by Dan Davis
“Disappointment?” Jocelyn said, laughing. “Is that what you believe is waiting for me? That I am a moth to a flame? Listen, Marian is a perfectly suitable woman and I am a suitable husband. Or will be as soon as I win myself land. If any man here is a moth, it is you with that woman. Mark my words, she is the archbishop’s, body and soul. She comes from his seed, you fool. She will give you up. Betray you. Betray us. Mark my words.”
“You are wrong,” I said, dreading even the thought of it.
“Calling me a moth,” Jocelyn said, scoffing. “You are the moth.”
Marian was always civil with Eva and with me but there was no doubt we had both offended the young lady by abandoning her to spend the winter with each other. She spoke to me very rarely.
We went into the village for most of the holy days, important saint’s days and feast days. Every time I saw him, Swein chafed to get north. He and Marian both wished vengeance upon the Green Knight and his band of evil men. They drew together, as far as their stations allowed. Swein could make her laugh, which was more than Jocelyn would ever be capable of.
“When can we return to Sherwood?” Swein asked me one cold March day in Cassingham’s hall. The others were with me and we shared the last of the stolen French wine, which was souring into vinegar but was better than no wine at all.
“I have been long thinking on that,” I said. “In order to hire enough men to scour Sherwood, we need money. And in order to overcome my outlawry we need a glorious military victory. And the French can provide both.”
A large part of me wished I could stay in the Crow’s Nest forever, swyving Eva, chopping wood. Getting old. Perhaps my seed would one day grow in her belly and we could live as man and wife. I said nothing of the sort to Eva, fearing scaring her away from me. She never mentioned marriage or a future together so I assumed she was not interested in one. So it was all just a dream. I had been playing all winter, pretending to be a commoner, pretending to be a husband and hoping to be a father. It would never happen.
Instead, duty beckoned. William had to receive the punishment he was owed. The monster had even slain the king. When the blossoms bloomed all over my wood, I knew it was time for me to fly the nest.
In late spring, the French returned to Kent in force. Cassingham gathered his men from all over the Weald.
It was time to fight.
Chapter Ten – The Great Dover Raid
“The French are coming,” I said to the assembled leaders in Cassingham’s adopted hall in early May 1217. One of his men had come charging in that morning. The fellow upon a steaming horse with word from the coast. The news he brought with him had stirred the hornet’s nest that was the Weald.
“They mean to take Dover once more but this time, they shall finish the job,” I said. “Your man’s report is clear. The siege engines are being carried ashore. The first are already being assembled. We must strike now before the fighting men join them.”
Jocelyn rapped his hand upon the table. “Sir Richard is right. The longer we wait to take action, the stronger their position becomes.”
Cassingham and his men were disturbed, exchanging glances.
“We have been taking action,” Cassingham said. “For many months have we been fighting the French while our king fights the barons of the north and the west.”
“Skirmishes and minor ambushes,” Jocelyn scoffed, waving his hand.
Cassingham’s lip curled into a snarl.
I stepped in. “You have performed magnificent deeds,” I said, raising my voice so all in the hall could hear me clearly. “You have harmed the enemy with raids, you have stolen his supplies, you have protected villages. Punished crimes. But now is our chance to destroy him. To truly change the course of the war. If we do this, Prince Louis will be denied Dover Castle, for months at least. We can destroy his engines, kill his engineers.”
“It would delay only,” Cassingham pointed out, “you say it yourself.”
I carried on, unperturbed. “They have unloaded their supplies at Dover. Supplies of food, wine, oil, bolts and swords, engines and horses are being brought ashore as we stand here and speak. If we destroy them, Louis will be without the things he needs to fight the war. He may have thousands of knights and bowmen but what use will they be if he cannot move them, supply them and fight them where they are needed?”
“If we do this,” Cassingham drummed his fingers upon his table. “The Marshal could move to isolate the barons. Without the promise of reinforcement from Prince Louis, he could invest in a siege.”
One of Cassingham’s captains spoke up. “Our men in London say the barons have taken the city of Lincoln.”
“But not the Lincoln Castle,” another said. “That, the rebel barons yet besiege.”
“Precisely,” Jocelyn said. “Many of the barons and their men are gathered in a single place.”
“We must move quickly,” I said, encouraging them to see it all. “We must strike at the French and then the Marshal must destroy the barons before Louis can recover his supplies. Speed is the key to this lock. We must strike now and we must send word to the Marshal right away.”
“Send word that we mean to attack the French camp?” Cassingham asked.
“We must send word that we have destroyed it. The riders must go out immediately. Today, if possible. Tomorrow at dawn if not.”
There was a minor uproar that Cassingham waved down.
“How can we give word of a thing that has not happened?” Cassingham said, aghast.
“But it will have happened,” I said, “by the time that word reaches the Marshal.”
Cassingham did not like it. It seemed immoral to him. As though he would be lying to the Regent.
“It is a moot point. We cannot attack a camp of that size,” Cassingham said. “Even if it is undermanned we would be hugely outnumbered.”
“You are always outnumbered, Cassingham,” I said, grinning. “All of your men, all of last year, all this past winter. It has never stopped you before. This is not so different to when we took Sir Geoffrey last year and led them into the woods.”
“That was a mad chance,” Cassingham said. “We never expected it to work as well as it did. It should not have done. In our favour was the fact we were on the far edge of the camp, we killed barely any of them and led them to where we were strongest. Carefully prepared ambushes, in the woods. It was little more than a gesture. And still they hunted us for weeks, we were always on the run. And even then, Sir Richard, we planned that raid for days. Now you ask us to muster hundreds of men and to mount an attack on a fortified encampment the moment we arrive at it.”
“It is the only way, Cassingham,” I said. “If we delay even a little, there will be hundreds of knights, hundreds of bowmen, thousands of men and our chance will be gone.”
“You wish only to better your own standing in the eyes of the regent,” one of Cassingham’s captains said. “You are accused of having a hand in King John’s death, are you not, my lord? You would risk all our lives for your own ends.”
Jocelyn leapt to his feet. “How dare you?” he cried. “Who said that?”
I stood too, slowly and waved Jocelyn down.
Crossing my arms, I looked around the room, into as many eyes as I could. All were silent. I found my accuser, recognising the captain as one I had fought beside before and saw him shrink under my gaze.
“We should each of us be thankful to God,” I said. “When duty and glory align. I fight for our young King Henry. Which man here says I do not?” I let the silence fall. Eyes flicked about. “We can win glory. William of Cassingham will win fame. Sir Jocelyn, too. You men who are not knights or not of noble birth, you will win whatever riches you can take from the French. And you will win the chance of a great story to tell when you are old and fat, about the time you saved England from a false king and his pillaging armies. You men are the finest archers in all England, or so you like to tell yourselves. You decided to fight with William of Cassingham when your lords ra
n and hid in the king’s castles. One day soon, this war will be over. What will other men say of the Wealden Archers? Will they tell of a band of big-mouthed oafs who sat through the war with their arrows shoved up their arses? Or will they sing songs of the common men who threw down a French prince and pissed in his face? Come with me, or stay here. The choice is yours. If you stay then I will simply have to keep all the spoils for myself.”
We rode for Dover at dawn.
***
Cassingham knew that I was right. Once we were committed to making the attack, we had to carry it out and get away before the French arrived in force.
All the first day while we rode through the Weald with over a hundred archers, I allowed Cassingham to take charge and admired how he harried his men, harangued them for their slothfulness, inspired them, bawled them out, praised them and kicked their backsides into a frenzy.
They knew him. They loved him. Me, they still did not know and few of them liked or trusted me. I was a knight, from far to the north. Some of the Wealden archers had fought in Gascony, Normandy, Ireland, Wales and the Holy Land but most had never left Kent. Amongst those men, outsiders were mistrusted. And I was an outsider amongst outsiders.
It was safe to say that the men under my temporary command obeyed me with some reluctance.
Watching them that day I noted that Swein was welcomed and accepted, despite his Yorkshire accent and youth. He was a brilliant bowman, through and through and when he talked, men listened. He had matured over the winter. His clothes were better than they had ever been and he had taken or purchased a gambeson and a decent helm with a huge nosepiece. Still, he wore a hood over the top of it but, at least, he had found a new, green one.
The second day we met with other groups in the woods outside Dover. We were almost two hundred and fifty of Cassingham’s men waiting in the darkness before the dawn a few miles from the edges of the French camp.
Cassingham and his captains, who it seemed now, included Swein who was supposed to be my squire, checked their men’s equipment and kept up their spirits in the dark.
“Hope it don’t rain,” Swein said to me, looking up at the grey clouds rolling in from the sea on the dark sky.
Wet bow cords lose their potency. But I doubted Cassingham’s huge band of archers would be shooting many arrows that day. We wanted the rains to stay away so that we could burn the French camp.
There was no way to hack that many siege engines to pieces. So we carried oil and most men carried bundles of kindling. With any luck, we could get in amongst the siege works and make such a blaze that they could not put it out before their vital equipment was destroyed beyond repair.
But only if the rains stayed away.
“I might even pray for it,” I said to Swein and he grinned.
“Do not mock prayer,” Cassingham’s priest said, overhearing. “Not this day, Sir Richard. God will not be mocked.”
“I never mock God,” I said. “Only men who believe that He cares about their whining.”
The priest cursed me under his breath as Swein laughed.
“This is why you never have any friends, Richard,” Jocelyn said. “Most men do not take such things lightly.”
“But my man Swein here takes God as lightly as I do,” I pointed out, “and he has made plenty of Wealden friends.”
“Swein is a commoner among commoners,” Jocelyn said, grinning. “And he can make conversation on subjects other than war, which is more than you will ever achieve.”
Swein had the good grace to laugh. I did not.
“You are in fine fettle this morning,” I said.
“We will win a victory,” Jocelyn said. “And perhaps even take a knight or two as my prisoner. And this time, I shall ransom him and finally put some marks into my purse. I shall be on my way.” He looked back along the dark road toward the village of Cassingham as if he could see Marian from all those miles away.
Eva had wanted to come with me before we left.
“I know that you wish to test yourself against real foes,” I had said. “And know that all your training has made you a fine man-at-arms. But you should stay with the Lady Marian. There will be few enough wounded men left behind to protect her, should the French raid here while we are away.”
“Do not condescend me,” Eva had shot back. “I know I am a fine man-at-arms. I want to kill Frenchmen.”
“And that is why you are needed here.”
Even though I knew she was stronger than most men, certainly better with sword and shield than any of the Wealden archers, still I treated her as though she was a weak and feeble woman. In time, the poor woman would pay for my condescension of her.
But Eva had stayed with the Lady Marian. Already I missed her long, hard limbs and her hot skin against mine. I would much rather have been naked and abed with her than lurking in the dark woods dressed for war.
Cassingham called his men to him.
“Some of us have been here before,” Cassingham said to them. “This one, though, will be the biggest raid any of us has ever been on. You all know what you must do so I will not repeat it. I merely remind you that if we succeed in our task this morning we may save the garrison in Dover Castle. And if we save them, we may save all England. Our battle cry will be King Henry.”
Their murmuring grew towards a shout and Cassingham growled at them to shut their idiot mouths until we attacked.
They knelt for prayer and for once, I joined them. While the priests wittered away, I asked God to make my enemies stupid, weak and fearful that morning. Please, Lord, I said, let the French have drunk themselves insensible last night on their fresh wine. God likes it best when you ask him for very little.
Cassingham and I divided our forces into three groups and agreed on the signal for starting the attack and the signal for withdrawing.
I would attack the centre of the camp. Cassingham would lead his men around the left flank and come in from the north. The third group was on my right hand, attacking the southern side of the camp. That group would attempt to hold that entire side of the camp and also to watch the town for any counter attack from French forces garrisoned there.
My group would drive into the centre of the French, straight for the largest of the siege engines.
I had eighty men under my command. They were nervous, excited, grim. They tested their bows, checked their swords, daggers and other weapons. I did not give them a speech. They knew their jobs.
We led our horses toward our group’s mustering place outside the French camp, under cover of the thin trees, already much cleared from the year before. The French camp was unseen over a rise but I could see the battlements of Dover Castle’s highest towers, dark against a lightening sky. A light mist drifted through the deep green, grey of the morning, settling dampness over the shimmering nettles, goosegrass, grasses, sedges and ferns. Ferns were everywhere.
I drew next to Jocelyn. “If this succeeds then we will have to ride north. We will have to bring the news to the Marshal.”
“What about the messengers you made Cassingham send?” Jocelyn asked.
“They were vital but they will not be believed.”
“And you will?” Jocelyn shot back. “You are outlawed.”
“They will believe you,” I said. “You are known to be a true knight.”
Jocelyn scoffed. “A true knight? No man of import knows me as anything.”
I did not argue. “Anselm will tell them, won’t you, son,” I said over my shoulder.
“Yes, my lord.”
“So you better not get yourself killed this morning, you hear me, Anselm? I do not give you permission to die. Stay behind Jocelyn or you and Swein will guard the horses.”
“Yes, lord.”
“You too, Swein. I know these men are your friends, now but I want you with me when I go into Sherwood.”
“Don’t worry about me, Sir Richard,” Swein said. I could hear the grin on his face. “This ain’t my fight.”
“Quite right.�
�
We gathered just as the light was growing and waited for Cassingham’s signal to attack. The other groups all had to get in position so that we could all attack at once.
The trees about us were young, well coppiced and much of the brush had been cleared. Along the floor was the last throws of the intense mauve-blue haze of bluebells in the wood. There had been an extravagant profusion in my oak wood because the deer grazed the undergrowth, the boars chewed and stamped down bushes and saplings leaving the ground layer clear for the strange plants to flourish. Outside Dover that morning, the pink campions and goosegrass spread along the ground, ringed by a wide layer of bright green nettles in the deep shade at the edges beneath the trees.
The woods were full of birds singing in the dawn. Rooks and crows gathered above our heads, scaring the pigeons and blackbirds into flight. We waited for the signal to attack.
“How do they know?” Swein asked me, pointing to the carrion birds. “That they will feast soon, I mean.”
Before I could answer, a Kentish priest growled his own opinion. “Because they are evil.”
“They are wise,” I said, ignoring the holy idiot’s huffing. “They have seen from their own experience that when men gather like this, blood is spilled.”
Swein nodded, accepting this truth.
“They are beasts,” the priest said. “They cannot be wise. It is blasphemous to think otherwise.”
Jocelyn glared at me. He was right. It was no time for an argument with a priest, no matter how much I enjoyed them. I held my tongue and wondered if I would get a chance to drink some blood of my own, along with the crows.
We waited for the signal.
On the horizon, beyond the camp, the familiar silhouette of the great castle resolved out of the darkness. Upon its huge mound, the castle looked down upon the landing area for the ships below the famous cliffs. Southwest, to my right, was the town, on much lower ground and overrun by French.
The messengers had told us how the beach below the town was covered with fat cargo ships pulled higher than the tideline up the sand and shingle. Many of the ships had already been unloaded. I half dreamed that we could go down there and burn them too but I knew we had to be realistic. We were but two hundred and fifty men against perhaps two thousand between the siege camp and the town.