Roseblood (27 page)

Eventually the mist lifted, a weak sun emerged and the carrack, so Katherine learned from the shouts and cries, turned north, with the Essex coast to port. She tried to draw Bertrand and those who served them food into conversation, but they remained coldly deaf to her questions. The sun strengthened, and the mild weather returned as the wind shifted, coming out of the south-west.

Katherine recalled all she’d learnt from the smugglers and contraband sailors who used these sea roads past the lonely inlets and deserted coves along the Essex coastline. Why were they sailing north? she wondered. She asked her companions, but it was futile. Father Roger had fallen fast asleep. Dorcas was no better, whilst Eleanor simply crouched, lips moving soundlessly. Katherine rose to her feet. She sensed a change. The ship’s crew were extra vigilant. More braziers were brought up from between decks, their charcoal fired; next to these were small catapults and rounded bundles of rags tied tightly with twine and reeking of oil and tar. Lookouts took turns in the small cradle high on the mainmast. The master constantly watched both sea and sky.

A bell fixed just under the small forecastle marked the passing hours. It had just finished tolling what Katherine reckoned to be midday when the lookout cried a warning. For a few heartbeats, all activity ceased; there was a brooding silence except for the creak of the carrack as it rose and fell, breasting the swell. The master and his crew now thronged on the other side of the ship. Again the lookout shouted. Katherine staggered across the deck, clutching at ropes and whatever else kept her balance. No one objected, everyone answering the lookout’s warning. Again the cry. Katherine peered across the running swell and, at the same time as the others, glimpsed two dark smudges against the bright horizon. The entire ship waited in silence, listening to the lookout chant like any monastic cantor singing the opening verses of Divine Office.

‘Two cogs, hulks, closing fast!’

Curses greeted this, a chorus of alarm and threats.

‘Two hulks, fighting ships, closing fast. I see fires lit!’

The lookout’s description deepened the tension. The approaching warships intended to attack; their companies had already prepared fire balls for catapults and arrows.

‘What banners?’ the master called.

‘Red crosses on a white field,’ the lookout eventually chanted back. ‘I see more: blue, gold and red, lions and lilies.’

This was greeted with roars of dismay from the Venetian crew. Bertrand and his comitatus remained grimly quiet.

‘Yes, I see banners fully hoist,’ the sharp-eyed lookout called. ‘Royal cogs, probably out of Ipswich…’

The rest of his declaration was drowned by the master bellowing orders and the rush of feet that followed. Somewhere a tambour began to sound its heavy beat. The carrack swiftly transformed itself into a powerful ship of war. The small catapults were primed, missiles soaked in tar and oil moved closer to the braziers or large copper fire bowls. Sand was strewn across the deck. Great buckets and vats of seawater were hastily filled; bows and arrows, swords, maces and other weapons were collected from the war chest. The Venetians armed themselves as the carrack turned into the mist that curled between itself and the distant shore. Katherine and the rest were ignored. The crew was summoned to battle stations. Flames fed by bellows flared up in their baskets and bowls. Acrid smoke curled and shifted. LeCorbeil also prepared, putting on helmets, brigandines and coats of mail. Each man was armed with sword and dagger as well as a powerful Brabantine crossbow, leather quivers containing feathered barbed bolts strapped on to their war belts.

Katherine staggered back across the deck. The ship pitched. She slipped and blundered into sailors hurrying to their stations; these roughly pushed her aside. She reached the other prisoners, sheltering beneath the taffrail. Father Roger still slept, Dorcas crouching close beside him. Eleanor was alert, lips moving in silent prayer.

‘Rescue?’ she asked. Despite the circumstances, Katherine laughed sharply.

‘Father has influence, but not for this. It is too soon after our disappearance. These cogs are not from London. Raphael has told me about them: privateers with letters of marque. A Venetian carrack would be a splendid prize. They must be surprised at seeing one here in the northern seas rather than the Channel Narrows.’ Katherine drew a deep breath, surprised at how calm she felt, pleased that she could recall the knowledge she had acquired from sailors and merchants along Queenhithe. She closed her eyes and, murmuring a prayer, rose to her feet. ‘Now,’ she mocked herself quietly, ‘I am about to learn a little more.’

The two cogs were closing fast, their names recognised and spread amongst the company. They were ships of war well known in these waters,
The Kyrie
and
The Calix
, massive fighting craft with a central mast and high bows and stern; menacing and dark-shaped, they were using the shifting wind to close with the Venetian. Bertrand and two of his lieutenants came striding across, fearsome in their sallets, mail coifs and armour.

‘You may go down into the hold.’ Bertrand shrugged. ‘However, if our ship is fired or breached, you will,’ he grinned, ‘either burn, drown or probably both. I advise you to stay on deck.’ He bowed mockingly and turned away.

‘He has left us to the terrors!’ Eleanor remarked clambering to her feet. ‘Either way we will experience all the horrors of battle. To think…’ She paused, biting salt-caked lips. ‘To think that I once trusted my life, my beloved, our future to such a man.’ She lifted her face, all drawn. ‘Now you know why I do penance, why—’

Eleanor’s words were cut off by shouts, followed by the whoosh of flaming materials from the carrack’s deck.
The Calix
and
The Kyrie
responded, scoring the greyish-blue sky with streaks of fire. The carrack’s aim was more true, and the keen-eyed reported fires aboard
The Calix
.
The Kyrie
, however, closed, more flame-fed bundles whistling through the air. One hit a sailor, engulfing him in flames; he collapsed screaming to the deck, as comrades tried to smother the fire with vinegar-soaked cloths.

As the air became riven with fire, arrows and barbs, Katherine rose gingerly to her feet. Oil-soaked plumes of blackness hung over the carrack.
The Kyrie
was now almost on them, turning to take them on the port side whilst
The Calix
attacked the starboard side. For a brief, heart-chilling moment, all three ships became locked together. An ominous silence descended. The fog of war thinned to reveal Bertrand and his comitatus lined up in two rows facing
The Kyrie
, whose crew, eager to board, were throwing out nets, planks and hooked ropes. The Venetians resisted. LeCorbeil remained as a phalanx; the first rank knelt, the second stayed standing. The crew of
The Kyrie
were now massing ready to board.

‘Loose!’ Bertrand’s voice thrilled. The kneeling crossbowmen released their barbs, each finding their victim. Bodies from
The Kyrie
toppled into the narrow gap between the two ships. LeCorbeil’s second rank moved forward and knelt, even as the first prepared their crossbows. The enemy were caught unawares, thronging along the side of the ship armed only with hand weapons. Their archers could not loose, whilst LeCorbeil moved in a well-practised formation, their rain of squat barbed shafts devastating the enemy. Katherine reckoned they had received at least thirty bolts, each finding its mark.

The Kyrie
’s crew retreated, cutting ropes and nets in a desperate bid to escape. LeCorbeil turned, hurrying across the deck to inflict similar damage on
The Calix
, which hastily swung away. Now free of his adversaries, the master of
The Golden Horn
took advantage of the strong breezes. The carrack turned, aiming directly for the mist-shrouded coastline of Essex.

Katherine crouched down. Dorcas sat petrified, swaddled in a cloak. Eleanor had found her Ave beads and was threading them through her fingers. Father Roger knelt, face pressed against the bulwark, hands clasped in prayer. Katherine moved over and put an arm around his shoulder. He turned, eyes glaring madly in his bruised, unshaven face.

‘They have come to take me,’ he whispered. ‘The ghosts. I am being punished, yet what I did was just. I saved their souls. I consigned their filthy, smelly bodies—’ He broke off as Katherine withdrew her arm and stared in shock. She recalled what Bertrand had said about this priest.

‘Who, Father?’ she hissed, ignoring the tumult of battle. ‘What are you saying?’

‘I suspected as much.’ Eleanor had drawn closer. ‘I saw him once with Margot, one of the slaughtered whores. I have also seen him after he has locked and bolted the church. Dressed in a hair shirt, he prostrates himself. I have heard the whip slashing his back. I did wonder. I wanted to talk to your father, but…’ She shrugged, wiping the spray from her face.

Katherine, despite everything that was going on around her, could only crouch and reflect on what she was seeing and hearing. Father Roger had blessed her as a child, shriven her at the mercy pew, given her the Eucharist, exchanged the singing bread; could he be the barbarous killer of those poor streetwalkers? Here was a man who had danced on her name day, who had sat at their family table and blessed the feasts they’d shared.

‘Why? Why?’ She turned back angrily, but Father Roger, eyes closed, was now banging his head against the bulwark, bloody lips chattering nonsense. Katherine comforted Dorcas and got up.

The battle was over.
The Golden Horn
had broken free, and was heading due west towards the treacherous Essex coastline. The two royal cogs, which had sustained dire punishment, were reluctant to follow. A sailor, elated by their escape and relieved to be alive, chattered amicably to Katherine in the lingua franca of the port, a mixture of English, French and doggerel Latin, until Bertrand intervened, grasping her shoulder and pushing her back towards the other prisoners.

‘Mistress, the danger has passed. I will send you meat, bread and wine.’ He gestured at her companions. ‘They seem to need it. Both the crew and my men have remarked on your courage and fortitude.’ He paused. ‘Believe me, you will need both if your father does not respond.’

‘To what?’

‘To my demands. A blood feud exists between him and me. Simon Roseblood should be careful which path he chooses.’

‘What is it you want?’

‘Information.’

‘About what?’ Katherine steadied herself against the pitch of the deck.

‘He will know.’

‘And this blood feud?’

Bertrand gestured at Eleanor, who crouched watching, eyes large and black. ‘Ask her. Now,’ he pointed into the mist, ‘we have escaped the hulks; soon we will be off the Colvasse peninsula and the Orwell estuary, where we will land and meet the rest of our company.’

‘And then?’

Bertrand shrugged.

‘What did you mean about our priest here?’

‘Ask him yourself. He certainly can’t judge us. We have kept Queenhithe under very close watch. Murder stalks its filthy streets. We were surprised to discover it wore a cowl and boasted a tonsure.’

Bertrand walked away. Katherine watched him go. She was pleased that he had recognised her courage; she would hate for a man like Bertrand to hold her in fear. But what did he want from her father? Was it connected with Simon’s mysterious disappearance over the last few days, then his sudden return, his appearance all changed, just before she was abducted? She also resolved to question Eleanor about the so-called blood feud. As for Father Roger… Katherine repressed a shiver as she glanced at the now demented priest, still banging his head against the wood, mumbling incoherently to himself. She drew a deep breath, smiled at Dorcas and persuaded the maid to stand and walk with her, albeit stumbling and slipping, along the deck. Again she was surprised to find that the pain in her right leg had not appeared. Encouraged, she urged Dorcas not to be frightened, though the young woman seemed to be broken, clinging like a frightened bairn to its mother.

Over the next few days, Katherine strove to compose herself, and to impose some order on her little group. She demanded and obtained better food and water, a brazier to drive off the chill and a more private place to relieve themselves, away from the catcalls of the watching men. Bertrand seemed amused by her forcefulness. Katherine, however, recognised that the man was very dangerous and would have no scruples about carrying out his threats. She also distracted herself by speculating about the carrack and its journey north.

The Golden Horn
had come through the battle relatively unscathed, whatever damage it had sustained soon repaired. As the days passed, Katherine walked around the ship whenever she could. The weather remained dull and misty, the sea fast-running but relatively smooth. She realised that the carrack was not only a means to elude and mystify any pursuer; LeCorbeil had hired it for more sinister and secret reasons. Horses had been brought aboard, undoubtedly mounts for Bertrand and his company, whilst the massive holds were packed with purveyance. She had glimpsed some of the contents as she passed open trapdoors with ladders down to the cavernous storerooms. She also stood close to the ship’s clerks with their indentures of goods and long lists of items spread out over the tops of barrels. The carrack was carrying everything a fighting force would need: weapons, dried meat, horse fodder and harness, armour and medical stores, vats of wine, barrels of gunpowder, two small cannon and a trebuchet. The clerks and crew talked easily amongst themselves, as if they were unaware of her presence or how knowledgeable she was about what was happening.

She also noticed that
The Golden Horn
was brought in as close as possible to the long black line of the Essex coast, whilst Bertrand and two of his henchmen closely studied the charts and maps the master spread out in front of them. The more Katherine watched, and the more she recalled her father’s talk of war and the chatter of soldiers in the tavern taproom, the more certain she became that Bertrand had hired the carrack and planned this journey for other reasons apart from herself. LeCorbeil, mounted and armed, would prove to be excellent scouts; they were undoubtedly preparing for the day when York and Lancaster clashed. They were waiting for civil strife. If they sheltered in Essex, they would be free of the Beauforts in London and find it easy to ride north to join York. Katherine was certain that was the real reason for their journey. She had been abducted as an act of revenge but also as a bargaining counter, which was part of a greater strategy. She decided to keep her thoughts to herself and not even discuss her suspicions with Eleanor. She comforted herself that Bertrand had made a serious mistake. He thought she would be terrified, like Eleanor, Dorcas and Father Roger. She would resist, watch and wait for her opportunity.