Ash: A Secret History (11 page)

The Imperial noblewoman looked startled. “You don’t mean she actually—”

“I command mercenaries,” Ash interrupted, “and that’s what I need to get back and do. We’ve never been paid with a marriage before. I know them. They won’t like it. It ain’t hard cash.”

“Commands mercenaries,” Constanza said, as if her mind were elsewhere, and then snapped a blue gaze back to Ash. Her soft mouth unexpectedly hardened. “What’s Frederick thinking of? He promised me a good marriage for my son!”

“He promised
me
land,” Ash said gloomily. “That’s princes for you.”

Godfrey chuckled.

Constanza snapped, “There have been women who tried to command in battle. That unsexed bitch Margaret of Anjou lost the throne of England for her poor husband. I could never let you do that to my son. You’re rough, unmannered, and probably of peasant stock, but you’re not wicked. I can school you to manners. You’ll find people will soon forget your past when you’re Fernando’s wife, and my daughter.”

“
Bol
— rubbish!” Ash lifted her arms in response to the tailor’s nudge. A blue velvet gown settled over her gold-embroidered underrobe, heavy on her shoulders.

One serving woman began to pull in the laces at the back of the tight bodice. The other draped the gown’s gold brocade hanging sleeves to one side, and buttoned the undergown’s tight-fitting sleeves from fur-trimmed cuff to elbow. The tailor fastened a belt low on Ash’s hips.

“I’ve had fewer problems getting into
armour,
” Ash muttered.

“Lady Ash will be a perfect credit to your son Fernando, I’m certain,” Godfrey said, straight-faced. “Proverbs, chapter fourteen, verse one: every wise woman buildeth her house, but the foolish pulleth it down with her hands.”
¹³

Something in his tone on the last words made Ash look at him sharply.

Constanza del Guiz looked up – and it really is
up,
Ash noted – at the priest. “One moment. Father, you say this girl owns a company of men.”

“Under contract, yes.”

“And is therefore wealthy?”

Ash snuffled back a laugh, wiping her sun-tanned wrist across her mouth. Her weather-beaten skin wasn’t set off to advantage by silk sleeves and wolf-fur cuffs. She said cheerfully, “Wealthy if I could keep it! I have to pay those bastards. Those men. Oh, shit. I’m no good at this!”

“I’ve known Ash since she was a child, my lady,” Godfrey said smartly, “and she’s perfectly capable of adapting herself from camp to court.”

Thanks.
Ash gave her clerk a look of heavy irony. Godfrey ignored it.

“But this is my only son—” Constanza put her thin fingers to her mouth. “Yes, Father. I’m sorry, I – faced with a wedding in less than a fortnight – and her origins – and no family—”

She dabbed at one eye with the corner of her veil. It was a calculated gesture, but then, as she looked at Ash struggling under the fitting of her headdress, a tension went out of her features. Constanza smiled quite sincerely.

“Neither of us expected this, but I think we can manage. Your men will be a welcome addition to my son’s prestige. And you could be lovely, little one. Let me dress you properly and put on a little white lead to hide your blemishes. I would wish you to stand in front of the court as the pride of the del Guiz family, not the shame of it.” Constanza’s plucked brows furrowed. “Especially if Tante Jeanne comes here from Burgundy, which she might, even with the war between us. Fernando’s father’s family always think they have a perfect right to come and criticise me. You’ll meet them later.”

“I won’t.” Ash shook her head. “I’m riding back to Neuss. Today.”

“No! Not until I have you dressed and ready for this wedding.”

“Now,
look
—” Ash planted her feet squarely apart under her voluminous, flowing skirts. She jammed her fists on her hips. The underrobe’s close-fitting sleeves suddenly creaked at the shoulder-seams.

Tacking threads snapped.

The azure velvet gown slid up through her hanging belt and bunched at her waist. The sudden weight of the purse pulled her belt skewed. Her heart-shaped horned headdress, with its padded roll and temple-pieces, slipped to one side and all but fell off.

Ash huffed a breath at the crooked wisp of linen veil that floated down into her eyes.

“Child…” Constanza’s voice failed. “You look like a sack of grain tied with a string!”

“Well, let me wear my doublet and hose, then.”

“
You cannot get married in male dress.!
”

Ash broke into an irrepressible grin. “Tell that to Fernando. I don’t mind if he wants to wear the dress…”

“Oh!”

Godfrey Maximillian, studying his captain, folded his hands across his robed belly and rather unwisely said aloud what he was thinking. “I never realised. You look short, in a dress.”

“I’m taller on the goddamn battlefield! Right, that’s
it.
” Ash wrenched the horned head-dress and veils off her head, wincing as the pins pulled out of her hair. She ignored the tailor’s protests.

“You
can’t
go now!” Constanza del Guiz pleaded.

“Watch me!” Ash strode across the room, the full skirt of her gown flapping about her slippered feet. She picked up Godfrey’s wet cloak and slung it around her shoulders. “We’re out of here. Godfrey, do we have more than one company horse here?”

“No. Just my palfrey.”

“Tough. You can ride pillion behind me. Lady Constanza, I’m sorry – truly.” Ash hesitated. She gave the tiny woman a reassuring smile that, she was startled to find, she meant. “Truly. I have to see to my men. I’ll be back. I’ll
have
to be. Since it’s the Emperor Frederick’s gift, I can’t very well
not
marry your son Fernando!”

There was some debate at Cologne’s north-west gate: a lady, with her head uncovered, riding unaccompanied except for a priest? Ash gave them a few coins and the benefit of a soldier’s vocabulary, and was put out to have the gate guards then pass her through as a whore accompanied by her pimp.

“Are you going to tell me what’s bothering you?” she said over her shoulder to Godfrey, an hour later.

“No. Not unless it becomes necessary.”

Rain made the roads into two days’ journey, not one. Ash seethed. Deep cart-ruts full of mud tired the horse, until she gave up and bought another at a farm where they stayed, and then she and Godfrey rode on through the downpour, until they smelled the downwind stink of an established camp, and knew they must be near Neuss.

“Ask yourself why it is,” Ash said, absently grim, “that I know a hundred and thirty-seven different words for diseases of horses? High time we had something more reliable. Get up, there!”

Godfrey reined in his palfrey, waiting. “What did you think of life in the women’s rooms in the castle?”

“A day and a half is enough for a lifetime.” The roan gelding slowed again as her attention wandered. Ash felt a shift in the air and looked north at breaking cloud. “I’ve got used to people looking at me as soon as I walk into a room. Well, no – they
looked
at me in Constanza’s solar, but not for the same reasons!” Her eyes slitted with amusement. “I’ve got used to people expecting me to be in charge, Godfrey. In camp it’s
Ash, what do we do now?
And in Cologne, it’s
who’s this unnatural monster?
”

“You always were a bossy brat,” Godfrey remarked. “And, come to think of it, you always were fairly unnatural.”

“That’s why you rescued me from the nuns, I suppose?”

He ran a hand over his bearded chin and twinkled at her. “I like my women strange.”

“That’s good, coming from a chaste priest!”

“You want more miracles and grace for the company, you better pray I
stay
chaste.”

“I need a miracle, all right. Until I got to Cologne, I thought maybe Emperor Frederick wasn’t serious.” Ash shifted her heels, bringing the roan from immobility to amble. The rain began to ease.

“Ash – are you going through with this?”

“I most certainly am. Constanza was
wearing
more money than I’ve seen in the last two campaigns.”

“And if the company objects?”

“They’ll bitch because I didn’t let them take prisoners for ransom on the skirmish, that’s for sure. I’ll bet I’m not flavour of the month. But they’ll cheer up when they hear it’s a rich marriage. We’ll own
land
now. You’re the one who objects, Godfrey, and you won’t tell me why.”

They confronted each other from the saddle: the surprising authority of the young woman, and the reserved concern of the priest. He repeated, “If it becomes necessary.”

“Godfrey, sometimes you’re a real Godly pain in the ass.” Ash pushed her wet wool hood back. “Now, let’s see if we can get all the command lance in one place at the same time, shall we?”

They were in sight of the south-east side of the Imperial wagon-fort now. The small foreign contingent of great-wheeled wagons here, chained together for defence, streamed with the last of the rain. Water ran down the forged iron plates that faced the sides of the war-carts, metal already streaking with orange rust.
¹⁴

Over the sides of the iron war-wagons, inside the immense laager, Ash saw a rainbow of heraldic banners and standards dripping. The canvas cones of the striped tents hung limp from their centre poles, ropes stretched and wet. A spatter of rain dashed into Ash’s face as they approached the gate. It was a good five minutes before a hail went up from the huddled guards.

Euen Huw, sidling into the gateway past them, with a chicken under his arm, stopped and looked extremely startled. “Boss? Hey, boss – nice dress!”

Ash looked resignedly straight ahead as their horses trudged in down the long wagon- and tent-lined lanes. Antonio Angelotti ran up seconds later, his pale and beautiful hands yellow with sulphur.

“Never saw you in a dress before, boss. Looks good. You missed all the excitement!” His perfect face beamed, like a down-market angel. “Heralds coming up from the Burgundian camp. Imperial heralds going down to the Burgundian camp. Terms put forward.”

“Terms?”

“Sure. His Majesty Frederick says to Duke Charles, pull back twenty miles. Lift the siege. Then in three days,
we’ll
pull back twenty miles.”

“And Duke Charles is still laughing, right?”

Angelotti’s yellow curls flew as he shook his head. “The word is, he’ll agree. j That it’s peace between the Emperor and Burgundy.”

“Oh,
shit,
” Ash remarked, in the tone of one who – two minutes before – had known exactly what eight hundred-odd men, women and dependent children were doing for the next three months. And now doesn’t, and will have to work something out. “Sweet Christ. Peace. There goes our cushy summer siege.”

Angelotti fell in to walk beside her gelding. “What’s happening about this marriage of yours, madonna? The Emperor can’t be serious?”

“Yes he fucking can!”

Ten minutes riding across camp brought them to the A-frame shelters and horse lines at the north-west corner. The voluminous folds of the velvet gown clung wetly to her legs, rain darkening the cloth to royal blue. She still wore Godfrey’s cloak. It was pulled back by its own weight of soaked wool, disclosing her kirtle and the wet linen of her chemise.

The company had separated off a corner of the Imperial camp with wattle fencing and a makeshift gate, something which had not pleased the Imperial quartermaster until Ash truthfully told him it was because her troops would steal anything not nailed down. A Lion Azure standard now drooped there in the wet.

A redheaded man from Ned Aston’s lance, guarding the gate, looked up and executed a perfect double-take.

“Hey – nice dress, boss!”

“
Bollocks!
”

A few minutes saw her in the command tent, Anselm, Angelotti, and Godfrey present; Florian de Lacey missing, and the company’s other main sub-captains missing.

“They’re off muttering in corners. I’d leave them to it until you’ve got something you can tell them.” Robert wrung out his woollen hood. “Tell us how badly we’re screwed.”

“We’re not screwed, this is one
hell
of an opportunity!”

Ash was interrupted by Geraint ab Morgan ducking into the tent. “Yo, boss.”

Geraint, new this season, currently overall Sergeant of Archers, was a broad-shouldered man with cropped hair the colour of fallen leaves, that stood straight up on his skull. The whites of his eyes were perpetually bloodshot. As he came in, Ash noted that the points which joined the back of his hose to the back of his doublet were undone, and his shirt had ridden up out of the gap, disclosing a ragged pair of braies and the cleft of his buttocks.

Aware she had come back unheralded, Ash kept tactfully quiet, except for a glare that had Geraint avoiding her eye and staring up into the conical roof of the tent, where weapons and kit were hung up on the wooden struts out of the wet.

“Day report,” Ash said crisply.

Geraint scratched at his buttocks under white and blue wool hose. “The lads have been inside for two days, out of the rain, cleaning kit. Jacobo Rossano tried to poach two of our Flemish lances and they told him to sod off – he’s not impressed. And Henri de Tréville is with the provosts, arrested for being drunk and trying to set the cook on fire.”

“You don’t mean the cook’s wagon, do you?” Ash asked wistfully, “you mean the cook.”

“There was some comment about the besieged eating better in Neuss,” Florian de Lacey said, as the surgeon entered, muddy to his booted knees. “And words to the effect that rat was a delicacy compared to Wat Rodway’s stewed beef…”

Angelotti showed white teeth. “‘God sends us meat, and the Devil sends us English cooks.’”

“Enough with the Milanese proverbs, already!” Ash swatted at his head; he dodged. “Good. No one’s successfully poaching our lances. Yet. Camp news?”

Robert Anselm volunteered briskly, “Sigismund of the Tyrol’s pulling out, he says Frederick isn’t going to fight Burgundy at all. Sigismund’s been pissed off with Duke Charles since he lost Héricourt in ’74. His men have been brawling with Gottfried of Innsbruck’s archers. Oratio Farinetti and Henri Jacques have quarrelled, the surgeons took up two dead from their men fighting.”