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Chapter 59: The Second Counsel

“In difficult and desperate cases, the boldest counsels are the safest.”

Titus Livius


Laigin, August 27, 1082

The sun was just rising in the east, but Guillaume de Toulouse hadn’t fallen slept that night. He wasn’t really getting any sleep recently. It wasn’t troubling him as much as it should have. His thoughts were still focused on his own family. He had no clue what Adelaide was doing in his absence. Did Hughes have enough backbone to stand up to her and make the right decisions? Now that he had left France he felt even more apprehensive, but he felt he had done something right by bringing Pierre along with him on the Crusade. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer, he thought.

Suddenly, Bert, his squire, hesitantly poked his head through the flap of Guillaume’s tent, “My lord?”

“What is it?” the Duke Guillaume growled.

“Sir Baudoin is breaking camp.”

This immediately snapped Guillaume out of his doubts and worries. “What?”

By the time he was dressed and out of his tent, Baudoin de Boulogne was riding past his tent with a column of men following him. Soon, Pierre had ran up beside him with Gaston following.

“What’s going on?” Pierre asked.

Guillaume answered bluntly, “I don’t know, but it looks like they’re all going north.”



Later that morning, a second counsel was hastily organized. Henri de Bourgogne, at the head of the table as before, was utterly flustered, “He took how much of the army with him?”

Cinead O’Braonain, the local Irish ruler, spoke up first, “By my estimate, about one fourth of our force has followed him.”

“Where in God’s name was he going?”

“I saw him moving out of camp to the north.” Guillaume replied.

“He said to me last night,” Otto von Habsburg added, “that Ulster was a target ripe for conquest. It’s my guess that Ulster is his destination.”

Clearly, Henri was no great strategist, and made a poor attempt to try to hide it. He struck his fist down on the table. “Damn it! We will all break camp tomorrow. We must apprehend him as soon as we can.”

“I do not think that is a wise course of action,” Rodrigo de Vivar interjected.

“I do not think,” Renaud de Nevers, Duke Henri’s right hand man, shot back, “you are in a position to question your commander’s judgment.” Guillaume found this kind of an ironic reversal the last meeting, where Duke Henri seemed so intent on listening to the Spaniard’s advice.

“With all due respect,” Pierre de Toulouse interrupted, “I do not recall any of us agreeing to anyone being any kind of high commander here. I say we should listen to what he has to say and take it into consideration as a counsel.” Henri glared back angrily, but neither he nor Renaud came up with any retort.

“I second that proposal,” Gualtiero Travesari, the old Venetian, rasped.

Besides Henri and Renaud, everyone wanted to know what Rodrigo had in
mind. Guillaume had to admit he was somewhat curious himself.

“Although he may be leaving himself open to an ambush,” Rodrigo went on, “Sir Baudoin may have just given us a golden opportunity.”

“How, exactly,” Robert de Coursulles, earl of Somerset, questioned, “do you suppose that?”

“This is just the catalyst we need to draw Hammud Bari into a pitched battle. Although Baudoin may not like it, we will send some men to reinforce his march north. Sir Geoffrey, Baudoin is your brother, and since I am confident that you are the only one in this room who can keep him in check you will organize and lead this force. However, you and your brother’s armies must look tantalizingly small enough to draw the Moor out of his hiding place. Meanwhile, as Hammud is moving northeast to Ulster, which I have no doubt he will do when he hears of Baudoin’s intentions, the rest of our army will quietly follow him and hopefully encircle his force when all armies meet. I personally wish to lead a contingent of cavalry to report on his whereabouts and shield our own intentions.”

All of the nobles, except for Henri and Renaud of course, were in agreement with the plan, but Guillaume could only sit back and wonder. He had fought this enemy before and wondered whether Hammud would fall for such a strategy after his defeat at Mallorca. He also wondered who Geoffrey de Boulogne would decide to bring north with him.