Sworn Sword by James Aitcheson Page B

face. ‘I only saw from a distance,’ he said. ‘You remember I became separated from you?’
    I did. In fact, the last I had seen of him was when we had cut down the thegn with the gilded sword. After that everything had been thrown into confusion. I no longer remembered who had been with me when we came to Wace’s aid, only that that was when the battle had turned against us.
    ‘I didn’t know where you were,’ Eudo went on, ‘but I heard the horns sounding the retreat from the square, saw our banners heading back towards the stronghold. The English were pressing up the hill; there was fighting in every street. I joined with another conroi and we tried to push through to rejoin the rest of the army, but the enemy were too many and it was all we could do to hold them back.’
    He turned his head down towards the earth, his eyes closed. ‘I looked up to the fastness and saw the hawk banner being pushed back. The English had broken through the gates. They had Robert all but surrounded, with the mead-hall at his rear. He retreated inside – it was the only place left to go …’
    He covered his face with his hands, and I saw him tremble.
    ‘What?’ I asked.
    He glanced at Wace, and then at me, his eyes full of apology. ‘Then they set the torch to it. The building went up so quickly; he could not have got out.’ He bowed his head again. ‘After that I fled. Men were dying everywhere; the English had won. There was nothing left to fight for.’
    That was when I recalled that I too had seen the mead-hall in flames, the blaze sweeping through its thatch, the smoke rising thick and black. I had not thought anything of it at the time; that Lord Robert could have been there had not crossed my mind. But then Eudo must have had better sight of it. He had seen it all happen, and yet been powerless to do anything to stop it.
    How much longer we stayed there I did not know. Nothing more was said as each of us sat, heads turned down, lost in his own grief. Above, the skies were growing grey and dark. It looked as though more rain was to come.
    ‘Come on,’ Wace said eventually, rising. ‘Let’s get away from the path.’
    We led Eudo with his mount back to where we had tied our horses. I gestured for him to go ahead of me and struggled on behind. My leg was agony to walk on: already it seemed worse than when I had woken.
    ‘You’re wounded,’ Eudo said, when he saw that I was limping. He glanced down at my calf, at my blood-stained braies and the crude bandage I had made.
    ‘It’s not bad,’ I said, grimacing despite myself. ‘I’ll be fine until we can get back to Eoferwic.’
    I saw the doubt in his eyes, but he said nothing. We settled down behind the earth bank close to our horses. Eudo found some nuts and damp bread which he had in his cloak pocket and we shared them out. It was the only food any of us had.
    ‘We should shelter through the day, travel by night,’ Wace said, when we had all finished. ‘If the enemy are still marching, we’re less likely to be spotted that way.’
    I nodded in agreement. With any luck we would be in Eoferwic within a couple of nights. I only hoped that my wound did not get any worse in that time.
    After that, each of us took it in turns to keep watch while the others slept. Since I had already rested some that morning, I offered to go first, and neither Eudo nor Wace objected. My eyes stabbed with heaviness but I knew I could not sleep, for fear of what my dreams might bring.
    I thought back to the day I had met Lord Robert, when he had been as old as I was now, and I was but a boy in my fourteenth summer. It had not been all that long since I had left the monastery – a few days at most – and I was travelling I did not know where, free but hungry, walking alone. All I knew was that I wanted never to return.
    Already it had been a hot summer, I remembered, though it was still only June. I had not found a spring in more than a day and all the streams were dry to their