Even with no wind, the force of the tides made the water turbid and brown. The English could cross several miles of water here, or aim for a spot further west, even one past Newport, though to do so would mean they’d face more than twice the distance, if less turbulent waters.
“Sound travels in the mist,” Math said.
“But it’s difficult to gauge distance and direction,” Llywelyn said. “It may be a day or two earlier than he intended, but this fog is a gift to Clare—or at least he will think it so. He will come now.” Llywelyn turned his head to gaze behind him. He was looking for Dafydd. The king had looked over his shoulder so many times in the last hour that Math had to stop himself from doing it too.
But for better or for worse, Dafydd had gone after William. He wasn’t here and wasn’t coming. Math had to trust that Dafydd knew what he was doing, and that Llywelyn—and Tudur, Carew, and Ieuan—and Math himself, could manage this assault without the prince.
A creaking sound echoed over the water. As Llywelyn had warned, Math couldn’t tell from which direction it came.
Apparently, Llywelyn could. “Our fire boats were to have launched. They should be leaving their harbor even now.”
Math listened hard, waiting, as everyone on the beach was waiting. The Englishmen in the boats out on the water were waiting too, with probably the same thumping in the chest and pounding in the ears every soldier felt, every time he went into battle.
“Hmm.” Llywelyn lifted up the binoculars and looked east, and then west. The fire boats still didn’t appear out of the mist. “What’s keeping them?”
One of the longest half hours of Math’s life passed and still no fire boats appeared. Then a soldier hurried up to King Llywelyn. “Sire!”
Math and Llywelyn turned to the man. His face was pale. The news wasn’t good. “I—” He stopped, unable to get the words out.
“Say it,” Llywelyn said.
“All four fire boats have foundered just off the dock.”
“Good Chri—” Llywelyn cut off the last word, loath as always to curse openly. “Those boats have patrolled the rivers and coast for two years. They’ve kept the English off our backs for two years. Why now?”
“It has to be sabotage, my lord.” The man looked pained.
Llywelyn turned to Math. “Gather the men. The English are coming. We’ll have to do this the traditional way.”
“Now?” Math said, surprised at the king’s ability to shrug off the sabotage of his fire ships.
“The loss of the fire boats is disappointing, but not devastating,” Llywelyn said. “Dafydd viewed them as a method to weaken the English minds, rather than as the lynchpin in our defenses.”
“But—”
“Listen.” Llywelyn pointed out to sea.
And then Math heard the echoes, so many that they had to be coming from across the Estuary. “I do hear them.” He listened some more. “It sounds like they could already be halfway across!”
“Only a third, perhaps.” Llywelyn said this with no anxiety in his voice. Math couldn’t match his preternatural calm. This is what they’d planned for, waited for, for three years. Part of him couldn’t believe that all that effort hadn’t actually gone to waste, that the Normans had really—and after all this time—marshaled themselves for an attack.
All along, the problem for Wales had been that the Normans had choices for this assault, and the Welsh were forced to defend themselves against whatever they threw at them. The Welsh border, from Chester to Chepstow, was over one hundred miles, with a further seven hundred and fifty miles of coastline. They couldn’t defend it all.
But Dafydd and Llywelyn had endeavored to try, through intimidation backed up by superior weapons of war. Their goal had always been to narrow the possibilities of where the assault might come. Or assaults. In this case, the Normans had attacked Buellt in concert with this southern advance.
In 1282, the English had gone first for Anglesey to capture the harvest. After they’d failed to force the Menai Straits, the Mortimer brothers had tried to assassinate Llywelyn. They’d failed. In Anna’s old world, however, they hadn’t failed. They’d murdered him, and then taken down the Welsh castles which Llywelyn had controlled, one by one. The Normans had conquered all of Wales that way, using each captured castle as a base to capture the next one. Ultimately, their ability to defeat the Welsh depended on persistence and resources, and overwhelming numbers.
Today, the English faced a different task, though one no less difficult: to gather enough men in a location close enough to Wales to invade successfully, but in such a way that the Welsh wouldn’t know of the attack until it was too late. Bristol Castle was such a place, just across the Severn Estuary from Wales. The same ridge that prevented Math from seeing the castle on a clear day could also hide thousands of men only a few miles from Wales. The only reason the English weren’t going to succeed today was because of the information Humphrey de Bohun had given them. That was something Math had never thought he would say.
Even though the city of Bristol was fewer than ten miles from the Welsh shore, at heart, it was much further. The Welsh and the English in the March had mingled freely for hundreds of years, swapping daughters and sons more easily than lords, and just as frequently. Not so for the English in Bristol, though Math couldn’t say exactly why. The Severn Estuary had always been a barrier to communication, if not commerce.
Llywelyn clapped a hand on Math’s shoulder. The two men looked into each other’s eyes for a heartbeat, and then Llywelyn nodded. “Go. We’ll combine our companies for a stronger force.”
Math raced down the path from the lookout to the place where his teulu waited, behind the sand dunes that lined the shore of the Estuary in this location. He’d ordered his men to stay alert and together as a matter of course, but he’d been thinking he would use them for clean-up work, or if some of the English boats survived the attack from the fire ships and made it to the beach. Now, they would lead the Welsh defense.
“Two must ride to Tudur at Chepstow.” Math stabbed a finger at his two best scouts. “Tell him that the English are coming here. Maybe elsewhere, we don’t yet know, and we will fight them on the shore.” He threw himself onto Gwynfor’s back and turned her head towards the path to the beach. “Where’s Lord Ieuan?”
“I’m here.” Ieuan trotted his horse forward. He’d worked like a madman to organize the foot soldiers and get everything in order, and now would lead them.
The Welsh had set up camp two hundred yards behind the dunes, awaiting the English assault. Overnight, the populace had arisen and come to fight for Llywelyn. Math had hoped for it, but not dared expect it. The southern cantrefs had lived under the Norman boot for two hundred years, on and off. Some had grown to like it. Some had thrived under their Norman lords and had resented their new masters, even if they were of the same blood.
The men of Monmouth were known for their skill with a bow, and distances being what they were (short), the few days Ieuan had been given was all the time he needed to marshal a force of four thousand foot, five hundred cavalry, and a thousand archers, spread out in small units along the coastline from Chepstow to Cardiff.
Each of the companies had captains and commanders of every rank, plus workers to insure that the horses were cared for and the men fed. It was costing Llywelyn a fortune, but not as much as it would cost to lose.
“How did the English get to our boats?” Math said to Llywelyn, once he’d led his men to the rendezvous point on the path back to the dune. Between them, they had a total of one hundred and twenty men. That would have to be enough. No more could fit on the narrow beach.
“Paid a Welshman to do it, probably.” Llywelyn said, briefly allowing his disappointment to show. “Isn’t that always the way?”
“The lead boats are only half a mile off shore!” A rider swept up to Llywelyn, his voice going high in his excitement. Llywelyn had sent fishermen to watch the English advance. They knew the vagaries of the Estuary better than anyon
e.
“How many boats do they report?”
The man swallowed hard. “At least two hundred.”
Two hundred. My God.
A stiff wind had sprung up in the last few minutes and blown away the fog as if it had never been, revealing high clouds skittering across the sky, heading for the sun which had risen over the horizon to the east. Math couldn’t see the English boats from where he sat on Gwynfor’s back, but those in the blinds, higher up on the dunes, could be gazing at the end of Wales as they knew it. And with the rising of the sun and the dissipation of the fog, the English would be able to see the stretch of beach for which they were aiming.
Math took in a huge breath of air. “Give me a moment to evaluate what we’re facing.”
Llywelyn nodded his approval and Math urged Gwynfor up the path to the sand covered blind. He dismounted behind it and stepped into the little room formed by canvas on three sides, which protected the men inside from the elements. “Is it as bad as it looks?” Math said, before peering through the hole that gave him a view of the whole Estuary, without the English knowing that he was spying on them.
Yes, it was.
“They have many boats,” the scout beside him said.
It was no good pretending what they faced wouldn’t be devastating if they allowed all those men to successfully navigate the beach. Watching the boats bob on the waters in the distance caused tendrils of anticipation—not to mention a touch of fear—to curl in Math’s stomach. He swallowed hard, got a grip on himself, and said, “Keep me posted.”
“Yes, sir,” the scout said. Math turned to leave but the man caught his arm. “Wait. That’s not all.”
Math’s shoulders didn’t even fall. The certainty and grit that he cultivated before a battle was settling into him. “What else?”
“A storm is coming.”
Math’s brow furrowed. He hadn’t noticed. He threw back the flap at the entrance to the blind.
The scout jerked his chin towards the southwest, from whence the weather always came in August. “That,” the man said.
The sun still shone, rising ever higher to the east, but the same wind that had blown away the fog was bringing clouds with it. Dark ones. At the rate they were heading up the Estuary, soon they would cover the sky from horizon to horizon. They grew darker even as Math studied them.
An older man stood a few feet away, sorting through the arrows in his quiver. He was of an age with Llywelyn, perhaps, if not older, bent and gray. His bow rested on the pack at his feet.
In a gesture similar to the one the scout had used, the man pointed with his chin to the southwest. “This time of year, that means trouble. If those English are going to beach their boats safely, they have less time than it will take me to finish sharpening my arrowheads to do it.”
“How do you know this?” Math’s heart, already pumping hard, began to race as the implications of the man’s observation occurred to him.
“My family has fished these waters since there were fish in the sea.”
Math didn’t wait to hear more. He made an instant decision that might not have been his to make, but he felt that every second counted. He pointed at the lead scout who’d come with him out of the blind, and then at the chief of archers who stood with his captains twenty feet below him, conferring. “Take this blind down! Get the archers in position and have them stand in a long row on the top of the dune so the English can see them!”
“On the dune, my lord? But—”
“On it!” Math said. “The time for secrecy has passed. We need to show them what they face! Move!”
Math scrambled on top of the sand dune himself, his sword unsheathed, and waved it in the air to gather the attention of every man within hailing distance. One of the scouts had a horn at his waist and Math grabbed it and winded it (not well). Disgusted, he thrust it back into the man’s hands. “Blow!” The man gazed at him wide-eyed, not understanding Math’s sudden lack of secrecy, but then he brought his horn to his lips anyway.
The call reverberated down the beach. It was a good horn. Maybe Tudur could hear it at Chepstow.
“Let them know that we defend this beach!” Math used all the air in his lungs to rouse his men. “To your positions. Now!”
Math bounded from the top of the dune, threw himself onto Gwynfor’s back, and raced her to where Llywelyn waited. The king’s face showed puzzlement, maybe amusement, but not anger, for which Math was grateful.
“The plan has changed, I see,” Llywelyn said.
“We need to form up on the beach. Show the English that they won’t take this land without heavy casualties.”
“The lead boats are two hundred yards off shore,” Llywelyn said, “with the bulk of the fleet well back in the channel. They could alter their plans at the sight of us and head west to land at Newport.”
Math grinned from beneath the helmet he’d just crammed onto his head. “They could have done so if they’d started an hour earlier. Now, they can’t. The tide is going to turn very soon and will start running against them.”
“And against us,” Llywelyn said, patience in every word. “We could never move enough men that far by sea—or by land for that matter—to counter them in time.”
“We won’t have to,” Math said. “All we have to do is make them second guess themselves long enough so that they dither in the channel before deciding.”
“You’ve lost me, nephew. Tell me what you’re thinking. I don’t understand.” Llywelyn studied his son-in-law. “The plan was to let the English beach their boats and then surprise them.”
“Not any more, Father.” Math pointed his sword at the clouds that loomed so large now, even the English couldn’t miss them. “Look at what’s coming. If the English head west, they head into the storm.”
Llywelyn glanced upwards. “The storm—” Then he held out his hand as the first raindrop splattered onto his palm.
Chapter 24
29 August 1288
Aber Castle
Anna
Anna didn’t know when she’d last been this tired. She felt as if grains of sand had caught under her eyelids. But she kept her eyes open. With the spectacle before her, she was in no danger of falling asleep just yet.
The Irish Sea was nothing but chop, the white crests evident on every wave. Below and behind them, the men who’d remained at Aber to defend it cleaned up the English mess, working through what was left of the night and into the morning. She’d doctored those she could save and looked away when Bevyn had hung the single Welsh traitor who’d helped the English into Aber. She had been glad that she couldn’t see the gallows, built in the marsh to the northeast, from where she stood. Bevyn had made everyone but her march out to see the death. Summary and swift justice in medieval Wales.
The watchers on the coast, whom Goronwy’s rider had warned, had done their duty. They’d lit the beacons on the Great Orme, and by so doing, sent a signal along the coastline between Aber and Conwy, long before they’d sighted the English ships. Exactly as David had planned, the beacons had raised the countryside to arms. David had hoped that because of the warning, the defenders would have enough time to counter whatever threat the English were bringing to bear. The beacons themselves were an old idea—not invented by fantasy authors—but had never been used in Gwynedd until today.
Only twenty minutes earlier, a fleet of English vessels had hove into view, coming around the Great Orme and heading towards Anglesey. They had only a few miles left to go, but the boats were fighting the wind, tacking back and forth in their attempt to progress. One third of the thirty craft had the shape of Viking longboats and had reefed their sails. Anna’s eyes weren’t as good as David’s—she certainly couldn’t see the oarsmen rowing low in the water—but someone with far worse eyesight than she had couldn’t miss what was before her.
“Look at them, Bevyn!” Anna said.
The old soldier stood on the battlements beside Anna. He raised a hand to the men below them. “Come here, my lads.
When you dangle your grandchildren on your knee, you’ll be able to tell the story of this day.”
Anna kept glancing to the west, and then back to the boats, and then to the west again, unable to contain her horrified fascination.
“They have to know what’s coming,” she said.
“Do they?” Bevyn said. “Though if they were smart, they would have hired Welshmen to sail them here—traitors that such men might be.”
“Plenty of English sail out of Chester,” Anna said. “Even they have to know the size of this storm.”
“Maybe they did before they sailed,” Bevyn said. “Maybe the English captain was arrogant enough to override any naysayers.”
And that sounded like a viable maybe to Anna. The confidence that the Normans had shown in this last week was stunning. It reminded her so much of King Edward’s tactics that a shiver passed through her. Could he have somehow survived Lancaster?
But no—enough people had seen his body—and seen it buried, for him not to be haunting them from the dead. This was someone else. But who? Not Edmund, obviously. Was Edmund’s brother, Roger, that clever? Bigod or Clare? It looked to Anna as if the man, whoever he was, had mortgaged his future on the chance of victory. The expense of all these men and materials had to be as enormous as her father was spending to defend against them.
But perhaps as Math had said, back at Valle Crucis Abbey, it didn’t matter who it was. They had to defeat him, regardless.
The sky drew darker to the west until the storm covered all but the eastern tip of Anglesey. Aber itself was due south of Puffin Island, the closest land the English could reach, if they were going to reach land. It seemed as if the tip of the island reached out a finger to the English boats. All it had to do was crook it to bring them to safety.
The lead boat seemed to reach out too. Anna’s heart was in her throat. Would it make it safely? But no. The lead ship foundered and swung sideways, in the face of the wind. Then as one, the ships turned tail. They pointed their bows east, flying before the wind, their hulls surfing over the surface of the water as fast as their masters could ride them. There was a danger in that too, but it looked like most of the ships had turned away in time.
Crossroads in Time (The After Cilmeri Series) Page 21