‘Beatrice?’ I called. ‘Is that you?’
There was no reply, but I was certain that there was someone in there. I tried the door only to find it locked, and I could not open it with any of the keys on the ring. Of course the abbot had probably possessed a separate key to his quarters that was not kept with the others, but it could be anywhere, and I had not the time to search for it.
‘Stand back,’ I said, and drew my sword. An axe would have been better had I thought of fetching one, but in that moment all I cared about was breaking down that door as quickly as possible by whatever means were at hand. Teeth gritted, I raised the weapon high and brought it down again and again, hacking at the timbers around the lock. At first it did no more than bounce off the surface, but after a couple of strikes the edge began to bite, and shortly splinters were flying, until eventually I cast the blade with a clatter to one side and hurled myself shoulder first at the door. The first time I heard a creak as the wood flexed; the second time I felt it budge. The third time it gave way, flying back on its hinges, and I found myself stumbling forward, breathless, into the chamber.
There she was, sitting huddled in the far corner upon a mattress of straw. Her hands and feet were tied; her knees were drawn up in front of her chest; her mouth was bound with cloth to stop her from speaking. Her fair hair was loose and dishevelled and streaked with dirt, falling across her pale shoulders and breasts. They had stripped her of her clothes, leaving her with nothing so much as a coverlet to hide her modesty.
Her eyes widened in relief as she saw it was me, and I rushed to her, untying the gag from across her lips and freeing her from her bonds.
‘Tancred,’ she said, gasping and almost in tears. ‘Is it really you?’
She threw her arms around me and I held her trembling, naked figure close as a surge of affection coursed through me: affection of a sort and an intensity that I had not expected.
‘It’s me,’ I replied, partly to reassure her and partly because I could think of nothing else to say. My throat was dry. There were bruises upon her arm and upon her face where she had been beaten, and a graze to her forehead too. ‘Are you hurt? Did they-?’
I didn’t want to finish the question, though she knew well what I meant. ‘No,’ she said hurriedly. ‘No, they didn’t.’
That was some relief, although I already knew what fate would befall the men who had done this, if ever I found them. ‘Can you stand?’
She nodded, and while she found her feet I brought her one of the winter cloaks I had noticed in the treasure chamber, wrapping it around her to cover her nakedness and keep her warm. It wasn’t much, but it would do for now. She was shaking hard, although whether that was born of cold and hunger or of the surprise of seeing me and the anticipation of escape, I couldn’t tell.
Having first retrieved my sword, I took Beatrice’s cold hand, leading her down the stairs and out through the yard with the yew tree to where the rest of our band were gathered. Father, son and daughter embraced, overjoyed at seeing each other, at being reunited for the first time in what I supposed must be weeks.
I would have liked to allow them more time together, but Wace as ever saw reason. ‘Come on,’ he said hoarsely, grimacing in pain. He’d wrapped a strip of cloth cut from the tunic of one of the huscarls in an effort to staunch the flow of blood, but the wound was clearly hindering him. ‘We can’t tarry here.’
He was right. We set off towards the abbey’s gates, some of us, like Serlo, limping, others slowed by wounds or hunger. At all times I made sure the Malets remained at the centre of our party, protected at both front and rear. Robert had donned a sword-belt and shield taken from the corpse of one of the huscarls, but he looked far from ready to do much fighting. Still, he looked in better condition than his father, Guillaume, who was more haggard than I had ever seen him, ashen-faced and coughing so hard that he was barely able to speak. When last we had crossed paths his grey hair had already been turning to white, but now he appeared truly old, drained of vigour, no longer the man I’d known. No doubt his sickness had played a part in that, but I wondered whether there was something else behind that change as welclass="underline" a kind of world-weariness, as if this latest ordeal had proved too much for his spirit to bear. As he stumbled forward I offered him my shoulder to lean upon for support.
‘After everything,’ he said, his voice barely more than a whisper, ‘you come to my aid again. I owe you my thanks, Tancred. We all do.’
Indeed, although the circumstances were very different, this was not the first time I’d had to rescue Malet’s hide. But then he was not the main reason I had come here to Beferlic.
‘Thank me if we survive this, not before,’ I said, more tersely perhaps than I meant, but we had some way to go before we could consider ourselves safe.
An easterly wind blew in biting gusts that pierced my jerkin and my shirt, bringing with it the chill of the marshes and the German Sea, and the frozen homelands of the Danes beyond even that. A thin drizzle was beginning to spit from clouded skies as we left the monastery behind us.
‘How did you get inside the town?’ whispered Robert. ‘And how do you plan to get out? Are there others waiting for us beyond the walls?’
I shook my head. ‘I brought every man I could muster. There are no others.’
For a moment he regarded me with a questioning look, as if unsure whether or not I was joking, but as soon as he realised I meant it seriously his expression changed. Still, there was nothing to be done about it now. The only thing that concerned me was escaping this town before Runstan brought an army of English and even more Danes upon us, and then finding our way across the marshes to?dda, who was waiting with our horses. All without being spotted.
With cries and calls to arms still filling the air across the town, we made our way along the narrow paths between the houses. The fires of the still-burning ships on the edge of the town were our guide, showing us the way towards the marshes. But the main thoroughfares were busy with men, and we would surely be spotted if we ventured out upon them, though at the same time it was impossible to reach the marshes without first crossing at least one of those streets, and that one was the widest for it led towards the marketplace.
‘We don’t have any choice,’ Eudo said. ‘If we stay here, they’ll find us soon enough. We have to chance it.’
So we did, in small groups, in twos and threes and fours: first Eudo with his man who had the injured arm and the elder Malet; then Wace and Robert followed by Serlo and Pons; and lastly myself with Beatrice, the Gascon and those that remained. And it nearly worked. The last of us had almost made it across when there came a cry come from further up the street. I turned my head and saw, not twenty paces away, Runstan pointing eagerly in our direction. With him were some two score men and more, and bellowing orders to them was a face I had not thought I would see again. A face with small, hard eyes that met mine with a piercing stare, quickly followed by a flicker of recognition.
Wild Eadric.
He had failed to capture me once before, but at that moment he must have thought that God’s fortune shone upon him, for he had his chance again.
‘Run!’ I said, gripping Beatrice’s hand and urging her and the others onwards. Eudo and Wace took up the cry, passing it on to those in front: ‘Run!’
We raced through the yards behind the houses, ducking past goose houses and butts filled with rainwater, climbing over low fences, until we found ourselves in the middle of a grassy paddock. But it was no use. Half of our party were weakened or hurt, and they could not move as fast as the rest of us, and besides there was nowhere to go. For as well as those behind us there were spearmen running to block our route ahead and also coming around the sides of the houses, as the order to stop us was passed on to some of the other thegns.