He sat at the window of the fortress, staring out across Acre at the sea.
He had been a Templar for some years now. Not as many as some of his brothers, but long enough to have been told all their secrets, shown their true intentions, lead along their enlightened path. He had been told of the Piece of Eden and shown the drawings of it, heard its tales of power; Robert had been particularly insistent on making sure he understood it, because most of the writings were in languages Sibrand had never learned. It was almost insulting, but in the end, he caught on. He knew what they were looking for.
He knew what God had handed down to them.
Only ...
A soldier stopped by, spoke briefly in French. He glared and the French turned to bastardized, almost mocking German. His ship was going to be built, the soldier said. Permission had been granted from Above. Only Robert needed to give that kind of power over; the harbor was Sibrand's territory, and rightly so. William couldn't be trusted with that much complexity, that much time spent dealing with the peasants. Garnier might have, but he was so settled in his district that the offer might have passed in one ear and out the other. Besides, slaves vanishing once they appeared at the dock? It would be too suspicious. If they disappeared after going into the city, though, who even bothered to search for them? They were filthy heretics, meant for death or worse.
Garnier promised more and granted both. Sibrand spent little time among the Hospitaliers.
It had taken less than a week after learning what the treasure could do for the doubts to surface. If it had the power to do all that, then what had happened in the past? Had it really been men, wielding the power of God? Would He truly grant that kind of ability to the fallible, corruptible souls of men? It seemed possible, but it didn't seem right. God could act on his own. He didn't need men to do his work.
The months that passed saw his doubts growing, shadowing and engulfing him to the point where sleep became a few hours spent listlessly napping at a table. If the works of God could be done by the treasure, then why had God even bothered to make himself known? If he had cast the treasure onto Earth, like Robert and the others said, then ... then ... why? There was no point to it. God could create miracles. He didn't need men to do the same! That treasure made men gods, put them on equal par with the Lord! It was blasphemy - was the Piece actually sent by the devil?
But then it would have done evil deeds, not good. It would have flooded the Red Sea, turned water into salt, wrought pure havoc on the souls of the Grecians. It would not have helped the Son, but hindered him.
Then why? Why? The question tore at him night and day.
Down on the ground level of the fortress, Sibrand ordered his men to their tasks - to find the workers for his warships, to begin the packing and storing of supplies, to prepare for movement of those supplies onto the ships. It would be a long time out at sea, and he had no intention of dying while he was out there. His orders were simple - keep the fools at home from sending more troops into Richard's needless war. He'd do this right, damn it. His men would not stand in his way. Incompetence was unacceptable, and they knew it.
Partway through the fortress - once he'd given his orders, sent his men scrambling - he heard the terrible low howling coming from the high windows that lined Garnier's section of the fortress (or rather, since it was actually entirely his fortress, the part that Sibrand hadn't temporarily holed up in). It always sent shivers down his spine to hear that, particularly at night, when he'd snap out of a dazed half-sleep with his dagger in his hand, expecting to see a demon come crawling through the doorway. But then he would remember, and the dagger would drop.
Garnier was tending to his patients. With a slight grimace, Sibrand made for the doors leading to the sick ward.
Six months in, he found his answer. The answer to the why? that wouldn't leave him alone. The reason for miracles, for belief, for the basis of faith. The reason that God had thrown his hand to humanity. It was simple, but he could easily understand why he didn't see it before.
The answer was ... because he had not.
God had not given anything to man. You could not give to someone when you did not exist.
No. There was no reason for God to allow miracles to happen through men. The Piece of Eden was made by men, controlled by men, believed by men. God had nothing to do with it. And if all the miracles in the world had been caused by that, then it meant that the miracles had not come from God. If God had not granted those miracles, then there was no proof that he had ever been. Only stories, writings, countless pages of empty words claiming that this or that had been granted by God when in reality it had been the treasure.
There was no God.
To understand that was to understand that there was no forgiveness, no damnation, no Heaven or Hell or Purgatory waiting after death. Every man's actions would be accepted or punished on earth and no more. There was no eternal agony waiting for the sinners; there was no eternal happiness for the saints.
There was – nothing. Nothing but life as it was right at that very moment. Nothing but silence beyond the grave and an empty horror to see him there.
In the ward, there were numerous beds lining the walls. Most contained a person, dressed in filthy clothes that used to be white. There was relatively little disease here, or so Garnier said, but Sibrand kept his distance in any case. These were the sick and destitute of Damascus, brought over by land or sea and given to Garnier to turn into soldiers. It had been his job for countless years, apparently; at this point, he was quite good at it.
The man himself was some ways down, tending to a gibbering man whose eyes had rolled back in his head. Garnier straightened as Sibrand approached, wiping bloody hands on his already bloodstained apron.
"Sibrand. I must say I'm surprised to see you in here. What brings you to me?"
"Not curiosity." He avoided looking at the man on the table, fixing Garnier with a hard look. "My orders are set. The ship will be built in two months' time if we stay on schedule. Once it's completed, the others will be done quickly enough." Something dragged his eyes toward another patient lying just beyond Garnier, but the sight made his stomach recoil and nearly rebel. "I'll be moving my men back to the harbor when it's finished."
"Excellent news." Garnier picked up a few small vials from a rickety table nearby and began to walk down the death-laden hallway, forcing Sibrand to follow and see more of the hideous treatments the man was so insistent on giving to people. "I believe you will hold well to your task. You have done so often enough before."
Somehow, he resisted a biting comeback. The urge remained even though Garnier's words had been nothing more than a compliment. He knew what the old man really meant. How he wondered at Sibrand's potential failure. How such a young commander could possibly succeed in such a grand task. He ground his teeth together and stayed silent, forcing himself to stare straight ahead instead of to either side or at Garnier, who had paused at another patient's bedside and given him a long look.
"Have you had trouble sleeping, Sibrand?"
The question was innocuous enough, but he turned sharply to glare at Garnier.
"What? Of course not."
"Perhaps I'm just a bit tired myself, but you look exhausted. Your eyes tell a different story than you do ... as do my men." The doctor raised an eyebrow slightly.
"Your men?" Sibrand scoffed.
"They see your lamps on at all hours of the night and hear you pacing the hallways of the fortress when most normal men are sleeping." Garnier stopped at a bedside to check on yet another patient, turning away from Sibrand. "You treat them like enemies when they try to speak with you. If you rested, your mind would come into much clearer focus."
"Your men are hostile to me first," he snapped, unwilling to watch Garnier at work but unwilling to let the man leave his sight. "Tell them to stop mocking me and maybe I won't send them back to you in pieces!"
"They rarely return in pieces," said Garnier in that infuriatingly calm tone of his, "and they are only hostile because they know you will be hostile in return. If you treated them like men, rather than puppets to order at your desire, I have the feeling they would treat you with greater respect."
"Their respect should be unconditional."
"Flies are caught more quickly with the sweet than with the bitter." The doctor looked over at Sibrand, concern etched in his features. "And the faithful fare better when they know they are commanded by their own."
The hate boiled within Sibrand. He snorted and turned away from Garnier.
Nothing. That was it. Nothing. No God. No higher power. Nothing waited for them after they died. Prayers went nowhere and donations were used to further the physical, not the spiritual. Man's urge to feel loved, his belief in knowing that for however alone he may be, God was with him - it was all lies.
Then – what of the wars? The Crusades had been fought for nearly a hundred years by now. The wars in Europe had gone on for centuries. So much blood spilled, so many lying dead - and for what? For a God who was never there? The deaths that had once had so much purpose were now nothing more than useless sacrifices for the greed of arrogant men. All the anger, the fear, the heat, the suffering, the fighting, the endless God-damn fighting - and it was all for naught. For nothing. There was no righteousness, no moral high ground. Had they fought for no reason other than to sate their own bloodlust?
To think that his entire life had been wasted in the name of something that didn't exist nearly drove Sibrand to suicide the very night he realized it. He'd stood at the window of his room (in a city that wasn't Acre, but he couldn't remember which, it had been – not that long ago, actually) and stared down at the ground that was surely far enough to kill him. It seemed to grow as he watched it - the distance, that was, got further and further until he felt that if he leaned too far he would end up falling forever. It was tempting to just let himself fall - let his armor drag him down as if he was drowning in a river - but after a few moments of unsteady leaning he dragged himself back inside, threw himself against the far wall, and started to curse. Started, didn't finish.
You couldn't curse a God that wasn't there.
No. No, he told himself in the following days, suicide wasn't the right path to take. His life may have suddenly lost all its meaning, but who was to say there was no meaning still to be gleaned? He no longer fought for God, but for the Templars. He fought to stop the worthless, senseless wars that were started over and over again, dragged on forever, in the name of that nonexistent God. He fought to live another day, to postpone the inevitable black emptiness that awaited him when he finally died. He fought to prolong his life, to live for each day as it was.
He fought for himself.
"For the last time, Garnier, I'm not interested in your proselytizing," Sibrand snapped, turning away and walking further down the hall. Garnier followed him a few moments later, still strong and swift despite his age.
"I know what you believe, Sibrand, but you must realize how foolish it is. There are things that cannot be explained by the treasure."
"You are the fool here!" He swept an arm out as if to indicate the patients lying in their cots, but he meant the Templars - the Europeans, the Saracens, all of them. "All of you! How you could have learned the secrets of the Piece of Eden and walked away with your faith intact - you are blinder than the illiterate peasants who cling to every shred of hope with their dying will!"
"At least they have hope, and are not slowly falling into unceasing madness." Garnier's voice had taken on a sharp quality, one that harkened back to his days as the leader of the Knights Hospitalier when they fought alongside the Crusade's greatest leaders. "I know what darkness has engulfed your heart and mind, Sibrand, and it is eating away at both of them. Your fear of not living beyond the moment is going to destroy you. If you would only realize that there is not an end with such finality, then you would not suffer the way you do."
"Don't talk to me like I'm one of your patients, Garnier. I'm not a fool, and I'm not blind or stupid! I'm the only one with any kind of sense in this city! If you want to delude yourself, fine, but I'm not going to be taken in by the constant lies! My fear is warranted! You should be just as afraid - if not more!"
"Yet I am not. Would you call me stupid?"
Sibrand glared; Garnier watched. There was silence for almost too long, interrupted only by the coughing and moaning of the patients.
No, he wouldn't.
And yet it wasn't long before his newfound confidence, pulled from a depthless despair, began to give way to worry. No, there was nothing after death ... but he was a knight. A soldier. A leader of high position, in a war that suffered countless casualties with every passing day. A man whose position was enviable ...
The thoughts of death began to plague him again. This was all he had, this life. If he died - whether in a battle or to an assassin's blade, from some disease inhaled on the wind or thrown from his horse - then he would ... well, he already knew. But the very idea of how fragile life was - as he saw every day when he slew another with his own blade - permeated his mind. He was no more or less human than they were. He, too, could die at any given moment.
That was when the fear set in - the fear of death. The paranoia of enemies, living or immobile, that could bring his existence to screeching halt. The restlessness, the lack of sleep, the glancing over his shoulders, keeping his back to the wall, finding more and more men to guard him or patrol the city. Death hid in every form. Death waited, watched, prepared to strike.
The black cross stitched into his surcoat grew heavier with every passing day.
"I have work to do," snapped Sibrand after far too long for his liking. He turned away from Garnier and stalked down the hall, heading for the fresh air and light that would lead him outside, free of this endless heavy anger and pain and despair that tried to weigh down on his shoulders. It was their burden, not his!
"As do we all. Puisse Dieu être chez toi, my brother."
Sibrand paused for a moment, then grumbled an insult under his breath and continued on his way out. He didn't need any blessings from a man who drew inspiration from idiocy and foolishness. He didn't need blessings or help from anybody. Garnier was clearly not going to be any help in the immediate future, and Sibrand intended to find a way to leave the Hospitalier district as soon as he could.
Outside, the sun was partially covered by clouds and smoke from the ruined buildings and dead bodies but still provided a stark contrast to the dark and dreary sick ward. Once he'd recovered from the bright light so sudden on his eyes, Sibrand shifted the bow on his back and started out of the fortress, two of his men quickly falling in line behind him.
Somewhere high above, circling the topmost tower of the fortress, an eagle screamed.