And yet Harald had a hard time restraining himself. There was nothing wrong with his courage and bravery. The problem was that he fought like a Viking, and if he continued to do that he wouldn’t live long in the Holy Land. He was stubborn too, but the more Arn punished his body with blows from the flat or the edge of his sword, the more furious he became when he attacked again. All the others who acted that way usually softened quickly both in mind and body, stopping to think and ask what they were doing wrong. But not young Harald.
Arn let the abuse continue for a week in the hope that Harald would grow wiser. But when that didn’t help, he was forced to try and make his kinsman listen to reason.
“Don’t you understand?” he appealed as they came out of vespers and had a free hour before the evening meal. As they walked together along one of Gaza’s piers, Arn explained. “It will mean the death of you if you don’t banish all the old techniques you’ve learned and start over from the beginning.”
“It’s probably not my ability with a sword that’s the problem,” Harald muttered morosely.
“No?” Arn said, truly astonished. “Then why is it that your body is aching from your neck to your shins, and yet you never hit me even once with your wild slashing?”
“Because I’ve met a swordsman that even the gods themselves could not defeat; against every other man it’s different. I have killed many men. That’s one thing I know for sure.”
“As long as you realize that you will be killed quicker than you can imagine,” said Arn dryly. “You’re too slow. The Saracens’ swords are lighter than ours, just as sharp as ours, and very quick. And by the way, you’re wrong when it comes to my skill. There are five of us here in Gaza who are exceptionally skilled, but three of the knights are better than I am.”
“I don’t believe it. That can’t be so!” Harald objected hotly.
“Good!” said Arn. “Then tomorrow you’ll have a chance to fight with Guy de Carcassonne, the day after with Sergio de Livorne, and then with Ernesto de Navarra, who is the best of all of us here in Gaza. And if you can still move your arms and legs after that, you can come back to me, because by then the medicine will have convinced you.”
That medicine bit hard. After three days of fighting against the best swordsmen in Gaza, Harald couldn’t raise an arm without pain or take a step without staggering. Not a single time during these three days with the best of the best had he landed a blow or even come close to doing so. He said that it was like trying to fight in a nightmare in which he was stuck in boat tar.
Arn found to his satisfaction that he had finally broken the stubborn Norwegian’s inflexible resolve.
Now they could start afresh. First he took Harald to the armory and selected a lighter sword that would be more suitable. He tried as kindly as possible to explain that it was never the weight of a sword that was decisive, but rather how well it sat in the hand of the man who wielded the weapon.
Then Arn let Harald lick his wounds for two days as a spectator, while he himself practiced with Ernesto de Navarra, the best of them all.
The two knight-brothers alternated between fighting in earnest and then repeating the same moves slowly so that the young tenderfoot could observe and learn. It was very strong medicine for Harald, for when the knights Arn and Ernesto went at each other with full force and at full speed, it was often hard for the eye to follow along in the whirling and flashing stream of blows and parries. It seemed as though the combatants were equal, yet Brother Ernesto seemed to be the one who connected more often.
What most astonished Harald was that when the two knights were fighting at full force, their blows were so hard that any man would have fallen to the ground in pain. But they both seemed able to withstand anything at all.
When one of them was struck he did not change expression, but took a step backward and bowed as a compliment, only to go on the attack himself in the next instant.
So young Harald’s journey to the world of a different kind of war had finally begun. When he once again faced Arn, they were able to practice move for move, drilling each little step and gesture until Harald could do them automatically. And soon Harald felt that he was changing, as if he saw the first small glint of light from the other world where such men as Arn and Ernesto lived. He became determined to reach that other world himself.
The next test for Harald was that his lord opined that he could not ride. Naturally he had been riding horses for his whole life like all the other people in the North. But there was a big difference between riding and merely sitting on a horse, as Arn Magnusson explained. Like all dwellers in the North, Harald was also convinced that horses were of no use in war, that one should ride to the battlefield and there dismount and tie up the horse before rallying and rushing at the enemy on the nearest field.
At first he was offended that Arn objected that as a warrior Harald was no good on a horse, but he went on to say that foot soldiers were important too. It took some time before Harald realized that this was actually true, that the foot soldiers were as important for success as the cavalry was.
When they proceeded to archery practice Harald was filled with renewed hope, because he had never met his match as an archer. Every Birch-Leg back home knew this, and their enemies even more so.
But when he shot against Arn Magnusson he soon felt annihilated, as if the breath went out of him and all hope was quenched.
Arn thought afterward that he may have waited too long to tell young Harald the truth, and that he had let his sergeant come close to despair before deigning to encourage him.
Young Harald had not even noticed how his archery contest with Arn had attracted both knights and sergeants as a furtive audience. They all pretended to have something to do in the vicinity, even though they really wanted to study the new sergeant who could shoot almost as well as the man whom even the Turks referred to as unsurpassed.
“Now I will tell you something that might cheer you up,” said Arn at last as they went to put away their bows and arrows in the armory on their fifth day of practice. “You are truly the best archer I have ever seen here in the Holy Land. Where did you learn your skill?”
“I hunted squirrels a lot as a child,” replied Harald before his thoughts caught up with his words and his face suddenly brightened. “Did you say that I was good? But you shoot better than I do every time, and so do all the others.”
“No,” said Arn, his expression both amused and a bit mysterious. He turned suddenly to two knight-brothers passing by and explained that his young squire had little faith in himself when it came to archery because he had lost to his lord. The two broke out laughing and slapped young Harald encouragingly on the back before they walked away, still laughing.
“Now I shall tell you the truth,” said Arn with a smile. “I am not as bad with a bow as I am on horseback or with a lance and sword. The truth is that I shoot better than any Templar knight in the Holy Land. I say this only because it is true; a Templar knight may not boast. Your ability will be a great joy to us, and perhaps more than once it will save your own life and those of others too.”
Harald Øysteinsson’s first opportunity to save his life with his bow came soon. The summer had not progressed very far before the Templar knights in Gaza were summoned to the north with full forces, which meant both heavy and light cavalry and archers afoot.
Saladin had perhaps learned something from the great defeat at Mont Gisard. This was how he viewed defeats, merely as something from which to learn for next time, and not at all as a sign that God had abandoned either him or jihad.