The Welsh Marches (The Anarchy 1120-1180 Book 15)

by Hosker, Griff

  The King’s voice was defeated even if his men still stood ready to fight. “Yes, Earl Marshal?”

  I said, flatly, “Monmouth has fallen. My knights are, even now, scouring the land for any remaining Welsh warriors. You have few archers left. If I assault now then my men will be so angry that I cannot answer for their actions. There would be great slaughter.”

  He held up a hand, “I will come down and speak with you. It is not seemly to speak of these matters in the hearing of all and sundry.”

  “Of course.”

  He disappeared and, dismounting, I turned to de Clifford, “Say not a word. I will negotiate!”

  He was contrite. He had seen the sharp edge of my tongue already, “Aye Earl Marshal.”

  I waited patiently. Eventually I heard the bar of the gate as it was lowered. King Maredudd emerged. He gave me a wan smile as he drew close. “I should have heeded the old warriors who advised me not to risk battle with the Warlord of the North.” He shook his head. “What are your terms?”

  “Leave this castle and return to your own lands. If you wish your men at arms, archers and knights returned then you will pay ransom for each one. There will be reparations for Monmouth and Striguil. They amount to one thousand gold pieces for each castle.”

  He looked surprised, “That is all?”

  “That is all that I wish from you but I will be taking my men west to restore all of the castles and manors taken by your lords during the civil war. I will return them to their former owners. I would advise you to inform the men in those castles of that. I will punish them if they do not surrender when I arrive.”

  “And my men? The ones you captured?”

  “They leave with you.”

  The King looked at his advisers. They nodded, “I agree to the terms.”

  I smiled, “It might be best if you had a cleric draw up a document.”

  “You are a careful man. Would that I had someone at my side like you.”

  I shook my head. “You need none, your majesty. You are a true King. I salute you.” I took out my sword, raised it and saluted him.

  “Thank you, Earl Marshal. That means more than you can know.”

  Chapter 18

  De Clifford could not believe that we had succeeded with so little loss. I admonished him as though he was a child. “Now, lord, you must work to hold on to your land. You have more power here than lords in England. Use it!”

  I sent my other lords out to continue our search for our foes. The King and his people began to make their way west. I did not allow de Clifford to enter the castle until the King and his men had left. It was courtesy. The King was the last to leave the castle. He leaned down from his horse. “I will send the reparations here, Earl Marshal, to you.”

  “Thank you, your majesty.”

  “Tell your King that this is not over. This land is mine. I am young but I will learn. We will battle again.”

  “I know, your majesty but you should know that if you fight me then you may well lose.”

  He laughed, “Even the Warlord cannot be in two places at once. Your heart lies to the north. I can be patient.”

  He left.

  I watched him go and wondered if our paths would meet again. Then I went back into the castle. I had much to do. I used my authority to have my men housed in the castle and our horses in the stables. I then sat with Sir William Liedeberge and Richard de Clare. We had maps and I was keen to make the Welsh Marches secure once more. That meant scouring the lords who still clung on to Norman land.

  Sir William wondered at that, “But the King has withdrawn. Surely that means his men obey his command and withdraw too.”

  I shook my head, “The King withdrew from Striguil. He said nothing about his other castles.” I looked at de Clare. “You hold on to your estates. Who lies between us and your lands?”

  “Apfael ap Iago holds a swathe of castles to the west of here. None are as strong as this one. They are made of wood but they form a barrier to Pembroke and the west.”

  “Then when de Mortimer and de Chaworth return from their raids we will rid ourselves of that barrier.” A sudden gust of wind flurried through the castle. “We do not have long for it will be winter soon.”

  “And the castles of ap Iago are in high land that suffers snow. If we have not rid ourselves by All Saints then it will be too late.”

  “Then we have less than four weeks.” I looked at the line of castles marked on the map. “Whose land is this?”

  “De Mortimer and de Chaworth.”

  “Then they shall have the task of assault.”

  Two days later we were ready to ride. I left de Clifford to his castle. De Braose returned to his castle at Monmouth. I retained their archers. We were smaller in number now but we would not be facing a large army. According to de Mortimer, ap Iago had just six knights. The bulk of his army were little better than brigands. The garrison at Caerleon had joined the King when he had left. We moved swiftly for we had to head into the mountains and the journey would be harder than the one thus far.

  De Mortimer rode with me. “So tell me of this castle of Tidfelly.”

  “It guards the valley. My father built it to watch the farms in the valley bottom. It is made of wood, lord.”

  “And how did it fall?”

  His head drooped, “The civil war lord. We were summoned by the Earl of Gloucester. We sought to support the Empress and her son.” He shook his head. “As soon as we left the Welsh swarmed into the valley. They slew the settlers and took over the castle.”

  I nodded. In many ways that helped. There were no innocent victims here. We did not need to enter the valley cautiously. We could sweep in and drive the Welsh from their recently acquired castles. Thus far I had not seen any attempt to replace wooden walls with stone. The valleys all headed north to south. Tidfelly was the larger of the line of castles. I chose it because it was the larger. If we took that one then, being in the centre, it weakened the whole line.

  The weather had changed almost as soon as we headed west. Skies darkened and rain fell. Winds blew and it was a most uncomfortable journey. It also made us ride closer together, wrapped in our cloaks. The exception were the archers of de Mortimer. There were four of them and they acted as scouts. They knew the land well. Rhodri accompanied them. He had grown well into the role of captain of archers.

  The valley road kept to the bottom of the valley. It passed through cultivated and tilled farmland. The valley sides were rock and tree filled. I kept a wary eye on them as we headed north. If I was ap Iago then I might have launched an ambush. Ap Iago did not have many knights but he did have men who could use a bow and hide in the rocks and the trees. We had been riding for a few hours and I had called a halt when a movement in the tree line, three hundred paces from us, caught my eye. I wondered why the scouts had not spotted it. I had older eyes.

  I dismounted and pretended to tighten my girth. “James, fetch Tom the Fletcher and my archers.”

  “Lord.”

  De Mortimer looked up, “Is there something wrong, lord?”

  “There may be. Do not appear alarmed. Just warn your men that there are watchers in the woods.”

  Tom arrived with my other archers and James. “Lord?”

  “There are men watching us from the woods. Back track down the valley and then approach them. If there are too many for you then alert us and I will bring the rest of the column to your aid.”

  He glanced up at the trees and then back at me. “If they are there then they are well hidden, lord. That means they may be brigands or bandits.”

  “Aye, they may be. Let us see who they are first.”

  He nodded. Turning to the other archers he said, “Let us see if we can find the cloak my lord lost.”

  He said it loudly. He was clever. The Welsh, for I was sure that they were locals, might not hear all of the words but they might be less suspicious of the small number who headed back down the valley road. As we mounted and continued north I wondered if the men
were scouts for ap Iago. The castle was just ten miles ahead of us. Had it not been such a dank and dismal day then we might have been able to see it. As it was we were surrounded by misty rain. I knew that we would have to complete our campaign sooner than I had expected. I hoped that Henry was on his way south. From what we had been told by King Madog the combination of King Henry’s men and the men of Powys would easily overcome Owain Gruffydd.

  James and de Mortimer rode with me. “It may be nothing, lord.”

  “De Mortimer you ignore such things at your peril. My archers, in Stockton, are the masters of such ambushes. I have known them destroy whole columns of knights. They know how to use cover and their arrows are deadly. We are fortunate here that the trees are more than a hundred paces from us and they are on our left.”

  “How does that help lord?”

  I turned to James. “We are carrying our shields on our left arms. It is what we do in hostile territory. If the woods were on our right then we could be ambushed more easily. Dick and his archers have taught me the art of ambush.”

  The valley turned a little east and a slight break in the cloud and the rain, albeit brief, showed us the castle. It was a dark shadow rising above the valley but we could see where it was. It seemed to me to be less than five miles from us. Then the rain returned like a curtain and the castle was hidden once more. We halted.

  “I am not certain that we will reach the castle before dark. De Mortimer, you know this valley better than any, find us somewhere to camp. Dry would be good.”

  “Aye lord. There are some farms just a mile away. One belonged to Sir Richard Ferrers. It had a hall.”

  I remembered Sir Richard. He had died in the debacle at Winchester when the Earl of Gloucester had been captured. I was about to tell him to secure it when Arne Arneson shouted, “Lord, Tom the Fletcher and the archers!”

  I looked up at the treeline. My archers were escorting seven Welsh bowmen down the rock covered slopes. The bowmen were barefoot each wearing an animal skin cloak but they were bowmen. They had the familiar Welsh bow. With rougher wood, it was unmistakeable. The bowmen were short and squat with barrel chests. Tom the Fletcher and my men rode easily alongside them. There was no danger here.

  They stopped when they were ten paces from us, “Lord, these men wish to serve you.” I held Tom’s eye. He nodded, “I have spoken with them. Their English is not the best but Rhodri has given me enough words of Welsh for me to talk with them. I believe they are honest.”

  I had learned, over the years, how to read men. Tom the Fletcher was honest and I trusted his judgement but I needed confirmation. “James, signal Rhodri to return.”

  My squire sounded three blasts on his horn. Our scouts reappeared from the mist ahead of us.

  “Lord?”

  “Tom has found these archers. They were in the woods to the west of us.” Rhodri flashed an irritated glance at one of de Mortimer’s archers. That must have been his job. “They say they would serve us. I need you to question them and discover the truth.”

  “Aye lord.” He dismounted and approached them. I knew perhaps two or three words of Welsh but I could not understand a single word of the interchange. “De Mortimer, go and find us shelter. We cannot reach the castle this day.”

  “Aye lord.”

  He and his men rode down the valley and were soon swallowed up in the drizzle.

  Rhodri turned, “I think they speak truly lord. They are from a valley to the north. Lord Apfael ap Iago went to their village a year since. It was remote and in the mountains. They had no lord and kept themselves to themselves. When ap Iago arrived, he needed women. He and his men took their women from them. When the men objected he had six slain. These are all that remain from the village. They became bandits, living in the woods. Some of their women escaped but ap Iago hunted them for sport. These men have been hunting the men of ap Iago. Two days since they caught a rider. They tortured him and discovered that we were coming. That is why they waited here. Ap Iago knows of our intentions. He has been reinforced by six knights and their men from the neighbouring valleys. He has emptied the other two castles. They are set to trap us.”

  I looked up at the skies. We had been cursing the weather but it had saved us. Had it been better weather then we would have been seen.

  Rhodri held out a medallion, “They took this from the dead rider. It is the sign of the Welsh king.”

  King Maredudd had wasted no time in organising his defences. That meant we had a short time in which to win back these valleys. The advantage we had was that all of our enemies were gathered together.

  “Which is their leader?”

  Tom pointed, “Tomas ap Tomas.”

  An older warrior stepped forward and bowed. He spoke to me. I understood his words. “We have heard that you are the lord of the wolves. You have come to defeat this evil man. We would serve you, lord.”

  “Then join us to help defeat ap Iago and when we have done so you can decide if you wish to follow my banner.” He nodded. “You will serve under my captain of archers, Rhodri. He is a Welshman like you.”

  “Aye lord.”

  “How many horsemen does he have?”

  “There are fifty since the other knights arrived. He had but twenty before they arrived. He had more but we know how to trap horsemen.”

  I turned to de Clare, “Let us head down the valley and hope that de Mortimer has found us somewhere safe to shelter. It seems that we were the hunter but now we are the hunted.”

  Heading down the track which de Mortimer had taken, Richard said, “And we have just four conroi of men. We only have five knights. He has more horse than we do.”

  “But we have something he does not; information. We know that he expects us. He will believe that we travel in the dark. Never underestimate the importance of that. Surprise on a battlefield kills as many men as a sword.”

  One of de Mortimer’s men met us, “We have the hall, lord. It was defended but they are dead now.”

  I saw, when we neared it, that it was a Norman hall. Although made of wood there was a stable under the hall and but one entrance, up a staircase, to the main hall. We would be able to defend it. I saw that there were six bodies covered with cloaks. They were men at arms.

  De Mortimer was bareheaded. He approached me, “I know that you would have wished prisoners, lord but they fought hard. I lost two men.” He pointed to the river. “Now I am pleased that we did so.” He led me down to the river. I saw the bodies of five men and girls. They were emaciated and naked. “How could men do this to women?”

  “I know not but I have seen it too many times. The men who follow this ap Iago seem to me to be like their master. They prey on others.” I turned and waved Rhodri down towards me. He and the scouts had returned.

  “Lord.”

  “You had better fetch Tomas ap Tomas. He is with Tom the Fletcher. I believe these may be their women.”

  Rhodri’s mouth tightened, “Bastards! Sorry, lord. My men and I will help them. It is no wonder he chose to follow you.”

  I watched with a sinking heart as my suspicions were confirmed. Two of the younger men threw themselves to the ground and began to weep as they cradled the bodies in their arms. Tomas turned to speak with Rhodri. He nodded and came to me, “It is their women lord. One is the daughter of Tomas. They ask permission to bury them.”

  “Of course, and I will ask Father Matthew to speak over them.”

  We had a young priest with us. I hoped he could offer comfort. That night we ate in a sombre silence. What I had hoped would be a short campaign had suddenly taken on a sinister significance. I sat with my knights and planned our battle.

  Chapter 19

  The rain stopped during the night but the effects were clear to see. Mud had washed down on to the already poorly made road surface. The river was high and those warriors who had not bothered to protect their armour now had rusty blemishes appearing. The shelter and the grain had, however, benefitted our horses. After making sure that m
y knights and Rhodri knew what they were doing we headed back to the road which led to the castle.

  As soon as we reached the spot we had left the previous evening then we could see the castle. It stood on a rocky outcrop above the widest part of the valley. I could see why de Mortimer’s father had built there. His castellan could survey the rich farmland from the wooden walls. Unlike de Clifford this castle had not been lost due to incompetence but duty. I would ensure that it became Mortimer land once more. Rhodri and the archers left their horses with the baggage train and headed up through the woods. They had Tomas ap Tomas and his vengeful men to lead them. Ap Iago could not know of this one advantage. He would see a column of four knights and thirty odd men at arms heading towards him. I had no doubt that he had already made his plans. I did not want him to change them.

  The road dropped down towards the farmland of the valley bottom. Our banners made the farmers and their families take to their heels and run towards the castle. The fact that they were admitted so readily confirmed that Apfael ap Iago knew we were coming. His banner fluttered above the gate. We rode steadily. I wanted him to think that we suspected nothing. It gave me the chance to examine the battlefield. There were trees six hundred paces to our left. They followed the line of the edge of the cultivated land. The fields were dotted with sheep and a few cattle. The trees thinned out closer to the rocks which marked the tops of the hills. The trees had been cleared to within three hundred paces of the castle. To our left and right were fields where animals grazed but a hundred paces closer to the river were fields with crops of winter barley, oats and cabbage. What I could not see were the horsemen who were waiting for us.

  We knew that they would not let us ravage the valley and take their animals. That was their food for the winter. They had been reinforced by horsemen. We had taken two castles and both were stronger than this one. King Maredudd was a quick learner. Even as he had been heading back to his home in the west he was preparing a trap for me. He would meet us horsemen to horsemen and use his Welsh archers to decimate us.