Hoodsman: Blackstone Edge Read online

  Selby's warehouses, which had already been fixed to house refugees, were filling with goods again. Profits were being made, merchants were arriving, the market was busy, and coin was flowing.

  In February, Count Robert came from York and asked that the boom be temporarily broken. Now that there were four other ships making the York run, he wanted to take his own ship downstream so that he could travel to Escumetorp in comfort. Robert was amazed at the liveliness of Selby compared to the other towns and villages along the Humber. He urged Thorold to sail with him, and work his magic in other towns, but Thorold begged off explaining that he had been appointed by the King to stay in Selby.

  "I suppose I should have asked William for your help while I was in York," said Robert.

  "William is in York already? He is back from Northumbria already? That cannot be," responded Thorold. From the corner of his eye he saw Raynar turn his ear to listen.

  "The exiles blocked him at the Tees River valley for a fortnight, but in the end, as is usual for these English nobles, they ran away. They always run. He has since punished Dun Holm and has returned bringing Bishop Aethelwine in chains. Cospatrick is still the Earl. William had no choice but to make peace with him because he still holds Bamburgh fortress. He had not the men, nor the time, nor the weather to break Bamburgh fortress.

  He has already returned to York and is planning his next campaign, while half of the army he took north are still making their way south. They are burning the villages and pushing the serfs south as they move. It is slow work, so William came on ahead. "

  "So is the next campaign Cumbria?" asked Thorold.

  "No, William has already made terms with Malcolm of Scotland and he is finished with the North for now. He is tired of winter, and besides, he has more pressing matters in Winchester and in Normandy and in Flanders. He will take the Roman street to Chester and crush a rebellion there on his way south."

  Thorold suggested that Robert take some Selby shipwrights with him on his ship. "There will be many ships hidden in the marshes or trapped in creeks. You must have trapped a few yourself when you blocked the Trent. Get those ships floated and refounded so that the Humber ferries can run again, especially at the Ermine street crossing. " Thorold walked with Robert to the ship, but along the way Raynar had begged his leave and had turned towards the house. He had a bad feeling and excused himself of Robert once they reached his ship, and also walked to the house.

  On entering the doorway he immediately had to duck. Anske was screaming obscenities at Raynar and throwing things. Beatrice was trying to calm her. Raynar was packing. At the sight of Thorold cowering from her anger, Anske broke into tears. "He is leaving. He will be killed. Stop him, oh please stop him."

  Thorold turned to Raynar but Raynar shook his head. "I must go. You know this. William's next campaign is Chester. To surprise Chester he must cross the Pennines. He will use the old Roman street through Manchester. Those are my Peaks he will ride through. My Peaks. He is a dead man. Make her understand. I must go. He must pay for what he did to all of those refugees. No, it is more than that. I must stop him before he does the same to anyone else."

  "You alone, against his army. Don't be foolish," replied Thorold.

  "Me and the Brotherhood and the wind and the fog and the ice and the sinkholes and the cliffs. Twenty of us would be enough, and between the men of Sherwood and of the Peaks I will have more than fifty. Half of them will know the Peaks as well as I do. There are countless places for ambushes. I must leave right away, now. It will take time to reach the brothers, and then more time to move them north to the street."

  Raynar was dressed in homespun and his brynja. which was a North Sea seaman’s choice of armour. A leather jerkin with a felted sheepskin liner, and with light weight metal rings sewn between the two to stop blades. Most important, it floated. He had his bows and his arrows and his other weapons, his two sheepskins, his heavy cloak, his new boots. He pushed passed the women to reach the kitchen shed, so he could pack food and ale.

  "I suppose you will want to borrow another cart horse?"

  "Thank you, Thorold."

  Anske realized that Thorold was agreeing with Raynar and she began screaming again. Beatrice slapped her once and raised her hand to strike again. Anske sniffed and winced. Little Lucy pulled at her skirts and told her not to cry.

  "Which route will you take?"

  "South to Sherwood to get the message to the Brotherhood, and then west to the first ridge of the Peaks. Then south along the ridges. "

  "Good hunting," said Thorold as he gripped Raynar's elbow. "Stop the bastard, lad. Stop him dead cold."

  Beatrice hugged him, and then backed away and left him to Anske. She wrapped her arms around his neck and smothered him with kisses.

  "I will be back in a week. A fortnight at most. And our world will have changed because William will be dead and his army will be running south to their ships to Normandy."

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  The Hoodsman - Blackstone Edge by Skye Smith

  Chapter 5 - Gathering the men of Sherwood in February 1070

  The first man of Sherwood who young Raynar met, threatened to beat him senseless for riding the mare close to death. The mare's breath was wheezing and her flanks were lathered with foam. When Raynar slid from the saddle he could barely stand. His arse and legs were numb, his back and neck ached, and he could no longer see clearly.

  He ignored the standard questions asked of anyone caught alone on this stretch of the highway through Sherwood. He handed the reins of the horse to the man who had threatened him and walked past him to the next hooded man. "Rodor, take me to Rodor quickly." He turned to the first man. "Save the horse if you can, and get me a fresh mount. Go. Do it now," he ordered.

  "We ate all the horses, so unless we capture a Norman, you will have to hope I can save this one," said the man holding the mare and looking around for the closest water.

  "You ate the horses. Why didn't you eat the venison instead?" asked Raynar.

  "Where have you been, twerp. The flood of Yorkies through here finished the venison before Michealmas. We are living on leaf soup and last year's turnips."

  "Save the horse, then. And get me to Rodor."

  The man holding the horse nodded at the other man and he disappeared into the forest. Raynar walked in tight circles stretching his legs and his back. Finally enough feeling came back that he realized that he needed to piss in the worst way. It is no wonder that so many nobles die without heirs, he thought, if they do this amount of hard riding.

  While he pissed, the man with the horse was exploring the rolled mat that hung from the saddle. He pulled out the end of the Byzantine bow, looked hard at it and pushed it back. "Jesus, that bow is a mate to Rodor's. Sorry, mate, I wasn't to know was I. Come on, let’s get off the highway. I hear riders coming. Do you want your bow?"

  Raynar grabbed his Byzantine bow and his quiver as the horse was led off the highway. "I need a fresh horse. If they are Normans I will kill for one!" he warned the hooded man as he nocked a heavy arrow.

  The man tied off the exhausted mare and then made towards the place he had been standing when Raynar had first arrived. He picked something out of the grass, a thick rope, and then he hauled on it. A line leaped up from a narrow trench in the roadbed. It had blackberry wands twisted into it and created a visible barrier blocking the highway at about shoulder height. "Come 'ere and stand wi' me," ordered the hooded man, "and put your hood up fer fucks sake. Don't you know nothin'"

  Two riders making good time halted a hundred paces down the highway as soon as they saw the barrier jump up. They trotted closer. "We are the king's couriers. Leave us pass, as you have agreed under treaty."

  Raynar walked forward, menacing them with the aim of his arrow. "I am in dire need of a horse. I have no argument with you, but I will kill you both to get a horse. You are welcome to mine in swap." He pointed to the sorry mare standing beside the highway. "Or you can double up. But one of
your horses is now mine."

  "You cannot. Did you not hear. We are king's couriers. You must let us pass."

  "I won't stop you so long as you leave one of those horses. If you want to fight for the horse, you will be dead before you can draw your sword. I mean what I say. I am in dire need of a change of horse," threatened Raynar.

  "That is horse theft. A hanging offence," announced one of the couriers.

  "The problem with bargaining with an outlaw," replied Raynar, "is that you have nothing left to threaten him with. If ever I am caught I will be hung in any case. What matter is one more horse theft, or two more murders. You are wasting my time. One of you of dismount. I don't care which. And transfer your kit to the other."

  "The sheriff will hear a..."

  "The sheriff blah, blah, blah. I am not of this shire, which is why I need a mount. What do I care about your sheriff." Raynar was visibly losing his patience.

  The man slid down from his horse and began moving his kit to the other saddle. He climbed up behind the other rider and the horse stumbled slightly to balance the new load. Raynar walked forward and grabbed the reins of the empty horse and pulled her away from the riders. He gave a signal and the hoodsman lowered the blocking line.

  "Fare thee well, kings couriers. Forgive my need. It was greater than yours, and you can get remounted at the next garrison." Raynar slapped the rump of the loaded horse and it charged off and over the crumple of line and brambles now on the road bed.

  "Neither Rodor nor the Sheriff are going to thank you for this," said the hoodsman as he tidied the line and bramble staves into the narrow trench and kicked dirt over it .

  "Bah. The couriers still got through unharmed. The loss of a horse is just a normal cost of being in the courier business."

  They left the stolen horse in a hidden gully close to the highway. The nag they took with them to Rodor's camp where it could be cared for or butchered, as need be. Rodor met them halfway and gave Raynar a bear hug. "It is a gift from the gods that you still live. After the stories we heard of the battles for York, I feared the worst."

  "The worst, you mean that I was an outlaw living in Sherwood," jested Raynar.

  "Don't jest of such things. Our life is worse than you could ever imagine this winter. There are too many migrant folk working the forest for us all to survive. They leave little for those of us that are forced to live here," grumbled Rodor.

  "You have treasure enough to feed and clothe yourselves. I have seen it."

  "You can't eat silver, so no one will trade food for it. Nottinghamshire is hungry. Countless starving folk have tramped through Sherwood since Yorkshire was harrowed and cleared. The abbeys fed them, but that left nothing in storage in case of a hard winter. The early rains ruined most of the harvest. The Norman lords will feed the folk but only if they make their mark on a serf oath. These are evil times."

  "That is why I have come. I know how to change the times for the better, but I need help," said Raynar.

  "Keep your story for the camp. It will save the retelling."

  "There is no story Rodor. You have no horses. Without horses your men cannot travel fast enough to help me. I will seek help in the Peaks forest."

  * * * * *

  They butchered his horse, and did not even save meat to hang and cure. They chopped it into vats of leaf stew and waited impatiently for it to cook. The camp that had been built for twenty or thirty, now slept two hundred. Most were not bowmen. Most were farm families who had been recently dispossessed.

  "They have no choice," Rodor poked at the fire. "They hoped that by hiding in the forest and living rough, the waves of northerners would pass on and they would be needed to till the land again. But many northerners have stayed on, from exhaustion or hunger. They have oathed as serfs and so the lords no longer need tenure these freemen."

  Raynar thought about this and then asked, "It is the same further east in South Yorkshire and Lincolnshire? What about Derbyshire?"

  Rodor shrugged his shoulders. "What does it mean Raynar? How will it end?"

  "It means that we have been conquered, for we become slaves on our own land. Our own lords have been slayed or exiled, so they are of no consequence to us anymore. We are on our own. Freemen against Norman, and we are losing badly. As for the end, I am not a seer. I am a bowman. I can only do what one bowman can do."

  "We may as well oath to serfdom so we can at least feed our families," Rodor said the words that many around the campfire were thinking.

  "Or split up the men of each family," Raynar suggested. "One brother becomes a serf so he can feed both wives and their little ones, while the other brother stays free and ekes a living in hope of a change. So long as there is one brother who stays free there is hope that he can eventually free the others from serfdom. Otherwise serfdom is forever."

  "Then his woman would live as a widow with her brother in law."

  "Yes, she would have to claim widowhood to take the oath. If she is a looker, she will become a plaything for the lord's men."

  "I will talk about this with the others," moaned Rodor.

  "They have little other choice. The bowmen were safe in this forest because there was no easy target that a Norman patrol could strike. This camp is now filled with so many families that it has become an easy target. It is only a matter of time before a patrol will shred your lives here." Raynar looked around the camp. It looked like a camp of refugees, like those who had crossed the Ouse at Selby. There was a feeling of desperation to everything. Absolute desperation.

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  The Hoodsman - Blackstone Edge by Skye Smith

  Chapter 6 - Gathering the men of the Peaks Forest in February 1070

  The stolen Norman horse was a fine fast animal and well trained. The leather saddle was comfortable, but it was not as useful as a normal farmers wooden saddle because it did not have all of the lashing posts for hanging things from. Besides, young Raynar's sheepskin, that saved him from saddle sores, kept moving askew on the slippery leather.

  The stirrups on the wide leather straps were a wondrous invention, and he remembered being told by Hereward that stirrups were the reason that Norman heavy cavalry were so feared. After riding thirty miles with them he understood why. Stirrups allowed you to ride a horse of any size and use your legs to absorb the shock of the ride and save your back and your arse. They allowed you to twist your body in the saddle so that you could use weapons while mounted, and to use your legs to brace yourself for when a lance hit it's target. It came to him why the Normans had been so successful using heavy cavalry in battle. They had been quick to adopt the use of stirrups.

  Despite the fine horse and saddle, he missed riding his farm nag. This fine horse combined with his homespun was like a flag marking him as a horse thief. Twice he had been chased by Norman patrols, and had to escape by racing at dangerous speeds. With the nag he was never chased.

  Though the fine horse was faster, the constant detours around places that may have resident Normans slowed him down more than the fine horse sped him up. With the nag he walked boldly past any Norman. In the worst case he could stick a thorn in the nags hoof pad and lead it limping around patrols. No one wanted a lame horse save the hungry, and Normans never went hungry, even if it meant that everyone else starved.

  It was with great relief that he finally reached the edge of the Peaks Forest. Now he could ride at ease. The horse that had marked him as a thief to Normans, also marked him as a thief to the outlaws. It was after dark when he reached the canyon of the valley that marked the turn into Alan's camp. He stopped at the widening in the canyon that gave him his first view of the camp. He was overjoyed to see that the camp was still a camp of men, and not swarming with families.

  "Keep moving. I'm late for supper!" yelled a voice from behind him and he was surprised that he had been followed unknowingly by a lad trailing a cut bush. The lad was sweeping the hoof marks.

  Alan of the Dales looked strong and well, as did his m
en. The starvation of Yorkshire had not reached this far into the high lands. He mentioned the state of the Sherwood brothers to the circle of men who were munching down on chunks of meat. It slowed their chewing but not by much.

  "Venison gone?" said the man across from him. "Ate their horses, no meat for a month. Bloody hell. I pity the buggers. Living in the forest is hard enough, even with food in your belly. Leaf stew, phew. They'll be eating the bark next."

  Another man piped up, "You say it was because of the waves of families fleeing Yorkshire. Them being hungry enough to become slaves for food. We have heard these stories from Derby, but they were beyond belief. When William cleared Yorkshire, how many folk were pushed off their land?"

  "A thousand villages, maybe more." Raynar could see immediately that the men were having trouble with the big number. "As if he cleared or slaughtered a village a day, every day, for three years." There was a sigh of awe from the men. "But he did it in less than two months. A thousand villages lost their roofs, lost their tools, lost their best men, and ate their animals as they walked a hundred miles through the winter with their children and ealders."

  "The damned you say. Starving and freezing. That is just slaughtering folk the slow way. Did any survive?" asked a voice to the left.

  "Enough survived to have destined the rest of us to slavery," Raynar explained. "The Norman land lords have been canceling the tenancies. The tenant has the choice of working the same land as a serf, or moving off to make way for a northern family that is starving enough to work it as a serf."

  "But that is a pattern without end," interrupted Alan. "The dispossessed tenant will eventually starve and agree to serfdom and replace another tenant freeman."

  "As I said, the clearing of Yorkshire has destined the rest of us to serfdom. Eventually all of us." Moans met Raynar's words, and curses from all sides. "I have come here as a brother to ask how many are willing to help me try to change this destiny." There was not a word, not an offer, just silence.