circling the field, watching the evolutions of men with a dispassionate avian eye. John turned to Robin and said: ‘What are they waiting for? Here we stand, a mere two hundred footmen, as juicy a target as ever presented itself. Why don’t they attack?’
‘They think it’s a trap,’ said Robin.
‘So they’re not entirely stupid then,’ growled John.
Robin raised his voice: ‘Owain, go forward and give them a little tickle, will you.’ Then he bellowed the order: ‘Open ranks!’ and with wonderful precision all the men moved as one, taking a step or two to the left or right, the line extending and leaving room for the archers to move through the rows of spearmen out in front of the line. Till then I had not appreciated how well trained Robin’s infantry was. I had seen them at practice, at Thangbrand’s and at Robin’s Caves, marching and wheeling and going through their manoeuvres, but I had not realised how much like real soldiers these raggedy misfits had become. Owain’s bowmen jogged fifty paces forward, lined up, pulled back the strings on their big bows and, on the command ‘Loose!’ sent a shower of arrows arcing forward to patter on to the line of enemy horsemen. It was at the extreme range of the bow, about two hundred and fifty yards, and the damage done was slight: one horse, skewered in the haunch by an arrow, reared and nearly threw its rider, barging into the next animal in the line and causing a ripple of movement all along the conroi. A knight pitched backwards in the saddle, a shaft protruding from his side. But that was all the harm we caused with that first salvo. The cavalry were too well armoured and the distance too great for much slaughter. Owain cried ‘Loose!’ once more and another thin curtain of steel-tipped shafts fell on the waiting line of men and horses. Again there was not much resulting carnage. Another poor animal began bucking and kicking from a wound I could not see. But the bowmen’s provocation was having the desired result. A knight had ridden out in front of the line and was exhorting his men to valour. The first line of cavalry re-ordered itself and began to move forward at a walk.
Robin shouted: ‘Owain!’ and the archers turned and scrambled back towards the safety of our thin line of spearmen. When the bowmen were through, once again, the ranks closed smoothly. John shouted: ‘Prepare to receive cavalry!’ and the men at the ends of our line began to curl around to the rear until, in less time than it takes to put on a pair of boots, they had formed a tight circle, three ranks deep — Robin, myself and the bowmen in the centre of a steel ring of men-at-arms, fifteen paces across, spear points outward, shields raised, the front rank of outlaws kneeling, the second and third ranks standing behind them holding their spears poised to impale any horseman in range. This was the hedgehog, a formation that I had last seen at Thangbrand’s — dying in the bloody snow. It was supposed to be impregnable to horsemen; the horses would not charge home into that glittering hedge of steel spear points. But at Thangbrand’s, Murdac’s cavalry had torn the hedgehog to bloody ruin. Would the same happen today?
As the first row of Murdac’s cavalry moved forward at a walk, I had to admit that they were an impressive sight: each horse caparisoned in a black trapper that entirely covered its body, the material padded for the animal’s protection, a red plume nodding atop each animal’s head; the knight in a black surcoat with three red chevrons on the chest. By God, they must have been hot, but they looked magnificent. Each man held a twelve-foot lance vertically with a red pennant fluttering just beneath the glint of razor steel. The horses of the conroi walked in step, their riders knee to knee, the line perfectly straight, advancing in a slow black bar against us. Behind the first row of horse-soldiers, all of whom I had been told were knights, sworn to Sir Ralph’s service, came the second; the sergeants, equally well-trained and just as lethal on the battlefield, but not of noble blood. They had only two red chevrons on their chests and carried no lances; they were armed with sword and mace.
The tactics of the conroi were brutally simple. The front rank of knights would charge into our body of infantry, a tight mass of heavy horseflesh and naked steel that would smash our formation apart with its weight and with the shock of the impact. As we were scattered, the second rank, the sergeants, would gallop in and slaughter the fleeing infantrymen. It was a devastating method of war, honed by the nobles of Europe over decades into a fine and murderous art.
The black knights began to trot and, at a signal, the lances came down in a ripple from left to right across the charging front line, each weapon couched, wedged under the armpit of the knight, pointed directly forward, seemingly thrusting ahead. Just then there was a shout from a man in our kneeling front rank and I looked left to the forest. Out of the thick trees stepped our bowmen, Thomas to the fore, sixty immensely strong men all in the same green woollen tunics, each holding a six-foot yew bow bent taut by a hemp string and ready for battle. They were ahead of us, in a loose group at the treeline, and two hundred yards from the first wave of trotting horsemen. The horsemen quickened their pace to a canter. ‘Come on, come on, you bastards, shoot,’ I heard John mutter and, as if at his command, the arrows began to fly.
The first cloud of grey streaks smashed into the black cavalry line like a shower of hail clattering against a barn door, yards of steel-tipped wood plunging deep into flesh all along the line and suddenly, like magic, a handful of saddles were emptied all along the row of charging knights. A second volley of arrows slammed home and the ranks were thinned again, a third volley and the ranks were looking seriously depleted; a fourth volley and all cohesion disappeared — instead of a neat row of black-clad warriors galloping to our destruction, there were clumps of horsemen desperately trying to control their wildly bucking horses, bumping into each other, shafts bristling from the bodies of horse and man like pins in a pincushion. Another grey wave of arrows, and yet another, and there was no line left at all, just men and beasts spurting blood and struggling about at random, spread across a hundred yards of valley floor, in pain. Bodies dotted the green field, loose horses whinnied and galloped aimlessly about, unhorsed men staggered, retching, snapping off arrow shafts and trying to staunch deep puncture wounds with blood-drenched hands. Some mounted knights had turned back, galloping into the second line of sergeants behind them in their panic to escape the rain of death.
But the merciless arrows followed them, punching through the backs of their chain-mail hauberks, into their shoulders and necks and bringing more bloody chaos to the second line. Soon the whole body of cavalry was in retreat, terrified men and horses scrambling to escape that field of blood. And still the arrows fell, like the thunder-bolts of God’s vengeance, smacking into horse and manflesh without the slightest discrimination. Two bloodied horsemen, brave men, actually made it to the front ranks of our hedgehog, but the horses baulked at our ranks of impregnable steel, and then I saw Owain sink a yard-long wooden shaft deep into the chest of the foremost knight as he battled to control his shying horse. The second rider, realising that he was now alone, wheeled his mount and galloped away zigzagging his path to confuse the aim of our hedgehog archers who made bets, in loud excited voices, about who would be able to spit him first. Arrows whipped past to his left and right but, by some miracle, the man and his horse escaped back to his lines. And I wished him Godspeed. I had seen enough slaughter, I felt, to last me a lifetime. But that day of blood was only just beginning.
We cheered the woodland archers until we were hoarse; we had not lost a single man and the enemy’s first attack had been decimated. And the archers responded with elaborate bows, pulling off their hoods and caps and bending from the waist until their long hair brushed the ground. They shouted rude jests at us about how few knights we had killed until, finally, Thomas got them in hand and ushered them back into the safety of the forest. Just in time. Out of bow range, a group of mounted sergeants were massing for what might have been a swifter and more lethal charge against our bowmen, a chance to revenge their fallen comrades.
But there was worse news than a handful of angry cavalrymen. Close by those milling horsemen, a large body of men, on foot, had marched out of a fold in the ground to the rear of Murdac’s camp and were forming up to our front left. They were clad in sleeveless green and red surcoats, in a pattern of large squares, under which they wore padded aketons. Each man had a helmet, and a short sword strapped to his side. And each carried a great, black wooden instrument shaped like a large cross.
‘God’s crusted arsehole,’ whispered John in disbelief, and he sounded genuinely shocked. ‘It’s the Flemings. It’s the damned crossbowmen.’ Robin was looking at this new body of men, about two hundred strong, with his head on one side and a strange expression on his face. ‘This is going to make things a lot more interesting,’ he said in a calm, ruminative voice. But when I caught his eye, I saw a flash of icy anger, a glimpse of a fury so terrible, that it gave me a real start of fear.
When the crossbowmen were formed up, to my surprise, instead of marching towards us, towards the hedgehog, they made a half turn and began to move in the direction of the forest wall. Each man paused for half a minute at the edge of the woodland. Before he entered the curtain of green, each man slipped his crossbow string over a hook on his belt and, placing his foot in a stirrup at the end of the bow, by extending his leg, he pulled back
