I raised my knee into the short one’s groin. He doubled over, shouting out in agony, and I smashed my hilt down over the back of his head. He collapsed, and then I was turning as the other ran at me, his blade flashing in the sunlight, half blinding me with its brightness. He thrust towards my chest and I tried to duck to one side, but the street was slick with mud and for a moment I lost my footing. I recovered just in time, raising my blade to meet his.
Sweat rolled off my brow, stinging my eyes, and for a moment I was blind as he thrust again. This time, though, he had gone too far through the stroke, and as he struggled to bring his seax back, I saw my chance. I lunged forward, hoping to drive my knife deep into the Englishman’s belly, but only managed to strike his side. It was enough. The blade tore through his tunic, piercing the skin, and he roared in anguish. His hands flew to the wound, his seax falling from his grasp.
The rest of his friends had fled, all but the one I had knocked out, and another who lay on the ground between Eudo and Wace, writhing and yelling, clutching at his arm. I turned back to face the Englishman, raising my knife before me as I stepped towards him. His face, so full of anger only moments before, now held only fear as he stared at my blade, and then suddenly he turned and ran, down towards the river.
He disappeared into the crowd’s midst, and I glanced at Wace and Eudo, who had already put away their swords. Neither looked as though he had been hurt.
Eudo gestured at the short one I had struck over the head, who lay on his side, unmoving. ‘Is he dead?’
I kicked him in the side. He did not move, but then I saw his chest rising and falling. ‘He’ll wake before long,’ I said.
We started off up the street. The knights I had seen earlier had disappeared, but as we approached the marketplace and turned to the right, up towards the minster, their pennons came into sight again, quivering in the breeze. There were at least fifty of them, perhaps as many as seventy, with more riding to join them even as we approached. And facing them on the other side of the marketplace, with the minster church behind them, was a horde of Englishmen, so many that I could not count them, all shouting out with one voice.
There were men young and old, some with spears and seaxes, while others had only spades or pitchforks, and I saw more than one axe-blade, of the kind that could fell a horse with a single blow. A few were carrying round shields, and they were crashing their weapons against them in an unearthly din, like the battle-thunder I had heard at H?stinges and at Dunholm, but somehow even wilder. For they were not beating all at once or even at the same speed, but, it seemed, simply trying to make as great a sound as possible.
‘Ut!’ they roared. ‘Ut!’
At first I thought this was the rebels’ army, come to take the city, but these did not look like men trained to war. There was not one mail hauberk between them, and only a few helmets. If they had a leader, I could not see him. These were not warriors, I realised, but the townsmen of Eoferwic, come together to stand against us.
Already some of the horses on our side were shaking their heads, fidgeting where they stood, but their riders kept them steady. I looked amidst the pennons for the black and gold I had spotted before, but I must have been mistaken, for I could not see Malet there. Instead, at the head of the conroi, flying from the end of one of the lances, I saw the red fox upon a yellow field that was the emblem of Gilbert de Gand. Even at such a distance and with his helmet on, I knew from his long chin and gaunt appearance that it was him. He rode up and down in front of the men, shouting at them to keep their lines: a deep-throated roar that belied his slight frame.
We made our way through the lines of horsemen, the press of bodies, towards the front, and then Gilbert saw us. At first he must have wondered who we were, for he came riding to challenge us, but then, as he approached, a look of recognition came across his face, followed by one of anger. He slowed before us and his mount whickered, plumes of mist erupting from its nostrils.
‘You,’ Gilbert said, his small eyes narrowing as he looked down at me. ‘You’re Earl Robert’s man. The Breton, Tancred a Dinant.’
‘Lord Gilbert,’ I replied, just as flatly.
He glanced at the others, standing beside me. ‘Wace de Douvres and Eudo de Ryes.’ He spoke their names slowly, and it was not hard to make out the contempt in his voice. ‘Have you come just to run from this fight, as you did at Dunholm?’
‘We want to help, lord,’ said Wace, with far greater respect than I might have expected from him. Usually he was never one to hide his contempt of those he didn’t like; his bluntness had often got him into trouble over the years. But this was no time for petty quarrels.
‘I don’t need help from you,’ Gilbert answered, his cheeks flushing red. He spat upon the ground. ‘I don’t need help from any of Robert’s men. Take your swords elsewhere.’