Such a column moving without straggling or stravaigin’ was certainly not Scots, for none of them were this far out on foot and none were as disciplined on a march. They were no foragers either, who would be in handfuls like thrown gravel, just strong enough to overcome a few peasants and steal their livelihood.
‘English,’ savoured Chirnside, ‘plootering aboot the countryside spierin’ out chickens.’
In threes, neat as a hem? Hal voiced the doubt aloud and those with heads agreed, nodding soberly. Still – there was nothing to be done with his twenty riders but take a look, so they rode forward, steady and careful, to where the column scarred across the green grain, cutting a careless swathe through it. Some snatched ears, even though it was unripe and had been left unburned because of it.
Lightly armoured, Hal saw, in leather and bits of maille with hardly a helmet between them and those no more than light leather caps. The one who led them, stepping out and pausing now and then to watch his men go past, was dark-haired and had a studded leather jack; all of them seemed to have short spears for throwing or stabbing and were bundled about with scrip and cloak and pack.
Then, sudden as a shock of iced water, Hal saw the black columns behind, first two, then four, then five, all footmen, moving in loose blocks. A swift tally gave him three, perhaps four hundred.
‘Christ betimes, they have broke the truce.’
It was a fact as harsh as a stab in the eye. The English had come out of Perth, hard and fast and Hal knew that he saw the foot only because he had already missed the horse, riding eagerly ahead.
He called Dog Boy, whey faced from his night with Jamie Douglas, yet grimly determined.
‘Ride to Bruce, hard as ye can,’ Hal said. ‘Charge into his fancy tentage if needs be but warn him that the English have broke the truce and the horse are upon him, wi’ the foot comin’ up hard.’
He did not add what he was doing, for he knew Bruce would work it out. The others had already done so, looked at the vanishing back of Dog Boy with envy while the warm summer’s morning turned cold as blade; yet their hands sweated on the shafts of the Jeddarts as they wheeled out like a flock of sparrows, into the view of the worming column.
Addaf saw the horsemen at once across the far side of the field and threw up a hand to bring his men to a halt; they stood in the sea of calf-height green stalks, watching the faint morning breeze ruffle it in slow ripples, like waves.
Light horse, Addaf saw without even narrowing his eyes much. Prickers, but Scotch ones and he had seen these kind before – more mounted foot than horsemen, though they could manage the latter at a pinch. Glancing quickly behind, he was pleased to see his men, quiet and calm in their ranks, standing hipshot and still as if paused on a pleasant stroll.
Good men, mostly with around twenty summers on them, a few older – and one, Hwyel, colt-young and eager. It struck him, suddenly and for no reason, that he was the oldest one and that none of them had been with him more than a five-year.
It would be the Scotch, he thought, bringing on such memories, for he had been leading men in the French wars for long enough and the last time he had been this far north had been the King’s campaign of’97 against Wallace. Christ – near ten years since, he realized.
Not one of the men he had been with then were around now and most of them were dead of sickness and disease, the others gone home. He alone had survived and the Welsh band who had fought for Edward then had become a company hired out to the highest bidder and he, though he hated to think of it, had become that most reviled of men, a contract captain.
Contracted, in this case, to de Valence, a retinue Addaf did not care to be in because he remembered de Valence riding down Welsh archers in that same campaign against Wallace. Drunk and quarrelsome Welsh, he admitted, but none that deserved death at the hands of English knights; King Edward had been fortunate that any of the Welsh archers had fought at all on the day and most had not out of spite, leaving most of the work to the Gascon crossbows.
That was when Addaf had seen Scots like this, whirling in and out on their little, fast-gaited horses, hauling proud knights out of their saddles with hooks, stabbing and slashing them as they scrabbled on the ground.
That was then and this was now; none of the ones he barked orders at cared who de Valence was, only that he paid on time and let them plunder. Obedient to Addaf’s instructions, the column turned smartly to the right, to become a loose-ranked block three-deep, facing the horsemen; there was a birdwing rustle as the bows came out of their bags.