Ash: The Lost History Part 15

"Oh. Right. He's one of those employers." Agnus Dei shrugged, which is a fairly complicated process in armour. His black eyes flashed at her. "Bad luck. I'm shipping out, down to Naples. Bring your men with me."

"Nah. I can't break a contract. Besides, most of my guys are back at Cologne, under Angelotti and Geraint ab Morgan."

A movement of the Lamb's lips, regretful, flirtatious. "Ah well. How was the Brenner Pa.s.s? I waited three days for merchants going down to Genoa to get their wagons through."

"We had it clear. Except that it snowed. It's the middle of f.u.c.king July for Christ's sake - sorry, Lamb. I mean, it's the middle of July. I hate crossing the Alps. At least nothing fell on us this time. You remember that slide in seventy-two?"

Ash continued to talk civilly, riding beside him, aware of Anselm glowering on her other side, his grey plodding, horse and rider creamed white with chalk dust. From time to time her gaze flicked ahead, through the opalescent pearl of the mist, to the blurs of sunlight breaking through. Fernando's bright silks and satins glowed where he rode helmetless in the morning. The creak of wheels and the loud voices of men and women calling conversation echoed flatly. Someone played a fife, off-key.

After some professional conversation, Lamb remarked, "Then I shall see you on the field, madonna. G.o.d send, on the same side!"

"G.o.d willing," Ash chuckled.

The Lamb rode off south-east, in what she supposed must be the direction of his troop.

Robert Anselm remarked, "You didn't tell him your 'current employer' is also your husband."

"That's right, I didn't."

A dark, short man with curly hair rode up beside Anselm, glancing to either side before he spoke. "Boss, we must be nearly in Genoa!"

Ash nodded to Euen Huw. "So I a.s.sume."

"Let me take him out hunting." The Welshman's thumb slid down to caress the polished wooden hilt of his b.o.l.l.o.c.k dagger. "Lots of people have accidents when they're hunting. Happens all the time."

"We're twenty wagons and two hundred men. Listen to us. We've scared the game off for miles around. He wouldn't buy it. Sorry, Euen."

"Let me saddle up for him tomorrow, then, on the way back. A bit of mail wire around the hoof, under the hock - aw, boss, go on!"

Her gaze could not help but be calculating when she looked through the mist at which of the lance-leaders rode with her, and who rode with Fernando del Guiz and his squires. It had been a frightening drift the first couple of days, then the Rhine river journey presented enough problems to keep every man occupied, and now it had stabilised.

You can't blame them. Whatever they ask me, he makes me clear all orders through him now.

But a divided company can't fight. We'll get cut up like sheep.

A man with potato features and a few wisps of white hair protruding under the rim of his sallet nudged his roan gelding up level with Ash. Sir Edward Aston said, "Knock the b.l.o.o.d.y little b.u.g.g.e.r off his horse, la.s.s. If he keeps us riding without scouts, we're up to our necks in trouble. And he hasn't had the lances drill any night we've made camp."

"And if he keeps paying over the odds at every town we stop at for food and wine, we're in trouble." Ash's steward, Henri Brant, a middle-aged stocky man with no front teeth, nudged his palfrey closer to her. "Doesn't he know the value of money? I don't dare show my face among the Guilds on the way back. He's spent most of what I had put by to last us until autumn in these past fifteen days!"

"Ned, you're right; Henri, I know." She tapped spurs and shifted her weight left. Her grey gelding sneaked its head out and nipped Aston's roan on the shoulder.

Ash belted The Sod between the ears, and spurred off, kicking up gouts of wet dust, the cool air welcome on her face.

She slowed momentarily beside the wagons that held the Visigoth amba.s.sadors.

Tall wheel rims jolted in the ruts of the high road, sending the cart one way and then the other. Daniel de Quesada and Asturio Lebrija lay bound hand and foot with hemp rope, rolling with every jolt.

"Did my husband order this?"

A mounted man riding with his crossbow across his saddle spat. He didn't look at Ash. "Yeah."

"Cut them loose."

"Can't," the man said, even as Ash winced mentally and thought, What's the first rule, girl? Never give an order you don't know will be obeyed.

"Cut them loose when Lord Fernando sends word back to you," Ash said, hitting The Sod with a gloved hand again as the gelding tried to sidle up to the crossbowman's mount, a wicked light in its eye. "Which he will - you need a gallop to shake the temper out of you, you sod. Hai!"

The last remark Ash addressed to her horse. She spurred him from trot to canter to gallop, weaving a thunderous way between the lines of moving carts, ignoring the coughs and curses of those in her dust. The mist began to lift as she galloped. A dozen lance-pennants became clear above the wagons.

Fernando's bright bay pushed ahead of the group, throwing its head up and fretting at the bit, the reins looping dangerously down. Ash noticed that he had given his helmet to his squire, Otto; and that Matthias - neither knight nor squire - carried his lance. The fur of the foxtail pennant shone dully, in wet mist, drooping from its shaft above his head.

Her heart stirred immediately she saw him. Golden boy, she thought. The absolute picture of a knight: glowing with strength. He rode easily, and bareheaded.

His Gothic plate showed rich, fine workmanship: fluted pauldrons and cuisses, each hinge f.l.a.n.g.ed with decorative pierced metal. Condensation gleamed on the curve of his breastplate, and his tangled gold hair, and the polished bra.s.s fleur-de-lis that rimmed the cuffs of his gauntlets.

I was never that careless, she thought, with pinched envy. He's had this since birth. He doesn't even have to think about it.

"My lord." She rode up. Her husband's head turned. His cheeks were rough with gold stubble. Ignoring her, he half-turned in his saddle to speak to Matthias, and the long riding sword that swung at his hip banged against the bay's flank. The horse kicked out in aggravation, and the whole group of young men swirled into movement, shouting good-naturedly, and re-formed.

The group of squires riding around Fernando seemed reluctant to let her in. A loosening of her rein allowed The Sod's head to snake out and nip the haunch of one.

"f.u.c.k!" The young knight sawed at his reins as his horse reared. Mount and rider staggered away, curvetting in circles Ash slid in neatly beside Fernando del Guiz. "A messenger came in. There's been trouble at Ma.r.s.eilles."

"That's leagues away from here." Fernando rode using both hands to hold up a wineskin, and tip it with his arms at full extension. The first streams. .h.i.t him in the mouth; he coughed; straw-coloured wine spilled down the front of his fluted breastplate.

"You win, Matthias!" Fernando dropped the half-full wineskin. It thudded to the ground and burst. He threw a handful of coins. Otto and another page rode in close to undo straps, cut points, take pauldrons and breast- and back-plate off him. Still wearing arm-defences, Fernando slit the arming doublet's lacing, and the points at his waist, with his dagger, and ripped off the wet doublet. "Otto! It's too hot for harness.5 Have them put my pavilion up. I'll change."

The spoilt garment went down into the dust as well. Fernando del Guiz was riding in his shirt now, the white silk bunching at his waist where it rode up out of his hose. His hose slid down to his cuisses, the material of the cod-flap stretched tight across his groin. When he dismounted, it would fall; he would strip it off and walk, unconcerned, in his shirt. Ash shifted in her saddle.

She wanted to reach out to his saddle and put her hand between his legs.

The trumpeter wheeled, sounding a long call.

Ash, jolted, said, "We're stopping?"

Fernando's smile took in those of her lance-leaders riding with him as well as his squires and pages and young n.o.ble friends. "I'm stopping. The wagons are stopping. You may do what you please, of course, lady wife."

"You want the amba.s.sadors fed and watered while we stop?"

"No." Fernando reined in as the lead wagons stopped.

Ash sat astride The Sod, casting a glance around. The morning mist continued to lift. Broken ground, yellow rocks, scrub dried brown from the long summer's drought. A few copses of bushes - they could hardly be called trees. Higher ground two hundred yards from the wide road. A paradise for scouts, spies and dismounted men. Maybe even mounted bandits could sneak up.

G.o.dfrey Maximillian plodded up to her on his palfrey. "How close are we to Genoa?"

The priest's beard was white, and the damp dust settled in the creases of his face gave her a premonition of how he would look if he reached sixty.

"Four miles? Ten? Two?" She fisted her hand, punched her thigh. "I'm blind! He forbids me to put scouts out, he forbids me to hire local guides; he's got this d.a.m.n printed itinerary for pilgrims going to ports for the Holy Land, and he thinks that's all we need! He's a n.o.ble knight, no one's going to bushwhack him! What if it hadn't been Lamb's men out there? What if it had been some bandit?"

She stopped as G.o.dfrey smiled, and shook her head. "Yeah, okay, I grant you, the difference between Lamb and a bandit is a bit hard to spot! But hey, that's Italian mercenaries for you."

"A baseless slander. Probably." G.o.dfrey coughed, drank from his jug, and handed it up to her. "We're making camp two hours after we get started?"

"My lord wants to change his clothes."

"Again. You should have tipped him over the edge of a barge into the Rhine before we ever got to the cantons, never mind crossed the Alps."

"That isn't very Christian of you, G.o.dfrey."

"Matthew ten, thirty-four!"6 "I don't think that's quite how Our Lord meant that one . . ." Ash lifted the pottery jug to her lips. The small beer stung her mouth. It was tepid, vaguely unpleasant, and (being wet) still extremely welcome for all that. "G.o.dfrey, I can't push it, not right now. This is no time to ask my people to start picking sides between me and him. It'd be chaotic. We've got to at least function until we get back from this idiot's errand."

The priest slowly nodded.

Ash said, "I'm going to ride up to the top of the next ridge while he's busy. We're wandering around in a mist in more ways than one. I'll go take a look. G.o.dfrey, go show your Christian charity to Asturio Lebrija and his mate. I don't think my lord husband had them fed this morning."

G.o.dfrey's palfrey plodded back down the column.

Jan-Jacob Clovet and Pieter Tyrrell caught Ash up as The Sod skittered unwillingly up the slope - two fair-haired, almost identical young Flemish men, with unshaven faces, and tallow candle droppings on the sleeves under their brigandines, and crossbows at their saddles. They smelled of stale wine and s.e.m.e.n; she guessed they had both been rousted out of a wh.o.r.e's cart before daybreak; probably, if she knew them, from the same woman.

"Boss," Jan-Jacob said, "do something about that son of a b.i.t.c.h."

"It'll happen when the time's right. You move without my word, and I'll nail your b.a.l.l.s to a plank."

Normally, they would have grinned. Now Jan-Jacob persisted, "When?"

Pieter added, "They're saying you're not going to kill him. They're saying you're c.o.c.k-struck. They're saying what can you expect from a woman?"

And if I asked who 'they' are, I'll get evasive answers or no answers at all-Ash sighed.

"Look, guys . . . have we ever broken a contract?"

"No!" They spoke simultaneously.

"Well, you can't say that for every mercenary company. We get paid because we don't change sides once we've signed a contract. The law is the only thing we have. I signed a contract with Fernando when I married him. There's one reason why this isn't easy."

She urged The Sod on up towards the lightening skyline.

"I was kind of hoping that G.o.d would do it for me," she said wistfully. "Hard-drinking reckless young n.o.blemen fall off their horses and break their necks every day, why couldn't he be one of them?"

"Crossbows work." Pieter patted the leather case of his.

"No!"

"Does he f.u.c.k good?"

"Jan-Jacob, get your mind out of your codpiece for once - f.u.c.king h.e.l.l"

The breeze took the mist as they came up to the top of the ridge, rolling it forward, away out to sea. Mediterranean sun blazed back from ochre hills. A blurred blue sky shone, and - no more than two or three miles ahead - the light fractured off creeping waves. The coast. The sea.

A fleet covered the bay, and all the sea beyond.

No merchant ships.

Warships.

White sails and black pennants. Ash thought in a split second that's half a war fleet down there!, and Visigoth pennants!

The wind blew the taste of salt against her lips. She stared for a long, appalled, frozen second. The knife-sharp prows of black triremes cut the flat silver surface of the sea. More than ten in number, less than thirty. Among them, huge quinqueremes - fifty or sixty ships. And closer insh.o.r.e, great shallow-draught troopships vanished from her sight behind the walls of Genoa, the wheels that drove them dripping rainbow sprays of sea-water. Dimly, across all the intervening distance, she heard the thunk-thunk of their progress.7 And she registered black smoke rising from the tiled roofs of the walled port city, and saw moving men among the painted plaster walls and winding streets of Genoa.

Ash whispered, "Troopships unloading, number unknown, fleet attacking, no allied vessels; my strength is two hundred men."

'Withdraw, or surrender.'

She still gaped at the coastline below the hills, the sound of the voice in her head almost ignored.

"The Lamb's run right into them!" Aghast, Jan-Jacob pointed at the standard with the white Agnus Dei, a mile ahead. Ash made a quick mental count of his groups of running men.

Pieter had already spurred in a circle, his mare hardly under control. "I'll sound the alarm!"

"Wait." Ash held up one hand, palm outwards. "Now. Jan-Jacob, get the mounted archers formed up. Tell Anselm I want the knights up and armed, under him as captain! Pieter, tell Henri Brant that all wagons are to be abandoned, everybody on them is to be issued with weapons and told to ride. Ignore anything you hear from anyone with del Guiz livery - I'm going to talk to Fernando!"

She galloped down to the Lion Azure standard in the centre of the wagons. Among the milling men she spotted Rickard, yelled at the boy to bring G.o.dfrey and the foreign amba.s.sadors, and pelted on towards the green-and-gold-striped pavilion that was being put up in a confusion of struts and ropes and pegs. Fernando sat his horse, sun-bright, cheerfully talking to his companions.

"Fernando!"

"What?" He turned in his saddle. An arrogant shape took his mouth, a discontent foreign to what she was beginning to think was only a careless nature. I bring out the cruelty in him, she thought, and threw herself out of the saddle, quite deliberately on foot and catching his reins, so that she had to lift her head to look up at him.

"What is it?" He hitched at his falling hose, that now rucked down around his b.u.t.tocks. "Can't you see I'm waiting to dress?"

"I need your help." Ash took a deep breath. "We've been tricked. All of us. The Visigoths. Their fleet. It isn't sailing for Cairo, against the Turks. It's here."

"Here?" He looked down at her, bewildered.

"I counted at least twenty triremes - and sixty f.u.c.king big quinqueremes! And troopships."

His face became open, innocent, bemused. "Visigoths?"

"Their fleet! Their guns! Their army! It's a league up the road that way!"

Fernando gaped. "What are Visigoths doing here?"

"Burning Genoa."

"Burning-"

"Genoa! It's an invasion force. I have never seen so many ships in one place-" Ash wiped a crust of dust off her lips. "The Lamb's run into them. There's fighting going on."

"Fighting?"