A Question of Honour Read online

  A Question

  of Honour

  The Saga of Roland Inness

  Book 7

  Wayne Grant

  A Question of Honour, Copyright © 2019 by Wayne Grant. All rights reserved.

  Printed by Kindle Direct Publishing. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  FIRST EDITION

  ISBN: 9781690742784

  A Question of Honour is a work of fiction. While some of the characters in this story are actual historical figures, their actions are largely the product of the author’s imagination.

  *Cover Art by More Visual, Ltd.

  For

  The fans of Roland Inness. Had not readers found and embraced a boy and his bow, this story would have died aborning.

  England 1196

  Valley of the Seine 1196

  Château Gaillard 1196

  Model of Peveril Castle

  Part 1: The Honour of Roland Inness

  Fortunes of War

  September, 1196 AD—South of Aumale, Normandy

  Philip Augustus, King of France, sat stiffly atop his magnificent white warhorse watching his army pass by on the road below. His back hurt and his thick thighs were rubbed raw from three straight days in the saddle, but he ignored the discomfort—for the news he’d just received was good.

  A courier had arrived from Aumale where his loyal vassal, Robert, Count of Dreux, was besieging the town’s English garrison. The Count reported that the English army, which had hurried north to break the siege the week before, had yet to breach his lines and relieve the garrison. The English king’s rush to relieve Aumale came as no surprise to Philip. The French king was no great strategist, but after three years of war, he’d come to know his enemy well. He’d expected Richard of England to be impulsive and the great Lionheart had not disappointed him.

  When Richard was released by the Holy Roman Emperor after two years in captivity, he’d burst upon the continent like some avenging angel, bent on reclaiming all of the land lost to the French during his absence. And those losses had been considerable. While Richard languished in a German cell, a dozen cities and castles fell to Philip’s armies, including Gisors, the great fortress that was the lynchpin of a line of English forts protecting the Vexin, that sad patch of ground between Paris and Rouen.

  Richard had hardly set foot back in England before dashing to Normandy where he launched a lightning campaign to stop the bleeding. He broke the French siege at Verneuil within a week and made forced marches to relieve the garrisons at Angouleme, Loches and Taillebourg in the first month alone. In the years that followed, Philip noted that the English king never failed to rush to the aid of any of his fortresses threatened by French armies.

  And the fortress of Aumale was the perfect bait.

  The town lay at a strategic crossroads, but more importantly, it was held by Baldwin of Bethune, Richard’s boon companion and closest friend. Sir Baldwin had fought beside the English king on Crusade and shared his captivity in Germany. Upon his release, the knight had been made Count of Aumale as a reward for his steadfast loyalty. Now this great knight, this intimate friend of Richard’s, was encircled and imperilled at Aumale. The threat to Baldwin, as much as the threat to the town, was bound to bring the English king rushing north—and it had.

  When word reached Gisors of Richard’s appearance before the walls of Aumale, Philip ordered his own army north by forced marches. Now he was less than a day’s march from the town and, on the morrow, he would fall on the English rear, catching the great Lionheart between the hammer of his French army and the anvil of Count Robert’s force. As the courier withdrew, the French king turned to his aide-de-camp with a grim smile.

  “We have him!” he proclaimed.

  ***

  Sir Robin of Loxley grasped the King’s arm to keep him from falling as he dismounted his charger. Men near Richard’s campaign tent saw the King falter and crowded around, their faces anxious. Those in the front ranks could see the shaft of a crossbow bolt protruding from just above the Lionheart’s knee and royal blood running in rivulets down the man’s calf.

  “Make way, damn you, and call the surgeon,” Sir Robin ordered, as he draped one of the King’s arms across his shoulder and helped him hop on one leg to his tent. Robin had barely settled Richard onto a padded couch when the surgeon burst into the tent. John Clement was short and thin, a mere wisp of a man with a pock-marked face, but he had intelligent eyes and a dark scowl on his face.

  “I warned you, sire!” he said in disgust. “You ride too close to the lines.”

  “Oh, shut up, Clement! It was a lucky shot.”

  “Not for you, your grace,” the man shot back. “Not if I can’t extract the head and not if it festers.”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake, man—just pull the damned thing out!” the King roared.

  The surgeon did not flinch from the King’s anger as he peered at the broken shaft of the crossbow bolt buried in the thick muscle above the knee. He gave the shaft a tentative tug causing Richard to grimace, but abandoned the effort when it did not come out easily.

  “Barbed head,” he noted, as he stepped back.

  Thin bodkin heads, while best for penetrating mail, could often be pulled out with little effort and, if they hadn’t pierced a vital organ, would heal quickly. But a barbed head, that was another matter. Clement picked up a large leather bag and dropped it on the map table. As he sorted through his instruments, he spoke calmly and quietly to the King, as though addressing a child.

  “Sire, the quarrel has a barbed head and may be lodged in bone. If I pull out the shaft, it will either leave the head behind or tear a great hole in your leg. Either way it will likely fester and I’ll have to take the leg. So I must cut it out.”

  As he spoke, he pulled an assortment of long probes and blades from the bag, laying them out in neat rows. He studied his surgical tools for a moment, then selected a double-bladed probe. The surgeon beckoned Sir Robin forward.

  “I think you may need to hold the leg steady,” he said.

  “Like hell!” the King snarled, stopping Sir Robin with a black look. The surgeon shrugged.

  “Very well. Then brace yourself, sire.”

  Richard gripped the edges of his cot and turned his head toward Sir Robin who stood behind the leech with a stricken look.

  “Why the long face, Loxley?” he said with his usual bravado. “It will take more than a damned crossbowman to kill me.”

  “I pray that is so, your Grace,” Robin said earnestly. “England is not ready for a new King.”

  That brought a sour look to the King’s face.

  “True enough, what with John and the brat, Arthur, waiting in the wings!”

  Robin managed a smile at the King’s words. Richard’s brother John, so recently thwarted in his attempt to steal the throne, had been accepted back into the fold, but was far from forgiven, and the King’s nephew, Arthur, son of his late brother Geoffrey, was under the thumb of his scheming mother, the Duchess of Brittany. The King had pardoned Lady Constance for her treasonous dalliance with the French whilst he was away on Crusade but did not trust the woman one whit. All in all, it made for a sorry list of replacements should the Lionheart die.

  “Given those choices, sire, we all have a stake in your good health,” Robin replied. “You risk yourself too heedlessly.”

  Richard waved a hand in dismissal, but did not argue. Sir Robin was a member of his personal guard and the King was fond of the young knight. Upon his release from captivity, Queen Eleanor had told him how Loxley and his outlawed companions from Sherwood had foiled his brother’s plot to steal the ransom
silver coming from York. Sir Robin and his lads had simply stolen the treasure before John’s henchmen had a chance to lay hands on it. It was just the sort of bold stroke the Lionheart loved. When the King set out to win back his lands in France he’d brought Sir Robin with him.

  As the surgeon bent over him, Richard leaned back and tightened his grip on the sides of his couch. Clement positioned the two blades of the probe on either side of the shaft and with practiced skill, cut into the King’s leg. Richard’s face drained of colour and the muscles in his jaw bulged as the surgeon slowly widened the wound.

  This was not the first such operation Sir Robin had witnessed. He’d seen many men take wounds like this in the killing fields of Palestine and France. Tending to them varied greatly between field surgeons. He’d watched men with similar wounds hacked into bloody messes by unskilled hands, but he could see that this leech knew his business. To his credit, the Lionheart uttered not so much as a groan as the surgeon dug into his flesh, though torrents of sweat made his face gleam in the dim light. A man stuck his head through the tent flap and motioned anxiously to Robin. The young knight reached out and took the courier’s message.

  “What news?” the King managed to croak as Clement dug deeper.

  Robin slid the twine off the rolled-up message and scanned the contents, shaking his head. It was from one of the patrols they’d sent south to watch the roads from Gisors.

  “Our scouts report that leading elements of the French army are at Grandvilliers, your grace,” he said, trying to hide his shock. The town was a mere ten miles from Aumale.

  He lowered the note. “They can be in our rear by noon tomorrow. If we cannot break through and relieve the garrison by then,” he said, “we must turn and fight, or run.”

  The surgeon wiggled the shaft of the crossbow bolt gingerly and Sir Robin could see the tendons in the King’s neck grow taut from the agony. Richard uttered a low curse, whether from the news or from the pain, Robin couldn’t tell. They’d known for weeks that Philip was gathering a large force at Gisors—three times the size of the English army at Aumale. But the French king was not known for sudden forced marches and any danger from that quarter had seemed remote. Now the threat was only ten miles away. Standing and fighting would be foolish, but for the King, the relief of Aumale was a personal matter.

  Baldwin of Bethune was there.

  For five days they’d fought to save the King’s old friend, but the French had been ready for them. They’d built outworks and dug entrenchments protecting their rear and had defended those positions with uncommon ferocity. Still, the English had pushed the French back to within the shadow of the town walls, close enough to see the proud banner of Count Baldwin flying above the battlements. To turn away now would be a bitter draught indeed, but Richard of England was no fool. He might risk his own neck recklessly, but he would not risk the destruction of his army, not even for his oldest friend.

  Robin waited patiently while the surgeon continued to probe with his blades around the wound. Finally the King spoke between clenched teeth.

  “The garrison will have to fend for itself then. Send for Marshall.”

  “Aye, your grace.” Robin poked his head through the entrance to the King’s tent and dispatched a rider to find Earl William Marshall, who had been directing operations on the eastern side of Aumale.

  “God’s breath!” the King bellowed in surprise as the surgeon stopped jiggling the shaft and with no warning, ripped the quarrel free. He held his bloody trophy aloft, the jagged head of the bolt still securely affixed to the shaft.

  “There we have it!” he declared, dropping the offending quarrel on the table and dabbing at the wound, which was welling up with blood.

  “Clean, I think,” he pronounced as he poked around at the opening, then reached for a needle and thread he’d laid beside his surgical tools. “No need to cauterize, your grace,” he said as he began to suture the wound. “I’ll dab some honey on it and wrap it and then you must rest and let your humours balance themselves.”

  “Fine, fine,” said Richard impatiently. “Just get on with it!”

  Just then, William Marshall burst into the tent with Sir Robin following in his wake. Word of the King’s wound had reached him without resort to couriers and he’d come at once. Marshall was tall and broad-shouldered with an air of command. Perhaps only the Lionheart himself had a greater reputation as a warrior than the Earl of Pembroke. The Earl was fifty years old, but he could still best men half his age in a fight. He made a quick bow and looked anxiously at Richard.

  “Your grace, you ride too close to the lines,” he said. Richard frowned.

  “So I’ve been told, William. I will try to do better, but for now we must look to the south. Word has come that Philip is moving with uncommon energy and will be here by sometime tomorrow.”

  “Then we must be gone,” Marshall replied simply.

  “I think that would be best, but William, this is our second defeat in a month.”

  “Aye, your grace.”

  Marshall did not say more. This was an army grown used to victory. Since the King’s arrival in France they’d bested French armies in the field again and again, but Philip was a resilient and tenacious foe. Only a month ago, the French king had personally led a daring raid on the Channel port of Dieppe, sacking the town and destroying the harbour. That bold foray had been a shock and now Philip had surprised them once more.

  “I presume we will fall back on Neufchatel, your grace?”

  “Aye, damnit, with our tails between our legs!” the King growled as the surgeon finished his stitching and started to smear honey on the wound.

  “William, we need more men.”

  Marshall sighed. It was an old argument between them.

  “True enough,” he agreed.

  “Trained men.”

  “Mercenaries….”

  “I note your disdain,” the King said as the surgeon began wrapping the injured leg in clean linen. “But that was likely a Genoese crossbowman who almost ended my story today, and Philip has a thousand more like him, not to mention four times our strength in heavy cavalry.”

  “Your grace, there are other ways to find men than to buy them. I have fought and beaten these…these sell-swords before! They fight well enough when they have the advantage, but at the first sign of trouble they will desert you. And their methods bring us no honour. Such men have no scruples.”

  The King gave a small grimace as the surgeon tied the last knot around the bandaged leg.

  “Scruples don’t win wars, William. Trained men do and I have already stripped the garrisons in the south to help us take back the Vexin.”

  “Then let us find other Englishmen or Normans to fill our ranks, not Flemings or Genoese. What of your nearby provinces? We’ve had precious little support from Poitou or Brittany on these campaigns. You could call up more men there.”

  Richard sat quietly for a moment then swung his legs over the edge of the cot. He rose unsteadily to his feet, putting a little weight on his bandaged leg, testing it. The surgeon scowled at him as Marshall hurried forward offering his arm for support. The King frowned, but took it, shaking his head.

  “Poitou and Brittany? Ha! The Poitevins hate me and Constance poisons the Bretons against me. They’re as likely to fight against us as for us. No, we’ll get no help there.”

  Rebuffed, Marshall tried a different tack.

  “When last we spoke of this, your grace, we did not have the funds to hire more mercenaries.”

  Marshall well knew the King had drained his treasury to finance the construction of a mighty new fortress on the Seine. Château Gaillard he’d named it—the “Bold Castle.” The castle would be a counter to the loss of Gisors and Richard had spared no expense to build it. Even Richard’s able Justiciar, Hubert Walter, had not been able to keep up with the growing demand for funds.

  Richard took a few limping steps, then stopped to gather himself. He looked at Marshall with a sly smile.

&n
bsp; “Since last we spoke, William, we’ve come into a windfall!”

  “A windfall, your grace?”

  “Aye, just this morning I received word from my beloved brother that he has secured a guarantee of funds sufficient to hire five hundred men for three months!” As he finished, he resumed hopping around the tent, gradually putting more weight on the leg. Red now showed through the linen bandages as he sat down on a stool and stretched out the injured limb.

  “And where did the Prince find this windfall, your grace?” Marshall asked. “He complains endlessly of being penniless.”

  The King hooted at that.

  “He does, doesn’t he! But this is not from his own purse. The money is coming from your old friend, the Earl of Derby.”

  Marshall bit back a curse. The King knew the Earl of Pembroke loathed William de Ferrers and thought the man should have had his head lifted on Tower Hill for supporting John’s treason in the late civil war.

  “And what will the Earl get for his generosity, your grace?” Marshall asked, finally.

  Richard shrugged.

  “Nothing of great value,” he said airily. “Just a year taken off his banishment. He will be free to return to his lands in England, once his contribution to our cause is in hand.”

  Marshall said nothing.

  “You disapprove, William?”

  “I do, your grace. He is a bad man.”

  The King laughed.

  “Of that I’m sure, my lord, but if I beheaded all the bad men in England, there’d be hardly any left!” He rose back up on his good leg and limped over to Marshall, laying a scarred hand on the Earl’s shoulder. “I am blessed to have honourable men such as you and Earl Ranulf in my service,” he said quietly, “but a king has to use all the instruments he is given, even if they be bad men.”