To kill a king master of.., p.4
To Kill a King (Master of War), page 4
‘Like Sir Thomas said, it is what it is, Sir Gilbert.’
‘Aye. That never changes.’
CHAPTER SIX
The higher they climbed, the colder it became. Stinging rain turned to sleet. Blackstone’s bastard horse was as surefooted as a mountain goat, but its uneven gait had Blackstone come close to leaving the saddle as it forged ahead around a tight bend on the narrow track. Had he not adjusted his weight and yanked hard to pull the horse’s misshapen head closer to the rock face, he would have tumbled over the edge and fallen two thousand feet to the gorge below. Heart pounding from the sudden lurch, he slowed the beast who might, for all he knew, be trying to unseat him. Such was its temperament.
Blackstone saw horses ahead. They were hobbled and attended by one of Renfred’s men, who had created a temporary corral using a length of rope between two rock outcrops. Sacking covered the horse’s heads as insurance to stop them panicking. And Blackstone knew there must be a reason for such precautions. John Jacob and Will Longdon followed four lengths behind, their mounts not as reckless as Blackstone’s: that creature thought to have been sired by the devil. Blackstone dismounted and led it forward – but not too close, lest the scent of the other horses stirred the bastard horse’s instinct to exert its dominance. He secured the reins to a jagged piece of rock and threw his cloak over its head, pulling it into a narrow defile. The biting wind immediately made itself known through his gambeson. John Jacob and Longdon followed his lead.
Blackstone strode through the veil of sleet. Beyond the next turn in the track, he could see a darker sky whose tumbling clouds were buffeted across the peaks. How long did they have before the rain and sleet worsened? Blackstone recognized the man tending the corralled horses as one of Renfred’s scouts.
‘Where are the others?’
The man bent his head against the wind-driven sleet. One hand settled on the nearest horse’s neck, calming the nervous animal. If one panicked, the others would break free. ‘Ahead, Sir Thomas. He’s trying to find a way past some men who hold the track.’
Blackstone’s instincts had not failed him. Henry of Trastámara was suspicious of the duplicitous Charles of Navarre, as was anyone who had dealings with him. Navarre would play both sides, but he would not interfere. He was already skulking, pretending to be held against his will in Pamplona. The coward’s absence suited Trastámara. It allowed him to send men into the mountains of Navarre without challenge. The French King had offered his support in removing Pedro and now urged the usurper to learn from French mistakes when they fought the English. Do not stand and fight a pitched battle. English bowmen will slaughter cavalry, and English knights and men-at-arms will engage with such violent fury that the shock will rock an opposing army back on its heels. There is only one way to defeat the English. Starve them out. Wear them down. Cut their supply routes. Harass and hit them with lightning strikes. Kill stragglers and slow-moving elements of an overburdened column. By day and night send men into the English camps to burn, kill and wage terror. Make the English fear men who come from nowhere, only to disappear as quickly as they appear. Such men now waited along the treacherous route.
John Jacob and Will Longdon nodded their greeting to the man, then followed Blackstone. They rounded a bend, saw Renfred and twenty of his men crouched behind cover among the uneven rock face. Scattered crossbow bolts littered the track. A man lay dead four yards ahead with a bolt in his chest. Blackstone pressed himself tight against the wall.
‘Renfred?’
The German captain, who always led Blackstone’s scouts, pointed further along the defile. ‘Thirty men, Sir Thomas. Their horses must be further along the track. You see where it widens after the narrow? I had Rosslyn there’—he nodded towards the dead man—‘move ahead on foot. It just didn’t feel right, so I held the men back with the horses.’
‘Your instincts saved the others,’ said Blackstone.
The huddled men who had laid the ambush were concealed behind a low barricade of rocks and, behind that, their shields. They covered the breadth of the track.
‘We can’t rush them on foot, Sir Thomas,’ said John Jacob. ‘They’d bring us down like Rosslyn. And up to where they span the track it’s barely wide enough for a horse even if we could get a mount to jump their barricade. A horse refuses and man and horse go over the edge.’
Renfred squatted, turning his back against the wind, and rubbed a grubby hand across his beard. ‘I thought of rushing them on foot behind a shield wall but they could fall back a step at a time and cut us down.’
‘And they have the wind at their backs. It gives them an edge with their range,’ said Longdon.
Blackstone squinted against the sleet. ‘Will, I make them to be two hundred and twenty yards.’
Longdon pressed close to Blackstone’s shoulder and peered past. ‘Aye, well, you can add another fifteen to that.’
Blackstone looked at the jagged outcrops at his shoulder that rose up to the higher peaks. ‘We have thousands of men at our backs and if they are forced to stop here we will have men and horses falling to their deaths. The weather is closing in. Those few men can stop the army.’ He peered again at the huddled enemy. ‘We need to get behind them.’
Renfred, John Jacob and Longdon let Blackstone’s words sink in.
‘All right,’ said Renfred. There was obviously only one way to do that.
‘A mountain goat of a climb,’ said John Jacob.
Blackstone nodded. ‘The visibility will get worse. Will, you have to make them think we are going to try and breach from the front. Place your shots when John and I get high enough to make our way across to get behind them.’
‘I’ll climb with you,’ said Renfred.
‘No. You lead your men hard and fast when we attack them from their rear,’ Blackstone told him.
‘Thomas, you make one wrong move up those cliffs and we’ll be waving goodbye to you and John when you fall into the gorge,’ said Will Longdon, pulling his war bow from its greased bag. He took his bowstring from beneath his cap and nocked the bow.
Blackstone crouched and edged away. He unbuckled his sword belt. Pressed his lips to Wolf Sword’s pommel with its embedded silver penny, a permanent reminder of his murdered wife, and put the belt around his shoulders. The sword nestled in its scabbard against his back. ‘They won’t see us if we start our climb back there. Shoot when we get beyond them, Will, and then space your shots to give us time to climb down.’
John Jacob followed him.
Will Longdon selected his first twelve arrows and settled them neatly, the shafts with their goose-feather fletchings resting against the protection of the rock face. He rubbed his hands together and blew warm air into them. ‘Renfred, I’ll need room to draw. Have your lads get behind me. You watch and tell me when they start their climb. Let them get as high as they’re going and then tell me when they’re beyond those bastards. I need to see how my shafts fly in this wind.’
Renfred did as Blackstone’s centenar asked. He herded his men back a few paces to give the bowman room and then turned his back to the wind and sleet to watch Blackstone and John Jacob clamber up the broken rock face. They were already being swallowed by the swirling storm.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Blackstone turned his face from the stinging sleet as he hauled himself up to the next foothold. His hands stiffened from the wind’s cold onslaught. He moved slowly, searching for a fingertip grip. His hose were already torn at the knee, the skin scraped. His eyes stung. How long had it taken to get this far? He looked down. John Jacob was ten feet below, following his lead. Blackstone knew the slow, demanding climb would take its toll on both of them. There was no point in going higher. They had barely climbed fifty feet and time was running out. The column would soon be halted if he and John Jacob did not take a greater risk.
‘John!’
His squire peered up, eyes narrowed against the sleet.
‘Get alongside me. We can’t go any higher.’
Jacob nodded, reached up, found his grip and slowly heaved himself closer. Blackstone saw that his squire’s hands were already bloodied. He looked across to where they had to traverse along the rock face to get behind the enemy. His hands gripping the rocks were no different from his squire’s, but at least the cold air numbed the pain. John Jacob had almost reached him when the rock he was gripping came away. He lurched backwards. Blackstone snatched at his flailing arm. His grip slipped until it reached his wrist. Blackstone squeezed. His shoulder muscles felt as if they were tearing. His fingers were weakening. John Jacob was mid-air. He had no hand or foothold. He peered up. Shook his head.
‘Let me go or I’ll take you with me. Let me go. Do it!’
Blackstone shook his head. ‘The rock face! Reach!’
The squire extended his arm, his fingers tantalizingly close. Blackstone bunched his back muscles. His grip was slipping again. They only had one chance. He heaved, pressing himself against the mountain, hauling John Jacob into the wall. The trailing man squirmed, twisted, put even more pressure on Blackstone, who felt his wet hand slide from Jacob’s wrist, his squire’s fingers slipping through his own. John Jacob clung to the rocks, face pressed hard against stone; he sucked in life, breath pluming as he exhaled fear.
He looked at Blackstone and nodded.
Blackstone edged along the rock face. Impossible to know how long it would take to traverse the two hundred and more yards to get behind the enemy.
*
‘I’ve lost sight of Sir Thomas,’ Renfred shouted.
‘How far along did he get?’ Longdon asked, his eyes focused on the men blockading the track.
‘Halfway. Perhaps more.’ Renfred crouched next to the archer. ‘Will, we need to halve the distance between us and them. The weather might cover us. You shoot, we run, find what cover we can. Then we wait until Sir Thomas gets behind them.’
Longdon pulled another handful of arrows from his bag. ‘Have your men ready.’
Mist swirled from the gorge below, churning into the sleet and wind. Despite the distance, blurred outlines of the men behind the barricade and shield wall were visible as the wind blew the white curtain clear for a moment. One man dared raise himself. In a swift movement, the arrow shaft in Longdon’s hand that had not yet been nocked suddenly flew. The wind made the arrow stray from the target; it glanced off the rock barricade, barely missing the man’s head. He ducked.
Longdon cursed but wasted no time damning the fickle wind. Nock, draw, loose. Nock, draw, loose. His rapid delivery of the first twelve arrows punched through the enemy shields. He heard a scream carry on the wind. At least one defender had been hit. As the twelfth yard-long arrow left his bow, he bellowed to the men.
‘Now!’
Renfred ran ahead of his men. They needed to find a cleft in the rock wall for protection.
There was none.
A hundred and ten yards from Will Longdon’s position, Renfred dropped to the ground, face pressed into the dirt. His men flattened themselves behind him, hoping that if the crossbowmen had seen their run that they would not dare stand up to angle their bows down to shoot at the prostrate and helpless men.
Renfred squirmed, looked back and saw Will Longdon with a handful of arrows tucked into his belt, another nocked on the bow cord. He was crouching. Ready to make his own run. Waiting for when he could kill the unsuspecting defenders. Waiting for Blackstone.
*
John Jacob was only three paces behind Blackstone. A narrow seam of rock acted as a ledge. Shuffling as fast as they dare without losing their footing, they pressed their chests to the rock wall and grasped any tenuous hand hold that presented itself. They heard voices drifting upwards. Cries of alarm. Men shouting that some were wounded. That an unseen bowman was among the attackers. The sleet had turned to snow. The wind freshened even more. Blackstone went another twenty yards past the huddled men below and began the torturous climb down. Leg and arm muscles complained. He slipped. Held on. Cursed as skin tore from his leg and hand. It was nothing. A wound in battle brought its own kind of pain. This was little more than a scratch.
He dropped the last six feet, took the fall with legs bent, his bloodied hand reaching for Wolf Sword. There was no need for words. There was killing to be done. They ran.
A dozen fast strides brought them behind the defenders. A man suddenly loomed out of the snowstorm. His jaw opened and then the scar-faced ghost cleaved him from shoulder to breastbone. John Jacob was already past the dead man. Steel clashed. Men screamed. Blackstone was at his shoulder. They slashed and parried, each covering the other’s killing arc, but the defenders whirled and struck back with fierce determination. The two of them would soon be overwhelmed. The snowstorm obscured one man from the next. It was impossible to see where the next attack would come from. Then a scream of defiance defeated the howling wind as Renfred led his men over the barricade.
The narrow road constrained the fight. Men were too close to even swing their swords. They grappled with knife, axe and mace. Fists beat opponents senseless. Others were forced back, split from the main group. Pushed ever closer to the edge. Those who lost their footing stumbled over the brink, their screams devoured by the beast howling through the gorge, pushing the snow before it.
And then Fate rewarded Blackstone’s daring. It stopped snowing. Clouds tumbled away over peaks, briefly exposing the sky. The stark scene revealed blood-soaked ground. Bodies lay scattered. Some of the enemy were crawling in agony.
Will Longdon sat on the barricade, wiping his archer’s bastard sword across the tunic of a dead defender. ‘Thomas, for once my war bow was of little use. There are times when honed steel is better.’
Blackstone looked at the seven bodies lying pierced with arrows. It was a formidable kill given the conditions.
Renfred’s men finished off the enemy wounded and tipped their bodies along with their dead comrades over the edge.
‘How many men did we lose in the attack?’ Blackstone asked Renfred.
‘Three.’
‘Who?’
‘Bartholomew, Dene and Tricart.’
‘Good men wasted for a poor cause,’ said Blackstone. They had served with Renfred’s scouting group for three years and more. The German captain would feel their loss.
‘We’ll strap them to their horses and bury them when we get across the mountains,’ said Blackstone.
The men cleared the barricade as Will Longdon retrieved what arrows he could. The sky had darkened again. In the distance, leaden clouds moved nearer. Blackstone felt the wind freshen on his face. A trickle of blood ran down his forehead into his beard from a head wound. The wind swept it from his face.
‘Aye, Thomas, I can see I’ll need my needle and thread again.’
‘You only killed seven with the bow, Will. You spent too long in the kitchens at Château de Langoiran.’
‘I was shooting blind.’
Blackstone scooped a handful of snow and pressed it against the cut on his head. ‘Then when you get your eye back, I’ll let you stitch my wound.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
The column following Blackstone clung to the narrow track. Killbere arrived with Blackstone’s men, who led their horses on foot, pressed between beast and rock face. If a horse shied, better for it to go over the edge than take its rider with it. Killbere looked at the bloodstained snow, which told its own story.
‘How many did we lose?’ said Killbere, voice raised against the wind.
‘Four,’ said Blackstone.
‘How many did we kill?’
‘Twenty-six. Likely a few more. Some went over the edge when we attacked.’
Killbere wiped an arm across the snot running from his nose. ‘A bargain,’ he said. ‘How bad is it ahead?’
‘Renfred has gone on. Another two hours and we are at the highest point. The track widens from here. They chose their ambush site well.’
‘Chandos and John of Gaunt are following,’ said Killbere, hunched against the biting cold and swirling snow. ‘The Prince will stay on the French side of the pass until the weather clears.’
‘He’ll be waiting days,’ said Blackstone. ‘Snow and ice won’t stop overnight. That means I’ll have to go back for him. Damn! I never thought the day would come when I had to wet-nurse him.’
‘Thomas, my balls ache. My breath is like broken glass. I can barely see with this infernal wind. It’s churning the snow like a devil’s cauldron. Can we discuss this when I am brought back from near death?’
Blackstone pointed to where John Jacob and Will Longdon waited with their horses. ‘We’ll go over and down into the valley. We’ve lost valuable daylight time dealing with the ambush.’
Killbere was too disgruntled to praise Blackstone’s success. He tugged his horse after him. ‘Then you took too long, Thomas. You must be getting old.’
*
Four hours of daylight remained. Blackstone increased the pace so the men who followed would reach the far side of the mountains before nightfall.
The keening wind howled like tormented souls: baleful cries of lost spirits terrifying horses and causing men to offer muttered prayers as they fought the weather and their laden beasts. Men stumbled on the ankle-breaking ground, losing control of their mounts that shied and fell blindly, whinnying pitifully as they tumbled into space. Those men who collapsed, injured, were left to face their lonely death. The column could not be stopped. They crested the highest point where, thankfully, the track widened. Now the men stood in the lee of their horses, letting the great beasts shield them from the buffeting wind and snow. On the jagged rocks below could be seen the deformed, shattered bodies of the dead from the ambush. The lower the soldiers descended, the calmer the weather became. The mist-laden peaks had been a challenging, hostile terrain, and those who looked over their shoulders at the winding column of exhausted men saw the mountain gods release ghostly, exhausted figures from their grasp.
