Jack Whyte: Standard of Honor

“Ewan!”

“Aye!” One of the two young men who had been lounging and talking to each other among the covered shapes of the wagon’s cargo sat up and reached to pull himself upright, to where he could lean easily with braced arms on the high driver’s bench, facing forward, his eyes level with the older man’s burly shoulder. “Whoa! Where did all the people come from all of a sudden? What’s happening?”

“If I knew that I wouldn’t have had to interrupt your debate wi’ your young friend.” Tam glanced sideways at the other man, quirking his mouth, which was almost concealed by his grizzled beard, into what might have been a grin or a grimace of distaste. “I need you to go up there to the gates and find out what’s going on and how long we’re to be stuck here. Maybe somebody’s had a fit or dropped dead. If that’s the case—and I don’t care whether it is or not—I’ll thank you to find us another route into the city before they lock the gates. My arse is sore and full o’ splinters from this damned seat, and I’m pining to hear the noisy clatter as we tip this load o’ rusty rubbish into the smelter’s yard. So just find out how long we’ll be stuck here and, if it’s to be a while, see if there’s another gate close enough for us to reach afore curfew. And be quick. I don’t want to be sleepin’ outside these walls this night. Away wi’ ye now.”

“Right.” Young Ewan placed a hand on the high side of the wagon and vaulted over it, dropping effortlessly to the cobbled surface of the roadway and pushed his way quickly into the crowd. La Rochelle was France’s greatest and busiest port, and the high, narrow gates of its southern entrance, directly ahead of him, were fronted by a wide, funnel-shaped approach that narrowed rapidly as it neared the checkpoints manned by the city guards.

Tam watched him go and then swung down after the boy, albeit not quite so lithely. The wagon driver was a strong-looking man, still in the prime of life, but the ability to do everything his apprentices could do physically was something he had gladly abandoned years before. Glancing incuriously and intolerantly now at the people closest to him, he moved to where a small oaken barrel hung, securely fastened with multiple bindings of hempen rope to the side of the wagon. He took the hanging dipper in one hand and raised the barrel’s loose-fitting lid with the other, then brought the brimming ladle of cool water to his lips and held it there in front of his face as he looked about him, seeing nothing out of place or anything that might explain the blockage ahead. The only thing he noticed was that there seemed to be a heavy presence of guards with crossbows lining the walkways above and on either side of the high gates, but none of them appeared to be particularly interested in anything happening below.

In the meantime, Ewan had moved forward aggressively, anonymous among the crowd and aware that he was not the only one trying to find out what was happening and why they were all being detained, and as he drew closer to the gates, he found it increasingly difficult to penetrate the noisy, neck-craning throng. He was eventually forced to use his wide shoulders and young muscles to clear a passage for himself, elbowing and thrusting his way single-mindedly towards the front, ignoring the deafening babble of shouting voices around him. But then, when he was almost there and, by standing on tiptoe and craning his neck, could see the crested helmet of the Corporal of the Guard, he became aware of louder, shriller voices being raised directly ahead of him, shouting in fear and alarm. Then three men came charging towards him, plowing through the crowd, pulling and hauling at people as they went, trying to run, their faces frantic and wide-eyed with fear. Something had terrified them, clearly, but Ewan had no notion of what it might be. One of them shouldered Ewan aside as he surged by, but the young man regained his balance easily and swung around to watch the three of them scrambling into the throng behind him, dodging and weaving as they sought to lose themselves among the crush, in the safety of the packed bodies of those who had not yet realized anything was wrong.

But even as the apprentice watched, wide-eyed and still not comprehending, he saw something remarkable: like a living thing sensing the terror of the fleeing men, the crowd pulled itself away from them quickly, people pushing and pulling at their neighbors as they fought to run backwards, frantically trying to keep clear of the fugitives and thereby exposing them to the guards in front of and on top of the gate towers.

The single shout of the Corporal of the Guard ordering the fleeing men to halt went unheeded, and almost before the word had left his lips, the first crossbow bolt struck the cobblestones with a violent, clanging impact that stunned the crowd into instant, terrified silence. Shot from high overhead, above the gates, and too hastily aimed and loosed, the steel projectile caromed off the smooth, rounded surface of a worn cobblestone and was deflected upwards again, somehow emitting a shrieking, piercing squeal, its speed and strength diminished yet still powerful enough to hammer its point through the wooden water barrel from which Tam was drinking, shattering the staves and drenching him in a deluge of cold water that soaked his breeches and splashed loudly on the cobbles at his feet. Cursing in startled fright and consternation, Tam dropped onto the wet stones, landing on all fours, and immediately threw himself sideways in a roll that carried him to safety under the wagon’s bed as the air became filled with the lethal, bowel-loosening hiss and sickening thud of crossbow bolts. His other apprentice, Hamish, dropped heavily to the ground behind him, having jumped from the wagon bed, and dove behind the protection of the wheel hub closest to the missiles, fighting off others who sought the same shelter.

The three fleeing men, whoever they were, ran without pattern, seeking only to escape capture or death, but none of them survived for long. The first was brought down by three bolts, all of which hit him at the same time, in the shoulder, the neck, and the right knee. He went flying and whirling like a touring mummer, blood arcing high above him from a jagged rip in his neck and raining back down and around him as he spun and fell sprawling less than ten paces from where he had begun his flight. The second evidently changed his mind, deciding to surrender. He stopped running, almost in mid stride, teetering for balance with windmilling arms, then turned back to face the city gates, raising his hands high above his head. For the space of a single heartbeat he stood facing his pursuers, then a crossbow bolt struck him dead, the sound of its meaty impact appalling the watchers as it smashed through his sternum, driving him backwards, his feet clear off the ground as he landed hard on his backside before his lifeless body toppled onto its side.

The third man fell face down at the feet of a tall, stooped monk, one outstretched hand clutching in its death throes at the mendicant’s left sandal, beneath the tattered, ankle-high hem of his ragged black robe. The monk stopped moving as soon as he was touched and stood as though carved from wood, gazing down in stupefaction at the bloodied, protruding ends of the two stubby metal bolts that had snatched the life so brutally from the running man. No one paid any attention to his shock, however; all their fascination was focused on the dead man at his feet. The monk was merely another of the faceless, wandering thousands of his like who could be found begging for sustenance the length and breadth of Christendom.

So profound was the silence that had fallen in the wake of the shattering violence that from some distance away the sound of a creaking iron hinge was clearly audible as a door swung open or shut, then came the measured tread of heavily booted feet as someone in authority paced forward from the entrance to the tower on the left of the city gates.