by Dan Davis
Jocelyn turned his helmeted head toward me.
“I hear the sound of battle,” I said. “Up ahead.”
“The sheriff has found William,” Jocelyn said.
“Or the other way around,” I said, speaking quickly. “Jocelyn, you and Anselm lead your five archers up the left through this field. Swein, you take six of your fellows and take up position to the right of the village. Sir Guy, come along with me and these five fine fellows here. We knights to close in from three sides, each covered by the bowmen. And if any of you archers shoot me in the back, I shall rip your giblets out. Move now, quickly now.”
The archers all dismounted and the three groups spread out from one another, the outer two circling through the fields to either side of the village.
Unslinging my shield, I advanced my horse slowly forward on the track, right up the hill toward the centre into the main street. Sir Guy rode beside me on his sturdy little rouncey.
The sounds of battle grew as I reached the top of the rise.
Inside the village, men were dying.
The sheriff’s men were fighting for their lives.
Two rows of houses, a wide street ran through in between the rows. In the centre, a small group of knights and men at arms fought back to back. Bodies, limbs, and entrails lay at their feet in pools of blood. Their horses were lying dead or dying all over the village, some still kicking their feet and thrashing, blood streaking down their flanks. In the rear of the village, one horse walked slowly left to right, dragging her entrails along the dirt behind her.
A group of men attacked them with darting and jabbing with swords, swinging blades in scything motions. Seven of them, with another man standing apart. All wore iron caps. A couple had spears, another a quarterstaff, and a couple with clubs. Most wore filthy gambesons, the rest in those green tunics. They moved like William’s monsters.
They were laughing, jeering, and cheering each other on.
Sheriff de Lacy was in the centre of those men, covered in blood, without a helm, parrying attacks with a bent blade. The men with the sticks were darting in, clouting the sheriff’s men with them and dancing gleefully out.
Sir Guy of Gisbourne, all credit to the man, cried out, “Roger!” and spurred his horse straight down the track toward his master and friend.
“The sheriff’s men are the centre group,” I shouted to the archers and raked my heels back.
My horse had been trained fairly well for the charge. He was often nervous and in high spirits around any sort of excitement and this time, he did not fail to be himself.
He swerved away from the track, trying to avoid the stench of blood and shrieking of the dying. I could not control him so I allowed him to veer to the left.
As he moved aside from the track, the arrows shot past me and sank into the jeering attackers.
A couple of the shots hit their marks, making that wet-solid sound of meat being punched through by steel. Those men went down, staggered and knocked back.
All the attackers broke off, spinning about, looking for the archers.
Guy bore down on them, his sword point forward and low, ready to spear it through the nearest man.
But Guy of Gisbourne had no true notion of the speed and power of the men he faced. What was a charging horse to the power of men filled with William’s blood?
The three nearest men charged forward and swarmed Guy’s horse, knocking it aside and bearing the beast down, with the rider crashing hard into the street. His sword spun aside, glinting as it momentarily left the long shadow and reflected the blood-red setting sun behind me.
I left my horse and ran toward Guy, the sheriff, and his men.
Arrows slashed through the air from behind me, most hitting home, smacking into the men.
More arrows from the left and right, shot from the flat, slapping into William’s men, who snarled and jeered.
The three nearest broke off from Guy and his horse, which was bleeding from the neck, the coat shining and sleek with it.
The boldest of the men wore a gambeson with a mail coif and he was faster almost than even I could see. He swung a rusted falchion at my head as I drew near, which was a terrible mistake on his part. A falchion is a single edged meat cleaver and wonderful for cutting open the flesh of non-armoured opponents. Whereas I was in full mail, shield, helm, and he should have retreated immediately. Instead, I took some of the weight of his blow with my shield, rolling with his wild swing to guide it past me, then pushed his blade away, throwing him off balance. I thrust at his open side, piercing him through the gambeson under his ribs and he screamed, reeling away. His two men were on me, one with a sword, and the other with a sturdy club. Both had arrow shafts sticking from their body.
They were savage and quite clearly trusted their speed and strength to overcome their paltry arms and armour. After all, they had just butchered the sheriff’s men, who had been all armoured as well as me. But they had not encountered my speed before.
I gutted the swordsman and took a huge blow to the side of my helm from the club, which shattered the wood and knocked my eyes out of alignment. I could see enough to pull the back edge of my blade through the swordsman’s throat.
The falchion-armed man I had run through ran away back to his fellows, as did the man with the broken club.
I straightened my helm in time to see William’s creatures fleeing from the centre of the village. They spread apart from each other and away from the sheriff and his two surviving fellows. At first, I assumed they were fleeing from us, from me.
Instead, they were seeking cover between the houses so that they could approach the three groups of archers. They leapt over the wattle fences to the pens and gardens and rushed my men.
They stayed away from me.
Most of the archers stood and shot their arrows but a few scattered away from the rushing men. Swein loosed an arrow into the head of the man charging him, dropping the man at the last moment. The young outlaw ran from the next man and dived into the barley, his archers filling the pursuer with arrows.
Across in the other field, I turned in time to see Jocelyn take the top of a man’s head off just as Anselm was borne down under another.
Footsteps slapped behind me and I swept my sword out, cutting into the arm of a charging man and knocking him aside. I was on him, stamping down on his hand and driving my sword through the base of his neck.
I was struck on the back of the helm, sending me staggering. I whirled and lashed out but I was hit again, high on the back near my shield shoulder. I caught a glimpse of a man’s face twisted in fury, wielding a heavy blacksmith’s hammer.
No mortal man can strike with such force. I was thrown from my feet into the dirt. I fell awkwardly, my shield under me and my sword arm flung out to the side.
I was blind, stunned, starting to panic when the hammer smashed down on my elbow.
The pain was incredible. The crunch of the bones was like a white-hot lance spearing through my body and into my brain. Even as I screamed and writhed, my instinct took over and I rolled to my left, over my shield arm and kept rolling so my shield was across my body. The hammer crashed into my shield with force enough to crack it.
My ears were ringing, I could not see.
I kicked out, purely on instinct and connected with a leg, a knee that crunched.
The man fell on me, pinning my shield to my body. I was afraid, I could not feel my arm.
Had it been cut off?
The body on top of me was not moving. I shoved up with my shield arm and threw him off me.
Screams, shouts, and clashes sounded through my helmet and I rolled to my feet, agony spearing through my arm once more. I wheeled about, shield up from the figures around me. I had to tilt my head back and look sideways to see out of my eye slits.
“Richard, Richard,” a voice shouted.
“Jocelyn?” I cried back, spinning around, trying and failing to lift my sword arm.
“Richard, we are victorious. Now sit down
before you hurt yourself.”
***
They had to hammer the side of my helm back into shape to remove it from my head. I laid my helm on the stone threshold of the nearest house and Anselm tapped a bad dent from the side with the pommel of his sword.
“There,” Anselm said, laying his sword down. “I believe that is it.”
“Get this thing off me,” I shouted. “Hurry up.”
When Anselm eased the helm from my head, I reached up and shoved it off, grinding the edge against the tender part of my skull.
“You took a bad hit, there, Sir Richard,” Anselm said, touching my scalp.
I slapped his hand away and stood up, swaying and blinking around.
We had won. William’s men were mostly dead. Of the living, the sheriff and Guy sat together, side by side on the threshold in the doorway of the nearest house, holding on to each other. Both were covered in blood.
The centre of the village was drenched in the stuff, red soaking into the packed earth.
Jocelyn stood guard over two survivors, two men bleeding and bristling with arrow shafts. One man had two arrows through the neck and mouth, as well as three through his chest. The man had his eyes closed, breathing slowly and holding himself perfectly still upon the floor.
The other man was not much better off. Five arrows had pierced his shoulders and upper back at various angles. The left side of his scalp from the crown to the ear had been sliced off. It was a flat, red slab, shorn of hair and skin down to the bone. Blood leaked freely from the wound, soaking the entire left side of his body. His face was white yet he looked around with clear eyes, fully alert.
Surrounding them stood Jocelyn, his shield and sword ready. Four archers stood back, arrows nocked upon the strings, five others stood with their blades out.
My sword arm was broken, very badly. My elbow was smashed and with every movement, I shivered.
“How many did we lose?” I asked Anselm as I stepped gingerly over to Jocelyn.
“John Redbeard and Bull,” Anselm said. “Struck dead in an instant. These men, their speed. Their power. It is astonishing.”
I was surprised that we had not lost more but still their deaths angered me. “Jocelyn,” I said. “Stand ready.”
Cradling my right arm with my left, I stood and looked down upon the pair of survivors.
“Who are you?”
The man with the arrows through the neck and mouth blinked up at me, unable to speak. He glanced at his friend. That man smirked and spoke for them both.
“My name is Much,” he said. “The tongue-tied fellow here is Will.”
“Ah,” I said. “You are Much the Miller? And he is Bloody Will?” I shook from the pain in my arm and the anger at the men before me.
“Will the Scarlet, so he likes to be told. His name’s Bill Scatchlock. Though you certainly is bloody now, ain’t you there, Will?” Much was putting a defiant face on things but he was losing more blood every moment and he would not last for very long.
I wanted to kill them immediately but I needed them to speak. “Where is William?”
Much the Miller stared up at me, nodded at the one with arrow shafts through his face. “Right here next to me.”
“Another William. The former Earl of Derbyshire. Where is the Green Knight? Whatever he is calling himself, you know who I mean.”
“Robert, his name is,” Much said. “Sir Robert. He’s nobly born, he is.”
“That was his father’s name,” I said. “His real name is William.”
“Christ almighty,” Much said, staring up at me, his eyes bulging. “You know what, lord. You don’t half look like him, you know. Are you his son?”
“Where is he?” I said, shaking with the effort of containing my anger.
“Might be here, might be there,” Much said, pausing to spit a little blood onto the street. “Never know with him. Who are you to him, then?”
I kicked Much in the stomach and bent to the one called Will the Scarlet. With my one good hand, I grabbed the shaft sticking through his mouth and yanked it out. The barbs caught on the man’s back teeth and those were ripped from his jaw.
Blood and teeth gushed out and Will bent over lest he drown in it. I braced the man against my leg, grabbed the arrow coming from his neck and yanked that one out. The barbs tore a great chunk of his neck as it came free, leaving a tattered and wet sucking hole.
I sank to my knees, grabbed the back of Will the Scarlet’s hair and held him up on his knees while I drank down what remained of the blood within his body.
It was like fire, that blood, like fire and ice and the first flush of the night’s wine in your belly, multiplied beyond counting.
And it was more. More than I remembered, better than the knight dressed in blue back in Lincoln. It reminded me of a cave in Palestine when I had drunk from my brother William. It was not the same. It was not as powerful but it was a faint echo of that blood. I drank until the spurting blood turned to a trickle. It did not take long.
I stood, letting the drained body fall. My elbow itched and I straightened it out, extending it as it popped back into shape. I sighed as the pain left my arm and my head and all my weariness fled from my limbs. My vision and hearing snapped into a sharpened point, colours warmed and glowed, edges popped.
“You are full of William’s blood,” I said to Much. “The Green Knight, you drank from him. Tell me all you know of him, now.”
“What can you do you me?” Much said, smirking. “No matter what I say, I’m going to end up like Bill, there, ain’t I?”
“You will certainly die,” I said. “But if you do not tell me then I shall remove the skin from your face, take off your hands and feet, smash your teeth out and leave you here to die slowly. Or I can take off your head. Which would you prefer?”
Much glanced at the body of Bill. “What do you want to know?”
“Where is he?”
“Eden,” Much said.
“Do not play games with me,” I said, through gritted teeth. “Where is he?”
Much grunted. “Eden is the name of the place. The Green Knight rules it, as Adam ruled the first Eden before God and woman betrayed him. We sons of Adam live within the walls of Eden. Sir Robert lives in the sacred dell beneath the palace.”
“What palace? There are no palaces in Sherwood. Are there?”
“The Palace in the Green,” Much said. “In the green heart of Eden.”
“Where is this Eden?” I said, barely holding to my remaining patience.
“Up beyond Mansfield,” Much said, jerking his head back. “Not really a palace, I suppose. It’s a hunting lodge what belonged to some fat lord before Sir Robert took it over. The old lord run off years ago, no one went there, not for something like fifteen years or more. No servants, nothing. Nothing but deer and boar for miles all around. And us. The sons of Adam. We gone back to the way things was, back at the start of the world.”
“And how were things then? Adam was a homeless outlaw, was he?”
The mad creature nodded. ‘The Green Knight came to us to gift us his gift. To bring us all back to our own land. We who was thrown off it by lords like you, who took everything from us and demanded more. Well, not no longer. Now we’re the ones who have the power of life and death. We overcome it. We are the hunters and now they are the prey. Them, you, and everyone who ain’t us.”
“This is no more than the typical William nonsense that you are spouting,” I said. “You hear me? I say he has filled your head with nonsense, man. Tell me this. You were living in the wood as an outlaw? And he took you and gave you his blood?”
Much nodded. “He done that but he done kill me first, then he saved me after, when he saw that I was a man who believed in the world being the way it was in the beginning, once again. I will help you return the earth to its true self, upon my oath, I said to him. And when I was empty of blood, he filled me up with his. His blood of fire, poured into me, flooded through my veins like quicksilver. It was the greatest
gift a man can receive. See, the Christ come down and he told us we had to wait for eternal life, had to wait to have it in Heaven when we wake on the day of the last judgement. But that was a lie. The Christ lied to us. We can have it now. We can live forever. All we have to do is let the Green Knight into our hearts. Obey, faithfully, and we live for eternity, here on earth, with all the pleasures that God has given us. All of it flows from the Lord of Eden.”
“You murder innocent folk for their blood,” I said. “That is not Heaven upon the Earth. That is base. That is plain murder.”
“It ain’t murder if we don’t kill them,” Much said. “We only kill the ones who refuse to open their hearts to the Lord of Eden. And them what offend us. And when we want to see their blood and bone smashed flat and ground up into a pulp. Blood and bone, marrow and flesh, ground up all nice and lovely. A taste worth killing for, ain’t it not? If we’re going to talk more, lord, I might be needing a little drink. Maybe just a cup’s worth off the floor, hereabouts? I can drink it right off the ground before it drains away and dries up. I’m right parched.”
“Where are the two women he has taken?”
“Two? Got to be right many more than two. More like two hundred, ain’t it, Bill? Oh, sorry, Bill. Poor old Bill. Poor old, dead Bill.”
“Two women of noble birth, taken recently,” I said. “You must know of them. Where are they?”
Much shifted his weight. “Don’t know what you mean.”
“I’m going to take your eyes and slice the skin off your face for that,” I said.
“No, no, I know I heard what was what,” he said. “John’s got them all locked up.”
It was all I could do to resist caving his skull in. “Where? This is your only chance to speak all you know.”
He nodded, grinning. “Do you know a man named John? Little John the Bailiff?”
“Go on,” I said.
“You know him?” Much said. “He’s a bad one, lord. You stay away from him. He’s a giant. A giant bastard, too. He’s not right in the head, that Little John. Not right at all. Not fair, neither, not fair at all but he’s lord of Mansfield, now. The Lord of Eden granted him the village and fields, just like he done with Blidworth and dear, dead Bill.”