‘It’ll be painful slow, Sir Edmund,’ Goffe said, checking the lead pair’s harness whilst the oxen lowed and swished their tails agitatedly, ‘but if we ta’ care w’ shall get there in one piece. It’s nay plough, and new to me,’ he said, lifting his helmet to scratch his red hair, ‘but they’re good animals.’ Then young Godfrey came up and presented Goffe with a long slender hazel switch he had cut from the copse, and the farmer whipped it through the air and gave a reluctant nod.
‘It’ll do, youngen,’ he said, then turned to Mun to show that all was set and his animals were ready to set off. Mun nodded back and gave the command, turning Hector west, away from the morning sun. The oxen moved forward, moaning, and the gun carriage creaked into life, the wheels turning over the muddied ground, and Goliath lurched, bound for Lichfield and Prince Rupert, the King’s loyal nephew. Scourge of the rebels.
Mun sent John Cole and two others cantering west to ride as a vanguard a mile in front of the train. Another trooper rode just ahead, his job to choose the route that would make for the easiest passage, given that Goliath weighed, by O’Brien’s reckoning, the better part of seven thousand pounds. Other than the man they had left back at the barn, the rest of Mun’s troopers were split between those walking beside the train keeping each pair of oxen in check, and those mounted and leading the riderless horses.
‘This all feels like an idea not even good enough to be terrible,’ O’Brien said, twisting in his saddle to regard the train over his shoulder. He and Mun rode side by side heading up the lumbering column. ‘I’ve seen men walk faster to their own hanging.’
‘Just keep your eyes peeled,’ Mun said, though he felt exactly as the Irishman did. Their success in the last weeks had come from their speed and manoeuvrability, from being unencumbered and lean. They had been a wolfpack all but living off the land, ranging far and wide. Killing at will. Now they were slow – painfully, cumbrously slow. They were just thirty men and a stolen gun that was so big as to be only useful for siege work. And there were twenty miles of open land between them and that siege.
‘His Highness the Prince must have Lidford’s gun if he is to break Lichfield,’ Rupert’s agent had said that night they had huddled beneath Mun’s rude shelter as the rain seethed in the dark. ‘And so Lidford’s gun he shall have.’
But it was slow. The ground was soft but not too wet, so that only occasionally did the gun carriage’s wheels need to be dug free, though that did not stop the men moaning when they did. Goffe was busy, covering twice the distance of any other, up and down the train with his switch, barking gruff commands in a language only the oxen understood. Where they could they kept to trackways and the well-trodden paths where the grass had long worn away and the ground had been compacted over the years. But this meant they were exposed and there were plenty of folk who watched them pass. Despite the war, men and women still worked in the fallow fields, spreading manure and their stinking cesspit waste, ploughing the filth into the soil to make it ready for the next year. They watched, leaning on spades, putting down handcarts and lifting their eyes from the plough lane to spy, and yet none of them approached, which was hardly surprising given the column’s ragged, almost feral appearance. An appearance that was more help than hindrance, Mun knew, just as Hook Nose had said it would be. For the passing of such a gun would not go unnoticed. The folk of Seal and Acresford and of all the other unnamed villages between them and Lichfield would spread the news much quicker than they would the manure. Better if Mun’s name and the allegiance of his troopers were not a constituent of that news, for he would be hard pressed to explain why he had stolen the gun from a lord who was even now with the King at Oxford.
And yet their anonymity did not stop Mun’s stomach rolling over itself when he heard a trooper yell from the train’s rear that a rider was coming hard and fast from the east and that it looked to be Walter Cade, the man they had left at the barn.
‘The lad must be missing me already,’ O’Brien said, the face behind the beard betraying his concern.
‘Don’t stop!’ Mun called to Goffe, then nodded at the Irishman, pulling Hector round, and the two of them trotted back down the column to meet the rider. Mun looked up at the sun which was directly overhead. Midday, then, and he guessed they had only come some seven or eight miles.
‘It’s Cade,’ O’Brien confirmed, but Mun knew it already for he had come to know how each of his troopers sat his horse, would recognize each man’s riding style and perhaps even their horses too.
‘Rides better than he shoots,’ Mun remarked.
‘Aye, he wouldn’t hit a hole in a ladder.’
Cade was flying, hunched low in the saddle, his face obscured by the peak of the single-bar pot which he had stripped from a dead rebel corporal. And Mun felt his heart hammering in his chest as fiercely as the hooves of Trooper Cade’s mare pummelled the ground, because he knew that someone must be on to them.
‘It’s not as though there’ll be any hiding from whoever is sniffing our scent,’ O’Brien said, which was true enough, for the oxen had disturbed the ground and the gun carriage’s wheels had cut two deep ruts which stretched back east as far as the eye could see.
Mun wanted to wait until Cade had reined in and caught his breath, wanted to maintain a façade of equanimity as a professional officer should. But he failed.
‘How many?’ he yelled as Cade made up the last fifty paces and hauled on his reins and the mare screamed, biting at her foam-flecked bit and tossing her head so that her mane flew.
‘Four,’ Cade said, spitting a wad of thick saliva, his chest within his buff-coat heaving, labouring for breath. ‘Four,’ Cade said again. ‘They must have seen the oxen were gone and they came to the barn.’ The sweat-lathered beast wheeled round and round and Cade held the reins loosely, allowing the horse to calm down in its own time.
‘Only four?’ Mun said. ‘Are you sure?’
Cade nodded. ‘Aye, and you said no killing,’ he said, as though all four would be dead now if Mun had not given that order. ‘I left the lads where they was and came hard after you.’
Mun looked back the way they had come. No sign of pursuers. Yet.
‘They’ll be along, sir,’ Cade said, wiping spittle off his beard with a filthy hand. ‘Could be they’re gathering more men.’
‘There’s a coppice back there, no more than half a mile,’ O’Brien said, nodding back along the churned track. ‘What say we prepare a welcome for our guests.’ He winked at Cade. ‘It’s clear that your fellows are after an introduction.’
‘We’re King’s men, O’Brien,’ Mun warned. ‘I’ll not kill our own, if that’s what they are.’ I’ve done enough of that, he thought sourly.
The Irishman raised both palms and perfected a look of childhood innocence: the kind employed by children who have already been caught stealing apples. ‘Being Irish doesn’t make me a savage,’ he said, ‘but we can’t stop, can we?’ He thumbed back towards Goliath lumbering on further up the track. ‘So better not to meet with any surprises, eh? A few of us in that copse, waiting nice and quiet. Then a polite greeting if someone happens along. What’s the harm in it?’
‘Then we’d better be quick,’ Mun said, turning Hector back towards the train.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
MUN HAD PICKED nine men and they had galloped back to a coppice of hazel, hornbeam and beech, and there waited hidden from the track by the young shoots upon which spring leaves were beginning to burst from their buds. Ten was not many, but to leave fewer men with the cannon would be to invite suspicion of an ambush from any who followed within sight, and likely slow the train’s progress further. So ten would have to be enough, at least to put the fear of God into those they fell upon and send them tearing off back the way they had come.
They did not have to wait long.
‘They only managed to scrounge two more,’ O’Brien remarked disappointedly as they watched the party of six canter along Goliath’s tracks towards them. ‘We could have sent t
hat lot running back to their mothers by ourselves, Sir Edmund. Still, I’d wager that shiny whore-monger doesn’t lack lady admirers. Have you ever seen a thing so pretty that didn’t have tits?’
Mun’s eyes were also on the man riding in the middle of the group, for he wore a cuirassier’s three-quarters armour that covered the entire upper body as well as the front half of the legs down to the knee. On his head was an open burgonet helmet with its distinctive fin on top, and the whole ensemble glinted in the sunlight, making him look like some long-ago hero from a story.
‘They’re brazen enough,’ Tobias Fitch said, ‘coming after us like this.’ The young apprentice already had a mason’s broad shoulders and thick arms so that in his forge-black back- and breastplates and pot he looked every inch the warrior.
‘Aye, makes you wonder what they intend when they catch up with the gun,’ Trooper Milward said, pulling his hanger half out of the scabbard then thrusting it back in.
Hector snorted, one foreleg pawing at the ground, the stallion sensing in his master the potential for imminent violence.
‘Do not give fire,’ Mun said as his men readied themselves to explode from their hiding place. ‘Show them steel and teeth and they’ll turn tail.’ I would if I saw us coming fast, he thought, aware more than ever of their wild appearance: their unkempt beards and hollow cheeks, their assortment of blades and arms, most of which had been stripped from defeated enemies and bore the marks to prove it.
Their pursuers were well armed too by the looks and the cuirassier and at least one other rode fine-looking horses: well-muscled Cleveland Bays of over sixteen hands that would in mere moments, Mun thought, be bearing their masters off in great haste.
‘As wild as you whoresons can look, if you please,’ O’Brien said through a grimace, and was met by eight wolfish visages and eyes blazing with that intoxicating mix of thrill and fear.
‘Now!’ Mun gave Hector the spur and they erupted from the thicket, shouting wildly, their mounts’ hooves thumping the earth and flinging clods into the air. ‘Yargh!’ Mun yelled, the thrill seizing him in its maw. This was the flame to his soul and he loved it, pulling his heavy sword from its scabbard and holding it out wide, a promise of blood and death unleashed unto the day.
And four of the six riders ahead of them hauled on their reins and turned their mounts off the track, spurring off south-west in sheer bloody fright. But to Mun’s amazement the cuirassier and one other turned towards them and drew their own swords and charged.
‘Mad bastards!’ O’Brien bellowed. And Mun wanted to warn his men again not to kill, but they were committed to the charge and the two fools had signed their own death warrants and Mun’s men would have to do what needed to be done.
In all that fine plate armour the cuirassier had fallen behind his companion and Mun on Hector had outstripped his men, so that he saw at least a chance, if only a slim chance, to avoid blood.
Forty yards.
Twenty.
Mun pushed his seat bones down into the saddle and sat up straight, thrusting his heels against the stirrups to slow Hector, but the other man did not slow, could not slow perhaps, and the blade at the end of his arm was bouncing madly. But Mun and Hector moved as one and Mun got his own sword up so that the two blades struck with a great ring of steel and the impact was too much for his opponent who was thrown back in his saddle. The man tried to cling on but couldn’t and some twenty yards behind Mun he fell in a sickening crump of flesh, bone and war gear.
‘Quarter! Quarter!’ the cuirassier roared, exhibiting much better horsemanship than his companion and bringing his own Cleveland Bay back to the trot just as Mun’s troopers came on him, enveloping him in a mass of horseflesh and blades. ‘I yield, damn you!’ the man yelled, hurling his sword at O’Brien so that the Irishman had to duck or be struck by it.
‘Don’t touch him!’ Mun barked over his shoulder, riding back towards the man he had spilled from his saddle. Was he dead? He was not moving. Mun knew it was all too easy for a man to break his neck or his back in such a fall. ‘Bloody fool,’ he murmured, dismounting and patting Hector’s neck, whispering praise and thanking the stallion for his fidelity.
‘Leave him be!’ someone called and Mun turned to see the cuirassier on his feet hurrying over to them. ‘He’s my son!’
‘Then your son is a damned fool,’ Mun said, seeing now the face of the young man on the ground before him. ‘But he’s alive.’
‘You want me to restrain the lobster?’ O’Brien asked, nodding at the man whose armour clanked with every move.
Mun shook his head. ‘Let him see to his son.’
‘The others ran, Father, the damned cowards,’ the lad said, wincing as he pushed himself upright. Beneath his helmet blood was trickling from his forehead down the side of his aristocratic nose and his eyes were round with shock. He wore good back- and breastplates over an expensive-looking buff-coat.
‘But you didn’t run, son,’ his father said, crouching awkwardly in his armour to undo his son’s helmet strap and ease it off his head.
‘He’s but a cub,’ O’Brien remarked, seeing the young man’s face properly for the first time.
‘And he needs to learn to control a horse properly or he’ll get himself killed before he can grow a man’s beard,’ Mun said.
The cuirassier stood and marched over to Mun, whose men were watching, their pistols drawn. ‘Who are you, sir?’ the man demanded, removing his elaborate burgonet helmet which was gilded with patterns of swirling leaves. His short white hair was swept back and his white brows made a hawk’s wings above eyes that were rivet heads of cold indignation.
‘My name is not important,’ Mun said, cringing inwardly. I sound like that clandestine bastard, he thought, recalling the man who had somehow persuaded Mun to do his bidding.
‘Damn your insolence!’ the cuirassier spat, his short white beard trembling with rage. The silk ruff at his neck spoke of a fashion long gone, completing the image of a soldier from a different age. ‘Who is your master? Whom do you serve, your king or Parliament’s traitors?’
‘I am Sir Edmund Rivers and I serve His Majesty King Charles,’ Mun said, unwilling to play the game of secrets any longer. The other man did not so much as blink, which led Mun to assume that he had not recognized his name.
‘Well, I have been soldiering, Sir Edmund Rivers,’ the white-haired man said, smacking his left hand in its iron gauntlet against his own beautifully incised breastplate. The other hand was gloved only in leather so as not to hamper the loading of pistols. ‘I have been soldiering in the Low Countries while this kingdom has been crumbling like bones in the grave. I have been in England but weeks, yet I see all too clearly that common folk have run amok and knights have become thieving thatch-gallows laying hands on whatever they come across.’ Behind him his son was gingerly climbing to his feet and using his lace falling band to wipe the blood off his face. ‘Where in God’s name, sir, do you think you are taking that gun and those beasts?’ He pointed up the track where no more than a mile away Goliath continued his slow lumbering progress west.
‘What has that to do with you, old man?’ Mun said, losing patience with this man who clearly did not appreciate how lucky he was that he and his son still lived and breathed.
‘What has that to do with me?’ the cuirassier blurted, eyes wide beneath his beetle-brows. ‘You insolent devil! That’s my damned gun!’
Mun heard an Irish snort escape then and nor was the perpetrator contrite when Lord Lidford spun and called them all thieves and scoundrels before turning his fiery gaze back on Mun. ‘You steal my gun and my cattle, then you try to kill my son. You are more of a villain than any of Parliament’s rebels!’
‘Your son tried to kill himself,’ Mun said, glancing at the young man whose cheeks flushed red with embarrassment for his reckless charge. A brave lad, though, Mun thought, for he could not have been a day older than seventeen and four other men had turned tail and fled for their lives. ‘Besides, I thou
ght you were in Oxford with the King.’
Lord Lidford flinched. ‘You knew it was my gun?’
‘I’d heard a rumour,’ Mun said, glancing at O’Brien. The Irishman was leaning over his saddle’s cantle, clearly enjoying the exchange. For the first time Lord Lidford seemed lost for words. Mun shrugged and took hold of Hector’s bridle, rubbing the stallion’s muzzle affectionately. ‘You were supposed to be in Oxford and I was supposed to borrow your gun.’
‘I have not been to Oxford for more than five years and then only to conclude some business before I took ship back to the war.’ Lord Lidford swept an arm back towards his son who, now that he was on his feet, looked hardly the worse for his fall other than the cut where his helmet had gouged his head. ‘I was at my estate. I have just buried my wife, Sir Edmund,’ he said, all but sneering Mun’s title, ‘and my son just happened to be out riding, taking stock of my cattle, when he saw more than half my beasts gone, along with the lads I pay to look after them.’
‘That devious bastard,’ Mun murmured under his breath, recalling Rupert’s spy assuring him that Lord Lidford was with the King in Oxford.
‘You will turn that train around and return my gun to me,’ Lord Lidford said flatly, then turned to walk back to his horse.
‘No, sir, I will not,’ Mun said. ‘The gun stays with me. It is going to Lichfield.’
‘How dare you?’ Lord Lidford exclaimed, his right hand falling on his sword’s hilt.
‘Don’t be an idiot … my lord,’ O’Brien growled, flapping his hand at the man, warning him to remove his own from his weapon or else face the consequences. Beneath his white beard and moustaches Lord Lidford’s face bloomed crimson with rage, though his hand came off the weapon’s hilt. His son stood statue-still, nonplussed, eyes riveted to his father as though he had never seen him in such a compromised position.
Brothers' Fury (Bleeding Land Trilogy 2) Page 17
