Conquest moe-1

by Stewart Binns

  Early in 1063, news reached Melfi that William had invaded the neighbouring state of Maine, following the death of its ruler. Hereward’s focus was now increasingly fixed on the northern horizon. It was becoming apparent that the great territorial prize to be had in northern Europe was England. Great warriors watched it like hawks: not only Duke William in Normandy, but also the equally ferocious Harald Hardrada, King of Norway, and Svein Estrithson, King of the Danes.

  As Hereward speculated about the future of his homeland, Torfida’s love for him deepened. He had become the pride of the Norman army of Apulia but, more importantly, had found a measure of humility to diminish his conceit. He now used judgement to control his instincts and had developed a thoughtfulness to counterbalance his volatility.

  Torfida knew that the north beckoned, and it was not lost on her that their journey was beginning to scribe the arc of a great circle, leading Hereward back towards England.

  10. The Omen

  Everyone was saddened to leave Melfi. Roger granted Hereward his heavy Norman horse, complete with armour, and from the Duke there was a parchment describing his valour in the service of Apulia and Christendom. Lord Roger had asked Hereward to take the title ‘Sir Hereward Great Axe’, as this was how the men of the army referred to him, but he declined, saying that he had been christened Hereward of Bourne and that he would prefer to keep his unadorned family title.

  They had all earned considerable sums in the service of Apulia, especially Hereward in his capacity as a knight. For their journey north, they were able to hire six retainers. They were all Normans who had welcomed the opportunity to return home: a sturdy sergeant and two crossbowmen, a groom, and two servant girls. Hereward and Torfida had risen in the world and now had the distinctive bearing of the sophisticated nobility of Europe.

  They stayed a week in Rome. However, the Papal See was rife with intrigue and plots and not a place in which to linger. However, the rest of the Italian peninsular became an ever-increasing source of wonder for them as they took the opportunity to visit Pisa, Siena, Florence, Bologna and Padua, before completing their sojourn in the magical city of Venice. The great church of St Mark, in the final stages of being rebuilt, was a haven not only for worship, but also for learning and philosophy. Everything on the Italian peninsular seemed to be built on such a vast scale; the churches, roads, palaces, monasteries and castles dwarfed anything they had seen in their homelands.

  Torfida was like a human sponge in collecting knowledge and like a magpie in collecting artefacts. She bought a richly illustrated parchment map of the known world. When she showed the map to the others, they looked on in awe as she tracked their journey around its fringes.

  The map also offered a stark reminder of the next phase of their travels: the Alps. They were grateful that it was high summer; it was not a journey they would have wanted to make in winter. Their passage took them past huge walls of white peaks stretching as far as the eye could see. Hundreds of feet beneath them, like a world in miniature, lay a wide valley of forests, lakes and pastures. At one point, Torfida jumped off her horse and walked into the distance on a tapestry of wild flowers to admire a sight more beautiful than anything she had ever seen.

  After several minutes had passed, Hereward walked over to join her. She was motionless; her eyes were open wide, tears running down her cheeks.

  She looked at him and began to sob. ‘How can anything be so beautiful? I have seen many wonders in many places, but how can this be? This is how Heaven should be.’

  ‘Perhaps it is Heaven.’

  ‘Oh, Hereward, let’s go down into the valley and stay awhile. The children can swim in the lakes; we can catch fish for dinner and collect wild berries. It is so magical.’

  ‘Of course we can stay – as long as you like.’

  He held her tightly, rocking her like a baby. As she buried her head in his chest, he looked out across the vast expanse before them.

  Torfida was right: how could anything be so astonishing?

  They made camp in a wide meadow by a lake, sheltered by a huge wall of rock towering above. Fish were plentiful; there were numerous varieties of berries, as well as mushrooms of all kinds, and the forests teemed with game.

  Gunnhild and Estrith were identical twins and resembled their mother. Although their hair and eyes were not as dark as Torfida’s, they were unmistakably her daughters. They had also inherited her curiosity, picking up anything that moved, and poking, prodding, pulling and plucking anything that did not.

  They were learning to talk in the many languages of their extended family. Knowing only too well that ability with languages was one of the few ways in which a woman could gain a modicum of respect in a world dominated by war and trade, Torfida insisted that everyone in the group spoke to the girls in their native tongue. Not satisfied with that, Torfida was also determined to teach them Greek and Latin.

  From their father, they had inherited boundless energy. They walked very early and were well coordinated and athletic but, unlike their father – whose restlessness and truculence had started as a toddler – Gunnhild and Estrith were well behaved. Indeed, Torfida would not have it any other way.

  The idyllic setting of the Alps put Torfida into a contemplative mood. She did not want to leave, and spent hours weaving fantasies about how they could build a life for themselves high in the mountains and raise their children in peace. Late one afternoon, Torfida was deep in such a reverie when she was suddenly and cruelly reminded of reality.

  She was clambering among the crags, high above their camp, on one of her frequent expeditions to collect specimens of the myriad alpine flowers she used in her medicines. The air suddenly turned foul like the stench of a blacksmith’s furnace and her hair stuck out from her head at right angles. There was a faint but audible crackling in the atmosphere around her and she suddenly felt very cold. Then came an ear-piercing crash, as if the earth were rending itself open, and Torfida was thrown at least ten yards down the crags, landing on her back on a grassy slope. Her whole body ached as if every part of her had been kicked and punched, and she could smell the sickly odours of singed hair and scorched flesh.

  She opened her eyes a few moments later, as a booming echo of thunder rumbled round the mountains. Torrential rain began to fall and, as it did, steam rose from the ground around her, the sky was as black as pitch and the wind began to howl.

  She knew she had been struck by lightning and, by some miracle, had survived. She lay motionless, as if petrified, drenched by the storm’s downpour. Aware only of the continuous screeching in her ears, she was unable to hear Hereward’s desperate calls.

  Martin reached her first, closely followed by Hereward, Alphonso and Einar; all feared she was dead. Martin had seen the lightning go to ground only a few feet from her. Knowing the mountains well, he had sensed the sudden change of atmosphere and the drop in temperature and, realizing that Torfida was high up, had scanned the slopes to locate her.

  Just as he saw her, the bolt struck.

  They carried her down the mountain as her body began to convulse. The skin on her face, legs and hands looked as if it had been hung in a smokehouse; tiny vessels had burst in her eyes, there were trickles of blood from both nostrils and her hair looked as if it had been frizzled in an oven. They could feel how hot her body was, and they noticed that her clothes were smouldering.

  It took Torfida several days to recover. Her bloodshot eyes cleared and oil of lanolin helped restore her hair, but her mood remained sombre. The weather had continued to assail the mountains, even though it was late August. For Torfida, a place that in one moment had been a paradise had, in an instant, presented a glimpse of Hell that would give her nightmares for the rest of her life.

  She spoke to Hereward alone. ‘I had begun to forget our purpose. This is an omen, a warning not to forget again. We must leave tomorrow; time is moving on and God only knows what is happening in England.’

  Torfida began to cry. She looked as bereft as Hereward had
ever seen her.

  ‘The King is old now, perhaps he is dead already. War may have started.’

  ‘Torfida, calm yourself.’

  ‘I am frightened, Hereward. We think we have the ability to make things happen, to change things, but compared to God and the world of nature he created, we are insignificant. That knowledge shakes me to my very core.’

  ‘Torfida, don’t talk like that, I need you. Whatever it is that we’re supposed to be doing with this cursed thing around my neck, I need you.’

  She began to fight back the tears. ‘Hereward, get me out of these mountains. Let’s make haste for Normandy.’

  ‘Get some rest. We’ll break camp in the morning and sleep on lower ground tomorrow night.’

  Hereward kissed her and held her tightly until she finally fell asleep. As he listened to the wind wail around the mountains, he too felt a quiver of anxiety. He had never believed in prophecies and omens, but now he felt a primordial shudder of instinctive fear and, desperate for the reassurance they would bring, he longed to wake the others.

  He fought his demons and held Torfida even tighter. Whether it was an omen or not, Hereward knew that mountains were dangerous places and he feared that lightning could indeed strike twice. He resolved to get as far away as possible, as quickly as Torfida’s recovery would allow.

  Everyone remained subdued for the next few days; they all wanted the mountains to be out of sight and for Torfida to regain her vitality.

  Eventually, after several weeks and a detour to avoid the French strongholds of Paris and Chartres, they entered the Norman province of Evreux. They had not been so far north in a very long time and everyone shivered in the fresh autumnal winds. But, more importantly, Torfida was happier. Hereward stayed close to her. She seemed to be back to her alert, purposeful self. She had cut away all her singed hair, leaving a boyish bob that made her look much younger. Her eyes had regained their brightness and her skin its clarity.

  Torfida’s decisiveness was also back, and she advised Hereward that they should head for Rouen, the seat of Duke William’s power.

  They arrived in Rouen three days later.

  It was a bustling city with new buildings being erected everywhere. The markets were busy and the people seemed affluent. Normandy was thriving. Duke William was on his way home from the cathedral at Jumièges, after giving thanks for victory over the Province of Maine. His invasion earlier in the year had been successful and he now held sway over the whole of northern France above the Loire. Not only that: the King of France, Philip II, was still a minor and the Duke’s only other serious rival, Geoffrey of Anjou, had recently died, leaving little threat from the south.

  After finding lodgings in the city and bidding farewell to their retinue from Melfi, they prepared to watch the Duke on his triumphant return.

  The streets were bursting with people and hundreds of sentries were deployed to keep clear the processional route. The Bishop of Rouen, flanked by the entire hierarchy of the Norman Church, and the newly appointed Bishop of Le Mans, the capital of the conquered Province of Maine, waited at the great door of the cathedral to anoint the conquering hero. Fanning out from the bishops, on both sides, were the abbots from Normandy’s monasteries, the sheriffs from its provinces and the great and the good of the city of Rouen.

  At the centre of the group, and a pace or two ahead, was a woman who, at first glance, could easily have been mistaken for a child. At not much more than four and a half feet tall, she was dwarfed by everyone around her. Matilda, Duchess of Normandy, daughter of Baldwin V, Count of Flanders – William’s most important ally and guardian of the young King Philip of France – was a direct descendent of Alfred the Great of England and had a personality which belied her diminutive stature. It was known throughout Normandy that her marriage to Duke William was happy and that she was quite capable of standing up for herself, even in the presence of her formidable husband. Her tiny frame did not prevent her from enjoying robust health, producing three sons, five daughters and being now heavily pregnant with a ninth child.

  Hereward and Torfida found the mood of excitement in the city infectious. As the horns sounded in front of the cathedral to signal the Duke’s entry into the square, they cheered along with everyone else. The Duke’s archers and crossbowmen came first, followed by a column of infantry, all marching four abreast in excellent order. The bowmen wore leather jerkins with brown woollen leggings, small leather skullcaps and, in addition to their bows, carried seaxs. Wearing mail hauberks and distinctive pointed helmets with long nose-guards, several columns of infantry and cavalry came next, carrying both sword and spear and holding the famous Norman conical shield. Then came the Duke, in the midst of at least a hundred colourfully dressed knights, many of them lords in their own right. With their huge destriers strutting beneath them, most carried a small pennon on their lance to affirm their chevalier status, but some carried much bigger and more elaborately designed gonfalons, which asserted their nobility as barons. The crowd could recognize where each knight came from by the local colours of his pennon or gonfalon; those from towns close to Rouen, such as Fécamp and Yvetot, were greeted by particularly fervent cheers.

  The Duke finally came into Hereward’s view. His ducal coronet covered a mane of thick red hair and his ruddy complexion was framed by a neatly trimmed beard, slightly darker than the hair on his head. He wore an unexceptional woollen cloak over his mail coat and had the same armour and weapons as his knights. However, resting on the pommel of his saddle was the legendary ‘Baculus’, his formidable wooden war club. A weapon of war dating back generations to the Normans’ Viking ancestors, all previous Dukes of Normandy had carried it as an icon of authority and virility.

  Sitting upright on his mount, William did not smile at his subjects, only giving a perfunctory nod to a particularly loud greeting, or to a face that seemed familiar. The crowd was impressed by his physical presence; he was clearly someone born to rule and rule firmly.

  William was not his father’s legitimate son. The old Duke, Robert I, had fallen for a beauty called Herleve, the daughter of a humble tanner from Falaise. No one had been surprised that he had bedded her, but his long-term affection for her and the acceptance of their son, William, as his heir, had caused outrage.

  Following the death of his father, Duke Robert, on the way home from a holy pilgrimage to Jerusalem, William became the Duke of Normandy in July 1035, at the tender age of eight. He was placed in the care of disciplinarian tutors and even harsher martial instructors, watched over day and night by knights loyal to his father, and he was denied any female or maternal presence in his life. His mother died when he was still a teenager, leaving William with few memories of a woman who had shown him little affection. Most boys would have wilted under the pressure, or snapped, but William was strong of body and resolute of mind. He increasingly developed into the role of powerful warrior and leader that had been ordained for him. He became uncompromising, like his tutors, and durable, like his instructors.

  His life had been a long and bitter struggle against internal intrigue and external threats. As he struggled to forge Normandy into the most powerful presence in Europe, he was aided by his two half-brothers: Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, one of his most loyal and trusted confidants, and Robert, Count of Mortain, another close ally.

  When the Duke reached the Bishop of Rouen for his anointing, he surveyed the most powerful subjects in his realm with the air of a man totally at ease with his position as their lord and master.

  The Norman warrior tradition was potent and remorseless, and he was its apotheosis.

  Duke William went hunting immediately after his anointment as Lord of Maine, and it took Hereward and his male companions almost two weeks to gain an audience with him.

  The Duke read Hereward’s parchment of recommendation with a stony face. It was going to be a difficult audience.

  ‘This is an outstanding recommendation, Hereward of Bourne. I know of Guiscard; he is a man not renowned for his ex
cessive generosity, so his testament bears much weight. I see you refused to be dubbed knight, but carry the Order of the Cotentin.’

  ‘I choose to carry my name by birth, your Grace. I like to live a modest life.’

  ‘So do I. I like that in a man. Modesty and discipline are vital to a long life as a warrior. Would you expect to serve me as a knight?’

  ‘I would, your Grace.’

  ‘But without the title?’

  ‘Yes, your Grace.’

  ‘You answer directly; I like that. And what of these men?’

  While the Duke looked them up and down, Hereward introduced Einar, Martin and Alphonso, outlining in detail their various martial talents. Hereward was impressed to see that William was looking at their weapons, checking their appearance, assessing the condition of their clothes and armour and even checking the trim of their hair and beards. The Duke understood soldiers well, and knew how to tell the difference between good and bad.

  ‘They would be my men-at-arms. I would pay them out of my allowance from you, my Lord Duke.’

  William of Normandy smiled for the first time. ‘You amuse me, Englishman. I don’t usually pay my knights; their service comes to me as a tithe through the obligation owed from the grant of their lands and titles.’

  ‘But they are your kinsmen, your Grace. I would serve you as a mercenary.’

  ‘Mercenaries usually serve as infantry or levies, not as knights.’

  ‘But I am an exceptional soldier.’