A Flight of Arrows by A.J. MacKenzie (mobi reader android .txt) 📕

Courcy’s voice was weary. ‘My boy, you have no idea. We took losses at Caen, and we left garrisons there and in Carentan, and that’s not counting the ones who deserted after Caen to go home and count their loot. We’ve barely thirteen thousand men left now, out of the fifteen thousand we started with. And we’re ranged against the French royal army, plus God knows how many Genoese crossbowmen and all of France’s allies from around Europe: the Empire, Bohemia, Savoy, Majorca. We stand about as much chance as a snowflake in hell.’

‘Then what are we going to do?’

‘Find a way across the Seine,’ Courcy repeated. ‘Then evade the French army and escape north to Flanders.’

Grey agreed. ‘If we can join the Flemish rebels and the English forces in the north, we might just have enough men to stand up to the French. The question is, how are we going to get across this goddamned river?’

No one had an answer. Mortimer departed, holding his side. He would have a serious bruise where the crossbow bolt had hit him, Merrivale thought, and quite possibly a cracked rib or two. Courcy and Gráinne followed him. Grey looked at the herald. ‘Are my watchdogs giving good service?’

‘There have been no further attempts to kill me,’ Merrivale said. ‘You called our situation a trap.’

‘Of course it is,’ Grey said. ‘We have been manoeuvred into it ever since we left Caen. Keep us penned up south of the river, let us batter ourselves to pieces against the bridges, and when we grow weak, cross the river and smash us. We have been gulled, herald. Haven’t we?’

Merrivale said nothing. Grey looked him directly in the eye. ‘Is someone betraying us to the French?’

‘Yes,’ Merrivale said.

‘And are the traitors the same men who persuaded the army to advance from Caen?’

‘Yes.’

‘I am relieved to hear it,’ Grey said sarcastically. ‘The other option is that the king and his captains are bungling idiots who know nothing whatever about war, a prospect I find profoundly depressing. Thank you, herald. You have restored my faith in human nature.’

Rouen, 8th of August, 1346

Morning

The English raid on the southern faubourgs two days previously had caused panic in Rouen. Most of the population had fled, taking with them anything they could carry. The only things that moved in the streets were the herds of semi-wild pigs that lived by scavenging in the gutters, and royal men-at-arms on patrol. Slipping through the back streets wrapped in a dun cloak with her hood pulled over her face, Tiphaine de Tesson was not sure which were the more dangerous.

Most of the army was quartered in the vast French camp on the high ground north of the city. Earlier, Tiphaine had walked through it, seeing the ranks of pavilions and the glittering coats of arms of the high nobility of France; Blois, Aumale, Lorraine, Hainault, Charles d’Alençon, the king’s brother. Down in the river, the galleys lay moored rank upon rank, sails furled and oars at rest, flying their own banners, the red cross of Genoa and the red and white lozenges of Grimaldi, the lord of Monaco. Only at the end of the day did she finally spy the banner she was looking for: the red saltire on gold of the Seigneur de Brus. The sight of it sent a shiver down her spine.

She lingered, steeling herself, and then approached the pavilion and asked the servant outside where his master was. The servant stared at the woman in boy’s clothes. ‘Why do you want to know?’

‘Mind your own business,’ Tiphaine said.

The man looked her up and down. ‘I don’t suppose you’d like to—’

‘No. And if you suggest it again, I will kick you where it really hurts.’

The man lost interest. ‘He’s at the castle. Attending on the Count of Harcourt. But you won’t get in there. They close the gates at sundown.’

He was right. As at Caen, the castle at Rouen was located just outside the city walls to the north. Tiphaine arrived outside the Port-Levis, the main gate, just as the chains began to rattle and the massive drawbridge was winched up, the gates slamming shut behind it, leaving her stranded outside. There were bakeries in the northern faubourg; she stole a loaf of bread from a passing cart and then slipped into the deserted city, where she made herself comfortable for the night in an empty stable. In the morning, dusting off her clothes and picking the hay out of her hair, she made her way back through the city and loitered outside the Port-Levis, a non-descript figure in ragged tunic and hose, waiting for her chance.

A wagon loaded with firewood rumbled past, heading towards the gate, slowing as the driver made the sharp turn onto the drawbridge over the fosse. She ran after it, scrambling onto the back and burrowing in among the wood while the wagon rolled through the gatehouse and came to a halt outside the kitchens. Dropping onto the cobbles, she looked around at the tall towers and the massive cylinder of the donjon, where the hated fleur-de-lys standard streamed in the morning breeze. She drew a deep breath and stopped the first passer-by.

‘I have an urgent message for the Seigneur de Brus. Where can I find him?’

The man, a Dominican friar with cold grey eyes, looked at her impassively. ‘You will find him in the Tour de Gascon,’ he said, pointing.

Guards with spears in mail coats barred the door to the tower. ‘What is your business here?’ one demanded.

‘I wish to speak to the Seigneur de Brus. Tell him Tiphaine is here.’

After five minutes of waiting, with the clatter and bustle of an army preparing for war all around her, the door opened and Rollond de Brus stepped out into the courtyard. Tiphaine studied him critically, hoping to see signs of imperfection or ageing: a receding hairline, perhaps, or wrinkles around his eyes. But no, he was the same as ever: tall, smooth-skinned with an overlay