A log cast onto the fire around which they were sat sent up a shower of sparks into the cold, damp air and one of Bardel’s cohort, shivering for effect, aired a complaint that got many a nod.
‘May the Good Lord forgive me for saying so, but I would welcome a bit of that baking heat we had in summer.’
‘I heard you curse that, my friend,’ Bardel laughed, ‘as heartily as you now curse the cold.’
‘My prayers fell on stony ground then, Bardel, but we need the sun to shine on us now, when we can bear it.’
‘They say it snows deep here sometimes,’ interjected another to increase feelings of gloom, present anyway under a grey sky.
The moaning went the rounds, but that was not anything to remark upon: soldiers, when not fighting, always grumbled, cursing heat if it was hot as heartily as they damned the misery of being cold and the food they were given whatever the weather.
Only talk of plunder could render them cheerful, the dream that one day they would uncover a treasure so great and on their own that they could look forward to a life of ease and comfort. This tended to be in a manor house of their own choosing, with a plump, willing and fecund wife, fertile land and villeins to plough it, with a church and a priest endowed by them within the confines of their demesne, where Masses would be said daily for his soul to secure entry to heaven.
As the talk moved on it was natural to speculate on what of value might lie within Ma’arrat al-Numan, a city full of rich merchants at the crossroads of two major trade routes, and this in turn led, as it was bound to do, on to the prospects of ever getting inside. This was commonly held to be sparse, given they had tried and been so resoundingly repulsed by folk who were not proper soldiers, but mere citizens, which disheartened them even more.
‘Perhaps the mighty Bohemund, now that he has joined us, has a way to get us over yonder walls?’
The tone of that comment, made from beyond the flames, was not friendly; indeed, it was downright acerbic. If Bardel and Tancred, in the time they had spent in each other’s company, had formed a bond of companionship, that did not apply to everyone present. Several members of Bardel’s cohort had looked distinctly piqued when he invited Tancred, wandering around inside their encampment, to warm his hams and drink some hot wine.
‘Perhaps,’ opined another, ‘he can tell us why we are outside Ma’arrat at all?’
The remark set up a murmur of agreement, showing that the sentiment was shared, while further interjections made it clear where the complaint lay. These men had come on Crusade to free Jerusalem from Islam, albeit they expected to prosper both on the way and once they arrived. Ma’arrat an-Numan was not in the direction of that goal, so why were they here if it was not for lordly pride? It was a grievance that had surfaced at Antioch when progress south was delayed by the infighting of Bohemund and Raymond, yet it seemed to be of a deeper hue on this high windswept plateau.
Listening carefully and taking no part, lest his view be seen as tarnished by his bloodline, Tancred heard many a curse directed at his uncle — they were eager to damn the Count of Taranto for his ambition and inflexibility — but more telling was the way Raymond’s own lances were prepared to castigate him too, and wonder if his head had been turned by the discovery of the Holy Lance.
Men like Bardel did not lack for piety and were strong in their Christian faith: if they saw the spiritual value of the relic and were prepared to openly ascribe the victory outside the walls of Antioch to its influence, they failed to see why it was not now leading them to their stated destination.
The way their liege lord tended to posture with the holy relic, always carrying it with him and eager to show it to the pilgrims, who would fall to their knees at the sight of such a marvel, patently fed his pride, of which the Count of Toulouse had never been in short supply. For all he kept his silence it was a grievance that Tancred shared and for the same reasons: he too was frustrated at the way the dispute had tempered the true purpose of the Crusade, which had his loyalty to his uncle at loggerheads with his faith.
He only spoke again when that complaint had run its course. ‘My uncle had a notion that with so few real soldiers the way to overcome the walls is with a siege tower.’
That was received with nods, for it made some sense, such a weapon being difficult to defend against even for trained fighters, until a sour voice pointed out, again to general approval, that they were naught but lances and lacked the skills to construct one.
‘He is minded to send back to Antioch for the English carpenters who are still there to have them build it.’
‘Waiting, like us, to fulfil their vow,’ came the sharp response from the other side of the flames. ‘They want to employ their skill outside Jerusalem, not here.’
‘Here would be better as of now,’ Bardel countered. ‘They might aid us in getting over yonder walls.’
‘The English devils work for pay, not faith,’ called another.
‘Worse than Normans, they are!’
‘The only thing worse than a Norman,’ Bardel shouted angrily, ‘is a man who ignores the law of hospitality.’
‘How would you have them behave, friend?’ Tancred enquired, for the barb about Normans was aimed at him, even if he was the son of a Lombard. ‘Such men must eat, and since no lord will feed them and they cannot fight, how are they to live?’
‘Let them spend your uncle’s gold, perhaps when they have left his coffers bare it will dent his pride.’
‘And what if they do, by building him a siege tower?’ Tancred asked. ‘Who then will have the plundering of Ma’arrat?’
That brought silence: any tower built for Apulians would not be gifted as a weapon to the Provencals, which set up another bout of murmuring, though this time it had a deeper and more irate tone that made Tancred think of a disturbed beehive. They had so recently been talking about what they could each gain if Ma’arrat fell; his claim had got them to consider the unpalatable fact that they might secure nothing.
‘My friends,’ he called, getting to his feet, ‘I thank you for the hot wine and the talk.’
Standing at the same time, Bardel clasped Tancred’s hand. ‘Drop by as you please, for you are ever welcome.’
The sound then emitted from some of the others gave a lie to his words.
‘And I invite you to join us in our lines, perhaps in the manege we have set up by the Aleppo road.’
‘Do you Normans never cease to test each other?’
‘No, Bardel, and in truth, if it hones our skills it also eases the boredom. You would be well to take up my offer, for I fear you will be sitting round your fires for so long your skills will rust along with your weapons.’
The message came to Bohemund the next day, given to him as he and his knights emerged from their daily session of practice, each still heaving from their exertions. There had been fighting on foot with sword and shield in the manege, but no lance work; as yet the Apulians had been unable to replace their fighting destriers, horses trained to be fearless in battle in the very same kind of sand-filled enclosure in which they had just been exercising their combat skills.
Even if they could have found mounts of the right kind, a breed common in Normandy and now Apulia, while being unknown in Asia Minor, they took years to train to the pitch where they would be steady in battle. Such horses had been sent for and at great expense, the beginnings of a breeding herd, but until they arrived, mated, foaled and their offspring then grew to full strength, it would be several years before they could be employed. Not that such a thing mattered here: you could not ride any horse into battle in a siege.