‘Be safe,’ Elise called to him as he mounted up. ‘Please be safe.’ Once more she rushed to his side; this time he held out a hand to her and she took it. She seemed to have regained her composure, or else she was simply holding back the tears.
‘I will,’ Malet said as he gazed down upon his wife and Beatrice. ‘God be with you both.’ He withdrew his hand to grip the reins, and gave his horse a kick. It whickered as it started into a trot. ‘Farewell.’
He waved to the half-dozen of his men who were waiting, then dug his spurs into the beast’s flanks and cantered away, past Eudo and Wace who were riding in the other direction. Not once did he look back.
‘The enemy are gathering,’ Aubert said. ‘We must go now if we’re to get away at all.’
The shipmaster was right. Again I could hear men chanting, filling the morning with their battle-cries, and if anything it seemed that they were closer now.
Wace and Eudo drew to a halt and quickly dismounted. Both looked drowsy still, their eyelids heavy; neither had shaven, and
light stubble covered their chins. Like myself they had probably been sleeping when word had arrived. It was still not fully light, the river a grey smear broken by faint ripples where the rain fell, more heavily now.
‘We’ve been waiting for you,’ the priest said to them, a little sharply, I thought, given that we ourselves had arrived only a short while before.
‘We came upon some of the townsmen by the bridge,’ Eudo said as he unfastened his saddlebag. ‘The whole city is rising. You wouldn’t believe it.’
‘We saw,’ I said. ‘We had to fight our way through them from the vicomte’s house.’
Four boys whom until then I had taken for deck-hands were seeing to the horses that we had brought, and I recognised them for some of the stable-boys I had met at the castle.
‘Wait,’ said Wace, when he saw one taking the reins of his horse. ‘What are you doing?’
‘The vicomte has asked us to take them to the castle,’ the boy answered. In fact he looked to be almost a man grown, probably around sixteen or seventeen in years, although his voice had not yet deepened.
‘It is all right,’ Ælfwold said. ‘They’re Lord Richard’s men.’
For a moment Wace looked doubtful. I understood: I would never have entrusted Rollo to someone I did not know. But he must have known that there was not a lot of choice; we couldn’t take them with us.
‘Go on,’ he told the boy. ‘Take care with him, though. He’s not used to others riding him; he’ll try to bite you if he has the chance.’
The boy nodded, a little uncertainly, and climbed up into the saddle that Wace had left. The animal snorted and fidgeted, but the boy pulled firmly on the reins and kept him in check.
Eudo waited until he was firmly seated, then passed his own reins up to him. ‘See to it that he’s well kept,’ he said sternly. ‘Otherwise you’ll have my sword to answer to.’
A shout from the shipmaster caught our attention and we followed the priest and the two ladies across the gangplank. Aubert waved
towards two of his deck-hands – one at either end of the ship – who unhitched the ropes from the mooring posts before rushing to their seats as the rowers pushed off against the wharf’s planked buttresses. On the other side, thirty oar-handles were fed through thirty rowlocks, until thirty blades broke the water, casting waves out into the river. They paddled backwards so that the prow pointed out into the midstream, and as the shipmaster began to beat his drum, larboard and steerboard fell into stroke, carving their blades through the Use’s murky waters.
The four stable-boys were already almost out of sight as they led the horses in the direction of the castle. But behind us, upon the bridge by the other end of the quay, the mist was beginning to clear and through it I saw the shadows of men as they ran, like ghosts in the gloom, bearing a forest of spears and axes.
‘Look at that,’ I murmured to the other knights.
There were dozens of them, perhaps even hundreds, roaring as they came, the light of their torches glinting upon the calm waters below. I felt my sword-hand itch again, and I wanted to ask Aubert to turn back, though I knew that I could not. Over the roofs of the houses between the castle and the minster I saw black smoke rising, and a glimmer of flames, and I heard, or thought I heard, men’s voices carrying on the wind: ‘For Normandy! For King Guillaume!’
Ælfwold bowed his head. His lips moved as if in prayer and I wondered what he was feeling. He was Malet’s man, and so far as I knew had been for some time, but even if he had no especial liking for the rebels or for Eadgar, they were still his kinsmen. Was he praying for them or for his lord?
‘Row, you sons of whores,’ Aubert shouted, beating harder on the skin of the drum. ‘Row, if you want to get paid!’
The oarsmen found their rhythm and the ship surged forward, cutting through the waters with all the sharpness and speed of a sword. Stroke followed stroke, and with each one the wharves, the storehouses, the whole city receded further into the mist. Somewhere in those streets, I thought, rode Malet with his conroi. In his hands rested the defence of Eoferwic.
We passed by the castle, its palisade and tower rising in shadow
high above us, and we stood there, not speaking to one another but simply watching while it grew smaller and smaller, until the river turned away to the south and even that great edifice disappeared from sight. Slowly the shouts and the battle-thunder faded into nothing. Before long there was only the sound of the drum and the oars upon the water, and then at last we were alone.
Thirteen
THE BANKS SLID
past in the evening mist. Low willow branches swung lazily in the breeze, bare save for a few yellow catkins: little pinpricks of colour amidst the gloom. The first signs of spring, perhaps.
The river was quiet, stately in its progress as it wound its way through the flat country. A fleet of ducks swam off our larboard side, watching closely with beady eyes as we overtook them. All that could be heard was the soft splash of oars against the water’s surface. How different it was from the crowded streets of the city; it was hard to believe it was just that morning that we had left. But night was nearly upon us again, and the darkening cloud hung low, threatening rain at any moment.
Beside me, Aubert pulled on the tiller as the river curved towards the west and the last light, and the
Wyvern
’s high prow carved a great arc through the calm water. On the right-hand bank a village came into sight, no more than a spire or two of smoke at first, but as we grew closer I was able to pick out firelight, and then a cluster of houses around a timber-and-thatch hall, a low rectangular shadow against the grey skies. I wondered who resided there: whether it was one of the few English thegns who still held land under King Guillaume, or – more likely – a new French-speaking lord.
‘Drachs,’ Aubert said to me as he pushed gently on the tiller. ‘South-east she runs from here, down to the Humbre.’
A chorus of laughter erupted from the other end of the ship, where Eudo and Wace were playing at dice with the other three from Malet’s household. They seemed like good men, from the little I had spoken to them, and I did not doubt their sword-arms,
though whether they had the temperament for battle, I couldn’t yet be sure.
I’d joined them earlier, but soon found myself distracted, my mind wandering and confused. So much had happened so quickly and I needed the time to think. We had departed Eoferwic in such a rush and I still did not understand how I had come to be here, why Malet had chosen me for this task.
Up ahead, the river’s course bent sharply left: so sharply in fact that it appeared to come back almost on itself. Aubert shouted to his rowers, and those on the left-hand side shipped oars, taking a few moments to rest their arms, while those to steerboard quickened their pace. The ship surged forward, taking the bend in a wide curve, and as the river straightened out, the pace slowed and the larboard oarsmen once more resumed their stroke.
A gust rustled the reeds in the shallows and I caught a glimpse of shadows moving about on the right-hand bank. I watched, trying to make out more detail, but whatever it was, it remained hidden by the mist. A deer or some other animal, I thought.
Aubert steered us away, back towards the middle of the river where the flow was fastest. I looked to the sky, where the moon was up, its milky light shining diffusely through the low, bulbous clouds. There had been wind, but it had lessened as the day wore on and the black-and-gold sail was now furled, the mast taken down. But the Use was high after the recent rains and the current was strong, and so we had made good progress.
‘You’re from Dinant, then?’ the shipmaster asked, and I was taken by surprise, not because of the suddenness of the question, but because he’d said it in the Breton tongue. I had grown so used to speaking French in recent times that the words sounded almost foreign to my ears.
‘That’s right,’ I replied. Malet must have given him my name. ‘You’re from Brittany as well?’
Of course, just because he spoke the language did not mean he was a native – and I had not noticed any trace of an accent before now. The words felt unfamiliar as they left my tongue. Like the ocean on the turning tide: never really gone, only
diminished, waiting for the moment when it would flood back once again.
‘From Aleth,’ he said. ‘Not far from you.’
I had never been there but I knew of it: a port some miles downstream from Dinant, where the river flowed out into the Narrow Sea.
‘It’s been a long time since I was there,’ he continued. ‘There or in Dinant, for that matter. Not since the time of the siege, anyway.’
At the mention of the siege I felt my chest tighten. The tale was five years old, and had been related to me long before. I’d heard how Conan, the Breton count, had refused to swear fealty to Normandy; how Duke Guillaume had invaded that summer and forced him back to the castle at Dinant; how the castle had been besieged and destruction wrought everywhere, until at last he submitted. But never before had I spoken to anyone who had seen it with his own eyes.
‘You were there?’
‘I was serving as steersman in Conan’s household. It was after the siege that I left his employ and Malet took me on.’
‘What was it like?’
‘Houses raided, half the town razed to the ground,’ Aubert said, his eyes vacant, staring off into the mist. ‘Women raped, men and children murdered in the streets. The stench of death everywhere: in the castle, in the streets. It was like nothing you have ever seen.’
‘I was at Hæstinges,’ I said, suddenly provoked. ‘I have seen thousands of men lose their lives in a single day, run through with sword and spear, trampled under the weight of the charge. You think I don’t know slaughter?’
I remembered my ears filling with the screams of my comrades. I remembered seeing the whole hillside awash with blood, and whether it was the enemy’s or whether it was ours, after a whole day of fighting it no longer mattered.
The shipmaster turned away. ‘You live by the sword,’ he said. ‘That’s different.’
A sense of guilt came over me, for I hadn’t meant to be harsh.
It was more than any man should have to witness – any man, at least, whose living was not made as mine was.
‘He should have surrendered sooner,’ I said. Even in those days Guillaume of Normandy had a reputation as a fierce warlord, loyal to his allies but merciless against those he considered his enemies. Conan had been foolish to think that he could challenge him.
Aubert shook his head. ‘By then the war had sent him mad,’ he said. ‘Some days he did not even come out of his chambers. He refused to speak with anyone, and he hardly ate, though he certainly drank.’ The shipmaster spat over the side into the river. ‘When he finally came to his senses, it was too late for the town.’
I shook my head. Even when I’d first heard the news, it was not the Normans I had been angry at – that, after all, was how wars were fought – but our own count, for inviting it upon Dinant, for betraying his people.
‘Still, the tides come and the tides go,’ said Aubert. ‘Five years is a long time. And we all fight for the same side now, don’t we?’
‘We do,’ I said quietly. Conan was dead – had been for some time – and any animosity there once might have been between Breton and Norman was long buried.
A drop of rain struck my cheek, heavy and cold. The last light of day was fading and already it felt colder as the river-mist closed in around us. The drops grew more frequent and I drew up the hood of my cloak to keep them out. Dark spots began to appear on the deck.
‘When do we put in for the night?’ I asked.
‘We’ll sail until dawn if we can. With luck we’ll have reached the Humbre by then, as long as there’s some moonlight and we can see our way. The river’s wide and deep enough here – not so many mudbanks to watch out for. Besides, I’ve travelled this river many times this past year. I know her curves like I do my wife’s.’ He flashed me a grin, and I saw that he was missing several of his top teeth. I tried to smile back, though in truth I did not feel at all cheered.
‘Row!’ Aubert barked at his oarsmen, for they had relaxed their pace while we had been talking. He picked up his drum once more
and began to beat the time he wanted. ‘Stop slacking, you bastard Devil-sons! Row!’
I looked up as Ælfwold approached and sat down on a bundle of fleeces next to me.
‘How are the ladies faring?’ I asked him, glancing up towards the bows where Elise and her daughter stood watching the waters slide past.
‘As well as might be expected,’ the chaplain said, his tone somewhat subdued. ‘Our prayers are naturally all for the safe keeping of the vicomte.’
He withdrew a small loaf from inside his cloak and broke it in two, pieces of crust flaking off to settle on the wooden timbers, then he offered me one half. I took it with thanks and bit into it, feeling its coarse texture between my teeth. A piece of grit scraped the inside of my cheek and I used my tongue to work it towards the front of my mouth, before picking it out and flicking it overboard.
‘How long have you served him?’ I asked.