No peace at Kerak Castle

I am sorry that I continue to be so scarce around here. I’ve been working hard at fending off the deadline dragon, while still dealing with more pain than I deserve. (My sins are just not that spectacular to warrant this!) Poor little Isabella can’t catch a break, either. She is twelve now, isolated at a dangerous desert fortresses with the In-Laws from Hell and Saladin has decided to take another crack at Kerak Castle, so she is facing her second siege in less than a year. I suspect she is also wondering just what sort of sins she could have committed to bring all this down on her head. Meanwhile, how is this for a wonderfully odd historical nugget? Saladin’s brother, al-Adil, is making ready to join him at the siege. He’d been ruling Egypt very effectively for the sultan for a number of years, but he has now been given command of Aleppo (yes, that very sad city had a troubled past even back in the MA.). He’d had to leave his family behind in Egypt and it took a while for him to be able to arrange safe transportation for them from Egypt to Syria. In the scene I am about to write, he will be reunited with his wives, concubines, children, household retainers, servants, and slaves. Naturally their caravan includes a large number of horses, mules, and camels. And according to one medieval chronicler, the family’s pet giraffe! No way I could resist writing about that.