May 1066, Dover
Stop scratching,” Alaric growled as they walked to a brewer’s cottage outside Dover nearly four weeks later. “You’re drawing everyone’s attention.”
“My bloody beard itches!” Roderick scowled as he followed Alaric into the hovel serving as a makeshift alehouse. They casually looked about the crowded room as two serving wenches sidled up to Alaric with a jug and two cups. Roderick wagged his abundant eyebrows and gave the women a leering grin to attract their attention, but they had eyes only for Alaric. He sighed and shook his head as Alaric sent them on their way with an appreciative smile.
In the weeks since seeing the comet, subterfuge had filled their days. Harold had begun to assemble his army and ships, and the movement of soldiers and supplies gave Alaric an opportunity to assess the location and distribution of Harold’s defenses. He and his four friends, all knowing the language and customs, blended in with the fyrds, the armed citizen army, farmer-soldiers, traveling to their posts. Each going to a different area, they reconnoitered the southern regions and surveyed the coastline making detailed maps, taking crude measurements. They overheard gossiping villagers, talked to fishers about tides and to steersmen about currents, charted the harbors where hundreds of ships might shelter, and found routes leading inland that could support a mounted army and heavy carts loaded with weapons. They had agreed to meet in Dover by the ides of May, at the beach below the old Roman lighthouse. So far, only Roderick and Alaric had shown up.
“A curse on Geeyome bastardus,” growled one of the patrons in Saxon before he spat on the dirt floor. “I seys the bastard es a devil. Yer wifs, yer gels, and . . . and even yer sons will be prikked by those evil Northmen.” He glared at everyone in the room. “If troth be telt,” he said, lowering his voice, “the Northmen rapen nuns and priests, too!” The pronouncement set off a flurry of boastful threats.
Over the rumbling crowd, someone shouted to the monk who sat in a corner with a bowl of mead. “Brothur, a blessan fur Harold kyng?” The others cheered.
The monk, his long yellow robe gray from walking the dusty roads and wet where mead had dribbled down his chest, raised his bowl to the crowd and sipped. Putting the bowl down, he clasped his hands together. “Gott in heafen,” he began, bowing his tonsured head. “We pray Harold king is saved from them that make wars and burn churches. Turn the Northmen into a nest of dragons and strike them down. May Harold king tie the Norman bastard to the gib and feed the kites and griffons.”
The patrons exploded with shouts of approval and calls for more blessings.
Raising his voice and his arms, the monk said, “May Harold king raise up his sword, unsheathed and wielded by God, to save us from this evil.”
Alaric lifted his bowl and signaled to Roderick, who slipped out of the inn. A moment or two later they met in the crowded street.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Roderick whispered. “It’s too dangerous.”
Alaric, walking beside him, agreed. Behind them, horns blasted. People began to shout and whoop as carts bearing lances and bows came from inside the gates of Dover with a company of housecarls who lodged within the fortified town. Without a word, Alaric and Roderick separated and merged into the crowds gathering outside the walls. Here, the small village had nearly tripled in size as tents and thatched cottages had been raised overnight. People had come seeking passage out of the kingdom. Others had come to provide goods and services to Harold’s warriors—arriving daily on foot, by horse or mule, in carts, by boat. Everywhere Alaric turned, someone hammered on weapons or armor, hawked bread or clothing, made leather harnesses, or repaired carts. Dover prepared for war.
Alaric wondered if Johan, Edo, and Gilbert would make the rendezvous. He thought it dangerous to wait even one more day. Just then, a couple of fyrds stumbled out of another alehouse before he could avoid them. One of the hooded, bearded men threw his arm around Alaric’s neck, grabbing him in a kind of stranglehold, dragging him backward nearly off his feet. Alaric clawed at the thick arm, trying to escape the men, whose short tunics reeked of manure and ale. Together, all three staggered along a few steps and stopped, swaying on unsteady feet in the middle of the narrow road jammed with carts and horses, and people. Alaric struggled to pull free of the chokehold; but before he could free himself, he felt the hot splattering of urine on his leggings.
Tottering and pissing in the street, the farmer-soldiers talked between themselves.
“Ah, yer prick’s a picked eel all yellow with brine. ’Tis a wonder yer never lost it in a goose-girl afore now.” The hint of a Welsh accent, grabbed Alaric’s full attention. “’Twill fall off any day now.”
“Nay,” said the other, squeezing Alaric tighter to his chest. “’Tis me old and dearest friend. Yellow though he might be, he’s a might bigger than yourn.”
Suddenly, Alaric recognized Johan and Gilbert. He barked a laugh and elbowed Johan in the ribs, winning his quick release. “Ye gads, yer sure to drown the village with yer piss. Or destroy the whole Norman host with yer stench!”
Together, all three linked arms and began to sing an old Saxon drinking song about the famous goat from Clee as they lurched drunkenly away from the crowds.
That night the four men huddled on the beach beside the remains of an old longship half buried in the gravel before the lighthouse. Only a few unbroken ribs and strakes protected them from the wind. Tied to the cracked, weathered stem-post, their horses faced the wind. Alaric spoke softly as he shivered in the damp mist. “We’ll make one more sweep of the area, but we have to leave. We can’t wait for—”
Someone shouted, and they heard the sound of horses in hot pursuit. They leaped from their shelter and looked down the beach at the source. A woman chased by three riders ran on foot holding her skirt above her bare knees. Her cloak flew out behind her, and she frantically waved her free arm. What? Alaric thought incredulously as the woman kept shouting and racing toward them. He heard his name.
“Let’s go,” Alaric shouted.
Mounted, they headed toward the woman. Roderick, the largest of the four, reached down and plucked the woman from the beach. With drawn swords, the others intercepted the soldiers. After a brief skirmish, Alaric and all of his men turned their horses and raced for the docks—as more soldiers joined in pursuit.
May 1066, Rouen, Normandie
Actually,” grinned Alaric, “we stole a boat!”
“Yes, a stinking boat filled with fish and just barely seaworthy,” Edo grumbled, his shudder recalling fish slithering into their leggings and wiggling down their braies. Everyone roared at his discomfort.
Alaric and his men had arrived at the ducal palace in Rouen, the seat of Normandie. They sat around a table in one of the duke’s towers drinking with Alaric’s best friend, Dreux Marchand de Ville. They related the story of their close escape, and how Edo had followed Gyrth, Harold’s brother as he trekked through the southern shires setting up defenses. The night Gyrth had arrived in Dover, Edo found an opportunity to steal the missives, maps, and everything Gyrth carried with him, by dressing as a woman selling her womanly wares. The story concluded with laughter and ribald comments about Edo and his comely figure galloping across the beach.
One by one, the men drifted away until only Alaric and Dreux remained at a corner table, a smoky tallow burned nearly to its base. Around them, everyone had taken to their beds. Familiar sounds embraced them—a woman’s soft giggle, a fitful snore, the rasping of a body turning on a straw pallet.
Dreux, with a lazy smile on his bronzed face, looked over at Alaric and shook his head. “You were always getting into trouble, even as a boy.”
“It is my nature.” Alaric grinned at Dreux whose hair was still blond, nearly white. His intense eyes were the same pale blue, and his lips curved upward, as always, a twitch away from a smile. “By God’s own sword, it’s good to see you again, Dreux!”
“It’s been nearly five years.”
“Yes.” Alaric smiled. They’d hated each other when they first met. At fourteen winters, although opposites in appearance, they were equally matched in height, weight, strength, skill, ambition, and impudence. Duke William had used their mutual hostility to train them. He thrust them together, made them compete with one another, pushing them harder and harder. When they were old enough for battle, he forced them to protect each other’s backs, and in the process, they had come to an understanding. Wary and tolerant at first, and then painstakingly professional, until, finally, they were friends. Alaric fingered the scar on the palm of his hand, the remnant of their blood-bond made on the eve of his return to Ewyas.
Alaric and Dreux were both twenty-three and landless. Dreux, the youngest of four sons, had not joined the Church, nor had he followed his brothers to join the Normans in Sicily.
“Have you a liege lord?” Alaric asked.
“I’m one of Bishop Odo’s men.” Dreux scratched his head. “But no title or land. My eyes are on Anglia.” Alaric smiled. He, too, hoped this war would reward him.
“And you?” Dreux asked. “Will you serve under Malet?”
“Possibly,” Alaric said. “Malet and I are working with William’s steersmen and the monks who’d once lived near the Wessex coast. We’ve pointed out possible landing sites and revealed what we know about Harold’s preparations. Daily, I thank God’s generosity, else William would not have taken me back into his fold.”
“He would have taken you back, Alaric. If for no other reason than to have you slay everyone within a three-horse radius.” They laughed remembering a bet they had made once a long time ago on one of the duke’s sorties.
Dreux next told Alaric how William intended to transport three thousand horses across the Narrow Sea.
“God’s shield!” Alaric said. “Battle-ready horses on ships in open waters?” Their ships would have no rowers. Loaded with heavy cargo, they would tack against an unfavorable wind. He imagined nervous stallions drifting for days on a choppy sea. After such a voyage, the beasts could not fight immediately. “Can it be done?”
“We shall see,” Dreux chuckled. “Normans now living near Sicily counsel William. They ship horses all the time on the Middle Sea. Learned how from Romans and Greeks.”
“Did any of your brothers come?” Alaric asked.
“No. Their fortunes will be made in Sicily.” Dreux changed the subject. “I hear you’re meeting with Gundulf, the mad monk from Bec.”
“Yes,” Alaric smiled, knowing the reputation of William’s architect who talked aloud to himself and shouted insults to no one in particular. “I’ve told him and the steersmen where the old, still usable forts are located along the coast. We are building a wooden castle in sections to transport. As soon as troops land, the notched timbers and frames will be reassembled, either to stand alone or to reinforce the old forts. We will need the protection. The English will see us coming and are likely to charge as soon as we touch the shore.”
Dreux nodded.
Gundulf’s fortresses were not the great stone strongholds in the heart of Normandie that took years to erect. Alaric had learned to construct the expeditious castles built throughout the duchy: timbered tower and ramparts atop a natural or man-made rise, a defensible courtyard, ringed with a timber wall and a moat or ditch. With enough labor, these strongholds could be raised in days or weeks and could pin down an enemy for years.
“Then what?” Dreux asked.
Alaric winced. “I will visit my uncle and cousin.”
Dreux laughed. “They’ll eat you alive, Alaric, just like they did, what, ten winters ago?”
“Maybe,” he said, smiling. “But now I bite back.”
Dreux raised his eyebrow at Alaric’s unmistakable intention.
“I’ll only stay a short time. The duke wants me to cross the Narrow Sea ahead of his fleet.”
“Dangerous,” Dreux said.
“So is war.” Alaric yawned and drained his wooden drinking bowl.
“Rannulf did not come?”
“No.” Alaric looked down at his empty bowl and explained.
“So,” Dreux said. “We’re going to save his arse, again, eh?”
Alaric nodded, grateful for Dreux’s understanding. “Afraid so,” he said, remembering the last time he had seen his brother.
Rannulf, although still furious at Alaric for leaving Hereford, had ridden hard to catch up with him. They had dismounted and walked their horses together in silence.
“If I could tie you to a tree and let you sit out the war, Alaric, I would.”
“Come with me.”
“You know I cannot.”
Alaric nodded, and they fell silent again before he teased, “Watch the archers, little brother.”
Rannulf chuckled. “And you be mindful of Harold’s two-handed battle axes. ’Twill fell your horse and give a fearsome headache.”
They laughed and sobered. “Alaric,” Rannulf said, shrugging his shoulders, “if . . . if something should happen. Will you . . . will you protect Leota?”
“I swear by my saints,” Alaric said. “I will!”
They embraced tightly for a moment and parted. When Alaric reached the valley’s edge, he reigned in and looked back. Rannulf had waited for his final wave.
In June, Alaric learned Harold’s brother Tostig threatened to invade Northumbria, and wondered if William had encouraged him. Norman counts, their military tenants, warhorses, armor, and weapons amassed. Soon William’s fleet began to appear. Alaric and Dreux, working together with William’s advisers, fell back into their old friendship. Alaric knew his brother and father would be likewise engaged in defense preparations, and he sometimes wondered whether Leota had given Rannulf a son or a daughter, for the child should have come by now.
In July, after nearly ten years, Alaric returned to his uncle’s home in Évreux. He and his cousin Guillaume eyed each other. Alaric noted their similarities: long, thin Norman faces and lean, tall bodies. But Guillaume’s blue eyes and reddish-blond hair, similar to Simeon’s, did not match Alaric’s gray and black. His family treated him differently after Guillaume tried to best him but ended up pinned beneath the sharp tip of Alaric’s sword. Perhaps it was his alliance with the duke. Although Guillaume outfitted new ships for William’s venture, Alaric gave Duke William information, which might already have assured victory. Still, Alaric felt deeply honored by his uncle’s invitation to confer on the Évreux preparations, and was surprised when he gave him a superb black warhorse and his old suit of chainmail—expensive gifts the equivalent of four mansi, enough land to feed several households.