I, Richard Plantagenet: Book One: Tante le Desiree

by J. P. Reedman

  Christmas was subdued this year, though I was back in Middleham and the snow fell and no word came of any disturbances that might blight the season of Our Lord’s birth. Little Ned was sick with a croupy cough. Anne fell sick while tending him—I told her she should have left him to his nurses and the physic, but she would not listen. Almost rudely healthy, despite my thin frame and my crookedness, I left Anne abed in the care of her women and her mother, and feasted with Rob and Joyce Percy at his manor at Scotton, Francis at his manor at Mottram and with the Scropes at Bolton Castle.

  With the latter was one Richard Ratcliffe, who was married to Agnes, one of the daughters of the house, a bonny-cheeked girl of quick wit and sparkling eyes. Dick Ratcliffe was well known to me already—a capable man, upright and bold, with a profile like a hawk and midnight hair. He held the position of steward at my castle of Barnard, and was a trustee at Richmond. I thought he would go far some day, and he had certainly done well for himself by marrying a Scrope.

  Having such good men as friends or supporters, and hearing that Jockey Howard had been given control of the royal fleet cheered me considerably as, after the winter snows had melted and buds appeared on the barren trees, I left Yorkshire and journeyed down to London for a council of war.

  Many worries assailed; not just Percy’s recent high-handed behaviour, but the unrest that had spread far and wide through England. Edward mentioned his own concerns to me: turmoil in the south, lords unhappy with the payment of benevolences and added taxation for this new war. I managed to convince Ned not to tax York after all they had already done to repel the Scots, and to my great relief he agreed to make them exempt. He asked only that York send one captain and one hundred and twenty archers to join our war effort.

  “They are good men, your Yorkshire northerners!” Ned had said brightly to me once the council had dissolved and we were free to talk as brothers. “I will not seek anything else from their purses. I know how you feel about them and they about you, it would seem. I would not gladly damage that affection. It is quite amazing, brother…quite amazing. The whole area used to be loyal to Lancaster until you won the people over.”

  “And you, my lord King, I must know…if we fare to Scotland to fight against James, will you be there?” I looked to Edward, anxious to see that gleam, that shining of the Sunne, the starred young prince who led his men to victory in every battle he fought. Instead, I could see only an aging man, heavy, ponderous, leaning forward in a huge chair wrought especially to hold his huge size in comfort.

  “I will be there, Richard, I swear it,” he said. “You go first and rendezvous with that Percy; keep him in hand! Later, I will come north via our castle of Nottingham. Once we are together, none will dare stand before us. The Sons of York united on the battlefield again.” He clasped my hand in his; it was warm, almost too much so, sweaty. His fingers felt bloated against mine; his rings were sinking into folds of flesh.

  I tried to smile; clasped my hand over his. “I look forward to that day, your Grace. I truly do.”

  I sat in a tent with the rain beating down outside. Water leaked through a gap; some stupid squire had carelessly poked the painted canvas with a finger, letting in the rain. I had upbraided the little fool and sent him outside to sit in the downpour in disgrace. The incessant sound of his sniveling through the fabric of the tent set my teeth on edge.

  “More wood on the brazier,” I snapped at another young squire. “I’m bloody freezing.”

  The boy, aware of the fate of his companion, jumped to attention at once and lobbed an armload of kindling on the fire.

  I was not happy. The campaign had started well enough, with Jockey Howard sailing down the Forth, capturing enemy ships and burning Blackness. But then the weather had turned. It rained and rained, and wind gusted…I was reminded of the sodden, ineffectual campaign in France, when the sun never shone and mud was knee deep. Men were restive wherever we went, unhappy at the thought of warfare; their crops were going to fail and there would be hungry bellies and death.

  We had seen no real battle, had only enjoined our foes in a few pointless clashes, a game of cat and mouse, of pointless chases. As ever, at the end of the day, the Scots skittered away into the forests like wild deer, avoiding us, taunting us.

  And Edward had not come. He had not, despite his promise on clasped hands. He wrote to me, bemoaning the turmoil that gripped England in that damp, cheerless summer. He did not say it outright, but I knew he would not come.

  Frank joined me in my pavilion; he was damp even from the short walk in the rain. “Miserable night, Dickon,” he murmured as the squires removed his cloak and hung it up to drip dry.

  “Indeed.” I stared into the fire, toying with my rings.

  “Where are the bloody Scots?” Francis sat beside me on my couch and stretched his legs before the blaze.

  “Where is the King?” I said, my tone soft, soft as silk but bearing a barb.

  Francis shifted uncomfortably. “I dare not guess, my Lord. What are we to do?”

  “Press on,” I said. “That is, after all, our duty.”

  We marched toward that most debatable town, Berwick, which had changed sides so many times in the hundreds of years of its existence. Burnt and looted, it rose and fell, rose and fell, now English, now Scottish. Marguerite of Anjou had given it to the Scots in return for help against us, the vile old harridan. What kind of Queen would hand a strategically placed town to an old enemy? She had been a fool and had paid the price for her wickedness

  The army was nearing Hutton, a small village a few miles from Berwick. Although naught to the eye, it was a famous place; in 1296 my forebear Edward I, Hammer of the North, had camped there with his army before taking Berwick.

  It was at fabled Hutton that the Scots finally attacked. Uneasiness had gripped me all day; stillness hung over the land, we saw no one, the villages were shuttered and empty as if the common folk had known of our coming and hidden themselves away. If they knew of our arrival, they must have had intelligence….James’ forces must be somewhere in the vicinity, although my scouts had not located them yet. How many men James had was a mystery, but rumour said his forces were ‘great’, and ours, missing Edward’s much-needed contingent, were not as strong or numerous as they might be.

  As the army marched down a track leading through deep stands of forest, a sudden hissing assailed my ears, the sound of a thousand striking serpents. A familiar sound that I had not heard for many years…arrows.

  The horses went wild with fear; I struggled to control my grey as it bucked and danced. I could not clearly see the enemy; they raced through the trees, dappled light and dark, lithe and transitory as forest sprites. The cowards…still attacking us like cattle thieves in the night! Why not meet us as true warriors, face to face on the field?

  “Draw back!” I commanded as another shower of arrows rained over us. Luckily, the inclement winds were dragging the missiles away from our men and little damage was caused to our contingent. Arrows twirled mid-air, then dropped harmlessly to the rain-soaked ground.

  Suddenly the Scots abandoned their useless bows and began rushing in a stream toward a spot far up the road where forest and path converged. Their intent was immediately obvious. They were going to try and cut my men off at the narrowest point of the road!

  I let out a curse. More of them than I first thought, and deep forest sprouting on either side of us, forming a perfect hideout. Glancing around as best I could in my sweltering helm, I caught glimpses of motion between the branches of the trees of the far side of the road as well. More Scots were bringing up the rear. If we did not engage soon and crush them, our enemy would crush us in a pincer formation.

  “Ride on! Advance banners! For England and St George!” I shouted, and struck my steed with my spurs, galloping forward like the wind. Francis was riding hard beside me, and together we cut through the band of Scots as they burst from the foliage, driving them before us like cattle, forcing them back into the forest and opening th
e narrowed gap between the two stands of trees.

  Once we had forced our way through the gap, we found ourselves confronted by more Scottish soldiers racing towards us in a full frontal attack. I surveyed them quickly; not many mounted knights, and not clad in the best of armour. I knew none of the banners they carried; the mightiest of the Scottish lords were not here on the field—but where were they? Their absence worried me. The leaders might be trying to weaken us in this sharp, short attack, while building the main force of their power elsewhere.

  Whatever the case, there was only one thing we could do with the trees behind us full of Scots—push forward and cut a swath through the main body of our enemies.

  I slammed my battleaxe onto a man’s head; his skull exploded in a shower of blood and brain. Suddenly one foot soldier, yammering in his own uncouth tongue, sprang up from the long grasses and stabbed at the flanks of my horse. His blade caught on the horse’s body armour and I spun round to strike at him, but he thrust upwards with a wicked dirk like a needle. Its blade winked in the muted daylight, as he sought a chink, any weakness in my armour, so that he could drive the blade in with a twisting motion.

  As best I could, I turned in the saddle to strike at my attacker with my axe, but instead of trying to flee, he unexpectedly launched himself forward and clawed at my leg like a crazed animal. Through the thin slit in my visor, I could see his wild, reddened eyes under the brim of his trivial metal helm as he clung to me, seeking to unhorse me and bring me down so he could have me.

  Galloping on my right-hand side, Francis must have realised I had been attacked. Wheeling his horse around with consummate skill, he drove straight towards my wild-eyed assailant. A blade flashed, a guttural scream rang out, and the weight on my leg was gone.

  I nodded my gratitude to Francis and we rode over the corpse of the dead Scot and lay in with fervour to his fellows.

  By the time dusk fell, the skirmish was over. Our forces had lost maybe a dozen men, our enemies many more. Their remnants had dispersed in panic, some fleeing toward the border, others toward Berwick.

  Wearily, I removed my helmet and signaled a squire to bring me much-needed refreshment. Lord Stanley, whose numerous men had been engaged in the thick of the fighting, approached me, helmet under his arm, his armour clanking nosily as he walked. I tried not to feel aggrieved at the site of his solemn, bearded face with those hooded dark eyes that never seemed to show…anything. Ever. Even when Stanley was angry, his eyes remained the same, two obsidian discs lacking any discernable emotion. I mistrusted that lack, and never forgot that bad blood still hanging over us.

  “My Lord Duke,” said Thomas Stanley, “the day is ours.”

  “Aye, praise Jesu” I sloshed back water from a flagon, hoping it came from a clean stream; town-water was often full of excrement and could kill a man. “Did you have any doubts that we would?”

  “But what are we to do next?”

  I stared at him. “Fight on, of course. Berwick is not far away.”

  Stanley’s eyebrows lifted, a grizzled mix of red and grey hairs. “That would be a noble endeavour, but a foolish one. My Lord Duke, we need the forces of the King to take a town as large as Berwick. My spies also bring news—James is mustering a great army, far larger and better armed than the rabble we fought today. We need the King. And the King has not come.”

  I gritted my teeth. Stanley was the last person I ever wanted to admit was right. But he was a seasoned campaigner…even if he swapped sides when it suited him, or played a game with his brother William, in which Thomas took one side, William the other, so that if the day went ill, one brother could plead for the other’s life.

  “What would you suggest, my Lord Stanley?” I asked tersely, finishing off contents of the flagon and wiping drops of water from my chin. Dusk was falling; Flies were starting to buzz around the bodies of the slain. The luminous eyes of beasts attracted by the scent of blood gleamed yellow between the boles of the trees.

  “Continue to patrol the borders and keep the peace…but keep out of trouble.”

  It was not what I wanted to hear, but without Ned’s contingent, and with the unknown might of King James’s growing army, I grudgingly had to admit it was the best plan.

  “So be it, then.” I turned dismissively away from Stanley, sure that I could see the faintest trace of a cynical smirk curving his mouth. I knew if I gazed too long, I would feel enraged, and I would not allow him to witness my annoyance. “Francis, where are you?”

  Frank stepped out of the growing gloom, moths fluttering around his fair head. Over his armoured shoulder, a thin crescent moon was beginning to rise through a haze of cloud. “How may I assist you, Richard?”

  “There is something I must do today, after you pried off that miscreant that tried to stab me.”

  “I am sure you could easily have managed to slay him alone, but it angered me to see him, and I would take no chances.”

  “Kneel down, Francis.”

  Frank knelt, amidst the crushed and gory grasses with the hungry flies whirring and the cold moon a skull above his head. Drawing my blade, I swiftly, perfunctorily, struck his shoulder in the accolade.

  “Be thou a knight, Sir Francis Lovell.”

  We spent the rest of the summer repelling Scots but going no farther into their

  territory, not even to Berwick itself, as tempting as it was. Money and supplies began to run low. By September, I had returned to Yorkshire, and no sooner was I seated in my own hall than I received the unwelcome news that huge hosts of Scots had gathered along the Marches. By swiftest courier I sent word to York, asking for the city to send soldiers…but apparently so had Henry Percy, and his message arrived several days before mine. Obviously, he had not learned his lesson; a clash seemed inevitable at a time when unity was paramount.

  However, those good loyal men of York, who had always served me well, deliberately delayed their departure, sending Percy many excuses before marching to meet me at Durham instead. Another slap in the face to the might of the Percys, another sign that Henry was becoming a malcontent and potential trouble-maker, but he backed down and wisely made no open complaint.

  As it happened, the rumours of the imminent invasion proved false; the threat vanished like mist on the Scottish moors, and those stalwart men of York returned home without seeing battle. It looked like the peril had dissipated for a while, though I lingered, waiting, on edge.

  However, when the leaves began to turn and the nights grew shorter and colder, I abandoned the north and went to Nottingham, where Edward had finally arrived after months of procrastination. Riding with my company upon the Great North, unease swept over me—all around were signs of hardship, poverty and unrest. The weather had remained poor all summer, not just in the north but the south too, and the crops had failed, sinking into the mud. Children starved and ruffians had taken to thievery and murder. Everywhere we passed, we saw rogues twirling on the gibbet, while crows picked out their eyes. V’s of migrating geese streamed out over the miserable landscape, seeking kinder climes, their noise like the belling of the Wild Huntsman’s Hounds as they hunter sinner’s souls.

  The sun had failed this year, even as the Sunne of Edward seemed dimmed. Wrapped in my cloak, I sat astride my mount with shoulders bowed against the wind. No, I must not think such unwholesome thoughts. The Scots had been driven back, a good start, and there would be another mighty push against them in the coming year. If Ned had made it as far north as Nottingham, surely he would make the effort to join us in the field. Just having him there would raise morale amongst the troops, even if he drew no sword—the Victor of Towton, the winner of Barnet and Tewkesbury overlooking us on the field!

  However, as I entered Edward’s chamber at the great castle of Nottingham, my heart sank. Edward looked ill. No longer just mildly unwell, but ill. He kept blinking at me as if he could not see me well until I came into the warm ring of candlelight. He seemed to have too many candles blazing; I was near dazzled, but he was squinting
, rubbing his eyes as if to raise a veil from them.

  Kneeling, I kissed his hand; he raised me and kissed me warmly on both cheeks. His breath smelt vaguely sweet…Was it the wine? It seemed odd, almost the scent of dissolution. “I am so glad to see you, Richard! I have heard of your exploits against the Scots, and that you knighted young Lovell. Always knew he would be a good one, one day, away from the machinations of Warwick. Glad I pardoned him. He is a good friend to you, eh?”

  “He is, your Grace.” I wondered where his good friends, Hastings, Rivers and Dorset were. None of them around him now, although I supposed Anthony could be excused. Ned had assigned him to attend on the young Prince of Wales at Ludlow castle, a position he doubtless enjoyed for many reasons…including that it would keep him from going to any Scottish war. On the continent, men laughed and whispered that Anthony the great jouster was, in fact, a coward when faced with real battle.

  “Forgive me for not coming further north, Richard, but strife ran rampant in the southern countries. You know how it can be. But I will be with you next year, you have my word. Ah…” he suddenly gasped as the cup he was holding tilted as if of its own doing, and spilled its contents over the floor.

  “Your Grace, are you well?” Alarm leapt up within me.

  As servants hastened to clean up the mess, Edward reacted with fury to my concern. “It was an accident, Gloucester; stop looking at me like I am some invalid in his dotage! It is just…my fingers feel numb on occasion. A mere cramp, I am sure, naught more. I have to sign many documents each day.”

  He rubbed his eyes once more. “Why is it so bloody dark in here? More candles and more torches!” His voice was strained.

  I sat in silence, afraid to say any more. Surely he could not be going blind? He was too young for such ailments.