35
Edmund le Bottelier stood on the battlements of Carrickfergus Castle, looking out at the silver wave tops, iridescent with moonlight against the black sea. It was a beautiful sight, but he had no desire to stand out in the cold much longer. Where the hell was Savage?
Below him in the dark shadow of the castle he could make out nothing save the obsidian silhouette of the wall falling away beneath him to merge with the rock and the plumes of blue-white froth thrown up where the cold black sea lashed into it. Looking into the dark waters gave him a strange chill in his stomach and he turned away.
Suddenly an arm slipped round his throat, squeezing his windpipe and cutting off his startled cry.
Strong arms wrenched him around to face away from the sea. Standing before him was a human figure swathed in black. No features could be seen except two glinting eyes that reflected the cold moonlight. The silver light also glittered on the blade of a curved knife, the point of which was aimed at the justiciar’s ribcage.
Le Bottelier knew he was about to die as the arm tensed to punch the blade into his heart. A flicker of annoyance flashed through his brain that he had to go this way, murdered in the dark by persons unknown.
The knife shot forward.
It stopped dead, its point inches from the justiciar’s flesh. A big fist was clamped around the wrist of his assailant, stopping its murderous progress.
Standing behind his assailant, le Bottelier saw the earl’s big galloglaich, Connor MacHuylin, who seemed to have appeared from nowhere.
MacHuylin spun the knifeman around and head-butted him full in the face. The man gave a startled cry and toppled over. MacHuylin was about to attack again but the man scrambled off the battlements and disappeared into the dark. The man holding le Bottelier threw him to the floor then leapt off the battlements into the courtyard after his companion.
‘You all right?’ MacHuylin asked.
Shouts came from below and both of them saw Richard Savage pounding across the cobblestones of the outer courtyard.
‘We’re under attack! They’ve seized the gate! The justiciar is in danger!’ Savage yelled.
MacHuylin and the justiciar dashed down the steps from the battlements, the galloglaich bounding recklessly ahead to meet Savage at the bottom. There was no sign of the justiciar’s assailants. They had simply vanished.
‘What’s going on?’ the justiciar demanded.
‘Assassins. They’re in the castle.’ Savage was out of breath and gasping. ‘Those Tyr Eoghan ceithernn we ran into in the woods today too. They’ve scaled the walls and taken the gate- house. They’ve dropped the portcullis.’
‘God damn it! My men are outside.’ MacHuylin swore, then looked puzzled. ‘What are “assassins” anyway?’
‘Saracen fanatics specially trained to murder. I think they’re after the justiciar,’ Savage said.
Edmund le Bottelier finally caught up, puffing, with MacHuylin.
‘Thank God you’re all right, sire,’ said Savage.
‘Thanks to this man here,’ the justiciar said, laying a hand on MacHuylin’s shoulder. ‘If he hadn’t arrived when he did I’d be a dead man.’
‘Lucky I had just popped outside for… ahem…’ the galloglaich coughed and looked awkward ‘…a moonlight stroll on the battlements when I saw them grab the justiciar.’
Savage suddenly noticed that the little wife of Syr Raymond Jordan was hovering, uncertain and worried near the bottom of the steps. He smiled, realising just what sort of “moonlight stroll” MacHuylin probably had intended. It was certainly not one Syr Raymond would have been happy with.
‘They just appeared from nowhere, and then disappeared again like ghosts,’ MacHuylin commented.
Savage nodded. ‘They’re trained to get in and out of anywhere. Hide in shadows. They’ve no fear of death either.’
‘What on earth are Saracens doing here?’ the justiciar said, looking around nervously. ‘We should get back into the hall. It’s well-lit and we can defend it ’til my soldiers get the portcullis up. God knows who is scurrying around in the dark out here.’
‘We need weapons,’ Savage said.
‘All weapons will be in the armoury. If I was attacking a castle, that’s where I’d go straight after taking the gate,’ MacHuylin said.
All three men exchanged glances as they realised the implications of what had just been said. All the guests in the great hall would have been disarmed on the way into the feast and their weapons locked in the castle armoury. All the soldiers were locked outside and there were two assassins and at least twenty armed attackers inside the castle. The nobility of the Earldom of Ulster and several surrounding kingdoms was unarmed and at the mercy of the killers at loose in the castle.
Savage heard a noise and looked up to the battlements. More men were clambering over the top of the battlements into the castle. Moonlight shimmered on iron sword blades.
‘How many of them do you think there are?’ MacHuylin asked.
Savage shrugged. ‘Can’t be sure. It was dark but I’d say about twenty.’
‘There’s more than that in the hall,’ MacHuylin said. ‘They have the swords but we have the numbers. De Thrapston will have the key to the armoury.’
‘To the banqueting hall,’ Savage said. MacHuylin grabbed Jordan’s wife gently but firmly by the arm and they all dashed across the outer courtyard to the great hall of the castle.
Behind them they heard the clatter of armed men running down the steps from the battlements.
At the hall they burst in through the doors. MacHuylin closed the door behind them but held it open a crack so he could watch what was going on outside without making a target of himself.
Savage and the justiciar pushed their way through the dancers to the dais at the top of the hall where the musicians were playing.
‘Stop playing,’ Savage ordered and as puzzled musicians complied, the dancers came to a disappointed halt.
‘We are under attack,’ the justiciar announced. ‘Armed men have taken the castle. My troopers are locked outside so we must deal with this ourselves.’
General uproar ensued. The earl strode through the crowd of dancers to the dais, his face a mask of cold rage.
‘Who has attacked my castle?’ he demanded.
‘They don’t wear any livery, Sire,’ Savage said. ‘But I believe they are from Tyr Eoghan. There are Muslim assassins with them too.’
‘What?’
‘It’s true. They very nearly killed me,’ the justiciar said. ‘Lucky for me that galloglaich of yours, MacHuylin, was out on the battlements at the same time.’
‘How dare they attack my castle?’ the earl said. ‘I’ll have their heads for this.’ He swung round and seemed to be scanning the room, looking for someone.
‘Where the hell is Montmorency?’ the earl shouted.
The Hospitaller was nowhere to be seen in the hall.
‘He can’t help us now,’ the justiciar said. ‘We must get to the armoury and defend ourselves. The portcullis is down so no one will be able to get in to help us.’
The earl nodded, the reality of the situation dawning on him.
Henry de Thrapston and Thomas de Mandeville joined them at the dais. De Thrapston rattled the huge bunch of keys that swung from his belt. ‘You’ll need these,’ he said.
‘Right. All the women stay behind,’ the earl ordered. ‘All the men follow me. We’ll go to the armoury and get our weapons, then I want these bastards cleaned out of my castle. De Thrapston, you have the key to this hall. We must lock the ladies inside when we have gone so none of the enemy get to them.’
The keeper of the castle nodded.
‘Sire, with respect I would prefer it if you and the justiciar stayed behind in the hall,’ the seneschal said. ‘For your own safety. It’s you two they are probably after.’
‘Stay in here with the women?’ the earl growled. ‘While there are Tyr Eoghan men running around my castle? What do you take me for?’
&n
bsp; ‘All the same, sire, I would be happier knowing you were safe in here,’ the seneschal insisted.
‘It’s you they’re after,’ Savage said. ‘It will be easier for us if we can concentrate on getting the castle back without having to look out for you as well.’
‘He has a point, Richard.’ The justiciar nodded enthusiastically. ‘This is a young man’s game. We’re past our fighting days now.’
‘Speak for yourself,’ the earl said, then caught sight of Countess Margaret, regarding him with a pleading look. De Burgh gave a heavy sigh. ‘All right, I will stay,’ he said, as he led the way to the door. ‘There should be some guards around. Where are they?’ he wondered aloud as they went.
‘I was arrested earlier by the constable and locked in the north tower,’ Savage explained. ‘There were Flemish crossbowmen left on the battlements to guard the tower. They’re probably already dead. The assassins would have killed them as soon as they got over the wall.’
The earl and the justiciar both tutted and shook their heads. ‘That bloody fool D’Athy,’ the earl said. ‘What is he playing at? Those mercenaries were expensive. With any luck he’s got himself killed too.’
‘What’s going on outside, Connor?’ the seneschal asked when they reached MacHuylin at his vantage point beside the door.
‘Not much,’ the galloglaich said. ‘About fifteen of them came over the wall and down the steps after us. They must know there’s a lot more of us in here because when they saw us going into the hall they stopped and headed through the gate into the inner courtyard.’
‘The armoury is in there. Next to the keep,’ de Thrapston said.
De Mandeville looked round and did a quick headcount. ‘There are about forty men here. They may be armed but if we rush them at once we should be able to take them.’
There were general nods of agreement but everyone realised that unarmed and unarmoured, some of them would also probably die in the attempt.
Savage saw a light coming from the open doorway of the kitchen near the hall.
‘Let’s go to the kitchen first,’ he said. ‘There’ll be knives in there. Meat cleavers, heavy ladles, pots, stools: grab anything you can find that you can use as a weapon.’
‘Right.’ MacHuylin swung open the door. ‘Go.’
The men all piled through the doorway and ran the short distance to the kitchen. Savage hung back momentarily while de Thrapston locked the door of the hall behind them. Then they both ran to meet the rest in the kitchen. It was empty except for the cook, who was lying insensible on the ground, face down.
‘Is he dead?’ the seneschal wondered.
‘Dead drunk, probably,’ MacHuylin grunted and stepped over the prone figure.
Everyone began ransacking the kitchen: turning over baskets, opening chests and grabbing carving knives, table knives, cleavers and anything that could possibly be used to inflict some damage on the enemy.
When Savage arrived he feared he was too late to get anything of use. Then he spotted the long iron meat spit that hung over the fire. He lifted this from its stand and hefted it in both hands like a spear. MacHuylin grabbed a huge meat cleaver and a small iron cauldron. De Thrapston had a carving knife. De Mandeville lifted two table knives. When the kitchen had been stripped of all dangerous implements, they prepared to make their move towards the armoury.
The band of men ran out of the kitchen and made for the gate in the inner curtain wall. Almost as soon as they were out of the doors there came the dull snap of crossbows shooting and two men screamed and fell, their improvised weapons clattering across the cobblestones.
Savage glanced around and saw figures on the dark battlements, two of them with crossbows. They were reloading.
‘Keep going. Make for the gate!’ he shouted. They could not afford to lose any more men. They may have started out with more men than the attackers but the odds were already shortening. Once the crossbowmen reloaded, they would become shorter still.
The castle was oyster-shaped and built in two concentric circles. Off-centre, like a pearl at the heart of the fortress, was the big square keep that stood as a citadel: the point of final refuge if all the outer defences fell. Around it was wrapped the inner curtain wall. Circling all of this was the newer, much longer outer curtain wall that enclosed the courtyard, stables, great hall, kitchens, garrison quarters and various other buildings and guard towers. Savage and the rest of the men were headed for the armoury, which was within the inner wall. Once through the gate, they would be out of sight of the crossbowmen on the battlements and no longer a target for them.
They arrived at the gate to the inner courtyard without incurring further casualties and poured through. Then they halted.
Arrayed before the doors of the armoury were fifteen armed men. They wore no livery and were armed with a variety of spears, swords and axes. Their bulky shapes betrayed the fact that they had armour on beneath their plain blue tunics. Four of them were trying to break down the locked doors of the armoury.
‘Who are you?’ the seneschal demanded. ‘What do you want?’
In answer, the men-at-arms launched a volley of spears. MacHuylin pushed the seneschal aside, knocking him to the ground and diving after him as the iron tip of a spear sailed past, cleaving the air where de Mandeville had stood an instant before.
There were more cries of pain as the spears found other targets amongst the tightly packed ranks of the men from the hall.
With a roar the men-at-arms followed up the spear volley with a charge.
A big man came running at Savage, his sword raised above his head for the kill. Like the rest of the attackers, he clearly did not expect Savage or any of the men from the hall to be armed and they came at them without heed to their own defence.
Savage took full advantage and rammed the meat spit into the man’s unprotected face. His battle cry was cut short as the point of the spit smashed through his open mouth into his skull, exiting the back of his head and taking his helmet off to bounce across the cobblestones.
Another attacker had a similar nasty shock as he ran into MacHuylin who swung his heavy iron cauldron left-handed in a scything arc that connected with his head, knocking him sideways. The galloglaich followed up with a swipe from the meat cleaver that went into the man’s exposed throat. The blade dug deep, almost decapitating the man who collapsed like a scarecrow with the support sticks snapped, blood gushing from the huge wound in his neck.
‘Back! Back!’ one of the men-at-arms shouted in Irish and the attack stopped. Realising that instead of facing unarmed nobles they were in fact outnumbered by armed opponents, the men-at-arms sprinted off in the direction of the steps up to the battlements.
‘Damn them to Hell. It’s like fighting with shadows,’ MacHuylin roared. ‘Will they not stand still for one minute and fight us like men?’
‘It’s not us they are after,’ Savage stated as Henry de Thrapston ran to the armoury door to unlock it. Savage did a quick headcount. They had lost two men to the crossbows, a further three had been taken by the spear volley so that left… twenty?
‘There should be more of us,’ Savage said. ‘There were forty in the hall, we left the earl and justiciar behind, we’ve lost five but there are only twenty men here.’
In disbelief, everyone looked around, each man doing his own headcount.
‘Not everyone has followed us out of the hall,’ MacHuylin said. ‘Cowards.’
‘Cowards? I hope so, Connor,’ the seneschal said, his face grim. ‘We left the earl alone back there with them. I hope they aren’t traitors.’
‘We have to go back,’ Savage said.
‘No,’ de Mandeville said. ‘It’s more important the castle is retaken. You men arm yourselves and retake the gatehouse. Get the portcullis up and let the justiciar’s troopers in. Get me a sword and shield and I’ll go back to the hall on my own and see what’s going on. It was me convinced the earl to stay behind so it should be me who goes back for him.’
‘Help your
selves, men,’ de Thrapston announced, swinging open the doors of the castle armoury.
They dropped their kitchen implements and armed themselves with real weapons. With a sword and shield in his hands, Savage felt less naked. Now he itched to get within striking distance of the enemy. Henry de Thrapston took the big key of the hall off his key ring and handed it to Thomas de Mandeville.
‘Good luck,’ he said.
The seneschal nodded. ‘And to you,’ he said, saluting them all. Then he turned to run back out of the gate into the outer courtyard.
Almost immediately they heard the sound of crossbows firing. After a heart-stopping second there came the clatter of the bolts hitting stone and they knew that they had missed their target.
‘What now?’ MacHuylin said, turning to Savage.
‘The seneschal is right. We need to get that portcullis raised,’ Savage said. ‘What’s the best way into the gate tower?’
‘There are towers on either of the gates with doors leading to the battlements so we could approach from either side,’ de Thrapston replied.
‘Let’s do both,’ Savage said. ‘We’ll split into three groups: one needs to go after those crossbowmen on the battlements to the north. A couple of men will create a diversion and attack the gate from one side, while the rest of us go in from the other side. Any volunteers?’
‘I’ll go for the crossbows,’ MacHuylin announced. ‘Who’s with me?’
William de Sandal, Eamonn Albanach and Congal MacArtain raised their hands.
‘Good. Who wants to create the diversion?’ Savage asked.
‘I will,’ Raymond Jordan, now wearing an oversized helmet, said.
‘And I’ll go with him,’ Roger Blanquet volunteered.
‘So will I,’ de Thrapston said.
‘All right. Get yourselves up onto the north battlements once MacHuylin is up the steps. The rest of us will head for the other battlements on the harbour side wall of the castle,’ Savage said. ‘The signal to start the diversion attack will be three slaps of my sword on my shield.’ He demonstrated, thumping the shield with the flat of his sword. It was a sound that could easily be mistaken for battle noise unless you knew what to listen for.
Lions of the Grail Page 25
