof over our heads and for finding so many excuses for celebration.

  Much love to all my friends who allowed me to share this incredible journey with them. In particular I want to thank Jo, Niall, Mark, Bridie, Clare, Liz, Monica, Patrik, Becky and Charley for their generosity, both in terms of help with the creative process and their friendship. Also, hats off to Ali for being a star.

  My gratitude to David Boyle for great reading suggestions, who I must also credit for the fantastic chapter on Acre in his book Blondel’s Song, which gave me a real insight into the city. Thanks to staff at the language department of the British Library for their help with the “code” issue and to Charles Davies for checking it over. And my sincere thanks to Dr. Mark Philpott at the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and Keble College, Oxford, for casting an expert eye over the manuscript. Any mistakes remain my own.

  Many, many thanks as ever to my agent, Rupert Heath, for generally being a superstar and for guiding me around the corners.

  I am greatly indebted to everyone at Hodder & Stoughton for their amazing support and commitment. Special thanks go to my editor, Nick Sayers, for pearls of wisdom; his assistant, Anne Clarke, for keeping everything running smoothly; and also to Emma Knight, Kelly Edgson-Wright, Antonia Lance and Lucy Hale. But there are many others, particularly those in the art department, foreign rights, sales, marketing and publicity who I cannot fit onto this page, but whose hard work is nonetheless enormously appreciated.

  Huge thanks also to my fantastic American publishers at Dutton, especially my editor, Julie Doughty, for her insightful suggestions.

  Last, but in no sense least, my love goes to Lee. Without him none of this would have been possible . . . or half as much fun.

  PART ONE

  1

  The Venetian Quarter, Acre, The Kingdom of Jerusalem 28 SEPTEMBER A.D. 1274

  The swords arced, then swung in and slammed together. Steel met steel with harsh ringing clangs, again and again. Each blow was fiercer than

  the last, the brutal concussion almost wrenching the weapons from the hands of the wielders. The sun baked the courtyard’s dusty red stones and beat down on the heads of the two men who stamped and lunged, back and forth.

  The smaller of the two was sweating profusely, his white hair plastered to his head, lips curled back in fierce concentration. His shirt was drenched and stuck to his back. Neither he nor his opponent wore armor. He was initiating more of the attacks, stepping forward after several whip-quick parries to thrust a lethal jab at the other man’s chest. But the strokes were becoming desperate. It was as if each one had been designed to be the last—precise, powerful—and he hadn’t expected to have to force another. He couldn’t keep up such a barrage. He was exhausted, and his tall, athletic opponent kept blocking, with imperturbable ease, each and every blow. And the more frustrated and frantic the small man became, the more his opponent grinned. It was the kind of grin a shark might flash when opening its razor-lined jaws for the killing bite. It was a little strained—more bared, gritted teeth than smile—but Angelo Vitturi was clearly enjoying himself.

  After several more thrusts, however, which he snapped aside with savage, blocking cuts of his sword, Angelo grew bored. It was hot, and he could feel a blister forming on the ridge of his palm where his skin had rubbed against the leather grip of the slender, narrow-edged blade, the pommel of which was a chunk of translucent rock crystal. As the small man lunged in again, Angelo sidestepped him, grabbed hold of his wrist and turned his hand viciously aside, bringing the edge of his own blade up to the man’s throat. The man let out a yelp, part in frustration, part at the pain in his wrist.

  Angelo’s face, wet with perspiration and set with boyish, scornful pleasure, hardened with contempt. “Get out.” Dropping the man’s wrist, he lowered his blade and leaned it against a low wall that ringed a square of grass.

  The white-haired man stood there agape, sweat dripping from his nose as Angelo strode over to a servant, standing rigid as the statues that decorated the palazzo’s courtyard. The servant handed Angelo a goblet of watered-down wine from the silver tray he carried. Angelo drained it, then turned to the gaping man. “I told you to leave.”

  The man seemed to collect himself. “My money, sir?”

  “Money?”

  “For my tuition, sir,” said the man, unable to meet Angelo’s unwavering, black-eyed stare.

  Angelo laughed. “And what would I be paying for? What new skills have you taught me today? What has this lesson given me that is worth a single sequin?” He arched an eyebrow. “The amusement perhaps?” He set the goblet on the servant’s tray. “Leave, before I decide to finish the duel. You’ll lose more than your wages if I do.” Turning his back on the instructor, he picked up a black velvet cloak trimmed with sable that was draped over the wall and shrugged it on.

  The sword instructor, utterly defeated, snatched up his own coat and headed across the courtyard, his face a mottled red.

  Angelo was fastening a belt of silver rings around his waist when a girl appeared through one of the doors that led into the grand building behind him. Like the other household slaves, she wore a filmy white gown, girdled at the waist with stiff gold braid. A coif covered her hair. She saw Angelo and headed over, eyes downcast, expression carefully blank.

  “My lord ask me tell you his guests arrive.” Her words were hard to understand, clipped and strained with the still unfamiliar language she forced her tongue around. “He asks you join them, sir.”

  With a forceful stab that made the girl start, Angelo sheathed his sword in the scabbard that hung from his belt. Without acknowledging her, he walked toward the palazzo, the girl flinching from him as he passed.

  At twenty-eight, Angelo was the eldest son of Venerio Vitturi and heir to the family business, established prior to the Third Crusade by his great-grandfather, Vittorio. Angelo was a regular sight in Acre’s slave market, where he sold off any surplus his father had acquired before helping to ship the bulk back to Venice. When the business was in its heyday, at a time when the Venetians controlled trade around the Black Sea, the Vitturi family had dominated the slave markets on the borders of the Mongol Empire. They supplied the prettiest girls to Western nobles in Outremer and Venice, and the strongest boys to the Mamluk Army in Egypt. But then Genoa, the second of the three great Italian merchant states, wrested control of the Black Sea trade and forced Venice out. The Vitturis were one of only a few Venetian families who still trafficked in humans, and they now had to rely on trade coming north from the Red Sea for their supply.

  The girl
s Angelo’s father kept for the household were always the best of the crop. Aged between eleven and sixteen, they were mostly petite Mongolians, with oval eyes and glossy black hair, and Circassians whose youthful faces already showed signs of the handsome, strong-boned lines characteristic of their race. Venerio’s family had grown rapidly over the past ten years, and Angelo resented every darkly pretty sibling that was presented to the household, none of whom looked anything like his plump mother. Though the girls who bore his father’s accidental offspring remained slaves, their own children were brought up as free citizens, baptized and educated. Angelo could understand his father being unable to resist the temptations of such young, exotic flesh; he himself had sampled it and had found it pleasing. But he couldn’t comprehend how Venerio could raise the products of these low women in the same way he did his own. Things, Angelo had long ago decided, would change when he ran the business. If, that was, he still had a business to inherit. The way the last year had gone, it was looking increasingly uncertain. But he refused to fully consider that possibility. And if all went according to plan today, he wouldn’t have to.

  Angelo walked down a wide passage decorated with blue and white mosaics. As he pushed open a set of dark wood doors, four men looked up from where they were seated around a large octagonal table positioned centrally in the spacious, airy reception room.

  Angelo regarded the men as he approached the table. There was the armorer, Renaud de Tours, a balding man of middle years, who had clad King Louis IX and his elite French knights during both of the sovereign’s ill-fated Crusades. Beside Renaud, hands clasped tightly on the table, was Michael Pisani, a dark, slender Pisan specializing in the exportation of Damascene swords, some of the strongest blades in the known world, who also supplied nobles of the West for war. He was much feared by his competitors, whom he had been known to force out of deals, using mercenaries to intimidate his rivals into capitulating, leaving him to secure the contracts. The third man, sunburned and sandy-haired, was Conradt von Bremen, whose home city was affiliated to the Hanseatic League, the powerful confederation of German cities that ruled the Baltic Sea. Conradt’s business, favored by a lucrative contract with the Teutonic Knights, was the breeding and shipping of warhorses. The German’s flat blue eyes and lazy smile concealed a potentially more sinister nature, for it was rumored he had ordered the murders of two of his own brothers to seize control of the family business, although this was perhaps malicious gossip put about by his competitors to discredit him. No one knew for sure. The bulky, sweating man trussed up in a heavy, brocaded coat despite his obvious warmth was Guido Soranzo, an affluent Genoese shipbuilder. Angelo knew them all, most merchants in Acre did, for they were four of the most successful Western traders in the Holy Land, his father excluded.