Hereward 02 - The Devil's Army (38 page)

The Fox hurried to the door and peered out. Once he was sure they would not be seen, he beckoned for the brothers to follow
and they hastened out. Across the palace, the sound of running feet echoed. The guards were already being called to take the regents’ orders. Torches sizzled into life on the other side of the yard. His heart thundering, Balthar led the Mercians through the dark along the perimeter fence. While the earls collected two horses from the stables, he ran to the entrance to the palace grounds. When he had sent the guard to fitz Osbern, he pulled open the gate. There would be no going back now, he knew.

Once the Mercians had led their steeds through, he eased the gate shut and with silent tread picked a winding path through the dark back-ways. At the western wall, the Ridgate stood unguarded. Balthar nodded, pleased with himself. This gate was ancient and rarely used, only large enough to admit a single rider. The three men lifted the oak bar and swung it open. The gibbous moon lit the still countryside. ‘Find it in you to join the fighters in Ely,’ he urged as the two earls mounted their horses. ‘You have it within your hands to change the course of things.’

‘We will ride towards the fens once we have met with our men,’ Edwin said with a nod. ‘But then we will do what we do.’ And with that, the two brothers rode out of the gate and into the night.

He had done what he could. Balthar ran back through the quiet streets, his fear that he had taken too long mounting by the moment. At Godrun’s house, he wrenched open the door and dashed inside. His heart leapt when he saw she was still there and well.

‘Is it done?’ she asked hopefully.

He nodded, leaning back against the closed door as he sucked in deep breaths to calm his thundering heart. ‘Edwin and Morcar have gone in search of their men. They ride towards the fens, but as yet they have not decided their true course.’

Godrun closed her eyes and clasped her hands together as if in prayer. ‘Then this torment is finally over.’

‘Not until we are beyond Wincestre’s walls,’ he cautioned. ‘Let us hurry.’ In the corners of her eyes, tears glistened in the
firelight and he saw her hands trembling. He felt guilt at how he had neglected her. Even he was afraid. How scared must this young girl be. ‘Come,’ he said gently. ‘All will be well. A new life awaits us, together.’ He held his arms wide and she rushed into his embrace.

Pain seared through his stomach. With an agonized cry, he staggered back. Shaking, Godrun gripped his knife in her little hand. Blood dripped from the blade. As he looked down, she lunged again and again, her face contorted with hate.

‘Why?’ he stammered, falling back against the wall. He slid down to the floor in a heap, convulsing in shock. His life-blood pumped through his fingers and puddled around him.

Godrun loomed over him, blinking away tears, not of fear but fury. ‘Every time you pawed my skin it was all I could do not to empty my stomach,’ she snarled.

Balthar gaped stupidly. Her words made no sense to him. He reached out one sticky hand and breathed, ‘Our love—’

She spat at him. ‘While good English men and women suffered, you grew fat eating at the king’s table. You traded their lives for comfort.’ She shook with revulsion and that wounded him more deeply than the knife she wielded. ‘All you have you built upon the bones of your own. You deserve to die.’

Hot tears streamed down his cheeks. ‘I learned my lesson. I tried to help—’

‘Too late.’

As she turned her back on him to collect the small bag filled with her meagre possessions, he reeled as the truth finally broke through his resistance. ‘You never loved me,’ he croaked, still barely able to believe it. ‘All these long months, you led me along to learn what you could … to help the English fighters … All the kisses, all the words of love …’

‘The Fox,’ she sneered as reached the door. ‘So cunning he could never see what was under his own nose.’

He blinked away his tears, and when his eyes cleared she was gone. Even then, his heart still ached for her. Pain racked him as he sensed his life’s blood draining through his fingers, but his
thoughts were of all he had lost through his own failings, and all that had been stolen from him. How foolish he had been, how weak. Bowing his head, he began to pray, his last hope for redemption.

The hut began to darken.

C
HAPTER
F
IFTY
-F
IVE

1 October 1070

THE SOUND OF
many voices raised in song shattered the still of the fenland dawn. At the gates of Ely, the guards stood on the high walkway and peered into the pearly mist swathing the meres and marshes. The rising sun cast a rosy hue over the drifting clouds.

Still bleary-eyed, Hereward shook his head to dispel the last of his dream and clawed his way out of his bed. Pushing past the watchman who had woken him, he strode down the leaf-strewn track towards the gates. All around him, warriors raced to fetch their spears and shields from beneath their beds. He saw their brows lined with apprehension, the hollow look in their eyes. Doomsday was coming, or so they thought.

But not this day. He had heard the Normans singing as they marched into battle and it was a sound like iron upon stone. These voices chimed like solstice bells. Hauling himself up the ladder to the walkway, he leaned on the palisade and stared into the drifting white clouds. Beside him, the guards peered over the rims of their shields, ready for a flight of arrows to whip out of the mist.

Closer the singing came, and as it neared he realized the words were not English, or Norman, but the old Roman tongue. Shapes materialized in the white haze. The guards’ knuckles whitened on their spears. And then the mist unfolded, like a cloth of linen being drawn back, and a column of men walked out into the dawn light.

Monks
, Hereward thought, puzzled,
singing to the glory of God
. As they emerged fully into the light, he saw that four churchmen carried a frame made from ash branches lashed together. On it rested a familiar chest, the relic box containing the arm of St Oswald. When he recognized Aethelwold striding among the clerics, hands pressed together in prayer, he realized these were the monks of Burgh Abbey.

The guards on either side of him gaped at the spectacle. Then one of them pointed to a figure walking apart from the other clerics. It was Alric, grinning as if he had played the greatest trick of all. Hereward flung himself down the ladder and ran out through the gates.

Alric beamed, throwing his arms wide, and they embraced for a long moment. ‘I thought you dead,’ Hereward said, adding with a feigned scowl, ‘or worse: that you had abandoned us.’

‘There was a time when I too thought myself dead,’ the monk replied. ‘But not high seas nor Danish spears nor fire could keep me down.’

‘Heaven was not ready for your complaining, more like.’

Alric stepped back and swept an arm towards the relic box. ‘And see, I have brought you a prize. God smiles upon the English once more.’

‘That is good,’ Hereward said. Still he felt afraid to hope that they were climbing out of the pit of misfortune that had claimed them. ‘Now if only you had brought me an army too.’

Alric nodded, his face darkening. ‘We must speak. On our long trek from the coast, we passed many Norman scouts and fresh camps. I think the Butcher is moving his army into place ready to attack Ely.’

‘He has been preparing for this battle since you left,’ the
Mercian replied. ‘He takes his time. It seems he wants to leave nothing to chance. I would stake good coin that he is afraid any failure will bring the king’s wrath upon his head.’

‘The delay may be his undoing,’ Alric said hopefully. He watched the singing monks trail through the gates. ‘It may give you space to build your army.’

Hereward grimaced. New men were arriving at Ely by the day, but still not enough to swell the numbers to a level sufficient to defeat the size of army that the Butcher was massing. ‘As the days pass, I worry that more English are beginning to accept the Norman rule,’ he said. ‘They hunger for peace after so many years of war and suffering. One day we may be seen as the enemy loose in this land.’

‘Then we must make plans to turn this war around,’ the monk said.

Hereward frowned. ‘You seem changed. What happened out there across the whale road?’

‘I will tell you all. But only when my belly is full,’ Alric laughed, clapping an arm around his friend’s shoulders. His humour faded and he narrowed his eyes, looking around to be sure he would not be overheard. ‘I did not choose to leave,’ he whispered. When he saw his friend’s surprise, he added, ‘Aye, I thought you would not know the truth. How could you? My skull was all but dashed in and the Danes were paid good coin to spirit me away. Paid,’ he continued, looking round once more, ‘by someone here in Ely.’

Hereward grinned. ‘Trouble yourself about this no longer. We have already driven out the king’s eyes and ears and now they flee for their life from the hard judgement of the English.’

Alric sighed with relief. ‘I feared that all your throats would have been slit in the night. But you are in good spirits. Tell me … Turfrida?’ he ventured with a note of hesitancy.

Before the Mercian could reply, a guard hailed him from the gate, where stood one of the scouts who had been out in the wetlands searching for Edoma, his face flushed from his haste.
‘Your eel stew will have to wait, Alric,’ Hereward muttered, already turning in response.

‘You found her?’ he asked as he strode up to the two men.

The scout shook his head. ‘Not her. Another. Four Norman knights hunt a girl by Lugh’s Bog, too many for me to help her on my own.’ He hesitated, his brow knitting. ‘She looked like Dunnere’s daughter.’

Hereward stiffened. ‘Fetch Redwald, Guthrinc and Hengist,’ he commanded, ‘with spears and shields in hand.’

As the scout raced off, Alric held out his hands in disbelief. ‘Dunnere’s daughter? It cannot be. No word for more than a year and she turns up now?’ Blood drained from his face. ‘Unless she is a ghost … and this is yet another portent of the End-Times.’

The Mercian gave nothing away, but if it was Dunnere’s daughter, there was hope. As the other warriors raced down the track with the scout, he dashed from the gate. Alric followed. They hurried down the slope, plunging into the sea of white mist. Their rasping breath grew muffled, the world around them deadened.

Hereward led his men across the causeway and then turned north. The secret paths appeared out of the reeds and willows and he chose the fastest route, no matter how dangerous. Four knights would show little mercy to any woman travelling on her own, let alone one as comely as Dunnere’s daughter.

‘Why such haste for this woman?’ Redwald hissed as they ran.

‘Because she could save all our lives,’ Hereward replied.

When they reached the edge of Lugh’s Bog, they slowed, straining their ears to hear any sound. Few ventured here. The marsh reeked of rot and occasionally foul-smelling bubbles burst as if something moved just beneath the surface. Thick walls of tangled willow, sedge and reed clustered hard on every side.

Hereward raised his arm to bring the others to a halt. Dim voices rumbled through the mist, call and response tinged
with the excitement of boys at play. He swept his arm left and right. Hengist crept one way, Guthrinc and Redwald the other. Drawing his sword, he prowled forward with Alric at his heel. Drifting white clouds folded around them.

Laughter echoed. Another cry. The Mercian grimaced as he cocked his head, trying to discern the direction of those smothered sounds.

Crashing erupted in the willows just ahead. Looking over his shoulder and laughing, a Norman knight burst out of the mist. Hereward leapt back in surprise, betrayed by the distorted echoes. Just as shocked, the knight cried out as he turned his head. A querying call in his own tongue answered from further along the edge. Realizing they had been discovered, Hereward roared like a bear and swung his blade. The knight tried to duck, but he was wrong-footed in the marshy ground. He half-stumbled and the sword sliced into the side of his neck. Clutching at the spurting wound, he fell, but his screams tore through the haze. They died in his throat as Hereward hacked down, near-severing the head. He loped on before the man’s gurgles had faded away.

Footsteps raced all around, whether friend or foe Hereward did not know. Distorted cracks and rustles faded in and out. Another gurgling cry reached his ears, choked short: a Norman he was sure. A few moments later he pushed past a curtain of willow branches to find Guthrinc with one foot on a fallen warrior’s chest, trying to wrench his spear from the body.

Hereward prowled on, searching through the mist. From the depths of a reed-bed, a knight leapt with a cry. His blade swung down. The Mercian threw himself to one side and the sword narrowly whipped past him. His battle-honed arm moved faster than his thoughts and he thrust Brainbiter into his foe’s chest before the Norman could recover. The knight tumbled backwards into the bog, trailing a crimson arc. In a flurry of sticky bubbles, he slipped below the surface and was gone.

One left
, he thought with grim satisfaction. But the Normans were a distraction. The girl was the only thing that mattered.
He ignored his concerns that there had been no sight nor sound of her and pushed on through the trees. The mist unfolded to reveal Alric, beckoning. He loped after the monk to a clearing where Hengist was sitting on the final body, wiping clean the tip of his spear in the sedge. The Mercian whistled and Redwald and Guthrinc appeared soundlessly. ‘Find Dunnere’s daughter, if she is still here,’ Hereward ordered.

They searched along the edge of the marsh, calling in clear English voices. After a while, the mist began to clear and shafts of warm autumn sun punched through the branches. As they followed the trail of crushed reeds and broken branches made by the Norman knights, Hereward heard a woman’s hesitant voice hail from the western end of the bog.

On the edge of the reeking mire, he found her crawling out from a hiding place among the tangled trunks and thick sedge. Her dress was filthy with the mud of the road, her fair hair lank and greasy and tied back with a piece of torn cloth. She looked up at him with a face like thunder, and he thought how changed she was in appearance; her eyes seemed older than her years by far. Her time in Wincestre had taken a toll. Behind him, the other men ground to a halt, marvelling at the woman who had disappeared from Ely in such mysterious circumstances.