Friday 9 September

‘Into line, you maggots!’ Grandarse roared, and the men shuffled and jostled into the semblance of a straight row. ‘And get those strings strung!’

Berenger stood in the drizzle and felt the water running over his brow and down his neck. His waxed cowl and hat were no help when the weather was like this. The rain had fallen steadily for the last two hours, all while the men had been standing to, waiting for the assault, and now, at last, it seemed that they were going to be moving.

He watched the rest of his vintaine. The words of Sir John had cut, as the knight had intended. Berenger had never yet run away from a battle or left either his men or his King when he was needed, but that was clearly what Sir John had expected. Or he had threatened him with expulsion and exile from the army in order to shock him into his senses.

Berenger didn’t know whether he was mad or not. Only a matter of weeks ago, he would have been unconcerned about women and girls who had been killed unless, as he had seen at Uzerche, the death of the victim might have an impact on him or his men by rousing rebellion among the population. Pointless murder was just that: pointless. In an army like this, there was logic in creating fear and horror. But it was one thing to inspire dread, and quite another to harbour a man who, for his own perverted reasons, wanted to torture and kill in that cruel manner. A man like that must be weak. He wanted his gratification at the expense of those so much more weak in comparison to him, so that he must pick on young girls.

Berenger heard a horn blow, then another, and the mass of men on his right began to tramp along the plain towards the French walls. One and a half thousand men armed with shields and spears began their walk towards battle and death.

There was a shout, then cries went up from their enemies and Grandarse gave a hoarse bellow, ‘Archers!’ that was repeated along the line of bowmen as each vintener took up the call.

‘Archers! Nock!’

Berenger heard the familiar commands up and down the line. They were acted upon almost without thought now.

‘Archers! Draw!’

The noise of creaking as all the men lifted their great bows overhead and then drew them, both arms lowering, the yew tensing and crackling in their hands, the strings taut as wires, the men grunting as they held the weapons on target, shoulders burning already with the immense effort.

‘Make sure you allow for the distance, you shitheads! Don’t hit our fucking men! Now: loose!’

A flurry of fletchings catching the air, the whistle as the shafts sprang away from their bows, and the men were ordered to nock again, and a second and third flight were gone before Berenger could take three breaths.

He nocked a fresh missile and prepared himself.

The men were moving more urgently now. He could see their leaders at the front, urging on their companies by their own example, waving their swords or holding spears aloft, and then starting to trot onwards. Suddenly the entire line of English was moving more swiftly, breaking into a faster pace as it reached the flatter lands before the town.

But then the line faltered. A series of volleys were launched at them from crossbows at the walls, and even with his eyesight Berenger saw the front row collapse like reeds under the scythe. The next ranks were already there, but they too stuttered, and there were splashes as men fell.

‘Bastards must have dug pits or something,’ Robin said.

The men were floundering now, some with their arms waving as if to aid them walking. Berenger could just make out the French darting from their walls, loosing their bolts, others with slings releasing their stones, while occasional gouts of flame spoke of small gonnes at the walls.

‘Archers! Archers! Give them support, in Christ’s name!’ Grandarse bellowed, and the men sprang to their duties again, sending shafts sleeting towards the walls. No time for worrying about picking a target at this range: it was a case of putting as many arrows into the sky as possible, hoping that even if they missed the enemy, the fact of their arrival would drive many French defenders to seek the safety of an overhanging roof of some sort.

The English were making heavy weather. They struggled on, but it was clear that they would not breach the walls. Men fell and were trampled, and over the noise of the trumpets and shouts, the screaming of the wounded was growing louder. Still the English moved on, depleted now, but determined.

Berenger held up his hand. ‘Stop sending arrows now,’ he said. ‘They’re too close to the French.’

The English had made it to the line of the outer wall, but there they were held. There were too many defenders, and for every Englishman that reached the weaker points, there were three Frenchmen with rocks to be hurled, or crossbows, or even spears to stab the man in the face or at the throat.

That was when the rain began to fall in earnest. Berenger was blinded immediately as the rain pelted down. His hat was nothing more than an encumbrance, and he pulled it off, tucking it into the front of his jack, but there was little point. The rain was so torrential that all he could see before him was a grey mist, with unrecognisable shapes that may or may not have been men, ebbing and flowing like wraiths in the wind. The very thought made him swallow uncomfortably. Perhaps the ghosts of past French warriors were here to repel the English invaders?

‘Archers! Hold fast!’ Grandarse called, and this time Berenger could hear the weariness in his tone. Even Grandarse had endured enough marching and rain in the last few weeks.

They did not even penetrate the main wall.

Later, as they marched back to their waterlogged camp, Berenger was struck by the atmosphere among the men. There was a sullenness about them all. The men were not despairing, but they were not far from it, and that was a cause for concern.

Berenger was sitting in the limited shelter provided by a cloak tied between a couple of trees and two thongs that took the lower corners to pegs in the ground when Archibald found him that evening.

‘Space for a small one?’ Archibald asked.

Berenger grunted and shifted to one side. There was barely enough room for him, and he took up less than Archibald, but there was a feeling of comradeship between the two from their past service.

‘I heard you were helping with the assault?’ Archibald said.

Berenger had tried to light a fire, but the wood was so damp that his tinder could not light even the thin sticks of pine he managed to rescue from the lower branches of the trees.

‘Yes. We were there to give what aid we could. Not that it was much use in this rain. The bowstrings got damp, and then the arrows would not travel as we needed. There was a risk of falling short and skewering our own men,’ he said.

‘If only I had some gonnes set up nearer. I could have blasted a hole through their walls, had I a large enough toy!’

Berenger smiled. Ever since he had known him, Archibald had been convinced that his devices would be able to batter a city to gravel in a day. Yet when he had been given his chance at Calais, his shots had bounced from the city, chipping fragments, but leaving the main city walls whole. To take a city an army needed tunnellers and bold men who could clamber scaling ladders more than gonnes. But he didn’t say so.

‘They did their best,’ he said instead.

‘A ridiculous way to waste men! A storming party of one and a half thousand men running forward, only to be confused by a line of ditches, by thick mud caused by the rain over so many days, and finally, by the fierce defence of the townspeople. Most of them, so I’ve been told, were women and children. They picked up rocks and beat the brains out of our fellows,’ Archibald said.

Berenger smiled thinly. ‘Small children? Lifting rocks large enough to break a man’s head? I doubt that. The truth is, there were only a few weak places where we could attack, and the French had the sense to concentrate their men-at-arms at those spots. War is not a precise art, but nor is it terribly difficult. They fought well. That is all.’

‘And now we will be forced to hurry away.’

‘Why? What have you heard?’

‘Nothing. But the French cannot be far away, and we have a depleted army since our foolish assault today. It would have been better to go around the town and straight over the bridge.’

‘If we could, yes. But if you leave a town behind you, you leave an attacking force that will cut you off, if you are not careful. We could not leave Tours standing.’

‘Well, we shall now.’

Berenger shook his head. ‘No, we’ll take the place tomorrow.’

Sunday 11 September

Berenger’s faith in the Prince’s ability to capture the town was misplaced, as he was soon to learn.

All that Saturday the English had struggled to continue the fight. Men stumbled and fell and staggered onwards under a withering barrage of rocks, arrows, bolts and even stakes and posts. Berenger and his men kept up what support they could, while the rain poured down and the mud grew viscous, thick and stodgy, and the stench of blood and intestines and shit rose to their nostrils. Berenger stood and stared down, barely able to see a single individual with his dreadful eyesight, but instead seeing the battle, from his distance, as if it were not a phalanx of men, but a great beast that consumed them, gorging itself on their bodies, while they fought and struggled and killed and died, trying to keep the beast at bay. But they could not: it was stronger than them.

‘Why?’ Robin asked as the day passed from morning to afternoon. ‘What’s the point of more slaughter?’

‘That town is in the way,’ Berenger explained. ‘Archibald told me that the Duke is over there somewhere. We have to cross the river to get to him. And we’re safe enough here on this side of the river for now. The French army is to the north, and they won’t be able to cross over the river any more easily than we could.’

‘If you’re sure,’ Robin said, unconvinced.

His lack of faith was shown to be justified shortly afterwards when the command came to pull off the attacking force, strike camp and march south.

The French army had crossed at Blois and now the full might of the French was heading towards them.

The rest of Sunday was one long slog southwards.

Berenger’s pony was weary and fractious, and Berenger’s mood was not improved as the beast tried to bite him and kick other people. He managed to force the little brute to his will in the end, and then the vintaine was pushed ahead once more to scout the land before the English and warn of any enemy forces that appeared.

They came to one river and crossed that without too much mishap, although a cart with stores on it was washed away when the horse drawing it fell on a slippery rock, breaking its leg. A butcher’s axe put paid to that. Then the army continued marching in a thin, chill rain that penetrated all clothing, all flesh, through to a man’s very soul. Berenger felt as though the rain was filling his body, until he reached a stage when he thought his belly would begin to swell and gurgle with the extra liquid. It was uncomfortable to be so cold, and all the men could feel their softened flesh chafing against leather straps, rough linen and saddles. Few that night would be without sores and blisters, he knew.

Some miles further on, they reached another river. Berenger and his men crossed warily, but there was no danger with this little course. It was shallow and broad here at their ford, and the men passed over and on to higher ground with a sense of relief as, at last, the clouds parted and the sun broke through. In only a few minutes the men had steam rising from their bodies where the sun struck them, and Berenger could feel the heat like a warming salve smothered all over his back.

Even the men felt the sudden uplift in their spirits. Berenger could hear their voices rising, and there was an occasional foul remark about another man’s ancestry and sexual inclinations that caused much ribald humour. He was tempted at first to remind them that they were in enemy territory, and try to curtail their laughter, but even as he opened his mouth to remonstrate with them, he saw Clip and Dogbreath’s eyes moving over the treeline ahead. He saw Saul issue a disgusting comment about Dogbreath while he stared fixedly at a building in the distance, and Berenger kept his counsel. There was no need to tell this vintaine anything. Their long march had moulded them into an effective team, and they knew the dangers as well as he.

It was only a short way to the next town. This was, so Berenger heard from a peasant they caught, the town of Montbazon, a smaller community than Tours, but still significant enough. There, since darkness would fall before long, Berenger decided they would halt. He sent Pierre and Felix back to the main army to guide them, and then he had Clip and Dogbreath ride on with Robin to check the land about while the rest of the vintaine waited. When the Prince arrived, they took the town.