by Dan Davis
The path ran down along the crumbling, chalk cliff face switching back halfway down. The cliff was angled enough to grow bushes and great clumps of sedge. It was narrow but we could make two abreast for most of it and we ran down as fast as we could.
Seagulls swooped about us, crying and squawking. It was nesting season and the gusting clouds of black smoke above had wound them into an even greater frenzy than gulls normally felt. Beyond there were more wheeling birds in mixed flocks of sanderlings and dunlin.
One of the men paused to take aim at one of the birds, being cheered on by a comrade at his elbow. I kicked the archer up the arse, cursing them for their delay and both of them picked up their feet and scarpered down the slope.
The sailors and guards had seen us streaming toward them and were already leaping from their vessels and trudging away down the sand, leaving the vessels unprotected.
I pulled off my helmet so my voice would be heard above the surf and wind. “Five men to each ship. Each group needs kindling, fire and oil if there’s enough.” I shouted to Swein and Jocelyn, who began organising and directing the men as they came down off the slope. “And kill any bastard who tries to stop us.”
I did not dare to hope that we would burn all the ships before we left. Likely, we would only get a couple going with a blaze so big that it could not be put out. As our men split up to take the ships, I trudged toward the nearest one, keeping a look out up behind us.
On the top of the cliff below the walled town, men were massing. Heads and shoulders looking down at us. Whether they were French or surviving English townsfolk, it was hard to say. They made no move to interfere, they simply watched. Many heads swivelled away from us to down the coast. From so low on the shore, with the enormous ships blocking my view, I had no sight of the fleet of Louis” ships. But I knew they must be close.
“We have to be quick, Swein,” I shouted as I came into the shadow of the nearest ship. The hull was covered with tiny shells and green stuff, although much had been scraped off and was lying about in the sand. The hulls of the older of the beached ships were chewed and gnawed at by gribbles and shipworm.
The sailors had set up little campfires. There were ropes strung everywhere, hanging laundry and supporting sailcloth shelters. There was the usual camp detritus underfoot, discarded smashed pots and animal bones amongst the driftwood. No sailor used driftwood for fires unless he was desperate. The flames of a driftwood fire burn green and blue, haunted by the spirits of the drowned.
The men had been lazing about for a couple of days, no doubt getting their fill of the supplies before their master Prince Louis of France showed up. I would be willing to bet the ship masters had been busy selling some choice stuff to the townsfolk, too.
Swein leaned over the side of the nearest ship and cupped his hands to his mouth.
“There’s oil here,” he shouted to the men. “Pass the word, this ship is full of oil. Come and get it. Pass the word.”
Jocelyn, his helm under his arm, shook his head. “You are the luckiest sod who ever lived.”
“I have been called many things in my time,” I said. “But lucky is not one of them.”
“Not in life,” he replied. “Clearly, Richard, you are not lucky in life. Merely in battle.”
“Is that what this is?” I said. “A battle? Come on, you lazy oaf, let us make a bonfire big enough for Louis to find us. Use some of this driftwood.”
We slung casks of oil between Swein’s ship to the farthest ship in either direction.
“This is taking too long,” I muttered, as the fires started to catch inside the ships.
Oil is all very well but much of it will not burn until it is heated. There were hundreds of small casks of almond, poppy and olive oil that the men were pouring all over the decks. There were stinking ones full of rendered animal fat that they smashed and dumped into the flames. But our fires would have to burn big and hot before they caught.
“Come on, hurry, lads,” I shouted up at them. “Pile the fires high and let us go.”
“Sir Richard,” men were calling me from up above the ships near to me and pointing frantically up at the cliffs behind me.
Our men were up there, waving and pointing and calling. Black smoke billowed above them. They were jabbing their fingers out to sea and jumping up and down.
“Time to go,” I roared. “Swein, get them out of here. We fall back now. Leave the fires unburnt, come on, to me, to me.”
I walked backwards, waving the men off the ships.
Swein shouted the orders and the word was passed down. They did not have to be told twice. They leapt from the smouldering ships and ran back to the cliff. We counted them all back in and Swein and I were the last to trot up the steep cliff path. The gulls squawked and dived at us.
At the top, I saw how close the French fleet was. They bobbed so near, their sales half full and men packed the decks and were shoulder to shoulder at the rails, staring at us while the spray frothed under the keels.
My men were tired and covered in soot and oil.
Looking down from the cliff, the beached supply ships had small fires glowing in the holds, the smoke from them blown flat by the offshore wind.
“God damn those French ships,” I said. “Everyone, we fall back.”
Hubert de Burgh rode up, scattering my men as they fled back toward the French camp. “Sir Richard, the French grow lively. They are emboldened by the arrival of their comrades. We cannot hold them and I will take my men inside the castle once more. On behalf of everyone, I humbly thank you for your efforts today. You have set Louis back by months, I pray.”
“The leader of these men was William of Cassingham,” I said. “A squire of the Weald. He brought these men together, he leads them. Remember him, my lord, when the war is done.”
“Truly? William of Cassingham, you say? Then I will certainly remember him,” de Burgh said, “and you also.”
His men were urging the Constable to flee when a crossbow bolt thudded into the flank of one of their horses. The knight wrestled the horse from panic and rode away for the castle.
Hubert de Burgh’s squire rode up and held out the Constable’s helmet. More bolts clattered in. They were being shot from long range, down by the town walls. There was a gusty wind and there was little hope for accuracy but the French had found their courage and it was truly time to flee.
“God be with you,” the Constable of Dover Castle shouted through his helm and he and his men rode off.
Anselm and his lads were rushing to us with our horses.
“Thank God,” Jocelyn said as they approached. “Come on, Richard, we’re the last men here.”
“It is a shame about those ships,” I said. We were so close to wiping out tons of vital supplies. I had a mad urge to run down there and stoke the fires.
Jocelyn clapped me on the shoulder and shoved his helm back onto his head. He fumbled with the chinstrap. “It was a good effort. The whole camp is burning, or near enough. This was a successful raid. Now, let us go.”
“I suppose so,” I said.
We mounted and turned, ready to weave our way through fire and crossbow shot, back to our men.
There was a roar, like a great rushing wind and I turned back in time to see the closest ship, the oil-laden ship, go up in a white-hot burst of fire, like a dragon had incinerated it. The flame grew and grew and it seemed as though the very air burned, shimmering and wild. I felt the heat of it through my armour and doublet and clothing from hundreds of yards away.
As if by some signal, the other ships also ignited, one after the other, with great rushes of light and heat and in moments, every ship upon the shore was engulfed in a terrible inferno.
I had never seen anything like it.
“Like looking into the unquenchable fires of Hell,” I said, hearing the rising passion in my voice as I spoke.
“Come on, Richard, you mad fool,” Jocelyn shouted. “Or we shall see the real thing for ourselves.”
We rode out through
the smoke, with bolts clattering about us and Cassingham’s archers sending their own arrows back toward those who were coming out to see us off.
As our full force gathered on the road back to the Weald, we found the French garrison suddenly losing heart. The men slung their crossbows over their shoulders and slumped back to Dover.
“What has plucked their goose, so?” I asked.
Cassingham himself told us when we met up with him under the cover of the woodland. By then, the sun was low in the sky. The day had almost gone without me really noticing the time passing. Such is the way in battle.
Cassingham was grinning, clapping every man on the back as he came to us. His priest was praising God, for we had won a great victory and, though we had many wounded, we had not lost a single man.
“Are we pursued?” I asked, for my fear was that our exhausted men, without mounts, would be overtaken and slain.
“It seems not,” Cassingham said, hands on his hips.
“Why not? What about the reinforcements?” I said. “They were practically on top of us. I could smell them over the smoke.”
“The French ships abandoned their landing,” Cassingham said, laughing. “Our brave king Louis must have thought twice about landing amongst that inferno.”
“Praise God,” I said, mad with the flush of victory. “Now is the time. Jocelyn, Anselm, Swein. We must take the women and ride north. With this victory, the Marshal as Regent will surely grant me a pardon. Then we will take Sherwood and destroy William de Ferrers and his band of blood drinking bastards.”
It seemed so simple.
Chapter Eleven – The Battle of Lincoln
“We will not be safe here,” Eva said, crossing her arms in the doorway of the small hospital, the small dormitory where travellers could stay when visiting or passing by the priory.
Eva and Marian would stay there, at the Priory of Tutbury, near to Ashbury. After riding north from the Weald, I had nowhere else nearby that I could take them. Nowhere that I could trust. Nowhere that was not under the influence of one great lord or other.
Thankfully, Emma had elected to remain safe in the Weald. She told me she had decided to stay. There was no discussion. She did not seek my permission nor approval. Cassingham had sworn holy oaths upon a local relic that he would defend the lady’s life and her honour.
“You expect me to trust your words because you grasp a box with some old saint’s rotten knuckle bones inside?” I had said to Cassingham in his parish church before I rushed north.
“Blasphemer,” Cassingham’s priest had hissed at me, his words echoing from the plastered walls. “You should fall to your knees and beg forgiveness from the holy bones of Saint Bertha.”
“You can shove Bertha’s bones up your holy arse,” I said. “Now leave my presence immediately or I shall drink your blood.”
When Cassingham gave him no support, he backed away and then fled, condemning me and my offspring to terrible punishments.
“You are not welcome in the houses of God,” he shouted from the doorway. “The Lord shall cast you down onto your belly and you shall be smited by His mighty hand.”
I laughed loudly and the priest slammed the door behind him.
“The men love how you fight,” Cassingham said, unimpressed with me. “But many people here will be glad to see you return to the north.”
“Take care of Emma,” I said, grasping his shoulders and looking hard into his eyes.
“I swear I shall,” he said. I believed him.
Marian and Eva, on the other hand, would not stay in Kent. But I could not risk taking them into the arms of my enemies. Before riding directly to the Marshal’s gathered forces I had to hide the women somewhere safe for a few days. If I was arrested or killed, they could be seized too. Once I was sure of their safety, I would collect them from the priory.
Strictly speaking, Tutbury Priory was on land granted by my family yet it was Hugh de Nonant who held ultimate authority. But he had not visited the place nor shown any interest in twenty years. It was a small house but it had always been attached to the lords of Ashbury.
“No one will know you are here but the monks,” I said, confident that she was concerned over nothing. “You will be safe in this hospital. The monks will keep an eye out for you.”
“It is them that we will not be safe from,” she said, throwing her chin out.
“I have seen you fight,” I said and reached up to stroke her face. She slapped it away.
“You are making a mistake,” she said, crossing her arms.
“My family has kept this Priory since it was founded,” I said, gently. “The new prior has been here since he was a boy. They are not dangerous.”
“Not to you, perhaps,” she said. “You are a man. A lord.”
“They are men of God.”
“They are men. And I cannot stay awake all night every night.”
I sighed, desperate to be away. “It is only for a few days.”
“You are a fool,” she said, unwilling to part on good terms and she would not kiss me.
Jocelyn fared little better with Marian, who was angry at being left behind. She wanted to come to Lincolnshire with us and I spoke to her too before we left.
“I must have the Regent’s pardon before I can return to the world,” I said to Marian at the gates of the priory while Jocelyn waited, already mounted, out on the road. “If I remain an outlaw I could be killed on sight. Once I get the Marshal to agree, I will return for you both and we will take the fight to William, I swear it. But none of that can happen unless it is I that tells the Marshal to his face that I have won a great victory for the king. Jocelyn and me both, that is.”
“You come back quickly,” Marian said, pointing her finger up at my face. “And you bring Jocelyn back to me. And Swein.”
“Good Lord, girl,” I said. “I promise nothing.”
Though I was in a great hurry to be off, I pulled young Prior Simon to the far side of the gate and extracted oaths sworn upon Christ’s bones in Heaven that he would keep the women safe and well cared for. Just words to me but binding for him, I believed. To make sure and secure an earthly loyalty, I made a small donation with what little coin remained to me and promised more upon my return. It was in his financial interest to keep them well and monks loved nothing more than money. Foolishly, at the time, I did not follow that thought through to its inevitable conclusion.
“What is happening at Ashbury?” I asked the prior in his house. “I hear there is no new lord yet.”
“A steward arrived,” Prior Simon said, not meeting my eye. “Sent by the archbishop. A hard man but a lively one. Full of jests but not kind, I fear. John is his name. Tall as an oak, he is. He brought a couple of servants with him. Rough types but they have not caused any trouble and I pray that they will look after your manor until you can make your proper return to us.”
“What about Cuthbert?” I asked.
“Ah, your old steward has gone to live with his daughter’s family in the village.”
“That God damned bastard bishop,” I said.
The Prior looked up at me while attempting to look down his nose at the same time. I wanted to smash that nose and suck out the blood but I need him to keep Eva safe so I swallowed my pride instead.
“I apologise, Prior Simon, I spoke without considering first,” I said, with as much contrition as I could muster.
The Prior, who I had known since he was a boy and given money to keep him and brothers in their house for decades, grudgingly forgave me.
Then he betrayed me.
***
It was two more days of hard riding from Derbyshire to Lincolnshire, something like sixty miles. The roads grew ever busier with scouting and foraging groups and levied men coming to muster with their lords.
The Marshal’s royalist forces were pouring into a camp around the village of Stowe in Lincolnshire. The village was barely ten miles north from the great city of Lincoln, where the rebel baron’s had concentrated
their forces.
When I reached the camp, the men-at-arms guarding the road by the camp forced me to surrender my arms in the name of William Marshal, the Earl of Pembroke and Regent of England. I told them that I had a vital message that the Regent must hear.
“Are you alone?” the chief knight among them asked. It was strange to them that a noble knight would have no retinue.
“I am,” I said, not telling them that my men waited in a woodland a few miles away.
They took me at once, through the great mass of men and horse, all the way into the Marshal’s presence. His quarters were in the tumbledown hall outside the village. The roof was sagging and the place reeked of damp, despite the warmth outside. A fire smoked away in the centre of the hall, which was crowded with lords, priests and attendants and the immense noise was like a pot filled with angry bees. The Marshal’s men escorted me through that chaos and into the presence of the great man himself, who turned from his conversation at the top table to peer at me as I was introduced.
I recognised many of the men around him. There was his son, also called William Marshal, who had helped Anselm to free me from Newark Castle, smiling yet raising his eyebrows in silent remonstration. Also, there sat young Geoffrey of Monmouth, smirking at me as if he knew what was in store for me. He was an odious little shit but the size of his lands guaranteed him a seat at the table. I recognised William Longspear, the illegitimate son of the old King Henry and brother of Richard the Lionheart and King John. Longspear was as tall as me and a great knight and leader, though he had commanded over the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Bouvines a few years before. Ranulf of Chester sat beside him, the great lord and slayer of Welshmen. There were also a dozen or more bishops and priests in all their finery, scowling at the mention of my name. Those holy men I did not recognise.
Those great lords and priests looked at me with surprise and waited for the Regent to make his response.
“You do not much understand subtlety, do you, Sir Richard,” the Marshal said as looked up at me. “Do you understand that I must have you arrested now?”