Edward Marston - The Lions of the North

The two men were courting danger. They knew that. Throughout all their discussions, it had been an invisible presence at their shoulders but it remained silent when their brave words instilled a heady confidence. Strength of purpose brought them to the city and enabled them to conduct their reconnaisance with care and precision.

Bright sunshine blessed their enterprise. The swirling crowds were an ideal cover for them. It all went as planned.

Darkness changed everything. The populous streets slowly emptied.

The teeming wharves became deserted. The boisterous taverns closed for the night. The last of the day’s cacophony gradually died away.

Even the competing smells of the city seemed to lose their pungency.

York was no longer the bustling marketplace that had opened its gates to them at first light with a smile of welcome. A chill wind began to blow. They found themselves locked inside a cold and hostile prison.

Danger could now be seen and heard on every side. It conjured fearsome shapes out of the gloom and assaulted their ears with strange and unexpected cries. Danger could also be felt, tingling in their blood, pressing in upon them with gentle but persistent force, weighing down their bodies, fettering their ankles. Their courage was put to the test.

It was the older of them whose resolve began to weaken.

“We need more men,” he said.

“No,” said his companion. “Two may succeed where twenty would surely fail.”

“Twenty? Ten times that number could not storm the castle.”

“We are not trying to storm it. We come but to look.”

“The walls are too high to scale.”

“That is why we brought the rope.”

“The castle has a garrison. There will be guards.”

“Then we must elude them.”

“What if they catch us?”

“They will not,” insisted the other, “if we stay alert and act boldly.”

He grabbed his friend’s arm. “What ails you, man? Have you so soon lost your nerve? I have not come all this way to turn back now with the task undone. Think how many depend on us. I’ll go alone if the dark brings out your cowardice.”

“I am no coward!” retorted the other, stung by the charge. “It was my idea to come here in the first place and I stand by that. I merely counsel caution.”

“Say no more. Let’s about it.”

The younger man was nineteen, tall, sturdy and lithe. His beard and hair were bleached by the sun, his face bronzed and weathered.

Five years older, his companion was shorter and more compact. Though he could move swiftly, he did so with a pronounced limp, executing a curious dance on his toes. His beard was fuller and already salted with grey. Both of them wore tunics and gartered trousers. Each had a dagger concealed in his belt.

As they flitted through the streets, they felt the first drops of rain.

They were on the west bank of the Ouse, the river that flowed through the heart of York before greeting its tributary, the Foss, with a liquid kiss beyond the city walls. When they came round the angle of a house, they halted in their tracks. Directly ahead of them, rising into the night sky like a small mountain, was the castle they had so meticulously studied during daylight hours. It looked indomitable. Its sheer bulk taunted them.

Rain now began to fall in earnest but the younger man ignored it.

His eyes traced the outline of the stronghold with the calculating ardour of a lover appraising his mistress before their first embrace.

“There it is!” he whispered.

“If only we knew what is inside.”

“We do know.”

“We may only be guessing.”

“We know,” affirmed the other. “My father helped to build this place.

He described it to me in great detail.”

“It has altered since then.”

“Not much. They lavished their time and money on that .”

He pointed across the river to an even bigger castle, which was climbing out of the shadows. The two citadels were monuments to military might, twin sentinels that protected York from attack without while discouraging any thoughts of insurrection within.

“Two Norman castles,” said the older man ruefully. “York is doubly cursed. I would love to torch them both.”

“Think only of one tonight. This is our target.”

“I am ready.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” said the other, mastering his apprehension.

“I need a strong man at my side, not a fearful one.”

“I am with you.”

“That heartens me.”

They embraced in a brief display of friendship, then steeled themselves for the task ahead. The younger man furtively led the way through the dripping darkness.

The castle loomed malevolently above them. Fronted by a deep ditch, its walls were high earthen banks surmounted by a wooden palisade.

Night painted out the gaudy colours in which the timberwork had been daubed. As they slithered down the bank, they found the ditch filled with accumulated refuse. One man swore under his breath as his foot slipped on human excrement, the other was startled when he trod on the putrefying body of a dead dog. They held their breath and scrambled up the bank towards the palisade.

The young man uncoiled the rope he had been carrying over his shoulder. It already had a loop tied in the end. He swung it a few times before tossing it high above him. It bounced harmlessly off the wood and caught his companion a smarting blow across the face as it came snaking back down. The rope was pulled in, partially coiled, then swung in the air before being hurled upwards again. The aim was true this time. The loop settled over one of the upright timbers that had been sharpened to a spike.

They waited for a few minutes to make sure that the thud of the rope had not aroused any of the guards on the rampart. Satisfied that they were unobserved, the younger man tested the rope before shinning up it with speed and agility. When he reached the top, he peered over the palisade to take inventory of the manpower. They were in luck. Only a handful of sentries had been posted on the walls and they were too busy complaining to each other about the wet weather to notice the lone figure who now rolled over the palisade and crouched on the rampart.

A tug on the rope signalled a second ascent. The man with the limp had strong arms and he was soon hauling himself over the palisade to kneel beside his accomplice. Torches flickered in the courtyard below to illumine a large oval area dotted with wooden buildings. Raucous laughter identified the guardhouse, and the stables were also easy to locate. Barracks and storerooms lay under the wall. Sheep and cattle were kept in separate open pens. A low fire still burned in the armourer’s forge.

The keep was at the far end of the bailey. Constructed of solid oak and sitting atop a huge mound, it was encircled by a ditch, which was in turn defended by a palisade of sharpened stakes. The soaring tower looked impregnable.

“We’ll never get in there,” hissed the older man.

“We must.”

“But how? ”

“Watch me.”

He retrieved the rope and coiled it up again. The rain thickened.

Though it hindered their movement and obscured their vision, it also came to their aid. Grumbling guards shuffled away to take cover. The intruders were able to scurry along the rampart without fear of being seen. When they were close to the keep, they sat hunched against the palisade while they took their bearings. A strange odour drifted into their nostrils.