Hoodsman: Courtesans and Exiles

by Smith, Skye

  The wolveshead in the bow dropped to the floor as a few more bolts whistled by. He cupped his hands and howled into the river mist.

  "Go back, go back," yelled Edgar to the eelman on pole. He got a toothy grin in reply. There was another howl from the bow, and then an answering howl from the mists. Then there came sounds of men in pain, shrieking and screaming and then moaning.

  Raynar popped his head over the gunnels again and saw arrows sprouting again and again in the bodies of the men on both banks. They were in a panic, running and dodging and falling. There was no escape for them. Once the arrows had done their worst, men in forest colors swooped in on them and finished them. There was a low hoot from one bank and then and answer from the other.

  The punt glided passed the charred wreckage of the bridge and the new men on the banks held their longbows up high in a one-handed salute. Raynar and the eelsman waved back. The wolveshead called up to them, "No one finds those bodies, ya hear, no one. And when you are finished, the ale's on me." He looked over to Raynar. "Well, you said we might be ambushed, so I called in some of the lads. They've had a tail on that lot for three days now."

  Edgar crawled back onto the bench, "That makes four ambushes. Those were probably the same men that tried south of Lincoln."

  "It means that Judith works for Odo," Raynar said glumly. "Should I warn Waltheof?"

  "That could cost her life."

  "Otherwise it could cost his," Raynar went silent. "I will warn Beatrice. She can decide what to do."

  There was no more trouble on the river, but when they reached Lynn there was plenty. A dozen ships were piled up in the port and seamen were leaning against every wall and drinking ale. The wolveshead grabbed a passing captain by the arm and asked what was happening. The captain looked him up and down, saw his colored scarf and the longbow across his shoulder and then returned the hoodsman's grip with a smile.

  "There are patrols of longships off Bulldog Sand, Norman patrols," the captain stated. "They've been there since Earl Ralph’s ships arrived. They probably chased them here but Ralph's captains aren't saying. Whatever they are doing, they have every ship here bottled up and no captain wants to risk ship nor cargo by putting to sea."

  "Whose ships?" asked the wolveshead, "Has the port master had word from them?"

  "They're not the local patrol out of Brancaster. The ships are too well manned. My guess is they're from the south. I wonder what that fuckin' earl has brought upon us."

  They thanked the captain and walked towards the port office. The port master was there and was being assailed by the shouts of other captains crowded around him. The two monks walked past the master and into the office. One nod from the wolveshead and the port clerk closed his desk and went for an ale, closing the door behind him. It took the master an hour before he could extract himself from the questioning captains, none of which he had answers to, and seek shelter in his office.

  "Sorry Raynar," the master said while gripping elbows all around, "the patrol ships are not answering my signals. I don't know what mischief they are up to. They came with Ralph's ships and stayed. They're not stopping inbound ships, but none of the captains wants to be first to be outbound."

  "On the river we were am..." Edgar began, but was interrupted by a swift kick in the shins from the wolveshead.

  "Nuf said," he was warned.

  "Do they still put crab pots out from that village at river's mouth?" asked Raynar, "Ongar is its name isn't it?"

  "Aye, they do," replied the master. "Not many doing it any more, mind you. Better earnings on the docks and the ships."

  "Do me a favour, and send a boat to fetch me a couple of the crabmen. I need a pilot for the sands."

  "No need, there's some tied up at the end of the docks. Brought their women in from Ongar to sell crab cakes to the seamen, didn't they?" The master opened the door and shouted something incoherent to a lad who was passing.

  A few minutes later the lad returned leading three men with craggy faces. They smelled of sea mud and old fish. They filed in and leaned against the desk and one of them said to the master, "The lad said you wanted us. We ain't done nothin'. Just waitin' for our women to finish sellin' their cakes."

  Raynar took the lead, and spoke to the men in Frisian. "What do you make of those longships patrolling the sands?"

  "Not from around 'ere. I'd say they's London ships by the accent of the crew. Too many oarsmen to be peaceable."

  "You've spoken to them?" asked Raynar. He could hear the master behind him whispering a translation to Edgar.

  "Sure, what of it? The three of them raft in the mouth of the river off our village every night. We sell them cooked food and ale. Take it out over the mud flats in our punts, we do. City coin. They pay in city coin."

  "Did they say what they are up to? They ignore the port master."

  "Didn't say, didn't ask. They did ask me some questions, though. They wanted to know if I had seen two monks." His craggy face became canyons when he smiled. "You ain't seen two monks, now, have you?"

  "Not the Earl of East Anglia, and not one monk. They are looking for two."

  "Never mentioned the Earl. Yep, two monks. Specific they wus."

  "That bitch," Raynar said under his breath. "Odo for sure."

  "Have you noticed that small cog at the end of the dock?" asked Raynar. The crabmen nodded. "She draws less than two feet unloaded. How much do you figure the longships draw?"

  "They 'aven't been beached for a while so the hulls are heavy. Maybe as much as five feet, but four for sure." The crabman snickered and then spoke again, "The lad said you were looking for a pilot. I see your game. Yup, it can be done, though they may not all fall for it. You'll need to catch the ebb near noon tomorrow."

  "You'll ship with me as pilot, then? You can go with us to Flanders, or we can put you aboard the first friendly inbound ship."

  "I'll tell the wife Flanders then, just in case you have no friends. What? Be back in a week or so with some silver for my daughter's dowry?"

  "And a bolt of milled cloth for her wedding gown," added Raynar.

  * * * * *

  The Frisian cog sailed out of the mouth of the river at noon. They had left the cargo on the dock for the next ship and had two men on each oar. Their bows were ready at hand, just in case this did not work. Behind them in the river a dozen trading ships were lined up and using their oars only enough to hold the ships against the ebb of the tide. If this worked, they would charge forward and make a run for open water.

  All the master had told the other captains was that the cog in the lead was the ship that the patrol was interested in, and it was going to make a run for it. Once the longships were giving chase, the other traders should be able to sail without worry.

  The crabber stood on the bow and was practicing signals to Raynar who was on the tiller. The cog was one of Raynar’s, and though it was not as new as the Anske, it had been retrofitted with rudder and keelboards. He had taken extra crew on for this voyage, and Raynar looked along to the oarsmen. "Slow and steady now. Trade ship speed, no more." The crabber kept them in the center of the channel but they could see the beginnings of sand islands drying out on either side as the tide ebbed.

  The three longships had seen them and were steering to intercept them. Raynar did not change his course nor his speed. The crabber yelled back to slow by half, else they would have to turn too soon. The longships ahead of them were increasing speed now and had the advantage of an onshore wind in their sails. Not enough wind to clear all the mist, and not enough to cause swells, but enough to help their oarsmen. The longships were pulling abreast of each other and spreading themselves out enough so that they could block the narrow channel.

  "Steady!" yelled the crabber, and again, "steady!" Silence. "Now hard a-port and then pull hard to straighten her up!"

  Raynar swung the tiller hard over, and the port oarsmen dragged their oars while the starboard oarsmen made a sweep. The small ship did not just turn, it spun, and the crabber
was yelling to straighten out, and the oarsmen occasionally felt bottom under their blades. "Straight and hard!" shouted the crabber.

  The three longships had been expecting some trickery and were ready on their steering oars. All three turned, one directly behind the cog, and the other two to cut it off no matter which way it turned. They increased speed after their turns and then the inside longship made a grinding, shushing noise and stopped so quickly that the men aboard it were all thrown to the deck.

  The outside longship now suffered the same fate, and even lost men into the sea.

  "Starboard, hard!" called the crabber, too busy watching the sands and channels to worry about the longships. The rear-facing oarsmen all saw the two ships run aground, but they could also see the last ship closing on them quickly. The occasional arrow bounced off the wooden hull, but they were too busy making the cog twist in place to worry about them.

  The last longship did not make the last corner in the narrow side channel. It ground slowly to a halt and there were angry shouts from those aboard it. The cog's crew began to cheer, but the crabman yelled at them. "Stoopid buggers! Gettin' them stuck means nothin' if we's get stuck too. No need to hurry anymore. Gentle on those oars. One more shallows and we should be in the main channel that will take us around Seal sands."

  Raynar risked a quick look over his shoulder because the oarsmen were pointing at something. There were sails bobbing and dancing coming out of the river mouth. The other ships were satisfied that the patrol was neutered until the next high tide, and were making for open water.

  Once in deep water, Raynar handed the tiller to his second and went forward to hug the smelly crabman. "Follow the other ships," he yelled to the crew. "We will keep with them for safety."

  They were less than a mile out when the watch spotted the sail of an inbound cog. Her captain was no fool and was staying well clear of the dozen outbound ships, that is until Raynar had some signal pennants run up the mast. Only then did the inbound ship changed course to better see the pennants, and once she had read them she made straight for the dozen ships.

  She was another of Raynar’s Oudenburg cogs. Once she was alongside, Raynar briefed the captain about the grounded patrol, while the crabber scrambled from one ship to the other with the faint sound of clinking coins coming from his jerkin.

  "Do you have any cloth on board?" Raynar called to the other captain.

  "Some of fine wool woven in Brugge," came the reply.

  "Give him his choice of one piece. Better yet, wait until you dock and give his wife the choice," yelled Raynar.

  * * * * *

  Most of the ships were bound for Brugge. When they arrived at Plassendale docks, folk literally ran to meet them from Oudenburg. With no ships arriving from the Wash for almost a week, the friends and families of the seamen had feared the worst. Now they would celebrate the safe arrival by drinking English ale and eating English eels.

  Edgar was still wearing his monk's cowl, though Raynar had cast his off once past the patrol ships. Hereward met them on the dock and immediately understood the purpose of the cowl. Without a single question he hustled them both to his fortified manor. It was only once they were safe inside his house, did he ask about the monk. Edgar undid and stepped out of the robes with relief, for the fleas in it had been driving him to distraction. He then grasped Hereward in a warrior's grip and greeted his longtime friend.

  Before they could start on wine and stories, Raynar had Hereward write a warning to Beatrice about Judith and drop it into the dispatch bag bound for Thorold's trading house in Spalding.

  "Bit of a bitch having Waltheof's wife spying for Odo," remarked Hereward as he finished the letter and sealed it. "What do you expect Beatrice to do about her? She would never harm Judith."

  "She can steer her away from conversations that she should not be hearing." replied Raynar.

  "We never trusted her when we ran Ely and Huntingdon because we assumed she would be sending reports to Winchester. Remember how we had Waltheof keep her away from our fortresses? That was why they both spent most of their time at Northampton, out from underfoot. We were so lucky."

  "It isn't luck to be cautious, Hereward, it is competence," Raynar replied.

  Hereward nodded in agreement and turned to the prince. "So Edgar, what's all this about you giving yourself up to the Conqueror? I suggest you visit your exiled friends in Montreuil first. I was there last week. The place is thriving now that France is trading more through Montreuil and less through Rouen."

  "So I've heard," replied Edgar. "Everyone has been doing well while I was being shipwrecked and making a starving march across the wilderness that Northumbria has become. Raynar has offered to take me to Caen via Montreuil, and I hope that some of the other nobles there will join me."

  "Not bloody likely," laughed Hereward. "Sorry, Edgar, but with coin in their pockets and a welcome in both Brugge and Paris, and good news back from those who have made the pilgrimage to Constantinople, well, I just don't see them in any hurry to bend a knee to William."

  They were interrupted by a knock at the door, and Roas came in followed by two of the ship's crew carrying Edgar's trunk. Edgar stepped behind Raynar to hide his half-naked body from Roas, not realizing that in the Fen villages the folk often did the wettest work in the nude. Roas was quick to spot the man's embarrassment, however, and then made a point of looking away and hurrying the crew out with promises of a hot meal.

  "Did you say Raynar is taking you to Caen?" Hereward looked at Raynar. "Don't be a fool, man. In your Frisian ships you won't get far past Montreuil. In Montreuil I have a Norman-founded longship with a mostly French crew. They can take him right up the River Orne to Caen castle, so long as they carry a cargo for trade. Let them deliver Edgar, if he still is of the mind by then."

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  The Hoodsman - Courtesans and Exiles by Skye Smith

  Chapter 32 - Taking Edgar to Caen, Normandy in September 1074

  Hereward had been right about the reaction of the English exiles in Montreuil. They looked at Edgar like he had two heads when he said he was on his way to make his peace with the Conqueror, and looked away in embarrassment when he asked if any of them cared to join him on his trip to Caen. Raynar spoke quietly with the nobles that had come with Edgar to Montreuil and asked them to convince him to give up this foolishness, but as usual they talked to a peasant down their noses and sneered at him when he left their company.

  He left Edgar well enough alone for three days at the fortress while he stayed with his crew in the harbour five miles away. He had convinced his own crew to call him Anso whenever he traveled as a monk. They had laughed of course, as Anso was the male form of Anske, the name of the ship, and both meant Eagle in the Frisian tongue.

  The Norman-built longship that Hereward had mentioned was serving there as a patrol ship, and he went out with it twice at the invitation of the captain, an old salt from Calais who had been sailing this coast for twenty or more years. The captain was already an acquaintance, but to the French crew Raynar was introduced as Anso, and the captain was careful to always address him as such.

  On the third night Edgar sent him a message saying that he would be traveling alone to Caen. The captain of the longship was there when the lad relayed the message, and he immediately called his crew together and told them to prepare for a journey of a week. Meanwhile, Raynar went back to the fortress. He was most surprised to find out that Edgar had talked one of his nobles into selling him a splendid mated pair of Frisian horses as a gift for William.

  The old captain just shook his head when he saw Edgar and Raynar riding the pair of Frisians towards his ship. Edgar was wearing finery borrowed from his friends, and Raynar was wearing a monk's cowl over a borrowed dress tunic of a Frankish knight. "What the Hades do you think you look like?" the captain laughed, "and where are you taking those horses?"

  "There are only two," said Raynar softly, "and surely you must know how to secure them amids
hips. Didn't you boast to me that you ran horses across the Manche in '66 for the invasion?"

  They spent two nights at sea before they sighted the headlands that guarded the mouth of the River Seine and the harbours of Honfleur and Harfleur. For the whole time, Raynar played the role of Anso, a Frisian monastery knight, and forced Edgar to never call him Raynar. That name was too well known to the Norman spy masters.

  It amazed Anso that there were no Norman patrol ships in these waters, considering their constant presence up and down the east coast of England. Perhaps clearing out the nest of pirates from the three harbours of Montreuil had been as big a favour to Normandy as it had been to Flanders and Boulogne.

  Once past the mouth of the Seine, they hugged the coast so as not to miss the mouth of the river Orne. Even as they crossed the bar at the mouth they were not stopped nor hailed other than the wave of the peasants collecting oysters on the sand bars visible at low tide. About two miles inland on the river the sands turned to mud which marked the point where the river's fresh water flow was countering the effects of the tides. Here they were hailed towards a dock and the port master came aboard.

  Edgar was again dressed as a court fop, and the port master groveled his appreciation. Edgar asked him in his courtly French if the Duke was in residence, and the master needed no other reason to let the ship continue. This was a lucky thing, because the garrison at the dock were a rough-looking bunch in half-mail and armed to the teeth.

  They saw the castle for miles as they rowed up stream. It loomed over the main port, which was extensive and must have required dredging regularly from the look of the sand islands braided into the river. The river itself seemed to become very small just upstream from Caen where its course separated huge horse pastures from orchards and vineyards.

  The castle was built of cream-coloured blocks of stone, as were some of the churches they could see. They now realized that it was this same cream-colored stone that had been stacked along the river bank and was being loaded into barges for shipment. "These Normans aim to pave the world like the Romans did," said the captain. "Show them a lush green valley and between roads and walls and courtyards the lushness becomes cold stone."