Serjabil stood close by the parapet with Thibaut the Apostate by his side.
“Behold,” he cried to those around him, “how the crescent moon climbs into the sky. She shall shine full on us that night when we cross the mountains.”
CHAPTER XLI
Tristan was still at Agravale with some two hundred men, when a mob of peasant folk came into the city, bringing with them a lean, half-starved southron who had fled to Agravale over the mountains. The man had served as a slave in Serjabil’s palace, and being wise as to the Caliph’s schemes of conquest, he had dared martyrdom and fled for the north. Two other Christians who had shared his flight had been taken and beheaded on the road. The third had gained the mountains in safety, and having crossed by the pass known as St. Isidore’s Gate, had descended into the lowlands with the cry of a prophet—
“Fly, for the Saracens are at my heels!”
It was but two days since Blanche’s men had marched from Agravale, glad to return home through the Seven Streams after their campaigning in the south. The Duchess had tarried one day more, leaving Tristan and Rosamunde to guard the rear as they marched north towards the fords of the Lorient. At Agravale she had received an embassage from the King stating that he was coming south with his barons to restore peace to the Southern Marches. He besought her to meet him at a certain border town that they might discuss the state of the Seven Streams. And since Blanche had no great belief in the King’s honour, nor in the sincerity of his faith, she had determined to meet him at the head of her men, the most powerful plea for peace and justice.
It was evening when the news came to Tristan as he was preparing to evacuate Agravale on the morrow and follow Blanche towards the north. He had but two hundred men left in the city, mostly Samson’s veterans from the Seven Streams. The country folk crowded round him as he came out upon the steps of Lilias’s palace, and besought him not to desert them in their extremity, and to leave their farms and hamlets at the mercy of the Saracens. Tristan pointed out to the chief pleader the smallness of his company, reminded them that they had little cause to claim protection at his hands. But when some of the rough men wept, and besought him the more to save their homes and families from the sword, pointing out that St. Isidore’s Gate might be held by a hundred resolute men, he told them he would consider the matter, and give them an answer before dawn.
That night Tristan went alone into Lilias’s garden and paced to and fro through the tangled grass. He was tempted greatly to abandon the south, for he had fought his fill since he had sailed from Purple Isle and landed in the heart of the Seven Streams. He had met grief and conquered it, and found love at last after many days. He was as a man who had grown weary of the chaos of war and hungered for God’s peace, and the clear calm of a woman’s love.
It was about Rosamunde’s face that Tristan’s passions played as he walked in Lilias’s garden under the moon. Should he gamble once more with fate, stake that which he had won with his own good sword, when the future stretched clear as a summer dawn?
Had not the lords of the Southern Marches harried the province of the Seven Streams and carried death and despair into a thousand homes? What claims had these people upon his pity? Could it be that God had decreed their destruction?