Shadows and Strongholds (50 page)

'Neither would I,' Brunin held out his hand. 'I will see you in Rhuddlan… Father.'

Joscelin snorted, for the appellation was still so new that it sounded strange, especially when Brunin's own father was at his side. He clasped the young man's hand and forearm, nodded in farewell and reined his destrier to join the baggage line.

Alberbury Castle was a small but stout affair of stone and timber, standing close to the Shrewsbury road and hard on the Welsh border. The FitzWarins held it from the Corbet family who were tenants-in-chief. Although it was not their main estate, was much smaller than Ludlow and very close to the threat from Wales, Hawise loved it from the moment she set eyes upon it. Perhaps it was the sense of intimacy. It was as if the place had opened wide to embrace her and then held her fast like a swaddled infant in maternal arms.

'Too small,' Mellette disparaged it with a sniff, 'and too buried. And I don't like doing homage to the Corbets for this place… hucksters and thieves, the lot of them.'

Hawise kept diplomatically silent. Eve looked weary and almost rolled her eyes, her expression betraying that she had heard this complaint ad nauseam.

'We'll stay long enough to have the horses shod and give that lazy farrier something to do. Make our presence known. Then we'll move on to Whittington.'

Eve grimaced and rubbed the small of her back. 'I was hoping to stay a little longer,' she murmured.

Are you not well, my lady?' Hawise asked with concern.

Gaunt hollows shadowed Eve's delicate cheekbones and she moved as if it were not a baby in her womb, but a burdensome lead weight.

'Just tired.' Eve forced a smile. 'I need to rest.'

'You can do that at Whittington,' Mellette said curtly. 'All the children have been born there. I'll not have you birthing the babe here under a Corbet's rule.'

'There are still four months to my confinement,' Eve protested. 'Spending one of them here will make no difference.'

Mellette's lips tightened with stubborn determination. 'Even so, the men will expect to find us at Whittington.'

'If they are not all summer in the saddle,' Eve answered with a hint of petulance.

'Can't see why it should bother you if they are… although it might bother the bride.' Mellette looked Hawise up and down as if expecting her to grow a belly on the spot. 'Unless of course she has news for us.'

'Whether I had news or not, I would still miss my husband,' Hawise murmured. 'I would like to stay here awhile and become acquainted first.' She managed not to place her hand on her belly. Her flux was not due for another week at least and she was not going to play Mellette's game.

Eve cast her a grateful look, but Mellette remained intractable. 'Latrines'll be full long before a month's up,' she said as if that were the end of the matter and walked away before anyone could argue.

Eve made a face. 'She always has to have the last word,' she whispered.

Hawise narrowed her eyes. 'That is all they are,' she said. 'Words. The only power she has is that of fear. You see it in cats. They puff up and yowl and hiss before a dog, but if it came to a fight, the dog would win.'

Eve looked both alarmed and diverted. 'You are not going to fight her, are you?'

Hawise laughed ruefully and shook her head. 'Not unless I must. I will grant her space and respect if she grants the same to me.'

The weather was close, threatening rain, but as warm as a sweaty armpit. Beneath successive layers of ring mail, padded undertunic, tunic and shirt, Brunin felt like a vegetable in a boiling pottage pot. The Welsh forest hemmed the sides of the road in swathes of impenetrable green and without sunlight it was like riding through a tunnel into the otherworld. The humid weight of the air bore down on King Henry's troops like a large, flat iron. Small black flies bedevilled the horses, so that even placid Jester was driven to stamp and jib with irritation. The sound of hooves thudding on moist soil, the jingle of harness and creak of leather filled the air.

The Welsh guides led them along scantily used pack-pony tracks that sometimes degenerated into little more than sheep trails. The sky darkened and so did the tree canopy until green almost turned to black. Brunin felt as if small trickles of sweat were creeping down his spine, but knew it was impossible, for the padding of his tunic: absorbed all the moisture that sprang from his body. Jester's bright bay shoulders and flanks had darkened to a liver hue and salty streaks rubbed along his bridle line. The gelding sidled, his mulish ears flickering, and Brunin leaned forward to tug them—as much to reassure himself as his mount.

'Christ,' Ralf muttered at Brunin's side. 'How much closer can the trees grow before the path disappears?' He glanced around, the whites of his eyes gleaming, and shrugged his shoulders inside his new hauberk. 'It is as if there are ants crawling down my spine.'

'You feel it too?' Until recently Brunin would not have credited his brother with that much sensitivity, but matters had changed. Ralf had softened, Brunin had developed a tougher shell, and of late they had been able to meet in the middle.

'It's like being the hunted instead of the hunter,' Ralf went on. 'I like to know what's around the next corner, not be led along like a blind beggar.' He reached to the tokens hanging around his neck: a medallion of St Christopher and a Lorraine cross on a leather cord. He pressed both to his lips. 'Give me open ground any day.'

'Give us all open ground any day,' Brunin replied grimly, trying to relax his tense muscles. He thought of Hawise and the tender farewell she had given him, and his mouth softened into an unconscious half-smile of remembering. God grant that this Welsh campaign ended swiftly so that he could ride to Whittington and join her. The few days of companionship since their wedding had unleashed a dammed-up hunger within him that went far beyond the superficial lust of a bridegroom for the pleasures of the bedchamber. He needed Hawise for the sustenance of his soul as much as his body needed food and drink. It was the banner that had released the flood… that and the unreserved way she had given herself to him. Even now, when he had yielded much into her keeping, he was not sure that he could ever match her generosity of spirit.

'Drink?' Ralf pulled his water costrel over his head and handed it across to him. Brunin took a long swallow and turned to toss the stone bottle to Richard who was riding in their wake with several FitzWarin knights.

Ahead of them there was a sudden yell and the standards shuddered and clacked together. A horse reared, another one screamed and a ripple ran down the line. Richard dropped the costrel and it smashed on the ground, splat-tering its contents afar. A sharp piece jabbed his horse on the fetlock and it plunged into Jester and Ralf's stallion.

' 'Ware arms!' the roar went up. 'Ambush!'

Swearing, Brunin swung his shield down on to his left arm and drew his sword. Ralf's grey stallion was plunging and snapping, making it difficult for Ralf to draw from his scabbard. And then the Welsh were upon them: a yelling, barelegged horde who wore little or no armour and were armed with knives, light spears and swords, and who struck faster than summer lightning. They ran in, slashed the destriers' hamstrings or ripped guts and saddle girths, then went for the rider of the stricken mount.

Brunin turned Jester with his thighs and struck at the sheepskin-clad Welshman who had been about to thrust a knife into the gelding's haunch. He felt the edge of his sword connect with the softness of flesh, grate on bone, and chop through. The warrior fell and Ralf's stallion trampled him underfoot. Panicking at the feel of the writhing body beneath its hooves, the destrier back-danced, crushing the warrior's rib cage. As the man died, Brunin felt the battle calmness surround him in its crystal bubble. He could see clearly, hear sharply, move with the swiftness of the wind, but that swiftness still seemed slow to his eyes. Every sense was attuned to the fight. He was a hawk on the wing, a lion on the hunt, a bright-scaled pike in the battle's flow. He heard his father shouting, saw his horse go down, spurting blood. Brunin spurred Jester forward and brought down the Welshman who had been about to finish FitzWarin. He used his shield to beat off another assault, backed round and struck. His father was on his feet by now, sword in hand, shield guarding his left side.

'Take him!' Brunin started to dismount from Jester but his father waved him angrily back into the saddle.

'No! To your left!'

Brunin pivoted, his arm instinctively raised. The Welsh spear stuck in the shield instead of his body and FitzWarin strode forward to engage the warrior. The fighting closed over their heads. Richard lost his horse to a Welsh gutting blade and had to fight on foot beside his father. Jester sustained a cut to the hindquarters, and Brunin a blow to his hand that numbed his fingers and crawled his sword grip with blood.

A bleeding horse burst past them, its rider spurring hell for leather. 'The King is down!' he bellowed. 'Save yourselves! The King is down.' Knights and serjeants fled in his wake, expressions bleached with terror. Brunin felt the panic spreading through the ranks like forks of underground lightning. Fear squeezed his own gut, but his choice was made. With his father and brother horseless, he couldn't flee. Ramming his wolf standard in the ground beside his father's, he prepared to defend it hard and bitterly.

Through the milling battle, he heard another cry. '
A moi! A moi! Le Roi Henri! Le Roi Henri
!' A trampled banner wavered aloft, the lions of England smirched but still snarling on their spear, and beside it the silks of de Clare of Pembroke. The fighting redoubled around the banner in a concentrated ball of men, and then it unravelled into vicious individual combats. Brunin spurred forward and a Welsh footsoldier flew from Jester's right shoulder. The shield on the left defended Brunin from a spear thrust and gave him the time to reach over and bring down his challenger with the full side of his sword.

The royal standard retreated on the path, drawing back towards the FitzWarin wolves, and Brunin recognised the King: he had lost his helm and no one else had hair of so fierce a red. Blood was trickling from Henry's temple and his complexion was stark white, rendered green in the hollows by the grudging light from the trees. Blood glistened on his mail too but there was far too much to be his own. Henry snarled a command at one of his knights and the man raised a hunting horn to his lips and sounded the retreat. The Welsh were dispersing, for although they had inflicted serious damage on their quarry, the impetus of their ambush was spent and the Normans had regrouped. Any more gains would cost more blood than most were prepared to spill. However, there was such a thing as harrying and although the Welsh had pulled back to the forest, now they sent arrows whistling from cover to thud among the horses and knights. Brunin reached down and took his father up pillion on Jester's back. He plucked the banners from the ground and heeled the gelding in the flanks. To one side he was aware of Ralf hauling Richard on to his own stallion and kicking hard.

'Sons of whores!' FitzWarin gasped in Brunin's ear as Jester settled into his deceptively ground-eating lope.

Brunin had neither the breath nor attention to answer. At any moment he was expecting an arrow to come whirring out of the trees and bring the horse down. It was not until they had travelled another mile that he dared to slow a blowing Jester to a walk and sit up in the saddle. His hands were slippery on the reins with blood and sweat. He could feel moisture crawling down his face and hoped it was the latter. The earlier barrier of calm indifference was fading and he was beginning to feel dizzy and sick. He swallowed a retch and fixed his gaze on his banner, striving to draw from it the sustenance he needed. There was a long way to go and they were literally not out of the woods yet. His father was coughing. Brunin turned to look at him in concern, but FitzWarin waved his hand in negation. 'I'm all right. Took a blow to the ribs when I lost the horse… You?' He pointed at the blood webbing Brunin's hand.

'It's not serious.' Brunin turned to check his brothers, but both Richard and Ralf were unharmed beyond minor cuts and bruises.

Harried all the way, Henry's badly mauled party finally rejoined the main troop on the safer coast road. Brunin went in search of a chirugeon to stitch the cut on his hand and endured the stab of a needle with the aid of a flagon of strong, honey-sweetened wine.

'You were lucky, the chirugeon said. 'A pinch deeper or to one side and you'd have lost the use of these two fingers.' He clucked his tongue and bent over his handiwork.

Enduring the tug of the thread, Brunin thought of Hawise sewing his banner, imagined the prick of the needle working thread through silk. As if catching the drift of his thoughts, the chirugeon made a jest about being a good embroiderer.

'You'll have a scar, but a neat one… like forked lightning,' he said. 'There. Done.' The man nodded with satisfaction and, having smeared the wound with a speckled green salve, moved on to his next patient.

Brunin rose and walked slowly towards the place where his father and Joscelin had pitched their tents. His stomach wallowed as if he were on the deck of a ship and he wondered why he was fighting it. Better over and done with. And then he saw his father striding towards him, Ralf and Richard behind, and knew from the look on their faces that something was terribly wrong, and that weakness would have to wait.

Finally, at Mellette's nagging insistence, the women set out for Whittington. Hawise had learned the hard way that the old lady never gave up. If she could not obtain her way on the first attempt, she would conduct a siege campaign, bombarding, undermining, stiffly bargaining; using every trick at her disposal until the opposition was frazzled into a state of guilty exhaustion.

Surrounded by sheepskins and cushions to protect her from the jolting of the cart as it rumbled along the road, Eve sat in the baggage wain with little Emmeline. Hawise would have preferred to ride, but since that meant keeping company with Mellette, who refused to countenance the wain, she was enduring the buffeting with Eve.