Hereward 03 - End of Days, page 13
‘What is this?’ Rowena asked. Acha gripped her wrist to silence her. In the distance, the sound of hoofbeats grew louder.
A hush fell over the entire camp. The main gates rattled open and the thunder of hooves drew nearer. Heads dropped one by one until all the men were bowing.
Rowena held her breath without knowing why.
The amber glow of the campfires lit a column of men riding towards the castle. Knights in helms and hauberks and noblemen in fine cloaks of purple and gold and blue. At the head of the procession was an oak of a man, broad-shouldered and powerful, his mail shirt a mountain of iron atop his stallion. His expression was fierce and he levelled his gaze across the men he passed as if he held their lives in his hand.
‘The king,’ Acha gasped. ‘It can be no other.’
As William the Bastard neared the castle gates, he turned his head and caught sight of the two women. He looked into Rowena’s eyes and held her gaze for a long moment until she realized what she was doing and bowed her head.
The castle gates ground open. The procession clattered through. And then the gates shut, and after a few moments of awed stillness the clamour of the camp rose up once more.
‘Then all that we heard was true,’ Acha said in a low, unsettled voice. ‘The king has come, and he will smite the east as he did the north. War can only be days away.’
‘I care little,’ Rowena said, turning back to the camp. ‘Let us find Elwin, and then we can be away.’
She strode out, following the line of the castle wall in the direction of the other, unexplored side of the camp. She had been right to worry that time was short. Her husband had to be found before Hereward and the Bastard started tearing bloody chunks off each other like starving dogs.
A quiet lay over the other side of the camp. No drunken soldiers lurched along the narrow tracks, but the stink of shit and piss was, if anything, even worse. The tents here were larger, the few huts more roughly built, little more than walls of peat blocks with planks laid across for a roof. Rowena peeped inside one of the tents. Row upon row of men lay upon beds of straw. They were filthy, their clothes near rags. They seemed to be sleeping fitfully, arms thrown over their faces as they tossed and turned. A few sat up, staring blankly into space. Exhaustion had carved deep lines in their faces. ‘These are English,’ she whispered to Acha.
‘But not levied,’ Acha replied, ‘not fighting men. They look as though they have been working in the fields. The king’s army is smaller still.’
Rowena turned away from the tent, her brow knotted. She felt a weight of dread upon her shoulders although she did not know why. Acha felt it too, she could see.
‘We must leave here soon,’ the other woman murmured, looking around, ‘or we may never leave at all.’
As they searched the narrow paths, they caught sight of a few men straggling back to their beds from the direction of the camp gates. A fire lit the face of one and Rowena all but cried out.
She ran over and caught his arm. ‘Swefred,’ she hissed. ‘It is I, Rowena.’ He peered at her with dazed eyes, recognition slowly lighting in their depths. ‘He is from my village,’ she said, turning back to Acha. Her voice trembled with excitement. ‘He was taken with my husband.’
‘Rowena? What are you doing in this foul place?’ Suddenly animated, the man’s eyes darted around as if he was afraid the wrath of the Normans would fall upon him merely for speaking to this woman.
‘I search for Elwin. For all of you. To take you home.’
‘There is no hope of that.’ He bowed his head so she could not see his face.
‘There is always hope.’
He swallowed and steadied himself. ‘Leave now. This is not a place for you.’
‘Where is Elwin?’ she pressed.
‘I cannot say.’
Rowena stifled her frustration. She could see the man was near-delirious with exhaustion. ‘Why have the Normans brought you here?’
‘To be their slaves.’
Acha looked around. ‘The castle is built. The walls of the camp stand. Why do you still labour?’
Swefred began to stumble away, but Rowena grabbed him and shook him more roughly than she intended. She too felt they would be caught and dragged away at any moment. ‘Tell us what you know,’ she hissed.
‘Very well,’ he snapped. ‘But no good will come from it. Here.’
He marched among the tents until he reached the camp’s wall. Glancing around to make sure no guards were near, he clambered up the rickety ladder to the walkway. Rowena and Acha climbed after him. ‘See,’ he whispered, pointing over the palisade.
Rowena’s breath caught in her throat. For a moment, she thought she looked out across the fields of hell. Fires blazed everywhere. Sparks swirled up in banks of black smoke. In a natural bowl, shielded by trees, a vast city of tents stretched deep into the night. Standards fluttered from poles. Along the edge, workshops squatted, and the sound of smiths’ hammers rang out as if they were beating the drums of war. Rowena’s nose wrinkled at the stink of brimstone from the forges. Looming over the camp, wooden towers soared up almost to the stars. They rested on platforms that could be rolled on logs. In the gloom beyond, Rowena could just discern the silhouettes of great siege machines.
Caught in the ruddy glow of the bonfires, men sat around drinking, their shields and helms resting beside them. Everywhere she looked, warriors, ready for bloodshed. The camp on the hill contained only the guard who would protect the monarch if the rebels attacked, she realized. Here was the king’s true army, a mighty force that would crush the unwary English in no time.
‘We must warn Hereward,’ Acha said, her voice weak. ‘If he rides now, unprepared, all is lost.’
‘The Bastard is building a causeway to the east, a great road across the waters and the bogs that will lead his men up to the very walls of Ely,’ Swefred said. ‘We have laboured on it night and day. Foundations of good wood and reed, sand, peat, and flint. Strong enough to take the siege machines and as many men as the king will send. Those towers will guard its edges.’ He hesitated, then added, ‘All is lost.’
As the two women gaped, he scrambled down the ladder and began to trudge back towards his bed. Rowena raced after him. ‘If you laboured on the causeway, Elwin must have worked beside you,’ she said, grabbing his arm. ‘Where is he? Tell me – I must see him now.’
‘I will tell you nothing,’ he snarled, trying to throw her off.
She held tight, her eyes blazing. ‘Tell me,’ she shouted.
Swefred flinched as her voice carried out across the camp. ‘Hold your tongue. You will bring the guards down upon us.’ He looked into her eyes and saw he had no choice. ‘Very well,’ he muttered. He turned and began to walk towards a long, low hut beside the wall. ‘Elwin – he always had a fire in his heart. The Normans treated us worse than dogs. They threw us scraps of food to fight over, and kicked us, and hit us with the flats of their swords to make us work harder. Days of that, and Elwin would take no more. He tried to get the English to fight back. He stood, and raged at the bastards, and yelled at the men to join him.’ His voice drained away and his head bowed. ‘But none stood with him. The guards dragged him away and beat him … beat him harder than I have seen a man beaten.’
‘Oh,’ Rowena said in a small voice, choking back her pain. Her voice fell to a whisper, but it was infused with hope. ‘Wherever they hold him, we must free him now. Will you aid me?’
Swefred came to a halt. After a moment, he raised his arm and pointed towards the hut. ‘There is your husband.’
Rowena followed the line of the roof and came to a pole at one end. On the top of it, Elwin looked down at her, his empty eye-sockets staring.
Swefred swallowed. ‘They took his head.’
CHAPTER TWENTY
THE CAMPFIRE ROARED. Shadows danced across the tent as William the Bastard stood in the entrance, looking out across the mud of the castle ward. From the dark by the gate, Deda watched the monarch lit by the red glare. He looked like a bear waiting for prey, and just as savage when roused, the knight thought. After his long, lonely trek across the wetlands, Deda’s hair was lank with grease and mud streaked his face. His tunic was still sodden from the rain and his legs felt as if they were made of lead. But he lived yet. Not too long ago that had seemed a thin hope.
Over the tent, the king’s standard fluttered, two rampant golden lions against a red field. The new tower was not yet ready for living in, Deda guessed. As William turned to go back inside the tent, the knight took a deep breath, lifted his head and set off across the ward. He could hear the king’s deep voice rumbling out, even above the din from the camp. Several other men seemed to be with him, giving their counsel.
‘These English,’ the monarch was shouting, ‘what is wrong with them? Half the time they are drunk, the other half asleep. Yet they fight like wolves, even now, seasons after I took the crown. Must this be the story for all of my rule? War and bloodshed? What victory did I not win that day on Senlac Ridge, that I cannot enjoy my prize?’
Deda grinned as he heard the familiar sounds of lackeys fawning and dissembling to drain the king’s anger before they suggested unpalatable truths. Soon he would be putting forward one of his own, and he expected the edge of the monarch’s tongue in return. But Hereward had been right; these words had to be spoken if they were to avoid death on a grand scale. And England had seen more than enough of that in recent times.
He stepped into the tent’s entrance. Before he could utter a word, every man inside reeled back in horror, the king included. Hands clutched at mouths and prayers were muttered. After a moment’s bafflement, Deda realized they were seeing some terrible apparition. Bedraggled and streaked with mud as if he had climbed from the grave, haloed by the fire at his back like a vision from hell. After the slaughter at the causeway, they must all have thought him dead.
‘My lord,’ he said with a bow. ‘I am in better health than I may appear.’
The king narrowed his eyes. ‘Deda? You have the reek of the shroud about you.’
‘The English spared my life at the causeway, but they seized me and took me back to Ely.’
‘And you escaped?’
‘I have word from Hereward.’
Excited murmurs ran through the tent. Deda looked around and saw Odo of Bayeux, Ivo Taillebois, William de Warenne and two other men he did not recognize, one aged but still potent, leaning upon a staff, and a younger man with apple cheeks and an innocent face.
‘The English dog is afraid, eh?’ the king roared. ‘He wishes to bow his head before me and plead for his miserable life.’ The monarch beckoned Deda into the tent. ‘Give him wine,’ he barked at Taillebois as if the latter were a slave. The Butcher flashed one unguarded venomous look before he turned to the pitcher.
Deda took the cup he was offered and said, ‘The English are ready for war. Their army is larger than we thought. I have seen it with my own eyes. They have no shortage of food to see them through the cold season. And God is with them.’ He eyed the king. ‘They have the arm of St Oswald.’
The monarch showed no surprise. Nor did the Butcher or William de Warenne.
‘If our men do not know it, they soon will. What then?’
William the Bastard took a cup of wine and swilled it back in one draught. After a moment’s reflection, he said, ‘They will accept peace?’
Deda was surprised by the response, and recognized the same reaction on the faces of the other men there. The king looked around, showing barely concealed contempt at what he saw.
‘This is not weakness,’ he snapped. ‘I fought hard for this crown. It will mean naught if I have to kill every man in England to keep it.’ He prowled to the trestle at the back of the tent and snatched up a chunk of salt pork. ‘We have enemies everywhere. We cannot afford to waste time putting down the English. With our eyes here in the east, we are not looking to the Danes … or Malcolm in the north … If our men are dying here, who then will fight to protect what we have?’ He chewed on the meat and spat out a chunk of gristle. ‘A long fight across the years will drain our coffers. Think on that. We will be beggared. What say you, Deda?’
‘The English are folk of honour,’ the knight said, choosing his words carefully. ‘The north … what they now call the Harrowing … weighs heavily on them. Many who accepted your rule have been sent spinning towards Hereward.’
‘But they needed to be taught a lesson, eh, Deda? You agree with me.’ The monarch glanced with cold eyes.
‘They were taught a hard lesson, my lord. And the north will not rise again.’
William the Bastard threw the meat aside. ‘If we offer them peace … if we forgive them their sins against us and spare their lives … we can talk until the fight is drained from them.’ He noticed Taillebois’s sour expression and scowled. ‘There is more than one path to victory, Butcher. Winning does not need a drenching of blood to make it grow. If you had the wits to match that sword arm, you would know that.’
The young man shifted, keen to speak.
The king beckoned. ‘You … the brother of Hereward. You know the mind of this dog. Will he talk peace?’
‘My lord,’ the younger man said, ‘Hereward cannot be trusted. He will smile and nod and speak of peace, and once your guard is down, he will attack. A dog, you say. A wolf more like. Can a wolf be tamed? Can it be trusted? It is what it is, a savage beast filled only with hunger.’
The old man bowed his head in deference and added, ‘Whatever you say, my lord, the English will see talk of peace as a sign of weakness. As one, they will rise and follow Hereward’s standard. That few have yet done so is down to one thing – their fear of your wrath.’
The monarch beckoned to Taillebois for more wine. ‘Speak, Deda. Give me the benefit of your wisdom.’
‘Show mercy, my lord. The English have been worn down by their suffering. They yearn for peace and a return to the lives they knew. They will thank you for giving it to them. Blood will only lead to blood. If we fight on, this war may never end.’
William the Bastard laughed. ‘The world has been turned on its head. The English call for war, against their own, no less. The Norman wants only peace.’
Deda watched the sideways glances the king cast in his direction, the shadow that formed at the edge of his mouth. The monarch loathed him. He did not know why. But in that moment he could see he had lost the argument. ‘Let me think on this,’ William the Bastard said, sipping his wine. Without gratifying the knight with a look, he flicked his hand to dismiss him. Deda bowed and stepped out. But he would not go far. However loyal he was to the king, he felt it wise to listen and learn what he could.
‘This relic troubles me,’ the monarch was saying. ‘Even seasoned fighting men will not take up arms against God. How do we give them the strength to stand against such a thing?’
After a long moment’s silence, Deda heard the Butcher reply. ‘There is a witch who lives in the woods near here. The English monks drove her out and burned her hovel, so my men told me. I saw even hardened warriors pale when they spoke of her.’
William the Bastard roared with laughter. ‘A witch! Aye, what better way! We will fight God with the Devil and see who wins.’ An uncomfortable silence settled on his audience at the blasphemy, but the king went on, ‘Have her brought here. We will feed her well and she will work her magic against the English, or at least make a show of it. That will put some fire into our men’s hearts.’
The Butcher muttered his assent.
‘Two years we have danced around this English dog,’ the Bastard continued, his voice hardening. ‘Two years, and all the Norman might here in the east has failed me.’ Deda imagined Taillebois and William de Warenne squirming under the king’s accusatory gaze, and smiled. ‘Now it is left to me to put things right. We have tested the English strength with that feeble causeway we built to draw the curs out. I expected them to slaughter every man there. But now we know that foot-soldiers alone are no use. It taught us much.’
Deda nodded. So the king had sent him there to die. He had half thought that might be the case when the English had taken the causeway so easily. His heart grew heavier at the other lives thrown away, good men all of them, so that William could learn more about his enemy.
‘Our sacrifice there will have lulled the English into thinking they are on an easy road to victory,’ the monarch was saying. ‘If they attack us, their chests will be swelled and their heads turned, and they will not be ready for our fury. You need to be cunning, like a fox,’ he all but shouted, ‘but you have been running in circles like frightened rabbits.’
The Butcher and William de Warenne must be regretting the moment they entered the king’s tent, Deda thought, not least because their humiliation was taking place before the eyes of two English.
‘Now leave my sight,’ the Bastard snapped.
Deda edged further round the tent as he heard the two men leaving. When he stepped out into the light of the campfire, Taillebois’s face boiled with a cold fury. William de Warenne was shaking, knowing how close they had both come to feeling the monarch’s full wrath. The Bastard had no friends there, the knight noted, but he needed none. He ruled by fear, and that had served him well.
As the two Normans trudged across the ward and into the night, muttering under their breath, Deda crept back until he found a place where he could see into the tent. If the king cared so little for his life, Deda felt he ought to pay even closer attention to the monarch from now on. He squatted in the deep shadows, watching the king prowl. William the Bastard poured himself more wine, then studied the two Englishmen over the lip of his cup. ‘There is no love lost between you and your kin, this dog Hereward,’ he said.
