Godfrey of Bouillon spoke next. ‘Whatever the Holy Lance brings to our cause, Count Bohemund has the right of it. We stay here within the walls and starve like curs or we die like men in battle.’
‘Outside the walls,’ Bohemund insisted.
This was said with a grateful look at Godfrey, whose views carried weight. That there was mutual regard was true; Bohemund, with the aid of Tancred, had, a year past, saved Godfrey’s life when he was about to be killed by a bear that had already savaged him severely. Yet he would not grant an opinion based on gratitude just for the sake of that; if Godfrey spoke it was with honesty.
‘We can barely muster a hundred fit horses,’ Raymond protested.
‘And if we had ten thousand I would not employ them. To go to Kerbogha would be fatal, for that allows him to choose the field of battle, something my forebears taught me was always a flawed notion. Let us choose where we fight, let us make him come to us and let us fight on foot as we did at Dorylaeum.’
‘Which you would have lost without we came to your relief.’
‘We held for a day and would have held for another,’ Normandy barked, for no knight liked his deeds to be belittled and the Normans had held off a Turkish force that massively outnumbered them. ‘The enemy you and your companions chased from the field was one we had much diminished.’
In truth it had been nip and tuck: Bohemund and Duke Robert, riding ahead from Nicaea with a third of the crusading host to ease the problem of supply, had been caught unawares by a force of Turks, led by the Sultan of Rum. Bold action by the Duke and Bohemund, leading their own familia knights, had blunted the initial assault, but it was only sheer bloody-mindedness and ability that had got them out from the men who eventually surrounded them.
Their actions gave Tancred time to get the rest of the host, pilgrims included, into a place the Normans could defend. Retiring into a nearby marsh, with a soft crust of ground that would negate the Turkish cavalry, they had been forced to fight on foot until relief came, which it did when Raymond, Godfrey, Flanders and the Bishop of Puy arrived to chase their attackers away. That had ended in a rout for the Sultan and the capture of much booty.
‘There is still hope that Kerbogha was lying,’ Count Hugh insisted, as if Normandy had not spoken. ‘Alexius might bring the might of Byzantium to our aid.’
Ademar cut off any scoffing by saying quickly to Vermandois that it was a very tenuous thing to hope for and gave ground when Bohemund took up the discussion again.
‘The promises of Alexius Comnenus are worthless — all he has ever been concerned with is the integrity of his empire.’
Nor did he stop at that, for it was time to tell the truth, however unpalatable it was to listen to. How many times had Bohemund been tempted to tell them this, to show how little trust they should place in the word of a Byzantine emperor, whoever he was and regardless of his winning manner? He could speak his mind instead, acting in a manner that he had been obliged to curb since their first council.
They had been dazzled by Byzantine magnificence and saw virtue where there was corruption and deceit, this driven home by a harsh assessment of the Emperor’s motives. If the Crusade aided him, taking back the old Byzantine possessions from the Seljuk Turks and handing them over to him, such offerings would be gratefully received. If, however, they died in the attempt, that was a loss with which Alexius could live, for in doing so they must diminish those who could threaten him, quite apart from the fact that they might themselves represent a future menace.
‘I fear,’ Ademar responded, ‘and it gives me no joy to admit it, that you may speak the truth.’
‘Mark it, My Lord Bishop, as no lie, for if it was not so, why is Alexius no threat to Kerbogha?’
The weary-looking cleric cast a glance around the assembly, as if seeking someone to refute what Bohemund had said, but not even Raymond was prepared to challenge a man who knew Byzantium too well. Having waited for what seemed an age, Ademar finally set things in motion again.
‘Do you have a way of proceeding to suggest, Count Bohemund?’ That got a sharp nod. ‘Then perhaps it would be a notion to outline your thinking to all present.’
Which he proceeded to do, and if it was bold as a plan it was also, if it failed, a route to certain annihilation. Many times it had to be restated that such a fate awaited them regardless of how they acted, and after much discussion it was agreed that to die by wasting away was not a fitting death for men of such stature, while those of lesser rank would follow either from the same feeling or because they had enough belief in God or relics like that which Raymond displayed to them.
‘Let them see the Holy Lance before the battle,’ Bohemund suggested, for if he was cynical himself he knew that others were not. ‘And let them kiss it if they so desire.’
Toulouse reacted as if the smelly mob was being invited to plant their lips on him.
‘But let us put my plan in execution and place our faith in our abilities.’
Put to the vote it was agreed, then came the vexed question of who was to lead, that immediately countered by the suggestion from Raymond that they should, as they had in the past, command their own contingents.
‘No!’ Bohemund maintained and not with much tact. ‘Such a battle requires one leader, one general, for a divided command will not serve.’
‘And no doubt, Count Bohemund, you see yourself in that position?’
‘I have a plan, Count Raymond, do you?’
That would have descended into unseemly wrangling if Godfrey de Bouillon had not spoken out forcefully. ‘I will say, without equivocation, that I will not assent to take my men into this battle under anyone else but Count Bohemund!’
‘He saved your life once, Duke Godfrey,’ Toulouse scoffed, ‘do not be so sure he will do so again.’
The reply was stinging and would have seen a sword drawn if it had come from anyone else.
‘I have often wondered if you are capable of being a fool, Count Raymond, now I know it to be so. You are a puissant lord, a famous knight, but do you think the Turks whisper in terror of you in the dark of the night? I know they do not fear my name any more than did Alexius Comnenus. He feared Bohemund de Hauteville, not anyone else of our number and I think our enemies know best of him and his deeds to be likewise affected. It is his banner that will draw their gaze, therefore let the man who has brought us to this conclusion and has at least a plan have the command.’
‘For the very good other reason,’ Robert of Normandy cut in, ‘that amongst us he is by any measure the best and most experienced general.’
‘You would serve under a man who owes you fealty?’
‘Better that than die under one in whom I repose no faith.’
That was like a slap to Toulouse, really the only other contender, and he was angry. Yet he was no fool despite what Godfrey had said and to put it to a vote was to lose. Flanders would go with his brother-in-law of Normandy, which only left Vermandois to back the Provencal case to the leadership, Ademar only having a casting vote if it was required. With a sharp nod and still holding his relic, he left the room.
‘Then,’ Ademar said, ‘it is needful that we say a Mass for our hopes.’
When it came to a choice of where to fight a battle, Bohemund had always been aware he was not gifted with much choice. Without horses he could not attack an enemy camped so far off from Antioch and, as he had said, would not have done so even if he was well supplied with mounts — that left the actual point of contact too open to chance. On foot he dare not stray too far from the security of the city walls, so all that was left was to use those as an anchor.
His aim was to deploy in such a way that would invite Kerbogha to attack him, but just to get what was left of the crusading army out through the Bridge Gate was hard enough and, despite his feelings, that seemed to require a strong body should be left behind to mask the citadel, thus weakening what could be put in the field and that he declined to do. The notion that it be left unguarded alarmed more than the men he led: Toulouse, who scoffed at any suggestion the Count of Taranto put forward, was vocal in his scorn.