Gilded Spurs

by Grace Ingram

  For twenty miles and more about Wallingford the land had been ravaged again and again; they rode all day and never saw thatch on house, beast in field or land under plough. That night they had to camp in the open, the wagons set in a circle about the tents and tethered horses, and the men did not unarm, but mounted guard by turn and dozed uneasily in their mail between reliefs. Wolves howled in the dark; Guy listened with the hair prickling on his neck and an arm about the Slut.

  On the sixth day they reached Hernforth. Here in the south, where King Stephen had ruled securely, the war had had little effect, though the decay of commerce and tillage showed to a discerning eye. Hernforth itself was a pleasant manor, with a decent stone hall, swept and scoured in readiness for them, set within a defensive palisade and ringed about with barns, stables, dovecote, kennels, dairy and brewhouse. In such a place a knight might settle very comfortably, managing and improving his estate, selling his woolclip to the Flemish and Italian merchants for small luxuries, taking his part in the activities of hundred and shire courts and breeding up sons and daughters beside a bustling wife.

  Again Guy’s clerical skills were required; he sat with Lord Reynald, the Hernforth bailiff and the manor priest over rolls and tallies, learning yet more of administration. He was tolerated on hawking parties, though he would never be adept; he joined in hare-coursing and an ineffectual wolf-hunt.

  Advent was on them, and the household celebrated a mildly festive Christmas from which Lord Reynald and Rohese held aloof. Guy learned that he never kept Christmas or Easter at Warby, preserving from Christian observance that stronghold of his own dark worship.

  There could be few secrets in the crowded manor-house, and all knew that Guy and Agnes no longer lay together, though few cared to comment on it. Lord Reynald however had no use for delicacy.

  ‘What’s gone amiss between you and that silly wench?’ he demanded.

  ‘We find we do not suit,’ Guy told him cautiously.

  ‘You’ve quarrelled? You’re not fool enough to be soft with a whore ? If she offends you, take your belt to her.’

  Guy shook his head. ‘We do not agree, and that’s an end of it.’

  ‘Humph. Do you fancy Gertrude instead?’

  ‘I’ll lie alone, my lord.’

  ‘Look over the peasant wenches. If there’s one takes your eye, you can have her scrubbed—or has Agnes worn out your manhood?’

  ‘No, my lord.’

  ‘You’ve not set your heart on the Trevaine bastard?’

  The heart in question jolted, but Guy managed to smile. ‘Is it likely?’

  Lord Reynald snorted. ‘It’s the kind of greensick whimsy afflicts young fools, before they learn one woman’s as much a nuisance as any other and it’s the dowry makes the bargain.’ He frowned at Guy, and then his mouth twitched in his lopsided smile. ‘If you have set your heart on her, I’ll win the wench for you.’

  '’What ? Lord Henry would never—’

  ‘Ah, but we’ve power, boy, power! Maybe he’d rather see his girl dead at his feet, but what of his right-born heir, eh?’

  ‘You’d take off the curse—?’

  ‘To win her for you, lad. See what we can do for our own! See the power that can be yours, to take all you desire! Can your pale Christ do half as much? Give yourself to our lord, taste our pleasures, learn our secrets, gain our powers!’ His fingers dug like talons into Guy’s arms. ‘You can have the girl, to wife or for your leman, to do as you chose with her.’

  Guy shivered, jerked free, and steadied his voice with an effort. ‘If I wanted her—and I do not—I’d not take my heart’s longing on such terms!’

  ‘You’ll wither under Wulfrune’s curses then, for I’ll protect you from her no longer.’

  ‘I will not.’

  ‘But this would be the fairest vengeance of all, to make him give up his girl to my son!’

  ‘I don’t want the girl,’ Guy said, his belly curdling with disgust. He must stick to that lest Lord Reynald set his design into action, for to his shame and dismay he knew himself tempted. He turned and strode away from further argument, remembering a creamy throat and the swell of a round breast, strong courage and shared laughter. He recalled instead the goat-mask’s blank eyes reflecting the firelight, the blood of sacrifice and the dance within the standing stones. It moved him to tramp to the church in the village and spend an hour on his knees before the Rood, praying confusedly for succour in following the right way.

  The children were running and squealing about the garth as he came through the gate. Maybe the air of these parts suited him better, for Roger’s affliction troubled him less here, and there was a trace of colour in his cold cheeks. If Lady Mabel could succeed in detaching him from Lord Reynald’s household he might win to normal manhood, for the spirit was in him.

  So near to Southampton there was still some foreign trade, and the bailiff had exchanged the woolclip for salt and imported cloth, with a small store of wine, dried fruits, almonds and spices to augment the Christmas feasting. Another commodity was available, news from Normandy. Little of it had been cheering to King Stephen’s adherents. Louis of France had indeed allied himself with Duke Henry’s rebellious brother Geoffrey, Stephen’s heir Eustace and the Count of Champagne against the Angevin, but their coalition had achieved little. Geoffrey had submitted after defeat, and Louis had fallen sick and sought a truce over the winter.

  ‘But that won’t save Wallingford,’ Lord Reynald consoled himself. ‘Spring will be too late. The Angevin cub won’t dare turn his back on so many enemies even then.’

  Before January was a fortnight old he had learned his error. Duke Henry was in England; he had embarked on Twelfth Night despite a winter gale, with thirty-six ships of mercenaries. About three thousand men that meant, experts informed Guy, and that was scarcely enough to relieve Wallingford, if they could reach it before it capitulated, let alone conquer a kingdom. Lord Eustace had returned in haste to fight for the throne he was resolved to inherit. Few men had much good to say of Eustace, a brave but barbarous warrior with nothing else to commend him as a ruler. 3

  Lord Reynald put forward his return to Warby, where he had too many enemies as neighbours to be easy about its diminished garrison. The weather broke, and they floundered northwards through torrents of icy rain. Guy learned the misery of riding day after day in sodden clothes, even his new cloak soaked through its fur lining, his feet frozen in the stirrups and his hands numb on the reins. His wet hauberk chafed his joints, his helmet streamed water over his face, and his shield dragged like lead at his shoulder.

  Each day’s journey was halved in distance and doubled in effort. Carts mired past their axles and had to be dragged free by extra horses and straining men, only to sink again in the next pool. The men on foot waded through mud that hung heavy on their sodden clothing, their footwear disintegrating; the horsemen were spattered to their heads; horses sickened and went lame. The women and children were bundled into a couple of horse-litters that at least kept them out of the rain, though the boggy tracks and stumbling horses made the clumsy things lurch like ships in a rough sea.

  An overnight halt at castle or abbey let them dry their clothes and sleep out of the weather, but four nights they had to camp by the wayside in the unceasing rain. The women and children huddled in the litters, whose poles were propped on stones or logs; the servants struggled with soaked canvas, iron-hard ropes and slipping pegs to erect tents before crawling under cart-covers or crouching in miserable little shelters of branches and bracken. Guy admired the cooks with all his heart; dry kindling was carried under cover in the carts, and every night they contrived a roaring fire under some sort of windbreak and served up at least bowls of hot pottage to thaw the chill from their bellies.

  Three days from Warby they were toiling through woodland. The rain had ceased, and a watery sun glinted in the puddles and gilded the mud. Relief had slackened vigilance; their hardship eased even slightly, men relaxed and lifted their faces to the sunshine.
Lord Reynald and Sir Gerard were riding a little ahead, giving their falcons an airing after almost a week in their travelling cages; Roger and Matilda had their heads outside the curtains of the litter, and even the horses picked up their hooves more briskly. Guy squelched along at the rear of the pack-train on a track churned to the consistency of soup and watched the clouds shred to uncover yet more blue.

  The Slut bayed, and all the pack of hunting-dogs took up her cry. Guy yelled alarm and swung his shield from his shoulder to his arm, tightened his knees on his mount’s barrel and jerked out his sword. Shadows flitted through the leafless thickets. Something clanged on his helmet, jolting his head back, and as he ducked behind his shield another arrow thumped into the wood. At the head of the line was tumult; yells and curses, Lord Reynald screeching orders, horses neighing, dogs barking. He spurred forward. A tattered shape dodged away. He swung from the track after it, swinging his sword low, conscious of others crashing ahead of him through the trees. An arrow whistled past his head. He hauled his horse about on his haunches as the man he was chasing twisted about a tree-bole and came back at him with a glinting knife.

  The Slut left his side, launched at the man’s shoulder; she bore down his arm and slashed once, and he sprawled kicking in a scarlet gush. Guy leaned down to strike, righted himself and peered about for another, filled with an eagerness wilder than that of the hunt. Lord Reynald and the vanguard were already out of sight, but he could hear their shouts. A yell burst from his lips, the fury of the chase seized him, and he gathered his horse to join it. Then a child’s shriek pierced to his wits, and he remembered his orders and his duty and charged back to the train.

  A dozen ragged thieves swarmed about the baggage-carts and litters. The bigger litter was slewed half-over, one horse down in the shafts, and between it and Guy was a snarling scrimmage round the treasure-cart. The driver was laying about him with his whip. Conan, half out of his saddle, was hammering with his sword-pommel at the head of a desperate thief clinging to his shield-rim. Guy hewed down and backhand, filled with the exultation of battle that left no room for fear. The Slut leaped past him to slash and tear. He smashed at a howling face beside his knee, threw up his shield to deflect a spear, felt a blade skid along the hauberk-rings over his thigh and swung his mount about by the pressure of his knees. His blade jarred on bone, gritted and jerked free. A child shrieked in panic.

  ‘Guy! Guy!’

  Half a dozen ruffians were tearing at the litter’s leather curtains. One had Lady Mabel half out of it. Guy heard him yelp as she slashed with her dagger. Roger tumbled out and grappled the nearest leg, clawing and biting.

  Guy drove in the spurs, calling to the Slut who had Conan’s assailant by the arm; the mercenary could take care of himself, and had already heaved back into the saddle to thrust his foe through the throat. The thieves had his stepmother out of the litter and were clutching for Cecily and the screaming girls when he stormed down on them from behind, striking as he had learned with all the weight of his arm. The blow slammed his buttocks against the cantle as the nearest head split; he wrenched the blade away and swung it under a howling face that leaped from its neck and bounced into the mud. The Slut was on top of a struggling body. Lady Mabel’s captor loosed her and stabbed at Roger, fiercely hanging to his leg. Hand and knife flew separately; his eyes gaped witlessly at his spouting wrist until Guy’s edge cleft between them.

  The rest turned on him like the wolves they were. He flung up his shield and struck past the spear that drove into it. Cecily screamed her husband’s name. The outlaws had hauled her from the second litter, and one heaved her up in his arms to fling her over his shoulder and dive for the thickets. Then Conan was on him, abandoning the treasure, storming over and past Guy’s enemies straight at the abductor.

  Cecily screamed and fought in frenzy, her legs flailing. Conan did not hesitate, but thrust past her billowing skirts as the ruffian looked round on his death, through the ragged beard under his chin. As he fell, jetting scarlet, Conan grabbed her gown and hoisted her into the shelter of his shield. She fought on, still shrieking; the horse reared, striking out with iron-shod hooves, and the outlaws dodged away.

  Guy plunged back to the treasure-cart where there was still work to do. One outlaw was in the cart, the whip-thong round his arm, grappling with the driver; a mercenary was down against the wheel, his comrade bestriding his body as he fought off three or four more. One raised a screech of warning as the stallion hurtled squealing at him, staggered and dropped. The driver toppled over the cart-rail. His assailant stooped to grab up one of the small barrels of silver pennies, and glanced up as Guy wrenched the stallion to a trampling stand alongside.

  The desperate face was that of Wulfric, a man he knew and had talked with, no nameless vermin. Some impulse he never understood made Guy turn his descending sword so that the flat, not the edge, took him on the shoulder. The barrel fell and rolled across the floorboards. He flung himself over the cart’s tail, between the wheels and out past the draught-horse’s hooves. Guy swung round. The rabble was gone. The woods rustled, the thickets shook, an arrow sang past his helmet. The Slut danced back to his side, her tail proudly waving, her ruff bloody. He let the sword droop from his hand, suddenly sick and shaking from his first taste of battle.

  Roger clawed out screaming from under the dead outlaw, his hair and face spattered scarlet. His mother caught him to her breast and stared over his head at Guy. Cecily was still shrieking, beating at Conan’s mailed chest with her fists as he held her across his saddle-bow. Philip pelted back astride his lathered pony that had bolted at the first onset, and out of the woods Lord Reynald and his knights came threshing.

  ‘Let my mother go, you bloody beast!’ Philip screeched, lunging his pony at the mercenary.

  Conan’s stallion shouldered the boy’s mount aside, and he slid her down and set her on her feet. She stumbled wailing to her husband, who stormed at Conan as he pulled his horse up.

  ‘What are you doing with my wife?’

  ‘Saving her from rape.’

  ‘You laid your foul hands on her—’

  ‘Where were you when she needed rescue?’

  ‘You hell-spawned raptor—’

  ‘You sound as though you’d rather a dozen wolves’-heads ravished her than that I should save her! What help or comfort are you to her now? You’re not worthy—’

  ‘Gerard—Gerard—’

  Belatedly he swung out of the saddle to take Cecily in his arms, clumsily patting and muttering awkward endearments. Conan looked down for an instant, and Guy had one glimpse of despairing fury that set his wits racing in comprehension. Then he turned away, the revelation past. In silence they looked at each other, at the sprawled corpses, the dead horse in the treasure-cart’s shafts, at the mercenaries and grooms herding together the strung-out train of sumpter-beasts. The women were out of the litters, some weeping, some gaping huge-eyed at blood and death, Rohese cool and contemptuous with a knife in her hand. Matilda stood silently against Lady Mabel’s skirts as she comforted Roger. His stepmother looked up at Guy.

  ‘I’ll never forget,’ she promised briefly.

  Lord Reynald trampled to them. ‘By the Horns, do you make such a work of driving off a parcel of thieves?’

  ‘There were few of us left to do it,’ Conan reminded him. ‘How many d’you need for such a rabble? Stop that snivelling, you wretched little coward! What sort of heir are you for a man to take pride in?’

  ‘Never doubt Roger’s courage!’ Guy flared. ‘He fought like a wildcat to defend his mother!’

  ‘That puling whelp?’ He snorted, and looked over the dead. ‘Didn’t you take any alive to make an example?’

  ‘This one’s breathing, my lord,’ offered a mercenary, stooping over one huddled heap and heaving it on to its back. As they gathered about it, the breath gurgled in its throat and stopped.

  ‘Not one alive!’ Lord Reynald complained, and kicked the dead man.

  ‘We were too hard-pr
essed to remember examples, my lord.’ The grooms and servants were righting the overturned litter and seeing to the horses. Lord Reynald went to check the treasure-cart. Conan looked down at blood dripping over his knuckles, pulled back his right sleeve, inspected a bloody gash, fumbled to open a saddlebag and proffered a length of linen.

  ‘Tie it up for me.’ Guy glanced at the litters, and he shook his head. ‘No, I don’t want a lady’s tender ministrations. Not the lady I’d get, in any event.’ A crooked smile twisted his mouth awry. He pulled down his sleeve over the bandage and regarded Guy with his normal mocking grin. ‘You’re a self-righteous whelp and your company sets my teeth on edge, but as a pupil you do me credit. You actually remembered what I told you and did it.’

  Guy flushed, remembering how he had almost forgotten it and left the women unguarded, and some of Conan’s contempt for the witless valour of noble knights lodged in his mind. He joined the men working to get the train set to rights and on the road again.

  They could have fared worse. Two grooms, the treasure-cart driver and a routier were wounded, but all were able to resume their duties when bound up. One horse was dead and a litter-horse lamed, so they piled two sumpter-beasts’ loads in a cart to free them for the shafts. Nine outlaws were left to lie where they had fallen, ragged bony heaps already flattening into the mud as though returning to the earth from which they came without benefit of interment. This stretch of road would be safer for travellers for months to come. When the cavalcade started again, herded closer and soberly guarded, Guy glanced back and saw only the dead horse bulking dark by the wayside.

  ‘They’ve gained that much at least,’ Conan commented.

  ‘Gained?’

  ‘A week’s food.’

  ‘The horse?’

  ‘God’s Blood, d’you think they’d have attacked so strong a force unless they’d been starved enough to eat each other?’