Son of the Morning (93 page)

On the bank he saw George go down – a charging knight’s lance had missed him but the clash of horses had sent him sprawling. Montagu felt something snag in his gambeson. A longbow arrow. Someone needed to tell the English archers to stop firing now their men were on the bank.

Montagu reached George as a dog devil, jaws dripping spittle, jumped up onto a dead horse and stared down at the young knight. Montagu cut it down from behind.

‘You’re all right, George, get up.’

‘Baron Despenser to you, you churl.’ George snapped to his senses. ‘William?’

‘Alive,’ said Montagu. Then he ran on, into the Genoese, joining the mass forcing them back. It was not long before the French were in retreat and the main body of the English army were looming under its angel. The army crossed, on a broad front, the tide rising. In an hour all the men were over and the French behind them cut off – at least for a while. Montagu had thought they might make a stand at the river.

Greatbelly was at his arm. ‘You looked after the lads,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’

‘I don’t need the thanks of a whore for doing what my duty and upbringing …’ He stopped himself. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘They’ll come through.’

‘You seek damnation,’ said Greatbelly. ‘Is that part of it – treating us as equals, spitting on God’s order?’

Montagu grimaced. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But I’m glad your boys are alive.’

For a day they tried to goad the French across but Philip would not be drawn. The English could stand in the field and starve while the French were sustained by the baggage train the English had discarded. Montagu knew that Edward had to find food and his Flemish allies, so he was not surprised when the army moved on.

The Flemish were not there – they had retreated under a piffling French assault. Two weeks they marched north. Montagu’s shoes were falling to pieces and he was not alone. They took more towns but the people had spoiled or run off with their food and no supplies came from England. Had messengers got through or had angels torn the devils from the skies?

The French angels were big above them now, Michael his arms stretched wide, his sword flashing bright across the countryside, the French army close behind. They would not outrun them for much longer. The English were ragged men, starving and tired.

Still they burned the land. Would the French angels engage? Would they need to?

In Cobham’s force, Montagu made his way down the track of a wood out into a broad field that led uphill to a windmill. A small village seemed to tremble at the foot of the hill, as well it might. At the summit, Cobham planted the royal standard. ‘Here!’ he shouted. ‘This is where we make our stand. This is Crecy, lads. Remember the name. You’re about to make it famous!’

14

While Osbert had waited in the Vincennes woods, Dow was tied to Nergal’s cart by his hands and by a rope through the iron collar at his neck. He had failed utterly, he knew. God had been too clever for him, securing the banner in a way that he knew no true Luciferian – as the Antichrist was bound to be – could ever release it.

He thought of Orsino, of his father, his nan, but most of all of his mother. Was she in there, still alive, possessed somehow by that devil. He tried to call down Murmur just to feel the little demon nuzzling against him, for the comfort it would bring. The demon did not come. He had not seen him since they crossed to the Island of God.

The devil drove on, night and day, taking fresh horses from the bandits they met on the road, or from farmsteads. In the mountains, a horse died from exhaustion, its back bloody from the devil’s whip. Nergal took the yoke himself and pulled the cart onwards. Dow was allowed to drink and, very occasionally, to eat and relieve himself, but only after he had explained to Nergal – the devil gave him its name – that he would die if he did not.

How Dow suffered at seeing the low people’s houses burned and their food and animals stolen. They went on at nightfall. Nergal never sleeping and moving always to the north west.

‘How do you know where to go?’ said Dow.

‘I smell fires on the wind,’ said Nergal, and sniffed. ‘France burning this way means the English king is ashore.’

‘You tried to kill me before, why not do it now?’

‘And risk summoning your mother from inside me? I think not. Besides, I am serving two masters now. I’ll secure your death but without danger to myself. It will be quick and you will have no warning, so your bitch mother will not reclaim her body.’

Dow was on the road for weeks, his body aching with the restraint, and the jarring of the cart.

The angel’s sword, mail and shield were tied to the cart – Dow had tied them there himself, supervised all the time by Nergal with a lit candle to his mouth. The devil would not touch the angelic items.

‘You are of Îthekter,’ said Dow. ‘How can they harm you?’

‘We are imperfect,’ said Nergal. ‘Just as a knave should not go dressed in silk nor a merchant in ermine, God will not have the devils touch the things that belong to his angels.’

‘So a holy sword is death to you as it is to a demon?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then why bring it?’

‘My Lord Despenser would trade it for favours. He is to be Satan’s favourite when he kills you. I, as his obedient servant, can only profit from any trade.’

Often Dow fell into something like sleep, something like death, the jolting of the cart banging his bones raw.

Suddenly awake. Bandits were whooping from the trees and from all sides. Nergal, who always kept a candle burning in a lantern, took out the flame and swallowed it. Heat and light, screams, the awful cry of the horse as it burned.

Dow could scarcely understand. Someone was in front of him on the cart. A man.

‘You can’t treat the boy like this, Nergal, he’ll die.’

‘I have given him water five times now.’

‘Today?’

‘Since we began.’

‘He needs more, there’s a stream ahead.’

‘I have no love for water. He’s lucky to have any at all.’

Dow felt himself cut from the cart, light paining his eyes, his head shoved into cool water. He gulped it in.

‘Those men kidnapped you?’ The devil’s voice, a cracked parody of Sariel’s.

‘And forced me to come here to find you. They were after the boy. Thank God you are such a stout defender, Nergal, thank God.’ He knew that voice too. Was it real? The pardoner. Well, he was unlikely to forgive Dow, who had turned him out to fend for himself in the wilds.

Dow was back on the cart, Nergal pushing. They skirted Paris. Despenser was not there, said Osbert. Days more travel, not so tightly bound. Osbert wore the angel’s armour, the sword at his side – with the high seriousness of a little boy dressed up in his father’s gear. Dow found the sight ridiculous, even through his pain.

Soon they were travelling at the rear of an army.

‘Make way for the king’s men!’ shouted Osbert, though many marvelled to see such a finely dressed knight on a cart pulled by a woman. Osbert bought a hobbelar from the retinue of a southern chevalier and spent most of the journey trying to control it until he tied it to the cart to force it to step on.

With regular water, though still no food, Dow began to recover slightly.

Every sound had the pardoner flinching. Even a sudden blast of hail had him dropping beneath the shield, screaming about arrows.

‘You know they intend to kill me,’ said Dow to Osbert.

‘You don’t know that. Look …’ he whispered. ‘Between you and me it’s no good to me you going to Despenser. I’m going to try to get you to Edward. It’s the only way I’ll get paid from this.’ He spoke as if that might be Dow’s chief concern.

‘So
he
can kill me?’

‘Well, he’ll kill you later than Despenser, and we’ll be on him in a couple of days according to this lot here. Look, there’s one of his devils flying in the distance.’

There was too – the size of a man, bat-winged, wheeling from the dark clouds. Up ahead was something more ominous. The clouds themselves seemed to glow and Dow thought he could see immense figures peering down from them, bright and haloed. Philip’s angels. Four of them, painting the rainblack sky with gold.

‘You couldn’t just pretend to convert could you?’ said the pardoner. ‘I could keep my office and you could be my assistant. Wine. Whores. Food. Everything a man needs for a happy and contented life.’

Dow said nothing and the pardoner threw up his hands. ‘All right, all right, I just thought I’d ask. Do you realise how inconvenient your attitude is for other people? Might it be time to think of them, for a change? This means Edward is my only option and not a very good one looking at the size of this army.’

Nergal sang out:

‘God’s blessing they have,

Holy fire they hold.

But they have not the Antichrist,

More precious than gold!’

‘Don’t shout about it,’ said Osbert.

The press was too great now for the cart to make it through. They were on the army’s baggage train and it blocked the road completely, the whole procession going at the pace of the slowest, most rickety overloaded cart pulled by the most blown, tired and sick horses. Knights trailing banners and pennants, muscled their horses through, cursing the rabble, though the poorer people were content that the column should crawl. Ahead of them, they knew, were the English.

‘If we don’t get to Despenser soon, the battle’s going to be over and he might even be dead,’ said Osbert. ‘We need to hurry up. We should ditch this cart.’

Dow guessed Osbert had thought that he might be easier to liberate in the crush of the road. That seemed impossible now.

‘I can’t see the reward in this,’ said Osbert.

‘Many men are to die,’ said Dow.

‘Yes, but I’m rather concerned about what happens after the battle. I hope my position is secure.’

‘Shut up. We’ll walk,’ said Nergal.

They pressed on, drawing comments and whoops of amazement as they passed – a slight, pale woman dragging a strong lad by the neck, a lit lantern in her free hand.

Dusk came down and now the angels were easy to see. Sometimes they appeared as a sunburst behind a cloud, sometimes as giant and beautiful creatures floating upon it. It was difficult to see how far away they were – they appeared near but they were massive and after an hour’s walk they were still half way to the horizon. The baggage trains were full of weapons now – giant shields for the crossbowmen, great sheaves of quarrels. No sign of the crossbowmen, though – all at the front. Eager boys.

‘Looks like England will have a new king by the end of the week,’ said Osbert.

‘Or none,’ said Dow.

‘Forget it mate, it all collapses without kings. Look, your only chance of survival is to declare for God. Convert and I can get you to Philip. Edward, I reckon is a plucked goose.’

‘He’s going to Despenser,’ said Nergal, tugging Dow along.

Dow said nothing. Four angels. He could have killed them, had he not stood on principle and failed to get the banner. He had done the right thing to spare the king’s life. But now, but now, what? Would England ever hand over the lands to Free Hell?

The three took to the fields; many did, as if the road was a river and they part of a human flood. It was a hot August but a close one, the dark clouds full of rain. To the front of the column they saw the winged devils wheeling in spirals under the angel light. Dow had the impression of two darknesses – the clouds above, the writhing devils below and between them a light at once fragile and mighty. The light was like the sun in her veil of rain on the moors, like the green light of the river pools he’d swum in as a child, like the shifting blue light of the sea and the lilac light of evening where the hawk hangs waiting, like the light of the stars and the moon and the light of his mother’s eyes, like all the remembered light that had ever comforted him or thrilled him.

They were arriving late in the day. Now there was a light from the south, a comet, a shooting star blazing through the sky to the head of the column. They were nearly there, beneath the angels, their vast inscrutable faces staring down from the clouds.

‘Let’s hope they don’t shit,’ said Osbert. ‘London pigeons are bad enough.’

Knights were crammed into the lane here, fully armed and armoured, clanking against each other in the press of it. Horses screamed and panicked, riders shouting at them, at each other, at their pages and grooms.

‘They can’t mean to attack today,’ whispered Osbert to Dow. ‘I need time to get to Edward.’

Nergal strode on, tugging the boy behind him.

‘Look, Nergal, old chap, or old devil. Have you considered any other buyers for this Antichrist? Despenser is simply not offering you the best deal.’

‘Favour with Satan is the very best deal,’ said Nergal. ‘And look, there ahead is my master Despenser’s red lion slouching on his banners!’

A shout came from the front of the line. ‘France! France!’ Trumpets blew. It spat with rain, though it was hot and the sun shone strongly up the hill towards the English lines.

There was no way through at all now – knights pushed, horses kicked – one panicking and in trying to climb the bank of the lane, sending its rider crashing to the floor. Those around him tried to make room but it was impossible. So many colours, so many sigils and banners. It was the most magnificent rabble Dow had ever seen. They skirted two hundred paces about, through lines of squabbling crossbowmen. The rain came down hard – the crossbow captains were screaming at their men and Dow didn’t need to speak Genoese – or any of the other Italian languages – to understand that the crossbowmen were not happy to deploy so late in the day in such weather. The captains gestured to the blazing angels and, Dow guessed, told them God was on their side. They ran up the hill, forming into their lines before the English.

Nergal’s eyes were full of fervour, as he pushed on to the front of the line. Dow whispered for Murmur to release him but Murmur didn’t come.

‘I heard that,’ said Osbert. ‘Your flying demon’s likely keeping a low profile. The angels are keeping it away, I should guess.’

Death, then
, thought Dow.