Chapter Two
For a moment, Joanna forgot the icy cold of the wind blowing through her wet cloak and dress. Warmth ran through her as she watched the master fight his way back along the ship. She, and she alone, had brought order out of chaos. Truly the sister of the great Lionheart.… Where was Richard himself now, she wondered, and how had he fared in this storm?
It seemed less violent now; the rain was lessening and surely the sky would grow lighter soon. They would be able to see the other ships and regroup the fleet. But the dromon surged on and the sky remained dark. Presently Joanna saw stars pricking the darkness overhead.
She was amazed. Night had come already. Had she really stood for hours leading them all in prayer? She would have believed some other being had done all that if it were not for her sore throat and aching muscles. She was now shivering uncontrollably. The cold seemed to have gone into her very bones and she was exhausted, drained, dazed. When they led her to a pallet in the hold, she could hardly walk.
There was no supper that night. Joanna refused some dried meat and took only a little bread and hard cheese and a long draught of wine. The pallet was damp around the edges and hard all over, but she was so glad to lie down that she hardly noticed. Someone covered her with rugs. She lay in the dark, breathing in the foul stink of the hold, a smell compounded of pitch and rope, vomit and onions and fish and ale. Her face felt stiff with salt and her eyes stung, even closed. And everything felt damp and cold: her clothes, her hair, her skin. She would not be able to sleep, she thought, but at least it was better to be lying down. The boat still pitched heavily but she was out of the wind now. She could hear the thudding of feet on the deck close above her and the creaking of timbers all around her and everywhere the rush of water sucking and swirling and sluicing until finally it washed her into insensibility.
She woke to a rush of feet and the sound of shouting. Grey light filtered into the hold and rain was pattering on the deck. She pushed herself up on her arms and winced at the aching stiffness of them from clinging for hours to the post. She was stiff all over, in fact, and her clothes were still damp and clung to her legs when she tried to rise.
Berengaria was asleep beside her. She looked younger in her sleep, her long upper lip vulnerable as a child’s, the little curved mouth slightly open, the dark eyelashes motionless on her cheeks. Joanna flung off the rugs, massaged her arms and legs briefly and went up on deck.
Land … There was land off the starboard bow. She went forward eagerly, ignoring the rain that lashed into her face and the chill seeping back into her wet garments. That was what the shouting had been about. They would be able to go ashore, get off this accursed tossing boat for a while, eat fresh meat, put on dry clothes, wash in warm water … She went to the rail and stared through the rain at the long grey shoreline. There was a sizable town with a port there. She could see the curved wharf jutting out into the sea and white-washed houses clustered behind it and at least two churches.
She turned to see the master beside her. He inclined his head briefly to her and answered her unspoken question.
“It’s Cyprus, my lady. That is the port of Limassol.”
“Cyprus?” Her heart sank and her hands tightened on the rail. She looked out again at the land, so near that she could see goats moving on the hills. “Are you sure?”
“I fear so.”
All the Crusaders had heard tales of the tyrant Isaac, who had usurped for himself the title of Emperor of Cyprus. They said he surpassed Judas in treachery and Ganelon in deceiving; he seized pilgrims who put in there and held the rich to ransom and forced the poor to become slaves; it was even reported that he and Saladin had drunk each other’s blood as a sign of mutual treaty.
Joanna sighed deeply and bowed her head. The disappointment was so bitter that she could almost taste it, like gall in her throat. When she looked up again, the coastline was no nearer despite the wind that drove towards it. The remnants of the sail were furled, the sailors idle. She looked questioningly at the captain.
“We have dropped anchor, my lady.”
“Can we not go on?”
“There is another storm coming from the south and I think it best to ride it out here rather than venturing back into the open sea. Besides, it gives us a chance to regroup as the other ships may be driven here, too.”
“Yes. You are quite right, Robert,” she said tiredly.
He was right about the other ships. There must have been a round dozen of them bobbing at anchor alongside them by the evening. But Joanna was not convinced that he was right about riding out the storm so near the rocky coast. A little before sunset the storm fell on them, as violently as before. The boats rocked wildly, straining at their anchors, and the rain and the waves lashed over them.
Joanna no longer had the energy and the passion that had sustained her through the previous day’s storm. She felt drained and miserable. Through the fading light and the heavy rain, she watched the line of rocks west of the jetty. The wind was blowing strongly to the west. The master had suggested that she and Berengaria take shelter in the hold and Berengaria had gone below. Joanna had refused and remained on deck. If I must die, she thought to herself, I will not die trapped in a dark smelly hole, but out in the open where I can face what is coming to me. Then she reproached herself for this thought. Where was her spirit of yesterday, when the captain had recognized her as a worthy sister of the great Lionheart himself? It was no use. She was exhausted, frightened, and nauseated.
The light was going fast. Sudden screams rose above the wind, way off to their left. Joanna had been sitting huddled at the foot of the post. She scrambled to her feet and strained to see through the sheets of rain. The wind dropped momentarily and the screams of men in terror for their lives carried clearly. Then she could see them as the rain slackened and fell straight.
A ship had torn its anchor loose or broken its chain. It was being driven towards the shore by the wind. Joanna gasped and the nausea rose into her throat. The sailors had run to the ship’s rail but they were too far away to help, and, in any case, there was nothing they could do. Like ants under an upturned rock, the sailors on the distant ship swarmed in every direction. Joanna could see their uplifted arms and hear their shrieks. They were running out the oars and rowing, furiously trying to keep off the rocks. Helplessly, the sailors along the dromon’s rail watched as the ship was driven nearer. They saw the men on board dive off into the water on both sides. There was an almighty crash. With a nightmarish sense of unreality, Joanna saw the ship list to starboard and settle lower in the water. She heard the screams of injured men and of drowning men in the water calling for help. On the dromon, the sailors crossed themselves.
Berengaria was beside her, white-faced, her dark eyes huge.
“What is it, Joanna? What happened?”
Joanna told her, then went to the rail and vomited.
There were bobbing lights along the shoreline, lanterns held by men who had come out from the city. Joanna and the others on board strained to see through the lashing rain and the gathering darkness whether the men had come to help the survivors, to attack them, to wait for plunder washed up from the wreck, or were there simply out of curiosity. Few of the sailors could swim, but some made it to shore. They saw them pulled from the water by the Cypriots, but at that distance and in the poor light, they could not tell whether their reception was friendly or hostile. The pounding of the waves on the rocks and the howl of the wind covered all other sounds. Presently the wavering line of lights retreated back into the city.
Night fell. The storm intensified. On board the dromon, no one slept. They were all on deck, praying, sobbing, or tensely silent. In the darkness the wild screams, the crashing and splintering of wood were more terrifying. Occasional flashes of lightning showed nightmare visions of a ship scudding helplessly towards the rocks, of spars and planks tossing on the waves, or arms and pale faces briefly upraised from the water.
The storm died down in the small hours. After the constant turmoil of wind and water, of thunder and cracking wood and tearing canvas, of shrieks and groans, it seemed as though an eerie silence succeeded it. The water lapped along the hull, the boat creaked as it rocked on the now gentle waves, but no one noticed these sounds. They heard only the silence. There were no cries for help, no screams, no shouts from the shore. The dromon lay peacefully at anchor, but somewhere out there in the darkness, between ship and shore, lay the unseen, but vividly imagined, carnage of wrecks and drownings.
Gradually, the darkness thinned. First a pearly pink flush glowed in the east, then rays of light intensified and spread, driving back the grayness, flooding the sea and sky with purple radiance, and finally the incandescent disk of the sun rose from the sea. Little, foam-capped waves ran inland one after the other. The strengthening light glinted on gold crosses on white churches in Limassol. The sound of bells carried across the water. They must be ringing for Prime, Joanna thought. They were the first bells she had heard since leaving Sicily a week before.
Three ships had been wrecked in the night. One, driven up on a rock, lay tilted over on its side, its mast snapped, another had sunk near the shore, and the third had been entirely broken up. The shoreline was littered with boards and boxes, and the sea around was strewn with flotsam. As Joanna watched, a boat put out from one of the nearby ships to go and search the wreck for survivors or supplies.
Stools had been set for Joanna and Berengaria. They sat with their backs to the forecastle. Around them, in a rough semi-circle, the men squatted, forearms resting on their thighs. They balanced easily on the rocking deck, accustomed as they all were to sea travel. They had gathered here from all the surrounding ships, officers of the fleet or court, ranking knights, ships’ masters.
“We should send a reconnoitering party ashore. Find out what happened to them. Are the Griffons holding them or what?” Robert, the ship’s master, spoke first.
“Spies, you mean? That’s what the Griffons will call them. They won’t like that.” His first mate answered.
“Too bad …”
“Now wait a minute. Why don’t we send provisions for the men? That way it won’t look like spying. It’s reasonable. They’ll need things and it will show we don’t mean to be a burden on the Cypriots.” That was Stephen de Turnham speaking, Richard’s treasurer. He looked sideways at Master Robert, his blue eyes shrewd.
Robert spat. “Good chance they’ll steal the provisions and hold the men who bring them, I’d say.”
Joanna leaned forward. “You think they’re holding prisoner the men who swam ashore, then?”
“It looks like it, my lady. There’s no sign of them today.”
“Perhaps they’re injured?”
“All of them?”
Joanna was silent. It did not look good. None of the men had returned to the ships nor had the Cypriots sent any message out to them.
“So we send armed knights with the provisions. If they can bring off the men, so much the better, but at least they can try to find out how many they are, who they are, and where they are.” Robert spoke decisively.
“Let us hope that Roger is safe among them, and not drowned; him they call Malus Catulus.” Stephen de Turnham’s voice betrayed his anxiety.
“Malus Catulus?” The nickname sounded familiar to Joanna. “But surely he is …” She remembered him and she stared around the circle in alarm. “He is Richard’s signet-bearer,” she said flatly.
No one contradicted her. They sat in gloomy silence. She knew what they were thinking: It was a bad omen to lose the King’s signet.
“Perhaps it would be better if he were drowned,” Robert said heavily. “Who knows what use Isaac might make of the ring if it falls into his hands?”
They were silent again, then Stephen said briskly, “Who shall we send? Bernard, will you go? And Thierry and Thomas?”
Joanna got up and left them discussing the party to go ashore. She moved to the ship’s rail and Berengaria followed her. They stood side by side staring across the intervening distance at Limassol. They could see people moving in the streets, some with baskets on their heads, others carrying a chicken by its feet or driving a donkey. A slight breeze stirred the colorful canopy that shaded the open-air bazaars. Beggars lined the church steps. The sounds of the city came to them filtered through the soughing of the waves: hammering, the town crier’s trumpet, the calls of vendors and the bleating of sheep in the marketplace. Somewhere a bell tolled.
“If only Richard were here,” Berengaria sighed.
Joanna’s fingers tightened on the rail and she did not turn her gaze from the port. A useless remark. Of course, they all wished Richard were here, but wishing did not make it so.
“I’m sorry,” Berengaria said quickly. “That was a stupid thing to say. I was speaking more to myself than to you. I do wish so much that he would come.”
Joanna looked at her then. Berengaria had a little self-deprecating smile but her eyes were sad. Joanna realized how little she knew her. They had been together on board this slow dromon for a week now, but Joanna had avoided her, more or less consciously. She tried to examine her feelings honestly now. Was she afraid that Berengaria would rob her of her close relationship with Richard? Life with Richard would not always be comfortable, she thought, but it would never be boring. There would be travel and music and all the bustle of a court on the move. But was Berengaria suited to it? She wondered again why Richard had chosen her out of all the women in Christendom.
“Do you think he will find us?” Berengaria asked now.
“Richard? Of course, he will. We only have to wait and he will come.”
“You have great faith in him, don’t you?”
“Yes. Don’t you?”
Berengaria stared at the shore and laced her fingers together. “I think Richard is the most marvelous man I have ever known. It’s hard to imagine there’s anything he can’t do.” She laughed a little and looked apologetically at Joanna. It was almost as if she mocked herself for the strength of her sentiments, though to Joanna it seemed a simple statement of fact.
She wondered again about Berengaria. A slight tell-tale flush had appeared under her sallow skin. Berengaria loved him! How could she have been so blind that she had not seen it before? Because she had avoided seeing Berengaria as a person at all. She was guiltily aware that Berengaria was far more observant than she and had noticed the hostility on her part. They both loved Richard and this should be a bond between them. Impulsively she put an arm round Berengaria and hugged her. Berengaria barely came up to her shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Berengaria, I’ve been so selfish and wrapped up in my own concerns. From now on, I’ll try to be a better sister to you.”
“I should like that,” Berengaria said shyly, though she felt stiff in Joanna’s embrace.
Joanna released her. Now that she had begun to think of Berengaria, guilt overwhelmed her for her neglect. How must Berengaria feel, summoned to marry Christendom’s mightiest king, brought from her father’s small kingdom by her formidable mother-in-law—and much as Joanna loved and admired her mother, even she found her formidable—reunited with Richard in Sicily only to have him refuse to marry her then because it was Lent, bundled on board a ship—not Richard’s—in the care of a stranger who had been less than friendly to her? And all this for a woman who had probably never left Navarre before. Joanna remembered how she herself had felt when she had left England and travelled all the way across France and Italy to marry William. But she had never met William and was only eleven years old. Berengaria was her own age, twenty-five already. Joanna had been married for thirteen years and widowed for almost two, but Berengaria had never left her father’s court.
“Why did your father wait so long to marry you?” she asked bluntly. Could he possibly have hoped for this match? No, it must have seemed out of the question. And besides, Richard had been betrothed.
Berengaria hesitated. “My father is a very indulgent man. He did not wish to oblige me to marry when I was unwilling.”
“And you never liked any of his previous choices?” It was hard for her to imagine a father so indulgent as to leave a daughter unwed to the advanced age of twenty-five.
Again, the nervous lacing of the fingers.
“Berengaria … did you have your heart set on Richard all the time?”
Berengaria looked at her with a little self-conscious smile but said nothing.
“Even though he was betrothed to Alice?”
“He was not married,” Berengaria said. “I swore that I would remain unmarried as long as he did. Just in case. Once he and Alice were married, then I would accept any suitor my father chose.”
Joanna was amazed. She had thought Berengaria a timid, mousy little thing, but she had had the determination to wait all those years and to reject her father’s choices. Suddenly she thought she saw why Richard had chosen Berengaria. She had always thought he admired flamboyant, decisive women like their mother, and perhaps he did, but for a wife he wanted someone who would idolize him and never rival him for attention. A little uncomfortably, she thought that perhaps that was the basis for her own relationship with Richard, too; she had always admired him and he had liked her for admiring him. He had always thrived on adulation.
“Did he ever love Alice?” Berengaria asked.
Joanna cast her mind back. “No, he didn’t. He thought her foolish.” He had been unkind to her, she remembered, ignored her or, worse, snubbed her. Yet Alice had been pretty and pliable and eager to please, at least at first. Poor Alice, imprisoned still in England—or was it Normandy?—as she had been ever since King Henry’s death. Poor, foolish Alice who had loved dancing and music and gowns and status and wealth and flattery, who had become a King’s mistress while betrothed to his son, and now had lost everything except her life.
“There’s the landing party.” Berengaria called her attention back to the present. Two boatloads of knights were being rowed by sailors to the shore. The sailors were having a hard time of it as the knights were fully armed and the boats sat low in the water.
It was not long before they returned. The Cypriots had resolutely refused to let them visit the men; they were being held until the Emperor Isaac arrived in Limassol to decide what they should do with them. They promised they would convey the clothing and other provisions to the men, but few on the ship, listening to the knights’ account, gave credence to that. The knights had not wanted to risk an attack, knowing it might mean instant death for the men who were held, so they had returned, perforce, without the men, without the provisions, and without any real knowledge gained.