The Splintered Kingdom

and we both knew it.

‘I hope you realise what it is you are undertaking,’ he said. ‘Beatrice said before that you were foolish, and she was right. You didn’t have to put yourself forward.’

‘If you’d wanted, you could have prevented me.’ He would have been within his rights as my lord to do so. The fact that he hadn’t I took as a sign of his respect for me.

‘I have no desire to lose you or any of my vassals,’ he said. ‘But I won’t deny you this opportunity, so long as you understand that by accepting this task you take your fate into your own hands. This is not as simple as hunting down a pack of raiders as you did last month. The Wolf, Fitz Osbern and I need to rely on you if we are to succeed.’

‘I know that, and I understand.’

‘Be sure that you do.’ His expression was stern. ‘If I have one piece of advice to offer, it is this: be wary of the princes Ithel and Maredudd. They will remain loyal only as long as they have something to gain by doing so, regardless of what oaths they might have made. Keep a close watch over them, and trust them only as far as you have to.’

‘I will, lord.’

‘Don’t underestimate the enemy, either. The Welsh are more cunning than I think even Fitz Osbern realises, and with Wild Eadric and the English rebels on their side as well, they will be more confident than ever.’

If he thought I didn’t already know this, he was mistaken, but I listened patiently regardless. There was a certain anxiety in his demeanour that I rarely saw, although it was impossible to know whether he was nervous for my sake or because he was mindful of the challenges facing him also. Whichever it was, it sent a chill through me. Only then did I realise the immensity of the responsibility I was about to shoulder.

‘God be with you, Tancred,’ Robert said.

‘And with you, lord.’

We bade each other farewell and he returned to where Earl Hugues was mustering his forces across the river, leaving me a conroi of his knights and Wace and Eudo too. The three of us had not ridden together in so long, and my mood lightened, though only briefly, as from the other direction I glimpsed the stout figure of Berengar with more than a dozen men beneath a banner decorated in horizontal stripes of scarlet and sky blue. He stopped his snorting destrier in front of me, though he did not deign to dismount.

‘What are you doing here?’ I asked, more out of surprise than anything else.

‘Rest assured I haven’t come out of choice, if that’s what you mean,’ Berengar replied sourly. ‘Fitz Osbern in his wisdom has decided I should accompany you on this reckless enterprise, though God only knows why he thinks I’d wish to take orders from the likes of you.’

To say that his abruptness didn’t rankle would have been a lie, but if we were to fight alongside one another then somehow his quarrel with me, whatever it was, had to be settled. ‘Berengar, if I’ve offended you-’

He cut me off. ‘Don’t waste your breath trying to win me over, either. I’ll do my part, have no fears about that. But let me warn you from the beginning that you’ll get no favours from me.’

Before I could say anything in reply, he gave a signal to his men and then rode off in the direction of a group of lords who were gathering by the banks of the river where they had planted their pennons.

‘What was that about?’ asked Wace as he and Eudo joined me.

I shrugged; he had about as much notion as I did. ‘You tell me.’

‘You always were quick to make enemies,’ Eudo said with a grin. ‘What did you do this time?’

When first we had met as boys, Eudo had not much liked me either, although that was due to the bloodied nose I had given him, and the wound to his pride.

‘If only I knew,’ I muttered, casting a glance towards the river, where Berengar was laughing at a joke told by one of his knights, in better spirits all of a sudden. Whatever the cause of his ill humour, it seemed it was reserved for me alone. Already in spite of myself I was taking a dislike to his pudgy face and his ridiculous beard.

I changed the subject, not wishing to dwell on it any longer. ‘Are these the last of the men who’ll be joining us?’ I asked, nodding towards the conroi that had recently arrived.

‘As far as I know,’ Eudo said.

I called for Snocca to bring me my helmet with its newly attached strips of scarlet cloth — the tail that signified that I was the leader of this expedition — and then vaulted up into Nihtfeax’s saddle. After waving to Pons, who promptly gave the two sharp blasts upon the horn that were the signal for the rest of our host to rally, I beckoned to Eudo and Wace to join me as I rode to the head of the column. The new day was already upon us, the bright disc of the sun breaking over the clustered rooftops of Scrobbesburh, and as it did so a thrill stirred within me: a thrill that I had not felt in many months.

For the black hawk was flying proudly in the breeze, its wings spread wide, its talons outstretched as if stooping upon its prey, and Tancred a Dinant was at last riding to war.

Our route led us south at first. We could have followed the wide valley of the river Saverna, since that presented the easiest country for riding, but the enemy would be expecting that, and it was known they often sent out scouts down either bank to keep watch for any sign of horsemen and to carry back warnings of impending attack. By taking the Roman way towards Hereford instead, I hoped that we might fool them into thinking that we were simply sending reinforcements to the castles that held the southern end of the March.

We kept a steady pace for half the day, maintaining the ruse for long enough that even the wariest of the enemy scouts who might be watching should have abandoned their suspicions. A few miles after Stratune, then, we left the road and made for the long mountain that rose to the west. Up steep-sided vales we climbed, through dense woods and across clear-tumbling streams. The paths were narrow and ill travelled, overhung by thick branches that forced us to dismount, and often we had no choice but to go in single file: a long string of men and horses stretching for as much as a mile and possibly more. Whenever we found ourselves in open ground I called a halt so that the rearguard could catch up, and so we did not make nearly as much progress as I would have liked, but it was progress nonetheless, and I tried to be content with that.

By dusk we found ourselves leading our horses across high heathlands, bright with purple flowers that matched the colour of the sky. Valley after valley stretched out before us: creases and folds in the fabric of the earth, endlessly rising and falling all the way to the distant horizon. Rocky outcrops rose like islands out of the sea of heather, and as the light faded we set up camp in the lee of one of those tors, not because it was especially sheltered, but for want of anywhere better, and because at least there was forage enough for our horses. We had some way to go before reaching the plains on the other side of this mountain, and I thought it better not to risk our mounts’ necks descending the slopes in the dark. At the very least I hoped that there we would have some protection from the wind, which swept across the land in fierce gusts from the west: a sure sign of worse weather to come.

If truth be told it was far from the best sleep I’d ever had; the ground was hard and littered with jagged stones, making it hard to settle. Nor did the tor offer as much respite from the elements as I had hoped; some of the men lost their tents entirely and were forced to share, sleeping four or five together, which did nothing to improve their moods the next day.

No sooner had we left Scrobbesburh behind us, in fact, than quarrels began to break out between the Welsh and the French parts of our host, who resented being made to march together, and while few of those came to blows, the further we travelled, the more frequent they grew. Thankfully Maredudd and Ithel were as eager as I was to foster a closer spirit between the two camps, and to set an example we made sure to ride together in the vanguard when we set out that second day: myself with my conroi, which included my knights as well as those that Robert had placed under my charge; and they with their teulu, which was almost the same thing, being the name they gave to their hearth-troops, their household warriors, their ablest and staunchest fighters; men who would give everything short of their lives in the service of their lords. It did not stop each side hurling insults at the other, but at the very least there was no more fighting after that, and that was enough to satisfy me. I only hoped the peace would last.

‘Once they sniff enemy blood, they will be much happier,’ said Maredudd confidently. ‘There will be less trouble then, I think.’

I cast him a sceptical look but said nothing. In my experience once men discovered the bloodlust within themselves it was a hard thing to shake. I had seen with my own eyes many occasions when as many men had died fighting between themselves over the spoils of victory as had been slain in their pursuit.