Eyes racing back and forth to make sense of the battle, emotions flying between this shore and that, Vilda turned from the rampart when the woman beside her laughed.
“Herba?”
She who continued to play the witch, mouthing curses with arms raised, lent voice to her next words. “It goes right for our people. I wish to live, but if the resistance prevails this day, I am well with breathing my last amid Saxon superiority.”
Am I well with it? Vilda wondered. Should I die here, will I go peacefully knowing those on the isle once more escape Norman rule?
She would not, for it would not end there. Another attack would follow. And another. More would die. And more. Eventually, the Saxons might take back their country, but that hope seemed more fickle than any other.
“My work is not done, all my prayers not prayed,” Herba said and turned back, thrust her arms higher, and resumed mouthing what Le Bâtard believed curses.
Feeling those words sent heavenward, knowing more were needed as greater numbers of missiles flew from this side of the river, and from that side to those on the causeway who continued advancing despite the enemy experiencing the same horror as their predecessors, Vilda closed her eyes and added her prayers to Herba’s.
Are you yet as stone, William the Great? Guy silently seethed as he and his men in a joint effort with Maxen’s fended off attacks that evidenced Hereward had done what the king was strongly advised to do—send a sizable force to the enemy’s back, trapping them between blades and the shore.
These past days, Taillebois’ patrol had been greatly reinforced and ordered to closely watch for evidence of that strategy. However, proving they remained far from conversant with the Fens, they had not seen what the resistance did not wish seen.
Whether it was this day or another, a hundred or more rebels had slipped off the isle and lain in wait for the Normans to launch their assault. Now, dusk having surrendered to dark, commoners trained into warriors bedeviled lifelong warriors who fought to keep fire from passing through their lines and devouring the camp along with any there or on the shore beyond.
Did this particular tide not soon turn in favor of the conquerors, instead going against them as had that which a short while ago rendered the new causeway useless by way of hurtling rocks and fire that forced the warriors on it to retreat, the victory espoused by Taillebois might not merely belong to Hereward. A second Norman loss could prove more disastrous than the first. Thus, no matter how many lives and limbs were lost, the resistance could not be allowed near enough the camp to land flaming arrows or toss torches.
Hardly had Guy pulled his sword from a rebel who nearly gutted him than a Norman-accented cry for aid sounded. Though Jacques appeared in control, needing only to find a hole in his opponent’s defenses, he could not stop a second rebel lunging toward a gap with sword in one hand, a torch in the other.
Guy stopped him, though not without paying a price. Fortunately, like other blades that tasted him this night, the one that scored his jaw was not life-threatening as it would have been were the man’s swing slightly lower. And hair singed by the torch Guy ducked before coming around and slicing the rebel’s legs out from under him would grow back.
He took a moment to grind the torch beneath his boot, another to deliver a kick to the head that would silence the man’s suffering, and lunged toward the next enemy who sought to cut a path through Normans for the torch bearer coming behind.
Maxen got to him first. With a bellow and the efficiency for which he was known, he put end to him while Guy continued past and rendered the arsonist as senseless as the last.
That wave of rebels subdued the same as the others, the friends knowing more would come, they exchanged nods and turned to inventory their men who regrouped in preparation for the next attack. There was no time to count exactly how many sprawled among the grass were their own, but moonlight revealed their losses were few and Jacques had prevailed as expected.
“The towers!” someone shouted, though already Guy was looking around, the din from the shore having risen with shouts of horror in response to flames rising up around the eastern war machines. As that terrible light convulsed above the tops of tents and the elevated command post in which William would not be found since he preferred what he named the courageous heart of battle over the cowardly extremities, Guy swung his regard to the western towers.
They were not aflame, but if those who had kept the battle off Ely and brought it here were not soon put to the sword, those towers would be next and Vilda—
“Go!” Maxen said. “Our fight here is near done. All we can do is keep a way open for our fleeing warriors.”
It was true. Their men had kept fire from the camp this side, but with it beginning to rage that side, already it was eating through the foliage en route to the tents.
“You have command of my men,” Guy said. Then sheathing his sword and drawing his dagger, he ran.
Chapter Twenty-One
The archer would not relent. If he must remain aloft with his fellow Normans now launching stones at rebels on this shore who had set the eastern towers alight, the witch and her companion would remain atop theirs. And Herba would continue to call down curses.
“Silence!” the man shouted when Vilda hastened to the side and tried again to persuade him to allow Herba and her to descend the tower. “One more word, and I shall put you through.” Further he drew
