The House of the Red Slayer

PROLOGUE

    June 1362
    Murder had been planned, foul and bloody, by a soul as dark as midnight. Only the searing sun and the glassy, wind-free waves of the Middle Sea would bear silent witness to Murder’s impending approach.
    The day had started hot and by noon the heat hung like a blanket around the three-masted carrack out of Famagusta in Cyprus. The sails drooped limp, the pitch and tar melted between the mildewed planks. On board, the passengers — pilgrims, merchants, travellers and tinkers — sheltered in whatever shade they could find. Some told their rosary beads; others, their red-rimmed eyes shaded against the sunlight, searched the skies for the faintest whisper of wind. The decks of the Saint Mark were hot to the touch; even the crew hid from the glare and heat of the sun. A look-out dozed high in the crossyards. Above his head a silver St Christopher medal nailed to the mast caught the dazzling sunlight and sent it back like a prayer for shade and a strong, cooling breeze.
    Beneath the look-out, at the foot of the mast, dozed a knight clad in a white linen shirt and sweat-stained hose pushed into leather boots which he moved restlessly. The knight wiped the sweat from his brow and scratched his black beard which ran from ear to ear. He looked towards a young boy, sheltering in the shadows of the bulwarks, who gazed in round-eyed wonderment at the armour piled there: mailed shirt, gauntlets, breastplate and hauberk. What caught the boy’s attention was the livery of white cotton surcoat with a crude but huge red cross painted in the middle. The boy peered at the knight, his hands going out to touch the wire-coiled handle of the great, two-edged sword.
    ‘Touch it, boy,’ the knight murmured, white teeth flashing in his sunburned face. ‘Go on, touch it if you want.’
    The boy did so, his face wreathed in smiles.
    ‘You want to be a knight, boy?’
    ‘Yes, sir, a crusader though I am an orphan now,’ the child replied seriously.
    The knight grinned but his face grew sombre when he glanced at the poop. He had seen the helmsman call the captain; now both were staring out to sea. The captain looked anxious. Doffing his great, broad-brimmed hat, he stamped the deck and the knight heard his murmured curses. Above him the look-out suddenly yelled: ‘I see ships, no sails, fast approaching!‘
    His cry roused the vessel. Boats with no sails skimming across the sea could only be a Moorish corsair. The people on the deck stirred, children cried, men and women shouted. There was a patter of hardened feet on ladders as both soldiers and sailors roused themselves. The chorus of groans grew louder.
    ‘No sails!’ a soldier cried. ‘They must be galleys!‘
    The clamour stilled as fear of death replaced resentment against the hot searing rays of the sun. The day would die, darkness would come and the air would cool, but the green-bannered, rakish-oared galleys of the corsairs would not disappear. They slunk round the Greek Islands like ravenous wolves and, if they closed, there would be no escape. Genoese crossbowmen began to appear, heads covered in white woollen scarves, their huge arbalests bobbing on their backs; behind them ran boys with quivers full of jagged-edged bolts.
    ‘One galley!’ the look-out screamed. ‘No, two! No, four! Bearing north by north-east!‘
    Sailors, passengers and soldiers ran to the rails, making the ship dip like a hawk.
    ‘Back to your posts! The puce-faced captain scampered down the ladder of the poop. ‘Bosun!’ he roared. ‘Armaments out! Crossbowmen to the poop!‘
    Again there was a rush; huge buckets of seawater were quickly placed round the deck alongside barrels of hard grey sand. Sailors and soldiers roared oaths at the frightened passengers, ordering them down into the stinking, fetid darkness below decks. The knight stirred as the captain approached.
    ‘Galleys,’ the seaman murmured. ‘Lord help us — so many!’ He looked up at the blue sky. ‘We cannot escape. One might not attack, but four
    ‘Will you fight?’ the knight asked.
    The captain spread his hands. ‘They may not challenge us,’ he replied despairingly. ‘They could stand off and just take a levy.’
    The knight nodded. He knew the sailor was lying. He turned to the small boy now sidling up beside him.
    ‘A good day to die,’ the knight whispered. ‘Help me arm.’
    The lad ran to the bulwarks and staggered back under the load of the heavy mailed shirt. The knight looked around