‘The enemy have Dunholm,’ I said. ‘How can you be so sure they won’t stop at that?’
He turned back to me, his face in shadow once more. ‘Of course I cannot,’ Malet said. ‘But remember that until now they have known only defeat at our hands. The murder of the earl will have given them confidence such as they have never had. I believe it will not be long before they start to march south.’ He sighed. ‘And you should know that Northumbria is only a part of it.’
‘What do you mean, lord?’
‘Hardly a week goes by without disturbances somewhere in the kingdom. We are constantly hearing tell of Normans being murdered by bands of Englishmen in the shires. On the Welsh borderlands the enemy are becoming bolder, their raids at the same time more penetrative and more destructive. King Guillaume’s forces have never been more thinly spread. And there is worse yet to come.’
‘Lord?’ I asked, frowning.
His eyes were fixed upon me. ‘Invasion.’
‘Invasion?’ It seemed scarcely possible. We ourselves had held England but a couple of years.
‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘It has been known for some time that the Danish king, Sweyn Ulfsson, has laid claim to the English crown, though he has thus far possessed neither the means nor the opportunity to pursue it. However, for some months we have suspected that he has been making plans for the coming summer. This we now know. Already he has begun to gather his ships, and it is believed that by midsummer he will have a fleet to rival our own of two years ago.’
Suddenly I understood Malet’s anxiety. Even if we succeeded in driving off the rebels, there remained still a second enemy, and the Danes were fighters of some renown, feared as much for their barbarity as for their skill at arms. Indeed I remembered it being said that they had conquered this island once before, though it was many years ago now.
‘Why are you telling me this?’ I asked.
‘It is no more than what will soon be commonly known,’ he replied. ‘But now you see why Robert’s death could not have come at a worse time. You understand why I need the services of men such as yourself. For, sooner or later, the enemy will come, and we must be ready to fight them when they do-’
He was cut off by a sharp knock at the door.
‘One moment,’ Malet told me, as he went to open it.
A boy in a brown tunic stood outside. There was charcoal on his face, his tunic and light hair were unkempt, and I took him for a servant. ‘My lord,’ he said. ‘The castellan Lord Richard is here. He wishes to speak with you as soon as possible.’
‘What does he want?’ Malet asked, and there was a hint of weariness in his tone.
‘He didn’t say, lord. He is waiting for you in your chambers.’
Malet let out a sigh. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Tell him I will be with him shortly.’
The boy gave a cursory bow and hurried away.
‘Forgive me, Tancred,’ Malet said. ‘The castellan is a tiresome man, but if I ignore him, he will only grow more persistent. I trust that you are comfortable here, that you are being brought everything you require.’
‘I am, lord.’
‘Very well.’ He smiled. ‘I do not seek an answer from you now, but I hope that you will consider what I have said over the coming days. No doubt we shall speak again before long.’
He left, and I was alone again. I thought over everything that he had said, about Lord Robert, and about the rebellion that he believed was to come. If it did, then I wanted to be able to fight, even if for nothing else than the opportunity to avenge Robert’s death. Although if Malet spoke truthfully, then there were few lords who would be willing to accept my service.
Few lords except, naturally, for him.
Eight
Eudo and Wace came to see me the next morning, and never had I been more glad to see them. We did not talk of the battle or of Lord Robert, for there was little more to say, though I could see from the looks in their eyes that it was in their minds as much as it was in mine.
I learnt from them that Rollo had not survived the journey. They had stopped briefly at dusk to let the horses rest, but when they made to leave, he had not got up.
‘The battle must have all but exhausted him,’ Eudo said. ‘When we saw that he wasn’t going to live, we decided it was better to end his suffering ourselves. I’m sorry.’
Perhaps my heart was already so filled with grief that there was no room for any more, but for some reason I felt no sadness, only regret. I had been given Rollo in the weeks after the battle at H?stinges, at the same time that I was entrusted with a conroi of my own to command. He had been with me almost as long as we had been in England, seen me through two years and more of campaigning. In all my years I had known no better mount than him; strong yet at the same time quick, steady and obedient. And now he too was gone.
I changed the subject. ‘The vicomte came to see me yesterday. His chaplain too, a man named?lfwold.’
‘The Englishman,’ Eudo said with a look of distaste.
‘You’ve met him, then?’ I asked.
‘He was the one who received us when we brought you in,’ Wace replied. ‘Malet has more than a few Englishmen in his household. He’s half-English himself, you know.’
‘Half-English?’ I said, disbelieving. When I had met him there’d been nothing in his appearance or his speech to suggest that he was anything but Norman.
‘It’s said that his mother was of noble Mercian stock, though no one seems to know for certain,’ Wace said. ‘I gather he doesn’t speak of it much.’
I was not surprised; it was not something that many would readily admit to.
‘His loyalty to the king is not in question, you understand,’ Wace went on. ‘He fought alongside him at H? stinges, and fought well at that. But his parentage means that he also has the trust of many of the English thegns.’
‘Which is no doubt part of the reason he was made vicomte here,’ I said. Whereas the south of the kingdom was now firmly under the control of Norman lords, much of the north was still in the hands of the same men who had held it under the usurper three years ago. As a result, whoever held Eoferwic needed to be able to treat with them. ‘How do you know so much, in any case?’ I asked.
‘Malet was at the king’s Easter council last year, when I was there with Lord Robert,’ Wace said. ‘All this I learnt from speaking with some of his men.’
However he had obtained it, it was useful knowledge to have, and I was grateful, just as I was for the news that they brought from outside. It seemed that there were rumours of risings in the very south of the kingdom, stories too of certain lords who had fled back to Normandy. Among them were Hugues de Grandmesnil, who had been the vicomte in Wincestre, and his brother by marriage, Hunfrid de Tilleul, the castellan at H?stinges: some of the most prominent men in that part of England.
‘I didn’t realise there was so much unrest in the south,’ I said. It was only a matter of weeks since we had left Lundene with Lord Robert, and there had been little trouble then. I wondered if these risings were what Malet meant when he had spoken the previous afternoon of bands of Englishmen, of Normans being killed.
‘Even here in Eoferwic there is disquiet,’ Wace said. ‘You can see it in the way the townsmen stare at you when you ride past. They resent us, and they’re no longer afraid to show it.’
‘Only yesterday evening a fight broke out down by the wharves,’ Eudo put in. ‘Some of the castellan’s knights were set upon by a group of Englishmen; I saw it happen from the bridge. It was a complete slaughter. They rode them down, killed half a dozen before the rest ran away.’
For knights to be attacked so openly meant that things were even worse than I had realised. No doubt the townsmen had learnt that a thousand Frenchmen and more had been killed at Dunholm, and now thought that they had less to fear from us. But that could not account for those risings in the south, for it was still only a week since the battle — too soon for them to have heard, and for us to have heard back. News often travelled quickly, but not that quickly.
