Agincourt - Bernard Cornwell [4]
Hook did not believe in much, but he had somehow persuaded himself that the curse that lay on his life would be lifted if only he could kill the Perrills. He was not quite sure what the curse was, unless it was the uncomfortable suspicion that life must hold more than the manor offered. Yet when he thought of escaping Lord Slayton’s service he was assailed by a gloomy foreboding that some unseen and incomprehensible disaster awaited him. That was the tenuous shape of the curse and he did not know how to lift it other than by murder, but nevertheless he nodded obediently. “I hear you, my lord.”
“You hear and you obey,” his lordship said. He tossed the arrow onto the fire where it lay for a moment, then burst into bright flame. A waste of a good broadhead, Hook thought. “Sir Martin doesn’t like you, Hook,” Lord Slayton said in a lower voice. He rolled his eyes upward and Hook understood that his lordship was asking whether his wife was still in the gallery. Hook gave a barely perceptible shake of his head. “You know why he hates you?” his lordship asked.
“Not sure he likes many people, lord,” Hook answered evasively.
Lord Slayton stared at Hook broodingly. “And you’re right about Will Snoball,” he finally said, “he’s weakening. We all get old, Hook, and I’ll be needing a new centenar. You understand me?”
A centenar was the man who commanded a company of archers and William Snoball had held the job for as long as Hook remembered. Snoball was also the manor’s steward, and the two offices had made him the richest of all Lord Slayton’s men. Hook nodded. “I understand, lord,” he muttered.
“Sir Martin believes Tom Perrill should be my next centenar. And he fears I’ll appoint you, Hook. I can’t imagine why he would think that, can you?”
Hook looked into his lordship’s face. He was tempted to ask about his mother and how well his lordship had known her, but he resisted. “No, lord,” he said humbly instead.
“So when you go to London, Hook, tread carefully. Sir Martin will accompany you.”
“London!”
“I have a summons,” Lord Slayton explained. “I’m required to send my archers to London. Ever been to London?”
“No, my lord.”
“Well, you’re going. I don’t know why, the summons doesn’t say. But my archers are going because the king commands it. And maybe it’s war? I don’t know. But if it is war, Hook, then I don’t want my men killing each other. For God’s sake, Hook, don’t make me hang you.”
“I’ll try not, my lord.”
“Now go. Tell Snoball to come in. Go.”
Hook went.
It was a January day. It was still cold. The sky was low and twilight dark, though it was only mid-morning. At dawn there had been flurries of snow, but it had not settled. There was frost on the thatched roofs and skins of cat ice on the few puddles that had not been trampled into mud. Nick Hook, long-legged and broad-chested and dark-haired and scowling, sat outside the tavern with seven companions, including his brother and the two Perrill brothers. Hook wore knee-high boots with spurs, two pairs of breeches to keep out the cold, a woollen shirt, a padded leather jerkin, and a short linen tunic, which was blazoned with Lord Slayton’s golden crescent moon and three golden stars. All eight men wore leather belts with pouches, long daggers and swords, and all wore the same livery, though a stranger would need to look hard to discern the moon and stars because the colors had faded and the tunics were dirty.
No one did look hard, because armed men in livery meant trouble. And these eight men were archers. They carried neither bows nor arrow bags, but the breadth of their chests showed these were men who could draw the cord of a war bow a full yard back and make it look easy. They were bowmen, and they were one cause of the fear that pervaded London’s streets. The fear was as pungent as the stench of sewage, as prevalent as the smell of woodsmoke. House doors were closed. Even the beggars had vanished, and the few folk who walked the city were among those who had provoked the fear, yet even they chose to pass