Hoodsman: Blackstone Edge

by Smith, Skye

  "Hah Raynar," Alan interrupted the embarrassing silence, "you were expecting perhaps a rousing cheer. You are no war lord. We knew you as a porter, lad. You will have to tell us more of what you expect of us. We are more than willing to listen." Alan's words got grunts of agreement.

  "All here of the Brotherhood, so I will explain. Our brotherhood began with Hereward's skirmishers in '66 . The membership has expanded with the spread of the Welsh bow and the increase in the number of freemen that have been outlawed by the Sheriffs. I remind you of our creed.

  * Hunt alone.

  * Strike a leader.

  * Vanish.

  * Never tell.

  * Gold buys chains.

  There is one instruction that is not in this creed. It is the most important and therefore is in the title, Brotherhood. As brothers we help each other to follow the creed. The oath that we all swore is all about helping each other. Watching each other's back.

  Brothers, I need your help. I have reliable word that William and much of his army plan to cross the Pennines moving fast to surprise Chester. For the first time William will cross through territory controlled by the brotherhood. The Peaks. I want to slow him down so that he will have a taste of the winter that he fed to the Yorkie children. Slow him down so that we can target his leaders and then vanish to where horses cannot follow. Slow him down so that Chester will not be surprised by his army and suffer a harrowing."

  There was silence around the circle. There were perhaps twenty expert bowmen amongst them. They were all thinking.

  "Tell us more of your plan," said a voice. Others chimed in the same.

  "William's army now is the smallest that it has ever been. Yet Chester is a city fortress and few Cheshiremen have been slain in the battles lost by our English earls. The only way that William can take Chester, is by surprise. The main highways from York to Chester are south through Derbyshire and along the River Trent, or north though Skipton and along the River Ribble. He cannot surprise them using these highways." The men all mumbled in agreement. They knew the roads.

  "There is another more direct highway that is rarely used. There is an ancient Roman street that climbs through the peaks, crosses Blackstone Edge and meets the valley of the River Roch. The street is on high lands for less than seven miles, but that land is rugged, and the weather fierce, and the street is in bad repair at the eastern end. With help enough I can block the street to create ambushes. Block it in a few places so that when Williams army comes, they can be ambushed again and again as they travel westward."

  "So your plan is to shoot as many leaders as you can in each ambush, and slow them enough to force them to overnight in the high country," Alan thought aloud. "You hope to take the leaders by arrow, and leave the men at the mercy of a winter storm. Have you started praying to Thor yet? Have you thought out that the brothers must weather those same storms for many days to prepare for William?"

  "We know the Peaks. They do not. We know the caves and the springs and the winter hunting grounds. I do not ask any to lay down their lives. This is a plan of block and ambush, not of battle. They will be on horses or leading them and our arrows will keep them in armour, so the terrain favours us, especially if it is icy," explained Raynar.

  Once Raynar had stopped talking, the men all began talking to each other. They were all from the Peaks. Most from the south, but a few from the north. One man pushed everyone out from the center and used a stave to smooth the dirt on the ground. Then from his memory he drew a line with few curves that was the Roman street. Other men gathered stones and branches and together they drew a detailed map of the street and the terrain that it passed through. Torches were brought and the detailed planning began in earnest.

  "So," Alan interrupted, "what do we need to do first."

  "Horses. Your men need horses to get to Blackstone Edge quickly," explained Raynar. "I would have welcomed the help of the men of Sherwood, but they had no horses so they could not be part of this. This winter and the refugees were hard on Nottinghamshire, and few horses survived the cooking pot."

  "We can lay our hands on ten mounts at any time just from our own families. Does anyone know of extra horses?" Alan asked. They didn't keep horses at this camp because they were too easy to trail.

  A tall man stood. "A small patrol of Normans, maybe ten, is visiting the hot springs at Buxton. They were invited by the Norman priest that has taken over the church there." At the mention of the priest, he spat a curse onto the ground, and others spat with him. "Their horses are hobbled in the churchyard to keep them away from the mineral water. If you don't need saddles those are ours for the taking."

  "Good. There is spare tack in Tideswell. What's say we take them tonight. If we take them all then they cannot follow us until they find more horses. By then we will have cleaned away all tracks. How many men will you need to steal these horses?"

  "One per horse would be best, though we could do it with half that number."

  "Go, then. Pick your men, one per horse, but leave us any men who know Blackstone Edge, and any men from a mining family."

  The men that were left closed in around the detailed map they had created on the ground.

  "We need to get men and tools working on the first blockade quickly, to ensure we have at least one. Men should leave at first light with horses and food and tools. They can borrow hard rock tools at the mine, and maybe get some help from the mining brotherhood."

  "Agreed," Alan pointed to two men that had been miners, "you choose some men and get that organized before you sleep."

  "I will go with them," said Raynar.

  "We need to warn Chester," one of the miners spoke, and with a thick Welsh accent. "They must be ready for William, either on their walls, or better yet, with a big ambush in the forest of the Roch valley. The army will be at their weakest as they comes down that slope from Blackstone Edge."

  "Hold," said another voice, "there are loose tongues in Chester. If William finds out that Chester has been warned he will not cross the peaks."

  "Right, good thinking. We cannot warn Chester until William is in the Peaks."

  "Food. There will be none in the highlands at this time of year. We will need to carry it with us."

  "Where is the closest hunting valley to that street?" asked Alan of the men.

  "There are many, but if what Raynar says is true about the refugees, they may be cleared of food by now. Certainly those valleys at the eastern edge of the peaks will be cleared. We know there is still much game here in this valley. We should take as much with us from here as we can."

  A woman’s voice piped in. She was hiding behind the men, and should not have been present. "I have five hinds curing and a hundred weight of smoked strips. That is a month's feed for this camp."

  Alan thanked the woman, and then spoke to the men, "Will we need more? The temperatures will be near freezing in the peaks so we can carry fresh meat. Who has been doing the hunting lately. Is there game at the watering holes?"

  Three brethren stood. One spoke, "We'll go at first light. It is our turn to hunt, though I'd rather be off stealing horses."

  "Oye," said the man with the Welsh accent, "what route do we take to get there? The high lands are all ice. If we stick to the low lands we have to circle around either to the west of the east."

  "There are too many Normans to the east, so we will circle west. The highway's are in better shape in the west anyway. We'll head out through Tideswell and make towards Maystonfield. That should keep us away from Buxton. Not a word of what we are about to anyone. Secrecy starts now," ordered Alan.

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  The Hoodsman - Blackstone Edge by Skye Smith

  Chapter 7 - Laying traps along the street at Blackstone Edge in February 1070

  "We can do it, with some picks and a bit of back work. Look see, the rock is rotten from the being frozen and thawed and frozen and thawed." The wiry Welshman, Jonas, was scrambling up the crumbling cliff. "Up here too. If we m
ine underneath the whole lot will come down and across the road to the other side."

  Young Raynar and the eight men that came with him to Blackstone Edge had learned a few things since they began their search for likely ambush places. The Romans did not choose this way because it was the easiest to build. They chose it because it was the easiest to defend. There were few places to set an ambush. In the highest places the street had good views all around.

  This place was one of the few that could be used for an ambush, because the street threaded between two edges for about half a mile. The edge on one side was high enough to give bowmen command of the road with little fear of immediate attack. The edge on the other side was high enough that if the street was blocked, a horse could not climb out of the shallow box canyon that the barrier would be created.

  "This is the best so far, lad," said Jonas convincingly, "I doubt we will find better in the high ground, though there may be some as good on the eastern edge. I'll stay here with most of the men and we'll put our backs into it. You press on and keep scouting for other places."

  "You are the miner," replied Raynar, "So we'll do as you say. Mind that you keep a watch on top of that cliff. There could be Norman scouting patrols about, and Alan would not forgive the loss of any of you."

  Raynar and two of the men continued eastward. It was icy cold and the clouds to the west were heavy and dark and menacing. They would bring either sleet or snow, and he was praying to Thor to hold them over Manchester until William arrived in the highlands. Jonas was right, there were few other places for ambushes. He made drawings and notes of places that could be made dangerous to pass, so that the army would be slowed even if there were no ambush.

  "See here on this slope. The weather has undercut the road bed on the downhill side. We could cause a cave in here with an hour of work, that would force them up that slope." They tried to ride up the slope but gave up and dismounted and tried leading the horses.

  One of the men kicked at the bracken and loose rocks slid from underneath. "If they come this way to get around the cave in, they will have to do it one at a time. The rocks are loose and the footing is bad. If they have carts, they will have no choice but to repair the damage to the street."

  One of the many questions that they asked themselves each time they found a likely place was, "Will they have carts?" Stopping carts is much easier than stopping men with horses. In this place, the army may be delayed at least an hour, but there was no place to set an ambush. Any bowman would be seen immediately and be chased off.

  They continued eastward and descended into a wooded valley with a mountain river. The woods and the street were on opposite sides of the river from each other. Jonas caught up with them while they were exploring the wooded side.

  "I got the slide started," Jonas explained, "and the men are finishing it. It was easier than I expected, though we had to run for it once the rock began to fall. They are chipping at the edges of the cliff by the fall to bring more rock down. Then they will have to drag some slag to the far side of the street and cave in some of the lower cliff."

  Jonas turned parallel to the river and walked his horse while he craned his neck. "Oye, did you see this." He pointed to an old cartway through the wooded side of the river. "Come with me". They trotted along the cartway until it led back to the river. "See, the river bends here, and the street was built on the outside of the bend. See over there. The road bed has been fixed. It must wash out there, and when it does, they ford the river and use this cartway to get around the wash out. That means they must cross a ford, pass along this narrow cartway surrounded by thick bush, and then cross another ford. This is the next place we need the men to start work on."

  "What do you mean. The street has been well fixed, so they won't need the ford," spoke Raynar.

  "Stick to your arrows lad, cause you don't think like a miner." Jonas waved to the other two men. "Do you have axes with you? Yeh, sure, but are you any good with them?" He dismounted and walked to a stand of tall pines beside the river. "You see that rock in the middle of the river. The big one with the wave washing at it. Yeh. Do you think you can fell one of these trees so that it snags on that rock."

  The two men stood under the trees and looked up at the possible snags. One started chopping at the tree closest to the river, and the other at the tree next to it. "Oye, we only need one" complained Jonas.

  "The first is too short, but it will snag the second, so they both have to come down together. Stick to your mining, old man, and leave the trees to us." They worked tirelessly with the axes in a race to see who would be first to the heartwood. Once they were close to the hearts, they ringed out the main cut so that the trees would not twist as they fell. These were heavy old trees. It would take an hour to fell them, so Raynar and Jonas mounted up and crossed the ford back to the street and headed again eastward.

  "I don't think we need to go much further." Raynar pulled up. "The valley is dropping quickly now and out of the weather. It serves nothing to have the army camped in the protection of this valley. We want them caught in the open moor at the top."

  "Just a hundred paces more, lad. See where the hillside is crumbing onto the road ahead. Let's have a look before we turn around." Jonas rode ahead and dismounted at the drift of loose gravel. He looked up at the hillside, then walked back and lifted down a shovel and a pick from his saddle. "This will slow them down a bit even if we can't use it for an ambush. See above, the slide. That is where this loose gravel is coming from. We just need to help it along a bit, and the army will have an hour of shoveling to clear it away."

  It took them an hour of back breaking work to coax the slide into carrying itself down to the road bed. When they were finished the street was under six feet of loose gravel for a dozen feet. There was no easy way around, so there would be no choice but to dig it out.

  They looked at their vandalism with pride. When Raynar worked as a porter at the mines he was always astonished at how a man that knew the rocks could do so little labour to achieve such great effect. Coaxing rocks was dangerous work, because when it worked, the effects could be frighteningly swift.

  They decided to rest back in the woods where they had left the axemen working, so they climbed warily onto their horses and turned westward for the first time today. Back at the woods, the trees were nearly ready to fall. One of the axemen looked at Jonas and told him threateningly that his idea better be good after all his sweat.

  He took two last swings at the second tree and then ran like a rabbit away from the trees. The second tree creaked and then leaned and tipped into the first tree. It tried to roll down the first tree, but then the first tree also began to fall. And then, slowly at first, but then with frightening noise and power they both slammed into the river.

  The longer second tree was now entwined into the branches of the first and both were upstream from the river rock. There was the sound of wrenching and tearing wood and branches and then the river pushed them hard against the rock. The river was now three quarters dammed. The wave that had been washing the rock had expanded and was washing all along the log dam. It sent a flooding surge towards the bank where the street ran. The surge hit almost exactly where the street had been repaired. The four men cheered at the efficiency of their vandalism.

  "Come on. The river will do its work whether we watch it or not. Lets go back and see how the others are doing," said Jonas as he walked towards his horse. The axemen retrieved their tools and their own horses, and followed him west up the cartway towards the other ford.

  Raynar showed Jonas the steep slope where he had thought about helping a cave in to get bigger. Jonas looked at it and said, "You may have an eye for stone after all. It will take some shovel work, but decades of rainwater have already created a cave under it." He got his pick and took some trial hits at the paving stones. They came loose and he pried them up.

  Jonas then he attacked the gravel underneath, while Raynar shoveled the loose stones out of the way. The pick suddenly disappear
ed and if Jonas had not held tight he would have lost it. "I told you. There is a cave forming underneath." He bent down to look through the hole. "It's too dark below to see how deep it is."

  He went back to using his pick. Now chunks of the road were falling down into the cave below. Raynar was trying to pry more paving stones loose using the shovel when Jonas suddenly grabbed him back and used his legs to push both of them away from the hole. The paving stones they had been standing on suddenly disappeared into a cloud of dust. When the dust settled there was a deep crevasse across the roadbed. The four men stomped their tools forward towards the crevasse, and more paving stones fell away. They looked over the edge and down. It was too dark to see the bottom, but it was deep. Perhaps twenty feet, perhaps more.

  "They'll not be filling that hole in a hurry, and it will be a bugger to get around. Here help me take the hole all the way to the edge so that they will have to take the horses around." They worked another hour but had to leave the work still not completed because they were about to lose the light. They mounted up and headed west to find the other men. The storm clouds were staying in the coastal plain, so although they were cold, they were still dry.

  They found the other men where they had left them. Though the initial rock slide had done most of the work for them, they had worked continuously on the work that the slide did not do. They were proud of their work, and were looking at it from the top of the cliff on the high side of the edge.

  "If you were a Norman patrol, you would be dead men," said the watcher looking down on them from above. It was true. On one side they had the twenty foot cliff up, on the other side a six foot cliff up, and in front they had a six or seven foot high wall of rubble. "Ride back a quarter mile to where the cliff on this side begins and come around. That is the only way to reach here by horse."

  They did as he said and followed a treacherous game path along the cliff edge to where the watcher was waiting for them. The other men's horses were already there, hobbled near him. They looked down on the box canyon and were pleased. The light was grey now, and the men were no longer working on the wall of rubble.