Prologue

A Quiet Man Stands…

     A woman ran through the city gate, shrieking ‘My husband, my husband.’ She disappeared into the local street market, where people turned and watched her loud cries. They could not comprehend the depth of her agony. She had just watched her husband murdered in a public and horrific manner. Inside the city only a few knew that six of their men were dead, killed by the warriors of Subedei, a general of Batu Khan’s army.
  
     Just outside the city gate, a tall man stood and watched the spectacle. At a distance of one mile, inside a field of wheat, the man saw a group of Mongol warriors erect a trophy pole supported by two tripods. These warriors lined up six men whose hands were bound behind their backs. Leather thongs were tied to the men’s hair and secured across the trophy pole. The men were standing on their toes when six Mongol warriors used short knives to cut their throats. They were allowed to bleed for a minute before their heads were severed and left to swing in a breeze from the south.
  
     “It is a warning,” said the tall man known as Justinian. He wore a dark blue cape over the tabard of a knight, white cloth with red crosses embroidered into the material. His tabard covered the chain mail of a warrior. A worn leather belt supported a short sword for close combat. Justinian was tall, over six feet and he bore the painful distinction of an enormous nose that seemed to bend downward below his bushy eyebrows and pronounced cheeks.
  
     He watched while farmer’s wives sold vegetables and parts of hogs along the road from the city gate. Word of the murders passed slowly; the women looked up and saw the six heads swinging from the trophy pole. Their calm faces began to display terror. They began to shout at their children and move their carts through the city gate. An armed party of ten warriors left the wheat field and began to ride uphill toward the city.
  
     Justinian moved back into the shade of the city tower. The single tower stood proudly in late afternoon sun; it cast its shadow across the southern gate to the city. It was an impressive tower of gray granite, thirty-six feet tall with squared notches in its upper roofline and vertical slits for defenders with bows. The tower protected a bridge across a moat fortified with spikes. The tower stood outside a twenty-foot wall of granite than ran in both directions until the wall turned at the edge of the river Mur. In times of war, the moat would be flooded and archers would defend the bridge and the gate.
  
     The tower and city stood on slightly elevated ground. Behind the tower were the city streets of Graz; the cobble-stoned streets led to the Hauptplatz, the square surrounded by three-story houses. A tall hill rose up behind the main square and workmen could be seen laboring to build Schlossberg castle. The men were idle; they stood and watched the drama as the ten warriors with a white flag approached the main gate. Within the city a general alarum sounded; men shouted and cursed. Several of the bravest carried bows and stacks of ‘long shafts’ and ‘short bolts’ for their weapons. They climbed the steps to the platforms inside the walls and the tower.
  
     Justinian walked through the city gate. Two men in their late twenties approached from the city center. They were equipped with dirks and sheaths of short bolts on their belts. They looked harried; they would in all probability die while protecting the gate. The tall knight turned his head toward them and said, “Do not hurry.”
  
     “Why is that?” said the older of the two archers.
   
     “They will not attack. It is not their way.”
  
     The older of the two men urged his companion toward the steps that led to the platform before he said, “What is their way?”
  
     “They send an emissary.”
  
     “He will live a short life,” said the archer, with a slight growl.
  
     The tall knight turned to walk away. The archer said, “How do you know this?”
  
     Justinian walked for several steps before he turned and said, “We heard reports inside Jerusalem. If the city is fortified, the Mongol army offered the chance to surrender. They will take a few young women and young men as hostages against your good behavior. If you do not surrender, the warriors will entertain themselves with slitting your throats and raping your women. They are no different than Tamerlane, the Cruel.”
  
     The older archer stood, struck by stories he heard from his grandfather about the cruelty of Tamerlane. In his mind he saw one hundred horsemen made to dig a trench, then buried alive while Tamerlane laughed. “You will join us?” he asked.
  
     “No, we cannot. We are on a holy mission.”
  
     There was shouting at the gate. The emissary of General Subedei demanded a meeting with the Lord Mayor of the town. A sergeant with a cadre of armed men marched past Justinian; they moved to form an escort for the emissary. Justinian moved up the street and found a quiet corner near the central square, the Hauptplatz. A few minutes later the tramping of many feet signaled the approach of the emissary with his armed escort.
  
     The nine men of Graz wore chain mail with short swords. Across their right shoulders a swatch of light blue cloth carried the crest of the House of Habsberg. They were the guards of the meeting house of the Lord Mayor. Walking inside the double rows of guards was a short man with a swarthy complexion; he wore a leather skullcap with hanging chin straps. The cap was decorated with small jewels and several dried, severed fingers. A long mustache hung past his chin; there were whiskers on his chin only. He walked with bowed legs.
  
      The group proceeded across the square. A few bystanders took the opportunity to shout an obscenity at the emissary. The honor guards led the emissary into the Lord Mayor’s meeting hall. A few local men, some armed and others without weapons, pushed their way into the tall three-story building. Others began to mill around, talking amongst themselves.
  
     Justinian turned and walked up a narrow side street. He stopped next to the stoop of a two-story house known as der Ritterhouse, or house for knights, and rapped on the door. A man almost as tall as Justinian opened the door; he wore a tabard smudged with burnt wood marks. His tabard had red crosses embroidered along the hem; his strong face wore the crags of age.
   
     “Justinian,” he said. “We were worried.”
  
     “Not enough, Thibaud…” remarked Justinian with a frown, “to be alert.” Justinian looked around the room; two of his friends were asleep while two sharpened knives. A short round man in a black monk’s cape sat at the table. He was eating meat and carrots, the remains of their noon meal.
  
     “They are here,” said Justinian to the room. He would tell his men later about the gory spectacle in the wheat field and the Khan’s mounted scouting party.
  
     “We thought so,” said Thibaud.
  
     “Go down to the market,” Justinian said directly at Thibaud. “Get fruit, vegetables. Food we can chew while we march.”
   
     “Oh, Jay-suz, Mary and Joseph,” came a loud groan from one of the men who was barely awake. He was lost in the effort to get his boots on straight.
  
     “Coming back from the market, stop at the Lord Mayor’s house and observe.”
  
     “Yes.”
  
     “The rest of us,” added Justinian, “are packing. We leave in an hour.”
  
     “Yes,” said Thibaud while he lifted the bar from the door.
     
     “We have been here for six days…” said Justinian. “A long time to rest.”
   
     He sent two of his knights to prepare their horses and the monk’s cart. He knew they were good men and would feed and water their horses in the stables just inside the south gate.
  
     The six knights arrived in Graz six days earlier, weary from the long trek from Jerusalem. They had followed the Roman roads across Turkey to Smyrna, ferried their horses across the Dardenelles, and marched north to Hadrianopolis. They then marched to the northwest and began following the mighty Danube River at Belgrade, traveling to the west. When the Danube turned north toward Vienna, the small band of knights continued west, following the ancient Roman road to Virunum, a walled city now called Graz.
  
     “Brother Stefan, you are welcome. We are pleased you have joined us.”
  
     “You are helping me,” said the rotund monk, “to escape.”
  
     “You may regret your decision,” said Justinian.
   
     “How may I?” said Stefan. His round face wore a mop of black hair; his robes were clean but patched. His face displayed a simple trust in Justinian.
  
     “We carry a holy relic from Jerusalem, directly to the Bishop at Abingdon.
   
     “Oh, what beautiful words,” said Stefan. “If only…”
  
     “What?”
  
     “I miss England. My Abbott prays at Newbury.”
  
     “A short ride of two days from Abingdon, I think,” said Justinian.
   
     “May God bless you for your charity…” mumbled the monk quietly.
  
     “We will see about charity. I will hide our relic in your cart.”
   
     “That is possible. There is a hidden compartment under the seat.”
   
     “Good,” said Justinian firmly, before he added, “You will take an oath.”
  
     “I will?” said Brother Stefan, with doubt creeping into his voice.
  
     “An oath to protect the relic. We are sworn to protect the relic.”
  
     Brother Stefan sat on his stool and waited. He had a pleasant face with heavy eyelashes above blue eyes. His Roman nose seemed to be protecting a perpetual smile. He had the stomach of one used to regular meals; he carried the worry lines of a monk traveling in hostile territory. From the sour smell of old wine, Brother Stefan noted that the six men had been into a rather large crock of wine. The half-empty crock sat on the table, with a few pirozhki, a black flour pastry filled with cabbage. Someone had found and opened a small barrel of payusnaya, the black caviar valued for its taste, salted in brine and shipped from Valcov on the Black Sea.
     
     Justinian walked to the knight known as Adelard, also called Addle-Brain by his friends. The man was still tying the laces of his black boots. Justinian held out a hand and Adelard produced a rough leather satchel from under his bench. Justinian moved to the long table, pushed the barrel of caviar across and laid the valise on the table. Justinian then untied the leather thongs, flipped open the cover and removed a folded parchment.
  
     “I studied these parchments during our long trek. They were dictated by Godfrey of Bouillon, the Lord Protector of Jerusalem. His story was about Adhemar, the Bishop of our crusade.”
  
     Two of the knights brought bags of clothes to the table and sat. They leaned over the table to stare at the unfolded parchment, held open by Justinian.
  
     “We remember Bishop Adhemar of LePuy. He joined us in France. Some of you thought he was a crow to the Pope.” The knights in the room chuckled. “We were sitting at Antioch, day after day, waiting to get on to Jerusalem. The good bishop died during the epidemic in August. Damn hot month, last August. Some of our friends died during that pestilence.”
  
     “It was later …Godfrey was named Advocatus of Jerusalem. The Bishop’s weasel, his secretary revealed that the Bishop and Ameer Jagi-Sian, the Muslim defender of Antioch, had been negotiating for the surrender of Antioch. That reptilian little man, the secretary reported that the Ameer believed he bought the lives of all the Muslims in Antioch with the Eagle of Christus.”
  
     The men were silent. Justinian smiled at Brother Stefan. From down the street came the sound of men shouting. Adelard moved to the small window and pushed the cloth aside. He reported there were torches in the central square.
  
     “The Eagle is in this valise. Godfrey’s parchment says the smiths of Samarkand, under the orders of Tamerlane, melted a cup of pewter into this Eagle to give the gold greater strength. The cup of pewter was revered by the Christians. Several men with swords died in a vain effort to stop the melting of ‘an old cup;’ it was said the cup was owned by Joseph of Aramethia.”
  
     Stefan sat, with a blank expression. He pulled his long robes tight around his legs, almost as if he wanted to hide inside his robes. His hand came up and covered his mouth and he thought, ‘Speak no evil in this place.’ He stared at Justinian. Adelard nodded in affirmation.
  
     “It is time for you to join us,” said Justinian. He looked at the men around him. They all nodded in agreement.
  
     “You must make your vow. Commit it to memory. It is the sacred vow of the Knights of Godfrey. You will swear to protect the Eagle of Christus with your life.” Justinian paused for a moment, considering the situation. “After we leave this useless city …you will sign your name under our names. We are the Knights of Godfrey.”
  
     Stefan lowered himself into a kneeling position. The knights groaned a little but followed suit. Justinian moved around the table and stood behind Stefan and put his hand on Stefan’s unruly hair. Stefan repeated the words. His vow was interrupted by the scream of a man in extreme pain. After a few moments there was a second scream, cut short. The room fell silent. The knights were quiet. Stefan finished his vow.
  
     Adelard filled a tumbler with wine and offered it to Stefan. “It was cheap …we were made a present of the wine by the merchant …after we told him we were going to use his house …and threw him out.” The two knights at the table laughed. One of the men put a ladle into the wine crock and poured wine into two small mugs. Stefan raised the wine to his lips and two of the men joined him. There was a muted sound of cheering from the direction of the main square. This was followed by silence, broken only by the sound of men talking loudly as they walked up the lane past the house. Thibaud entered quietly, then barred the door. He looked at the gathering around the table, walked over and held out a hand for a mug of wine.
  
     “I am getting too old for this,” said Thibaud. He took a large swallow of the wine.
  
     “This town is an armpit. Those screams you heard were from a priest who was convicted of having carnal knowledge with a ten-year-old girl. If the gossip is true, she was a niece of the Lord Mayor. I think the trial must have been quick, to impress the emissary. He was sitting in front of the Great Hall, watching the execution.”
  
     “This Mongol, the emissary?” asked Justinian.
  
     “A short man, powerful arms. Bow legged. His cape had ermine trim. There were red and silver designs stitched into the tan leather of the cape. He wore a necklace of leather. It held a small leather bag at his throat.”
  
      Thibaud hesitated. Then he added, “He impressed me … a determined man … stubborn … not afraid. His leather cap was a warning, I think.
   
     “How do you mean?”
  
     “It was a typical Mongol helmet of leather. Silver bangles were sewn onto the leather. It must sparkle when he rides in the sun. There were four human fingers sewn onto the leather.”
     
     “Aiyee,” said one of the knights. Justinian clapped Thibaud on the shoulder. Brother Stefan turned away from the table, his face suddenly pale.
  
     “Who are they?” asked Justinian.
  
     “From my place outside the door, I heard the emissary briefly. He said his lord is Subedei, General of the Great Khan Batu. He said Ogodei was here 20 years ago, when Ogodei leveled Baku by the Caspian Sea. He boasted it was Ogodei who trained Subedei.”
   
     One of the knights had a frown. Justinian looked at him and cleared his throat. “Ogodei is a son of Jenghiz Khan. He is the current Great Khan.”
  
     “There were shouts inside the Mayor’s meeting hall. Shouts of ‘To the stake with him’ and ‘Let us roast his arrogant hide.’ They mean to harm the emissary, I fear.”
   
     “And the priest they convicted?” said Justinian.
  
     “You once told me they love the stake in Hungary. You were right.”
  
     “That screaming we heard?”
  
      “The priest.”
  
     “How did he die?” asked a curious knight. The man watched Brother Stefan when he stumbled across the room. Stefan disappeared into a back room.
  
     “After they raised the stake to vertical, the priest hung there, his legs kicking. He said something like ‘please, have pity.’ Someone told him to greet Satan. A deputy of the Lord Mayor came forward and tapped an archer, who put three arrows into the priest. The kicking stopped.”
  
     From the back room, the knights heard the sound of retching.
  
     “Can’t hold his wine, can he?” said one.

*****

     At the top of a small hill northwest of Graz, with the sun rising in the east, the band of knights stopped to watch Brother Stefan and his cart climb the last rise to the pass. Stefan stopped and stepped down from his cart. He looked back toward Graz. A column of black smoke rose from the central square, the Hauptplatz.
  
     Brother Stefan watched the smoke rise straight up in the still, early-morning air. He said a prayer for the priest who had died with a two-inch stake inside his torso, sticking out of his right shoulder. When Stefan walked through the square on the way to the stables, he saw the image of the man on the stake backlit from the torches; he shivered. He was thankful that Justinian and the other men were in a hurry to leave Graz. Their haste spared the timid monk from having to watch another man die.
   
Back on his cart, following the knights and their train of spare horses, the monk said a further prayer, for himself and for their mission to England.

An Historical Footnote:
  
     Few of the knights of the Sixth Crusade ever returned from the Holy Land. Of the few that returned, one Justinian, a knight in service to Richard of Cromwell and possibly in service to Godfrey, Protector of Jerusalem, lived out his life at Abingdon Abbey. He told a story of seeing the Mongol Horde on the plains in front of Graz, Austria shortly after Batu Khan’s army razed Kiev in 1240. Justinian also states that he was in Hamburg when the church bells suddenly began to ring. The Mongol army had turned and was leaving Germany.
  
     Historical texts report the Sixth Crusade was loosely organized by the Duke of Burgundy, Thibaud of Champagne and Richard of Cornwall. Richard ruled over Jerusalem until the city was sacked by Saracen warriors in 1244. Richard was a Franciscan who lived in Paris after 1244.
  
     Batu Khan, grandson of Jenghiz Khan, led the Golden Horde of 200,000 warriors across Russia, thence into Poland and into Germany. Ogodei, the reigning Khan died in 1242 and Batu Khan was recalled to Karakorum, capital city of the Mongol Empire. His recall spared Europe from certain invasion. The Mongol wars were over; leaving in their wake 80 million dead.
   
     During the persecutions of the Benedictine Order by Henry VIII, the monks in England fled to the west and founded new monasteries in Ireland. During the persecutions of the same monks by Cromwell, many were shipped to English colonies in the New World. Somewhere in these tumultuous years, the parchment of Justinian and the Eagle were lost.