There must have been folk working in the fields and vineyards, but they hid
whenever they saw horsemen in mail. ‘How much further?’ Roland asked as they watered the horses at a ford that crossed a shrunken field.
‘Not far,’ Philippe said. He had taken off his helmet and was wiping his face with a scrap of cloth. ‘Maybe two hours’ riding?’
Roland gestured for his squire to take his horse. ‘Don’t let him drink too much,’ he ordered, then looked at Philippe again. ‘And once you’re at Labrouillade,’ he asked, ‘you’ll have to leave for the north?’
‘Within a day or two.’
‘And you follow the English?’
Philippe shrugged. ‘I assume so,’ he said. ‘If the king reaches us we join him, but otherwise we harass their foragers, cut off their laggards and keep them worried.’ He hitched up his mail coat to piss against a tree. ‘And with any luck we take some rich prisoners.’
And the first arrow struck.
Thomas led his men and tired horses into a small town. He had no idea what it was called, only that there was no easy way around it and so they must ride through the narrow streets and hope no one delayed them. He took the precaution of tying the prisoner’s hands and stopping his mouth with a gag made of rags.
‘We should buy food,’ Karyl suggested.
‘But do it quickly,’ Thomas said.
The horsemen clattered into a small square at the town’s centre, though to call it a town was to flatter a place that had neither walls nor fortress. Market stalls lined the western side of the square while a tavern lay hard under a steep hill to the north, and Thomas gave Karyl some coins. ‘Dried fish, bread, cheese,’ he suggested.
‘No one’s selling,’ Karyl grumbled.
The stallholders and their customers had all gathered by the church. They looked with curiosity at the horsemen, but none asked their business, though a couple, seeing that the horsemen were interested in the food offered for sale on the stalls, hurried to help. Thomas walked his horse across the cobbles to where the crowd was thickest and saw that a broad-shouldered man was reading aloud from the top of the church steps. The man had lost his right hand and instead wore a wooden spike on which a parchment was impaled. He had a close-fitting helmet, a short grey beard, and wore a faded jupon that displayed golden fleurs-de-lys against a blue field. He lowered the parchment as he saw Thomas draw close. ‘Who are you?’ he called.
‘We serve the Count of Berat,’ Thomas lied.
‘You’d do well to return there,’ the man said.
‘Why?’
The man flourished the parchment. ‘This is the
‘Are they coming this way?’ Thomas asked.
‘God be praised, no. Those goddams are well north of here, but who knows? The devil could bring them south any day.’
Thomas’s horse stamped a hoof on the cobbles. Thomas leaned forward and stroked its neck. ‘And the king?’ he asked.
‘God will bring him victory,’ the grey-bearded man said piously, meaning that he had no news of the French king’s movements, ‘but until God does, my lord summons every man-at-arms to assemble at Bourges.’
‘Your lord?’
‘The Duke de Berry,’ the man said proudly. That explained the royal fleurs-de-lys on his jupon because the Duke de Berry was a son of King Jean and the holder of a slew of dukedoms, counties, and fiefs.
‘The duke plans to fight them on his own?’ Thomas asked.
The messenger shrugged. ‘The king has ordered it. All forces from the south of France are to gather at Bourges.’
‘Where’s Bourges?’
‘North,’ the messenger said, ‘but to be honest I don’t know precisely, except you go to Nevers and there’s a fine road from there.’
‘Wherever the hell Nevers is,’ Thomas grumbled. ‘Has your lord summoned Labrouillade too?’ he asked.
‘Of course. The
‘And these good people?’ Thomas gestured at the crowd that numbered perhaps sixty or seventy people, and which contained no men-at-arms as far as he could tell.
‘He wants our taxes!’ a man in a butcher’s bloodied apron shouted.
‘Taxes must be paid,’ the messenger said firmly. ‘If the English are to be beaten, the army must be paid.’
‘The taxes are paid!’ the butcher shouted, and the rest called out their support.
The messenger, fearing the anger of the crowd, pointed at young Pitou. ‘A prisoner?’ he asked Thomas. ‘What has he done?’
‘Stolen from the count,’ Thomas lied.
‘You want to hang him here?’ the man asked hopefully, plainly wanting a distraction from the crowd’s hostility.
‘He must go back to Berat,’ Thomas said. ‘The count likes to hang thieves himself.’
‘Pity.’ The man pulled the document off the wooden spike and pushed his way through the crowd until he reached Thomas’s stirrup. ‘A word, monsieur?’ he asked.
Now that he was close, Thomas could see that the messenger had a shrewd and weathered face which suggested that this man had experienced too much, and that nothing that happened in the future could surprise him. ‘You were a man-at-arms?’ Thomas asked.
‘I was, till some whoreson Gascon chopped off my hand.’ He used the wooden spike to wave away the men who had followed in hope of overhearing his conversation, and gestured Thomas towards the square’s centre. ‘My name is Jean Baillaud,’ he introduced himself, ‘Sergeant to Berry.’
‘A good master?’
‘He’s a goddamned child,’ Baillaud said.
‘Child?
‘Fifteen years old. Thinks he knows everything. But if you help me, I’m sure I can persuade him to be grateful.’ He paused, smiling. ‘And a prince’s gratitude is worth having.’
‘Then how can I help?’ Thomas asked.
Baillaud looked back at the small crowd and lowered his voice. ‘The poor bastards have paid their taxes,’ he said, ‘or at least most of them have.’
‘But you want more?’
‘Of course. There are never enough taxes. Be stupid enough
to pay once and you can be sure we’ll be back to squeeze you again.’
‘And the count sent you on your own to do the squeezing?’
‘He’s not that foolish. I have seven men-at-arms here, but the town knows just why we came.’
Thomas looked at the tavern. ‘And the town has been generous with wine?’ he guessed.
‘With wine and with whores,’ Baillaud said.
‘So,’ Thomas said, and let the word hang in the hot midday air.
‘So squeeze the bastards for me and you can take ten per cent back to Berat.’
‘The count would like that,’ Thomas said.
‘That butcher is the town treasurer,’ Baillaud said. ‘He has the tax list but claims to have lost it. You might start by helping him find it?’
Thomas nodded. ‘Let me talk to my men,’ he said, and kicked his horse towards the tavern. Once out of Baillaud’s earshot he beckoned for Keane. ‘There are eight horses in the tavern stables,’ he said, ‘and we’re taking
