‘We can’t get up that!’ he whispered to Martin.
The poacher tapped the side of his nose, then put his finger to his lips to indicate silence before waving to William and Herluin to follow him for another half-dozen paces. He pointed at the rock, stepped towards it with his two comrades . . .
. . . and disappeared.
William gasped. His night vision was excellent, but he simply could not see where the three men had gone. And then, without any sound or warning, Martin was back, gesturing at William and Herluin to follow him into the blackness. William flinched, expecting at any moment to hit solid rock, but he found that he could take two steps into the rock face before he ran into Martin, who had come to a stop just ahead of him.
‘Can you see anything?’ Martin whispered, so softly that William could barely hear him.
He looked around. Slowly his eyes adjusted to the even greater darkness, and he began to see that they were standing within a deep fissure that ran up through the rock. They had walked in through an opening no wider than a door, and he could reach out and touch the walls on either side. He heard Herluin mutter, ‘Mother of God’ beneath his breath just behind him, and he could well understand his stepfather’s alarm, for the crack was narrower than the most cramped castle staircase, and the rock bore down oppressively without even a torch to lift the darkness.
‘Where are the others?’ William asked Martin.
‘Already gone up. It’s easy. No different to climbing a cliff for gull’s eggs. Just follow me.’
Martin turned to the rock and began making his way up. William saw how he used his legs to brace himself either side of the crack, while his hands searched for tiny outcrops or horizontal fissures that would give his fingers something to cling to as he pulled himself up. The poacher seemed to have a steady rhythm and pattern to his movements, and the speed and apparent ease with which he moved persuaded William that it really shouldn’t be that difficult.
He reached up, grabbed the first handhold he had seen Martin use, placed his left boot against the side wall, pulled up with his hands and scrabbled for purchase with his right foot. He and his companions had come out without helmets, shields or chain mail, to save weight and cut down noise, but even that wasn’t enough to help him now. His fingers ached as the full weight of his body dragged against them, and his right foot swung and kicked against the rock but could find no resting place. His protesting hands gave up the unequal struggle and lost their grip, and he fell back down to the ground, bumping and bruising his forearms, shins and chest bone against the rock as he went, and cursing as he ended up in a crumpled heap on the ground.
He felt Herluin’s hand grip his upper arm, helping him to his feet, and then heard his voice say, ‘Go ahead without me. I’ll only slow you down. Besides, there’s another job I can do for you. One that will serve you better.’
With that, he was gone. William hissed, ‘Come back!’ but it did no good. He could not believe it. All his life Herluin had been held up to him as the epitome of a loyal, brave friend. His father had told him endless stories about their adventures together, and everything he had seen on his visits to Conteville had only served to reinforce that glowing image. How could he run away now, of all times?
‘Hurry up, Yer Grace. Cloud’s thinning.’
The sound of Martin’s voice brought William back to the here and now. He looked up at the tiny sliver of sky visible at the top of the crack. Sure enough, it looked paler, and now there were very faint patches of light and blue-black shadow picking out the features on the rock around him. That would make it easier for him to climb, but also for the sentries to see movement beneath them. For if the rocks could cast shadows, so would people, and theirs would move, catching any watching eyes as they went.
William threw himself at the rock again. This time he tried to copy the scuttling rhythm of hand and foot movements that he had seen Martin employ, and although his was a very clumsy version of the poacher’s technique, his feet still scrabbling for grip and his fingers rubbed raw by the rock, still he managed to make his way up until another hand grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and virtually pulled him the final few feet up to the narrow grassy ledge, just below the top of the precipice, along which the track ran, where Martin and his two companions were crouched waiting for him.
‘Where’s Lord Herluin?’ Martin asked.
‘Gone back,’ William replied.
The poacher nodded as if the news did not surprise him. By now, William too had come to understand why his stepfather might have thought himself more of a hindrance than a help. But then another thought struck him. Herluin was the only one of them who knew his way around the castle. What were they going to do without him?
He felt a tap on his shoulder. Martin was pointing upwards. The glowing silver moon was just showing its face beyond the veil of cloud. The poacher tapped him again, this time to show him that he had a small rock in his hand. He indicated that he was about to throw the rock in one direction. Then he pointed at William and gestured in the opposite direction.
William nodded.
Martin drew back his arm and threw the rock down the path. In the silence of the night, the sound of it clattering along the stony earth seemed like a company of horsemen riding up to the castle.
Even before the noise had died away, William had pulled himself over the top of the precipice on to the track and sprung to his feet. Above him he could hear two men’s voices shouting.
‘Did you hear that?’
‘Where’d it come from?’
‘Over there!’
William raced along the track, almost running on tiptoe as he tried not to make the slightest sound.
‘Nah! Can’t see nothing. Must’ve been an animal,’ said one of the voices as William reached the gate, which was really more of a door inset into a stone arch, and squeezed himself right up against it. Now he faced a new problem. How did he knock on the wooden door loudly enough to be heard by his grandmother, even assuming that she was there, but not so loudly that the sentries would hear? He tried once, barely touching the wood at all, but nothing happened. Then he had a second go, a little more firmly this time.
Still nothing happened.
William stood there, his heart thumping so loudly he feared that that alone would be enough to give him away. He took a deep breath, raised his fist and was about to risk everything with a proper, loud knock when he saw the door move a fraction, very slowly, and then a bit more, until he could just see the very vague outline of a human head poking out from behind it, and a nervous high-pitched voice whispered, ‘William?’
‘Yes, it’s me,’ William replied as the door opened and he darted through it to be greeted by his grandmother’s relieved embrace.
‘I’m so glad to see you,’ she said. ‘I’ve been waiting here for ages, thought you’d never come.’ She paused and stepped back from his arms. ‘Are you by yourself?’
William realised he hadn’t heard the other three follow him up from the ledge. He felt a momentary start of panic, and then, without the slightest advance sign of their coming, there they were, slipping through the gate as noiselessly as wraiths.
‘This is all of us,’ he said. ‘Now, Granny, it’s time we went to the gatehouse. Herluin told me the way.’
‘Well, it’s changed a bit since your father’s day. But just follow me and I’ll get you there in no time.’
‘Why aren’t the men ready? The castle gates will be open soon!’ Herluin glared in furious desperation at the men languidly draped around Ralph de Gacé’s tent – a far larger, more well-appointed one than that allocated to the Duke of Normandy.
‘Oh for heaven’s sake, Conteville, do stop this nonsense,’ said de Gacé. ‘Sit down, relax, have some wine. There was some excellent roast beef around earlier. I’m sure one of the squires will get you some if you ask them.’
‘I couldn’t give a damn about wine or beef! William of Normandy – your duke, whose vassal you are – is almost certainly inside the castle by now. He will find a way to open the main gates, and when he does, he’ll be expecting his men to come charging through them.’
De Gacé gave a noisy, irritated sigh. ‘Look, I’ve had about enough of this nonsense. That little bastard is sixteen years old. He’s never so much as seen a battlefield, and now he thinks he can single-handedly break the siege of a castle held by one of the duchy’s greatest warriors. It’s absurd!’
‘Just how legitimate are you, de Gacé?’ Herluin asked, his voice tight with the effort of controlling his temper. ‘And how long is the honour roll of your victories? You know, I’m beginning to wonder whether you actually want William to succeed. It might show you up if he did. Much handier if he should die tragically, taking a foolish risk, nothing you could do about it . . .’
‘Are you insinuating that I would betray the duke?’
‘I’m not insinuating anything. You are the one who is refusing to go to his aid. Others can draw their own conclusions. I have better things to do.’
With that, Herluin turned on his heel and stalked out of the tent. He had just made an enemy of the man commanding the troops on whom William’s survival relied. Now it was up to him to do the job, or tell Herleva that her firstborn was dead and he had done nothing to save him.
Well, he had the remaining men from Conteville. They at least would follow him. After that, God alone knew, and He would decide what all their fates would be.
Doda led William and his three companions along a circuitous route that took them through the storerooms at the foot of the keep and round the back of the stables. The castle lay as still and noiseless as if it were deserted, with only the snorting of a wakeful horse to break the silence. Finally, as they stood in the shadow cast by the barn where the animals’ feed was stored, there was no more cover, just thirty paces of open ground between them and the back of the gate, which stood within an arch flanked by stone towers.
‘How do we get across that?’ William whispered to Martin.
The poacher grinned. ‘Wait, pray . . . and run like hell.’ He looked up at the sky. Another bank of clouds was scudding across the heavens towards the moon. In a matter of minutes its light would be extinguished. William was thankful for the oncoming darkness, but it would still not be enough to save them if any of the eyes up on the battlements, currently looking out towards the enemy, should glance inwards at the castle itself. And yet they were so close now that as he watched the clouds approaching the moon, skirting around it like a suitor sidling up to a beautiful girl, he found himself gripped by a feeling he’d never known before. He was apprehensive, he had to admit it, about all the things that might go wrong, and even a little afraid of what might happen to him – he was suddenly very aware that this was not a game, not a training session, and that his life itself was at stake. But that fear was far outweighed by anticipation and even excitement about what was soon to happen. This was his chance to make his name in the way that counted above all others: victory in battle. Right now, as he stood in the shadows waiting for his moment, he was still the boy duke, the bastard duke, the ruler of a duchy in name alone. But if he took this castle, everything would be different. He was sure of it.
The clouds swathed the moon and hid it away. Darkness fell. It was time.
‘Go!’ hissed Martin, and they started running, darting across the muddy yard. William felt even more exposed than he had done dashing along the track to the postern gate. His back seemed to itch, as if expecting at any second the piercing agony of an arrow or crossbow bolt between the shoulders, though it would be a rare archer indeed who could hit a moving target at the dead of night.
And then they were there, breathless but alive in the lee of the gateway, and Martin was pointing his men to the far end of the heavy oak beam that sat between two iron brackets and kept the gate closed.
William looked around. There was an open arch at the foot of one of the towers, with a stair beyond it that led up to the battlements. He waited for a moment, half expecting someone to emerge from the arch and ask them what they were doing. But no one came, so he stood beside Martin and grabbed their end of the beam, lifting it up and back over the top of the brackets, and then, very gently, noiselessly, down to the ground.
The gates, loosened from the beam’s grip, creaked on their hinges as they swung ajar. Now the four men pulled them wider until the gateway was a void through which William could see the night sky. The moon had come out again. Stars dusted the heavens. Any second now, a cheer would go up from the Norman lines, and de Gacé would lead the charge up the path and into the castle.
But there was no cheer. There was nothing but silence. And then shouts from above them.
‘The gates! They’re open!’
‘What the hell?’
‘Look, down there . . . See? Open!’
‘Well go and bloody close the fuckers then!’
There were sounds of running footsteps now, orders being given to fighting men, soldiers racing to the gates. But they came from the battlements.
Where William had expected to see a column of his men, bearing the golden leopards on their shields, charging to join him, there was nothing.
He ran through the gates on to the path beyond and shouted out into the night.
‘Men of Normandy! This is William, your duke! The gates are open and the castle is ours!’
It was meant to be a warrior’s battle cry. But it sounded more like the high-pitched screeching of a child.
And still nobody came.
15
Herluin had gone to rouse his own men and those that Baldwin had provided, but the ones who had ridden from Bruges were tired from long days in the saddle, and those who had walked were footsore. And while they had heard hours ago that Duke William had promised to take the castle, and even borrowed three of their number to help him do it, they didn’t quite believe – any more than de Gacé, or any other man in the camp – that the boy really meant it. They thought he was playing at soldiers, and had gone to sleep without giving the matter any serious thought at all.
But now their lord was pulling the blankets off their sleeping bodies, kicking them as they lay on the ground and shouting at them to get up. And though they loved Herluin as a good and just master, and were normally willing to obey him, still his words didn’t really register with them as he shouted, ‘Get up! Now! Your duke needs you! His life is in danger unless you get up now!’
The sound of Herluin’s voice carried to the men clustered around the nearest campfire, and to one set of ears at least it brought back memories from many years earlier. One fifteen-year veteran of the Norman militia, a towering mass of muscle, rose to his feet, rubbed the sleep from his eyes and walked across to where Herluin was desperately trying to get his men to put on their padded leather jerkins and chain-mail coats, stick helmets on their heads, pick up their swords, bows and shields and follow him up to the castle.
‘My lord,’ the man said, ‘can I help?’
Herluin turned and looked up at the giant standing before him.
‘I’m John,’ the man said. ‘The blacksmith’s son. From the siege.’
Herluin looked at him, frowned, recalled a boy of twelve or thirteen who’d spent his time atop the highest tower of Falaise Castle, for he’d had the sharpest young eyes of any of them. Now here was this titan who was, no doubt about it, built just like a blacksmith. And then a look crossed the titan’s face, an expression of well-meaning, almost innocent eagerness to please, and Herluin at once saw the face of the boy in the man he’d become.
‘By God, so you are,’ he said. ‘And yes, you can help. William of Normandy is in the castle. He is planning to open the gates. And he needs us to be there when he does.’
John h
ad known William’s father, Duke Robert. He’d been little more than a lad himself when he took the castle and held it against his own brother. But he’d been a fine leader, always putting himself where the fighting was thickest, never asking anyone to do anything he would not. If Duke Robert’s lad was in danger, then John knew where his duty lay.
‘Count on me, my lord,’ he said, and moments later, his voice was added to the growing clamour as he bellowed, ‘Right, you lot, up! Boots on, helmets on! Shields! Swords! Now!’
Herluin thought of running to get his horse, but it would need to be found amidst a hundred other men’s mounts, untethered and saddled, and by the time he’d done that, the battle would be lost. So he just shouted, ‘To me, men of Conteville! For William, Normandy . . . and glory!’
Then he ran towards the castle, hardly daring to look behind him for fear that nobody was following.
‘Run!’ said Martin. ‘Run for the lines and we will hold them at bay.’
‘No,’ said William, knowing that the poacher was offering to sacrifice his life for him. ‘I will stay here and fight.’
‘But Your Grace—’
‘Thank you, Martin,’ William said, quite calmly, though the sound of footsteps racing down from the tower was growing ever louder. ‘I understand. But I’d rather fight and die like a man than run like a little boy.’
Martin grinned and slapped him on the shoulder. ‘Well said.’ Then he drew a long, wicked-looking dagger from his belt and took up position to one side of the arch that led to the stairs.
The first of the castle defenders appeared. He looked aghast for a second as he saw three armed men in a semicircle opposite him, then Martin stepped out from his hiding place, clamped a hand across the defender’s face, pulled his head back and sliced his knife across his exposed throat.
The Leopards of Normandy: Duke: Leopards of Normandy 2 Page 31