by David Gilman
‘You’ll be with me on the walls, lad. Do as I tell you and you’ll come through it well enough,’ he said quietly.
‘I will, Master Longdon,’ said the archer.
Longdon deftly stitched one side of the patch. ‘Not enough thread. Cut me more. Your name?’
‘Peter Garland,’ the boy answered.
‘All right then, lad. You’ll do fine. You have been blessed with serving the bravest man I have ever known. He was once as nervous as you but he learnt his lessons well.’
‘Sir Thomas?’ said Garland, breaking off more thread.
‘Aye. When we went ashore at Normandy back in ’46, we took the beach and settled on the cliffs in case the French were ready for us. Thomas was a sixteen-year-old boy who protected his young brother: an ox of a lad, malformed, deaf and mute. But as courageous and as big as bear. Bigger than Thomas even. And Sir Gilbert, well, he’s always been a hard man. He was Thomas’s sworn lord, not that that meant he was privileged in any way, other than having his protection. We teased Thomas about his father’s war bow because it had a draw weight on it that few of us could pull and we got him to loose an arrow at a crow in a tree. Sir Gilbert struck Thomas for wasting an arrow. He was a harsh master, was Killbere. Hard as nails. Hanged men who failed in their duty. But that day, back then, when Thomas could have pointed the finger at us archers who had taunted him into wasting that arrow, he didn’t. He took the blow and curses from Sir Gilbert and kept his mouth shut. I reckon whatever angels there are for the likes of us, they had Thomas Blackstone ready to be a leader of men even back then.’
He tied off the stitching and bit through the thread. ‘You just do as the other lads do, Peter Garland, and you will see the light of day.’ He handed the jupon back to the youngster and patted his shoulder.
‘Thank you, Master Longdon.’
Will Longdon got to his feet and stepped away. Perinne glanced his way. Will Longdon smiled. Here he was mothering youngsters. Those who had served with Blackstone over the years cared for those in their charge even though many would also know the lash of Blackstone’s tongue. He pushed aside the embarrassment of being overheard by Perinne and looked at the wall builder’s men: they had felled a young tree and tapped wedges into its length to split it. They had drilled holes and hammered in hewn rungs. The assault ladder was light enough for two men to carry but it had to bear the weight of a dozen fighting men clambering up it at the same time. Perinne had built many defensive walls and assault ladders over the years; as the men stood back from their labours he lifted the end of the ladder and, using nails for shoeing horses, hammered three into each of the ladder’s feet to stop it slipping when it was set against the town’s walls.
Perinne caught his friend’s arm. ‘Will,’ he said quietly. ‘When Thomas rode out to rescue Jack a buzzard circled. It hovered over him. For a moment I feared for his life in case there was an ambush.’
Longdon frowned. It was unusual to hear the veteran soldier express such heartfelt concern but every man understood how an unexpected sign could be a forewarning. ‘Perhaps it called for Jack. He looked half dead when you brought him in.’
Perinne shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’
Will Longdon hesitated. How many times had Blackstone been close to death since he had known him? More times than he could remember. They were all mortal and if the forest spirits had beckoned Blackstone’s soul then there was nothing any of them could do to stop it. ‘It can happen to any of us, Perinne,’ he said. ‘And you know wherever Thomas is then death is always at his shoulder. I swear there are many others who will die before him.’
Longdon heard his attempt at comforting them both ring hollow. But it was the best he could do. ‘Your men have finished the ladder. They’re waiting.’
He turned away and let Perinne join his men, who righted their ladder and leaned it against another tree. Perinne pointed to two of his heaviest men and gestured them to test the ladder’s strength. When the attack began he, Renfred and John Jacob would race up the ladder with others at their heels. Any fault in its construction meant they would die before breaching the walls. The two men clambered up the twenty feet, followed by another two. Satisfied that the ladder could bear the men’s weight Perinne signalled them to take it and return to the camp. He scrubbed a hand across the crow’s feet scars on his close-cropped head. A night attack brought its own fears. Thomas Blackstone had taken him and the men into battle many times and not so long past had been trapped behind an enemy’s city’s walls and had had to fight their way through the streets of Milan. They had been outnumbered and lost good men yet some kind of divine hand had shielded Blackstone.
Will Longdon’s storytelling had reminded him of what he knew of Blackstone when Blackstone and other young men like him had stormed the walls of Caen. A dying Welsh archer had bequeathed Blackstone a pendant of the silver goddess Arianrhod. The pagan Celtic charm had not spared Blackstone from personal tragedy but she watched over him, of that Perinne was certain. He wished he had such a charm himself but knew in his heart he would prefer a priest to give him absolution. No man wanted to die unshriven. If they survived the ice then he would go through that window and in the fight that followed stay close to Blackstone. Perhaps some of the goddess’s blessing would also shield him.
Perinne spat and buckled on his sword. The time for idle thought was over.
CHAPTER FIVE
Blackstone ran across the ice towards the dark shape of Saint-Aubin-la-Fère’s walls. A dull glow emanated from the small window. The cooking fires in the kitchen had been bedded down for the night, the embers deep in the grate’s ash ready to be brought to life the next morning. The glimmer, though barely visible, guided the attackers, who had lain throughout the night hours on the frozen ground and then, slowly at first, forced their stiffened limbs to follow the whispered commands of their captains, who in turn rose up after Blackstone. It was pitch black. The clouds had settled low in the sky. No moon, no stars. Only the bobbing white patch on the collar of the man in front.
In the silence of the night all Blackstone heard was the men’s rasping breath and the crunch of their weight on the ice. Each footfall sounded like a warning to the night watch on the walls, but he and his men were more than halfway and no alarm had been raised. Men gasped for air as they tried to keep up with Blackstone’s long strides and at every step, as they felt the ice give a little more, they became more desperate to reach the black curtain of the wall that lay ahead. And then they were there. In silence, other than their heaving breath, the men went down on one knee, making themselves less of a target should they be seen. No commands were given. Every man knew what role he played. Raising their eyes they saw the blind gaze of their dead comrades hanging from the walls. Contorted in death, their frozen faces told their own story. They had choked to death. No quick release. No snap of the neck. A heel-kicking agony. The ladder went up. Men spat phlegm. Got to their feet. Gripped their swords, slung their shields across their backs. No longer any need to follow the white patch in front. Shuffling forward they spread themselves out at the base of the wall. Waiting for the ropes to drop. Waiting for John Jacob to start the killing.
Blackstone’s squire went through the window first, knife in hand. The smell of cooked meat lingered in the air. His mouth watered. A sudden pang of hunger, tinged with envy that there was abundant meat for the Lord of Saint-Aubin even in winter. He settled his feet onto the kitchen floor. There was enough fire glow to show the servants’ sleeping bodies. Their backs were pressed against the huge hearth, arms tucked into their chests, curled in on themselves for warmth. As in most kitchens the cooks and servants were men. He took three paces into the room, rolling each step onto the side of his foot to lessen any sound of his footfall. There was no need to check whether Perinne and Renfred were behind him; they moved silently but he could hear their shallow breathing. He stepped past the sleeping bodies and went to the furthest man. Six men would be dead in seconds.
John Jacob’s first victim roll
ed in his sleep. Jacob stopped. Was the man about to wake? The figure coughed and turned to face the hearth. Jacob darted forward, sensed the others do the same behind him, then bent, smothered the man’s nose and mouth and cut his blade deep across the man’s throat. Warm, sticky blood spurted across his cutting hand. The body bucked. It made no difference. The gurgles of death were each followed by a swift knife to the heart. As the silent killers despatched the servants another three of Blackstone’s men quickly passed them. They ducked out of the door, turned left onto the walkway, up six steps to the wall-head defence to drop their ropes to the waiting men below.
Perinne ushered Will Longdon through the kitchen. His bow was unstrung, the cord tucked below his skullcap helmet. His sheaf of arrows was still in the waxed cotton bag that the archers had tugged behind their belts into the small of their backs. Once on the walls the bows would be strung and arrows nocked.
The ropes unfurled down the walls. Blackstone and Meulon each took a handhold; one of the men-at-arms took the third. They found purchase and clambered up the roughly hewn stone. Sixty feet of heaving effort brought them to the parapet. Sweat soaked their linen shirts beneath their mail despite the freezing air. Callused hands cracked from the hardened, rough hemp. The rope men guarded the walkway but there was no sign of town guards. Blackstone crouched, making his way towards the bridge that would take them across the street below and into the great hall. Men followed him quickly but as he passed Will Longdon, who was guarding the approach, the archer pointed silently below. The curfew demanded the citizens of Saint-Aubin be off the streets in the hours from sunset to sunrise but a night lantern and four flickering torches spilled light into the square. Their glow cast long shadows from the hanged men and revealed in the middle of the square the half-naked figure of Killbere. Head slumped on his chest, his knees bent, the unconscious man was bound to a stake by ropes. Blackstone’s heart raced. Was Killbere still alive? That possibility would drive his determination to save his friend. And kill the butcher who had slain so many good men.
Blackstone resisted the urge to run down and release his friend. Movement in the torchlight would alert the guards on the other walls. The darkness and the low temperature were Blackstone’s best friend. He hoped that the sentries on watch would be huddled in their cloaks, most of them asleep.
‘Protect him, Will. Once the alarm is raised kill anyone who goes near him.’ With that simple command he ran across the walkway above the street and plunged into near darkness as he entered the passageway leading to the great hall. Dim cresset lamps gave enough light for him to see the iron-studded door ahead. He grasped the iron ring latch, turned it slowly and pressed his shoulder against the door. There were still no cries of alarm from outside, which meant that Blackstone’s men had secured the walls. Blackstone, Perinne and John Jacob moved quickly across the vast expanse of the great hall. The hearth held large logs, which were burning slowly. A long table and benches straddled the room, but no servants slept on the floor or corridor. There was no knowing where de Charité’s bedchamber might be but, as in many older fortifications, Blackstone guessed it would be in a wing off the hall where the latrine tower was built.
Blackstone pointed to a handful of torches stacked by the vast stone fireplace. John Jacob and Perinne pushed the oil-soaked torches into the flames. They flared brightly. Flanking Blackstone they reached the end of the great hall, turned down a passage and saw stairs winding their way up. This had to be where de Charité’s bedchamber was located. The steps curved right to left and if there were guards at the top then they had the advantage because the wall on Blackstone’s right hand prohibited the use of a sword. No challenge was issued, however, and at the top of the stairwell the torchlight revealed the bedchamber’s door. Blackstone didn’t hesitate as he pushed the door open.
The canopied bed was fit for a nobleman, not a Breton warlord. Fresh reeds on the floor cushioned a woven carpet and a tapestry hung from the walls. There was warmth in the room from a smouldering fire and the smell of stale sweat and sex. The wooden bedframe was decorated with blue and red paint and the feather mattress’s bed coverings were of embroidered cloth. Bernard de Charité had plundered far and wide and lived the life of a wealthy merchant.
There was still no movement from the two bodies on the bed. A naked woman lay on her back, arm outstretched, the bedsheets twisted around her torso. Four empty wine bottles lay on the floor and a burnt-down candle’s congealed wax dribbled over a wooden table. The remains of a meal made a squalid mess that spilled onto the floor. Next to the woman a man lay face down, mouth open, snoring, with spittle dribbling into his beard. His back muscles rose and fell with his heavy breathing. There was no need for Blackstone and the others to be cautious; the butcher of Saint-Aubin was deeply asleep. The three men relaxed their guard.
‘He’s a hairy bastard,’ said Perinne as he found a bottle that still held some wine. The man’s back was smothered in a mat of dark hair, in contrast to his close-cropped head. Perinne offered the bottle to Blackstone, who took a mouthful, passed it back and then went to the window where he could see the first hint of daylight creeping into the darkness.
‘Like a bear,’ said John Jacob, lifting the drunken man’s sword away from the bench that held his clothing. ‘And I’ll wager he stinks like one. He lives well,’ he said, admiring the sword.
‘Not for long,’ said Blackstone.
CHAPTER SIX
The town awoke slowly as daylight fought its way through the threatening clouds. The chapel bell for matins clanged tonelessly as men and women, hunched and shivering, staggered into the narrow streets to relieve themselves. There were still many weeks until warmer weather would break up the hard ground underfoot and water butts would not need their ice broken. It couldn’t come soon enough. Sentries on the night watch who had huddled at their stations throughout the night shrugged off their cloaks. If the guard commander saw them still hunched when he clambered up the steps to the parapet then they would be flogged. A woman squatted in the street, her bladder heavy from the long night’s curfew. She yawned and blew snot from her nose. Stiff from the unyielding floor that served as her bed she eased the crick from her neck, her eyes raised towards the high walls. Something dark fell from the sky. Her eyes widened in horror when she saw it was one of the night watch with an arrow through his chest. By the time she had screamed and soiled herself scrambling to her feet others had fallen dead into the narrow street.
Will Longdon had set his men in the perfect position to kill the sentries and as voices raised in panic echoed around the walls Blackstone’s men-at-arms had surged into the barracks next to the town’s gate. There, de Charité’s soldiers were being roused from their sleep and most died desperately reaching for their weapons as Meulon and Renfred’s men hacked their way through their ranks. A handful of the Breton warlord’s men ducked and weaved their way clear of the slaughter. Naked, grasping weapons, they ran into the square – where Will Longdon and six of his archers had already run down to form a defensive line between the unconscious Killbere and the soldiers’ quarters. With practised ease they bent their bodies, pushing their bow staves away from their chests, hauled back the yard-long bodkin-tipped arrows and loosed their deadly shots into the hapless men.
Peter Garland did as commanded and killed with the same relentless efficiency as the others and as the surge of excitement settled he felt the elation of being part of the elite group of men. Jack Halfpenny had retrieved his war bow and stood with his centenar. Ignoring the wound in his side he refused to let the pain from bending the bow stop him from shooting the men who had slain his archers in the ambush.
Within minutes of the town’s awakening Blackstone’s men had killed most of the sixty men under de Charité’s command. The townspeople barricaded their doors but those who had been too slow were forced into the square at sword point while others had their doors broken down and were dragged into the streets. By the time Blackstone had kicked the naked de Charité from his drunken s
lumber Jack Halfpenny had cut Killbere free. Meulon carried him under one of the arches where others dragged a straw mattress. Renfred and his men seized food and blankets and took them to where Killbere would be tended.
Amid the screams women ran, dragging their children through the streets littered with de Charité’s men into the charnel house of the square, where Blackstone’s dead men still hung. Their men were forced at spear and sword point to follow. The hapless citizens of Saint-Aubin saw roughly dressed figures shouting at each other in English, and stocky men with war bows taller than themselves pulling bloodied arrows from the soldiers who only hours before had made the townspeople feel safe from any attack. Now that illusion had been wrenched from them by sudden violence inflicted by an invader who seemed to have appeared from nowhere. The terrified people were herded ever closer together by Blackstone’s men and watched as a tall, rugged-looking man with a scar on his face dragged the naked Breton warlord into the square.
Blackstone clutched de Charité by the flesh of his cheek, painfully twisting his face. Despite the Breton’s obvious strength he could not resist because the Englishman would have torn his face from him. With a hefty shove and a kick the naked man was plunged into the cowering townspeople. Blackstone stood amidst them and looked around at the desecrated bodies of his men hanging from the gibbets. He knew every man’s name. He had depended on each of them in battle. Every man had been ready to bleed for the man next to him. His heart thumped hard as if trying to break through the constraints of his leather jerkin. He looked at Meulon, whose glowering expression told him he would cut the throats of every living creature in the town if Blackstone so wished it. Tears stung Blackstone’s eyes. He could not express his loss at seeing how his men had died. His voice was no more than a tormented whisper but its tone carried every threat imaginable to those close enough to hear him: ‘Get them down, Meulon. And use these bastards to do it.’
