James Aitcheson - The Splintered Kingdom

They came at first light, when the eastern skies were still grey and before anyone on the manor had risen. Shadows lay across the land: across the hall upon the mound and the fields surrounding it, across the river and the woods and the great dyke beyond that runs from sea to sea. And it was from those shadows that they came upon Earnford, with swords and knives and axes: a band of men perhaps as few as a dozen in number, perhaps as many as thirty. In truth no one knew, for by the time enough of us had woken, armed ourselves and gathered to stand against them, they had already turned and fled, slipping away amidst the trees, taking seven girls and women from the village with them.

It was the third such raid the Welsh had made in the last month, and the first that had met with any success. Always before now a cry had been raised and we had managed to gather in time to ward them off. For despite their barbarous ways, they were a cowardly race, and it was rare that they chose to fight unless they were sure they had weight of numbers behind them. Every night I’d made sure to place a man on watch, except that this time the sentry must have fallen asleep, for there had been no warning until the screams had begun.

Behind them they left three men slain together with their livestock, and a cluster of smoking ruins where houses had once stood. And so as the skies lightened over the manor of Earnford, my new-found home, it was to me, Tancred a Dinant, that the villagers turned. They wanted justice; they wanted vengeance; but most of all they wished to see their womenfolk returned safely to them. As their lord I had a duty to their protection, and so I called my knights to me — my faithful followers, my sworn swords — together with as many men as would join me from the village. We buckled our scabbards and knife-sheaths to our belts, donned helmets and mail and jerkins of leather, and those of us who had horses readied them to ride out. Thus with the first glimmer of sun breaking over the hills to the east, we set off in pursuit of the men who had done this.

But now the shadows were lengthening once more; soon it would be evening and we were no closer to finding them or the women they had taken. We had tracked them across winding valleys, through woods so thick with undergrowth that it was often hard to make out their trail, and we were many miles into their country. I no longer recognised the shape of the hills or the curve of the river, and nor, I was sure, would those men of the village who had come with me, most of whom had probably never ventured this far from home in all their lives.

‘They’re gone,’ muttered Serlo, who was riding beside me. ‘It’ll be dark before long, and we’ll never find them then.’

He was the most steadfast of my household knights, one of the three who lived on my manor: built like a bear, and possessed of stout arms and a fierce temper. He was not quick, either in movement or in wits, but there were few who could match his strength and so he was a good man to have at one’s side in battle.

I shot him a look, aware of the others following close behind: the dozen men and boys who were depending on us, whose wives’ and sisters’ honour, not to mention their lives, would be forfeit if we failed.

‘We’ll find them,’ I replied. ‘We haven’t chased these sons of whores all day just to give up now.’

I tried to sound confident, though I had my doubts. We hadn’t stopped since first we set out, but instead had ridden and marched throughout the day, the hottest so far this summer. Yet still I had no idea how close we were, if at all.

Even this late in the afternoon the sun was still strong, the air sticky, as if there were a storm on its way. My shoulders ached under the weight of my hauberk, which felt as if it were made of lead, not steel. Hardly had we ridden a single mile from the manor this morning before I was beginning to regret wearing it, and I’d been half tempted to turn back, but every hour lost was one in which the enemy could be getting ever farther away, and so I had borne it as best I could. My gambeson and tunic clung to my skin, so drenched were they in my sweat, and every time we paused to let the rest of the party catch up I had to fend off the flies which followed me.

I glanced up the path towards the hunched, solidly built figure of?dda, who had stopped some twenty or so paces further ahead. He was my stableman, the ablest tracker in Earnford and possibly in all of the March. I was relying on him. He had lived in these parts longer than most, and he alone knew where we were. Or so, at least, I hoped.

It wasn’t just my own spirit which was failing, either, but those of the villagers too. I couldn’t speak much of their tongue, but I didn’t need to, for I could sense it in not only their tired eyes, which were turned down towards their feet and the path in front of them, but also in their silence as they trudged onwards for mile after mile.

‘Lord,’?dda called. He was crouching low to the ground, waving towards me.

I frowned. If he had lost the trail, then we would have no choice but to turn back. My first thought was one of relief, and straightaway I despised myself for it. If we arrived back home without the women, I would lose all the respect that I had worked so hard to gain. I had promised that I would find them, which was probably a foolish thing to do, but it was done nonetheless, and I was bound by that promise.

‘What is it?’ I asked, sliding from the saddle, my boots sinking into the soft earth as I landed. It had rained for a while around midday and under the trees the ground was still damp, which meant that the hoof-prints left by the enemy were easily spotted.

But that was not what he had to show me. Instead he held in his palm a whitish object about the length of his middle finger: a comb, fashioned from antler, decorated with crosses and triangles painted red and green, and at one end, so small as to be barely noticeable, a carved initial letter ‘H’.

I took it from him, turning it over and over in my fingers as I examined it, using my nail to scratch some of the dirt from its teeth.

‘You think it belongs to one of the women?’ I asked, my voice low.

‘Who else, lord?’?dda said. Of all the Englishmen and — women in Earnford, he was one of the few who could speak French. ‘We’re an hour from the nearest village.’

He gazed at me with his one good eye; the other he had lost in a fight some years ago, or so I had heard. Where it had been only an ugly black scar remained. Indeed he had an unsettling appearance; to add to his missing eye, he had been badly burnt across one side of his face, and the skin that was left was white and raw. Nor was he the friendliest of men: easily goaded, he was prone to fits of anger, and not the kind of man one did well to cross. But while many in Earnford were afraid of him, to me he seemed safe enough, especially compared with some of the men I had fought alongside over the years.

I nodded grimly and placed the comb in my coin-pouch for safekeeping. At least we were on the right trail. But whether the fact that it had been dropped here was a good sign or a bad one, I had no idea.

‘Come on,’ I called to the others as I returned to my horse. I vaulted up and into the saddle, feeling a fresh determination stir inside me, and gave the animal a kick to start him moving. ‘We’re close.’

From there the trail led up a steep incline, and so we were forced to dismount and lead our horses on foot. The sun was in front of us, so that whenever the breeze caused the leaves above to part, shafts of golden light would strike us straight in the eyes. The forest was thick with noise: from the chirps of birds as they chased each other between the trees to the buzz of the insects flitting about before my face. Yet despite that it felt strangely quiet, for there was no sign of anyone but us. My sword-arm itched, my fingers curling as if around the hilt of the weapon. I had never much cared for woods. When every direction looked the same, it was so easy to become lost, and between the ferns and the low branches and fallen trunks, there were too many places where an enemy might hide.