The Hooded Men

by David Pilling

  “Enough!” Robert shouted. “My friends, please. It is useless to speculate on Edward, whether he is still alive, when or if he will come home. We must deal with facts as they stand.”

  Warenne spat in the hearth again and resumed his seat. Some man of business, thought Robert. The wretched oaf should have a muzzle, and be led about like a bear on a string.

  Clare continued to look amused, while Audley’s expression was carefully blank. Robert wondered how far he could rely on these men. Their alliance, at best, would be short-lived. He would have to strike quick and hard against his enemies, before his allies turned on each other. Clare in particular loved to bait others, and Warenne was too easily provoked.

  He managed to steer the conversation back to mutual self-interest. The afternoon wore on, and the four men were still deep in conspiracy when there came three soft knocks at the door.

  Robert cursed. He had warned his household that he was not to be disturbed, except in dire emergency. Panic surged through his breast. Had his enemies stolen a march on him? Was there a royal army outside the gates of Chartley?

  The earl got up and limped to the door. He lifted the bar and opened it a little, wide enough to peer through.

  Outside was the last man he expected to see. A burly, greying brigand in late middle age, his haggard face burnt brown by a lifetime out of doors. He wore a rumpled brigandine, none too clean, the plates stained and rusted with other men’s blood. His short beard was dark grey with streaks of reddish brown, and his grey eyes were full of calm intelligence. This man had seen it all, and not been overly impressed.

  “My lord,” he said with an apology for a bow. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but the news I bear cannot wait.”

  Robert glanced nervously at his guests, then shuffled outside and dragged the door shut behind him.

  “Roger,” he hissed. “What in hells are you doing here? If you need more money, you should have sent an envoy.”

  Roger Godberd was the most prized of his captains. Robert hadn’t clapped eyes on the man for at least a year. His job was to raise havoc in the midlands counties of Leicester, Nottingham and Derby, while Robert did the same in the west. Roger’s commission was wide-ranging, and he had been known to lead raids as far afield as Wiltshire or even the far north, in Cumbria near the Scottish border.

  Robert’s sense of panic returned. He and Roger usually kept in touch via messengers. For the man to come in person to Chartley, so far from his normal stamping ground, implied some terrible disaster had occurred.

  “I didn’t come to ask for money, lord,” said Roger. “The truth is we have a problem. Six days ago my lieutenant, Walter Devyas, tried to rob a merchant caravan in Sherwood Forest. It was a trap. The merchant was a king’s officer in disguise. Sixteen of our men were killed and nine taken prisoner. Walter himself was captured. Even now he lies in the dungeon at Nottingham Castle.”

  He gave a shrug. “Or he might be dead. If so, the killing was not done in public. I have posted spies in the town.”

  Robert quickly mulled this over. The news was bad, right enough, if not as terrible as he had feared. The loss of so many men was a blow. They could at least be replaced. The number of his followers was steadily growing as word of the fall of Chartley spread. Some of those who came to join him were loyalists whose ancestors had dwelled on the Ferrers estates for generations. Those estates were in the hands of others now, but they would not abandon their old lord. Others were simply criminals, robbers and outlaws who saw a chance for easy plunder by taking part in a revolt.

  The capture of Walter Devyas was another. “I expect he is still alive,” said Robert. “We can’t take the risk.”

  Roger nodded, and a silent understanding passed between them. “Devyas is a fool,” Robert added. “I put him under your command, and the man has done nothing but stir up trouble and disobey orders.”

  “He’s a useful fighting man,” said Roger. “And a good leader in some ways. Men are happy to follow him into danger. They know he won’t ask them to do anything he won’t do himself.”

  “I know. Why else do you think I have let him live all these years? For the sight of his pretty face?”

  Robert made a snap decision. He had more important matters to attend to, and it wouldn’t do to keep his guests waiting.

  “Get into the castle,” he ordered. “You know the place better than anyone.”

  Roger gave another nod. He had once served in the Nottingham garrison. “Take no more than thirty men,” his master went on. “That should be enough. Pick out the best.”

  As Roger turned to go, Robert caught his arm. “Don’t fail in this,” said the earl in a low voice. “Walter knows too much. They have probably questioned him already. He’s a hard man, I know, but the king’s interrogators could screw information out of a rock. You understand me?”

  “Of course,” came the answer.

  8.

  Hugh woke with a gasp. It was pitch black, and his body was drenched in sweat. He drew in breath to scream.

  Peace, the inner voice told him. There is nothing to fear.

  He clapped his hands over his mouth. For a while he lay quiet in the dark. When his pulse had stopped racing he threw off the thin woollen blanket and swung his legs out of bed.

  Stars glimmered in the arch of the night sky. It was a warm night, and Hugh had left the shutters open to let in some air. He took some comfort from gazing at the stars. His mother used to say they were lamps in the sky, lit by God to illuminate the world at night.

  Hugh ran a hand through his sweat-soaked hair. He had been dreaming again. Of the midnight forest. Black trees with tangled roots like claws. They groped at him as he stumbled through the wilderness, tore and snatched at his flesh. His blood ran thick. He kept running. In his dream he was stark naked, unarmed and defenceless against the thing that chased him.

  Don’t look over your shoulder. Never look over your shoulder. One sight of it will burn and blast you. Drive you into the screaming pit of madness.

  Hugh wrapped his arms about himself and gently swayed back and forth. The dreary howling of wolves echoed inside his head. They slowly faded into the deepest caverns, until there was silence.

  He was slowly going mad. Hugh knew it. The dreams had grown steadily worse over the years, until they started to intrude on his waking hours. How long before the predator in the forest caught up with him?

  There was no use dwelling on it. Hugh reached for the water jug next to his bed and tipped it over himself. The water was lukewarm, but still cold enough to drive away the nightmares.

  Hugh stood up and listened to the silence. Something had dragged him out of the forest. A noise. He listened hard. What time was it? Two or three hours after midnight, probably. The castle would start to wake at four in the morning, when servants got up to light fires and prepare breakfast.

  There.

  He heard it again. A scraping noise, something heavy being pushed carefully across a bare stone floor. It came from below.

  Hugh tried to get his bearings. His bedchamber was on the first floor above the bakehouse and buttery adjoining the great hall. This was a favoured lodging for guests, since the delicious smell of freshly baked bread rose through the floorboards every morning. Now, in place of fresh bread, Hugh smelled danger.

  He dressed and took up his sword. Should he rouse the guard? There was a staircase outside his room that led to the battlements. The sentry on guard would be half-asleep, his belly full of bread and ale. Alan Kirkby, the constable, liked to keep his men well fed. It kept them happy, if not exactly alert.

  If there was no danger, Hugh would look like an idiot. He would also be roundly cursed by the sentry. On balance, he decided to check for himself first. The noise might be a phantom, another symptom of his fractured mind. Hugh preferred to keep his madness to himself for as long as possible.

  What are the prospects of a mad spy?

  Most spies were mad, of course; it came with the territory. Yet there were many
forms of madness. A spy who saw and heard things that weren’t really there was in trouble.

  Hugh carefully pushed the door open and sidled out into the passage. He went barefoot in loose tunic and hose. His sword gleamed in the light of a single torch, high on a sconce on the wall. The light was kept burning all night, in case guests needed to visit the garderobe at the end of a side-passage to the left.

  He turned right and crept to the stairwell. Then he paused, retraced his steps and reached up for the torch. He laid it carefully inside the door of his chamber. That way the light would not cast his shadow against the stairwell. If there was anyone lurking below, they wouldn’t see him coming.

  It also meant the corridor was plunged into darkness. Hugh put his back to the wall and sidled towards the top of the stair. Deprived of sight, his other senses strained to compensate.

  He caught the murmur of voices below. Hugh was both relieved and frightened. At least his imagination wasn’t playing tricks on him. Who in hells would be creeping about the ground floor at dead of night?

  Hugh edged closer to the top of the steps. He stopped dead at the sound of a hinge creaking below. Someone had flung open a door. The voices rose again, louder this time.

  “What’s this? What’s this? You there, stop! Turn round – turn round, I say!”

  Hugh recognised the indignant voice of Kirkby’s pantler, a fat and impatient man in charge of supplying the castle with bread. His job made him deeply unhappy, to judge from the way he cursed and beat the servants in his charge.

  “Wait!” squeaked the pantler. “I don’t know any of you. Who in God’s—”

  His voice dissolved into a grunt. A scuffle followed. Bodies heaving about in the dark, an involuntary squawk of pain.

  “He bit me!” hissed another voice, full of rage. “The fucker actually bit me!”

  Someone was trying to kill the pantler, quickly and without noise. He had no intention of letting that happen.

  Nor did Hugh. The logical thing to do was race upstairs to rouse the guard. Instinct dragged him down the stairwell.

  It was dark as the lowest pit of Hell. He had to go carefully, padding down the steps on bare feet, even as the scuffle grew louder. The pantler wasn’t going down without a fight.

  The stair ended in an archway which opened onto the kitchen, a vast cavernous space with a massive hearth at one end. Other doors led off to the buttery and the bakehouse. Some light came from the glowing embers of a fire in the grate. The light cast monstrous shadows on the wall, demonic figures locked in a desperate struggle.

  Hugh quickly took in the scene. The pantler lay on the floor, legs kicking as he tried to throw off the men holding him down. There were three of them, all in black cloaks and hoods. One knelt on his chest, forcing down his victim’s wrists. Another had stuffed a gag in the fat man’s mouth. The third held aloft a dagger in his right hand. His left was bleeding heavily from fresh teeth-marks across the knuckles.

  “Stop!” Hugh shouted. His voice echoed in the high rafters of the kitchen. At the same time the knife flashed down into the pantler’s throat. A gout of red blood spouted into the air. His enormous body thrashed about, choking and gurgling in his death-throes.

  The murderers leaped off the dying man and swung about to face Hugh. Three pairs of cruel eyes fixed upon him. Otherwise their faces were hidden under the hoods.

  “Another fool,” rasped the one with the wounded hand. “Kill him, and make less noise about it!”

  His companions charged at Hugh. Their leader turned aside to drag open a nailed and timbered side-door next to the hearth.

  “Come up!” he shouted through the doorway. His voice echoed, over and over again, down the passage beyond.

  Hugh retreated backwards up the steps. He used the stairwell to his advantage; it was built to aid the defender against men attacking from below, and so narrow they could only fight him one at a time.

  The first man was too late to realise his mistake. He was only armed with a long dagger, while Hugh had a sword and the advantage of height. After a brief clash of steel the hooded man staggered backwards. His knife clattered to the flagstones as he clasped both hands over the stab-wound in his belly. Breath whistling between his teeth, he crumpled to the floor.

  His accomplice had the sense to draw back. He also carried a dagger, and flung back a fold of his cloak to reveal a sword at his hip.

  “Help!” Hugh roared at the top of his voice. “A rescue – a rescue here!”

  Somewhere above his head a door slammed. Voices were raised in alarm. Soon the alarm bell would ring, summoning the garrison to arms. He just had to stay alive long enough for help to arrive.

  The hooded man’s sword flamed into life. He advanced cautiously towards Hugh and tried to cut his legs away. Hugh parried the cut and they fenced for a few moments, stabbing awkwardly at each other in the constricted space.

  More men flooded into the kitchen. They streamed through the side-door, all in the same black gear, armed with swords and daggers. Hugh remembered that Nottingham castle was built on top of a sandstone cliff. There was said to be a secret passage bored through the rock underneath. He had never seen it for himself, or the hidden entrance supposed to lie at the foot of the cliff. Somehow these intruders had found it.

  Treachery, thought Hugh, even as he blocked another vicious cut at his ankles. Someone in the garrison, perhaps.

  He couldn’t hope to hold the invaders off by himself, and had no intention of dying a hero. His opponent showed no desire to follow as he retreated backwards up the steps.

  “Run away, little mouse,” the hooded man laughed. “You’ll be dead soon enough, along with everyone else!”

  Hugh’s pride, such as it was, could endure any number of taunts. He ran up to the passage next to his bedchamber, just as two guardsmen emerged from the stair leading to the battlements. They looked pale and frightened, their faces mazed with sleep.

  “We’re under attack,” Hugh cried. “They’ve got into the kitchen through the tunnels. I counted a score of them, maybe more. Get back up to the wall and sound the alarm.”

  The guards looked stupidly at him. He recognised the look. These lads had joined the military in the hope of an easy life, regular meals and wages and a bit of garrison duty. The last thing they expected was to do any fighting.

  Hugh pointed at the ceiling and drew in a deep breath. “Get up the fucking wall,” he bawled in his best drill sergeant voice. “Sound the fucking alarm bell. Look sharp, you dozy bastards. Move, before I ram my sword up your bum-holes!”

  This jerked them into life. They turned about and scrambled up the steps, heavy boots scraping against the stone. More shouts filtered down from the battlements. Somewhere a drum started to beat. The castle was waking up.

  Hugh followed the guards. The cold night air hit him like a blow as he scrambled onto the walkway and looked around him. In the east, the sky was just starting to lighten. Lights flared in the arrow-slit windows of the keep.

  He looked over the parapet. Below the wall plunged down to the rock upon which it stood, the ground lost in shadow. Somewhere below was the hidden gate. Hugh thought he heard men’s voices, far below, the neigh of a horse. He tried to force his exhausted mind into action.

  These invaders, whoever they are, have come armed and mounted. They are organised and well-trained. Who in hells are they?

  One obvious answer presented itself. The hooded men had come to rescue Walter Devyas. Hugh’s prisoner was in the castle dungeon, a stinking vault with barely room to stand up in. Walter was chained to the wall, his only companion an ancient beggar who had been a prisoner so long nobody could remember why he was there.

  Hugh had tried to question Walter, and gained nothing except a barrage of curses and defiant laughter. The constable, Alan Kirkby, suggested putting the man to the torture.

  “He’s a brute,” said Alan, “and understands nothing except brute force. Try ripping out his fingernails.”

  “No,” replied
Hugh. “We both know that torture is against the law in England.”

  Now it was Alan’s turn to laugh. “Against the law!” he exclaimed. “What law would that be, Longsword? I cannot speak for London and the south, but north of Trent the king’s writ is a joke. No royal justice has visited these parts in years. They wouldn’t dare. There can be no law until the land is at peace again. For that to happen, men like Walter Devyas must be dealt with.”

  His craggy face darkened. “I’ll drag some answers out of him myself, if you’re too delicate for the job. It will be a pleasure. The whoreson has killed or crippled dozens of my soldiers.”

  Still Hugh refused. He was perfectly capable of breaking the law, if need be, but in his opinion torture was impractical.

  “A man will say anything to stop being hurt,” he said. “I’ve seen it done, and the results are usually worthless. Torture is a means of revenge, nothing more.”

  Alan shrugged. “As you like. He’s your prisoner. I only ask one thing. Once you’re finished with Walter, give him to me.”

  Hugh had agreed to that, at least. There was a genuine edge to Alan’s voice, and he didn’t like to anger his host. Nor did he wish to do Walter any favours. Once the man had expended his usefulness, Hugh was happy to throw him away.

  If he got the chance. The alarm bell on the gatehouse was now clanging, while drums and trumpets added to the din. He rushed to the opposite wall and saw hooded figures in black streaming out of the great hall. Soldiers of the garrison rushed to meet them Some of the braver servants joined in, women too. They grabbed any weapon that came to hand, shovels and pitchforks and staves, and charged recklessly into the melee.

  Where’s Richard? Hugh wondered. This was just the sort of thing the young squire enjoyed. Then he spotted Richard’s tall, athletic figure, nightshirt flapping about his bare legs as he sprinted from one of the guardrooms, bellowing like an enraged bull.

  Hugh was tempted to stay put and enjoy the view. He fought when he had to, not because he enjoyed the clash of arms for its own sake. That was for mindless knight errants, high-born madmen like Richard, who ennobled their foolish savagery with tales of chivalry and similar rubbish. Chivalry! Hugh had seen too many villages burnt to the ground by so-called valiant knights, too many slaughtered peasants, their limbs and heads hacked off and piled up like human dunghills, to believe in such nonsense.