It doesn’t seem to matter that no one ever saw Hereward after that day, nor that he was but one of many who stood against us at Elyg, for the stories that people choose to remember are rarely those of what really took place, but rather the ones they would prefer to believe. Thus as the seasons turn and the years and the decades pass, the stories grow ever wilder, and the myths grow more powerful than the truth.
The truth, which few men alive these days know, or care to remember.
But I know, for I was there.
‘No one will believe me,’ Godric said glumly as the belfry of Elyg’s church came into sight. It was the middle of the afternoon and cloud had rolled across the sky, obscuring the sun, but that had done nothing to dampen my spirits. The monastery’s bell rang out across the fens, not in warning but in celebration of our victory.
‘Show them the blood drying on your sword and they’ll believe you,’ I answered. Out of gratitude to him, and in honour of his triumph, I had allowed Godric to ride Fyrheard, while I walked beside him. ‘If anyone still doubts you after that, challenge them to deny it through combat.’
Godric didn’t look reassured. ‘And what if they accept?’
‘They won’t.’
‘How can you know?’
‘Because you’re under my protection now, and they’ll know that if they so much as lay a finger upon you, they’ll have me to answer to. On that you have my oath.’
Godric’s eyes brightened. ‘Truly, lord?’
‘Truly,’ I replied. ‘Being a warrior is as much about how men see you as about the number of foes your blade-edge has claimed. If you believe in your own accomplishments, then others will believe them too.’
We reached Elyg soon after. That last mile seemed the hardest of all, for our horses were tired and thirsty, and so were we. Thankfully the ale was already flowing when we arrived. I was glad to see, too, that tempers had cooled in the hours we’d been gone, and that the quarrels that had been breaking out were now settled. Great fires had been lit and around them there was dancing and drinking, while elsewhere men were receiving treatment from leech-doctors for wounds taken in the battle.
I asked if anyone knew where we might find Lord Robert, since no doubt he would be wondering where we were. A gap-toothed boy, who was carrying pails of water on a yoke, nodded towards the monastery.
‘You’ll probably find him in the great hall with the other barons,’ he said, and went on to tell us that King Guillaume had returned to Wiceford, where he had received the formal submission of all the English leaders who had surrendered. Behind him he’d left several hundred knights to garrison Elyg, as well several hundred more who were already too insensible with drink to stand, let alone accompany him.
I thanked the boy and we hastened towards the monastery, where we rode through the great stone arch of the gatehouse and gave our weary mounts to the care of the stable-hands, who directed me towards a long stone building with high windows on the south side of the cloister.
A throng of men and shit-stinking animals filled the yard, but I forced my way through them.
‘If you’re looking for Lord Robert, you won’t find him there,’ someone called as I neared the hall’s doors. I turned to see a familiar figure waving in our direction.
‘Eudo!’ I said, at once forgetting why we were here, so glad was I to see him alive. He was sitting on a stool while a young woman dressed in drab, loose-fitting robes, who might have been a nun, wrapped a length of cloth around his forearm, but he rose to greet us, embracing Wace and myself in turn.
‘Is it bad?’ I asked, gesturing at the bandage.
He sat back down and gave a wince as the woman tied off the loose ends. ‘One of the bastards broke my finger and laid a cut here. His axe came down on my shield and smashed straight through. It could have been worse, I suppose. At least it wasn’t my sword-hand.’
‘We didn’t know what had happened to you,’ Wace said. ‘We feared the worst.’
‘Likewise,’ Eudo said. ‘So where have you been?’
‘Ask Godric,’ I said. ‘He’ll explain.’ Eudo gave me a questioning look, but before he could say anything, I asked him: ‘Where’s Robert?’
‘He rode back to camp. His father isn’t long for this life, or so we heard. A message arrived from his chaplain a couple of hours ago. He left straightaway.’
We’d all known that Malet’s days were few, and yet somehow I’d never actually believed that his time would come so soon. Not on this, our day of victory.
‘He’s returned to Alrehetha?’ I asked.
‘That’s right,’ Eudo said. ‘Why?’
I started back towards the gates. ‘Because that’s where I need to go.’
‘What? Why?’
It was hard to explain. I was stubborn in those days, and rarely cared what others thought of me, and yet for some reason it felt important that I should have Malet’s forgiveness before he left this life behind him. Whether that was simply because he had once been my lord and I had been oath-sworn to him, or because he had given me new purpose and offered me a chance for redemption at a time in my life when all seemed dark, I couldn’t say exactly.
I only hoped I was not too late.
The sun was growing low in the sky by the time I arrived at Alrehetha and rode through the gates of the guardhouse, which was where Malet was quartered. A handful of sentries were posted on the gate, but when I told them why I’d come they let me pass and directed me to a large timber-built hall, a fine place which had existed before the ditches and banks and palisades had been built, and which had been appropriated for the comfort of the king and his household. Certainly it was a more fitting place for a baron of Malet’s standing to live out his final hours than the hovel at Brandune in which he’d spent all those weeks. I took that as a sign that the king’s feelings towards the family were at last softening. It was about time, too, considering everything we and Robert had done for him of late.
At the hall I gave my weapons to the steward, who directed me along a narrow passage. At its end, guarding the door, stood a man whom I recognised for one of Robert’s hearth-knights.
‘Is he—?’ I asked.
‘Still with us, if only barely,’ the man replied. ‘I can’t let you go in, though. Not unless Lord Robert says so.’
‘Then why don’t you ask him?’ I suggested.
I waited while he went inside. After a few moments he returned and with a nod of his head motioned me through.
The chamber was windowless and filled with a powerful, sharp stench of burning tallow, which came from stout candles placed all about. I remembered Father Erchembald, the priest at Earnford and a dear friend, once telling me how the smell helped guard against pestilential vapours, and that was why he recommended keeping one burning whenever someone was laid low with fever or other sickness. But no amount of tallow smoke would save Malet from whatever malady it was that afflicted him. Not now. He looked so thin, and so frail, not at all like a man of fifty, but one twenty years older. He lay upon a bed beneath a bundle of woollen blankets, with his head resting upon a pillow, so still that at first I thought Robert’s man had been mistaken, and that I was too late, but then his eyelids trembled, and I saw his chest rise and fall. He was not gone quite yet, then.
A host of familiar faces were crowded into that small space. On one side of the bed were Robert and the chaplain, Dudo, who knelt by Malet’s right hand with a bowl of what looked like pottage. On the other were Malet’s wife, Elise, her usually stern expression broken by the tears flooding down her cheeks, and Beatrice, her fair hair glimmering in the flickering candlelight. She smiled sadly when she saw me. At her side stood a dark, thin-lipped man I didn’t recognise but guessed must be her new husband. They must have all arrived earlier today, even while, on the other side of the bridge, the battle for the Isle and for Elyg was under way.
Robert rose and came to greet me, clasping my hand. ‘It’s good to see you,’ he said, keeping his voice low. ‘Where did you go? One
moment you were with us, and then you and your men had disappeared. What happened? Is Wace with you?’
This was no time to give a full account, and so I told him simply, ‘Hereward is dead.’
‘Dead?’ he asked. ‘You know this for sure? How?’
‘I know because we pursued him and his band across the marshes and met them in battle. I saw his corpse with my own eyes.’
He blinked, as if the news were too incredible to take in, then turned back towards the bed where the elder Malet lay. ‘Did you hear that, Father? Hereward is dead.’
His father stirred and gave a rasping cough.
‘Here,’ said Dudo, and offered him an ale-cup. ‘Drink.’
Malet shook his head as the cough subsided, and drew the blankets closer around him. No fire was lit, but it was nevertheless far from cold in that room. Beneath my hauberk my arms were running with sweat. I wished I’d thought to return to my tent first and leave it there, and at the same time to exchange my tunic for the spare one I kept in my pack. Although I had dried in the hours since the fight with Hereward, the damp marsh-smell still clung to my clothes.
‘Who is it, Robert?’ Malet croaked as his eyes flicked open. ‘Who comes here?’
‘It’s Tancred, Father.’
Malet sighed. His eyes closed again. Long moments passed before finally he said, ‘Leave us.’
His voice was hardly strong enough to sustain a whisper, but in the silence it was clearly enough heard. At once all eyes were on me. I found myself besieged by Dudo’s unfeeling gaze, by the thin-lipped man’s indifferent regard, and by Elise’s hard, spiteful stare. She had never liked me, from the moment our paths had first crossed. Only Beatrice’s eyes held any sympathy, although she made no protest on my behalf. Not that I blamed her. Her father had spoken and his wishes were to be respected. I had done everything I could, and yet even in his dying hours the old man couldn’t find it within his heart to finally lay to rest this quarrel of ours.
‘I’m sorry, Tancred,’ said Robert. ‘But perhaps it would be for the best if—’
‘It’s all right,’ I muttered, and looked around the chamber, meeting the eyes of each of the Malets in turn. I was thinking about saying something more, but the only words that came to mind were ones that I dared not utter in my lord’s presence, and so I kept my tongue inside my head as I made for the door and grasped the handle—
‘No,’ said Malet. ‘No.’
I halted with my fingers wrapped around the twisted rods of iron, and glanced over my shoulder.
‘What is it?’ Robert asked.
Malet’s chest rose and fell several more times before he was able to muster the strength to speak again. ‘I don’t mean that Tancred should go,’ he said at last.
Robert frowned. ‘Then I don’t understand.’
‘I mean the rest of you must leave.’
‘Guillaume,’ Elise pleaded. ‘You have no need to waste your strength speaking to such a worthless creature. What more do you have to say to him?’
‘I will spend the strength I have left how I choose,’ Malet said. ‘And I would speak to Tancred alone.’
Elise looked despairingly first at Robert and then at Beatrice, evidently hoping for one or both to lend her their support, but none was forthcoming.
‘Come, Mother,’ said Robert. ‘We should go, and let Father say what he must.’
Elise pointed at me, her cheeks red. ‘How can you defend him, Robert? You know how he betrayed your father. He is nothing but a perjurer!’
‘Peace, Elise,’ Malet whispered, while Robert was still struggling for words. ‘What has passed, has passed.’
Elise’s eyes bored into me. ‘Guillaume told me how you broke your oath to him when you were in his service. But even if he has forgotten, I have not! It sickens me how you prosper while our house and our name is brought ever lower. May you be damned!’
‘Mother—’ Beatrice began, but Elise was not listening. She rose and pushed past us, hastening from the room. I heard her footsteps disappearing down the passage.
‘Let me speak to her,’ Robert said, and darted out after her.
Beatrice’s husband held out a hand to help her to her feet, and then they too made to leave.
‘I knew you would come,’ Beatrice said when she passed me. She took my hand in hers, just for a moment, and I felt the warmth there. I had loved her once, or thought I had, and she had loved me. Those feelings had faded now, but in their place had arisen an understanding and friendship that I valued far more.
Her husband regarded me with that same indifferent expression as before, as if appraising me in some way, but said nothing. Apart from Malet, only his chaplain remained.
‘Perhaps it would be wise if I stay,’ Dudo suggested as he fingered the carved wooden cross that hung from his neck.
‘If I have need of you, I will have Tancred send for you,’ Malet said.
‘Lord—’
‘Do not argue, please. I am too weak for that.’
The priest pursed his lips and bowed in deference to his lord’s wishes. He did not look at me as he went, closing the door behind him.
Now that the chamber was empty of people, I saw how sparsely furnished it was. A threadbare rug covered the floor, while in one corner stood an iron pail filled with water, in which floated a scrap of cloth.
Malet raised pale fingers, beckoning me closer, and I knelt down by his bedside.
‘It’s good to see you, Tancred.’ He managed the faintest hint of a smile, but there was pain in that smile and it was short-lived. ‘I’m glad you came.’
‘You are, lord?’ I asked, surprised and confused in equal measure.
‘I am. Dudo told me yesterday evening that you wished to speak with me.’
‘He did?’ Wonders never cease. The toad had delivered on his promise after all.
‘He urged me to summon you, but I, in my stubbornness, refused. I have since been regretting that decision.’
‘You changed your mind,’ I said. ‘Why?’
Malet did not answer straightaway, but gave a deep sigh. ‘There are things that privately I have long wished to say, but which I have been reluctant to admit openly.’
He was speaking in riddles. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Pride,’ he said. ‘I have always been too proud. You would agree with that, wouldn’t you?’
‘No, lord,’ I said, a little too quickly.
Malet smiled again. ‘Just because my end is near, Tancred, don’t presume that you must tell me what you think I want to hear. I know what’s in your mind. Robert thinks the same. And you are right, both of you.’
I didn’t know what to say to that, and so I bowed my head.
‘It is a strange thing, pride,’ he murmured. ‘We are taught that it leads to disgrace, and that anyone who is proud of heart is an abomination to God. These things are true, aren’t they?’
Both proverbs were ones that I recognised. They had been favourite sayings of the prior at the monastery where I’d grown up.
‘So the Scriptures tell us,’ I replied neutrally. Not for the first time, I felt as if he were testing me. ‘But they are not meant to bind us, only guide us. There is no shame in taking pride in one’s work and deeds, so long as that pride is not excessive. There is always a middle path to be found.’
‘And yet it is not always so easy to follow that path, is it?’ He breathed deeply, and I heard a rasp in his throat. ‘That is why it has taken me so long to say what I will tell you now.’
He held out a pale hand, and I took it. His skin was dry, like the parchment in the gospel books I had sometimes copied from during my studies as an oblate.
‘I have been mean-spirited, and undeservingly so, given all that you have done in my name and that of my kin. For that I am truly sorry.’
I felt a tear forming in my eye and tried to blink it back. My throat was dry and I swallowed to moisten it.
‘You served me well, Tancred, for the brief time that you were sworn to
me, difficult though it was for me to acknowledge that when we parted ways. And you have served Robert well, too.’
‘He is a good lord,’ I replied.
‘He is becoming one, certainly. God knows he can be pig-headed at times, much like myself. Still, at least he understands how to win respect. He will do well for himself, and for those who follow him, in the years to come. Better than I have done, at any rate. But he needs loyal men around him.’ He made a feeble attempt to squeeze my hand. ‘I ask that you remain faithful to him. That is my one wish.’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘You know that I will.’
‘Do I have your oath?’
I laughed, not with frustration but with amusement. I had lost count of the number of times I’d sworn pledges of one sort or another to various members of the Malet family.
‘You have my oath,’ I assured him.
He rested his head back upon the pillow, closed his eyes and coughed again, after which he gave a flick of his hand, and I realised he wanted the ale-cup brought to him. Cradling the back of his head with one hand, gently I lifted it to his lips. He sipped at it and his mouth twisted in distaste.
‘Whatever this infusion is that Dudo has prepared, it is supposed to be good for me. Or so he insists,’ he said when he had finished and I had set the cup back down on the stone floor. ‘But the taste of it is foul.’
‘I thought it was ale.’ I raised the rim to my nose and sniffed at it, but could smell nothing offensive about it, nor much at all, save for the faintest trace of honey.
Conquest 03 - Knights of the Hawk Page 22
