‘You mentioned that the king used to hold him in favour. What happened?’
‘It seems he was rewarded generously with lands and for the next couple of years there he sat, growing ever fatter on the wealth of his estates. The next time he was called upon to fight, apparently his arse was so large that his horse collapsed under his weight. Some months after that he somehow managed to kill his two young nephews in a training match and was made to forfeit most of his lands in recompense. All he has left now is one manor near to Hereford, and not a rich one at that.’
‘That still doesn’t explain why he hates me so much.’
‘It ought to,’ Wace said. ‘Don’t you see? He’s you, except that you haven’t yet eaten your own weight in mutton or beaten your sister’s sons to death. He used to be the one who was lauded. Now he finds himself ridiculed and shouted down in council, while you’ve taken his place. Of course he hates you.’
‘Because of that?’
Wace shrugged. ‘Men have killed each other for less.’
He’d been right; none of that brought me closer to working out what I could do to repair the damage that had been wrought. If unpleasant words were the worst Berengar could offer, I wouldn’t have been concerned, but he had slain two of his own kinsfolk, and the way that Wace had spoken of it suggested it was no mere accident. Nor had I forgotten how he had almost killed that mother and child. If their lives were worth nothing to him, what did that say about mine?
The next day I sent Eudo and Ithel ahead at the head of a party of ten men, with Haerarddur as well, both to explore the land around Mathrafal and, if they managed to get close enough, to catch a glimpse of the enemy encampment. They were gone longer than I had expected, and by the time they arrived back it had already been dark for several hours. We had pitched our tents within the ringworks of an ancient hill fort, and I was pacing their circuit, anxiously keeping a lookout for Eudo’s return, when I heard a shout of greeting from the men on watch by the eastern ramparts. I hurried across the enclosure to find, emerging from out of the black, the dark forms of thirteen horsemen climbing the slope towards the causewayed entrance. The skies were clouded that night, and at first I could not make out their faces, but I knew it was them.
‘They’re gone,’ was the first thing Eudo said once he had reached me and let someone take care of his mount.
‘What do you mean?’ I asked.
‘We saw the hall with its moat, and the village as well, but the enemy weren’t there,’ he said with a sigh. His shoulders hung low and he looked bone-tired, but then I supposed he must have been riding hard since daybreak. ‘Their campfires were still smouldering, so they couldn’t have left long before we arrived. A few hours, perhaps; no more than half a day.’
Not for the first time I wished that ?dda were with us. He would have been able to tell us.
‘The place looks to be defended by barely fifty spears,’ Ithel added, and there was an eagerness to his tone that I had not heard before. ‘We could storm the palisade and take the fastness; it would not be all that difficult.’
Eudo snorted. ‘You would try to capture it?’ he asked, as if the mere suggestion was a ridiculous idea, a sentiment that I shared.
Ithel looked taken aback. ‘We have the numbers,’ he said defensively. ‘Why not?’
I’d had my doubts before about his ability and experience as a war leader, and what he had said only served to strengthen them. ‘Even if we manage to take it,’ I said, ‘what would we do with it?’
Eudo nodded in agreement. We both knew that there was nothing to be gained in wasting time and men trying to capture such a place when we had little need of it, when we could just as easily skirt around it.
‘It is Mathrafal,’ Ithel replied, as if it were as simple as that; as if that were all he need say. When he saw that we were waiting for more he went on: ‘It has been the seat of their house for a hundred years and more; it is where they hold their court, where their treasure hoard lies. If we strike at the heart, the head will fall soon after. How can their vassals and followers continue to brave the shield-wall for men who cannot even protect their own halls?’
All this had come out in an excitable rush, and despite his years I saw Ithel now for the youth that he was. A noble youth, for certain, and by no means stupid, but rash nonetheless and as yet lacking in knowledge of how wars were waged. The hour was late and I was too weary to listen to his ramblings.
Ignoring him, I turned to Eudo instead. ‘Was there any sign of which way the enemy went?’