A Parliament of Spies

by Cassandra Clark

  ‘They were mates.’

  ‘Always ready for a laugh, was Martin.’

  ‘Not recently. He must have had a premonition. Remember that time he could only throw “ones” and somebody said “your luck’s gone, fella”, and he nearly throttled him?’

  Hildegard said her goodnights then went over to climb into her sleeping space in one of the small baggage wagons. She was just drifting off to sleep when she heard a group of men walking slowly past. Voices clear on the still night air. Conversation had turned to London. It was the first time down there for most of them. They had no idea what to expect.

  ‘They say the streets are paved with gold, don’t they? Do you believe it?’

  ‘Nah, paved might be true. With gold? Never.’

  ‘Maybe one or two, outside the palaces?’

  ‘Outside the Duke of Lancaster’s, maybe.’

  ‘I bet King Dickon walks on gold.’

  She heard a third voice. ‘Aye, at our expense.’

  ‘You don’t like Dickon, do you, Jarrold?’

  ‘Why should I? What’s he ever done for me?’

  ‘He’s well enough.’

  ‘God save him, say I.’

  Murmurs of agreement followed. Their voices faded.

  After that Hildegard drifted off to the sound of distant snores, the clink of metal as the guard shifted at his post, and that strange wrenching sound as horses crop grass.

  By now they were travelling through a landscape that was flat and bleak, a no man’s land, with mile after mile of nothing but scrubland, the straight Roman road cutting through it, and a huge sky full of curlews.

  The huntsmen began to grumble. They wanted to bring down some game. The archers strung their bows. They wanted wolves.

  The skin of the one shot before they left Holderness was dry now. It hung from its pole and the head, boiled in cummin as a favour by Master Fulford, gazed sightlessly towards their destination. The drivers geed their horses and made the wagons bounce on the track in their eagerness to reach somewhere more interesting.

  ‘Woodland up ahead,’ somebody muttered at last, staring hard at the skyline to the south after a few more uneventful miles. ‘We’ll get sport there, enough at least to fill our bellies.’ There were grunts of agreement. Somebody peeled off to the wagon carrying the sheaves of arrows to prepare to bring them out.

  The dogs in their wicker cage whined with frustration.

  The woods were a dark blur from one side of the road to the other and there was a cheer when the chamberlain called a halt.

  Holding up his white stick so everybody could see he had something to say, he bellowed, ‘It’s not for your benefit. His Grace wishes to stretch his legs!’ He turned to the kennelman. ‘Might as well get a brace of those dogs out, see if you can raise a few rabbits?’

  ‘We flying the hawks, sire?’

  The chamberlain shook his head. ‘Not unless you want to follow on foot to Lincoln. This is a short stop. We aim to be there before nightfall.’

  The long line of wagons squeezed up one by one as the command to halt was passed down the line and eventually, with a creaking of harness, the whole convoy groaned to a stop. Several people jumped down at once, following the archbishop’s example, and walked about, stretching their legs and trying to ease the aches out of bruised joints, while others leant wearily against the wheels of the carts they had been forced to run alongside. Someone produced a reed pipe and struck up a tune, bringing several cheerful souls to stamp their feet in a rough-and-ready jig.

  A couple of huntsmen whistled up the dogs as they were released from their cage and led them purposefully towards the woods.

  The archbishop looked round for his master of horse. ‘Bring Pegasus up, will you? I’ll ride into Lincoln. It’s not far now.’

  While he waited he glanced up at the sky as if checking for rain. It was awash with flat grey cloud from one side of the horizon to the other, but with a fresh wind from the coast that had been blowing for several days now, keeping the rain off.

  Hildegard saw him scrutinise the convoy spread back along the narrow road. There was a ditch on one side full of water, a clump of trees, then miles of empty moorland. His cook, from the canopied comfort of his wagon, was ordering parcels of bread and cheese from the vittling cart behind and a few servants were scurrying along handing it out to a forest of eager hands.

  Hildegard watched all this with a mind as empty as the sky, thinking, Lord I’m tired, I wish we were there. Munching on her own portion of bread and cheese, she wandered over to have a look at the hounds. Her own two, Duchess and Bermonda, too old to travel, had been left behind in the kennels at Meaux. She ruffled the heads poking between the bars. ‘Is anybody going to let the rest of them have a run?’ she asked the kennelman.

  ‘We’re not stopping long. Chamberlain says it’s only to give the lads a chance to raise a few rabbits while His Grace stretches his legs. ’

  Hildegard was about to return some bantering remark when there was a shout up ahead followed by more shouts from the tail end of the line. An oath followed and some further altercation that ended in a howl of pain. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the cook, Master Fulford, rise magnificently to his feet on the running board of his char only to sink down again as an arrow winged past his head.

  A voice somewhere in the thick of the commotion shouted, ‘Nobody move unless you want your throat slit. This won’t take long.’

  There was a jangling of chain mail, more cries, stifled this time, and then a sudden ominous silence over the entire convoy as three crossbowmen rose from the ditch beside the road followed by two foot soldiers in chain mail.

  Hildegard, caught between the dog cart and the one next to it, craned her neck to see what was happening. Word was filtering back that the wagons were being searched.

  ‘By whom?’ she asked a man standing next to her.

  ‘Dunno. Some armed band it looks like.’

  ‘Whose insignia do they wear?’

  ‘None so far as I can see.’

  The man climbed onto the running-board of the wagon loaded with arrow sheaves and peered back down the line. ‘They’re chucking things out onto the road,’ he reported. ‘They seem to be looking for something.’

  Just then Hildegard turned her head and to her astonishment saw the archbishop being helped into the saddle by his groom. He was carrying a leather bag under one arm and as she watched he kicked his horse on and vanished soundlessly into a brake beside the track. No one else seemed to have noticed.

  Meanwhile the wagons were being searched one by one, all the carefully packed stores hurled out, the chamberlain wringing his hands and making polite protests, the master cook growing redder in the face and saying nothing. The chamberlain turned to the members of his household. ‘I advise everyone to do as we’re told until we find out what these fellows want.’

  His surprising lack of resistance was the result of having a crossbowman aiming an arrow straight at him from a hand’s breadth away.

  There was a subdued grumbling, but with another couple of bowmen coming into view, it was enough to make everybody do as he suggested.

  ‘What are the archbishop’s bodyguard doing?’ Hildegard whispered to the man on the running-board beside her.

  ‘Bugger all,’ he growled.

  She noticed the hunting bow slung across his chest and indicated the sheaves of arrows in the wagon. ‘Can we work our way round behind their line without being seen?’

  He showed his teeth in a grin. ‘We’ll have a bloody good try.’ He slipped quietly down off the wagon. ‘I’ll get a couple of the lads.’

  No one was paying any attention to the middle of the convoy, cowed into submission by the one bowman. The looters, with short swords raised, and protected by the other bows, were laboriously working their way towards the centre while their commander, his face concealed by the nosepiece of his helmet, sat astride a grey destrier and looked on.

  Hildegard reached for one of the bows u
sed by the pages. They were shorter than the hunting bows the bodyguards carried. There was no way she would have been able to draw one of those. She found the strings and took one out and, snatching up a few arrows from the sheaf, strung the bow as she followed three archers into the gully beside the road. They began to work their way behind the line of wagons. Once under the cover of the trees, the men spread out.

  Hildegard edged further into the trees with the intention of coming out behind the crossbowman with his bolt aimed at the chamberlain. After that she had no idea what the plan was, maybe to give the impression that the men were surrounded in the hope it would scare them off.

  She found a vantage point with a good view of the chamberlain’s wagon. The crossbowman was half concealed by the trunk of an oak, clearly expecting to be safe from retaliation. His broad back was an easy target. I must not draw blood, she reminded herself.

  She tightened the string, fixed the nock of an arrow into place, drew back and sighted the target. A long time had elapsed since she had handled a bow.

  Pull, aim, release.

  That had been Ulf’s teaching in the old days at Castle Hutton during the long hours when he had made her practise at the butts.

  She saw the others get into position then waited for the signal.

  It came.

  Pull. Aim. Release.

  She did so.

  There was a grunt from the man behind the tree. He jerked his head round to find himself pinned by the sleeve of his chain mail to the trunk of the oak.

  There was a chuckle behind her. ‘Neat work for a nun.’

  She turned. It was the man she had spoken to earlier.

  ‘There’s no way he can get out of that without dragging his hauberk off,’ he chuckled again.

  Then he drew his great hunting bow and aimed.

  The power of the longbow meant it could cut through mail and even through plate armour. It was the instrument of war that had led to England’s victories at Crécy and Poitiers against far greater odds of mounted militia. Hildegard was well aware of all that.

  The bowman, so neatly pinned by her small bow without bloodshed, finished up clutching an arrow that pierced his steel shirt and reappeared through the front in the middle of his chest. He staggered, looking down in astonishment at the arrow tip between his fingers. Then blood gushed from his mouth and he toppled forward.

  The other bowmen were dispatched with no more than the loss of an arrow apiece. As the last one fell, the men-at-arms penned in their cart by the looters erupted with a roar, snatched up their weapons from the armoury wagon and turned to attack the horsemen.

  In the melee that followed Hildegard searched for a sight of Thomas and Edwin. The last she had seen of them was when they jumped down from the char to walk back along the line towards the tail end to see what was happening. Now she glimpsed a flash of white and saw Thomas, unarmed except for a hazel switch, staring up at a horseman whose sword was arching towards him.

  Hildegard had automatically slipped an arrow into its notch and now, without thought but with a whispered, ‘Forgive me’, lifted her bow and loosed an arrow into the nearside shoulder of the swordsman’s horse. It reared with a scream of agony as the arrow hit. When it fell it toppled onto its rider, who scrambled to escape. A nearby man-at-arms finished the job. The body was kicked into the ditch.

  Hildegard closed her eyes. When she opened them Thomas was rushing to the aid of one of the kitcheners, lashing out with his hazel stick at the face of his assailant and managing to hook his fingers into the servant’s belt to haul him out of harm’s way.

  In a hand-to-hand skirmish with the now armed bodyguard the attackers were beaten back. Their leader had already ridden off and one by one the survivors streaked after him across the wasteland and into the woods.

  The York captain roared at his men to fall back.

  ‘Too late now, you losels! Save your arrows! From now on you keep a proper lookout.’

  There were some cuts and bloody noses but nothing serious. The attackers had abandoned their dead and wounded and the captain ordered his men to find the one least likely to die and have him bound in ropes and brought along as a hostage. The man was barely conscious but he was dragged off, groaning in pain, to the back of the convoy and thrown roughly onto a cart among the spare wheels.

  It was all over by the time the two huntsmen who had gone off earlier emerged from the woods carrying a dozen or so rabbits on poles across their shoulders. They looked askance at the partially unloaded carts.

  ‘I thought we weren’t stopping?’ one of them asked.

  When they were told what had happened they said they were sorry they’d missed the fun. One of them added that they had heard horsemen crashing about in the woods and thought it was a local hunting party and best to give it a wide berth.

  ‘Who the hell were they?’ asked Edwin while everything was being packed in again. Nobody knew.

  ‘There’s that manor over at Kettlethorpe,’ somebody suggested. ‘On the rampage from there, you reckon?’

  ‘I don’t see what they were after. They didn’t take so much as a crust.’

  ‘We’ll get the truth from that hostage,’ the captain snarled. ‘Meanwhile,’ he turned to his men, ‘sharpen up unless you want your ears off. We’re not on a bloody pilgrimage.’

  It had all happened too suddenly for the kitcheners, who were unused to anything more violent than a pan whizzing past their heads in the palace kitchens at Bishopthorpe. There were white faces. An air of faintness. No one said much.

  The chamberlain returned to his char and sat within, fanning himself with his sleeve. When he asked for news of the archbishop, a servant came back looking puzzled. ‘Gone on ahead, My Lord.’

  The chamberlain closed his eyes and it was Master Fulford who rose to the occasion.

  ‘Break out the ale, Gufrid. We’ll catch up with him. Meanwhile let’s stiffen our sinews, then back on the road to Lincoln.’

  The archbishop was waiting for them on the far side of some woodland astride his horse Pegasus, with the leather bag strapped across his chest. He offered no explanation for his escape as he handed the reins to his groom.

  Edwin, climbing back into the char after him, spoke with a tinge of disapproval in his voice. ‘I trust Your Grace is unharmed?’

  Neville growled a response and they travelled on in an uneasy silence.

  Edwin had shown himself to be useful with his sword and when Hildegard made a remark to that effect he nodded. ‘Why do you think I was thrown out of Oxford?’ He looked quietly pleased with himself.

  Licking his cuts, Thomas cuffed Hildegard on the shoulder. ‘I didn’t know you’d been keeping up the old skill. I’m in your debt.’

  ‘Nonsense, Thomas. I’m truly distressed that men were killed. Even if they did invite a tough response. And the poor horse …’ she shuddered.

  ‘I saw it gallop off after the survivors,’ he told her. ‘Those boys’ bows don’t penetrate deep tissue.’

  This mollified her somewhat but the fate of their attackers preyed on her mind. As did the reason for their ambush and Alexander Neville’s uncharacteristic flight.

  They thundered on towards their destination and it was shortly before curfew when they poured at last through Lincoln’s northern gate on Ermine Street into the narrow cobbled lane leading to the bishop’s enclave. With the archbishop, true to his original intention, riding at their head on Pegasus, they filled the town with the noise and excitement of their arrival.

  Judging by the number of armed guards patrolling the city walls and visible at the top of the great keep on its hill above the town, the whole place was on high alert.

  ‘News of the invasion?’ asked their own constable, taking in the presence of the militia as soon as he arrived. He stood alongside the city guards and counted everybody in.

  ‘Nothing fresh. It seems King Charles is having to wait for the Spanish to bring all their ships up.’

  Then the attack on the York conting
ent came out and men were roused from the guardhouse to get out after them, more as a show of goodwill to the visitors than in the hope of stumbling across the band, for they would be long gone by now. The hostage was thrown into the castle jail for the night until he recovered enough to denounce his comrades.

  Unable to talk confidentially to Thomas in the turmoil of carrying in their baggage, Hildegard looked for a chance as soon as they were being conducted towards their separate quarters. They were lodged in the guest house across the garth from the bishop’s palatial abode, with the large Saxon hall between.

  She tugged urgently at his sleeve. ‘Has anybody said anything to you about why we’ve been asked along?’

  ‘By “anybody” I suppose you mean Hubert?’ Thomas gave a wry smile. ‘Whatever the abbot might know he would surely have told you above anybody.’

  ‘I need to know, Thomas.’

  He became serious. ‘Rest assured, Hildegard, I would tell you if there was anything to tell.’

  ‘Even if you were sworn to secrecy?’

  He took her arm and turned her aside from the toing and froing of servants bringing in the baggage. ‘Do you suspect some secret motive?’

  His grey eyes were as guileless as a child’s.

  ‘I wondered if you’d heard anything?’

  ‘Only that you have knowledge of herbal lore. Hubert mentioned something along those lines. Not that I asked. It’s not my business.’ He smiled down kindly. ‘No one’s sworn me to secrecy. There are no secrets. Even the archbishop’s arthritis is known to every soul in the shire. I’m here to be your shadow wherever you go. You can trust me.’ He smiled reassuringly. ‘I expect that ambush has made you uneasy? I believe it was merely a chance attack.’ He watched her closely. ‘Do you think there’s more to it?’

  Chapter Two

  Lincoln. The bishop’s enclave. Early morning. Rain.

  They were scarcely out of prime when a messenger arrived. His horse came splashing into the foregate, and by the time everyone had turned to stare, a man in Neville’s livery was tumbling from the saddle. A group of excited servants hurried him towards the guest quarters.