[Norman Conquest 01] Wolves in Armour (3 page)

“What’s your name, Monkey-Man?” asked Alan, goading his opponent. “I want to know who it is I’m going to kill.”

“Lonner the Quick,” came the reply, the Fleming disappointed to see confidence and contempt in Alan’s eyes rather than the fear he’d expected. He himself licked his dry lips quickly as he struggled to adapt to the change of roles.

The two men circled each other in the firelight, with a crowd of now of nearly fifty men, faces expectant in the flickering light, making a circle around them that was some eight paces wide. Alan was content to let Lonner make the first move, watching Lonner’s knife-hand and his feet. Lonner had a right lead, waving the knife back and forwards about six inches and had dropped his eyes to look at Alan’s knife. He made several feints and then tried a slash towards Alan’s arm. Alan stepped sideways to avoid the slash and circled left. With a sharp upward movement of his head he caught Lonner’s eye and stepped in and sideways to give his opponent a hard sideways kick to the left knee. The steel toecap of Alan’s boot smashed Lonner’s kneecap as he also savagely cut Lonner’s left upper arm with his knife. Lonner dropped with a squeal like a stuck pig, knee smashed and blood spurting from the deep wound in the arm.

Alan glanced about the crowd. “I guess that Lonner is no longer ‘the Quick’. Anybody else want to chance their arm?” he demanded. There were no takers and Alan walked back to sit by the fire, trying to still the trembling in his hands as he wiped his knife blade clean before putting it away in the sheath in his boot. Several men carried Lonner off towards the abbey infirmary.

“What the hell was that about?” Alan demanded of Hugh. “You could’ve stopped that anytime and made them give me the respect of my position. Instead I’ve had to cripple, and possibly kill, one of your men.”

Hugh de Berniers shrugged. “Respect has to be earned in a war-band. You have that now. I wanted to see what kind of man you are- now I know. You’re a killer who thinks quickly and fights dirty, which is just what I need. You’ll be second in command of the troop.”

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Several days later they were still sitting and waiting for the wind. Each was eating a bowl of unsweetened oat porridge for breakfast when Robert asked Hugh, “Do you think we’ll ever get on the ships and sail to England?”

Hugh scratched a stubbled chin; it had been some time since he had troubled to shave. “We sailed from Dives near Caen on the 12th September with a southerly wind; it had blown from the north for weeks. Then there was a storm from the west and we got scattered as we were moving here to St Valery sur Somme. The duke made a deal with Count Guy to let us sail from here as it’s a more direct journey to England- just sail due north. We lost some ships in the storm. For the last week the wind has been back in the north- which was lucky for you or you’d have missed the passage.”

“But what about the portends? The fire in the sky after Easter?” asked Robert.

Hugh snorted with amusement. “Who knows about such things? Certainly not me- and I think not either kings nor popes. They make of them what they will. Duke William claims the fire in the sky means he’ll be successful. I doubt not that Harold claims it means William will be crushed. It was six months ago. Omens are easily read in hindsight after the battle has been decided.”

“But Duke William has the right to be king!” said another man. “Harold promised him that. He swore on holy relics and is now forsworn. Duke William has a claim by blood relationship to be king and was appointed by King Edward as his successor. God is on our side and will strengthen our arms!”

“If that’s the duke’s greatest claim to kingdom of England, then he’ll have to rely on the same argument as Sveyn Forkbeard in 1013, when he became king of the Danish part of England in the north. Swords!” interjected Alan. “Sveyn’s son Cnut followed him as king in the north when Sveyn died in 1014 and in a deal with Edmund Ironsides he also became king of Wessex, Saxon England, in the south - the deal was whoever lived longest would be king of all England. That probably seemed like a good bet to Edmund as he was a young man. But he was dead within a year or so and Cnut expanded his kingdom. His son, Harald Harefoot followed him, and then his brother Harthacnut.

“Edward returned and assumed power in the south, but who you recognised as king would probably depend on whether you were Anglo-Saxon or Danish, no matter where you lived. Harthacnut then died without legitimate heirs. The whole thing regarding ‘rights’ is a mess. William has no right to the throne, just as a bastard he had little enough claim to be duke if his father hadn’t named him his successor over the claims of his legitimate brothers, and made his vassals swear to support him before he set out on pilgrimage and then died.

“William’s claim of blood comes from being a distant relative of Cnut and being a cousin to old King Edward. The only one who may be able to claim a right to be king is Edgar the Aetheling, the boy who has the blood of King Alfred in his veins. He’s thirteen.

“Duchess Matilda, Duke William’s wife, is also distantly of the blood of Alfred, but Duke William isn’t claiming the throne in her stead. Harold has no royal blood at all. He was just the brother-in-law of Edward, but the English chose him as their king and he sits on the throne- which makes the argument of right and wrong largely irrelevant. The Norman nobles aren’t supporting William to be king out of any fine principles. They’re doing it for the land and wealth that being successful will give them- just like us lowly soldiers. To win the crown William has to beat the English army in the field and kill Harold. It’s our swords and our blood that will give him the right to be king.”

Robert added, “Recently Harold Godwinson’s brother Tostig, who’s been in Flanders with his wife’s family after he fled England when he was deposed as earl by the Northumbrians and his brother didn’t support him, has been flitting backwards and forwards. Latest rumour is that he’s been to see Harald Hardrada of Norway to see if he can get him to invade and claim the throne of England, so Tostig can get his earldom back. God only knows what Hardrada will end up doing! It’ll probably depend on whether he’s bored with constantly beating Swein, the king of Denmark.”

“To win the crown for William and riches for ourselves, first we have to get to England,” said Hugh wryly. “With the problems we’ve been having with that, it makes you wonder if God is on our side. We’ve been waiting for the right wind for weeks. It’s autumn and there are always gales and storms in autumn. It’s the equinox tomorrow. No prudent sailor takes to the sea after that, other than for short journeys. The duke has moved heaven and earth, spent all his gold and made God knows what promises to put this army here and those ships out in the river. In another two weeks it’ll all fall apart and everybody will go home.”

The next day William and his great lords arrived, chief amongst them the duke’s former guardians Robert Count of Eu and Hugh de Montford, together with Hugh de Montgomerie, Geoffrey de Mandeville, William de Warenne and William’s half brothers Robert of Mortain, Odo of Bayeux and the duke’s seneschal William fitzOsbern. The following morning the duke had Mass said for the assembled host, using the services of the many bishops and priests that would be accompanying the expedition- many of them present in the army in a martial role.

After Mass was completed Duke William mounted a small dais and shouted out an address, the words of which could not be made out by most of those present. After several minutes firstly his ducal banner of a gold leopard on a red background was unfurled, whipping in the strong breeze; the host gave a roar of approval. Then with great solemnity another banner, large and white, was borne to the dais. When unfurled by the standard-bearer, a flag with two large crossed keys in gold on a white background was revealed- the insignia of Pope Alexander. There was another roar of approval, but this somewhat muted as the watching soldiers didn’t understand the import of what they had seen. Next the monks from the abbey emerged carrying the gold-covered reliquary boxes in which the bones of St Valery resided and these were paraded in pomp around the assembled host, the soldiers kneeling piously and chanting religious songs.

Later that evening a herald, one of several dispatched by Duke William to repeat the words of his speech that distance and wind had made inaudible to most of the army, explained Duke William’s claim to the throne. This was that he was related to a number of past English monarchs from Alfred the Great to Cnut and latterly King Edward; That both in England and on the continent kingship should pass to those of royal blood, of which Harold had none; The story of Harold’s swearing on holy relics to support Duke William’s claim to succeed King Edward was repeated, as was the claim that he therefore was a forsworn oath-breaker to be reviled by all.

All of this was old news and not particularly impressive to the humble rank-and-file of the army, who saw it as standard propaganda. What was new information, and which explained the white standard, was that Pope Alexander II had recognised William’s claim to the throne of England and had given his blessing to the invasion, presenting William with a consecrated banner of St Peter and a papal ring.

All those who opposed the Duke Will
iam’s army did so at risk of ex
communication and eternal damnation.

Finally the prayers of the duke and his followers were answered. After what had seemed an interminable wait, the wind, which had blown consistently from the north for four weeks, finally changed to the south on the morning of Wednesday the 27th September.

The Norman army hurriedly embarked into the armada of waiting ships on what had become an unusually hot day. There were hundreds of ships, only the largest able to carry as many as fifty men and most as few as twenty- even less for those where the horses had been led snorting and afraid up small gangplanks onto the vessels.

Hugh de Berniers’ small squadron of cavalry was split between three of the smaller ships with six armed men, a few retainers and six horses each. Odin, Alan’s huge destrier, had proven to be one of the more fractious animals. A narrow wooden boardwalk had been build across the mud that separated the small open ship from the firm land of the riverbank and the war-horse had been reluctant enough to walk along that. To get him up the gangplank and into the padded stall that lay athwart-ships, with the animal being disturbed by the bustle and shouting all about and the loud neighing and the thump of kicks striking wood from those horses already loaded, required Alan to cover the head of the horse with a cloth while he pulled on the reins from the front and six men put their shoulders behind the horse’s rump and pushed, dodging out of the way as the horse lashed out with its rear hooves.

Everywhere were men and horses milling about in confusion on land. Ships were in equal disarray on the water, many crashing into each other as their inexperienced crews tried to manoeuvre them to or from the riverbank.

They departed on the mid-afternoon tide, the shallow mouth of the River Somme requiring the ships to have the assistance of the outgoing tide to navigate the many sandbanks and shoals. Even at high tide the ships carefully skirted exposed mudflats, where tiny brown and white sandpipers darted about and the larger black and white oystercatchers wandered slowly, using their large red beaks to dig for worms and crustaceans. White herons stalked carefully in the shallows, occasionally stabbing their beaks to catch small fish. Overhead seagulls wheeled and screamed loud protest at this invasion of their usually quiet estuary home. Alan stood with his elbows on the ship's rail, cheerfully exchanging comments with Robert and Hugh.

William had ordered the fleet to assemble around his flagship Mora in the bay beyond the river mouth, which would show a stern light on the overnight voyage. With so many ships there was no question of keeping any formation other than the ships moving en mass behind William’s large flagship. With the call for 600 ships had come a need for over 2,000 experienced sailors- which again Normandy didn’t have and which, unlike ships, couldn’t be obtained in a few weeks.

The fleet, the soldiers and sailors having attended a special Mass to beseech God’s mercy in their endeavour to sail such a large fleet late in the season, commended their souls to the Lord and set sail, heading north.

The boat on which Alan and Robert were travelling was ‘captained’, if that was the correct word, by a Fleming, with the assistance of two youths whom the Fleming had to instruct which ropes to pull. As darkness fell they couldn’t see the stern light of the Mora, so the captain, muttering all the time about the lateness of the season and the risk of storms, simply headed due north looking for the high white cliffs of Beachy Head, intending to then make a turn to the east to land at the instructed disembarkation point of Bulverhythe harbour, a large harbour just to the west of the smaller harbour of Hastings proper.

They spent an uncomfortable night. The strong southerly wind, while filling the single sail and pushing them north, also caused choppy seas. This, together with a swell from the east, caused the small cog to both pitch and roll. Almost as soon as the ship had reached open water most of the men were lining the ship’s side and vomiting. Robert was badly affected by seasickness, Alan less so. The horses, in their temporary stalls athwart-ships, were clearly unhappy; they stamped their feet, snorted and tried to kick or bite anybody who came in range at either end.