Sacrifice (31 page)

“We’re supposed to be dragoons, man,” Bletchley replied impatiently, “dragoons ride to battle, but dismount to shoot and fight. Though few of our men know how to do either. God grant the enemy are every bit as raw.”

Since joining the army, Henry had made something of a friend of Bletchley, and several others who came to Shewsbury to fight for King Charles. In spite of his small stature and lack of physical fitness, Henry had found it easy to enlist. The King’s recruitment officers were taking men in far worse condition - any hobbled, stunted, black-gummed farm labourer capable of holding a pike was welcome, and men who brought their own horse and weapons especially so.

He joined a troop of dragoons commanded by Bletchley’s master, Sir William Woodhouse, a sallow, consumptive gentleman of over fifty years, whose permanent racking cough did nothing to lessen his enthusiasm for the fight.

“Stout fellows!” Woodhouse was fond of saying as he proudly reviewed his troop, two score recruits, most of them his own servants, “together we shall dirty our blades in Roundhead blood, and usher the traitors of Parliament howling to their graves!”

Brave words, marred slightly by the coughing fit that shook his emaciated frame and left a spatter of blood on his chin. He took a handkerchief from his belt and delicately wiped it away.

In common with many of the gentlemen who fought for the King, Woodhouse appeared to value style over personal safety. He wore no armour  save a kind of iron skull-cap under his hat. In place of a buff coat, he sported a suit of crimson Spanish cloth richly inlaid with silver lace, a long riding coat of the same material, doublet and breeches of glossy buck leather, and over all a splendid Dutch coat lined with fox fur.

“No sombre Puritan, our Sir William,” Bletchley said fondly as his master handed the bloodied handkerchief to another of his servants, “a gentleman of the old sort, he is. True, he will not hear Mass, but has no objections to his servants and tenants doing so, so long as we are discreet.”

Henry, who never made friends easily, was made welcome in Woodhouse’s company. They all had some fellow feeling, being loyalists and civilians who never expected to see anything of war.

Unlike the others, Henry had little fear of being wounded or slain. The covenant protected him. He believed in that protection, as fervently as the Anglican preachers who made Shrewsbury hum to their ceaseless prayers and sermons, believed in their God and the rightness of the King’s cause.

“Why has the sausage-eater ordered us to halt, I wonder?” grunted Bletchley, nodding at Prince Rupert, who was in deep discussion with his officers under a tree, “I wager he’s got himself lost. He don’t know this country, and nor do I.”

“I do, a little,” said a tall, lanky youth named Honest Carter, “I have kin nearby. That’s the Teme river, and that there is Powick Bridge.”

He pointed at the sluggish brown flow of the river, immediately south of the field the Royalists occupied, and a stone bridge leading over it. The road from Worcester, a narrow lane lined with hedges, continued over the bridge into the green country beyond.

Rupert seemed in no hurry to move, so most of his command dismounted and sat down to their rations, or took their horses to drink in the river. Fearing no danger, some of the men removed their heavy helmets, and unbuckled their breastplates.

Discipline was slack. Maybe two-thirds of Rupert’s men were well-armed and mounted, soldiers from the army his uncle had brought to Shrewsbury. The rest were made up of volunteers and raw recruits from all over the Marches and Wales.

Like Henry and Bletchley, many had brought their own horses and gear, which was fortunate, since the King lacked the resources to supply them. With his pistol and sword and buff coat, Henry was one of the better-armed. Sadly, his old master’s generosity had not stretched to a helmet or a back and breast, such as the best of the prince’s troopers wore.

Henry sensed the tension among his new comrades. They were eager to see action, or so they claimed, and yet were frightened as well. He listened to their talk, the unsettling combination of forced mirth and grim silence. A few of the men stood apart, staring hard at the river and the tree-line, as though expecting Roundheads to spring out at any moment.

What fragile creatures we are
, Henry reflected as he led his gelding to the river,
every man present knows he stands on the cusp of death. A single bullet, a chance sword-stroke, might send him toppling into the abyss.

He shuddered. Despite the preacher’s assurances that tales of hellfire and everlasting pain were mere propaganda, disseminated by the church to keep mankind obedient, Henry’s fears were growing: fears for the condition of his soul, rather than his physical being. 

It was not so easy, he discovered, to shrug off a lifetime of Christian teaching. He owed God nothing, but God was not willing to let him go. Images of the torments his undying soul would suffer haunted his dreams, the worse for being vague and indistinct. When he woke, streaming with sweat, he could only recall the red glow of the fire, and a stench of burning flesh.

My flesh.
Swallowing, Henry shook away the nightmares and patted his horse’s neck as she bent her head to drink. With stark humour, he had named her Faith.

Henry was late in bringing his horse to the river. Most of his comrades had already ambled back to the field, where Rupert was still locked in a furious row with his officers. Henry was amused to note how they refused to back down before the prince, who was clearly furious at having his orders questioned.

“Yon German princeling has to deal with Englishmen now,” remarked Rice Hughes, a Welsh trooper from Powys, “he will have to learn some manners, and sharp, if he wishes to be obeyed.”

Henry didn’t respond. His acute hearing had picked up a sound beyond the river. Frowning, he cocked his head to listen.

There it was again. The clop of hoofs on soft ground. At first he thought it was a single horse. A farmer, perhaps, out to inspect his livestock?

Then he caught the jingle of harness. More hoofs. He glanced at Hughes, who was gazing stupidly across the river, his mouth hanging open.

“Look-look there!” gasped the Welshman, jabbing his finger at the woods immediately south of the bridge.

Henry’s eyesight was poor, thanks to years of squinting at poor handwriting by bad light, but even he could see the flash of sunlight on steel harness, dappled among the trees.

Hughes and two other men were already dragging their horses around, yelling warnings as they clambered into the saddle.

“The enemy!” they shouted, “Fiennes is upon us!”

Henry was not infected by their panic. He stood and watched as a file of dragoons emerged from the woods. Barely a dozen at first, scouts riding in loose order. Like the best of Rupert’s men, they all wore buff coats, lobster-tail helmets and back and breasts. Every man had his musket, sword and heavy wheel-lock pistol.

Across their breastplates they wore orange sashes, confirming them as Parliament men: the Royalist sashes, such as Henry wore, were red.

They rode at a leisurely pace, and were obviously unaware of the Royalists encamped in the fields to the north. Henry mounted, keeping a wary eye on the men trotting towards the bridge.

He turned Faith about, just as the nearest of the Roundheads gave a startled yell.

“King’s men - there, across the river!”

Henry raked in his spurs and bent low over his horse’s neck. She responded and surged into a gallop. More shouts erupted before and behind him, echoed by the crack of a bullet. One of the Roundheads had taken a pot-shot at him.

He should know better
, thought Henry as his heart pounded with scarcely less vigour than Faith’s hoofs,
pistols should only be discharged at close range. It will take him an age to reload.

The hurried shot betrayed the rawness and inexperience of the Parliament-men. Many of the Royalists were in a similar condition, and the field was a scene of chaos as they scrambled to deploy.

“Into cover!” one dragoon sergeant was shouting at his troop, “line the hedgerows and charge your muskets. Not that way!”

Several of his men, having lost their heads completely in the excitement, were running towards the hedge bordering the north of the field. “The enemy are over there!” howled the sergeant, waving his sword at the bridge as he galloped after them, “back to the road, you clods! Move!”

The spare figure of Sir William Woodhouse, mounted on his rangy grey, thundered towards Henry. “Private Malvern,” he croaked, “to your place, sir.”

He waved at his company of dragoons, bearing a marked resemblance to a flock of sheep as they huddled near the centre of the field. “The prince requires us to support his advance,” he cried, eyes bulging at the onset of another coughing fit, “mount, you fellows, mount!”

Woodhouse’s voice died away as the consumption took him. Bletchley and Carter and the others were still milling about uncertainly, though their orders were clear enough. A few mounted, while others scattered as Prince Rupert thundered past at the head of his Life Guards. The prince had sprang into action without giving his men time to buckle on their armour properly, and a good number rode without helmets, or with breastplates flapping loose. 

“God save us,” Henry heard Hughes remark as the prince’s men surged towards the bridge, “he still has that little dog with him.”

Henry eased Faith to a trot and twisted around to look at the bridge. More Roundheads had appeared, many more, riding in double file. Their officer led them straight towards the bridge, obviously hoping to seize it before the Royalists could form up.

A troop of Rupert’s dragoons had dismounted, and were lining the hedges flanking the lane north of the bridge. They grappled with their heavy matchlocks, lighter versions of the weapon used by common musketeers, but still cumbersome enough.

“Draw out your match,” Henry heard their sergeants barking out the firing drill, “blow your match. Cock your match. Try your match. Guard your pan...”

Henry drew his wheel-lock pistol from its holster and feverishly loaded it, smiling at how his fingers shook as they fumbled powder and ball into the barrel.

Why so nervous?
he chided himself,
no need, no need!
You are guarded by a power stronger than anything the Roundheads can bring against you.

Faith, as nervous as her rider, fidgeted and pawed at the ground. Henry swore as she gave a sudden jerk, making him drop the ball. It landed with a squelch in the mud.

He groped for another from the bag attached to the bandolier slung across his chest. There was a ragged outbreak of musket fire, and Henry looked up to see the Roundheads pouring over the narrow bridge.

Rupert’s dragoons fired on them from the hedgerows flanking the lane. The harsh bang of the guns was accompanied by thick smoke rippling across the field, and the acrid stench of black powder. They shot in haste, most of the bullets flying wide. Henry saw one or two Roundheads knocked from their saddles and tumble into the muddy river, but the rest came on at a furious pace, eager to get to close quarters.

The prince, showing he was a bit of a soldier as well as a firebrand, was drawing up his cavalry on the field a good distance from the river, allowing the Roundheads to cross. More enemy dragoons could be seen to the south. They halted on the southern bank, reluctant to support their impetuous comrades. 

“Forward!” brayed Woodhouse, making Henry jump. The elderly black-coated gentleman cantered past towards the royal banner, his company trailing after him.

Not wanting to appear cowardly or insubordinate, Henry brought up the rear. He was still fumbling with his pistol, and steered Faith with his knees while he fumbled with the rammer. Most of the powder fell out, thanks to his clumsy handling and the jolting of his horse.

Henry gave up and stuffed the pistol back into its holster. It had a heavy butt, and could at least be used as a club. He saw Woodhouse yank out his sword, a gleaming basket-hilted rapier, and flourish it above his white head.

“Courage, lads!” he cried, “a little, little let us do, and you shall see the rogues run!”

The old man was over-excited, his face mottled, watery blue eyes bulging in their sunken sockets. Henry feared he might have a seizure.

He dragged out his own sword, a straight-bladed weapon bought for ten shillings in Stafford market. The weight of it felt good in his hand, even though he had little notion of how to use the thing. He dimly recalled his father, back in the mists of Henry’s childhood, giving him a couple of fencing lessons in the yard behind their modest house in Stafford.

“One good heavy blow,” Malvern senior told his son, “struck true and hard, counts for more in a fight than any amount of pretty fencing. So!”

He chopped clumsily at the dummy, an old sack stuffed with hay and nailed to a post. His sword was a cheap, blunted object, bought for a few pennies and normally used by Henry’s mother to poke the fire. Henry broke it one day while at play in Doxey Marshes, hacking against a tree he had decided to pretend was a hungry troll.

His duel with the tree was the last time Henry had wielded a blade in anger. Now he gulped, conscious of a rising tide of fear in the pit of his belly. The strength of his covenant with the Devil was about to be tested.