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  “No one knows about it,” Thomas said. He was about to question Pirmin about the sheepish look on his face when Pirmin’s eyes caught on someone standing in a doorway at the end of the room. The man was waving him over.

  “Drink up, Thomi, and I will show you yet another way to fill a purse. He got up and Thomas followed Pirmin through the doorway. They entered a good-sized open space created with tables pushed up against the walls. A group of men stood around one table with a stack of coins on it. A man detached himself from the group as Pirmin and Thomas approached.

  “Evening, Jean,” Pirmin said.

  “I have a new one for you, Pirmin. He has been here every night this week and has not yielded once. He brought friends too, so the purse is well worth our while. If you think you can beat him, that is.”

  Jean nodded toward a group of a half dozen men milling along the far wall. It took only a second for Thomas to surmise who would be Pirmin’s opponent. A scowling, black-haired, bull of a man stood with his arms crossed, sizing up Pirmin. He wrinkled his nose and said something to the men around him that elicited a round of laughter.

  “Looks strong enough,” Pirmin said. “Smelling, that is. I will need soap after this one.”

  “Do not take him lightly, lad,” Jean said. “He has dropped all comers. He has a fast start and aims to put a man on his knees first thing.”

  Thomas knew what Jean was talking about. There was not a boy living in the Levant, and most girls for that matter, who had not tried his hand at the game of Fingers at one time or another.

  The rules were simple: two opponents faced each other and interlocked their fingers. Each one then attempted to make the other yield by bending and twisting his opponent’s fingers in the most painful positions possible. No head-butting allowed. That was it. If there were any other rules, Thomas was not aware of them. The game was popular amongst drinking men, so broken fingers were the norm rather than a rare occurrence.

  Thomas pulled Pirmin aside. “You sure you want to do this tonight? He looks like he has some strength in those hands.” The thick-set man had laced his fingers together and was working them against one another while he stared at Pirmin. He was shorter than Pirmin, but was broader across the chest. His arms were short, his forearms massive, and Thomas thought that would give him a leverage advantage in this contest.

  “He is a hairy little troll, I give you that,” Pirmin said.

  “Do not be afraid to yield,” Thomas said. “I will not be feeding you your soup if you cannot hold a spoon for the next month.”

  “Thank you for the words of encouragement,” Pirmin said. He winked at Thomas and stepped into the open area to begin the contest. Pirmin was a head taller than the stockier man, but as they jammed their fingers together, Thomas saw Pirmin’s eyes flicker with surprise at the man’s strength.

  A third man stepped forward to play the part of master of fights, but aside from telling the men to begin and warning them not to head-butt, there was little else for him to do.

  The cheering started as a few shouts of encouragement, but as the men’s movements became wilder and more strained, the shouting began in earnest. Back and forth they struggled, taking turns grunting with exertion or pain as fingers and knuckles creaked and cracked. More than once the onlookers let out a collective groan as one man bent the other’s fingers over in a painful lock, but no one yielded.

  Pirmin’s face had reddened and he had not smiled in a long time. He was no longer having fun.

  His opponent pushed both hands forward toward Pirmin’s chest, and then quicker than a snake, whipped only his right hand around and down to the outside, forcing Pirmin up on his toes. The shorter man wedged his elbow in tight against his body and looked like an immovable rock, while Pirmin danced on his toes trying to stop his left wrist from giving away to the point where he could no longer resist the pressure on his fingers.

  Thomas recognized the danger. Yield, he thought. This game is not worth broken fingers. No sooner had the thought entered his mind than Pirmin hopped slightly to his right and twisted his right hand by bringing his elbow up level with his hand. The movement turned his opponent’s wrist sideways with his little finger pointed upwards. Thomas recognized the position as a sword or knife disarming technique they often used in practice. It was an excruciatingly painful joint lock, one which could very easily result in a broken wrist.

  The stocky man yelped once, then his face twisted in fury when he realized his left wrist was being attacked. He let out a yell and flexed his wrist and forearm with all he had, pushing Pirmin back. But that was what Pirmin was waiting for.

  While his opponent was channeling all his power into his left arm, he gave up control with his right. Pirmin suddenly stepped to his left while circling his left arm up to chest height. Using his newfound leverage, he twisted over his opponent’s wrist once again into the same position as the other arm and bore down on the fragile joint. The man screamed as the connective tissues holding his wrist onto his forearm were stretched to their tearing point. In a desperate bid to escape the pain, his legs gave out and his knees crashed onto the floor.

  “Yield!” Pirmin shouted.

  The man resisted and attempted to rise, but Pirmin put more pressure on his wrist and the man’s knees hit the floor once again. This time he could not get the words out fast enough.

  “Yield! I yield, God damn you.”

  He was still kneeling on the ground, cradling his arm, when Pirmin picked up his winnings and steered Thomas to a new table near the entrance of the tavern. Corrine brought them two new mugs of ale and Thomas noticed Pirmin’s swollen fingers had a slight tremor to them as he wrapped them around his tankard.

  “You know you cheated,” Thomas said. “It is called ‘Fingers’ for a reason.”

  “Yah, well the bugger almost broke mine,” Pirmin said. “Even if I had yielded he would have gone ahead and done it, I am sure.” He gave the fingers on his left hand a quick rub. “I admit the troll was stronger than he looked.”

  “He looked plenty strong to me,” Thomas said.

  Pirmin gave his hands one last shake and then held up his mug. “To the troll! This round is on him.”

  It was almost midnight when they left. Pirmin was still talking about Corrine when three men stepped out of the shadows before them. Another four closed off the path to their rear. Thomas felt the pleasant glow of the evening’s drinks flee from his system, and he was left with a cool tremor running along his spine as he recognized the squat form of the man Pirmin had bested in the tavern earlier. All the men he could see were armed with swords. Two of them were drawn. Thomas was about to draw his own knife when Pirmin whispered, “Easy Thomi. There are too many. Let me talk this out.”

  A tall man standing next to the stocky form of the troll spoke up. “My friend here says you owe him something.”

  “The big monkey almost broke my wrists,” the troll said, his words slurred with drink.

  “Almost is the key word here,” Pirmin said. “You may have trouble holding a spoon for a few days,” he shot Thomas a sidelong glance and one corner of his mouth turned up in a grin. “But I would wager my entire purse nothing is broken.”

  The tall man said, “The time for wagers is over. How about we just take that purse off you and call it a night.”

  Pirmin looked slowly around at the seven men surrounding them. “Normally, I might argue your point, but it is getting late.” He pulled the purse from his belt and tossed it to the tall man. It flopped through the air and hardly made a sound when he plucked it out of the air.

  “Feels a little light,” he said. “Maybe you are trying to cheat us. But then, that would not be the first time, would it?” He drew his sword and the man next to him followed suit.

  Thomas and Pirmin drew their knives, both woefully aware of how outnumbered they were. Thomas could sense the blood pumping in Pirmin, saw his chest heave with breath and his muscles tense, and then he launched himself forward at the three men. For a spl
it second Thomas envied the ability of his friend to burst into action. He lost no time to any agonizing decision-making process. He saw something that needed doing, so he did it. But this was sheer lunacy.

  Pirmin had already crashed into the three men in front by the time Thomas had cleared his own knife from its scabbard. He considered turning on the men coming up from behind, but quickly discarded that idea. He stepped forward to help Pirmin.

  Pirmin was embroiled with the three men in a tangled mass of arms and legs. One of the men was on the ground wrapping himself around Pirmin’s thigh, another was on his back. The troll had one hand on Pirmin’s throat, while the other was locked around Pirmin’s knife wrist.

  Thomas considered knifing the man riding Pirmin’s back, but he hesitated, for no blood had yet been drawn from what he could tell. Instead, he wrapped his arm around the man’s neck and attempted to pull him off his friend. He choked him with the crook of his elbow until he came away, then he felt a heavy blow to the back of his head.

  His vision clouded and he remembered thinking he was grateful it was not a naked blade. Then he felt more blows on his face and body, and when his vision cleared, he was on the ground with boots flying at him from all directions. A big shape next to him was receiving a similar treatment. Dull, thudding pain shook his entire body and every breath became a struggle. Thomas could do nothing but curl into an even tighter ball. Then, mercifully, the barrage ceased.

  He heard the tall man’s voice, a little out of breath. “Let Malcolm finish the big one, if he can hold a blade. Make the young one watch so he learns something from all this.”

  Laughter erupted in a full circle around Thomas and Pirmin, as rough hands jerked Thomas to his feet. He coughed and had to spit out a mouthful of blood before he could catch his breath. His sides hurt with every inhalation, but he could tell his ribs were not broken. Someone grabbed him by the hair and turned his head. He saw the troll with a short sword in hand, standing over Pirmin.

  “I am going to start with your fingers, you bastard. This will not be quick.”

  Panic dulled all the pain in Thomas’s body and his chest heaved. Pirmin groaned and stirred on the ground. In a moment of clarity, Thomas knew he would rather die than live and watch his friend be killed in front of him. A voice inside accused him of being selfish.

  The troll stomped down on one of Pirmin’s wrists and he raised his sword over the youth’s hand. He stayed there for what seemed an eternity. A glint of light flashed in the left side of the troll’s chest and then faded away with a soft, sucking noise. The troll tottered from one foot to the other and then pitched forward head first onto the ground. He lay there unmoving, crossed neatly over the inert form of Pirmin.

  As Thomas raised his head, he saw another cross. This one brilliant white and unmoving, piercing the blackness of the night like a harvest moon. Above the cross was the gray beard of what Thomas thought must surely be an apparition brought on by the heat of the moment. Only when the figure spoke did Thomas begin to think he was not imagining the spectral figure.

  “Unhand the lad,” Marshal Clermont said.

  “Shit! He killed Malcolm,” one of the men holding Thomas said.

  “Get out of here, old man. This is not your business,” said the man who had taken Pirmin’s purse.

  Marshal Clermont lunged and anyone with an untrained eye would have sworn he did not move at all, for he had returned to his starting position, sword by his side. The tall man clutched feebly at his throat. Blood, black because of the lack of any light source, poured around his hand and dripped off his elbow. Then it turned red as nearby lanterns beat back the darkness.

  “Make way for the watch! Clear a path. What is going on here?” Several new figures materialized out of the gloom. The men holding Thomas swore and took their hands away as an officer of the city guard approached. Thomas dropped to one knee as a fresh wave of pain lodged itself somewhere deep in his ribs.

  The city soldiers fanned around in a semi-circle with their spears leveled. The officer drew his sword even as he said, “Any man with a naked blade in his hand will be cut down by my men.”

  After very little hesitation everyone sheathed their swords. Everyone, that is, except for Marshal Clermont. He flipped the point back and brazenly rested it on his shoulder once everyone else had stored their weapons.

  “What happened here?” the city guard commander asked.

  “He killed two of our friends,” one of the men who had been holding Thomas said. He pointed at the bodies of the troll and the corpse of the tall man with the gaping neck wound lying nearby. Pirmin was still on the ground, but at least he was moving.

  “I did not ask you,” the officer snapped. He turned to the marshal and waited.

  Marshal Clermont nodded. “I killed these two men and was about to kill the rest when you intervened.”

  “You see? We did nothing!”

  “Shut up,” the commander said, without looking in the man’s direction. The muscles in his jaw moved back and forth as he looked at the Hospitaller. “What would you have me do with these men?” he finally asked.

  Marshal Clermont looked at each of the men in question. Thomas had seen this appraisal of his before, when he looked over men in the training yard. Thomas suspected he was not impressed with what he saw.

  “Let them go. The city will have need of all types of men in the near future. But escort these two lads back to the Hospital. I fear they have become lost.”

  The marshal did not wait for the officer to respond. Instead, he turned to Thomas. “I know his name is Pirmin. What is yours, boy?”

  Thomas licked his lips and took a moment to get his tongue moving. “Thomas, Marshal. Thomas Schwyzer.”

  Marshal Clermont narrowed his eyes and nodded. He turned and strode away into the night. Thomas did not know it at the time, but those would be the first, and the last, words he would ever speak to Master Mathieu de Clermont, “the Mongoose” of the Order of Saint John.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Foulques and Brother Alain stood at the docks of Acre looking out at the Hospitaller ‘fleet.’ Dozens of Schwyzers carried barrels and bundles wrapped in canvas from a mountain of supplies on the dock to two small merchantmen moored to the nearest wharf. A third ship, a galley with banks of oars on either side, was anchored out in open water. Impressive in both size and years, it was the only warship they had. When Vignolo had first seen the ship, he asked Foulques how old it was. Foulques had no idea, nor did anyone he asked. So Vignolo announced he would row out to her and see exactly what dark arts were keeping her afloat. He left Foulques and Alain co-ordinating the loading of the merchantmen. That had been two hours ago, but finally, Foulques could see the small skiff returning.

  By the time Vignolo joined Foulques and Alain on the dock, the mountain of goods had become a small hill.

  “What are your thoughts?” Foulques asked Vignolo.

  The Genoan let out a deep breath and sat down heavily on a canvas-wrapped crate full of foodstuffs. “I hope you can all swim.” Brother Alain shot Foulques a panicked glance. “It is worse than I thought,” Vignolo continued. “She is a brute, all right. Been repaired so many times over the years, there is enough wood on that ship to build three. Her prow has seen the worst of it, though. Seems sturdy enough now, but whoever owned her before the Hospitallers thought she was a battering ram. There are more layers on her prow than you would find on a Venetian virgin.”

  “But it will get us to Cyprus, correct?” Foulques asked.

  Vignolo nodded. “She has not fallen apart yet, so there are forces conspiring to hold her together that are beyond my understanding. But I know some Rhodes men who would enjoy looking at her.”

  Vignolo was about to say something else, but he seemed to lose his train of thought as his eyes caught on something behind Foulques.

  “What is it?”

  Vignolo scanned the entire dock, left and right, before he spoke. “Do you know who that Arab is over there? The one standin
g in the shade of the harbor master’s hut?”

  Foulques looked over his shoulder. He immediately picked out the man Vignolo had noticed. A thin man stood under the eaves of a small shack nestled between a warehouse and a tavern. At first glance, he appeared to be seeking shelter from the morning sun, but he did not lean against the building in a relaxed manner. He stood erect under the eaves of the building, staring in their direction intently, as though calling them toward him with the force of his stare. And that was exactly what he was doing. It was Monsieur Malouf.

  “Stay here,” Foulques said. “I will be right back.” He turned toward Malouf, but Vignolo reached out and grabbed him by the arm.

  “Do you know that man?” Vignolo asked again, but with more force this time.

  “I do,” Foulques said.

  “Then you would be best served by pretending you never saw him.”

  Foulques grabbed Vignolo’s wrist and slowly removed his hand from his arm. “Since you seem to know who he is, then you also know that we have seen him because he has wished it so.”

  As Alain looked on in confusion, Foulques turned his back on the two men and walked toward Monsieur Malouf.

  As Foulques approached, Malouf leaned against the building and used a tiny knife to trim his fingernails. He looked up. “Peace be upon you, Admiral Foulques.”

  “And Peace be with you, Monsieur Malouf.” Foulques joined him in the shade and he too leaned against the wall. The two men looked out over the harbor and Foulques waited for Malouf to speak.

  “You know, I have always liked the way you call me ‘Monsieur.’ It must sound strange to anyone else. You, a Frank, addressing an Arab man with a French title.”

  Foulques shrugged. “That is how my uncle introduced you to me when I was a child. It does not feel strange to me.”

  “Yes, Guillaume always did have a penchant for tradition. That is one of the things I like about him. Any word from your uncle?”