Paul Finch - Stronghold

"Wasn't it you, my lord, who said you'd rather have men who told the truth?"

"Yes, Ranulf, it was. But that doesn't mean I won't kill them for their impudence."

Ranulf pursed his lips. Perhaps it was time to hold his prattling tongue.

"You may hate my cruelty, Ranulf. You may resent my power. You may revile my ambition. But do you know what hurts the most — your mistrust of my abilities."

Ranulf could not refute the charge. His temper had got the better of him, for there was no doubt that breaking the bridge was a clever plan. No matter what demonic powers protected them, the Welsh could assail the castle with missiles for day after day, but if the bridge was destroyed they could make no further gain. They could never physically wrest the stronghold from its defenders. Of course, a prolonged bombardment would still inflict horrendous casualties.

"My lord, if they continue to pound us…"

"It will achieve little," Corotocus said. "Apart from wasting their time. King Edward plans to enter this country through the north, but he won't sit on his arse there forever. Even if he doesn't receive a plea for help from us, he'll come down here at length to consolidate his gains. Let's see how they fare then, against a host of fifty thousand. In any case, once the bridge is broken, I can withdraw all my troops from the south wall. We won't need the outer rampart any more."

Ranulf nodded. Earl Corotocus might be a brute but he'd always been a capable tactician.

"Which brings me back to you," the earl said. His lieutenants hovered behind him, uncertainly. Only Navarre looked pleased by this turn of events. "I can't tolerate your constant rebellions, Ranulf, or your petty treasons. So your sentence is death."

Some of the knights hung their heads. Navarre broke into a delighted grin.

"Do you hear me?" the earl said.

"I hear you, my lord."

"You think I can endure this indefinitely, boy? You think I can be defied with venom in the midst of battle, when other men of mine — better men, and more loyal than you — are dying all around? Do you think I should endure it?"

Ranulf said nothing.

"Be assured, if I didn't need every man in my command right now, I'd hang you from the highest gibbet in Wales. But don't be comforted, Ranulf. When this war is over, the sentence will be confirmed. And of course you must challenge it. You must claim trial by combat, as is your right. I'll be more than happy to oblige…"

Before he could say more, a shadow fell over them. They glanced up.

A dark but glittering cloud was arcing from the top of the western bluff towards the castle's northwest corner. At first it was like a flock of birds, sunlight glinting on their black, metallic feathers. But then they realised that it was debris — or 'iron hail', to use catapult crew parlance — maybe a ton of it, spreading out as it descended on the Barbican.

Its impact was deafening and prolonged. It covered almost the entirety of the Barbican roof and spilled partly onto the Gatehouse alongside it. Even from as far away as the Constable's Tower, a hundred yards to the south, the clangour of impacts, the chorus of shouts and screams was ear-splitting.

Earl Corotocus moved to the north battlements, the others joining him. Though located on elevated ground, the Barbican wasn't as tall as the Constable's Tower. Subsequently, they had a perfect view of the damage the iron hail had inflicted. The trebuchet appeared to be intact. A good number of Carew's Welsh were milling around it, though many others lay prone as though felled by hammer-blows.

"The scoop-thrower!" du Guesculin shouted. "Dear Lord in Heaven, they've got the scoop-thrower as well!"

"Of course they've got the scoop-thrower," Corotocus replied. "It's the deadliest machine in my arsenal. Would they leave that behind?"

"Why is it trained on the Barbican?" Navarre wondered.

"It's trained on the trebuchet, you idiot! If they break the trebuchet, we've no way to demolish the bridge and they can continue the infantry assault."

"Can't we disassemble the trebuchet and move it?" du Guesculin said.

Corotocus snarled his frustration. "There's nowhere to set it up where it'll be out of reach of the scoop-thrower unless we move it to the east rampart, where it will be useless anyway."

"What in God's name do we do, my lord?" Du Guesculin had gone white. Of them all, he had looked most hopeful at the suggestion the southwest bridge might be made unusable and the Welsh held in abeyance. "In the good Lord's name, what do…?"

"Arm the trebuchet!" Corotocus bellowed. "Smash that bridge now, before it's too damn late!"

"D'Abbetot will need Carew and his damn malcontents to help," Navarre said. "But look at the state of them."

Even after one deluge of iron hail, the priority on the Barbican had changed from mutual defence to self-preservation. There was still much shouting and consternation, but something like a retreat was in progress. Numerous wounded were being assisted up the steps to the Gatehouse.

Corotocus bared his teeth.

"Get over there, Navarre," he snarled. "Remind Captain Carew that if this castle falls he and his Welsh malingerers will be singled out for even less merciful treatment than we English. Remind them they are to assist William d'Abbetot, my senior engineer, in any way that he requests, and that this means holding their position until ordered to do otherwise. If any object, put them to the sword immediately."

He turned to another of his tenant knights, a wiry, leathery-skinned fellow in a black and orange striped mantle, called Robert of Tancarville.

"You as well, Robert. And you!" Corotocus pointed at Ranulf. "A chance to redeem yourself early."

Ranulf didn't suppose the Barbican could be any worse a posting at this moment than the south curtain-wall. He nodded curtly and followed the other two.

"Let's hope d'Abbetot hadn't already got up there," he said, joining them on the downward stair. "If he's dead, the trebuchet's no use to us anyway."

"Always you expect the worst," Navarre jeered.

"No, I expect the iron hail," Ranulf said. "The worst may be yet to come."

The Barbican was another supposedly impregnable feature of Grogen Castle.

Standing just to the west of the Gatehouse, it was a bastion in its own right: a squat, hexagonal tower, filled with rubble so that it was basically a gigantic earthwork clad with stone and fitted around its rim with huge crenels. Its roof was broad enough not just to accommodate the trebuchet, but over a hundred men-at-arms and archers, who could assail, in more or less complete safety, any force attempting to attack the castle's main entrance. The trebuchet itself was powerful enough to shoot clean down to the river, or, thanks to its turntable base, far up onto the western bluff. It was a strong and defensible position for any company of men, but it had never been foreseen that it might be attacked from overhead. When Navarre and Tancarville arrived up there, it was a scene of carnage. The corpses of Carew's malcontents dotted the Barbican roof, while many of those still living clutched bloody wounds as they flowed up the Gatehouse stair to mingle with Garbofasse's mercenaries.

In general terms, Carew's band were poorly armed, clad in hose, leather jerkins and boots. One or two were in mail, and some wore pointed or broad-brimmed helmets, but most lacked shields to shelter beneath, and so the iron hail had taken a massive toll of them. Carew, who had also retreated to the Gatehouse, was better equipped than most. His helmet was fitted with nose and cheek pieces. He also wore a hauberk of padded felt studded with iron balls, but he'd been cut deeply across the neck. Blood gushed from the wound as he sought to bind it.