‘Yes, Frip.’
Berenger took his horse back down the line until he was back at the place where Robin had first seen something. ‘See anything in there, Clip?’
‘I can see trees. What else do you expect me to see?’
‘We’ll ride in along that path, Clip. Keep your eyes and ears open, all of you. This could be another ambush,’ Berenger called, and spurred his mount onwards. He had no desire to ride at a slow pace to allow a crossbowman time to draw a line on him. Instead he rode in at a sharp canter, close to the line of the trees on the left, studying the trees at the other side of the track, searching for a paler smudge in among the ferns and bushes that thickly filled the darkness. There was nothing, only large oak and elm boughs and occasional chestnuts. He saw only verdant growth, heavy, hanging branches, and . . . a face. And another.
‘Ware! Ambush!’
Berenger roared and clapped spurs to the beast’s flanks, bending low as the first bolt flew over him, and already he was flying along. There was a man before him, then two more, all with crossbows, all aiming, but before they could loose their weapons, he was on them, jumping over the middle of the three, the horse’s hoofs striking his assailant on his helmet and knocking it away with a ringing clatter. Berenger landed, his horse wrenching from side to side, and Berenger had to tear the reins round to attract its attention, then he was hurtling back, his sword out and flashing at the archer on his right. The man went down with a shriek, but the last man had slipped back into the forest again, out of sight.
Pierre and Felix were sitting on their mounts with mouths agape, while Clip and Dogbreath were darting hither and thither from one man to another lying on the ground. When Berenger approached, he saw that Clip was weighing a man’s purse in his hands and pulling a face. ‘Hardly enough for a loaf of bread. I tell you, these were all peasants.’
‘How can you tell?’ Felix said.
‘Even you can see they made their attempt too soon, can’t you? We weren’t all in their trap, and the men who tried to kill us had no skill.’
Berenger explained, ‘They loosed their bows with their eyes shut, desperate to send their bolts at us and then run, so they all missed, and when we got closer, they were so panicked they ran along between the trees. If they were sensible, they’d have jumped in among the trees. We couldn’t ride there to hunt them down, and they could have spanned their bows again and taken us one by one. As it is, these peasants died for nothing. They harmed none of us, and gave us every opportunity to kill them. Fools!’
He was bitter. All thoughts of eagerly accepting death, such as he had known at Uzerche, were gone now. Berenger could not die and leave his men to be misused in the way that these peasants had been. Their lives had been flung away as though they were worthy of little more than death. They were mere stalks of wheat to be scythed down. It was wasteful, sheer foolishness.
Then he began to wonder whether there was some reason after all. ‘Clip, did you find their commander?’
‘No. Only these lummoxes,’ he said, kicking the nearest body.
‘Why would they throw men like this at us? They must realise that we would trample them into the dirt.’
‘It’s too few to cause us a real headache,’ Clip said.
‘But enough to hold us up a short while,’ Berenger said.
‘Why bother?’ Felix asked.
‘Clip, Dogbreath, remount, fast!’ Berenger said.
‘Just let me . . .’ Clip began.
‘No! String your bow and get on your horse now! This must have been a distraction while they attack our vanguard. Why else would they throw so few without effective leadership at us here? Quick! Back to the Captal!’
It was the early evening when Béatrice happened to see her.
There was a line of women who were marching wives to the men, some women who had been captured and forced to submit, but mostly girls who had seen in the English army an opportunity for money and food. Many were peasant children orphaned by the wars, although some had been attracted to a specific man and chose to march with him and his comrades. Some remained with the one man, although others were happy to offer their affections to many in return for money, food or drink. Some were raucous, flamboyant characters, while others trudged reluctantly, heads hung low.
It was when they stopped that Béatrice walked about the women’s part of the camp and saw her again.
Gaillarde was foraging, and there was a fair-haired man with her. Both were hunting about for sticks and tinder, preparing to make a fire for their evening meal, and Béatrice felt a flood of warm relief wash through her.
‘Gaillarde!’
The woman’s head snapped around, and Béatrice saw the fair-haired man look from Gaillarde to her, and then over to a little fire. He looked suddenly terrified.
Béatrice stepped forward to Gaillarde, but even as she did so, she saw Gaillarde shaking her head vigorously and stepping away. ‘Go! Go away! Quickly, before he . . .’
‘What is it, Gaillarde?’
But Gaillarde and the scared man were drawing away. And then Béatrice saw the black-haired man at the fire. His eyes were fixed on her and she suddenly realised why the other two were so scared.
He had the face of a Devil.
Berenger galloped from the woods with his pony puffing and blowing like an aged nag, his men straggling behind him as they urged their own beasts to greater efforts.
‘Robin, that was a diversion!’ he bellowed as he came closer. ‘The main attack must be ahead! Ride now, warn the Captal de Buch!’
Robin needed no second encouragement, but clapped his heels to his pony and took off after the leader of their army, Berenger clattering along behind.
The force under the Captal de Buch was over a thousand strong, and it marched slowly, the men carrying heavy loads as well as their weaponry. There was no certainty of obtaining food while they were on the march. Berenger rode along behind Robin, wiping away the spatters of mud that Robin’s horse threw in its wake, until they were past the main column and had reached the vanguard.
‘Robin!’ Berenger shouted. ‘There! The Captal!’
Robin heard his call and followed his pointing finger, riding to the group of fifteen knights and squires who were plodding on in the muddy road.
That was when the trap was sprung.
A flash of powder and a thick cloud of smoke on the left showed that there was a gonne of some sort, and Berenger felt as though his bowels were going to dissolve. A large stone ball was flung from the midst of the smoke and over the heads of the startled Captal and his commanders, and then there was a loud hissing, and Berenger saw a plume of greasy grey smoke rising from the trees. A scream came from that direction, but he ignored it, riding to the Captal, shouting, ‘Ambush! Ambush!’
His warning was too late, he saw, and he groaned. A sudden flurry of heavy bolts and arrows flew from the front and a little behind, and while the men were recovering from that, a second flight struck them. Horses shocked and terrified by the gonne’s shot were stung by these darts, which, while they were not driven by bows as powerful as the English longbows, were enough to penetrate the cuir bouilli of the mounts. Maddened by the stinging barbs, several horses reared and plunged, throwing their riders and hurtling off. Berenger saw a movement from in front, and then the main attack was launched: thirty or more horsemen screaming and yelling, lances couched, riding straight at the Captal and his men.
But the Captal was no novice to fighting. He gave a command and his men-at-arms spread out, donning bascinets, pulling down visors, and advancing. On a second command, the first men trotted forward, then cantered, and suddenly they were galloping. A third command and the Captal himself and the remaining men were hurtling in the wake of the first row, and then the squires and sergeants were following with remounts. Meanwhile two centeners had already cursed and bullied the archers from their mounts, and had them string their bows and send the first of many flights of arrows into the trees where the French archers an
d gonnes were.
Berenger watched with his heart pounding as the Captal and his men crashed into the French. There was a rattling sound like a thousand pewter plates being thrown together on a stone floor, and then the English were through the French, leaving a number of inert bodies. The Captal’s horse seemed crazed, rearing and kicking, then trying to bite another beast with a Frenchman on its back. There was a man on the ground looking dazed, sitting and holding his head. The Captal’s mount came down heavily with both forehoofs and Berenger didn’t see him again.
Meanwhile the little plain was filled with the ringing of steel as the warriors drew their swords to finish the battle. In only a short time the French cavalry had been put to flight.
Exchanging a glance, Berenger and Robin rode for the place where the blackened undergrowth spoke of the gonne. Berenger avoided the powder-burned bushes, but rode to the side where the undergrowth looked thick, and as his horse entered, he saw three men fumbling with a barrel of powder. He rode at them, panicking as he saw the powder spilling all over the ground, and when his horse stood in the middle of it, but their serpentine was damp or ineffective, because nothing happened. He lunged at the nearer of the men, and saw a spear-point thrusting at his belly, knocking it away with only a moment to spare, and then he was kicking his beast on again and hacking at a man, who held up a broken barrel for defence, but Berenger’s blade caught all his fingers and chopped them off as easily as a knife cutting through chive stems. When the man screamed and threw the barrel at Berenger’s head, Robin was behind him, slashing at his bare pate.
They moved through the undergrowth with caution, but soon they were through the woods and at the far side they could see the remnants of the infantry running away over the surrounding fields. Soon, from either side, they saw English riders in pursuit.
‘You want to join them?’ Robin said.
‘No. I’ve killed enough today,’ Berenger said. He looked down at his sword. There was a notch on the blade that had not been there earlier. He pulled a face and wiped the steel on his sleeve, then thrust it away into his scabbard before leading the way back to the column.
The Captal de Buch was waiting when they both rode back to the column. The Captal pulled his bascinet from his head and nodded to Berenger and Robin. ‘How did you know that was going to happen?’ he asked.
Berenger explained about the diversionary attack and how he had immediately thought that there could only be one reason for it.
‘You did well, Vintener.’ His stern, square features suddenly broke into a grin. ‘Although you were almost too late, hey? Next time, more quick. But I thank you.’
He rode on, leaving Robin and Berenger. They took their horses back along the column towards their own men.
‘At least he will remember your name, Frip,’ Robin said.
‘Perhaps,’ Berenger said. He grinned without humour. ‘So does a King’s Justice when he gives a death sentence!’
Thomas de Ladit wanted to return to the safety of Navarre. He was the King’s man, after all, and while poor Charles languished in prison, waiting for the King of France to forget his anger, it was Thomas’s duty, so he thought, to go and keep the administration of Charles’s lands in good order. It was categorically not his responsibility to remain here in France, at his own risk, to help the English, allies of King Charles though they may be.
He left the Prince of Wales’s pavilion. They were inside, staring at maps and trying to make sense of the landscape about them, and he was, frankly, fed up. He didn’t know this part of the land, and if they were so keen to have better information about the terrain, they should ride out themselves and view it. For his part, he craved only a real bed and a chance to sleep for a week. Being on campaign with an army like this was little better than hard labour. Constantly marching, riding, stopping and having a scrappy meal of pottage and bread, and then sleeping on a tree-root or stone as best he could, before lurching up and being forced to repeat it.
This was no life for a man used to the comforts of life in King Charles’s court.
He stood and stared out at the men all around. Thousands of them, sprawling out in every direction. Armourers and farriers belting out their own irregular timpany; cooks bellowing for salt as they sweated over their fires, kicking at their servants; soldiers sweeping their whetstones over swords or daggers already razor-sharp; dogs bickering and snarling at each other – the noise was deafening.
Strolling away from the worst of the hubbub, he found himself in among Gascons, and then more English. The voices, the dialects and languages buffeted his ears like a stormy sea striking a harbour. There was no regularity.
‘Thomas!’
Suddenly he was grabbed from behind, and he found himself staring into the face of Bernard.
‘What are you doing here?’ he cried.
Friday 26 August
They passed an uncomfortable night, with the rain still falling in a desultory fashion as though it was itself as bored with dampening the men as they were of being soaked. Berenger sat with his cloak over him, his hat dribbling water like an old man trying to drink with a broken jaw, squatting before a fire, his back to a tree. Before him in the flames of the campfire he saw his wife, smiling, and then looking at him with sadness in her eyes; and then her face smoothed out and rounded, and he was looking into the face of Alazais, the widow of Uzerche, and she was beseeching him to avenge her murder and the murder of her boys. Their faces, too, he saw in the flames, and then in the embers as the rain slowly drowned the fire.
He must have slept.
Berenger came awake startled, all in a sudden, with the shock that makes a man draw a deep breath, like the first inhalation of a newly born child. He couldn’t tell what had woken him, but all about him the sun was beginning to brighten the sky. Berenger rose stiffly, feeling the tendons and joints moving roughly, like old bolts sliding in unoiled channels. He was old. Too old for this kind of life any more. He didn’t know how Grandarse managed, nor Sir John. They both of them were older than he, but neither, he thought, woke with this dullness behind the eyes. It was debilitating to always have this sensation of thick, clogged weariness on waking.
But a man had work to do, no matter how he felt. Berenger rose and shook out his cloak, wrung out his hat again, and studied it with dispassionate appraisal. It was oddly bent and twisted from too many occasions of being cleaned and dried. It was comfortable, but surely, when they took a fresh town he would have to find a hatter who could provide him with a newer garment that would offer greater protection from the elements. He hoped so.
He saw to his own gear, then woke the men. The only man missing was Robin, who reappeared later, when the men were almost all on their feet. He had gone to defecate, he said when asked. Berenger didn’t care. He had spent his time reigniting the fire and forming his own oatcake, setting it to cook with his sign – a ‘B’ – cut into the upper surface so no one could claim it as their own. When it was hot and toasted on the outside from the too-vigorous flames, he packed his gear and was soon ready with his horse saddled and bridled. When Robin appeared, throwing his blanket over his pony, then setting the saddle and tightening the girth, Berenger peered at him.
‘Imbert. Is he the one?’
Robin hesitated without meeting his gaze. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I know you don’t sleep with the rest of the men. You wander off and return in the morning. But if you’re trying to avoid Imbert, that won’t work. He’ll figure out one day, and then he’ll be able to hurt you away from all the rest of the vintaine.’
‘So I should stay here and wait for him to come to me in the night? I should allow him to kill me at his leisure?’
‘No. But if you are here, it will be easier for you to get the help of others to subdue him. He is not popular with the other men. You are.’
‘What does that matter? He’s strong and powerful. He is accepted by all the leaders here.’
‘The Prince and the Captal de Buch are more appreciati
ve of their archers than a meathead like Imbert. But if he tries to attack you, I will see him flogged. Unless you have a better idea?’
‘No. A good flogging will suit him fine,’ Robin said. He finished tightening the girth, and then paused, looking up at Berenger. ‘Thanks, Fripper.’
‘I’ll tell him. Just make sure your dispute doesn’t make for bad feelings in the vintaine.’
They crossed the river early that morning.
Berenger had a feeling that this would be a day he would remember when he spoke to Imbert and had to threaten the man of the consequences if there was more trouble between him and Robin. Later, staring down at the remains of the bridge over the River Cher, he knew he would have good cause.
Uprights were leaning drunkenly, and even as the army watched, the last hammer blows broke the final supports. As Berenger stared, he saw the last sections of the bridge move slowly from the verticals and begin to fall into the waters, individual planks pulling away from the rest of the structure, then the heavy beams that took the full weight of the bridge, all traffic tumbling after them, and the whole of the main roadway floating away like a vast barge. At last, the noise of hammering and then cries and the sound of wood rending and tearing came to them on the air.
‘That looks like the furthest extent of our ride,’ Robin said.
Berenger glanced at him. ‘You think so? If there’s a town up there, and there’s a river here, that means someone used to cross the river before the bridge was built. So, somewhere down there is a ford. All we have to do is find it.’
‘A ford?’ Robin said. ‘Over that river? It’s huge!’
‘Not as big as the Seine when we crossed that ten years ago,’ Berenger said. As he spoke, the command to proceed came, and before long Berenger was being called to the front.
‘Sir?’
The Captal looked as though he was ready to beat to death the first man who answered back or who seemed to thwart him. ‘I want to know . . . How can we cross that river? We must get to Vierzon on the other side.’
Blood of the Innocents Page 30