XLII
Dawn rolled out of the east, red and riotous, its crimson spearsstreaming towards the zenith. Over the far towers of Gilderoy swept aroseate and golden mist, over the pine-strewn heights, over Tamarsilvering the valley. A wind piped hoarsely through the thickets, likea shrill prelude to the organ-throated roar of war.
The landscape shimmered in the broadening light, green tapestriesarabesqued with gold. To the east, Sir Simon's multitudinous squadronsran like rare terraces of flowers, dusted with the scintillant dew ofsteel. Westwards dwindled the long ranks of the Lauretians. On theheights, Morolt's shields flickered in the sun. About a hillock in thevalley, the rebel host stood massed in a great circle, a whorl ofhelmets, bills, and pikes; Fulviac's red pavilion starred the centrelike the red roof of a church rising above a town.
On the southern heights, Richard of Lauretia had watched the dawn risebehind the towers of Gilderoy. He was on horseback, in full panoply ofwar, his gorgeous harness and trappings dazzling the sun. Knights,nobles, trumpeters were round him, a splendid pool of chivalry, whileeast and west stretched the ranks of the grim and gigantic soldiery ofthe north.
Hard by the royal standard with its Sun of Gold, a corpse dangled fromthe branch of a great fir. It swayed slightly in the wind, black andsinister against the gilded curtain of the dawn. It was the body ofSforza the adventurer from the south, Gonfaloniere of Gilderoy, whom theKing had hanged to grace his double treachery.
As the light increased, sweeping along the glittering frieze of war,Morolt of Gorm and Regis stood forward before the King. He was a leanman, tall and vigorous as a bow of steel, his black eyes darting fireunder his thatch of close-cropped hair. The nobles had put him forwardthat morning as a man born to claim a boon upon the brink of battle.Fierce and virile, he bared his sword to the sun, and pointed withmailed hand to the rebel host in the valley.
"Sire, a boon for your loyal servants."
The King's face was as a mask of steel heated to white heat, ardent andpitiless. He had the spoilers of his kingdom under his heel, and wasnot the man to flinch at vengeance.
"Say on, Morolt, what would ye?"
"We are men, sire, and these wolves have slaughtered our kinsfolk."
"Am I held to be a lamb, sirs!"
A rough laugh eddied up. Morolt shook his sword.
"Give them into our hand, sire," he said; "there shall be no need ofropes and dungeons."
The iron men cheered him. Richard the King lifted up his baton; hisstrong voice swept far in the hush of the dawn.
"Sirs," he said to them, "take the Black Leopard of Imbrecour for yourpattern, rend and slay, let none escape you. Every man of my host wearsa white cross on his sword arm. Let that badge only stay yourvengeance. As for these whelps of treason, they have butchered ourchildren, shamed our women, clawed and torn at their King's throne.To-day who thinks of mercy! Go down, sirs, to the slaughter."
A roar of joy rose from those rough warriors; they tossed their swords,gripped hands and embraced, called on the saints to serve them. Strongpassions were loose, steaming like the incense of sacked cities intoheaven. There was much to avenge, much to expurgate. That day theirswords were to drink blood; that day they were to crush and kill.
In the valley, Fulviac's huge coil of humanity lay sullen and silent,watching the spears upon the hills. Their russets and sables contrastedwith the gorgeous colouring of the feudalists. The one shone like agarden; the other resembled a field lying fallow. The romance and pompof war gathered to pour down upon the squalid realism of mob tyranny.Beauty and the beast, knight and scullion faced each other on the stagethat morning.
Gallopers were riding east and west bearing the King's commands to SireJulian, Duke of Layonne, who headed the Lauretians, and to Simon ofImbrecour upon the hills. The King would not tempt the moil that day,but left the sweat and thunder of it to his captains, content to playthe Caesar on the southern heights. His commands had gone forth to thehost. The first assault was to be made by twenty thousand northmenunder Morolt, and a like force under Julian of Layonne. The wholecrescent of steel was to contract upon the meadows, and consolidate itsiron wall about Fulviac and his rebels. Simon of Imbrecour was to leashhis chivalry from the first rush of the fight. His knights should ridein when the rebel ranks were broken.
An hour before noon, the royal trumpets blew the advance, and a greatshout surged through the shimmering ranks.
"Advance, Black Leopard of Imbrecour."
"Advance, Golden Sun of Lauretia."
"Advance, Grey Wolf of the North."
With clarions and fifes playing, drums beating, banners blowing, thewhole host closed its semilune of steel upon the dusky mass in themeadows. The northerners were chanting an old Norse ballad, a grim,ice-bound song of the sea and the shriek of the sword. Sir Simon'sspears were rolling over the green slopes, their trumpets and buglesblowing merrily. From the west, the Lauretians were coming up withtheir pikes dancing in the sun. The thunder of the advance seemed toshake the hills.
Fulviac watched the feudalists from beneath his banner in the meadows.His captains were round him, grim men and silent, girding their spiritsfor the prick of battle.
"By St. Peter," said the man under the red flag, "these fireflies comeon passably. A fair host and a splendid. If their courage suits theirpanoply, we shall have hot work to-day."
"Faith," quoth Colgran, who had returned from Gilderoy, "I would rathersweep a flower-garden than a muck-heap. We are good for twice theirnumber, massed as we are like rocks upon a sea-shore."
"To your posts, sirs," were Fulviac's last words to them; "whether wefall or conquer, what matters it if we die like men!"
Billows of red, green, and blue, dusted with silver, Morolt and hisBerserkers rolled to the charge. They had cast aside their pikes, andtaken to shield and axe, such axes as had warred in the far past for thefaith of Odin. Fulviac's rebels had massed their spears into a hedge ofsteel, and though Morolt's men came down at a run, the spear pointsstemmed the onrush like a wall.
Despite this avalanche of iron, the rebel ring stove off the tide ofwar. They were stout churls and hardy, these peasant plunderers; deathadmonished them; despair tightened their sinews and propped up theirshields. The shimmering flood swirled on their spear points like tawnybillows tossing round a rock. It lapped and eddied, rushed up in spray,seeking an inlet, yet finding none. The Lauretian feudatories hadswarmed to the charge. Fulviac withstood them, and held their panoply atbay.
Richard the King watched the battle from the southern heights. He sawMorolt's men roll down, saw the fight seethe and glitter, swirl in awild vortex round the rebel spears. The war wolves gathered, thetempest waxed, and still the black ring held. Like steel upon a graniterock the onslaughts sparked on it, but clove no breach. Under the latenoon sun the valley reeked with dust and din. The royal host was as adragon of gold, gnashing and writhing about an iron tower.
It was then that the King smote his thigh, plucked off his signet, sentit by Bertrand his herald to Sir Simon and his knights.
"Go down at the gallop," ran the royal bidding, "cleave me this rock,and splinter it to dust. Spare neither man nor horse. Cleave in orperish."
The black banner of Imbrecour flapped forth; the trumpets clamoured.Sir Simon's knights might well have graced Boiardo's page, and girdedAlbracca with their stalwart spears. They tightened girths, set shieldsfor the charge, and rode down nobly to avenge or fall.
As a great ship sails to break a harbour boom, so did the squadrons ofthe King crash down with fewtred spears on Fulviac's host. They rodewith the wind, leaping and thundering like an iron flood. No slackeningwas there, no wavering of this ponderous bolt. It rushed like a hugerock down a mountain's flank, smoking and hurtling on the wall ofspears.
The corn was scythed and trodden under foot. Ranks rocked and brokelike earth before a storm-scourged sea. The spears of Imbrecour flashedon, smote and sucked vengeance, cleaving a b
reach into the core of war.The knights slew, took scarlet for their colour, and made the momentmurderous with steel. Into the breach the King's wolves followed them;Morolt's grim axemen stumbled in, rending and hurling the black mass toshreds. Battle became butchery. The day was won.
What boots it to chronicle the scene that travelled as a forest fire inthe track of Sir Simon's chivalry? The iron hand of the King closedupon the wrecked victims in the valley. Knight and noble trampled thepeasantry; rapine and lust were put to the sword. The Blatant Beast wasslain by the spear of Romance. The boor and the demagogue were troddenas straw before the threshing-floor of vengeance. The fields were ashroud of scarlet; Tamar ran like wine; thorn and bramble were fruitedred with blood. On the heights the tall pines waved over the splendidmasque of death.
It was late in the day when Morolt and his hillsmen, with certain of SirSimon's knights, forced their way through the wreckage of the fight, tothe hillock where stood the banner of the Saint. South, east, and westthe rout bubbled into the twilight, a riot of slaughter seething to thedistant woods. About Yeoland's banner had gathered the last of theForest brotherhood, grey wolves red to the throat with battle. Sullenand indomitable, they had gathered in a dusky knot of steel as the daysped into the kindling west. Even Morolt's fierce followers stoodstill, like hounds that had brought the boar to bay. Simon of Imbrecourspurred out before the spears, lifted a shattered sword, and called onFulviac by name.
"Traitor, we challenge ye."
A burly figure in harness of a reddish hue towered up beneath the fringeof the banner of the Saint. He carried an axe slanted over hisshoulder, as he stood half a head above the tallest of his men. As SirSimon challenged him, he lifted his salade, and bared his face to thewar dogs who hemmed him in.
"Black Leopard of the West, we meet again."
The Lord of Imbrecour peered at him keenly from under his vizor.
"Come, sirs, and end it," quoth the man in red, "buffet for buffet, andsword to sword. I fling ye a gauge to death and the devil. Come, sirs,let us end it; I bide my time."
Morolt sprang forward with sword aloft.
"Traitor and rebel, I have seen your face before."
Fulviac laughed, a brave burst of scorn. He tossed his axe to them, andspread his arms.
"Ha, Morolt, I have foined with ye of old. Saints and martyrs, have Iavenged myself upon the lap-dogs of the court! Here will we fight ourlast battle. Bury me, sirs, as Fulk of Argentin, the King's brother,whom men thought dead these seven years."
A sudden silence hovered above that remnant of a beaten host. The redbanner drooped, hung down about its staff. Morolt, uttering a strangecry, smote his bosom with his iron hand. Old Simon crossed himself,turned back and rode thence slowly from the field.
Morolt's voice, gruff and husky, sounded the charge. When he and his wardogs had made an end, they took Fulviac's head and bore it wrapped inYeoland's banner to the King.
Love Among the Ruins Page 42