The Templar’s Bowl

 

by
Peter “Lou” D’Alessio
Copyright © 2011

 

Chapter 18: Two Knights on One Horse

 

I have seen more than a man should see, even with four lifetimes.  I have seen men covered in oil burning like a candle, I have seen bodies cleaved in two, whole battlefields of dead and dying in pieces who neither cared nor desired to know which side was winning as they leapt into God’s or Allah’s hands for their final judgments.  As each century of my lifetimes passed, mankind learned all the more and all the better how to kill himself and his fellows, a scientific or practical change here or there, which even with Inquisitions or Mosques opposing them could not be stopped or denied.  Rather, we seemed to insist that God or Allah’s purpose for us was to kill each other as efficiently as we could.  All that seemed to remain constant down through the centuries were the woman and children who sat by quietly and helplessly on the sides of humanity, waiting for an unfair death from starvation for lack of a man at the plow or by a frenzied enemy who considered their foes to be any who would not agree with their philosophy, religion, or even the color of their clothing.

As I sat in my chair peering and peeking out the back door window in expectation of my friends to retrieve me, my heart ached inside.  I told myself that I had seen it all, the death and the pain.  There was nothing in the universe that could surprise me.  I was wrong, very wrong.

I sat and no one came.  I remember that spring evening forever ago and how cold the air felt that night, and still not a holy soul came to get me.  At last I fell asleep in my chair.  When I awoke, time was reaching out for the final hour of the day.  Without pause I stood, remembered reality, and grabbed quickly for the doorknob to keep myself from falling.  Yet, I did not fall.  The face reflected darkly in the window was that of a Knight who had just taken his vows of knighthood.  I stood there wondering who that face belonged to.  I wondered why he was dressed for battle except for his weapons.  In my ears was the growing sound of shod horses moving to the east and to war.  I stepped through the door to the porch.  I peered into the night.  Through the darkness, a single rider quietly approached me.

Our society, through the centuries, has built an image of the White Knight who rides into the darkness of night or the shadows of sin to forge a happily-ever-after.  Young maidens pray for their White Knight to rescue them from the a fearsome dragon, to carry them far away to a castle in a land where by King’s decree the rain may never fall ’till after sunset.  We ask our sons to be the knight on the white horse, to ride up carrying a sword of justice in one hand and the shield of righteousness in the other.  Yet nobody in our world can conceive that this mysterious White Knight is in fact a Templar.  It is seeded in truth.  A Templar riding up is an intense vision, and his intent is to be your sword and shield.  It is a sight not easily forgotten, and has been a mainstay of our literature since the Middle Ages.

Through the lifetime I shared with Beaumond, I had always ridden at his side.  As he approached, even with the bucket Templar helmet on his head, I knew who it was... and he was an awesome vision to behold!  Here was a man who was prepared to die yet again for his beliefs.  An interesting conundrum: could a spirit be allowed to die a second time?

The great mounted vision stopped in front of me.  He leaned forward, offered me an arm up, and we became two Knights on one horse.  He turned the animal towards the great cave.  As we began to emerge from the forest, a huge swarm of mounted cavalry swirled about us in a great circle as they fell into formation.  I saw Hamet and Theo passing out swords and other weapons beyond count—not to Templars, but to Teutonic Knights.  Hundreds upon hundreds appeared out of the obscurity of darkness.  Eerie and silent specters in their black crosses and white cloaks, they were almost invisible against the snow and icy gloom of the northern tundra.

Once, as living men, they had gone before a monk to receive a final blessing before battle.  Now, as spirits, they did so again.  Then they leaned down from their mounts to take hold of a great sword from the treasures of the cave.  Theo handed up the weapons and McCorvy, with his little red bowl filled with holy water, splashed their outward commitment to their God in the pattern of the cross upon them.  I could feel the anger that radiated from these ghosts of ages long gone as they passed us to join their units.

Hamet looked up and waved Beaumond and me into the cave.  Neither spoke a word as we entered into the candle-lit fissure.  Halfway to the treasure room had been placed a small makeshift table whereupon maps appeared to be spread.  Men leaned above them, straining their eyes at the chicken scratching on the parchments.

I kept my eyes lowered as I approached them.  My mind was spinning.  In all the wars they and I had fought through, we battled for an abstract belief in God.  For sure, most knights and soldiers had offered only lip service to God and fought for what they could put in their hands or carry off on their backs.  But these men here now were not most knights and soldiers; they fought their wars believing that their greatest weapon and shield was God, whose rod and staff would protect and defend them.  If their reward for believing was death, Deus le volt!

But now in the twentieth century, ages past their day, wars of unimaginable destruction and terror had changed the nature of conflict.  It was no longer a face-to-face test of speed and strength, and God was not to be found almost anywhere on these battlefields.  Millions were rounded up to be slaughtered and the score was kept—the absolute obliteration of an enemy nation would soon be possible, no doubt, so they killed just to kill, rolling up the numbers.  We as a race in the twentieth century got off to a grand start in the First Great War with flamethrowers, machine guns mustard gas, and airplanes raining bombs from the sky.  Worst of all, there was no honor left in battle—merely nations and ideologies clashing in a ferocious explosion.  How would I explain all this if the Templars asked me?

When Geofray stopped suddenly in front of me, I nearly toppled over him.  “ ’Way, paisan, still have your head up your ass?” I heard an old familiar voice say, and another old and familiar voice gruffly answer, “And this be the man sent to lead us!”  My heart filled with the joy warriors feel knowing old comrades still lived—if such as they were indeed alive!  “Askold... Roger.”  I nodded at them.  The other men at the table shifted into the candlelight.  Egil and Gardar Helgi stood there, leaning on the near wall, grinning at me.  I was told later that, as they were not of the war council, they were not allowed entrance to the cave and certain Teutonic Knights tried to block their way.  There is something about two angry Vikings drawing axes that can reverse even the best-intentioned order.  I was truly glad they had also returned.  Betwixt them sat an aged, dark figure pondering a map of the more northern coastlines of Canada and beyond.  As if in a reverie, he never looked up.  By the black cross on his white cloak and other non-Templar like adornments, I knew him as a Teutonic Knight and probably a Hochmeister, or High Master, the leader of his Order.  His face was familiar to me, but I knew not from where, nor could I recall his name.

During the last crusade, more or less, the Teutonic Knights had separated from the ranks of Saint John’s Hospitalers around 1190 (as I can best recollect).  On February 6, in the year 1191, Pope Clement III gave his blessing to the order in a great ceremony which included the head of the Crusader Army in the Holy Lands, heads of both the Templars (of which Theo and I were counted a part) and other Orders, and granted the Teutonic Knights a Black Cross upon the left shoulder of a white cloak as their symbol.  As friend and confidant to Frederick II of Germany, and by virtue of their great religious fervor, valor in battle, and healing skills afterwards, by 1217 the Order had attained equal status with both Hospitalers and Templars.  And the two related Orders oft times did not agree with the Templars on how to proceed, we did not always... mesh?

De Flor, in the red and black of a Templar Sergeant, tapped on the table and motioned to the German Knight to look up.  “Richard,” he began, “I believe you’ve met the Magister Domus Sancte Marie Theutonicoram Jerusoslomitani... Von Salza.  He’ll be leading the land forces supporting you.”

Oh, yes.  That’s where I had met “Old Herman”... in the Holy Land before he became Master of the Hospital House of Saint Mary of the Germans at Jerusalem—my God, they liked titles back then, and the longer the better!  I wanted to run the arrogant little rodent through, but Theo reminded me that Herman was still a Christian and hence I needed to extend the Templars’ gift of Christian charity to him.  Now I had to work with him!  Von Salza raised his dark eyes towards me very slowly as if, while his eyes moved, his mind was still on those maps.  Unlike most of the German warriors he governed, Von Salza was neither fair nor light, but dark of eye and hair.  Back in the day, I had expressed to Theo my thought that his real father had been an Italian soldier who had made it over the border and was raped by Von Salza’s mother for three silver coins.  His eyes settled on my face and he studied me for a moment.

“Young man,” he spoke in a rather cold and forceful manner, “do you still wish to run me through?  Or can we work together against this uncommon enemy?”

A hand fell on my shoulder.  “Ah, Richard, I see you’ve reacquainted yourself with the Magister Domus Sancte...”

“YES... Theo.  I have.”  Hamet and Theo had entered the cave and saved me from having to answer old Von Salza.

“Good, good!," Hamet said.  "Now let’s to business!”

As positions shifted and more candles were lit, Gardar approached, pointed to the bay, and explained, “Your ship and old crew be anchored, there!”  He pointed a slightly different direction.  “And our fleet off shore, sir.  Five drakons and four karves crewed by all good men; Vikings of all tribes and many kinds of Templars await your orders.”  He paused and just stared at the boy he had once grown old pirating with, who was again not much more than a boy.  I could see my Viking friend Helgi was choosing his words with great care now.  “Egil, me... glad to see you again, cap’in.  I also wait at the tiller for your orders.”  And then he smiled a smile I hadn’t seen in centuries.  “Jus’ like old times, young Saxon.”  He turned and walked out of the cave.  I looked at Egil, who stood at my shoulder with his shield held high enough to cover his chest and his hand on his ax.  As he had in life, my shield man would remain at my shoulder no matter what.  I think he could sense my dislike of Von Salza.

It was de Flor who actually seemed to be in charge, which made sense.  In life, my mentor had indeed been one of the finest military minds of his age.  As had been my place in all my lives, I held my tongue and waited to lend myself if requested.  So I stood and listened to the plan unfolding in front of me.  As we talked through the night I found what I heard interesting.  De Flor, with the bigger European ships and supported by all Viking vessels but mine, would take His Eminence Von Salza and the Teutonic warriors from Labrador north in expectation of a German landing.  A small force of Knights had surprised the crew of a U-boat making repairs and... extracted certain information from the captives needed to give form to our plan.  All it took was a red-hot dagger and some philosophy left over from the Middle Ages and the Inquisition.  Interesting.  Those who inflict pain are just as subject to it.

I had not spoken to Van Salza or any of his knights, but the hatred of these Germans from the eleventh century for the evil of the modern Germany was overwhelming.  You could sense it as they passed you.  The concept that Occult Nazism, these vilest offenders, had chosen Teutonic symbols and banners to represent their values... when translated into the Void by the sacred relics, it had proven so offensive it had awakened the wrath of those dead for nearly a thousand years.  As the others measured and compared and speculated over the ancient maps—some of which I knew as the charts of Perro and Pietro Zeno—I found myself again being measured by Von Salza, only now the arrogance of his past life seemed to be fading and was replaced with the weariness of the ages.  As the others prepared, Von Salza quietly rose from his seat and, motioning me to follow, made his way to a small cavern adjoining the great cave.

Dutifully, I followed the senior warrior, who paused only to light a candle held in a cylindrical container, dotted with holes throughout.  The holder glowed upon the walls rather than lit the cave, creating an eeriness that was contributed to a sense of dark spirits being about who sought to thwart our plans.  He led me to a place where several small barrels and a stool or two had been placed.  Motioning me to sit, he poured something into a bowl that rested upon a small indentation in the rock.  As he sat, he extended the bowl towards me.  “I never cared for honey,” he said, “but I find it softens the dried apples enough to allow toothless old men to gum them down.”  Despite my feeling of mistrust for the old man, I smiled and took a piece.  “They will plan... but you and I will execute.  Honestly, Sir Templar, I have my doubts.  Such strange weapons they have that can bear a man underwater and not drown, or cut a knight in half by hurling small metal stones...”  He grew silent and chewed on a piece of apple.  In his life, I had never looked upon him as human—but here in his death, he seemed to be growing more and more of a soul.

I shifted my weight nervously upon the barrel top where I rested  In the dim candlelight, Von Salza looked older than even my young eyes remembered him being.  The worry on his face shone like a beacon and radiated out.  “How low of Spirit, how far from the face of God, has my Germany grown to be?”  There was much sorrow in his voice.  “These... people... are doing such horrific things, worthy of the Great Satan.”  I gave no answer to the old warrior, for in truth I did not know what this was really all about, or why I should be the one called upon to defend God’s honor in life.  “I hear in life,” he continued, “you are a cripple.”

I suddenly remembered why I wanted to run him through.  I have always resented that term, though I consciously knew that Von Salza’s use of the term was little more than a descriptive idiom—Indeed, a term oft meaning ‘patient’ to Hospitalers and Teutonics.  His head lowered until his chin rested on his chest.  “I have heard these Germans destroy the disabled, aged, and defective for the sake of racial purity.  How fitting that the forces arrayed by their God against them should be led by an old man and a cripple.”

I had never, in my natural life, allowed myself the recognition that being crippled, disabled, or any other such term should dictate the perimeters of life.  Yet, Von Salza’s observation redefined what these negative terms might actually mean, especially in our situation.

“You have been up the great river?" Von Salza continued.  "Where the convoys gather?”  I nodded.  “They are in there, Templar, waiting for you.  But the real threat to the Templar treasure... oh yes, I know about it... will come at you through the fishing waters off of New Scotland.  I am told the great invasion is coming from the north... but I do not think so.  I think on the coast of the place called Labrador instead.  They expect a great store of wealth and sacred relics, so they will need men near to move it.”

I nodded.

 

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