The crew liked me not at all. Occasionally, they vented their fury with words, but I ventured no replies, biding my time. I think they feared me because of my sudden rise and my decisive move against the man who had taken my knife. They feared what they did not understand.
Twice, they captured fisher boats, attacking lustily with swinging swords when the odds were seven or eight to one. And then, off the Mediterranean coast of Spain, they made a grand capture, and the fault was mine.
The sky had been blue that morning, and the air breathless, the sea smooth as glass. While busy splicing a line, I felt a sudden dampness. Suddenly, we were shrouded in fog, moving like a ghost ship through the mist.
A few minutes before the fog closed down I had glimpsed a merchantman sailing a course parallel to our own. Now, after a few minutes within the fog, I heard a faint creaking as of rigging, the slap of a loose sail, and a gurgle of water about a hull.
For what happened I have only myself to blame. I hated Walther and all his bloody, misbegotten crew, yet there was in me the blood of corsairs.
Walther came to stand beside me. “You heard something?”
“A ship,” I said, “and not one of your scrawny fish boats but a fat, rich merchantman out of Alexandria or Palermo.”
The glitter of greed was in his eyes. He touched his fat lips with his tongue. “They would be strong,” he muttered, “we could not—”
“Why not?” I spoke with contempt for such fears. “Only one man was on deck when the fog closed in, and half the crew may be asleep. There was a storm last night, and they would be tired. Before they could organize resistance it would be over.”
For once greed overcame caution. Grabbing a crewman, he sent him for others, and at his order I began to edge the vessel closer. Fifty men gathered along the bulwarks, keeping themselves out of sight.
Water slapped her hull, rigging creaked. We shipped our starboard oars, and the watchman on their deck came quickly to his ship’s side, alarmed by the sound.
He saw us; his mouth opened to scream a warning, but an arrow transfixed his throat, and then our men were scrambling over their side. There was shouting then, a clash of arms, a scream of mortal agony.
That was the moment I had chosen to shear off and escape, but the chance was lost in the instant of birth, for Walther was beside me, a sword point in my ribs as if he had guessed my intent. I dared make no move.
The surprise attack had been a complete success. The merchantman’s crew awakened only to die; moreover, the ship was well-found, with a rich cargo of silk and cinnamon. There was gold and silver coin … and a girl.
She struggled to the ship’s side, the prisoner of Cervon, a huge Gaul, the largest man in our crew. Beside her an older man pleaded and argued with the Gaul. Her eyes, wide with terror, looked across the rails of the two ships into mine. She could have been no more than sixteen and was very beautiful. Her eyes met mine, pleading and frightened.
“Stop him,” I protested to Walther.
“He captured her. She is his.” There was envy in his tone, for he hated to see such a girl in the arms of another. It was an envy to be used.
“You would waste such a girl? That is no shepherd’s daughter! Would you throw away a fortune for a moment in the scuppers? Can’t you see? This girl is worth more than all the loot combined! Think what her family would pay!”
Greed won where any other argument would have failed. The Gaul was pressing her against the bulwark and fending off the older man with one hand. Even at this distance it could be seen that her flesh was soft and her dress woven with threads of gold.
A fortune-hungry and jealous man, Walther seized the chance. “Stop!” he shouted to the Gaul. “Bring her here, and the man as well!”
The older man spotted Walther and leaned over the rail of their ship. “We can pay, and pay handsomely if the girl is unharmed.”
Cervon hesitated, angry, but found no sympathy, for envy as well as the idea of profit had turned the crew against him. Angrily, he swung her over the side and dropped her to our deck, where we were lashed alongside. He left the man to find his own way, and went away, disgruntled and furious.
Already our crew was looting the vessel of both cargo and supplies. Bales and barrels came over the side, as the men stripped the vessel hurriedly, for fear a warship might intervene before the looting was complete.
The girl threw a glance my way and spoke to the older man beside her who also looked my way. Knowing I had spoken for her gave her more hope than the moment deserved. Yet I smiled at her, and she smiled in return.
When all attention was diverted by the stripping of the prize, I spoke softly to her, in Arabic. “Friend,” I said.
The fog thinned, and our crew hurriedly abandoned the captured ship.
Ignoring the complaints of Cervon, Walther turned to the man. “Who are you? What can you pay?”
The man was not so old as at first he had seemed. He was well setup, a man of military bearing, gray of hair but clear of eye, and obviously accustomed to command. He had formed a quick estimate of Walther, and expected no mercy from the others.
“She is the daughter of ibn-Sharaz, of Palermo, a wealthy man, and one with power.”
“She has not the Moorish look,” Walther grumbled. “I think you lie.”
“Her mother was Circassian, blonde as your northern girls. Treat her gently. If she is harmed, fifty ships will hunt you down.”
“Fifty ships? For a slip of a girl?”
The man was brusque. “Fifty ships for the daughter of ibn-Sharaz, friend and adviser to William of Sicily!”
Walther paled. He had none of the sea rover’s disdain for landlubber princes, although even a corsair might hesitate at the name of William of Sicily, descendant of Norman conquerors, his ships upon every sea, his spies in every port.
“Such a man can pay,” Walther admitted, but speaking as much to advise his crew as to acknowledge the fact.
“Take us safely to any port in Spain, and you will be paid well and what you have done forgotten.”
Of the first I was convinced, of the second I was not. This man and his kind were not likely to forgive such an injury, and I remembered the story my father had told me of the young Julius Caesar, taken by pirates. He promised to return after his ransom was paid, and hang them every one, and they laughed. Yet he did return, and he did hang them, and this man was of such a kind.
Walther strode off to discuss the matter with the crew, and the man spoke to me. “You have helped us. I value such aid.”
“My word carries small weight here. Until recently I was chained to an oar. They neither like nor trust me.”
“They listened to you.”
“They are ruled by greed and envy. Each wanted her for himself, and hence was willing to listen when I suggested ransom.”
“Remain our friend, and I shall replace the weight of your chains with an equal weight of gold.”
When one is young, one does not think of gold but only of the light in a maiden’s eyes. Yet a time would come when I would discover that one might have both—if one had wit.
Never had I seen such a girl. Our northern girls were stronger but their skin less fine from exposure to sun and wind, and they lacked garments such as she wore on this day. My father’s house had been filled with treasures looted from eastern ships, and often he had spoken of the life in Moorish Spain where I longed to go.
Our northern castles were cold, drafty halls with narrow windows and few comforts, their floors scattered with straw and the accumulated refuse of months. My father had brought from Moorish Spain a love of beauty and cleanliness. So, accustomed to my own home, I could not abide the ill-smelling castles of nobles who had little but weapons and pride.
The old Crusaders learned a little, but merchants and minstrels had picked up the Moorish habit of bathing, changing their clothing instead of allowing it to wear out and drop off. Occasionally, travelers brought books to their homes. But books of any kind were rare in the land of the Franks, and the few available were eagerly read—but read only in private for fear the church might disapprove.