Robard took the spare horse and we turned them south and steered our way through the crowd. A quick glance told me Sir Hugh was still occupied with the mass ofpeople, many ofthem angry at him for starting the fire.
“Hurry! And stay low! They still have crossbows!” I shouted above the noise. We could not easily gallop with dozens upon dozens of citizens still rushing toward the center of town. Robard cursed and bellowed and exhorted everyone in our path to make way.
“Let us pass! Out of our way! We have urgent business with the King!” he shouted. The King? We pushed and cajoled our way along, and I looked back to see a knight on horseback bringing his crossbow to bear.
“Behind us! Down!” I hollered as loud as I could. The bolt whizzed between Robard and me and into the crowd. I heard a cry of pain and the people gave way to find an old man, lying in the street, the small shaft sticking out of his shoulder. The townspeople were confused. First their marketplace was set ablaze and now someone was shooting them down in cold blood.
“Go! Keep going!” I shouted, resisting the urge to stop and aid the man. Sir Hugh was gaining, and our presence would only endanger more innocents.
“It’s the man over there!” I shouted, turning in the saddle and pointing at the knight who had fired. “He did this to your fellow!” The crowd was in a confused frenzy and easy to manipulate. Two dozen people surged around my horse, charging down the street toward the knight on horseback. Though the man was a Templar, someone these folks might even know, they had witnessed what happened and wanted vengeance.
Maryam and Angel were farther ahead of us and free of the worst part of the riotous mass of people. Before long the three of us cleared them as well. We gave rein to our horses, needing to put some distance between us and Sir Hugh and his men. In a few moments we had reached the outskirts of Dover and entered the wooded countryside.
“We’re headed south!” Robard shouted over the pounding hooves.
“We need to get away first and worry about direction later,” I answered. The night sky would make it difficult to spot any pursuit until we could hear them, and by then they would be almost upon us. The terrain was rolling and filled with thick trees that required us to go much more slowly than I would have wished, but we could not risk running headlong into a low-hanging tree branch.
We climbed a hill lying roughly two leagues from Dover and stopped in the tree line for a moment. The moon still shone behind the cloud cover, so there was just enough light to guide us. We rested there a moment with our horses breathing hard. Angel dropped to the ground, panting, staring off the way we had come.
“This is too close to town,” Maryam said. “They will be upon us-”
She was interrupted by Angel, who jumped to her feet, her body rigid and a low growl sounding in her throat. She paced a few steps and stopped, cocking her head to the side.
“Someone’s coming,” Robard said. And indeed off in the distance I could just make out the sounds of horses and the shouts of men. Sir Hugh and his remaining knights had freed themselves from the angry crowd and were after us.
We rode off, trying hard to make a difficult trail for them to follow.
“They are better mounted!” Robard exclaimed over the sound of hoofbeats. “It won’t be long until they overtake us!” He was right. With the exception of the knights’ horse I rode, Robard’s and Maryam’s animals were smaller and much less hardy than the warhorses ridden by the pursuing knights. What we gained in their ability to maneuver more easily through the wooded countryside was lost by the greater speed and endurance of our enemies’ chargers.
“You better think of something quick!” Maryam yelled. “My poor horse is about to give out.”
We rode down the edge of another rise, and off to our left, I spotted a heavily overgrown thicket, dense with shrubs and saplings and evergreens. Though it was winter, these trees still held dead leaves, and the ground cover would hide us well.
“Hold!” I said, reining my horse to a stop. “This way.” I steered us into the thicket. Luckily we had ridden over some of the same ground on our trip into Dover. And I remembered a small ravine cutting through the forest floor not far ahead. If I was lucky, maybe I could trick Sir Hugh.
“The two of you wait here,” I said. “Keep the horses and yourselves hidden.” Maryam and Robard raised no argument and dismounted quickly. I took the satchel from my shoulder and tossed it to Robard. “If I don’t come back, if Sir Hugh catches me, you know what you must do. Take it to Father William at the Church of the Holy Redeemer in Rosslyn. Don’t come for me. He’ll kill me anyway. He must not have this.”
“What are you going to do?” Maryam asked.
“Don’t worry. I have a plan.” I smiled. “Come on, Angel.” I turned the horse and started to trot away. “Robard, keep an arrow ready. You’ll hear me coming back to the thicket before you can see me in this light. I’ll yell ‘Beauseant’-that way you’ll know it’s me. All right?”
“How will I know it isn’t Sir Hugh hollering ‘Beauseant’ as he’s about to charge us? You Templars love that word. You think you’re all such great fighters. What if-”
“Robard!” I nearly yelled, trying to keep my voice under control.
“What?” he answered. Robard often became incessantly chatty when he was fighting. Or about to fight. Or finished fighting.
“Just keep alert. I won’t be gone long.”
Angel and I left them there in the woods and made our way back to the point where we’d cut away toward the thicket. I turned the horse and pushed him hard, hoping I wouldn’t get lost in the dark. Along the way, I made no effort to disguise my route, snapping the branches off of passing trees and steering him through muddy ground whenever I could find it. Whenever I stopped to listen, I heard no one, but I knew they were coming and had an advantage with Angel at my side. She would hear and smell them long before they reached me.
We rode through another dense copse of trees. The muted moonlight revealed the entrance to the small ravine cutting through the forest floor, and I hoped to use it to our advantage. Without giving myself enough time to question my plan, I steered the horse down the steep slope and called for Angel to follow. We navigated the twisting gorge until we found a suitable spot. Time was our enemy. It would only be a few minutes until they tracked me here.
Sir Hugh was mad in his pursuit of me and desperate to recover the Grail. But I also believed he would be cautious. For one thing, though I had made a thorough effort to lead them directly here, he could not surmise which of us lay waiting in the darkness, and it might just be Robard with his longbow. His timidity would give me a few extra minutes. All the time I needed for my scheme to work.
The ravine was rocky, pocked with boulders and scrub trees and bushes. I walked forward a few yards until I found what I was looking for. A tree branch had fallen into the ravine from the forest above. It was about six feet long and perfect for my plan.
With my sword I hacked it in half. Ripping a length of cloth from my tunic, I lashed the branch together into a crude cross, and with a few more strips managed to tie it firmly onto the saddle so the two “arms” stuck up in the air like the arms on a headless man. Quickly I shrugged out of my brown servant’s tunic, draping it over the tied- down branches. From a distance, it would appear as if I were still mounted on the horse.
Angel growled again, peering back down the ravine. The knights were coming. I wrapped the reins around the pommel of the saddle and waited. Behind me came the sound of horses and the soft clinking sound of chain mail. I closed my eyes. My thought was to convince them that we had separated and that Robard the archer waited here ready to bring doom upon them with his bow. In my mind I concentrated on remembering the sound of Robard’s speech. His was a shade deeper than mine. Finally, when I was ready, I lowered my voice and shouted out to the approaching men.
“Come ahead! I’ll spoon-feed you goose feather and birch straight from the bow of a King’s Archer! I won’t surrender and you won’t take me alive!” The movement and noise down the ravine stopped as they paused to consider my comments.
“What’s the matter? No taste for the longbow?” I shouted.
Still no sound.
“Then try to catch me!” I yelled, and gave the horse a sharp smack on the rump. It leapt forward, careering down the ravine, my tunic flapping in the breeze.
“Come on, Angel,” I whispered. We moved another few yards ahead and found a small collection of boulders and shrubs large enough for us to hide behind. We would be invisible to anyone approaching from the opposite
