Gate of the Dead

by David Gilman

  ‘You stink like a dog’s arse,’ said Killbere as they heaved Blackstone to his feet and took his weight. ‘Thomas, look here, man, your boy comes for you.’

  Blackstone stared towards the gloom-laden doorway where Henry Blackstone stood wearing a jupon bearing his father’s coat of arms.

  A spark flared in Blackstone’s eyes – the boy seemed taller, stronger even, and he looked at his father with an unwavering gaze. Killbere beckoned the lad, who held a sword and scabbard. The old knight took them from him and thrust Wolf Sword against Blackstone’s chest, forcing him to grasp it tightly. ‘You’re needed. By the King’s command,’ he said and grunted with pleasure. ‘We’re going to war.’

  ~

  We hope you enjoyed this book.

  The next gripping instalment in the Master of War series will be released in winter 2016

  For more information, click one of the links below:

  Historical Notes

  Acknowledgements

  About David Gilman

  About the Master of War Series

  Also by David Gilman

  An invitation from the publisher

  Historical Notes

  The opening attack on the hilltop town of Santa Marina reflected an historical event in northern Italy in 1358 when a large mercenary force – known as routiers to the French and condottieri to the Italians – was defeated by peasant militia. The mercenaries had passed near the town of Maradi and promised to pay for supplies – which they did not. It was unheard-of for unarmed countryfolk who might, at best, call themselves a local militia, to take on professional soldiers, but the villagers of Maradi in the central Apennines did just that. In that summer they sought revenge for Konrad von Landau’s mercenaries – and they won by trapping them in the mountain passes and wearing down the soldiers’ defences.

  Following the great battle of Poitiers in 1356 thousands of soldiers were released from duty and, doing what they did best, they joined others as military professionals. The place to ply their trade at that time was Italy. In the Middle Ages Italy was not the unified country we know today but a number of independent states and princedoms. City-states were self-governing and hired mostly outsiders to fight their wars and protect their cities. Florence, Pisa, Rome, Milan, Genoa and other great city-states who offered a condotta, a contract for hire, had strict rules of employment for these men. Accounts were kept, food and weapons were supplied, but the soldiers were not allowed to reside within the city walls because they were inclined to commit acts of violence and theft against the civilians who were their paymasters. The English, in particular, were prized for their martial skills – as were the Germans – but the English and Welsh had by 1358 the greatest reputation as fighting men.

  The Via Francigena is the commonly known route for pilgrims travelling between Rome and Canterbury. Several mountain passes could be used to connect with ‘Francia’, and the term ‘Via Francigena’ was used for different roads through these various passes that connected Italy and France. The so-called ‘Lombard Way’ became the Iter Francorum, or the ‘Frankish Route’ in the Itinerarium sancti Willibaldi of AD 725. The ‘Via Francigena’ is first mentioned in the Actum Clusio, a parchment in the abbey of San Salvatore al Monte Amiata (Tuscany), in AD 876. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells us that in AD 990 the Saxon Sigeric was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury and went to Rome to collect the pallium or the investiture mantle from the hands of the Pope, as was customary for that period. Sigeric’s journey back from Rome after his investiture is recorded in a manuscript in the British Library, rediscovered in the 1980s by Italian researchers. The Archbishop’s descriptions of places along the route have been shown to be very accurate though the tenth-century place names listed differ in many instances from their modern counterparts. This discovery has generated academic research, tourism promotion and, in some cases, restoration of the actual route for modern walkers. I used Sigeric’s chronicle of distances between each landmark to gauge Blackstone’s travel time in his return to England.

  I walked for a couple of days along the beginning of such a journey – before it became too arduous – and I have published some photographs of the countryside. I have also included on this page some of my research photographs of Lucca: http://bit.ly/1j7V0XN. Of the many routes followed by pilgrims I used the area around the Maddalena Pass that connects Barcelonnette in France with Cuneo in Italy. It meant Blackstone travelling across the 2,000-metre range in winter. Historically it was also the pass through which Hannibal led his Carthaginian army towards Rome in 218 BC.

  The character Fra Stefano Caprini, a Knight of the Tau, otherwise known as the Order of Saint James of Altopascio – was a member of a hospitaller order who offered protection to pilgrims and also had their own hospitals. The brethren were knights and priests. During my research for this book in the wonderful city of Lucca the character had not yet been conceived, but as I walked the streets I saw a large fresco above one of the city gates showing two men of striking appearance. My guide explained they were Knights of the Tau and the role they played. I knew immediately I had to have such a man at Thomas Blackstone’s side.

  The Italian town of Pistoia, north of Lucca, was famous for its extremely sharp and deadly daggers. For centuries Pistoia supplied Europe’s assassins with their weapon of choice. I had my anonymous assassin work in the Ceppo Hospital of Pistoia, founded in 1277, one of the oldest continuously operating hospitals in the world, which has underground passageways that extend for several hundred metres. This allowed my assassin to ‘disappear’ and find his master knife maker.

  The Lords of Milan – Galeazzo II and Bernabò Visconti – murdered their brother Matteo in 1355 and divided his inheritance between them. These ruthless men let nothing stand in their way of gaining power and Bernabò’s cruelty is well documented. He was declared a heretic in 1360 by Pope Innocent VI. Needless to say, the Visconti fought the Papal States – and Florence – for many years. Galeazzo was the more remarkable of the two brothers and was a patron of the Italian poet and chronicler Petrarch and also founded the University of Pavia. He was also known for the quaresima, a particularly sadistic form of torture that lasted forty days, alternating one day of excrutiating torment with one of rest.

  Thomas Blackstone had to return to England in time for the great tournament at Windsor on St George’s Day. The tournament was at the heart of chivalric culture and for the contest in 1358 the King had given safe passage to any European knight who wished to attend. I wrote that there was to be jousting by night during this tournament, but this is not historically accurate. I took this idea from a previous tournament held by the King at Bristol, and liked the imagery it conjured.

  Juliet Barker in her book The Tournament in England 1100–1400 claims, like other authors, that a knight’s hand was protected on his lance by a vamplate, the inverted cone on the shaft that fits snugly over his gauntlet. However, Ewart Oakeshott, considered to be one of the world’s leading authorities on the arms and armour of the medieval period, claims in his book A Knight and His Weapons (2nd edition) that this device did not come into practice until after 1425. He states that a lance had something that looked more like a sword’s crossguard to protect a knight’s hand. Oakeshott also mentions that the tilt, the long barrier of wood between two horsemen during the contest, also only began being used in the fifteenth century, quite some time after the St George’s Day tournament in 1358 at Windsor. To show the danger posed by two charging horses rather suited my story. And although this was not a fight to the death, I chose to arm the Prince of Wales and Blackstone without the benefit of blunted swords.

  When it came to the fight to the death at Meaux between Thomas Blackstone and the skilled knight, Werner von Lienhard, I took the ritual of prayer from The Last Duel by Eric Jager, who recorded the trial by combat of two knights in medieval France in the late fourteenth century. I chose von Lienhard’s banner of a Harpy, or Harpie as it is also spelt, wanting it to elicit fear in the eyes of the beholder. In c
lassical mythology the harpies were the spirits of the wind when it was especially destructive. Three were named Aello (storm), Celeno (blackness), and Ocypete (rapidity). Homer mentions only one of them, Hesiod two of them, and medieval writers describe them as very fierce, gaunt and loathsome, dwelling in filth and stench, contaminating everything within their reach. Greek mythology cast them as messengers of divine vengeance.

  I am aware of the subjugation of women in the Middle Ages, and that those times dictated that they were controlled by men. But there were women of strength and character who, despite their ‘subservient’ role, ran vast estates, bore their children and at times went to war. I have written about Countess Blanche de Harcourt et Ponthieu in Master of War and Defiant unto Death: a woman who raised a band of mercenaries to revenge her husband slain by King John II of France. And Blackstone’s wife, Christiana, who deserted her husband because of her sense of betrayal, but who fights for her children’s survival during the Jacquerie uprising in Gate of the Dead. The women of these times were complex characters driven by fear, joy, desires and loyalty, and they had to find the strength to survive by any means that were open to them. It is too easy to see medieval women as downtrodden and abused caricatures. What about King Edward’s mother, Queen Isabella, possibly one of the greatest women in English – and for that matter, French – history. She had guile and courage and was used as a negotiator between the French and English Crowns. She had a wide-ranging library that suggested a cultured woman. She owned religious books, furnished her chapel richly, gave alms and made pilgrimages; but if she did take the habit of Franciscan Poor Clares as reputed, it was only on her deathbed. She journeyed from Hertford Castle to the great tournament of 23 April 1358 at Windsor Castle to sit alongside her son and it seems obvious from chronicles that she and her son were not as estranged as some have suggested. During that great spectacle she was gloriously attired and enjoyed the public affection of the King. She had been ill for some time and died on 23 August, but records show that prior to her death payment had been made to a messenger going on several occasions to Canterbury for medicines and for the hire of a horse for Master Lawrence, the physician. On 1 August, payment was made to Nicholas Thomasyer, apothecary, of London, for spices and ointments supplied for the Queen’s use. Among other entries is a payment to Master Lawrence of forty shillings for attendance on the Queen at Hertford, for an entire month.

  Research reveals that Isabella – known many years later as the She-Wolf of France – always loved the husband she was supposed to have betrayed. She insisted prior to her death that she be clothed in the same gown in which she had been married.

  The quest that Blackstone undertakes across France to rescue his family, and the life of the French King’s daughter, meant he had to travel through a land of turmoil and violence. The Jacquerie was predominantly an uprising by peasants – who were commonly and contemptuously called Jacques by the nobility – but lesser lords and knights also threw in their lot with them and even provided some military leadership. Old scores could be settled while the Jacques tore the land apart, looting and killing. After the English had captured the French King at Poitiers two years earlier, the French nobility were discredited. France became virtually ungovernable. The Dauphin struggled to establish control while Étienne Marcel, the Provost of Merchants in Paris, seized control. Under their captain general, Guillaume Cale, the Jacquerie joined forces with Parisian rebels under Marcel. When the hordes reached Meaux, a city to the east of Paris where the French King’s daughter and other ladies and children of the nobility had sought sanctuary under the protection of Lord de Hangest, a loyal supporter of the French Crown, the peasant army were let into the city by Mayor Jehan de Soulez. It was thanks to Jean de Grailly, the Captal de Buch, and his cousin Gaston Phoebus, Count of Foix, who had returned from a crusade in Prussia, that the women were saved. Naturally, Thomas Blackstone was going to be there.

  David Gilman

  Devonshire, 2015

  I always welcome comments and can be contacted via my website: www.davidgilman.com; or on my author’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/davidgilman.author; and for those who are more fleet of foot: https://twitter.com/davidgilmanuk.

  Acknowledgements

  My thanks to Antonella Marcucci, professional guide, who gave me a personal tour around Lucca. Her knowledge was very helpful in the writing of this book and she kindly answered my ongoing questions once I returned home. Her enthusiasm and interest never wavered. Should anyone wish to gain an understanding of this wonderful city’s rich history she can be booked at www.guidelucca.it. I am indebted to Dr Nelli Sergio and his staff at the Archivio di Stato, Lucca, for their assistance and for allowing me access to the early fifteenth-century manuscript Le croniche di Giovanni Sercambi. Maurizio Vanni, curator of the Living Museum, was very generous in opening the museum to me when he had a private function and photo shoot in progress, allowing me to explore the museum’s basement where the original walls of the city are located and where I was able to place Thomas Blackstone in the medieval brothel – which is what these cellars were in the fourteenth century.

  During the writing of Gate of the Dead I participated in a CLIC Sargent charity auction event. The auction raised funds for children with cancer and the highest bid would have a character in the book named after them. Neil Cracknell was the successful bidder and asked that his grandson Samuel Cracknell’s name be nominated. By coincidence I learnt that Samuel’s great-grandfather was Brigadier General Sir John Jacob Cracknell, and as readers of the Master of War novels will know, I have an existing character named John Jacob. A nice touch of synchronicity.

  Much appreciation, as always, to my literary agent Isobel Dixon at Blake Friedmann Literary Agency for her unflagging enthusiasm and keen eye that improved the initial drafts of this novel. Thanks to Nic Cheetham and the whole team at Head of Zeus for their passion and belief in the Master of War series; without their dedication to the project we would founder. I am grateful to my copy-editors and proofreaders, unsung heroes who diligently right the wrongs and to the art/design department for these wonderful book covers. My heartfelt thanks go to my editor Richenda Todd. Her suggestions always make a sentence more eloquent. She patiently and with much grace refused to let me get away with anything she thought to be questionable. Needless to say the liberties I eventually did manage to sneak past her are my responsibility alone. Thanks also for the efforts of my international publishers and editors who embrace translation and marketing with such commitment. Finally, my love and gratitude go to my wife, Suzy, whose support and understanding make the whole thing possible.

  About Gate of the Dead

  TUSCANY, 1358

  Thomas Blackstone has built a formidable reputation in exile, fighting as a mercenary amid the ceaseless internecine warring of Italy’s City States. Success has bred many enemies, who will seize any opportunity to destroy the man they cannot overcome on the field.

  When a dying man delivers a message recalling Blackstone to England, it seems almost certain to be a trap. Yet Blackstone cannot decline – the summons is apparently from the Queen.

  Blackstone will brave the terrors of the High Alps in winter, face the Black Prince in Tournament in Windsor, confront the bloody anarchy of a popular revolt in northern France and submit to trial by combat with a man he knows could kill him.

  And every step of the way, he will be shadowed by a notorious assassin, a killer who has been instructed to inflict the maximum pain on his target before he despatches him to hell.

  Reviews

  “Page-turning and gritty.”

  Daily Mail

  “Gilman does heart-pounding action superlatively.”

  The Times

  “The 100 Years’ War is the new Rome for historical adventure novels”

  Ben Kane

  About David Gilman

  DAVID GILMAN enjoyed many careers, including firefighter, soldier and photographer before turning to writing full time. He is an award-win
ning author and screenwriter.

  Visit his website: www.davidgilman.com

  Like him on Facebook: www.facebook.com/davidgilman.author

  About the Master of War Series

  I – Master of War

  ENGLAND, 1346

  Amid the carnage of the 100 Years’ War – the bloodiest conflict in medieval history – a young English archer confronts his destiny.

  For Thomas Blackstone the choice is easy – dance on the end of a rope for a murder he did not commit, or take up his war bow and join the king’s invasion.

  Vastly outnumbered, Edward III’s army will finally confront the armoured might of the French nobility on the field of Crécy.

  It is a battle that will change the history of warfare, a battle that will forge a legend.

  Master of War is available here.

  II – Defiant Unto Death

  FRANCE, 1356

  Ten years ago, the greatest army in Christendom was slaughtered at Crécy when Thomas Blackstone and his fellow archers stood their ground and rained death on the steel-clad might of French chivalry. Blackstone left that squalid field a knight.

  Now, Blackstone commands a war band and has carved out a small fiefdom in northern France. But the wound of war still bleed and a traitor has given the King of France the means to destroy first his family, and then the English knight himself.

  As the traitor’s net tightens, so the French King’s army draws in. Blackstone will stand and fight – in pitched battle and in single combat. He will defy his friends, his family and his king. He may yet defy death, but he can’t defy his destiny: