The Grail Quest 1 - Harlequin tgq-1

by Bernard Cornwell

  It was at Poissy that Thomas, with Eleanor beside him, rejoined the army.

  And it was there, by God's Grace, that the hard times began. Eleanor had been apprehensive about joining the English army. They won't like me because I'm French,“ she said. The army's full of Frenchmen,” Thomas had told her. There are Gascons, Bretons, even some Normans, and half the women are French."

  The archers“ women?” she asked, giving him a wry smile. But they are not good women?"

  Some are good, some are bad,“ Thomas said vaguely, but you I shall make into a wife and everyone will know you're special.” If Eleanor was pleased she showed no sign, but they were now in the broken streets of Poissy, where a rearguard of English archers shouted at them to hurry. The makeshift bridge was about to be destroyed and the army's laggards were being chivvied across its planks. The bridge had no parapets and had been hurriedly made from whatever timbers the army had found in the abandoned town, and the uneven planking swayed, creaked and bent as Thomas and Eleanor led their horses onto the roadway. Eleanor's palfrey became so scared of the uncertain footing that it refused to move until Thomas put a blindfold over its eyes and then, still shaking, it trod slowly and steadily across the planks, which had gaps between them through which Thomas could see the river sliding. They were among the last to cross. Some of the army's wagons had been abandoned in Poissy, their loads distributed onto the hundreds of horses that had been captured south of the Seine.

  Once the last stragglers had crossed the bridge the archers began hurling the planks into the river, breaking down the fragile link that had let the English escape across the river. Now, King Edward hoped, they would find new land to waste in the wide plains that lay between the Seine and the Somme and the three battles spread into the twenty-mile-wide line of the chevauchee and advanced northwards, camping that night just a short march from the river. Thomas looked for the Prince of Wales's troops while Eleanor tried to ignore the dirty, tattered and sun-browned archers, who looked more like outlaws than soldiers. They were supposed to be making their shelters for the coming night, but preferred to watch the women and call obscene invitations. What are they saying?" Eleanor asked Thomas.

  That you are the most beautiful creature in all France,“ he said. You lie,” she said, then flinched as a man shouted at her. Have they never seen a woman before?"

  Not like you. They probably think you're a princess.“ She scoffed at that, but was not displeased. There were, she saw, women everywhere. They gathered firewood while their men made the shelters and most, Eleanor noted, spoke French. There will be many babies next year,” she said.

  True.

  They will go back to England?" she asked.

  Some, perhaps.“ Thomas was not really sure. Or they'll go to their garrisons in Gascony.”

  If I marry you,“ she asked, will I become English?” Yes," Thomas said.

  It was getting late and cooking fires were smoking across the stubble fields, though there was precious little to cook. Every pas-ture held a score of horses and Thomas knew they needed to rest, feed and water their own animals. He had asked many soldiers where the Prince of Wales's men could be found, but one man said West, another east, so in the dusk Thomas simply turned their tired horses towards the nearest village for he did not know where else to go. The place was swarming with troops, but Thomas and Eleanor found a quiet enough spot in the corner of a field where Thomas made a fire while Eleanor, the black bow prominent on her shoulder to demonstrate that she belonged to the army, watered the horses in a stream. They cooked the last of their food and afterwards sat under the hedge and watched the stars brighten above a dark wood. Voices sounded from the village where some women were singing a French song and Eleanor crooned the words softly.

  I remember my mother singing it to me,“ she said, plucking strands of grass that she wove into a small bracelet. I was not his only bastard,” she said ruefully. There were two others I know of. One died when she was very small, and the other is now a soldier." He's your brother.

  Half-brother.“ She shrugged. I don't know him. He went away.” She put the bracelet on her thin wrist. Why do you wear a dog's paw?" she asked.

  Because I'm a fool,“ he said, and mock God.” That was the truth, he thought ruefully, and he pulled the dry paw hard to break its cord, then tossed it into the field. He did not really believe in Saint Guinefort; it was an affectation. A dog would not help him recover the lance, and that duty made him grimace, for the penance weighed on his conscience and soul.

  Do you really mock God?“ Eleanor asked, worried. No. But we jest about the things we fear.”

  And you fear God?"

  Of course,“ Thomas said, then stiffened because there had been a rustle in the hedge behind him and a cold blade was suddenly pressed against the back of his neck. The metal felt very sharp. What we should do,” a voice said, is hang the bastard properly and take his woman. She's pretty."

  She's pretty,“ another man agreed, but he ain't good for anything.”

  You bastards!“ Thomas said, turning to stare into two grinning faces. It was Jake and Sam. He did not believe it at first, just gazed for a while. It is you! What are you doing here?” Jake slashed at the hedge with his billhook, pushed through and gave Eleanor what he thought was a reassuring grin, though with his scarred face and crossed eyes he looked like something from nightmare. Charlie Blois got his face smacked,“ Jake said,'s o Will brought us here to give the King of France a bloody nose. She your woman?”

  She's the Queen of bloody Sheba," Thomas said.

  And the Countess is humping the Prince, I hear,“ Jake grinned. Will saw you earlier, only you didn't see us. Got your nose in the air. We heard you were dead.”

  I nearly was."

  Will wants to see you."

  The thought of Will Skeat, of Jake and Sam, came as a vast relief to Thomas, for such men lived in a world far removed from dire prophecies, stolen lances and dark lords. He told Eleanor these men were his friends, his best friends, and that she could trust them, though she looked alarmed at the ironic cheer which greeted Thomas when they ducked into the village tavern. The archers put their hands at their throats and contorted their faces to imitate a hanged man while Will Skeat shook his head in mock despair.

  God's belly,“ he said, but they can't even hang you properly.” He looked at Eleanor. Another countess?"

  The daughter of Sir Guillaume d'Evecque, knight of the sea and of the land,“ Thomas said, and she's called Eleanor.” Yours?" Skeat asked.

  We shall marry."

  Bloody heilfire,“ Skeat said, you're still daft as a carrot! You don't marry them, Tom, that's not what they're for. Still, she ain't a bad looker, is she?” He courteously made space for Eleanor on the bench. There wasn't much ale,“ he went on,'s o we drank it all.” He looked about the tavern. It was so bare there was not even a bunch of herbs hanging from the rafters. Bastards cleaned up before they left," he said sourly, and there's about as much plunder here as you'd get hairs off a bald man.

  What happened in Brittany?" Thomas asked.

  Will shrugged. Nowt to do with us. Duke Charles led his men into our territory and trapped Tommy Dugdale on a hilltop. Three thousand of them and three hundred with Tommy, and at the end of the day Duke Charles was running like a scalded hare. Arrows, boy, arrows.

  Thomas Dugdale had taken over the Earl of Northampton's res-ponsibilities in Brittany and had been travelling between the English fortresses when the Duke's army caught him, but his archers and men-at-arms, ensconced behind the thick hedge of a hilltop pasture, had cut the enemy into shreds.

  All day they fought,“ Skeat said, morning to night, and the bastards wouldn't learn their lesson and kept sending men up the hill. They reckoned Tommy had to run out of arrows soon enough, but he was carrying carts of spares to the fortresses, see, so he had enough to last him till doomsday. So Duke Charles lost his best men, the fortresses are safe till he gets some more, and we're up here. The Earl sent for us. Just bring fift
y archers, he told me, so I did. And Father Hobbe, of course. We sailed to Caen and joined the army just as it marched out. So what the hell happened to you?”

  Thomas told his tale. Skeat shook his head when he heard about the hanging. Sir Simon's gone,“ he said. Probably joined the French.”

  He's done what?"

  Vanished. Your countess caught up with him and pissed all over him from what we hear.“ Skeat grinned. Luck of the devil, you've got. God knows why I saved you this.” He put a clay jar of ale on the table, then nodded at Thomas's bow that Eleanor was carrying. Can you still shoot that thing? I mean you've been bollocking about with the aristocracy for so long that you might have forgotten why God put you on the earth?"

  I can still use it."

  Then you might as well ride with us,“ Skeat said, but confessed he knew little of what the army was doing. No one tells me,” he said scorufully, but they say there's another river up north and we've got to cross it. Sooner the better, I reckon, as the Frenchies have skimmed this land proper. Couldn't feed a kitten up here." It was indeed a bare land. Thomas saw that for himself next day as Will Skeat's men moved slowly north across harvested fields, but the grain, instead of lying in the barns, had already been taken for the French army, just as the livestock had all been driven away. South of the Seine the English had cut grain from abandoned fields and their advance guards had moved swiftly enough to capture thousands of cattle, pigs and goats, but here the land had been scraped bare by an even larger army and so the King ordered haste. He wanted his men to cross the next river, the Somme, to where the French army might not have stripped the land and where, at Le Crotoy, he hoped a fleet would be waiting with supplies, but despite the royal orders the army went painfully slowly. There were fortified towns that promised food and men insisted on trying to assault their walls. They captured some, were repulsed at others, but it all took time that the King did not have, and while he was trying to discipline an army more interested in plunder than pro-gress, the King of France led his army back across the Seine, through Paris and north to the Somme.

  A new trap was set, an even deadlier one, for the English were now penned in a land that had been stripped of food. Edward's army at last reached the Somme, but found it was blocked just as the Seine had been barred. Bridges were destroyed or guarded by grim forts with heavy garrisons that would take weeks to dislodge, and the English did not have weeks. They were weakening daily. They had marched from Normandy to the edge of Paris, then they had crossed the Seine and left a path of destruction to the Somme's southern bank and the long journey had abraded the army. Hundreds of men were now barefoot while others hobbled on dis-integrating shoes. They had horses enough, but few spare horse shoes or nails, and so men led their animals to save their hooves. There was grass to feed horses, but little grain for men, and so the foraging parties had to travel long distances to find villages where the peasants might have hidden some of the harvest. The French were becoming bolder now and there were frequent skir-mishes at the edges of the army as the French sensed the English vulnerability. Men ate unripe fruit that soured their bellies and loosened their bowels. Some reckoned they had no choice but to march all the way back to Normandy, but others knew the army would fall apart long before they reached the safety of the Norman harbours. The only course was to cross the Somme and march to the English strongholds in Flanders, but the bridges were gone or garrisoned, and when the army crossed desolate marshlands to find fords they discovered the enemy ever waiting on the far bank. They twice tried to force a passage, but both times the French, secure on the higher dry land, were able to cut down the archers in the river by crowding the bank with Genoese crossbows. And so the English retreated and marched westwards, getting ever nearer to the river's mouth, and every step reduced the number of possible crossing places as the river grew wider and deeper. They marched for eight days between the rivers, eight days of increasing hunger and frus-tration. Save your arrows,“ a worried Will Skeat warned his men late one afternoon. They were making their camp by a small, deserted village which was as bare as every other place they had found since crossing the Seine. We'll need every arrow we've got for a battle,” Skeat went on, and Christ knows we've none to waste.“ An hour later, when Thomas was searching a hedge row for black-berries, a voice called from on high. Thomas! Get your evil bones up here!”

  Thomas turned to see Will Skeat on the small tower of the village church. He ran to the church, climbed the ladder, past a beam where a bell had hung till the villagers took it away to prevent the English from stealing it, then pulled himself through the hatch and onto the tower's flat roof where a half-dozen men were crowded, among them the Earl of Northampton, who gave Thomas a very wry look.

  I heard you were hanged!"

  I lived, my lord," Thomas said grimly.

  The Earl hesitated, wondering whether to ask if Sir Simon Jekyll had been the hangman, but there was no point in continuing that feud. Sir Simon had fled and the Earl's agreement with him was void. He grimaced instead. No one can kill a devil's whelp, eh?" he said, then pointed eastwards, and Thomas stared through the twilight and saw an army on the march.

  It was a long way off, on the far northern bank of the river that here flowed between vast reedbeds, but Thomas could still see that the lines of horsemen, wagons, infantry and crossbowmen were filling every lane and track of that distant bank. The army was approaching a walled town, Abbeville, the Earl said, where a bridge crossed the river, and Thomas, gazing at the black lines twisting towards the bridge, felt as though the gates of hell had opened and spewed out a vast horde of lances, swords and crossbows. Then he remembered Sir Guillaume was there and he made the sign of the cross and mouthed a silent prayer that Eleanor's father would survive.

  Sweet Christ,“ Will Skeat said, mistaking Thomas's gesture for fear, but they want our souls bad.”

  They know we're tired,“ the Earl said, and they know the arrows must run out in the end, and they know they have more men than we do. Far more.” He turned westwards. And we can't run much further.“ He pointed again and Thomas saw the flat sheen of the sea. They've caught us,” the Earl said. They'll cross at Abbeville and attack tomorrow.

  So we fight," Will Skeat growled.

  On this ground, Will?“ the Earl asked. The land was flat, ideal for cavalry, and with few hedgerows or coppices to protect archers. And against so many?” he added. He stared at the distant enemy. They outnumber us. Will, they outnumber us. By God, they out-number us.“ He shrugged. Time to move on.” Move on where?“ Skeat asked. Why not find our ground and stand?”

  South?“ The Earl sounded unsure. Maybe we can cross the Seine again and take ships home from Normandy? God knows we can't cross the Somme.” He shaded his eyes as he stared at the river. Christ,“ he blasphemed, but why the hell isn't there a ford? We could have raced the bastards back to our fortresses in Flanders and left Philip stranded like the damned fool he is.” Not fight him?“ Thomas asked, sounding shocked. The Earl shook his head. We've hurt him. We've robbed him blind. We've marched through his kingdom and left it smouldering, so why fight him? He's spent a fortune on hiring knights and cross-bowmen, so why not let him waste that money? Then we come back next year and do it again.” He shrugged. Unless we can't escape him.“ With those grim words he backed down through the hatch and his entourage followed, leaving Skeat and Thomas alone. The real reason they don't want to fight,” Skeat said sourly when the Earl was safe out of earshot, is that they're scared of being taken prisoner. A ransom can wipe out a family's fortune in the blink of an eye.“ He spat over the tower parapet, then drew Thomas to its northern edge. But the real reason I brought you up here, Tom, is because your eyes are better than mine. Can you see a village over there?” He pointed northwards.

  It took Thomas a while, but eventually he spotted a group of low roofs amidst the reeds. Bloody poor village,“ he said sourly. But it's still a place we haven't searched for food,” Skeat said, and being on a marsh they might have some smoked eels.
I like a smoked eel, I do. Better than sour apples and nettle soup. You can go and have a look."

  Tonight?"

  Why not next week?“ Skeat said, going to the roof hatch, or next year? Of course I mean tonight, you toad. Hurry yourself.” Thomas took twenty archers. None of them wanted to go, for it was late in the day and they feared that French patrols might be waiting on the track that twisted endlessly through the dunes and reedbeds that stretched towards the Somme. It was a desolate country. Birds flew from the reeds as the horses picked their way along a track that was so low-lying that in places there were battens of elm to give footing, and all about them the water gurgled and sucked between banks of green-scummed mud.

  Tide's going out," Jake commented.

  Thomas could smell the salt water. They were near enough to the sea for the tides to flow and ebb through this tangle of reeds and marshgrass, though in places the road found a firmer footing on great drifted banks of sand where stiff pale grasses grew. In winter, Thomas thought, this would be a godforsaken place with the cold winds driving the spume across the frozen marsh. It was very nearly dark when they reached the village, which proved to be a miserable settlement of just a dozen reed-thatched cottages, which were deserted. The folk must have left just before Thomas's archers arrived, for there were still fires in the small rock hearths. Look for food,“ Thomas said, especially smoked eels.” Be quicker to catch the bloody eels and smoke them ourselves, Jake said.

  Get on with it," Thomas said, then took himself to the end of the village where there was a small wooden church which had been pushed by the wind into a permanently lopsided stance. The church was little more than a shed, maybe it was a shrine to some saint of this misbegotten marshland, but Thomas reckoned the wooden structure would just about bear his weight so he scrambled off the horse onto the moss-thick thatch and then crawled up to the ridge where he clung to the nailed cross that decorated one gable. He saw no movement in the marshes, though he could see the smear of smoke coming from the French campfires that misted the fading light north of Abbeville. Tomorrow, he thought, the French would cross the bridge and file through the town's gates to confront the English army whose fires burned to the south, and the size of the smoke plumes witnessed how much larger the French army was than the English.