by David Gilman
Blackstone’s prediction caused the arrogant nobleman to cast a nervous glance towards the north where the Count d’Armagnac’s host would soon appear. He had bickered with his commanders, who insisted that King Edward’s Master of War was a common man, granted the honour by the King because of his defiant and troublesome past and kept in France to spare the English King any further aggravation. It was they who insisted that their honour would be tarnished by fighting on foot. And they had swayed Gaston Phoebus.
Blackstone saw doubt furrow the Count’s brow. He softened his voice. ‘My Lord Phoebus, we destroyed France. We stood our ground. At every battle my King found the best defensive position and let his enemy’s arrogance throw them onto our swords. It is the same French arrogance that has brought you to this place. It is their wilful disregard of your family that has caused this. It is their arrogance that makes them believe they will grind you under their horse’s hooves.’
The Count de Foix faced him. ‘Perhaps you are right, Sir Thomas. I do not doubt your own courage. I saw it when we were at Meaux and I believe that Edward honoured you because you have earned the right, but I have feudal lords whose family honour is as much a burden as any suit of fine armour. My Catalan vassals, the Viscounts of Cardona, Pallars and Castelbou, make demands on me I cannot refuse. If those knights and lords we do not slaughter cry mercy, then we hold them for ransom.’
It was obvious that the Count could not be turned away from what seemed a disastrous course of action. The fight had to be salvaged somehow.
‘Very well. Then place your infantry behind your knights. When you ride have them follow on foot. As you gain ground, let them seize it. And hold. Do not let them advance any further than that first line of battle. Cut down your lances so that five infantrymen can attend each one. Three to keep a firm hold so that blood-crazed horses impale themselves, two more to kill its rider. Tell your glory-hungry lords there will be ransom enough for everyone but they have to be alive to claim it. I will hold the right flank and when the time is right use my archers. Then I am spent. If you don’t close the circle you will lose this battle and I and my men will die.’
Blackstone’s matter-of-fact summation of the coming events had a sobering effect on the Pyrenean prince. ‘I will not fail you,’ he said, ‘I will give my orders so we all know what they must do and when.’ He turned away to where his commanders waited and squires burnished their master’s armour.
A knot of cold apprehension coiled in Blackstone’s stomach. Chaos and slaughter was only hours away and what had been a sound plan of battle was now in tatters.
CHAPTER SIXTY
Blackstone gathered his captains and told them of the Count’s intentions. It was not the first time men on the ground had been abandoned to their own fate by fast-moving horsemen or self-serving noblemen. Blackstone half expected that the Dome contingent would desert, but they were men who had fought set battles. Those among them who knew the knights they would be facing spoke to others about the riches that awaited those who killed the noblemen and lived to seize their silk undershirts, bejewelled rings and scabbards encrusted with precious stones. For some, greed would overcome fear.
‘Armagnac will try and break our lines before he turns from the main force. We will have a fight on our hands the moment they see our blazon,’ said Killbere. They ate salted mutton and washed the sharp taste away with Gascon wine. Hundreds of fires twinkled in the cold night as Phoebus’s army bedded down for the night. The smell of cooked food drifted into Blackstone’s ranks. None of the arrayed men complained. Like Blackstone’s men they lay under their blankets knowing they fought for the one man who would not squander their lives needlessly.
Blackstone walked along the lines. His men slept where they would fight. Will Longdon and his archers were in the trees behind hurdles crudely fashioned from fallen branches, enough to obscure them until horseman broke through Blackstone’s ranks. Jack Halfpenny’s bowmen curled in the night air, their waxed bow bags tucked close to their bodies. Blackstone saw his archers’ pegs tapped into the ground at fifty-yard intervals. They served as grave markers where a common man’s arrow would end a nobleman’s life. The frosted air settled on his beard. It made no difference what the weather did the next day. The hard ground would jolt horses’ legs, and their iron-shod hooves might find it difficult to gain purchase when urged into the gallop. He cursed a weak man’s desire for glory because the Count’s own horses would share the same struggle and that put Blackstone’s men at greater risk.
He gazed at the moon and raised Arianrhod to his lips. The Silver Wheel Goddess glistened in the veiled moonlight. Memories flooded over him. The great pitched battles of the war echoed in his mind. The fear that gripped a man anticipating the fight and made muscles taut and eyes keen. Lungs filling with bellowing rage that drove a fighting man forward into the fray.
There was no need for prayer. It was not God that such men wanted at their side.
It was Death.
*
They came three hours after first light. The winter sun was still low in the sky an hour after rising as a distant bell in the village of Launac chimed the terce hour. A rhythmic beat of a hundred drums and a blaring cacophony of trumpets silenced the humble bell. A forest of pennons wavered as massed troops followed the mounted knights. The Count de Foix et Béarn stared in quiet amazement, as did every man under his command. The wall of shimmering steel edged closer, three ranks of knights, one behind the other, followed by infantry. Mercenaries rode on their left flank. Gaston Phoebus knew then that Blackstone had been correct. They were outnumbered three to one. At least. He looked over his shoulder at the sun struggling to rise in the sky. The English Master of War had chosen the place well. The sun would keep its low arc behind the slender hills and be in the Count d’Armagnac’s troops’ eyes throughout the day. Commanders bellowed orders, breaking his reverie as they brought the knights’ war horses forward. Gaston Phoebus wore silver-grey armour, but had not yet donned his bascinet. He mounted his horse, which bore chest armour – added weight for the beast to carry but which offered a chance of survival against lance or spear. The Count de Foix had heard mass at dawn with his priest and his soul and conscience were free of sin and doubt. The battle would determine the future of his family name and if its dynasty were to end this fifth day of December, then it would not be because of trepidation in the face of greater odds. He rode to the front of his men, his blond hair still free of a helm so that all men would know who it was that promised them glory and a share of the spoils.
Blackstone stood with his captains on the most vulnerable flank of the line. Jack Halfpenny’s archers were already in position and like those in the woods behind them had been awake before dawn to add extra beeswax to their hemp bow cords, added protection against the brittle air. Now they stood cradling the six-foot bows with their hands tucked beneath their armpits for warmth. Cold, stiff fingers were an added burden when wrapping a fist around the six-inch circumference of a yew bow. Arrows had been carefully assessed and each three-foot-long shaft, an inch thick and tipped with a three-inch-long iron bodkin, had been gathered in a bushel at their feet besides those in arrow bags. Once the arrows were spent they would fight with buckler and bastard sword. Each carried a mercy knife in their belts to pierce the eye slits of a unseated knight’s helm, but if the bowmen faced mounted men-at-arms then their lives were soon over.
Killbere, Meulon and Renfred stood at Blackstone’s shoulder as they watched the long-haired figure of Gaston Phoebus ride along the ranks and exhort his troops to kill and plunder but insist that if an enemy knight or lord claimed mercy it should be granted and ransom accepted. They should give no mercy to any man of lesser rank.
‘If they cut his horse’s legs from beneath him I wonder if he would learn sudden respect for the common soldier who had a spear at his throat and blood-lust raging,’ said Killbere.
‘I care less about him and more about our fate today,’ said Renfred, glancing at the gaunt faces of
the Dome contingent.
‘We keep the men from Dome in the second rank behind us,’ said Blackstone. ‘A shield wall will not serve any purpose against the first waves of horsemen, but when their infantry fight through that is when they must hold.’
Meulon looked at the gathered arrayed men. ‘Spear and shield will hold only for a while. If they break, then Will and his lads behind us will have nowhere to run.’
‘They will hold,’ said Blackstone, ‘because archers will bring down horses before they reach a hundred yards. And then we go forward on my command and claim the ground between us and that first wave because then we deal with those horsemen who will be hampered by the dead and dying in front of them.’
Killbere cleared his throat and spat. He grinned. ‘I never thought I would live to see such a battle again. It’s how it should be, Thomas. Drums and trumpets and flags.’ He laughed aloud. ‘It pumps blood into a man’s heart and strengthens his sword arm. Let these bastards do their worst; they are no match for those we have killed on greater fields of battle than this puny patch of grass. You chose well, Thomas. The sun will keep their heads tucked down against its low glare. They’ll stumble over their own dead and dying and we’ll smell their fear and shit when they see our blazon.’
Blackstone strode forward and faced his men. Each of his captains stood paces ahead of their own contingents. Raising his voice so that his words carried along the ranks, he addressed them. ‘We are men alone here in this place. We make our stand where no other would dare. When steel and horse thunder forward and the storm of terror threatens then remember this: if our thoughts twist with doubt we turn to the boldness and defiance in our hearts. What stands between us and the fear they inflict is our courage.’
Killbere stepped forward. Raising his sword, he shouted loud enough for his voice to carry along the ranks of waiting men. ‘Sir Thomas and defiance!’
Blackstone’s captains and men cheered and brandished their weapons. The battle cry rippled along the lines.
‘Sir Thomas and defiance!’
The Count de Foix reined in his horse and faced Blackstone’s men; then he raised his sword in salute.
When the cry ended the men bellowed in rage, thundering that defiance across the open plain.
‘If Armagnac didn’t know we were here before, he does now,’ said Blackstone. ‘All right, take your positions.’
The captains moved to their men as Killbere slipped his sword’s blood knot onto his wrist. He pulled on his helm. ‘May the angels be with us, Thomas,’ he said. He nodded at the cord around Blackstone’s neck. ‘And your pagan.’
Blackstone pulled on his open-faced bascinet and took his customary strides forward so that his men might see him more clearly. He turned to Halfpenny. ‘Start killing them at the two-hundred-and-fifty-yard marker, Jack. Those that live through that mustn’t get past a hundred and fifty. The downed horses will slow those that follow on. Will and the others will shoot at a hundred yards. After that, kill them any way you can.’
Jack Halfpenny nodded his understanding. The ground beneath their feet trembled. Gaston Phoebus’s and the Count d’Armagnac’s knights had spurred their horses from the canter into the charge.
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
The two armies hurtled into the centre ground. The clash of steel echoed across the open plain, defeating the sound of trumpet and drum. The shock wave rolled into Blackstone’s men, who stood three hundred yards from where the horsemen fought. D’Armagnac’s knights yielded slightly from the impact in the centre of their ranks and Blackstone knew if he had led the charge that yielding ground at the first impact would have been intentional. A soft belly in the armour-clad ranks that absorbed the blow and drew in the enemy. D’Armagnac might win this battle in the first hour if they captured or killed Phoebus. Then Blackstone saw, as some horses turned, that he and his men stood in their way as they tried to outflank the Count.
‘Jack! Shoot now!’
If the archers could kill those who had yielded and enveloped the Count, then de Foix could fight his way through.
Halfpenny’s voice rose up against the roaring passions of the fight. ‘Nock! Draw! Loose!’
The flutter of goose fletchings rippled through the still air. No sooner did the first cloud rise into the air than Halfpenny’s command called out again. A dozen sharp breaths later another three flights curved into the sky and fell into men already screaming in agony, their cries joined by the pitiful whinnying of wounded horses.
‘We’ve stirred the hornet’s nest now, Thomas,’ said Killbere. ‘They’re turning away from the Count towards us.’
Knights yanked reins, raked spurs and fought through the thrashing hooves of the downed horses. Their squires and men-at-arms turned with them; footsoldiers caught in the turmoil followed their master’s pennons.
‘Two hundred!’ Blackstone yelled.
Halfpenny’s bowmen loosed again. And then again. But horsemen and infantry in d’Armagnac’s ranks had peeled away from the main assault and raced towards Blackstone’s thinly held line.
The weight of the charge would trample him and his men underfoot. They needed stopping and Halfpenny’s men were too few. Blackstone turned to face the woodland. If Will Longdon did not realize that Gaston Phoebus’s attack had caused Blackstone to strike early then there too few archers in Halfpenny’s number to slow their attack.
Killbere rolled on the balls of his foot. His eyes locked on the fast-approaching attack. ‘Come on, you bastards, come on,’ he muttered.
Halfpenny’s men were shooting rapidly but a dozen more tireless times of bending into their bows’ heavy pull weight would exhaust the arrows at their feet. Twenty-four times they would nock, draw and loose. Men and horses would die, but their arrows would soon be depleted and all that would remain would be what weapons they carried in their belts. The earth shook. At 150 yards three waves of horsemen, forty men wide, had turned towards Blackstone. Horses’ nostrils bled, their eyes widened in terror, foam flecked their shoulders and flanks, iron bits tore at their mouths as their riders sawed their reins trying to control their headlong, crazed gallop over those already writhing on the ground.
Will Longdon knew well enough when a battle plan had faltered. A dark cloud of arrows soared through the open spaces between trees bereft of leaves. Blackstone heard his centenar’s distant command and turned quickly to Halfpenny. ‘Jack! Save what you have. Shoot low when they are halfway closer. Then get back behind the shield wall.’ Renfred and Meulon brought their men forward so that Blackstone’s first line of defence became an extended line. They would fight forward until they could go further and the men in the shield wall would be at their heels. Ground would be gained, yard by yard, and then held from behind the wall.
Will Longdon’s archers held the knights at bay but the arrows had struck more of those on horseback than the footsoldiers who scrambled through the carnage, running forward desperate to kill those who could slaughter from a distance. Jack Halfpenny’s archers shot into them. Bodies fell one on top of the other, waist high, another bloody barrier for the attackers to overcome. But still they came.
Time faltered. Gasping, tortured minutes followed every ragged breath. Violence surged and broke again and again onto Blackstone’s unyielding ranks. Blackstone’s line held. Their dogged resistance saw them give little ground. Some of the attackers gave up the fight and were swallowed by the turmoil behind them as d’Armagnac’s men fought in confusion. They were being pressed hard in a great half-circle as Phoebus’s men closed behind them, forcing them onto what they thought to be the weak line of archers, but whose men-at-arms were proving to be unbreakable. The fight wore on. An hour passed, and then another. There were moments of respite when those attacking paused, bent over their swords, gasping. Some went down on all fours as exhaustion claimed them, vomiting from effort; others with blood dripping down their faces were too weak to raise their heads and beg for mercy. The line of Englishmen and Gascons seemed tireless. Their killing did no
t falter. As horses barged and panicked and knights lost control of them another wave from de Foix pushed d’Armagnac’s weakening men onto English swords and sudden silent death as arrows ripped into their ranks. By the third hour the weight of men behind them forced them even closer to Blackstone’s men. They were pressured from the fighting at the rear and if they could not turn and fight the enemy behind them, then their only chance was to let their fear and rage drive them forward.
‘Back now!’ Blackstone shouted at the archers and lunged forward to stop d’Armagnac’s troops gaining the advantage as they gathered momentum. If they could be held where the horses writhed and the crushed knights slowed the attackers’ progress then it gave his men a longer chance to survive the onslaught. Killbere, Meulon and Renfred ran at his heels, their men a few paces behind. It separated John Jacob from the others and he fought alone, with some of Blackstone’s men at his side. Small pockets of men fought toe to toe. Blackstone’s men were almost overwhelmed. Unseen enemy knights wheeled their mounts behind the fallen. Gaston Phoebus cut his way through the wall of steel, turning the weight of his men in an attempt to tighten the noose. They fought in an ever-smaller arena, jostling for position, but d’Armagnac’s knights saw that there was no longer any risk from the archers. If they shot high now, their arrows would fall into allies.
Meulon and his men bravely threw themselves ahead of Blackstone and rammed shortened lances into the ground. Terrified horses clambering over the wall of death impaled themselves. Men leapt onto the knights and killed them underfoot. Thrashing hooves killed more than one man in those frantic moments as Blackstone strode into the fray and blocked a strike against Meulon. Killbere was two paces behind, covering him. Renfred harried the enemy, his men quickly forming a defensive arc around Blackstone because now the enemy were breaking through in force. The balance of the fight was turning against Blackstone’s position. A mace swung hard against the side of his head buckled Blackstone’s knees. Killbere lunged and caught the man in the throat as Meulon stopped Blackstone from falling. With a shake of his head Blackstone yanked himself free and single-handedly blocked the gap where men clambered through. He fought with furious strength, unassailable, killing with such violent intent that men did all they could to hurtle past him, only to face determined resistance from Killbere and the men fighting with the captains.