Bernard Cornwell - 1356 (Special Edition)

‘And if a man’s not good enough?’

‘I discharge him. There’s plenty want to serve here. They make money.’

Keane grinned. ‘ Coredors with a castle, eh?’

He had meant it as a jest, but Thomas flinched anyway because there was truth in the jest. Coredors were bandits, men and women driven from their land to live wild in the hills and prey on travellers or small communities, and the incessant wars in France meant that there were many coredors . The largest highways were patrolled by men-at-arms, but other roads were dangerous except to formidable bands of armed men. The coredors were hated, but what were the Hellequin if not coredors ? Except that they served a lord, in this case William Bohun, Earl of Northampton, who was God knows how many miles away watching the border between Scotland and England, and it was the Earl of Northampton’s wish that Thomas dominated this stretch of France. Did that make it right? Or was Saint Sardos’s church in Castillon d’Arbizon rich in silver and bright with wall paintings because Thomas suspected otherwise? ‘I first met Genevieve in this cell,’ he told Keane.

‘Here?’

‘They were going to burn her as a heretic,’ Thomas said. ‘They’d already built the fire. They had piles of straw for kindling and they’d stacked the faggots upright because they burn more slowly. That way the pain lasts longer.’

‘Jesus,’ Keane said.

‘Not pain,’ Thomas corrected himself, ‘but agony. Can you imagine Jesus burning someone alive?’ he asked. ‘Can you imagine him making a fire to burn slowly, then watching someone scream and writhe?’

Keane was surprised by the pure anger in Thomas’s voice. ‘No,’ he said cautiously.

‘I’m a devil’s whelp,’ Thomas said bitterly, ‘a priest’s son. I know the church, but if Christ came back tomorrow he wouldn’t know what the hell the church was.’

‘We’re all evil bastards,’ Keane said uncomfortably.

‘And you’re not fast enough with a sword,’ Thomas said. ‘Another five years’ practice and you might be swift enough. Here, try this.’

The weapons in the cell were all captured from enemies. There were swords, axes, crossbows, and spears. Many were useless, their blades just waiting to be melted down and recast, but there was plenty of good weaponry, and Thomas had chosen a poleaxe. ‘Christ, that’s wicked,’ Keane said, hefting the heavy axe.

‘The head’s weighted with lead,’ Thomas explained. ‘It doesn’t take a lot of skill, but it needs strength. Mind you, skill helps.’

‘To hack?’

‘Think of it as a quarterstaff with a blade. You can trip with it, thrust with it or hack with it.’ The poleaxe was short, just five feet long, with a thick wooden haft. The head, forged from steel, had an axe blade and opposite it a hooked spike, while both ends of the haft had short spikes. ‘A sword isn’t much good against an armoured man,’ Thomas said. ‘Mail will stop a cut, and even boiled leather will stop most sword slashes. A sword thrust might work against mail, but that,’ he touched the spike at the tip of the poleaxe, ‘works against all armour.’

‘Then why do men carry swords?’

‘In battle? Most don’t. You have to batter a man down if he’s in armour. A mace, a morningstar, a flail, an axe will all do better.’ He turned the head to show the hooked spike. ‘You can pull a man off balance with the fluke. Hook or trip him onto the ground and beat the bastard to death with the axe head. If you like it, take it, but tie some rags under the head.’

‘Rags?’

‘You don’t want blood trickling down the haft and making it slippery. And ask Sam to weave you some bow cord to improve the grip. You know the blacksmith in town?’

‘The one they call Squinting Jacques?’

‘He’ll put an edge on it for you. But go into the courtyard first and practise with it. Hack one of the stakes to bits. You’ve got two days to become an expert.’

The courtyard was already filled with men practising. Thomas sat on top of the keep’s steps and smiled a greeting to Sir Henri Courtois, who sat beside him, then flexed an ankle and flinched. ‘It still hurts?’ Thomas asked.

‘Everything hurts. I’m old.’ Sir Henri frowned. ‘Give me ten?’

‘Six.’

‘Sweet Jesus, only six? How about arrows?’

Thomas grimaced. ‘We’re short of arrows.’

‘Six archers and not many arrows,’ Sir Henri said unhappily. ‘We could just leave the castle gates wide open?’

‘It would be much less trouble,’ Thomas agreed, provoking a smile from Sir Henri. ‘I’ll leave you a thousand arrows,’ he suggested.

‘Why can’t we make arrows?’ Sir Henri asked unhappily.

‘I can make a bow in two days,’ Thomas said, ‘but one arrow takes a week.’

‘But you can get arrows from the Prince of Wales?’

‘I’m hoping so,’ Thomas said. ‘He’ll have brought hundreds of thousands. Wagonloads of arrows.’

‘And each takes a week?’

‘It takes a lot of people,’ Thomas said, ‘thousands of folk in England. Some cut the shafts, some forge the heads, some collect the feathers, some glue and bind them, some nock them, and we shoot them.’

‘Ten men-at-arms?’ Sir Henri suggested.

‘Seven.’

‘Eight,’ Sir Henri said, ‘otherwise you’re leaving me unlucky thirteen.’

‘Fourteen with you,’ Thomas said, ‘and you should have sixteen soon.’

‘Sixteen?’

‘That prisoner downstairs He’s to be exchanged for Galdric and our two men-at-arms. They should arrive any day now. So sixteen. Jesus! I could hold this castle till Judgement Day with sixteen men!’

They were discussing how the castle was to be protected. Thomas planned to ride north and wanted to take as many of the Hellequin as he could, but he dared not leave the castle too lightly garrisoned. There were chests in the great hall that contained the gold and silver that Thomas wanted to take back to England. A third of it belonged to his lord, the Earl of Northampton, but the rest would buy him a fair estate. ‘In Dorset,’ he said, thinking aloud, ‘back home.’

‘I thought this was home?’

‘I’d rather live in a place where I don’t need sentinels every night.’

Sir Henri smiled. ‘That sounds good.’

‘Then come to Dorset with us.’

‘And listen to your barbaric language every day?’ Sir Henri asked. He was over fifty now, a man who had spent his long life in mail and plate. He had been the commander of the old Count of Berat’s men-at-arms, and thus had been an enemy of Thomas, but the new count had reckoned Sir Henri was too old and too cautious. He had scornfully promised Sir Henri command of the small garrison at Castillon d’Arbizon when it was recaptured, but instead the count’s siege had been defeated. Sir Henri, abandoned by the count, had been taken prisoner by Thomas, who, recognising the older man’s vast experience and common sense, had kept the count’s promise by making Sir Henri his own castellan. He had never regretted it. Sir Henri was reliable, honest, stoic, and determined to make his former lord regret his scorn. ‘I hear Joscelyn has gone north,’ Sir Henri said.

Joscelyn was the new Count of Berat, a headstrong man who had still not given up his dream of reclaiming Castillon d’Arbizon. ‘To Bourges?’ Thomas asked.

‘Probably.’

‘Where is Bourges?’

‘North,’ Sir Henri said, though he was plainly uncertain. ‘If it was me I’d ride to Limoges and ask the way from there.’

‘And the Prince of Wales?’

‘He was near Limoges,’ Sir Henri said cautiously, ‘or so they say.’

‘They?’

‘A friar was here last week. He said the English had ridden somewhere north of Limoges.’