Blood of the Innocents

by Michael Jecks

  There was a shout, and Berenger turned to see the nearer pursuer pointing to Dogbreath. The man who was already lower on the slope urged his beast straight for him.

  ‘Dogbreath! String your bow!’ Berenger bellowed. ‘Quick! There’s a man after you!’

  In answer Dogbreath held up the two broken halves of his bowstave. He gave a sheepish grin. Berenger saw the man-at-arms couch his lance and ride for him. Dogbreath stood still.

  ‘Dogbreath! Are you going to die by a Frenchman’s lance! Move your arse!’

  Dogbreath said nothing, but his shoulders sagged and Berenger knew real horror as he realised the Englishman would do nothing to protect himself. He had given up his battle.

  Then Dogbreath reached down and picked up a heavy stone. As the lance came closer, he hurled it with all his might at the horse’s head. It struck with a sound like a hammer striking rock, and the beast jerked sideways. The lance went wide as the rider tried to keep his balance, and then the horse whinnied in panic as his hindquarters started to slide, and the brute tried to turn to face up the hill once more, but the weight of the man-at-arms made him overbalance. The horse and rider seemed to hold themselves at an impossible angle for a moment, and then, with a crashing and clattering like a dozen sacks of heavy plate, the horse reared up, and fell back, crushing his rider, and the two went rolling and tumbling down the slope.

  Berenger was of a mood to clap and cheer, but before he could think of anything like that, he saw the last two riders coming at him. He had little time, but he picked up a stone in each hand too, and began to hurl them. One struck the leading horse on the shoulder, but that only sent the creature into a deeper anger, and he saw the rider was urging the beast on at him. He flung the second, and as he did so he saw Dogbreath running back towards the road. It was no surprise, the man could do nothing useful here. He had arrows, but no bow. He would only be a target if he were to remain.

  Berenger grabbed another rock. Perhaps he could be lucky. First he had another thought, and began to scramble for his life, up the slope. It grew steeper, and then must grow more shallow, he thought. He could only see the nearer lip of rock, and then all was sky, and he hurried as fast as he might up the loose pebbles, slipping and falling flat on his face, tasting the mud and grit in his mouth, and then spitting it out as he grabbed for clumps of grass to help himself up the rest of the way.

  He heard panting and snorting, and turned to see the first horse was a matter of yards away now. There was a large, irregular stone near him, and he grabbed it, hurling it, but it went wide, and he knew that he was almost done. He turned and started to clamber higher, and then he heard the familiar tock sound. There was another, and he turned as the horse began to neigh and jerk about, trying to reach the arrow that was embedded in his flank through the saddle. Even as Berenger watched, he saw another arrow strike the rider, this one high on his shoulder. Another hit him in the back, low, and glanced away, but one was already stuck in his back, and now another hit the horse in the shoulder and, maddened with pain, the beast tried to bite at it. His hoofs seemed to lose their grip all at the same time, and suddenly he was sliding down the slope. His rider was already slumped, head forward, and as the horse went, the man slowly spilled from his saddle.

  The last man-at-arms was now alarmed and he tried to escape by turning his mount to the slope, but Dogbreath had the distance now, and sent five arrows swiftly at him. Dogbreath had many faults, but inaccuracy was not one of them. Each of the arrows found its mark on the man’s flanks, under his arms where the armour was weakest, or in the shoulder and neck of his horse. A sixth hit the horse just behind the ear, and the brute collapsed like a pole-axed bullock, all legs folding simultaneously.

  Berenger looked about him and felt the shivering begin in his cods, and rise through his stomach to the top of his skull, so that his teeth chattered. He wanted to speak, but there was no strength in his lungs to say a word.

  ‘You all right, Frip?’ said Dogbreath. He was already running to Berenger, apparently concerned that his vintener might be injured, but as Berenger fell back to sit on his backside, he could not help himself. He began to laugh.

  Béatrice met Gaillarde again when she was filling her water bowl from a small stream, and the woman snapped round to face her, fear in every line and bruise, at the sound of Béatrice’s call. ‘Oh, it’s you!’

  ‘You look fearful. Are you not here willingly?’

  Gaillarde sank onto the ground and sobbed. Gradually she told her story, about her husband, about the men who had taken her village by storm and killed everyone, and the one black- haired man who had caught her and forced her to become his marching wife. Although he had made no overt advances to her, he was always nearby, watching her.

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘He rode off with his leader, the man called Will. I don’t know when they’ll be back.’

  ‘But you can leave them, woman! You are free, if they do not watch over you.’

  ‘And what then? I am with the marching wives, but if I run, someone else will catch me. I cannot leave here. If I run, they will come and find me. And then I will have the same hardship and punishment. And where can I go? My husband is gone, probably dead, and my home is burned and ruined. I have nothing: no family, no home, no hope!’

  ‘Get up, Frip! Get up!’

  Gradually the urgency of Dogbreath’s words got through to Berenger. He took a deep breath and nodded. With Dogbreath’s help, he made his way to the top of the hill, both of them falling many times, until they lifted themselves over the lip of the ground and could see the plain before them.

  Only a half-hour or so earlier they had ridden past this area. Berenger could remember the tranquillity of the fields, the sound of birdsong. All was destroyed now. As he watched, the remnants of the French formed a long line, perhaps fifty strong, turned, and charged the English column. He could see that Audley and Chandos were already in the fray, battling with a number of other English knights against a smaller force of French. His own men were nowhere to be seen, and he wondered what had happened to Robin, but when he mentioned them to Dogbreath, the wizened little man curled his lip and pointed. ‘Rob’s goin’ all right. He’s over on the left flank there with the rest of the archers. Looks like Clip’s there too. Couldn’t kill him if you tried.’

  Even as he spoke, there was a cry, and the French charged, their mounts thundering over the damp ground. Berenger could feel the pounding of their hoofs through the ground under him.

  Suddenly a force of knights flashed out from the English lines and rode around to take them in a vast circle. As Berenger stood up, he could see the manoeuvre and the way that the English charge had disrupted that of the French, making them fear that if their own continued, the English must entrap their whole force. What had started as a little skirmish for the French was turning into a disaster. As Berenger and Dogbreath made their way back towards their ponies, the battle was already mostly over. French men-at-arms lay on the ground, dead, while a number hurtled away, bloodied and desperate.

  ‘Not so bad,’ Dogbreath muttered.

  ‘No,’ Berenger agreed, but as he spoke, in his mind was the question: where did Will go?

  Thomas de Ladit was marching again, his feet tender and blistered after so many days of slogging onwards, but his mind was not on his feet or the soreness of his legs. He was still thinking of the brief discussion with Bernard three days before.

  It had been such a shock to see him, and they had little time to talk. The only thing Bernard was interested in was making sure that Thomas would make no mention of the women killed in Normandy. Those peculiar rumours of a killer who was keen to savage women, to rape and crucify them. The stories had grown to terrify the entire community, as Thomas had seen. No one dared leave young girls alone lest they be captured and slain.

  But why was Bernard so keen to see those stories suppressed?

  He trudged on, and when he glanced to his side, looking at all the soldiers marching, heari
ng the jingle of their mail habergeons, the squeak of their leather scabbards, belts and sometimes the cuir bouilli, he studied their faces. There was such a variation in appearance between these men. Some were the sort who would grab and rape any women they captured. Others had a less brutal look about them. They appeared more like any man to be found in a market town at midday. Which sort was Bernard, he wondered. Amiable or brutish?

  Imagining Bernard’s grim face, it was easy to think him capable of the most heinous crimes, he thought, and then his face was struck with a dawning realisation.

  There was a lot of questioning later. Berenger was given a large cup of wine, and he drank it quickly, gasping as it passed down, warming him all the way to his feet. It was tempting to demand another, but he forced himself to do without. He didn’t want to break his run of mornings without hangovers.

  ‘You were lucky, Vintener,’ Chandos said. ‘Your men reached us quickly, and we were able to kill many of the French.’

  ‘It was a sharp battle, Fripper,’ Robin said. He held a jug, but Berenger shook his head and asked for water. ‘We breasted the hill, and there before us was the whole column. We shouted our warning, but our speed was enough to give the alarm. They soon had the whole battle fixed. It was magnificent!’

  ‘The men are trained,’ Chandos said. ‘I hear you killed three yourself?’

  ‘No. Dogbreath did. He killed the first with a stone, knocking him from his horse, and then reached my bow and killed two more.’

  ‘Good! The French can never win while England has her archers, eh?’ Chandos said, slapping his thigh. He had a cut under his eye and his left arm was hanging as though he had injured it, but he would not speak of his wounds. ‘So, we still have no passage over the river, far as you could see, eh, Vintener?’

  From all that we saw there is no bridge. We were not able to get close enough to search for a ford before the French came at us,’ Berenger said.

  ‘Well, we caught eighteen of them. They can be questioned to see if there is anything,’ Audley said. He was the slimmer of the two men, and had a way of keeping his head lowered so that he peered at the world from his beetling brows. It made Berenger wonder whether he had injured his neck. A man who wore a heavy bascinet daily and regularly took a heavy axe or hammer blow on the crown would often be injured and lose some of the muscles at the back of his neck.

  ‘What do you think?’ Chandos said to Berenger. ‘Is there likely to be another bridge to the west?’

  Berenger tilted his head doubtfully. ‘When we were here before Crécy, the French were adept at destroying all the bridges in our path when they wanted to keep us away. It worked for them then. I doubt not that they will do the same again to keep us to the south of the Loire. The river is greatly swollen compared with its usual course, I think. If I were to guess, I would expect the bridges all to be down. If you want to pass north, you will have to build a bridge, but the river is very wide . . . and while she is overflowing her banks . . .’ He shrugged expressively.

  ‘So you don’t think it possible?’

  ‘I served the King during the whole of the Crécy campaign, and in all that march we never managed to overcome an obstacle the size of this one,’ Berenger said. ‘I think it unlikely that we can do so now.’

  Audley nodded to himself, then glanced at Chandos. ‘Are we in agreement?’

  ‘Yes,’ Chandos said. ‘Fripper, you have new instructions: we require that you ride back to the Prince and tell him all we have discussed here. We think you must be right. We will have some more scouts sent east and west to check the river and we will question our captives, but the likelihood is that there is no crossing point here.’

  ‘So you wish me to suggest an alternative?’

  ‘For now, we must assume that the passage north is blocked.’

  Monday 29 August

  Berenger and his men rode into the Prince’s army at Vierzon in the middle of the morning, and Berenger felt only sadness to see the destruction.

  In the two days since leaving the town, the place had suffered. Although there had been some fires started when Berenger and his men were there originally, in the days since almost the whole town had been consumed.

  ‘Fripper, I hope I see you well?’ Sir John de Sully was in an expansive mood in his pavilion outside the town. He had seen his tent pitched far enough from the town to ensure that the smell of burning would not reach him. ‘We have been busy. I trust you have too?’

  Berenger had been given a written note from Chandos, and he passed this over now. Sir John glanced at it long enough to ensure that the seal was still complete, before passing it to his clerk. ‘This is for the Prince. See to it that it is delivered swiftly.’

  The clerk nodded and took it as gingerly as a man passing a barrel of Archibald’s powder with a lighted fuse clearly visible. He slipped away as soon as he had it.

  ‘Now, Fripper. Tell me what it’s like up there,’ Sir John said, sitting.

  Berenger told him all he had seen: the swollen river, the flooded plains, the mud, the overflowing dykes and irrigation channels.

  The knight listened, his face growing longer as Berenger completed his tale of floods and mud, and then, when Berenger spoke of the attack from eighty French men-at-arms, Sir John scowled. ‘I have been fighting for the King and the Prince for more years than I care to remember. I must not live many more summers. I’m five-and-seventy years already, in God’s name! Will I never see this war ended? Surely the French must come to realise that their nobles and King cannot protect them? Yet their men-at-arms will still come and contest the land. It is maddening, and so wasteful. The courage of so many, all being killed for such a foolish argument, for so ridiculous and petulant a King! Do they not see that God Himself fights on the side of England?’

  ‘I think they see the depredations of the English fighters and resent us more than they dislike the failures of their nobles,’ Berenger said.

  ‘Our English fighters do their duty, no more. We fight to bring to the attention of the peasants the fact that they must all be far better off in the safety of the King’s Peace,’ Sir John said dismissively. ‘And now, Fripper, go and find yourself some food. You and your men must be tired after your action.’

  Berenger was glad to find Archibald not far from Sir John’s pavilion.

  ‘What of the others? Where is Grandarse?’ Berenger asked.

  ‘He has been sent, moaning and grumbling, to scout out to the west for the day,’ Archibald said. ‘There are rumours of a French force. He was not happy!’

  The two were sitting before a small fire built at a safe distance from the wagons containing Archibald’s serpentine powder and gonnes. Berenger could not help but glance in their direction every so often. He almost expected to see a demon clambering all over them. While he tried to squash his superstition about the powder, there was still something malignant and terrifying about it and the way that it would explode like a thunder-crack, deafening all and slaughtering men and beasts yards away with its massive stone balls.

  Béatrice walked to them. She looked at Berenger, but when he glanced up, she looked away quickly so that he was uncertain that she had been looking in his direction in the first place.

  ‘How are you?’ he asked as she moved past him.

  ‘I am well. I hope you are also?’

  He shrugged. ‘If my arse never has to sit on a pony again, I’ll be happy enough.’

  She chuckled. Archibald said nothing, but was pleased to see that there appeared to be no shaking in Berenger’s hands when he took a cup of wine. His eyes were clear, and his smile looked less forced, too.

  ‘What will you be doing now? Have you been told?’ Archibald asked.

  ‘I have some unfinished business with people here,’ Berenger said. He looked about him. Berenger wanted to find Denisot again and talk. And then he still wanted to find Will. That was becoming his most fervent desire of all.

  ‘Who?’ Béatrice asked, and then, as he told her the story o
f Will, his own Alazaïs, and Denisot, her mouth fell open. ‘His wife was named Gaillarde, you say?’

  ‘Yes.’ He caught sight of her face. ‘Why?’

  Tuesday 30 August

  Next day, Berenger rode beside Grandarse towards the little town of Romorantin.

  He had not told Denisot about the woman yet. If Denisot was to try to liberate her from her captors, there was no telling how the matter would end. Better for Berenger to see if he could learn more about her first. Perhaps Will’s men would let her go for a small ransom.

  ‘Why’s it always us, Frip?’ Clip was whining. ‘They always send us out first, don’t they? Why’s it always us have to go do the hard work?’

  ‘They took one look at you, Clip, and saw an easily disposable archer,’ Robin said.

  ‘Me? They wouldn’t want to get rid of me in a hurry!’

  ‘I suppose you would make a useful target for a real archer,’ Imbert sneered.

  ‘Me? You’d never dare loose an arrow at me!’

  ‘You want to try me?’

  ‘Enough! Shut up, Imbert, you lunatic little turd,’ Grandarse bellowed, and held his hand up. ‘That’s it, then, Frip.’

  Ahead of them a little walled town had appeared from between the trees. The land here was so flat that a small copse could conceal a city, but now they were presented with Romorantin, a small town with an inner citadel that towered over the walls. The walls themselves were pale, a cream colour, with some darker stones intermingled with the rest, and Berenger found himself studying it with interest. There were some areas that looked shaded, as though the sun was behind a cloud just there, but with his eyesight he could not tell if that was an illusion or not.

  Sir John had been riding behind them a short distance, and now he caught up with Grandarse and the others. ‘Well, there’s the next objective,’ he said.

  ‘Is it worth the effort?’ Grandarse said doubtfully. He looked over the worn walls. ‘It doesn’t look like it has a lot worth plundering.’