“You can read it but it stays here with me,” he said. “You can come back as many times as you wish.”
Abigail nodded eagerly. “I promise, I will never take it out of your house,” she said. “I won’t even tell anyone about it, at least for now, but when I publish my dissertation, I’ll have to cite the source. You do understand that, right?”
Queensborough nodded. His focus was on the old book, thinking of the story he’d read in those pages and of what his grandfather had told him. Settling back in his chair, he kept his gaze on those faded vellum sheets.
“Lupus Guerre,” he muttered. “That means Warwolf in Latin, but I’m sure you already know that. But I want you to remember these names I am about to tell you, Miss Devlin.”
“Of course.”
“De Wolfe, de Lohr, de Russe, de Reyne, de Moray….”
“Okay?”
“De Winter, de Lara, St. Hèver, du Reims, and Wellesbourne.”
“Who are they?”
Queensborough looked up at her. “The men whose stories you are about to hear.”
Abigail could feel anticipation like she’d never felt in her life. A smile flickered across her lips, tugging the corners of her mouth. “I’m more than ready to hear about them.”
Queensborough could see the unadulterated happiness in her eyes. That told him that he was doing the right thing.
“Tea first?”
Abigail’s expression fell and Groby, with a snort, leaned on his cane and slowly stood up. “I’ll get the tea,” he told Queensborough. “You tell that young lady what she’s been waiting to hear before she explodes.”
Queensborough grinned, a surprising gesture. “Make mine with gin,” he called after his friend.
“No gin until you finish your story!”
Groby was off, hobbling in the direction of the kitchen and the kettle, as Queensborough returned his attention to Abigail. He pointed to the chair that Groby had vacated.
“Sit down,” he said. “This is going to take a while.”
Abigail quickly planted herself in the warm seat. “I have all of the time in the world, Mr. Browne.”
“What were the names I told you to remember?”
Abigail didn’t hesitate. “De Wolfe, de Lohr, de Russe, de Reyne, de Moray, de Winter, de Lara, St. Hèver, du Reims, and Wellesbourne.”
His grin returned. “You’re very sharp.”
“I have an eidetic memory. I see words.”
Queensborough was increasingly impressed with the young American. “Then I won’t keep you waiting.” The smile faded from his face as he settled back, his expression turning into something distant. “While the Duke of Normandy came to these shores aboard the Mora, Warwolfe had his own vessels, named for the angels because Gaetan de Wolfe and his knights called themselves Anges de Guerre, or the Angels of War.”
“Gaetan de Wolfe?”
“Warwolfe.”
Now, the man behind the legend had a name. “Go on,” Abigail begged.
Queensborough did. “De Wolfe evidently had at least a dozen ships to carry thousands of men, ships named the Ramiel and the Sachael, the Raphael and the Uriel. Jathan came aboard the Ramiel, which was named for the angel of thunder, and that ship contained all of those men whose names I had you remember. Those were the Angels of War, arriving on a boat named for thunder. Appropriate, considering the storm that was approaching England on that day.”
Abigail was already fascinated with the tale. “Just ten knights?”
Queensborough nodded. “Ten knights and thousands of men,” he said. “According to Jathan, the knights were experts in warfare. The Duke of Normandy would use them like a crack group of specialist warriors. Sort of like a modern-day SAS squad. They were, literally, the Angels of War. There wasn’t anything Warwolfe and his men couldn’t do, the first ones into battle and the last ones out. You’ve been looking for the unsung heroes of the conquest? These men were it, Miss Devlin.”
Abigail had waited her whole life to hear this tale. “Will you start from the very beginning of Jathan’s story? And even if you think a detail is unimportant, please don’t leave it out. Tell me everything.”
Something wistful reflected in Queensborough’s eyes. “All I ask is that you do this justice when you write your paper. As you said, these men deserve to have their stories told. But I’ll take it a step further – bring them back to life again, Miss Devlin. Will you do that? Will you bring them back to life?”
There was so much delight and passion in Abigail’s eyes that she was positively aglow from it all. Leaning forward, she put a hand on Queensborough’s dirty fingers.
“I’ll make you proud, I swear it. I’ll make these men breathe again.”
He believed her.
CHAPTER ONE
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De Wolfe Motto: Fortis in arduis
Strength in times of trouble
Year of our Lord 1066 A.D.
Late September
Pevensey, England
Through the mists of time, they came.
Thousands of men disembarked vessels that had brought them across the dark and rolling sea. These titans of war emerged from the surf astride war horses that breathed fire, with eyes that bespoke of their thirst for blood.
The Apocalypse, for the Anglo-Saxons, had arrived.
It was a cloudy day towards the end of the month of September when the transports of the Duke of Normandy’s fleet moored off the coast of Pevensey, England in shallow water with hardly a ripple from the waves that came in from the south. The sea spray was minimal, as was the swell, allowing both men and materials to be offloaded without trouble. Horses, who had suffered the uncertainty of a trip across the channel, were led off the ships by their masters, kicking up the water and jumping about, smelling the salt and the sea grass, eager to be on land where they belonged.
As the army came upon the shore in waves of flesh and bone and armor, setting foot in this land for the taking, a beachhead was set up so men could recover from the journey and prepare for what was to come. But they made no secret about their arrival; they had no intention of being covert about their presence. Thousands of men raided the countryside for food and anything else they could carry while their commanders, including the Duke of Normandy, huddled in tents and planned the coming incursion.
A military action unlike anything the world had ever seen before.
With their tactics, manpower, and superior weapons, the Normans had the advantage. Harold Godwinson, the King of the Anglo-Saxons, had been far to the north dealing with another attempted invasion by the Norwegians when the Normans appeared on his southern shore. The Normans knew this, of course, through their network of spies and mercenaries, so their appearance on the shores of Southern England had been no accident. This is what they’d planned for, making sure they were able to make it ashore without any resistance from Harold and his army. Now, they were here – and it was essential that they defeat the Anglo-Saxon army in a mighty display of their power.