With what he saw as a workable arrangement to proceed, it was time to ensure that if he did succeed, he should be the beneficiary — that the law of conquest he had sought to gain before was agreed, and in that he ran into a wall as stout as those of Antioch. His fellow Princes would not deviate from the notion of shared possession, while Tancred remained the only person he could be open with about his frustrations.
‘There is a furtive tone when the subject is raised. Godfrey de Bouillon apart, I cannot help but think that others are on the same path as we and for the same purpose.’
‘Then why not agree to what you propose?’
‘Believe me, if they are scheming the time will come when, close to fruition and sure they will be the one that gains and that they have allies in place to support them, the right of conquest will be accepted.’
‘Raymond?’
‘Is, I grant you, the most likely, but Vermandois will be conniving, even if he has already had his fingers scorched. Our Robert of Normandy could buy back his duchy from his brother with half the revenues of Antioch, so he too will be conspiring.’
‘Such a loss does not mean an end to opportunity, there is still Jerusalem, which is ten times a richer capture than Antioch and will be a fief to covet in Christian hands.’
That had to be acknowledged; Jerusalem produced massive revenues from pilgrims in bad times and Muslim hands; once back under the way of the true faith it would return wealth in untold quantities.
‘If I have plunder to gain there I have little else, certainly not power.’
There for the first time, as far as his nephew was concerned, Bohemund had been open about his desire for domains, not just gold and silver.
‘You cannot be sure of that.’
‘Tancred, Jerusalem is no different to Antioch. Once captured how is it to be held?’
‘By Crusaders.’
‘In joint control, like Antioch?’ There was no option for Tancred but to nod. ‘It will not do. Where has such a thing as joint ownership of a fief led to anything but jealousies and dissension? All that kept my Uncle Roger and my father from conflict was the separation of the Straits of Messina. Whichever city you speak of it must be under the control of a single authority. Do not be fooled by the forced agreement we have enjoyed so far — that has been fed by necessity and some success. Once in Jerusalem, with the Crusade complete, that will not hold and the only solution is to hand the Holy City over to one of our number.’
‘Which will not be you.’
Bohemund smiled. ‘No, there is only one man who would justify selection, one of the council who would be content to stay and hold Palestine.’
‘Godfrey de Bouillon?’
‘I think that the case. Raymond is rich already and would not want to abandon his Provencal domains. Robert wants his Duchy of Normandy back, and the capture of Jerusalem will so raise him in wealth and standing, not even his brother William Rufus would be able to hold out against a successful Crusader with the Pope on his side and he would be bound by oath to leave Robert be.’
‘Vermandois?’ Tancred joked, which got a snort of derision.
‘No, Godfrey sold nearly all he possessed to come on Crusade and he is a good man as well as true. If we do end up in the Holy City, I will expend every sinew to make sure that he is given whatever title is agreed upon and holds Jerusalem as his own fief.’
‘If you can carry the principle, no one will dare vote for anyone but him.’
‘I look forward to seeing Raymond of Toulouse’s face when Ademar, a man he thinks his pet bishop, does just that.’
News had come from some of their eastern Armenian allies of another Muslim army being raised to come to the relief of Antioch and it was soon established that it was not being gathered — it was complete and ready to march in numbers that beggared the imagination; this had happened before and been proved to be much exaggerated, a point made by the Duke of Normandy, but it was decided to send out scouts to verify what the council were being told. The information that came back was worse than confirmation. Whatever threats they had faced up till now this was the greatest; the Turkish host was said to be beyond calculation and under the command of a formidable and experienced general called Kerbogha, and the conclusion drawn by Ademar was sobering.
‘Up till now we have faced the forces of two brothers who hate each other and so they have only ever been able to bring to the field a part of the available Muslim strength. This host is different: it has been ordered to assemble by the Sultan of Baghdad and is led, I am told, by the Atabeg of Mosul.’
‘This Kerbogha is a name that means nothing to me,’ said Vermandois.
‘It means a great deal to our Armenian allies, Count Hugh,’ Ademar insisted, ‘enough to strike terror into their souls and they begged us not to think the numbers are embellishment, but insisted it is three to four times the strength of anything we have yet faced, which our own scouts have confirmed.’
‘Only if you choose to believe it,’ Raymond said. ‘Even our men can be blinded by sights they think they see.’
‘My Lord of Toulouse, I admit I am still a tyro in matters military, but what would be the point of sending another army to dislodge us from Antioch if it were merely of the same size as those we have already beaten? My information from the Armenians tells me that the Seljuk Sultan has finally decided to brush us off the face of the earth and has ensured his commander has the numbers to do so.’
‘Will Byzantium aid us?’ asked Robert of Normandy.
This only proved to Bohemund he had yet to understand Alexius Comnenus, who would fear that such a host would turn on him if he took the field. ‘Let us say it would be unlikely.’
‘So,’ Godfrey de Bouillon interjected, ‘if we must fight this Kerbogha, and what we are told is proved to be the case, we must do so with every man we can muster.’
No more explanation was required; that meant lifting the siege and marching to do battle and with no guarantee that the Crusaders would win, which was an even more sobering prospect, for they still lacked enough horses of the kind that could stand in battle. It had always been a known fact that they had only successfully sustained their Crusade and got this far due to dissension between the Muslims, it being common knowledge that if they put aside those differences the numbers they might have to face would be staggering.
If the Sultan of Baghdad had hitherto see advantage to his own security in that family discord — men who fought each other could not combine to depose him — he obviously now saw the men around Antioch as the greater threat and he had the authority to force others to put aside their disputes and join in a counter-crusade.
‘If we were within the walls of Antioch, this general the Sultan so esteems would have to besiege us.’
Every eye was upon Bohemund when he said that and all held the same expression. They were not inside.
‘We have no prospect of that,’ Ademar said, but there was a lack of conviction in his voice, a suspicion perhaps that a member of the devious family de Hauteville would not have said such a thing lightly.
‘My Lords, I return to my previous plea that the common laws of conquest be applied, that whoever’s banner flies over Antioch when we are within its gates has the right to claim it as their possession. I have not to this point alluded to what anyone of us must have sought, namely a way of entry by betrayal, but I would ask that we be open now and tell each other what contacts we have made for such a purpose.’
‘You seem sure that the Lords assembled have done such a thing?’ Ademar responded, clearly displeased.
‘It is out of admiration for my peers that I think they are not so foolish as to have set aside the notion or that they have not sought to pursue it. And to prove my own sincerity in this I have very recently made contact with an Armenian commander willing to surrender to me a tower.’