Their destinies had crossed last autumn on St Bernard’s way across the Alps. The Frank, travelling under the name of Vallon, was on foot, having sold his horse and armour in Lyon. Soon after starting his descent into Italy, he passed a party of pilgrims and merchants glancing anxiously back at storm clouds massing in the south. A shaft of sunlight picked out a herdsman’s summer settlement by a gorge far down the valley. It would be as far as he’d get that night.
He’d covered less than half the distance when the clouds snuffed out the sun. The temperature plummeted. A wind that started as a faraway sigh struck him with a blast of hail. Chin nuzzled into his chest, he struggled against the storm. The hail turned to snow, day turned to night. He lost the path, tripped over rocks, floundered through drifts.
He reached flatter ground and caught a whiff of smoke. He must be downwind of the settlement, the gorge to his left. He continued more slowly, probing with his sword until a mass denser than darkness blocked his way. A hut half-drifted over. He groped round the walls and found the door on the lee side. He kicked it open and stumbled into a chamber choked with smoke.
A figure leaped up on the far side of a fire. ‘Please, don’t harm us!’
Vallon made out a gangling youth with bolting eyes. In the gloom behind him another figure stirred in restless sleep. ‘Calm yourself,’ Vallon growled, sheathing his sword. He wedged the door shut, beat snow from his clothes and crouched by the flames.
‘I crave your pardon,’ the young man stammered. ‘My nerves are stretched. This storm …’
The figure in the corner muttered in a language Vallon didn’t understand. The youth hurried back to him.
Vallon fed the fire with chips of dung and massaged the feeling back into his hands. He retired to the wall and gnawed a heel of bread. Draughts flustered a lamp in a niche above the pair in the corner. The man lying down wasn’t sleeping. His chest wheezed like leaking bellows.
Vallon swigged some wine and winced. ‘Your companion’s sick.’
The young man’s eyes were moist highlights. ‘My master’s dying.’
Vallon stopped chewing. ‘It’s not the plague, is it?’
‘No, sir. I suspect a cancer of the chest. My master’s been ailing ever since we left Rome. This morning he was too weak to seat his mule. Our party had to leave us behind. My master insisted we go on, but then the storm caught us and our groom ran away.’
Vallon spat out the sour wine and wandered over. No doubt of it, the old man would be rid of his cares before dawn. But what a life was written on that face — skin stretched sheer over flared cheekbones, the nose of a fastidious eagle, one dark, hooded eye, the other a puckered scar. And his garments glossed an exotic tale — silk robe fastened with ivory toggles, pantaloons tucked into kidskin boots, a cape of sable that must have cost more than the ring winking on his bony hand.
The dark eye found him. Thin wide lips parted. ‘You’ve come.’
Vallon’s neck prickled. The old man must imagine that the spectre of death had arrived to usher him through the last gate. ‘You’re mistaken. I’m just a traveller sheltering from the storm.’
The dying man absorbed this without contradiction. ‘A pilgrim walking to Jerusalem.’
‘I’m travelling to Constantinople to join the imperial guard. If I pass through Rome, I might light a candle at St Peter’s.’
‘A soldier of fortune,’ the old man said. ‘Good, good.’ He muttered something in Greek that made the youth glance sharply at Vallon. Struggling for breath, the old man groped beneath his cape, drew out a soft leather binder and pressed it into his attendant’s hand. The youth seemed reluctant to take it. The old man clawed at his arm and spoke with urgency. Again the youth glanced at Vallon before answering. Whatever response he made — some vow or pledge — it seemed to satisfy the dying man. His hand fell away. His eye closed.
‘He’s going,’ the youth murmured.
The old man’s eye flicked open and fixed on Vallon. He whispered — a rustle like crumpled parchment relaxing. Then his stare travelled up to some region beyond sight. When Vallon looked down, the eye was already veiled.
Silence gathered like a mist.
‘What did he say?’
‘I’m not sure,’ the youth sobbed. ‘Something about the mystery of the rivers.’
Vallon crossed himself. ‘Who was he?’
The youth snuffled. ‘Cosmas of Byzantium, also called Mono — phalmos, the “One-Eyed”.’
‘A priest?’
‘Philosopher, geographer and diplomat. The greatest explorer of our age. He’s sailed up the Nile to the pyramid at Giza, explored the palace at Petra, read manuscripts from Pergamum given by Mark Antony to Queen Cleopatra. He’s seen lapis lazuli mines in Persia, unicorn hunts in Arabia, clove and pepper plantations in India.’
‘You’re a Greek, too.’
‘Yes, sir. From Syracuse in Sicily.’
Fatigue quenched Vallon’s curiosity. The fire was nearly out. He lay down on the dirt floor and wrapped his cloak about him. Sleep wouldn’t come. The Sicilian was intoning a mass, the dirge merging with the droning wind.
Vallon hoisted himself on one elbow. ‘That’s enough. Your master’s at rest. Now let me take mine.’
‘I swore to keep him safe. And within a month, he’s dead.’
Vallon pulled his cloak over his head. ‘He is safe. Now go to sleep.’
He skated in and out of nasty dreams. Surfacing from one hagridden doze, he saw the Sicilian crouched over the Greek, sliding the ring from his master’s hand. He’d already removed the fine fur cloak. Vallon sat up.
Their eyes met. The Sicilian carried the cape across and arranged it over Vallon’s shoulders. Vallon said nothing. The Sicilian went back to his corner and stretched out with a groan. Vallon placed his sword upright on the ground and rested his chin on the pommel. He stared ahead, blinking like an owl, each blink a memory, each blink slower than the last until his eyes stayed closed and he fell asleep to the roar of the storm.
He woke to the dripping of water and mysterious muffled thuds. Daylight filtered through chinks in the walls. A mouse scurried from his side, where the Sicilian had laid white bread, cheese, some figs and a leather flask. Vallon took the meal to the door and stepped into scorching sunshine. Streams of meltwater braided the cliffs. Footprints ploughed a blue furrow towards animal pens. A slab of snow flopped from an overhang. Vallon squinted up at the pass, half-wondering if the party had reached the summit refuge. During his halt there, a monk had shown him an ice chamber stacked with the corpses of travellers withered in the postures in which they’d been dug from the snow. Vallon tilted the flask and swallowed tart red wine. A glow spread through him. When he’d eaten, he cleaned his teeth with a twig and rinsed out his mouth.
Only a spear’s throw from the hut, the gorge plunged into shadows. He went to the brink, loosened his breeches and pissed, aware that if his path last night had strayed by an arm’s span, he would now be a mash of blood and bones too deep in the earth even for vultures to find.
Back inside the hut he lit the lamp with flint and steel and gathered his possessions. The Greek lay like an effigy, hands folded on his chest.
‘I wish we’d had time to talk,’ Vallon heard himself say. ‘There are things you might be able to explain.’ A bitter taste filled his mouth and there was a deadness at his core.
A raven croaked overhead. Vallon bowed and blew out the lamp. ‘Maybe we’ll meet again, when death has laid his consoling hand on my heart.’
He padded towards the door and pulled it open to find the Sicilian waiting with a trim bay pony and a fine grey mule. Vallon almost smiled at the contrast between the youth’s mournful expression and the gaiety of his costume. He wore a wool cloak trimmed with blue satin, pointed shoes of laughable impracticality, and a soft round hat sporting a jaunty cockade. It wasn’t just fright that made his eyes bulge; nature had given him an expression of permanent startlement. He had a nose like a quill and the lips of a girl.
‘I thought you’d gone.’
‘What! Leave my master before committing him to rest?’
A proper burial was impossible in that stony ground. They laid him in a scrape overlooking the south and heaped rocks over him. The Sicilian planted a makeshift cross on the cairn. After praying, he gazed around at the peaks and glaciers.
‘He insisted on being buried where he died, but how bitter that a man who’s witnessed the glories of civilisation should lie in such a savage spot.’
A vulture trailed its hunger across the slopes. The clanking of cow bells floated up from distant pastures.
Vallon rose from his knees. ‘He chose his grave well. He has the whole world at his feet now.’ He mounted the mule and turned it downhill. ‘My thanks for the food.’
‘Wait!’
Deep drifts blocked Vallon’s path. It was like wading through icy gruel. But the foothills shimmered in hazy heat. By noon he would be riding over soft green turf. This evening he would dine on hot meat and blue-red wine.
‘Sir, I beg you.’
‘You have an uphill path. You’d better start now if you want to cross the pass by nightfall.’
The Sicilian caught up, panting. ‘Aren’t you curious to know what adventure set us on this path?’
‘On a lonely road, it’s not wise to confide in strangers.’
‘I was with my master for only three weeks. But his journey began two months earlier, at Manzikert.’
That checked Vallon. He’d first heard of Manzikert in an inn near the Rhone. Since then he’d been bumping into the story at every wayside halt, the tale growing wilder with each telling. Most accounts agreed that in late summer a Muslim army had defeated the Emperor of Byzantium at a place called Manzikert, on the eastern marches of Anatolia. Some travellers said that the Emperor Rom anus had been taken captive. Others that he was dead or deposed, that the pilgrim route to Jerusalem was closed, that the Muslims were camped outside the walls of Constantinople. Most alarming of all, these invaders weren’t Arabs, but a race of Turkoman nomads who had swarmed out of the east like locusts only a generation ago. Seljuks, they called themselves — half-man, half-horse, drinkers of blood.
‘Your master travelled with the Emperor’s army?’
‘As an adviser on the Turks’ customs. He survived the slaughter and helped negotiate ransom terms for the Byzantine lords and their allies. When that was done, he returned to Constantinople, took a ship to Italy and crossed to the monastery at Monte Cassino. One of his oldest friends is a monk there — Constantine of Africa.’ The Sicilian’s eyes bulged expectantly.
Vallon shook his head.
‘The most brilliant physician in Christendom. Before entering the monastery, he taught at the Salerno medical school. Where,’ the Sicilian declared, grinning with pride, ‘I’m a student. When Cosmas explained the purpose of his journey, Constantine selected me to be his secretary and travelling companion.’
Vallon must have raised his eyebrows.
‘Sir, I’m a promising physician. I’m well schooled in the classics and can speak Arabic. My French is adequate, you’ll agree. I also know geometry and algebra, and can expound the astronomical theories of Ptolemy, Hipparchus and Alhazen. In short, Constantine considered that I was qualified to minister to my master’s physical needs, and wouldn’t affront his intellect.’
‘It must,’ Vallon said, ‘be an extremely important mission.’
The Sicilian slid out a packet wrapped in linen.
Vallon removed a silk binder seeded with pearls and embroidered with gold. Inside were two manuscripts, one written in Roman letters, the other in an unfamiliar script, both stamped with a seal resembling a bow and arrow.
‘I’ve neglected my letters,’ he admitted.
‘The Persian document is a guarantee of safe passage through Seljuk territory. The Latin text is a ransom demand addressed to Count Olbec, a Norman magnate whose eldest son, Sir Walter, was taken prisoner at Manzikert. We’re — we were — on our way to deliver it.’
‘I’m disappointed. I thought you must be searching for the Holy Grail.’
‘What?’
‘Why would an old and ailing philosopher take such pains to secure the freedom of a Norman mercenary?’
‘Oh, I see. Yes, sir, you’re right.’ The Sicilian seemed flustered. ‘Cosmas had never visited the lands beyond the Alps. He planned to call on scholars in Paris and London. All his life he searched for knowledge at its source, however distant that might be.’
Vallon massaged his forehead. The Sicilian was giving him a headache. ‘Why burden me with information I don’t want?’
The Sicilian cast his eyes down. ‘After contemplating my predicament, I’ve concluded that I lack the constitution to complete the assignment on my own.’
‘You should have consulted me earlier. I could have spared you a sleepless night.’
‘I’m aware that I lack your martial skills and courage.’
Vallon frowned. ‘You don’t imagine that I’ll take on the mission?’
‘Oh, I have no intention of turning back. I’ll serve you as loyally as I would have served Cosmas.’
Anger rose in Vallon’s face. ‘You insolent pup. Your master’s hardly cold in the ground and already you’re fawning around for another.’
The Sicilian’s cheeks burned. ‘You said you were a soldier for hire.’ He fumbled inside his tunic. ‘I’ll pay for your service. There.’
Vallon hefted the leather purse, loosened the drawstring and dribbled silver coins into his palm.
‘Dirhams from Afghanistan,’ the Sicilian said. ‘But silver is silver no matter whose head it wears. Is it enough?’
‘The money will run through your fingers like sand. There’ll be bribes to pay, armed escorts to hire.’
‘Not if I ride under your protection.’
Vallon made allowance for the Sicilian’s youth. ‘Suppose I agree. In a month or two I’d be back at this spot no better off than you see me now.’ He lobbed the purse across and continued on his way.
The Sicilian caught up with him. ‘A lord as grand as Olbec will reward you well for bringing him news of his heir’s deliverance.’
Vallon scratched his ribs. The hut had been crawling with vermin. ‘Never heard of him.’
‘With respect, that means little. Norman adventurers rise to glory from nothing. In my own short life they’ve conquered England and half of Italy. Here’s the seal of Olbec’s house.’
Vallon glanced at a medallion stamped with the image of an equestrian knight. ‘Your master wore another ring.’
After a moment’s hesitation the Sicilian withdrew it on a cord from inside his tunic. ‘I don’t know what kind of jewel it is, only that it’s as old as Babylon.’
The colours of the gemstone slithered according to how Vallon angled it to the light. Without thinking, he slipped the ring on.
‘Cosmas used it to predict the weather,’ the Sicilian said. ‘Now the jewel appears blue, but yesterday, well before the storm, it turned as black as midnight.’
Vallon tried to remove the ring.
‘Keep it,’ the Sicilian said. ‘It will be an advantage to know under what conditions you’ll engage the enemy.’
‘I don’t need magic to tell me how to plan a battle.’
But as hard as he tried, Vallon couldn’t twist the ring off. He had an image of the Greek’s cunning stare. ‘Before your master died, he passed you something. What was it?’
‘Oh, that. Only a copy of Constantine’s guide for travellers, the Viaticum peregrinantis. I have it here,’ the Sicilian said, patting his saddlebag. ‘In a casket containing healing herbs and medicines.’
‘What else?’
The Sicilian produced a filigreed brass disc similar to one Vallon had lifted from a Moorish captain he’d killed in Castile.
‘It’s an astrolabe,’ the Sicilian explained. ‘An Arab star guide.’
Next he showed Vallon an ivory plaque with a conical pin at its centre and a border of geometric carvings. Onto the pin he placed a small iron model of a fish.
‘Master Cosmas obtained it from a Cathay merchant on the Silk Road. The Chinese call it a south-pointing mysterious fish. Observe.’
Holding the device at arm’s length, he moved it in a semicircle, first one way, then the other. He wheeled his pony and repeated the demonstration.
‘You see, wherever I position myself, the fish remains constant, pointing to the south. But every direction has its opposite. And the opposite of south is north — the way my path lies.’
‘And mine leads south, so let’s agree the double pointer is a guide for each of us.’
The Sicilian clung like a burr. ‘You said you were riding to the wars. There are wars in the north, too. Ride with me and you’ll ride in comfort.’
‘If I wanted comfort, I’d have cut your throat and taken your silver.’
‘I wouldn’t speak so frankly if I wasn’t certain of your character.’
‘I’ve stolen your master’s mule.’
‘A gift. I can’t handle two mounts. Besides, a knight shouldn’t travel on foot.’
‘Who said I was a knight?’
‘Your speech and noble bearing. That splendid sword you carry.’
It was like being pestered by flies. Vallon reined in. ‘I’ll tell you the difference between north and south. First, I prefer to do my fighting in the sun, not slogging in the mud. Second, I can’t return to France. I’m an outlaw. Any man who takes me will receive the same bounty as if he’d delivered a wolf’s head. I don’t mind dying in combat, but I’ve no wish to meet my end hanging in a village square while some pork butcher pulls out my entrails and holds them up for my inspection.’
The Sicilian bit his downy lip.
‘You’re right about one thing,’ said Vallon. ‘You’re too tender for the task. I’ll let you follow me as far as Aosta. Take the ransom note to the Benedictines. For a few of those coins, they’ll post it from abbey to abbey. It will reach Normandy long before you could deliver it.’
The Sicilian looked back at the pass. ‘My master said a journey uncompleted is like a story half-told.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. A journey’s a tiresome passage between one place and another.’
The Sicilian’s eyes swam. ‘No. I must go on.’
Vallon heaved a sigh. ‘Payment for my advice,’ he said, holding up the finger banded by the ring he couldn’t take off. ‘Sell that pretty pony and buy a nag. Exchange your gay costume for pilgrim drab. Shave your head, carry a staff and mumble prayers. Join an escorted company and only sleep in hospices. Don’t blab about ransoms or wave coins and alchemists’ toys about.’ He flicked the mule’s reins. ‘We’re done.’
He thought he’d ridden clear when the Sicilian’s dismal postscript lodged.
‘The Count’s lands aren’t in Normandy. He fought with Duke William in the English campaign. His fief’s in England. Far to the north.’
Vallon laughed.
‘I know I won’t reach it on my own.’
‘Then we part in agreement.’
‘That’s why I was so heartened when Master Cosmas promised you would be my guide and protector.’
Vallon whirled.
‘With his dying breath, he said fortune had appointed you to lead the way.’
‘Appointed? He was sick in his wits!’ Vallon wrenched off the cape. ‘I won’t wear a dead man’s mantle.’ He made another futile attempt to remove the ring. ‘Don’t say another word. Don’t follow me another step. If you do … ’ He slapped the mule’s neck, squeezed its flanks.
It wouldn’t budge. It rolled its eyes and laid its ears back.
Vallon booted its ribs.
The beast reared. In the moment it took him to regain control, Vallon heard a muted fracture. From the nearest summit to the west a cornice fell like a severed wing and exploded into fragments that skipped and bounded into the valley. The slope began to crawl, accelerating, until the whole snowfield was sliding. The mass surged across the valley floor and smashed against the opposite side in a cloud of frozen surf.
When Vallon’s ears stopped ringing, the first thing he heard was a noise like pebbles clicking together. A black-and-red bird flirted on a rock, cocking its tail and fluttering its wings. Vallon knew that if the Sicilian hadn’t delayed him, he would have been right in the path of the avalanche.
Twice in the last twenty-four hours, fate had steered him away from what he deserved. There had to be a reason. His shoulders slumped.
‘Show me that pagan contraption again.’
He played with the compass, but couldn’t outwit its mechanism. Magic or trickery, it didn’t matter. Whatever direction he took, in the end he would find what he was looking for, or it would find him.
‘If I employ you as my servant, you’ll learn to curb your tongue.’
The Sicilian hung the cloak about Vallon. ‘Gladly. But with your permission, when the road is lonely and the night long, I’ll entertain you with tales from the ancients. Or, since you’re a military man, perhaps we could discuss strategy. Recently, I’ve been reading Polybius’s account of Hannibal’s campaigns.’
Vallon gave him a look.
‘And if you should fall ill, I’ll restore you to health by the grace of God. In fact, I’ve already diagnosed your condition.’
‘Oh, yes?’
‘The melancholy cast of your features, your restless sleep — those are the symptoms of lovesickness. Tell me I’m right. Tell me that you lost your lady to another and mean to win her back by feats of arms.’
Vallon bared his teeth. ‘Can you make a hanged and quartered man skip?’
The Sicilian’s expression turned solemn. ‘Only God can perform miracles.’
‘Then start praying we aren’t caught in France.’
Vallon steered the mule around, not sure which of them was the dumber weathercock. The gem on his finger mirrored the flawless sky. The prospect of retracing his steps freighted his feelings with lead.
‘You’d better tell me your name.’
If the Sicilian had worn a tail, it would have been wagging. ‘My lord, I’m called Hero.’