The Kingdom of Heaven Page #4

GODFREY goes out from the forge.

EXT. THE TRACK BY THE FORGE. LATER

The party rides out. GODFREY lingers.

GODFREY:

It is easy to find Jerusalem. You

come to where the men speak

Italian, and then continue until

they speak something else. We go by

Messina.

Goodbye.

GODFREY turns his horse after his party.

INT. THE FORGE. NIGHT

A sword smokes, white-hot, in the coals of the forge. BALIAN

looks up and notices: THE PRIEST, lurking uninvited in the

door. He continues to work.

(CONTINUED)

17.

CONTINUED:

PRIEST:

The village does not want you. When

the old lord is dead they will

drive you out. When the bishop is

dead, it is certain.

BALIAN:

And you take my property.

PRIEST:

The Church...

BALIAN:

You.

PRIEST:

They would have taken you to

Jerusalem. Away from all this. I

arranged it.

(grabs Balian’s wrist)

I swear that you will have no peace

as long you stay. No man ever

needed a new world more. Imagine

your sin and pain erased. All.

BALIAN looks up slowly in the firelight. He sees around the

priest’s neck his wife’s CRUCIFIX.

PRIEST (CONT’D)

And if you Crusade you may relieve

your wife’s condition in hell.

(BALIAN looks at his

brother)

I put it delicately. She was a

suicide. She is in hell.

(turns smiling)

Though what she does there without

a head...

BALIAN, the hot metal smoking in his hand, drives the white

hot sword, slowly, through the PRIEST’s chest, and carries

him back onto the live coals of the open forge. The PRIEST,

still alive, looks up in wonder for a long beat, then bursts

explosively into flame. As the clothes burn away Balian sees:

His wife’s crucifix. He grabs it out of the fire. He backs

away. COALS have spilled from the forge and the building is

catching fire. Balian turns and sees:

The APPRENTICE. The APPRENTICE turns and runs into the snow.

18.

EXT. A ROAD SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE. DAY

GODFREY and his knights are riding. GODFREY reins in, and so

does the party.

GODFREY’S POV:

BALIAN sits his mare atop a small hill. He rides down. BALIAN

is hollow-eyed, exhausted in the saddle, his burnt hand

wrapped. GODFREY spurs forward.

GODFREY:

Have you come to kill me? Even

these days, it is not easy.

(noticing with real

concern Balian’s

distraught condition)

What do you want?

BALIAN:

Is it true that in Jerusalem I may

erase my sins, and those...of my

wife. Is it true?

GODFREY:

We’ll find out together.

BALIAN:

I’ve done murder.

Father and son look at each other. Godfrey nods.

GODFREY:

Haven’t we all.

(to the HOSPITALER)

Look at his hand.

EXT. A CAMP BY A RIVER. NIGHT

BALIAN is having his hand re-wrapped by FIRUZ. He is given a

drink by the HOSPITALER.

HOSPITALER:

It is the poppy which grows in the

East. I think it is the true lotus

that the men of Odysseus ate. It

numbs all pain. A burn needs that,

and butter.

BALIAN, the drug in him, watches as: A falling star glitters

and explodes. The men of the camp exclaim at it.

(CONTINUED)

19.

CONTINUED:

HOSPITALER (CONT’D)

(bemused)

Perhaps Jerusalem has fallen.

BALIAN stares across the fire at GODFREY, who returns his

stare. BALIAN cannot keep his eyes open. He sleeps.

EXT. THE CAMP. MORNING

A SWORD is thrown into the leaf-mould. BALIAN looks up from

his porridge at:
GODFREY, who leans on another sword.

HOSPITALER:

His hand is hurt, my lord.

GODFREY:

I have fought two days with an

arrow through a testicle.

Godfrey swings the flat of his sword at Balian, who, favoring

his burnt hand parries, clumsily but like lightning and with

great force. GODFREY grins: not bad. ODO is watching

carefully. BALIAN takes up a “low” guard, in terrible pain.

he knows what he’s doing on a duffer’s level.

He’s strong, dangerous, a natural, and Godfrey knows it.

GODFREY (CONT’D)

Never take a low guard. Watch.

(He raises the sword above

his head)

Like this. This guard by the

Italians is called la posta di

falcone...one strikes from high.

Like this. Do it.

BALIAN duplicates the posture. GODFREY from the high guard

swings low and sweeping and BALIAN parries. The great sword

hacks into the dirt.

But when Balian strikes at GODFREY...clang! His sword spins

away, and ends up falling point down into the earth, the

cross hanging sidewards, much like a grave marker. It’s

obvious:
Balian may have some experience, but he’s not match

for a knight. ODO takes the sword from Godfrey.

ODO:

(touches Balian’s eyes

with two fingers)

Pay attention.

(to Godfrey)

I have your leave?

(CONTINUED)

20.

CONTINUED:

GODFREY, sitting in the leaf-litter, eating dried apricots,

nods gravely. We see ODO and BALIAN circling each other,

fighting. Steel clangs. As they practice, others of the party

are packing to leave. The SQUIRE oils Godfrey’s chain mail.

FIRUZ, fastidious, washes his knife and plate at the stream.

FIRUZ senses something and looks up. GODFREY sets down his

bag of apricots.

GODFREY’S POV

A KNIGHT, and then four more KNIGHTS, come out of the trees

to the front. They are the equivalent of rich country

layabouts out to do a lynching. ODO and Balian stop fighting.

GODFREY mounts and rides over to the newcomers.

GODFREY’S NEPHEW

Uncle.

GODFREY nods.

GODFREY’S NEPHEW (CONT’D)

You have with you a man, Balian,

who killed a priest his brother. I

am charged by both my father and

the lord bishop to bring him back.

The KNIGHTS look at Godfrey, who says nothing. He stares at

this putrescent nephew calmly.

ODO:

(riding up to GODFREY’S

NEPHEW)

I say he is innocent of the charge.

If you say hie is guilty, then we

will fight, and God will decide the

truth of it.

HOSPITALER:

(leaning drily forward)

My German friends is a close

student of the law.

BALIAN walks up, ready to surrender. Much to his surprise:

GODFREY winks at him.

GODFREY’S NEPHEW

He is a murderer.

GODFREY:

(slowly, and very

dangerous)

So am I. Aren’t we all?

(CONTINUED)

21.

CONTINUED:
(2)

A half dozen MEN AT ARMS with PIKES come out of the trees to

the right.

Godfrey’s party is flanked on both sides: CROSSBOWMEN to the

left, PIKEMEN to the right. And confronted by the knights.

GODFREY (CONT’D)

Whoever dies here, you will

certainly be among them.

GODFREY’S NEPHEW

(wrily, looking at the

very veteran knight)

You are my uncle: I must give you

the road.

The OPPOSING KNIGHTS unexpectedly wheel away. GODFREY (not

new at this) snaps a look left as-

A VOLLEY OF CROSSBOW BOLTS fly out of the trees. The SQUIRE

is struck in the hear and dies instantly. FIRUZ has his mare

killed beneath him.

ODO is shot through the middle of the neck, but he wheels and

as a PIKEMAN stabs at him grabs the shaft of the PIKE and

kills the man holding it. The HOSPITALER also deals with the

Pikemen (and so does his destrier, a weapon in itself, which

bites a man’s face off, and kicks another down).

GODFREY’S NEPHEW AND KNIGHTS (having attained the distance to

mount a charge) wheel and charge the party, taking advantage

of the confusion following the ambush. GODFREY looks up at

them and only now do we see that he has been shot under the

arm and into the chest.

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