Yusuf enjoyed the campaign. Best of all was fighting at
Shirkuh’s side, riding with the Syrian army against King
Amalric and his Frankish knights, and against the Egyptian
enemies of Vizier Shawar. Yusuf watched and learned while his
uncle won quickly with a few short, well-fought battles.
With the help of the Syrians, Shawar was soon the strongest
man in Egypt once again. But he wanted to be strong without
the help of Nuradin’s army, and he did not want to pay Nuradin
the gold that he promised him before. Shawar decided to talk to
the Franks. ‘I don’t like General Shirkuh and the Syrians. They
want to get their hands on Egypt, so I want your knights to push
him and his army out of the country. If you do what I ask, I’ll
give you the money that I promised Nuradin!’
The Frankish generals agreed to help Shawar, and they battled
against Shirkuh and his soldiers and pushed them out of Egypt.
The Syrians fought bravely, but in the end they had to go back
to Aleppo with nothing to show for their hard work. Nuradin
was very angry. He thought that the campaign was a bad use of
time, money, horses and men. He didn’t want his army to go to
Egypt ever again. Shirkuh was angry too.
‘Don’t worry, Yusuf,’ he said to his nephew, ‘Shawar will
never win against me! Just wait. Nuradin doesn’t want more
fighting now, but when he sees how Amalric and the Franks get
rich in Egypt with Shawar’s help, he’ll send us again. And then
we’ll make that criminal Shawar sorry that he was ever born!’
Egypt –1167
The old general was right. Three years later, Yusuf, now twentynine,
was marching beside his uncle at the head of the Syrian
army. ‘Why aren’t we taking the same road to Egypt as last time,
General?’ asked Yusuf.
‘Shawar and the Franks know that we’re coming. We must travel quickly and secretly. My hope is to surprise them by taking
the road down to the Dead Sea, and then travelling through the
Sinai Desert. We’ll get into the country by the back door while
our enemies are looking for us through their front windows!’
‘But, Uncle, won’t it be terrible for the men?’
‘Yes, but my soldiers are brave, and they want to win against
Shawar and his Frankish friends. They’ll do it!’
They crossed the hot dry land and near Suez, there was a
deadly desert storm that very nearly killed them all. Men and
horses were ill or died, but Yusuf spoke to the soldiers to help
them go on bravely: ‘Nuradin needs you to teach Shawar that
he can’t break his promises to Syrians and stay out of danger!
Under Shirkuh we’ll have a great victory in Egypt and then
he’ll give rich presents for the bravest!’
Finally, they arrived. The men were very weak, and Shirkuh
decided that they weren’t ready to fight against the large armies
of Vizier Shawar and King Amalric. He stopped his soldiers at
Giza, on the other side of the river from Cairo.