The Crescent and the Cross

By S. J. A. Turney

An epic battle of the Reconquista; a personal struggle to survive; a fight for glory.

War is brewing, and the Pope has summoned a crusade. The nations of Christendom are rallying to fight the Almohad caliphate, but they are a formidable foe.

Meanwhile, behind Moorish lines, a fortress held by Castile is under siege. As the siege falls, a knight is lost. Arnau leaves on a dangerous, near-suicidal quest to save him, a new squire in tow.

In the heat of the sierras though, things are not as they seem. War is coming to Iberia and all will be tested. Arnau’s sword arm will need practice, as will his mind.

A riveting and brutal historical adventure, the latest instalment of S.J.A Turney’s Knights Templar series, perfect for fans of Bernard Cornwell and Conn Iggulden.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Canelo Adventure
• Release date: Jul 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9781788633123

S. J. A. Turney

S.J.A. Turney is an author of Roman and medieval historical fiction, gritty historical fantasy and rollicking Roman children's books. He lives with his family and extended menagerie of pets in rural North Yorkshire.

Book preview

The Crescent and the Cross. S.J.A. Turney

1. The Saviour Castle

13 September 1211, Fortress of Salvatierra, Southern Castile

The morning sun already shone bright, issuing a blistering heat, as Brother Martin Calderon climbed the last few steps and emerged onto the flat top of the Tower of the Resurrection. The simple merlons of the battlements glowed gold in the light, dazzling Martin after the gloom of the staircase. As he approached the parapet where Brother Tomas leaned on the ramparts, he felt the familiar queasiness take him, his stomach churning and his head light. The tower was tall, the tallest in the castle, perched at the north-west corner, but that was just the tip of it, for a craggy rock sat beneath the tower, itself rising from a lower set of heavy fortifications which in turn sat on another jagged cliff face before the slope flattened out to the rocky, brown, shrub-strewn land far below the vertiginous slope.

Salvatierra, home fortress of the most sacred Order of Calatrava, rose like a bastion of golden-brown towers above a craggy ridge in the most fiercely contested and dangerous land in the entire peninsula, eighty miles south of Toledo and at least nominally in Moorish lands, outside the recognised border of Castile. The monastic knights of the Order, given legitimacy by Papal Bull, retained a loyalty to the crown of Castile that was surpassed only by their fealty to the Lord and the Church, and their position here at the very forefront of the fight spoke eloquently of their Christian strength but also of their worldly loyalties.

‘Any changes?’

He tried to force down the sickening effects of the vertigo and concentrated on the shapes down there on the plain as Brother Tomas shook his head. The caliph’s army filled the parched lands into the distance all around the castle, as they had done since the investiture of the siege back in July, ten weeks ago now. An endless sea of tents lay in the distance, safely out of the range of artillery, despite the fact that the Order had run out of ammunition for their machines two weeks ago, and now loosed them only sparingly, loaded with pieces of stone hacked out of demolished buildings inside the castle walls.

Closer by, units of Almohad warriors stood watching behind their temporary defensive line that surrounded the castle. The archers stood silent and watchful, aware of their inability to reach any useful height with their weapons. As Martin fought the dizziness, the morning of the seventy-second day of the siege began more or less as all the others had done.

At regular intervals along a high ridge on the far side of a narrow valley to the south-east of Salvatierra’s crag sat al-manjanīqāt, trebuchets with heavy counterweights, capable of hurling massive missiles extraordinary distances. Initially the commander of Salvatierra had laughed at the Moors’ temerity, for it seemed that no siege engine could hope to cross that gap of over a thousand feet. It had taken less than a week for the caliph’s engineers to prove him wrong. They were the largest machines of their type anyone had ever seen, and they were clearly at the very edge of their range, yet one great boulder in every ten or fifteen launched from that ridge found a target. The lower walls on that side had succumbed swiftly, but the breach had been little more than an irritation, for the upper walls remained to thwart attack. Those higher defences had taken a lesser pounding over the months. Little critical damage had occurred, but the brothers would walk through the rooms on that side of the castle each day and note the narrow cracks in the walls and the dust that had shaken loose beneath the ceiling’s beams. The wall would hold for a long time yet, but eventually it would inevitably succumb.

The only important blow had clearly been a freak accident. Back in early August a rock had somehow managed to clip the very top of the wall, tearing out a section of battlements and crashing down into the bailey, demolishing the stables, which then became a source of ammunition for the castle’s own siege engines.

Now, as every other day, the caliph’s morning barrage began – a distant echo of thuds in a staccato burst along the ridge. From the Tower of the Resurrection, Martin could see the distant shapes of the weapons, but the missiles that mostly fell short were hidden behind the bulk of the castle from here.

Another volley would be starting up now, off to the north, at the far end of the long castle and out of sight from here. There the fortress’s numerous levels of defences descended the gradual slope of the crag to the level of the plains, and there was where the rest of the caliph’s weapons were sited, intent on demolishing successive levels of defences until finally the castle broke open.

In the first week of the siege, the Moors had made a major push for the main approach to Salvatierra, thinking to break the castle’s shell with ease. What they had not counted on was the level of preparedness within the Order. The commander had long expected this siege, cut off as they were from the rest of Christendom, and for months supplies had been pouring into Salvatierra, including additional manpower and the best teachers the Order could send. Every brother in the fortress had spent half a year putting aside his monastic duties with the master’s dispensation to devote all his time to perfecting the art of the artillerist and the crossbowman. The ban on the use of crossbows extended only against Christians, after all, and the caliph’s men had learned that to their cost in that first great folly. More than a thousand steel-clad men had assailed the castle’s main gate, only to be greeted by clouds of bolts from hidden archers and by a veritable rain of deadly debris from the artillery on the towers.

They had never committed such a huge force to an assault since. For the past few weeks, the caliph had sent only small forays over the rubble that was all that remained of the outer defences at the north, making a push for the third wall and its solid gate. Each time, they probed the defences in an attempt to determine whether another day’s barrage had weakened the place enough to consider a full-scale attack; to test the defenders, assessing whether they were close to exhausting their supply of missiles.

In truth, they were. Ten weeks ago, there had been scores of bolts for every crossbow in the place. Now each archer had only a dozen or so, and new ones were being manufactured slower than they were being used despite the effort bent to their production each day. The knowledge that time was running out was what had prompted the commander to send his riders. Five brothers had slipped out of the castle under the cover of darkness and made a break for it. Three had been caught by the besiegers, but Martin had watched with relief as two brothers escaped the lines and disappeared off to the north, tiny diminishing black shapes in the brown night. They had ridden to the king, seeking his assistance.

A stony crash announced a successful shot from the trebuchets on the ridge, and a cloud of dust rose into the air over at the eastern wall.

‘There,’ Tomas said, jabbing out towards the gathered forces with a finger. ‘It begins.’

Martin swallowed his nausea and peered down at the enemy. Riders were delivering orders, and as he expected, the barrage of artillery stopped, leaving an eerie silence in its wake. ‘Come on, Brother,’ Martin said, and moved to the staircase.

As the two men pounded down the steps towards the castle’s bailey, Tomas gave a sly smile over his shoulder at Martin. ‘I suspect there are times you regret abandoning your wench at Alcaniz and taking the vows, eh, Brother?’

Martin answered with a grunt. He didn’t want to think about Joana now. It wouldn’t help. How she had watched him go with a look of indescribable pain, her dreams of marriage and children torn away as her betrothed reneged on his vows to her in favour of what he deemed a higher calling. At least she would be safe, way off in the north-east. Not so, the occupants of Salvatierra.

‘We can last another four weeks, the commander reckons, but not if we run out of ammunition. Then we open ourselves to assault again.’

Once more Martin simply grunted. Sometimes, he felt, Brother Tomas talked simply for the love of hearing his own voice. They stepped out once more into the golden sun of the courtyard. Men were emerging at speed from other doors in preparation for the next phase of the daily routine. Brother Jorge stood at the armoury door, thrusting a crossbow into the hands of every man who ran past, each of them then sweeping up a quiver of bolts from the trestle.

Martin took the proffered weapon, snatched up the ammunition and followed Tomas and the others as they ran up another set of open-air steps and onto the wide wall that reached along a narrow spur of rock to the heavy, squat square shape of the Gabriel Tower, which overlooked the ruined outer gates and the third line of defence on the slope. Already a dozen men were at their positions beside arrow slits or behind the battlements on the tower top.

Martin Calderon found his favourite position, still enduring the churning of his gut at the sickening distance down to the defences below. He swallowed a mouthful of saliva and breathed slowly, eyes squeezed shut until the feeling passed again, then positioned himself carefully. A privy at the base of the tower had long since had its seat removed, granting the perfect field of view over the gateway below. Brother Pero had been the man to coin the phrase ‘shit on the Moor’ when he had done just that in the third week of the siege, causing a most unchristian roar of mirth around the tower. Pero had died the following week, taking an arrow through the throat at sunset. Since then, Pero’s privy had been a position of choice for revenge shots.

Sure enough, it was a matter of just a few minutes’ wait before figures came into view. Black-clad and white-clad, some in bright colours, some gleaming like heretical silver angels as they swarmed over the ruins of the outer defences.

‘Make every bolt count,’ came a commanding voice from the stairway above. ‘Don’t let them think we’re running out of bolts, but do not be wasteful.’

Rather unnecessary, really. Every man in Salvatierra knew the score.

‘God Almighty,’ came the master’s voice once more, this time raised in prayer. ‘Eternal, righteous, and merciful, give to us poor sinners to do for Thy sake all that we know of Thy will, and to will always what pleases Thee, so that inwardly purified, enlightened, and kindled by the fire of the Holy Spirit, we may follow in the footprints of Thy well-beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Give us, O Lord, a steadfast heart, which no unworthy affection may drag downwards; give us an unconquered heart, which no tribulation can wear out; give us an upright heart, which no unworthy purpose may tempt aside. Amen.’

The chorus of amens rose from the tower, a challenge to the figures swarming over the rubble below. Martin prepared his crossbow and loaded the bolt, sighting down through the stained privy. ‘West gate pier, thin and black with feathered spear,’ he called out, noting his target so that no one wasted a shot on the same man. Similarly, around the tower men labelled their own choice, a few uttering curses as men named the target they had been trained on, forcing them to select someone new.

They waited, tense. The front runners of that probing attack crossed the second wall, and as the last of the named figures passed into the latest killing zone, a whistle blew in the tower. With a cacophony of cracking noises, each crossbow’s string snapped tight, launching a steel-tipped shaft on an almost straight trajectory. It said much for the skill of the men the grand master had brought in to teach the weapon’s use that four in every five of those shots found a home in flesh.

What a brutal weapon, Martin reflected, as he watched his victim fall. No wonder the Pope had banned their use against fellow Christians. No armour was protection against their sheer power. The man he’d selected had worn a black cote over a mail shirt, but Martin had become cocky as he realised how good he was, and with this shot he had eschewed the mail, the bolt instead punching through the solid steel of the man’s helmet and embedding itself in his skull, slicing through the brain within. The figure toppled away, spear falling from his hand.

A second wave was coming now, and the men around the tower hurriedly loaded their crossbows once more. Each man, as he readied himself, called out his readiness, and once all were prepared the master paused, watching the assault progress as each man named his next target, and then gave another blast on his whistle. The bows released with a cacophony of cracks once more, and Martin clicked his tongue in irritation as his bolt slammed into the man’s shoulder, spinning him and throwing him aside. Martin knew he was better than that. It should have been a kill. Still, the man would be out of the battle, Martin consoled himself as he watched the Moor climb to his feet, clutching his shoulder, and scurry away the way he had come.

‘Ready…’ the master called. As the pause settled in weird silence, he filled the gap with praise. ‘An exceptional set of volleys, Brothers. The Lord guides your eye this day.’

A chorus of amens echoed around the tower once more. Each man had pulled away from his aperture now. Martin had dropped to one side, crouched by the privy wall, recovering from the constant nausea as the drop disappeared from view. The whole routine had become rote, and realistically every man could have done his duty here without the need for orders from above. Each day: two enemy waves into the breach, and then a party of talented Almohad archers would step out from their hiding places and attempt to sight the sources of the crossbow bolts, trying to pick off the Christian archers, covering the retreat of the footmen. Rarely a day passed without them finding a target now.

Martin crouched for a while, waiting for the tell-tale clatter of arrows against stone and a pained cry from somewhere around the walls and towers as a brother took an enemy missile. Still nothing happened. Not only no agonised shout, but not even the sound of arrows in flight. The format of the attacks had become so routine that any change seemed unthinkable, as though sunset had come and gone but the moon had decided not to rise.

A tense silence reigned, each man looking at his fellows with an expression of concern and uncertainty. Even the master could be heard fretting, from the sound of fingers drumming on leather. Finally, unable to bear it any longer, Martin rose and gingerly poked his head over the privy lip. Far from receiving an arrow in the face, he was baffled to note no sign of the caliph’s archers among the rubble. Something had changed. For a moment a shining hope thrilled through him. Had the king come? Surely…

Changing his angle of view, he peered into the distance, and quickly disabused himself of the notion even as his vision swam with the height. While the assault had been foreshortened and the archers remained undeployed, the Almohad army remained in position and drawn up in ranks. What was happening?

Standing, he hurried across to the doorway and dipped around the edge, just in case he had been mistaken and the archers were there, somewhere. Still no missile sought him, and he stepped into open view now, approaching the battlements of the wall with their unrestricted view. At the sight of his bold approach, another defender at the wall rose to look over the top. Sure enough, the attack had pulled back but nothing else seemed to have changed. Martin swallowed his nerves and gripped the stonework for steadiness as he peered down at the enemy. It took long moments scouring the Almohad ranks to identify what was happening.

To the north, past the ruin of the outer gates, the lines of besieging Moors were opening like a pair of drapes, pulling back from their rear ranks all the way down to the front lines, forming an empty corridor. At the far end, like Moses parting the waves, a black and white banner of the Almohad Caliph was carried forth by a man on a white horse. Behind him a party of brightly-coloured men in shining armour bore other banners. Martin’s heart thundered. A triple turreted golden tower on a field of red… the standard of Castile.

But if the king had sent men to help them, why then were the Almohads still in siege lines, and why were they being escorted through the ranks? Martin felt a weight settle upon him as he realised what this had to mean. The only thing it could be.

By the time he was moving, he was not alone. As he reached the plaza behind the inner gate, still strong and untouched, the place was crowded with expectant brothers, each silent in their apprehension. Among the brothers stood those few civilian locals who had sought refuge in the fortress at the arrival of the caliph’s army. Those who tended flocks in the hills and those, even occasional Moors, who had sought the protection of the Order against the rabid fanaticism of the new regime in Al-Andalus.

At a command from a master, the gate was unbarred and unblocked, and the great wooden leaves drawn inwards for the first time since the early days of the siege. The Almohad escort had stopped with his own forces just out of crossbow range, but the small party of knights rode carefully between the shattered remnants of the defences which rose like rocky fangs towards Heaven. Three knights and a small guard of their vassals. As they approached, their expressions were grave, seemingly confirming just what Martin now expected.

A frisson ran across his skin, a strange and unearthly feeling, a touch of the Divine upon his person, and he shivered at the meaning of it. He almost waited for the voice he knew was coming. The divine call that he had heard only once, but which had changed his life utterly, when an angel had come to him as a holy messenger whose voice had echoed within his head as clear as a sermon in church. He had been commanded by that divine voice to cast aside his earthly trappings and place his destiny with the Order. He had been in love with Joana, had dreamed of their future together at Alcaniz, and it had been no small thing to break their betrothal. But he knew without a shadow of doubt that the command had come from the Lord, and it had come to him and him alone, unheard by the others in the room. To have a destiny was to place one’s trust in the Lord.

Now, he felt that same tremor. His head seemed to fill with a golden light and the warm echo of harmonious song. Then it came, once again in the confines of his head and without the requirement of his ears. A solemn and yet soft and soulful voice.

‘Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies which the Lord shall send against thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all: and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until he have destroyed thee.’

Deuteronomy, twenty-eight, forty-eight. He reeled. No! How could he be asked such a thing?

He was still reeling, feeling that terrible, wonderful, all-consuming presence, as the small party of Christians approached the gate, passed through and reined in before the assembled brothers of the Order. The grand master, commander of all the forces of Salvatierra, took a step forwards, bowing his head. The elegantly dressed knight on the lead destrier matched the gesture, then straightened, speaking with a clear, carefully-measured voice.

‘Grand Master Ruy Díaz de Yanguas, I presume? I am Álvaro Núñez de Lara, alférez to his Majesty King Alfonso the eighth of Castile.’

‘God be praised for your arrival, sir,’ the grand master replied, guardedly.

‘Yes. Well. The situation is unfortunate,’ the nobleman said with clear levels of understatement. ‘His Majesty had hoped to come to your aid and, indeed, to use this great defence as the trigger of a great adventure against the Moor. Sadly, the forces he managed to gather were insufficient to field against the enemy, and will remain so without the Papal Bull calling for a crusade that would bind so many disparate factions together.’

‘The king is not coming.’

‘His majesty’s army remains at Talavera. In a desperate attempt to break the siege and to change the balance of power in the region, his Majesty dispatched the infante, Prince Ferdinand, with a strong force to raid the caliph’s lands, attempting to draw him off.’ The nobleman winced. ‘The raid failed drastically, and the infante fell in the fighting.’

‘His Majesty has our deepest sympathy for his loss,’ the grand master said, without a hint of irony.

‘It is the belief of the court that Salvatierra cannot hold out until the spring, and there can be no attempt to bring relief to this place before that. I am afraid Salvatierra is lost.’

The grand master’s eyes narrowed. ‘We do the Lord’s work here, even if we do so with one boot in the camp of the king. It is our duty as a bastion of Christ against the infidel to hold this place to the very last brother if we can.’

The nobleman looked troubled now. He had clearly expected some resistance. ‘His Majesty wishes to remind you that this castle was his gift to your order after the loss of Calatrava to the Almohad menace. As such he feels that this gives him sufficient moral authority to request that you give up your defence of it.’

‘The king cannot ask such a thing of us. It would be an affront to God to bow to the yoke of the caliph.’

‘The king is better acquainted with the turning of the world than you, good Brother,’ Núñez de Lara replied in an odd mix of confrontation and conciliation. ‘He would no more wish to hand Salvatierra over to the Moor than you, sir, but there is more at stake here than a castle. In the coming months the Pope is expected to call for the Crusade. When that happens, Aragon, Leon and Navarre will join us, and possibly Portugal and the Franks. The Temple has already pledged their support, as well as the Hospital, and the Order of Santiago. The army that will march against the caliph will be the greatest Iberia has ever seen. It would be foolish to squander the King’s right hand, your Order, here in a hopeless folly when he will have true need of you on the battlefield in the days to come. We do not ask this lightly, but what the king requests is for the benefit of all.’

The grand master still looked uncertain, unhappy. He glanced around at the gathered brothers, each of whom bore his own opinion openly on his face, all different, all conflicting. Martin knew what would happen. What must happen. He could still hear the final bars of that divine melody echoing around the back of his mind. He had to submit, and not only to the King’s order to surrender. Shalt thou serve thine enemies, the voice had told him, and that was most definitely not the king of Castile.

It came as absolutely no surprise when the grand master finally gave a regretful nod. ‘It shall be as you say, Alférez, and I pray that this day will grant us the path to victory you suggest. Have you pressed for terms?’

Núñez de Lara nodded. ‘The caliph is feeling merciful, or so he tells me. He has agreed to allow each member of the order to leave Salvatierra and return with us to Castile, carrying only what he can hold.’

The grand master sighed. ‘We must leave the horses?’

A nod.

‘This is a poor end to a devout defence of Christendom.’

‘It is not an end, Brother,’ the nobleman reminded him. ‘It is but a corner.’

‘Still it burns in the blood.’ The grand master turned slowly, addressing the gathered brothers. ‘You heard the alférez. We are granted free passage from this place with what we can carry. You know your duty. Do not delay. The caliph is a devious man, and may renege on his agreement at any moment.’

Wordlessly, the gathering broke up. Each man went to gather what was important to him. As Martin Calderon marched purposefully through the midst of the chaos, he watched men dropping the crossbows, which were bulky and only of real benefit in a siege. They would gather their weapons, their armour, their robes and effects, and whatever they could carry of value. The civilians among them would gather what possessions they cared to save.

Martin somehow knew, though, precisely what he needed to do. Broken by the yoke of the Almohad, he would have no need for sword and shield, for helmet and hauberk. Passing the entrance of the dormitories and the armoury, he walked into the spacious and austere chapel instead. The altar was basic and unadorned, the cloth upon it suited to a life of poverty and simplicity. The cross was no great gilt affair such as the bishops in the cities cleaved to. It was a simple wooden cross with an effigy of the weeping Christ upon it, and of all the more value for its plainness. Martin reached across the altar and gathered up the cross, hefting it onto his shoulder where he held it with reverence, hoping that this was no affront to the memory of the Christ who had carried a full-sized version around the Holy City to his place of execution.

Moments later he emerged from the church with the cross, otherwise dressed only in his mantle and mail and with his sword still buckled at his side. As he passed through the gathering of brothers, each carrying arms and armour and gold and treasures to keep out of the hands of the Moors, he garnered looks first of confusion, and then, with the dawn of understanding, of respect and reverence.

It took less than a quarter of an hour for the entire garrison to assemble once more at the gate, each with their burden of gear and treasures. Many looked at him oddly, clearly wondering why he had a free hand when he could be carrying something of use or value. Only Martin knew why.

He remained silent, preparing himself for what was to come, as the grand master gave the order and, at the heels of the royal embassy, the knights of the Order of Calatrava left their beleaguered fortress.

Martin Calderon was a son of the True Church and a man of unbridled faith. Once, years ago, he had abandoned everything he had loved in his mortal life at the call of the Lord, and now he was being called to do it again. He had no idea why he must submit to the Moor, and the very notion both appalled and terrified him, but the Lord had spoken and commanded him to do it, and he was not going to betray the command of God. With luck, one day his brothers would understand.

They emerged beyond the ruins of the outer defences and into that nerve-wracking open ground before the lines of the Almohad multitude. There was a truly strange silence. The breeze was barely noticeable and yet managed to blow enough to make a pennant snap flat, the sound echoing across the plain. That wide passage through the enemy lines remained. As they approached, the king’s man spoke quietly. ‘This is an uneasy peace and a fragile agreement. Offer neither insult nor resistance, lest you condemn us all.’

In the silence of his head, Martin addressed the Lord. Please, Heavenly Father, do not bring suffering to these men for what I must do, for it is in Your name that I do it.

In that weird, uneasy stillness the column of knights and their companions moved, the only sounds the occasional flap of a flag, the rustle and shush of men standing at attention and the crunch of boots on grit as the brothers of Salvatierra trudged, disconsolate but proud, between the ranks of the enemy who had kept them fastened up in the fortress for so many months. Of the few Moors among the refugees, two broke from the column and hurried towards the nearest Almohad commanders, hands raised in surrender, babbling placations in their own tongue. The others remained in place, trudging forwards, eyes locked only on the men in front, preferring subservience to a Christian to that of a zealot from their own kind.

As they moved into the gap, Martin’s eyes strafed the lines of Almohad infantry. It did not take long to find what he was looking for. There were plenty of