Chapter 91: After the Storm
May 24th, 1180 - outside Aleppo
The sun dipped toward the western horizon, casting long shadows across a field soaked in blood. Smoke still hung low over the earth—the remains of torched siege wagons, shattered arrows, and burning banners drifting skyward like lost prayers.
Baldwin IV stood on a rise just east of the battlefield, atop a ridge muddied by the trampling of hooves and men. His horse, foam-flecked and weary, stamped restlessly beneath him, nostrils flaring at the stench of blood and burnt flesh. The king's silver-inlaid helm was tucked beneath one arm. His face, gaunt and pallid, was streaked with sweat, grime, and blood—not his own.
The wind stirred his purple cloak. His eyes—ice pale, clear despite the fever eating at his flesh—scanned the field.
It was over.
Below, the plain was littered with the detritus of war. Thousands of corpses lay strewn across the slope and valley, twisted in death: Crusader and Saracen alike. Muslim horsemen in green and black lay beside Christian knights clad in steel and white. Splintered lances jutted from the ground like skeletal trees. The banners of Jerusalem still stood—tattered, but standing—along the ridges of the right and center.
They had held. And then they had crushed.
But the cost...
A shout broke his thoughts. Marshal Raymond of Jaffa rode up beside him, his helmet off, face bloodied and his left eye swollen shut. He was breathing hard.
"The field is ours," he said. "They're running. Those who can. The rest—"
He gestured toward the carnage.
"They're dead."