Their pursuers were no more than a few hundred yards off the stern by then. William could see men in chain mail and tabards standing on the open deck. There were perhaps two dozen of them, no more, though they carried swords and axes enough to board against a merchant crew. He swallowed as he saw archers come to the high wooden castle built up behind the prow. With both ships rising and falling and the wind blowing in gusts, he wished them luck, then watched in dismay as three longbows bent and sent arrows soaring to strike the deck of the Bernice with a noise like hammers.
William’s good hand gripped the rail like a clamp, his frown deepening. Pirates found their crews in coastal towns, but there had never been a French bowman capable of that sort of accuracy. He knew he was watching English archers, traitors and scoundrels who preferred a life of thieving and murder to more honest work. The captain came past him at a run, heading to the stern to see this development. William tried to go with him, but with only one good hand, he staggered and almost fell as soon as he left the rail. From instinct, the captain grabbed at him before he went into the sea. It was bad luck that he fastened on the mangled hand, making William cry out in sudden pain.
The captain was shouting an apology over the wind when an arrow took him, sinking cleanly into his back and through, so that William could see the bodkin head standing clear, with white rib splinters around the dark iron. The two men gaped at each other and the captain tried to speak before his eyes dulled and rolled up in his head. William flailed at him, but the weight was too much and the captain vanished over the rail into the froth, slipping under in an instant.
More arrows thumped around them and William heard a sailor shout in pain and surprise as another found its mark. The great sail above William’s head began to flap. He could see the men at the whipstaff were lying flat, abandoning their duty in the face of arrow fire. The Bernice moved sloppily without their hands to guide her, wandering off course. Keeping as low as he could, William bellowed for them to take hold once again, but the damage was done. The pursuing warship crashed suddenly along the side, a rasping roar of splintering wood while the rain hammered down on them all.
William was thrown from his feet and was still struggling up as armed men leaped over, yelling their own fear as they crossed the strip of heaving leaden waves. William saw one man miss his catch and slip to be crushed or drowned, but there was another there in an instant, scrambling over to him with a sword held straight and sure.
‘Pax!’ William said, gasping as he tried to rise. ‘I’m Lord Suffolk! I can be ransomed.’
The man looming over him put his foot down hard on William’s broken hand, making the world go white for a second. He groaned and gave up any thought of standing as he lay there on the deck, drenched and frozen as the rain drummed the wood around him.
The boarders relied on shock and violence to secure the Bernice. Her hapless crew were either tossed overboard or cut down in the first wild flurry, most of them unarmed. William glared up at his captor, half-surprised he had not already been killed. He knew they’d strip the cargo and probably sink the Bernice, taking all witnesses down with her. He’d seen bodies washed ashore enough times to know how they worked and even the prospect of a ransom might not be worth the added risk. He waited for the blow, sickened by the waves of agony coming from his crushed hand.
The wind continued to howl around the ropes and the strange beast of two ships wallowing together in a crashing sea.
Jack Cade glowered at the men who’d come to him daring to dispute his plans. It didn’t help that they were all those he’d raised to command others. They were the originals from his meeting at the tavern, where he’d set them to training groups of a dozen men. Under his leadership, they’d fought and won against the sheriff of Kent. That man’s gaping head still leaned at an odd angle on the top of a pole by Jack’s fire, with the white-horse shield resting at its foot. The sheriff had been a short man in life, but as Paddy pointed out, he was finally taller than all of them.
Although Jack could not have said exactly why, it bothered him more than anything that it was Ecclestone they’d asked to beard the lion in his tent, or whatever the phrase was. His friend stood at the head of a small group of men, talking calmly and slowly, as if to a lunatic.
‘No one’s saying they’re afraid, Jack. That’s not it. It’s just that London … well, it’s big, Jack. God knows how many people are there, all crushed up between the river and the old walls. The king doesn’t even know, most likely, but there are a lot of them — and a lot more than we have.’
‘So you think we’re done,’ Jack said, his eyes glinting dangerously beneath his dipped head. He sat and watched the fire they’d lit, feeling nicely warm outside and in, with a bottle of clear spirit to hand that he’d been given just that morning. ‘Is that it then, Rob Ecclestone? I’m surprised to hear it from you. You think you speak for the men?’
‘I don’t speak for any of them, Jack. This is just me talking now. But you know, they have thousands of soldiers and a hundred times as many seething in the city. Half of those are hard men, Jack. There’ll be butchers and barbers to stand against us, men who know one end of a gutting knife from another. I’m just saying. It might be a step too far to go looking for the king himself. It might be the kind of step that will see us all swinging on the Tyburn gibbets. I hear they have three of them now, with room for eight on each one. They can hang two dozen at a time, Jack, that’s all. It’s a hard city.’
Jack grunted in irritation, tipping his head back to empty the last of the fiery spirit down his throat. He stared a while longer and then clambered to his feet, looming over Ecclestone and the others.
‘If we stop now,’ he said softly, ‘they’ll still come for us. Did you think you could just go home? Boys, we’ve robbed and stolen. We’ve killed king’s men. They’re not going to let us walk away, not now, not since we started. We either throw the dice for London, or …’ He shrugged his big shoulders. ‘Well, I suppose we could try for France. I don’t think we’d be too welcome there, though.’
‘They’d hang you in Maine, Jack Cade. They know a Kentish scoundrel when they see one.’
The voice had come from the back of the group. Jack stiffened, blinded by the firelight as he peered into the darkness.
‘Who was that? Show your face if you’d speak to me.’
He squinted into the yellow and black flickers. Shadows moved across men turning nervously to see who had spoken. Jack made out the bulk of his Irish friend heaving two other men towards him.
‘He said he knew you, Jack,’ Paddy said, panting. ‘He said you’d remember an archer. I didn’t think he was a madman to taunt you.’
‘He’s had worse from me in the past, you great Irish bullock,’ Thomas Woodchurch replied, struggling against an iron grip. ‘Christ, what do they feed you?’
With both his hands full of cloth, Paddy could only shake the two he held in exasperation. He did that until their heads were lolling dizzily.
‘Had enough?’ he said.
‘Woodchurch?’ Jack said in amazement, walking forward out of the firelight. ‘Tom?’
‘I am. Now, will you tell this bog hound to put me back on my feet before I kick his balls up his throat!’
With a roar, Paddy let go of Rowan and raised his fist to hammer Thomas to his knees. Rowan saw what he was about and grappled the Irishman in a rush, toppling all three in a heap of kicking and swearing.