The King’s Arrow (14 page)

Horses approached, heavy mounts, and men called to each other. Spear shafts spanked flanks of horses, urging them to greater speed, and when the
menee
sounded next it was close, not far from the high, moss-bound walls of the pinfold.

“Certig,” said Simon, in his firmest voice. Simon forced out the words like a man used to giving fighting orders. “Ride to Aldham Manor. Tell my mother to move at once into the tower.”

“The tower, my lord Simon?”

“My father's keep,” said Simon in a tone of gentle exasperation. “On the hill behind the house. She and Alcuin and the house servants could hold off an army from there.”

Certig groaned. “Oh, we don't have to hide there, do we, my lord? What has happened to make us so afraid?”

“The king is dead,” said Simon.

“Did our lord king hurt himself?” asked Certig, sounding like child in need of comfort.

Simon let his horse step gently sideways, into Certig's mount, jostling the servant and causing him to gather the reins more firmly in his grasp. This soft collision had its intended result, stirring Certig back into his wits. He said, “I begin to understand.”

“We'll hasten down to the river, Certig,” said Simon, “and sail the
Saint Bride
to sea.”

“By Jesus, you'd better be quick,” said Certig. “Hide in Normandy, my lord. They'll never lay hands on you there.” Now that he was in possession of his spirits, the old Certig was back in full. “Oh, never fear, Lord Simon—your mother will be secure.”

Before Simon could say more, heavy horses arrived, wild-eyed and dancing as their riders pulled them back. Walter and his companions were trapped in the livestock fold by five of the marshal's men, resplendent in their blue-and-gold surcoats—with Grestain in the lead, a broadsword in his hand.

26

Simon realized that actual fighting would not be much like the pretty, long-winded ballads, in which a wounded adversary swooned and woke and offered up a prayer in rhyme, forgiving the victor. And yet he was not prepared for what actually happened.

“Stand aside, before Heaven,” cried Nicolas, in a piercing voice amazing from such a slight youth, “for the passage of Lord Walter, lord of Poix and peer to the crown of England.”

This command was given in such a ringing, disciplined manner that three or four of the horsemen drew all the harder on their reins. Their horses backed, snorting, shaking their bridles.

But Grestain, the royal sergeant, stood in his stirrups, as though Nicolas had not made a sound. This Grestain—so fond of his days herding oxen, thought Simon—is the mortal who will deliver me to death.

It was clear that Bertram and his companions were not equipped for fighting. Simon had a knife at his belt, but nothing else, and even Walter, aside from his bow, carried only a shortsword, a modest weapon compared with a war blade. Bertram was likewise outfitted for the hunt, with a short sword in a brass-chased leather scabbard, and he wore no helmet or body armor.

Grestain, by contrast, was a royal sergeant and accustomed to arming himself with little warning. His leather helmet gleamed, the nasal guard that extended before his face making him look cross-eyed with determination. The other riders and their heavy stallions were likewise armed for combat, with only a few dangling buckles betraying their haste.

Bertram urged his mare forward with a gentle click of his tongue, like any placid rider. He was tall and broad-shouldered, but looked like a man more prepared for diplomacy than bloodshed.

It began as a feat of horsemanship.

Bertram encouraged his mare to ride into Grestain's warhorse with a gentle but insistent, “Press on, press on.”

The mare needed little encouragement.

The stallion responded with a snort, pawing the air with a forehoof, and instantly the mare fought back, taking a nip out of the stallion's ear. Soon the animals were squalling like gigantic cats, the big warhorse towering over the mare, the smaller horse seizing the stallion's neck in her teeth and hanging on.

Grestain, encumbered by shield and sword, could not cling to the reins. He toppled sideways out of the saddle, but after his clumsy, arm-waving effort to keep his balance, the gleaming broadsword was no longer in Grestain's grasp. The weapon had found its way into Bertram's hand, and the knight began cutting great slices out of the increasingly helpless Grestain.

The assembled horsemen crowded forward to defend the sergeant, but Bertram made short work of thrusting and stabbing, using the mare as a battering ram against the larger, less determined mounts. Two saddles were empty, then a third, until only one royal guard remained on horseback, in full retreat back toward the woods.

Simon was aghast at this sudden butchery, but fascinated, too, at the deftness shown by Bertram even now. He backed his increasingly uneasy horse out of the widening pond of flesh and gore, and with an air of a woodchopper ready for his next task, turned to learn his master's will.

Simon was further surprised at Walter's reaction to this violence. He gave no sign of concern for the agony of the men still writhing, facedown in the scarlet mud, and he offered no words of praise to Bertram. Walter's manner was that of a man who had seen such sudden death routinely and did not believe that it warranted comment. The violence calmed Walter, and he looked around with a smile to see if Simon, too, was feeling increasing confidence.

Walter accepted the gift of the broadsword from Bertram, along with its belt and sheath, and buckled the weapon on with a look of worried satisfaction. He hooked his thumb into his belt and swelled in the saddle, as though he had felt quite shabbily dressed until now.

Walter murmured a quiet command to Bertram, and the knight rode off beside Certig, a small herd of sheep parting, scattering, and reforming with resilient meekness as the horsemen passed.

Simon envied the sheep that instant—by the day's end these animals would be cropping this very grass under a lively summer rain shower, kept safe by their very number. He envied Bertram and Certig, too, heading off to the thick stone walls and experienced housemen of Castle Foldre.

There was no such promise, Simon knew, that he would be so much as breathing by day's end. Without Bertram and Certig, Simon felt all the more defenseless.

He knew an ancient path that bisected the pastureland, plunged straight through a field of nettles where Caesar the goat stood with his feet spread, chewing earnestly, tethered to a stake.

The horses were eager, well into the mood of what they took to be the day's sport. Nicolas looked ever more youthful, punished by the sunlight sifting down through the clouds, but he was a skilled horseman, riding flank like an experienced squire.

There was about the afternoon a feeling of reprieve, like that moment when a fragile earthen vessel topples and before it strikes the ground, an impression that perhaps, with a little further luck, jeopardy might prove to be an illusion.

They rode hard.

27

A smile lit up Gilda's face as Simon and his companions approached.

She was so beautiful in the afternoon sun, her countenance such a relief from the events Simon had just witnessed, that he was swept with emotion.

“What are the horn blowers telling us?” she asked.

Gilda had been carrying a wicker basket down to the ship, the freighter alive to the tide, the unanchored ship stretching her mooring cables, the ship eager to depart like a living thing made of spruce and tar. Walter made a gracious gesture from horseback as he rode down toward the river, acknowledging her with a show of courtliness, and Nicolas offered her a pleasing, “Good afternoon, my lady.”

Gilda's spirits began to wilt.

Simon realized what an enigmatic group they must be, all courtesy and tense smiles, while their horses were spiky with blood and spattered with the claylike mud of the local byway.

Gilda's smile was further replaced by an expression of concern as Simon's companions rode their mounts to the river and out into the water. The horses splashed the current with their muzzles, taking a moment to drink, the water around them stained dark at once with mud and with gore.

Walter climbed aboard the vessel and turned to help Nicolas on board, with the air of a man who owned and disposed of everything within sight—including the services of the astonished Oswulf, standing beside the ship's tiller. Tuda, Oswulf's chief rope mender and seaman, climbed up from the ship's hold, his mouth agape.

Simon told Gilda, “We require the ship.”

“What do these people want?” called Oswulf, indicating Walter and his herald as though they were a pair of beggars who had blundered onto the vessel.

Simon repeated his statement to Gilda's brother in a voice that would have been audible across the river.

“The ship is not available for hire,” called Oswulf, without explanation or courtesy, ignoring his visitors and preferring to speak at a shout with Simon.

Walter had the manner of so many aristocrats, believing that his station in life, his wealth—and his skill with sword and lance—made speech unnecessary and even a little unseemly. He would not engage in a parley, and he certainly would not utter a word of English. He folded his arms and waited.

Oswulf, for his part, ignored Walter, making a point of having freight to secure, canvas to tug into place, matching a nobleman's arrogance with a freeman's disdain. Tuda took his master's stance as an unspoken command, and he worked a sweep through an oarlock, getting ready to push the ship off with the long oar.

Nicolas set to work rearranging cargo on the deck, and Tuda smiled, pleased to have a helping hand.

“Oswulf, will you take us to Normandy?” asked Simon, riding to the river's edge and dismounting.

“I won't,” said Oswulf, with deliberate bad manners, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand.

“The ship is ours,” responded Simon, realizing as he spoke that his rights as a lord of all the farmland around did not extend to piracy. It was true that, in an emergency, a man and his ship could be pressed into service, but free folk like Oswulf and his sister would have to be paid a fair price.

Oswulf moved deliberately, but his actions were emphatic. He sprang from the ship and hurried through the shallows to the stony bank. He seized a mooring peg from the shore, a tall, heavy stake with one sharp end and the other shaped like a mushroom from being struck with hammers and mauls over the years.

He held the object like a club. His message was clear. This was his ship, this his mooring place. He would do what he chose. “Our ship needs no passengers, Simon. We are full of Aldham cheese for the merchants of Brugge harbor.” He lowered his voice. “What is this the horn blowers are saying? What's wrong?”

“Walter will pay a good fee,” said Simon.

“Surely, Oswulf,” urged Gilda, “we have room for three gentlefolk.”

Oswulf said nothing.

“What has happened?” Gilda asked, turning to Simon.

It was easy for Simon to understand Oswulf's position. He was protective of his sister, not wanting her to spend shipboard hours or even days with a high-handed Norman lord. And he felt resentful of Simon's ability to play the English and the Norman lord all at once, and perhaps was even further confused as to Simon's ultimate loyalties.

Simon could see that Oswulf understood that something uncommon had happened, and that a crisis was unfolding. Furthermore, he had a businessman's sense that, as the owners of the sole ship of any substance on this stretch of the river, he and his sister could secure a good, round purse.

“Oswulf, take the price he offers you,” said Simon.

“Why?” Oswulf seemed to like the sound of his own obdurate inflection.

He made a show of sauntering past Simon, gazing up toward the trees. It sounded as though horses were approaching, a good many, and coming on fast. “Why should some crisis in the woods have anything to do with my sister and me?”

“He'll take the boat without your leave, otherwise,” said Simon.

Lord Walter was still wearing his sweeping hunting mantle, and leaning against the rail, he looked like a gentleman in no hurry and quite pleased at the way Nicolas was stowing the huge, wax-coated wheels of cheese into the hold.

“He certainly will not take the ship,” said Oswulf in a confrontational tone, awakening to a new stubbornness.

“Accept his silver, Oswulf,” Simon pleaded, but the big Englishman brushed past him, hurrying down toward the vessel that gave every sign of being ready to depart in his absence.

Perhaps Oswulf realized the tactical error he had made, leaving the two strangers with only Tuda to attend them. Nicolas was already hauling on the severed length of mooring cable, and the ship was turning with the outgoing tide, her prow quick to catch the current toward the sea. Far from hindering this effort, Tuda was working hard with the oar, compelling the keel away from the shore.

Oswulf hurried, climbing over the side. He seized the tiller of the broad freighter, just as the vessel began to make way toward a half-submerged stump. At the same time a new sound reached them, the high notes of an alarm, and another one across the woodland, two ascending notes, echoing along the river. The horsemen had arrived, and were taking positions along the bank beyond the trees.

Simon accepted Walter's help in climbing on board the ship, and in turn assisted Gilda. The vessel was already slipping well into the current, the rocky bank drifting away as the abandoned horses accepted their freedom, plunging playfully like dogs in the water.

“Master of the ship,” said Nicolas, using the English title of respect, “my lord gives his word of honor, before all that is holy, that you and your vessel will be rewarded.”

Oswulf shook his head with a confused frown, acting out the role of a river man confronted with the incomprehensible. But when he spoke he was less blunt, showing that he had understood enough. There was a shift in his tone—even a stubbornly single-minded river merchant like Oswulf realized that months and years later he would see Simon in church and at market, and that intractable behavior was unwise as well as unneighborly.