It was ever thus. Townsfolk, instilled with a courageous heart and a preacher’s zeal, would believe themselves indestructible. They would gather behind their walls and shout oaths to their enemies and prayers to their God, and genuinely begin to feel that they could, through some divine power, repel an army. But then that army would come, and it would not be a host of demons, dissolving amid the citizens’ projected piety, but men. Real men with real cannon and real muskets and real blades, and they would prick the self-righteous bubble, breach the walls and burn the town. Stryker had seen it many times, and now it was happening in his homeland.
He glanced in on stores and homes, many with their doors caved inwards, splintered by savage boot heels and the butts of muskets. Several were illuminated, their insides glowing orange where small fires were taking hold, and he could see the destruction within. Nothing of value was left: tables were upended and cupboards flung open, their innards disgorged haphazardly across bloody floorboards. Chairs – used to batter open strongboxes and locked doors – were smashed into a myriad jagged shards and shelves were swept violently clean.
Passing one such smallholding, Stryker drew close to a group of men – perhaps five or six – gathered at the street’s edge to rifle through a large chest. It was lighter out in the open, for the debris-strewn road was bathed in the glow of the smouldering town, and one of the group had evidently had the forethought to drag the prize from within the dishevelled building.
Stryker took a wide berth as he reached the men. He understood their behaviour, had partaken of it in younger days, and knew that they would be dangerous to engage, strong drink and plunder transforming them from soldiers to a pack of wolves. He drew his cloak tight, dipping his head so that the brim of his hat cast shadows across his face.
One of the men looked up. ‘Hold, cully.’
Stryker ignored him, though he felt his pulse gather pace.
‘I said,’ the man repeated, the threat in his tone unmistakable as he stood, moving sideways to block Stryker’s path, ‘hold.’
The man was big, as tall as Stryker, and broad of shoulder and neck. Stryker did not recognize the uniform, but then many in the king’s ranks were merely clothed in what they had stood up in when they first enlisted. Even so, a lack of regimental recognition did not prevent Stryker detecting the danger the man presented. The aggressor was clearly muscular, and the gleam in his dark eyes had at least a modicum of intelligence. Most ominously, the broad, bucktoothed grin was that of a man supreme in confidence.
Stryker met the bucktooth’s gaze levelly. ‘None of your concern. Out of my way.’
‘Oh, I thinks it is, cully,’ the bucktooth said in low tones. He was close enough for Stryker to smell the stench of wine on his breath. ‘I thinks it sore is, an’ no mistake.’ He ran small eyes from the feathers at Stryker’s hat band down to his tall cavalry boots. ‘Got a pretty penny, I’d say. Turn out yer pockets. You’ll pay a toll to me an’ my fedaries.’
‘I’m in a rare black mood,’ Stryker said slowly, making to move past, ‘and wish only to press on.’
A thick-fingered hand jerked up to press against Stryker’s sternum. ‘Makes not a fig o’ fuckin’ difference to me, General,’ the bucktooth growled. ‘Every man for ’imself tonight.’
The rest of the group were standing now, revelling in a confrontation.
‘Last chance, you beef-brained router,’ Stryker said, lifting his chin slightly so that his features were bathed in the smouldering building’s glow.
The bucktooth’s beady eyes widened in sudden alarm as he gazed into a face he had never before seen, yet instantly recognised. An unmistakable face, narrow and feral, its ragged patch of swirling scar tissue appearing demonic in the livid orange light.
‘I—I’m sorry, sir,’ was all he could say as he stepped quickly out of Stryker’s path.
Stryker turned to the rest of the looters, who stared at him with slack expressions. ‘Anyone else?’ he snarled. ‘You have the advantage of numbers, gentlemen. Do you wish to be as courageous as your friend, here?’
To a man, the looters shot wide-eyed glances at the buck-tooth. The big soldier simply stared at his boots, all trace of bravery long gone, shoulders sagging as though he were a giant set of empty bellows.
Stryker removed his hat, rearranging the feathers carefully, before returning it and flattening down his crusty coat. ‘I thought as much.’
‘Find his company commander,’ Lancelot Forrester said as he inspected the spur of an upturned boot.
Stryker glanced up from his tankard of small beer. ‘To what end?’
Forrester was seated opposite Stryker at the low table, and his small teeth gleamed white in the guttering candle glow as he grinned wolfishly. ‘Gauntlet the insubordinate bastard.’
The friends, along with four of Colonel Mowbray’s other company captains, were in a small room above the Golden Goose taphouse. It was a good building to occupy, overlooking the marketplace and at a relatively safe distance from any of the town’s fires. Mowbray had commandeered the entire building for his officers’ billets, and the captains, as befitted the dignity of their rank, would share the group of smaller rooms on the first of three floors. They had congregated in one such room to share a drink, toasting their collective survival.
‘I probably would,’ Stryker said, considering the idea. Making the bucktooth’s own company whip him with gloves filled with musket-balls was a tempting punishment. ‘But he did not know who I was at first.’
‘You’re too lenient,’ Forrester said, turning his attention back to the long, black boot.
‘If he’d decided to take me on, things would have been different, I assure you.’
‘I do not think anyone doubts that,’ said a tall, willowy man as he strode into the chamber, the candle flames casting shadows over a head of tight, golden curls and severely crooked nose.
‘Captain Kuyt.’ Stryker stood hurriedly to greet the most senior of Mowbray’s captains. His four comrades stood too, snatching off hats in salute.
First Captain Aad Kuyt went to the nearest table, lifted a pewter goblet and drained its contents, letting a small belch escape between thin lips. ‘Sit, gentlemen,’ he said, his voice smooth in confidence but distinct in origin. His tone was similar to that of Prince Rupert, but more pronounced, its source more definitely rooted in the Netherlands. ‘Sir Edmund informs me we are to follow the general to Gloucester.’
Stryker stared up at him. ‘Follow, sir?’
Kuyt sighed deeply before continuing. ‘Prince Rupert wishes his army to be—’ He chewed the inside of his mouth as the most apt word proved elusive. ‘Fast.’ The word ended up being uttered more as a question than a statement.
‘Flying,’ another voice interceded. It was Bottomley, the regiment’s third-ranked captain. Bottomley was vastly corpulent, with yellow-bagged eyes and milky skin that seemed to glow against the coke blackness of his thick hair and neat whiskers. ‘I overheard the colonel speaking with Lieutenant-Colonel Baxter. Prince Rupert means to have a flying column moving across the Midlands with stealth, attacking before the enemy’s made its defences properly stout.’
Kuyt offered a slight bow. ‘Thank you, Job. A flying column. And to have speed, Rupert must ride. He cannot wait upon infantry. So we follow his wake.’
‘And Gloucester is his next target?’ Stryker asked.
‘Aye,’ confirmed Kuyt. ‘He will take his horse and dragooners nor’-west at dawn and call upon the town to surrender. Some foot are to form rearguard. Some must stay.’
‘We go,’ said a man sat on a three-legged stool in the room’s far corner. Lettis Fullwood was newly commissioned, and as the regiment’s sixth captain, was the lowest ranked of the company commanders. The man, in his mid twenties, had a sickly countenance of sallow skin and dense pockmarks. ‘Sir,’ he added, immediately looking abashed.
Captain Kuyt nodded. ‘We go. Gloucester first, and then perhaps Bristol. Blunt Bob has been made aware, so your mounts wi
ll be prepared by sun-up.’
Stryker thought of Vos, his giant sorrel-coated stallion, and felt a mighty sense of relief that Blunt Bob was overseeing his care during their stay in this precarious town. Vos was an excellent horse, one that had been with him for many years. True, he had been captured by Captain Tainton in the killing ground of Shinfield Forest the previous autumn, but had been discovered, to Stryker’s great joy, tethered with other captured mounts in a barn at the eastern edge of Old Brentford, after that fierce battle had finally ended.
‘So tonight we round up our lads,’ Kuyt went on. ‘They must be ready for our march.’
Stryker rubbed rough fingers across his prickly chin. ‘No easy task.’
Kuyt shot him a hard look. ‘Problem?’
‘No, sir, but you have been a soldier as long as I.’
‘Longer,’ Kuyt corrected.
Stryker dipped his head. ‘So you will know that to deny a man his right to plunder is to invite trouble.’
‘Then you will inform Prince Rupert that his infantry cannot do as they are ordered?’
Stryker stood up, wincing as his shoulder twinged at the sudden movement. ‘No, sir. Of course not.’
Kuyt nodded curtly, eyes flicking to each man in turn. ‘Then you have your orders, gentlemen.’
Forrester was bent forward, red-faced, hauling at the long sleeve of leather swathing his lower leg. ‘Damn these new boots! I’ll see to the men as soon as I can get this ill-fitting bloody thing on to my foot.’
‘It’s those enormous calves,’ Stryker said, seeing the others stifle smirks.
Forrester glared up at him. ‘Enormous due to muscle, Stryker! Too much cursed marching!’
‘Oberon does all your marching, Forry,’ Stryker said, keeping his face blank. ‘Poor beast.’
‘I am cut to the quick,’ Forrester protested, though without conviction. Finally the boot jerked upwards and he grinned triumphantly. ‘There!’
The company commanders filed out of the room under the gaze of Mowbray’s First Captain. Stryker was last out, and Kuyt hailed him, compelling him to turn back. ‘I have one other task for you, Stryker.’
They were alone now, and Stryker raised his scarred brow. ‘Sir?’
‘There is a man here, in this building, we are safeguarding.’ His voice was low, conspiratorial. ‘He has been ordered to Prince Rupert’s billet. I want you to escort him.’
‘I don’t understand, sir. The general’s quarters are only a matter of three of four hundred yards away. Just across the marketplace.’
‘The man is important,’ Kuyt said simply.
‘And the town is dangerous,’ another voice suddenly interrupted from out in the corridor.
Stryker turned to the doorway, to see two men enter the room, neither of whom he recognized. The first was in his early forties, tall, square-jawed and bright-eyed. Golden hair fell from beneath the brim of his hat to his shoulders, thick, coarse and straight, like a straw thatch. ‘The name is Jonathan Blaze,’ he said in a loud, confident tone.
Stryker shook the proffered hand, noticing the swirling, mottled skin of the man’s fingers. ‘You deal in ordnance?’
Blaze grinned, bearing long, white teeth. ‘Keenly observed, Captain. I am a fireworker, yes. More than that. I deal in all types of explosive. Artillery, grenadoes, petards.’ With a small nod, Blaze indicated his companion. ‘My assistant Jesper Rontry.’
Rontry was a man of similar age to Blaze but of far smaller stature, with thinning, mousy hair above his ears, a completely bald pate and a disposition as dissimilar to his master’s as Stryker could imagine possible. He seemed sickly, frail, and flinched at every scream or crash coming from outside the tavern, while his eyelids were perpetually screwed down, as if he could not help but wince in the presence of such warlike men.
Rontry’s nose was pinched and red at the tip, made to run thick with sticky mucus by the cold. ‘Captain,’ he acknowledged, wiping a dirty sleeve across his upper lip. ‘I am pleased to make your—’
‘Enough of your twittering, Jes,’ Blaze interrupted suddenly, waving a big hand towards his assistant as if swotting a fly. Rontry dropped his gaze to the straw beneath his boots. Blaze stared at Stryker. ‘The prince would undermine any city that defies him. Blow their walls to kingdom come. For that he requires my expertise.’
‘Which is why you must keep him alive,’ Kuyt said.
Stryker glanced at his superior. ‘Escort Master Blaze to the general’s billet?’
Kuyt nodded. ‘Only that, Stryker. Then you may see to your men.’ He pulled a mildly apologetic expression. ‘It is a simple task, I admit, but I am a mercenary, Stryker. I do not easily trust.’
‘I’ll see him safe, sir.’
‘My apologies for dragging you from your duties, Captain,’ Blaze said, addressing Stryker as the trio crossed the debris-strewn marketplace, ‘but I am quite sure Jesper and I would not fair well on our own tonight.’
That was true, Stryker thought, as he looked at the booming-voiced fireworker. ‘The streets are not safe,’ he agreed. ‘After a storming, our men are akin to wild animals.’
‘It is not only the king’s men we fear, sir,’ Blaze replied.
‘Oh?’
‘Parliament’s supporters in the town would have me flayed alive if they could,’ Blaze explained, his wide face almost glowing with pride. ‘I am a wanted man, you know.’
‘A criminal?’ Stryker asked, Blaze’s haughty tone already beginning to grate.
He noticed Rontry wince.
‘Not a bit of it, Captain,’ Blaze said, evidently taking no offence at Stryker’s curtness.
‘A genius!’ Rontry blurted.
‘Hush, Jes,’ Blaze commanded, again making the swotting gesture at his assistant.
Stryker sensed that the way had been left open for him to ask Blaze about his supposed genius. He kept his mouth shut.
‘Master Blaze,’ Jesper Rontry began, his legs scuttling rapidly to keep pace with the taller men, ‘is an expert in his field. There are very few in the land as capable as he. Consequently the enemy would pay dear to be rid of him.’
Stryker thought back to the approach towards Cirencester, remembering all too well the daunting prospect of breaching the web of defences protecting the town’s south-western entrance. But those barriers had vanished in great tongues of flame and clouds of filthy smoke, the explosion ringing hours later in his ears. ‘It was you,’ he said suddenly, stride faltering. ‘You blew the barricades at the Barton, didn’t you?’
Blaze revealed those dazzling teeth again. ‘An odious task, I don’t mind telling you,’ he said. ‘Or do I mean odorous? Hid myself all that night in a cart full of rotting mulch with nought but the petard as company.’
‘I’d have stayed with you,’ Rontry interrupted.
Blaze wrinkled his long nose. ‘Bloody freezing it was.’
‘You placed a petard in a cart,’ Stryker said, for it was all beginning to make sense, ‘and left the cart against the barricade.’
‘Aye,’ Blaze nodded. ‘I’d already packed the thing full of black powder, so it simply remained for me to listen for Rupert’s trumpets, light the bugger and run like hell.’
‘Run like hell?’ Stryker repeated as they picked up the pace again. ‘That’s a brave act in itself, Master Blaze, for you might have found a musket-ball between your shoulders.’
Blaze casually picked grime from beneath his broad fingernails. ‘They’d be lucky to hit a man from forty yards, Captain,’ he said, a wry smile turning up the corner of his mouth. ‘By the time they realised what I was about, I was out of any effective range.’
Stryker touched a finger to his hat in acknowledgement of the feat. ‘Odious or odorous, Master Blaze, it worked us a miracle.’
‘You are most welcome, Captain,’ Blaze said, and Rontry, while saying nothing, looked like he might burst with pride.
‘We are here, sir,’ Stryker said after a short while. He pointed at a big stone building,
once home, he presumed, to a wealthy member of the local mercantile class. Armed men in blue clothing guarded the door. ‘The prince’s headquarters.’
Blaze shook Stryker’s hand. ‘Thank you, Captain. Perhaps our paths will cross in the future.’
‘One never knows, sir.’
Stryker returned to the Golden Goose and stepped into its capacious taproom.
‘Sir,’ a voice snapped from the gloom.
It took a few moments for Stryker’s vision to become accustomed to the gloomier surroundings, but, sure enough, the man he had expected to see was standing, straight-backed and square-shouldered against the bar. Skellen had been drinking, for there was a wooden cup beside him, but he stood upright and looked sober. Around him were a handful of Stryker’s men, and he indicated that they should all follow.
Stryker shoved open the tavern’s heavy oaken door. ‘With me.’
‘Off for a stroll, sir?’ Skellen asked, his expression blank but his tone wry.
‘Don’t be so bloody impudent.’
‘Sorry, sir, but that’s what Cap’n Forrester said.’
‘Of course he did. We’re to gather the men. The Prince intends to march on Gloucester at first light.’
They were out in the street now, the glow of fires affording the night a strange luminosity. Skellen and Heel walked shoulder to shoulder with Stryker, followed by his standard-bearer, Ensign Chase, and two of his corporals, Tresick and Shephard.
‘Where’s the lieutenant?’ Stryker asked.
‘Ain’t seen ’im, sir,’ Skellen replied, almost too quickly.
Stryker shot him a hard glance. ‘Are you covering for him?’
Skellen fixed his gaze on a point just above Stryker’s shoulder. ‘’Course not, sir.’
‘Think carefully, Moses,’ Stryker said, turning to Sergeant Heel. He knew attempting to break through Skellen’s well-practised impassivity would be futile, but Heel was easier to coerce. ‘Where is Lieutenant Burton? If you lie to me, Sergeant, it will not go well for you.’
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