The Red Knight

The captain rode through the postern gate of the Bridge Castle with no one but Michael, also mailed and armed. They’d ridden out of the upper postern of the fortress with a minimum of fuss – two men-at-arms on detail. But the captain rode fast and hard down the ridge because the sky was full of crows to the west. He noted there wasn’t a bird to be seen over the fortress or the castle.

He dismounted in the Bridge Castle courtyard, where big merchant wagons were parked hub-to-hub leaving just room for a sortie to form up. As the captain looked around he realised that all the wagons were occupied. The merchants were living in them. No wonder Ser Milus said he had room. Over by the main tower, dogs whined and barked – four brace of good hounds. He stopped and let them smell him. Dogs made him smile with their enthusiastic approval. All dogs liked him.

Cleg, Ser Milus’ valet, came and led him into the main tower, where the garrison had their quarters on the ground floor – plenty of paliasses of new straw, with six local women and another half-dozen company trulls sitting on the floor and sewing. They were making mattresses – there were twenty ells of striped sacking already measured and cut, as the captain had seen done in a dozen countries. Clean sacks made good mattresses while dirty linen spread disease – any soldier knew it.

The women rose to their feet and curtsied.

The captain bowed. ‘Don’t let me disturb you, ladies.’

Ser Milus took his hand and a pair of archers – older, steady men, Jack Kaves and Smoke, pushed the merchants away. Three of them were waving scrolls.

‘I protest!’ the taller man called. ‘My dogs-’

‘I’ll take you to law for this!’ called a stout man.

The captain ignored them and went up a set of tight steps to the uppermost floor, where tents had been used to partition the tower into sleeping quarters for officers.

Ser Jehannes nodded curtly to the captain. He nodded back.

‘Ready to move back up the hill?’ the captain said.

Jehannes nodded. ‘Do I owe an apology?’

The captain lowered his voice. ‘I pissed you off, and you sulked about it. I need you. I need you at the fortress, giving orders, kicking arses and taking names.’

Jehannes nodded. ‘I’ll go back up with you.’ He looked over to Gelfred, and indicated the huntsman with a nod. ‘It’s bad.’

‘No one ever summons me for good news.’ The captain was relieved that he hadn’t lost his most senior man forever, and clapped the man on the back hoping it was the right gesture. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

Jehannes paused. ‘I am also sorry,’ he said. ‘I am differently made to you, and I lack your certainty.’ He shrugged. ‘How is Bent doing?’

‘Very well indeed.’ Bent was the archer in Ser Jehannes’ lance – and also the most senior archer in the fortress.

‘I’ll send you Ser Brutus,’ the captain said to Milus, who grinned.

‘You mean you’re trading me the best knight in the company for a kid with an archer he can’t control?’ He laughed. ‘Never mind – Jehannes outranked me and never did any work anyway.’

The captain thought – not for the first time – how sensitive his mercenaries were. Jehannes had chosen to go to the castle garrison as a mere man-at-arms rather than go to the fortress with the captain, because he was angry. And everyone knew it, because there was no privacy, in a camp or in a garrison. And now that he and the captain had made it up everyone was very gentle about it., The teasing would start later. The captain thought it remarkable that such men had so much tact, but they did.

Gelfred was waiting, and from his expression, he was about to explode.

The captain went into his ‘room’ and sat at the low camp table on a leather stool. Gelfred beckoned to the other two officers, and both came in. Jehannes paused in the doorway and spoke to someone just outside the tent flap wall. ‘Clear this floor,’ he said.

They heard men grumbling, and then Marcus, Jehannes’ squire, said in his guttural accent, ‘All clear, sers.’

Gelfred looked around. ‘Not sure where to start.’

‘How about the beginning? And with a cup of wine?’ The captain tried to be light hearted, but the others looked too serious.

‘The merchants came in – two of them had animals.’ Gelfred shrugged. ‘I’m telling this badly. Two of them had a dozen good falcons and some dogs. I took the liberty of securing them. Aye?’

A dozen good falcons and some hunting dogs would be worth a fortune. No wonder the merchants were so incensed.

‘Go on,’ the captain said.

‘Today is the first morning I’ve been here.’ Gelfred cleared his throat. ‘I’ve been in the woods.’

‘You did a beautiful job,’ the captain said. ‘Tom hit their camp just right – didn’t even see a guard.’

Gelfred smiled at the praise. ‘Thanks. Anyway. Starting this morning, I-’ he looked at Ser Milus. ‘I started flying the hawks against the birds – those that watch the castle.’ He shrugged. ‘I know this sounds lame-’

‘Not at all,’ said the captain.