Agincourt - Bernard Cornwell [12]
“Picardy,” Hook repeated the name dully. He thought it must be a town somewhere else in England.
“Earn yourself some money in Picardy, Hook,” Sir Edward said, “because God knows you’ll need it.”
Hook hesitated. “I’m an outlaw?” he asked nervously.
“You’re a dead man, Hook,” Sir Edward said, “and dead men are outside the law. You’re a dead man because my orders are that you’re to wait in the tavern and then be taken back to the judgment of the manor court, and Lord Slayton will have no choice but to hang you. So go and do what I just said.”
But before Hook could obey there was a shout from the next corner. “Hats off!” men called abruptly, “hats off!” The shout and a clatter of hooves announced the arrival of a score of horsemen who swept into the wide square where their horses fanned out, pranced, and then stood with breath smoking from their nostrils, and hooves pawing the mud. Men and women were clawing off their hats and kneeling in the mud.
“Down, boy,” Sir Edward said to Hook.
The leading horseman was young, not much older than Hook, but his long-nosed face showed a serene certainty as he swept his cold gaze across the marketplace. His face was narrow, his eyes were dark, and his mouth thin-lipped and grim. He was clean-shaven, and the razor seemed to have abraded his skin so that it looked raw-scraped. He rode a black horse that was richly bridled with polished leather and glittering silver. He had black boots, black breeches, a black tunic, and a fleece-lined cloak of dark purple cloth. His hat was black velvet and sported a black feather, while at his side hung a black-scabbarded sword. He looked all around the marketplace, then urged the horse forward to watch the one woman and three men who now jerked and twisted from the bell ropes hanging from the Bull’s beam. A vagary of wind gusted spark-laden smoke at his stallion, which whinnied and shied away. The rider soothed it by patting its neck with a black-gloved hand, and Hook saw that the man wore jeweled rings over his gloves. “They were given a chance to repent?” the horseman demanded.
“Many chances, sire,” Sir Martin answered unctuously. The priest had hurried out of the tavern yard and was down on one knee. He made the sign of the cross and his haggard face looked almost saintly, as though he suffered for his Lord God. He could appear that way, his devil-dog-bitten eyes suddenly full of pain and tenderness and compassion.
“Then their deaths,” the young man said harshly, “are pleasing to God and they are pleasing to me. England will be rid of heresy!” His eyes, brown and intelligent, rested briefly on Nick Hook, who immediately dropped his gaze and stared at the mud until the black-dressed horseman spurred away toward the second fire, which had just been lit. But, in the moment before Hook had looked away, he had seen the scar on the young man’s face. It was a battle scar, showing where an arrow had slashed into the corner between nose and eye. It should have killed, yet God had decreed that the man should live.
“You know who that is, Hook?” Sir Edward asked quietly.
Hook did not know for sure, but nor was it hard to guess that he was seeing, for the first time in his life, the Earl of Chester, the Duke of Aquitaine and the Lord of Ireland. He was seeing Henry, by the grace of God, the King of England.
And, according to all who claimed to understand the tangled webs of royal ancestry, the King of France too.
The flames reached the second man and he screamed. Henry, the fifth King of England to carry that name, calmly watched the Lollard’s soul go to hell.
“Go, Hook,” Sir Edward said quietly.
“Why, Sir Edward?” Hook asked.
“Because Lord Slayton doesn’t want you dead,” Sir Edward said, “and perhaps God did speak to you, and because we all need His grace. Especially today. So just go.”
And Nicholas Hook, archer and outlaw, went.
PART ONE
Saint Crispin and Saint