Warriors (3 page)

‘So you just accept being cheated?’

‘It’s Duke Robert all over again,’ said Mauger.

That took William back to Normandy, just days before the first major battle of his life, to the great ducal pavilion hard by the hamlet of Giverny, in which he had first laid eyes on his then liege lord. Duke Robert had not been happy at the way Tancred de Hauteville, leading his sons, had forced his way into his presence, even less joyful when he had been reminded that five of those boys shared with him a bloodline through their late mother, albeit one carrying the taint of illegitimacy.

It had been a less than joyful interview for a man who liked to be styled Robert the Magnificent: Tancred was not one to show excessive respect, of the kind Robert had come to expect from fawning courtiers. Like an uncle to the family of the duke, this was a man he had known since childhood, who he had, along with his elder brother, tossed high in the air. Rumours abounded that Duke Robert had poisoned that elder brother to gain his title; those who believed such an
accusation to be a literal truth called him Robert the Devil.

Tancred had raised his sons with one aim in mind: the prospect of joining the
familia
knights of the ducal household, the men who served their liege lord close and would die in battle to keep him safe, the reward for good service being the captaincy of a castle, maybe even lands and possibly a title of their own. Duke Robert had disabused him: he had no trust in the connection of bastard blood, even less in Tancred or his sons.

He would not allow any de Hauteville to serve him close, for fear of what they might do to his own born-out-of-wedlock son, who was now, following Robert’s death, the reigning Duke of Normandy. Rabidly ambitious himself, Robert could not be brought to even consider that these tall and sturdy boys were free of that trait, nor that the solemn vow Tancred had made to his own father would bind them to his service, a refusal which had brought them to this place and this conundrum.

‘We have no choice but to do now what we did then,’ William insisted. ‘We must look for good fortune elsewhere. I want to be sure that whatever I do I can count on your support.’

‘To whom else would we give it?’ asked Mauger, who could not hide the look in his eye, one that told all present how much he worshipped a brother many years his senior.

That brought forth a smile. ‘No one, Mauger, but I wish to remind you all we are bound together, that we are de Hautevilles, in the same way our father was wont to remind us—’

‘Endlessly,’ Humphrey interjected, champing those very prominent top teeth, he being one son who was sure he had never truly enjoyed his father’s love.

Geoffrey spoke next. ‘You are our leader by right as well as birth, William.’

‘Is it sacrilegious to puke in church?’ asked Drogo, though he grinned to make sure all understood he was joking.

‘From now on there are two worlds, that outside and ours. I will seek your support when there is no time to explain why, but know this: I will always act in all our interests, not just my own. I ask you, as our father did, to swear on the Holy Cross that you will follow me wherever that may lead us, and I ask you to renew the vow he made us all swear before we left Normandy, never to raise a weapon against each other.’

William hauled out his sword and knelt, the others following, each using hilt and pommel as a personal cross, to take the oath William had asked of them, their eyes fixed on the crucified Christ as they pledged their word.

‘You said elsewhere,’ Drogo said as they stood again. ‘Where would that be?’

‘Apulia.’

‘Why Apulia?’

That question was posed with a look of deep suspicion. William, he well knew, was capable of laying deep and long-sighted plans. He was also inclined to keep such things to himself and this time was no exception.

‘Wait and see. Now stir yourselves, it is time we ended our devotions and returned to camp.’

‘What devotions?’ Geoffrey demanded, a reasonable question since no prayers, barring the oath just taken, had been said.

William smiled. ‘The ones I told Rainulf were due today, a Mass for the soul of our late mother.’

‘But…’ Geoffrey paused before stating the obvious: this was not the day on which the mother he shared with everyone except young Mauger had passed away.

A mock tourney it might be, more a way of exercising fighting men to avoid them becoming rusty, rather than proper warfare, but today would, nevertheless, be brutal. No one should die, but none would emerge lacking a bruise and quite a few would need days in their cot to recover, added to the ministrations of their womenfolk and, perhaps, a mendicant monk from nearby Aversa. William de Hauteville, still the senior captain, had arranged the fighting contingents, several of them led by his own brothers – but if they were united by blood, they were also animated by the desire to prove their fighting worth; no sibling could expect gentility from another.

On the open agricultural plains of Campania, finding room to deploy four hundred mounted warriors
presented little difficulty, and if some crops got trampled in the process, well, these were Rainulf’s own lands, the peasants his to command, the rich soil his to exploit, so they would be obliged to watch the destruction of their careful husbandry and ploughed fields in silence.

William, aware of this, and as a sop to their depleted larders, had arranged they should participate in the feast which would follow the tournament – several oxen were already roasting on spits – an act which had earned him a snort of disapproval from his chief.

‘They will not love you for it,’ Rainulf insisted, looking up at a man who towered over him by several hands, his purple-veined face censorious. ‘The Italian peasant understands only hard treatment, and if you are soft on them, your reward, one dark night, will most likely be a knife in the back.’

‘Part of the crops we destroy are theirs to live off. If we are taking the food from their mouths, it does no harm to put some back.’

‘My crops, my food! I could overrule you.’

‘You could,’ William replied, his tone as cold as his stare.

The locked eyes and stony expressions, which followed that exchange, underlined how things had altered between these men in the last two and a half years. At one time Rainulf would have welcomed the suggestion from a man he trusted absolutely; now
there was some doubt if he could tolerate the speaker’s presence.

‘It is time and Prince Guaimar is waiting,’ William said, indicating with a finger that the powerful Italian sun was well past its zenith, that the day was cooling and so it was time to commence the tourney.

Mention of his titular overlord had Rainulf looking to the elevated, shaded pavilion he had erected so the party from Salerno could watch the tourney in comfort. Prince Guaimar, at a mere twenty years still looking too young for his title, was seated next to his wife and young son, she holding a newly born daughter still at the suckling stage, while his sister, Berengara, her radiant beauty evident even at a distance, sat on their left. On the right of the prince sat another Lombard called Arduin of Fassano, a fellow known to William but not to Rainulf. Behind the prince, alongside the various officials from Guaimar’s court, sat Rainulf’s slender young concubine, his new bedmate, holding his restless child, Hermann.

‘Odd,’ Rainulf observed, with no attempt to disguise a degree of contempt. ‘Guaimar is a prince who has never led men, never seen a real battle, yet I, who have seen and spilt much blood, must bow to his title.’

William was about to reply that the prince had in his veins the blood of his forbears, but he checked himself: to mention such a lineage was to raise the spectre of Rainulf’s bastard son, a subject best avoided.

‘He has the good sense to let we Normans do his fighting.’

‘The other fellow, Arduin, you know him from Sicily?’

‘I do.’

‘And?’ Rainulf said querulously, not happy at having to drag out information.

‘A good soldier, he commanded the contingent of pikemen from Apulia, and given they were reluctant to serve, he trained and led them well.’

‘Trustworthy?’

‘He’s a Lombard, Rainulf.’

The squat older Norman nodded, which made the spare flesh under his chin more pronounced; that remark required no further clarification for a man who knew the Lombards better than most and shared with them a history of conspiracy.

‘Any notion of why he is here?’

William knew very well why he was here: realising that Rainulf was intent on breaking his word regarding the succession, he had gone to see Prince Guaimar in Salerno, and, in a disappointing interview, in which he had tried and failed to get him to remind his vassal of his promise, the prince had told him about Arduin and his appointment as the
topoterites
of Melfi. He had also told him of the plan to betray his new master, Michael Doukeianos. It was telling that Guaimar had yet to inform Rainulf.

‘My guess is he will be looking for lances.’

‘To fight where?’

William just shrugged.

‘Then it is time we showed him of what we are made.’

Rainulf was now too long in the tooth to spend much time in the saddle; he would watch with Guaimar, and no doubt use his proximity to press the prince once more for help. He had asked the Papacy to grant him an annulment of his marriage to his second wife, without which he could not legitimise his child, Rome being a place where a Lombard prince could apply more weight than any Norman. William knew he was wasting his time, and not just because of the tangle of Roman politics: Guaimar had only borne his title for less than three full years but had learnt very quickly that the best way to sustain his power was to keep alive dissension amongst those who might oppose him.

He would no more act as Rainulf requested than respond to William’s appeal, and for the same reason. All the advantage for him lay in the strained relations between the two Norman leaders. In fact, there were very good grounds to suppose that Prince Guaimar was doing the very reverse of what Drengot required – this made easy by the endless jockeying of several claimants to the papal title – using whatever influence he had in Rome to block that which Rainulf sought, and thus keep him dependent.  

Guaimar had grown in acumen as he had become accustomed to power and, no doubt, fatherhood had sharpened his resolve. He was no longer the young innocent William had first encountered – the dispossessed son of the previous ruler, easily outwitted in negotiation. Now he had a mind that could calculate where his advantage lay and he applied it well. He might smile at Rainulf, but he would never fully trust him, never forget this was the same man who had betrayed his father.

Should he falter in that resolve his younger sister was ever present to remind him. Berengara had her beauty, but that was leavened by a degree of spite aimed at the Normans, any Norman, which made speaking with her an exercise in bile. She hated the men who had betrayed her family with unabated passion, and rumour had it she had traded her virtue to put pressure on Conrad Augustus to come south and restore her brother to his fief. The Normans, when the news came that the Holy Roman Emperor had expired, were inclined to put his demise down to her poisonous embrace.

William’s relations with her were no better than those of his confrères, but he was prone to guying her when chance presented itself, given that she never failed to react. Much as he despised Frankish customs – no true Norman had any respect for their French or Angevin neighbours – he had heard that the knights
of Paris and Tours were wont to request from a lady, prior to an event such as this, some favour to decorate their weapons. Thus, before he rode out to commence matters, he stopped before the pavilion and lowered the padded point of his lance till it was before her face.

‘My lady, I am told it is the custom of the northern courts to beg support from a fair maiden prior to combat.’

Berengara knew she was being played upon, and if she had had any doubts, the smile – or was it a smirk? – on William’s face, would have told her so.

Her brother sought to head off her angry response, by speaking first. ‘It is not yet the custom in Italy.’

‘You may have my favour,’ said Berengara, swiftly, removing a thin shawl, which had covered her bosom, pleased by the way William’s eye was drawn to that which was revealed. She was still smiling when she spat on it, followed by a swift twist round his lance. ‘And also you now have my sentiments as well.’

William laughed out loud, which wiped the acid smile off her face, before he hauled round his mount and headed out into the open, past the curious peasantry, to where the entire force of Rainulf’s mercenaries was lined up.

‘He has pride, that one,’ whispered Arduin to Guaimar, ‘and has the gift of command as well. I saw him fight outside Syracuse, and he is formidable both in single combat and in battle.’

‘They all are that, Arduin,’ Guaimar replied in the same soft tone. ‘So much so, that they are also a menace. You will do me a service if you take most of them out of my lands.’

The sound of a battle horn, a single long note, floated across the open fields, the signal for the tournament to commence.

‘It is the catapan’s gold that will take them there, Prince Guaimar, and I will give them Melfi, but they need two other things if we are to foment a real revolt that will not only break Byzantium, but elevate the Lombard cause: a leader and a purpose.’

‘Will you not lead them?’

‘I am but a soldier, with no land and only the title gifted to me by the catapan. Militarily I can command, but to head the enterprise I have outlined requires a nobleman of stature, someone under whose banner the Italians and Lombards can unite against the Greeks. It is not modesty, but truth, to say they will not follow me.’

The invitation was obvious in the words and look, a request that Guaimar should raise the banner of Lombard revolt in Apulia, an offer he would decline. Arduin might say, and indeed might believe, Byzantium was uniquely weak and vulnerable at this time, but if revolts had failed in the past they could do so again and, previously, retribution had been bloody and swift. Whoever raised the standard would, if things went against him, pay a heavy price.

If an army could invade Apulia, a rampaging Byzantine host could do the same to Campania, quite apart from the prospect of a powerful fleet sailing from the Bosphorus, then appearing in the Bay of Salerno, which had also happened before. Guaimar had held his title for too little a time to place it in jeopardy; let another take the risk, as long as he was around for a share of any reward should they enjoy success.

‘I think when you leave here you should pay a call upon the Prince of Benevento.’

‘You think Prince Landulf will take the lead?’

‘I was thinking more that Argyrus, the son of the great Melus, now resides in Benevento.’

Melus was a potent name, as the man who had so nearly succeeded in the task Arduin was now setting out to repeat. Argyrus, his son, had only recently been released from imprisonment in Constantinople, as a sop to Lombard sensibilities. He was, as of this moment, an unknown quantity, but his name was worth half an army.

‘His presence is known to Byzantium. To lead another revolt he must have permission from the Prince of Benevento. Would Landulf agree to let him participate?’

‘I think he might. Benevento has much to gain if there is any success.’

So do you
, Arduin thought, but he kept that to himself.

There was no metal in use this day, for the very simple reason that every one of the men assembled was either young or too seasoned a fighter. The former were, by nature, hot-headed in battle, the rest too proud to take lightly being bested by another. No trust could be placed in their restraint, and the use of swords and metal-tipped lances would lead to multiple deaths. What William wanted was to exercise the horses and men, not in the tens of the standard Norman conroy, but in the mass, to underscore the lessons learnt in Sicily. He wanted them to behave as the mounted component of an army.

The purpose of doing so he had kept from Rainulf: in his meeting with Prince Guaimar he had as good as acceded to the notion of taking service with Arduin. He would follow the Lombard to Melfi and take possession of the fortress, and, under his command, invade Apulia. But on this expedition he was determined to act on behalf of himself and his family. If Rainulf Drengot could gain land and title in Campania, then William de Hauteville was determined he would do the same in those fresh pastures.

There would be many obstacles along the way, not least the Byzantines, who were formidable in adversity. He would also have to outwit the Lombards, Prince Guaimar, and Rainulf, all of whom would see him only as a mercenary, or in the Norman leader’s case, a captain, acting on his behalf. His brothers, in
that vestry, had more or less accused him of allowing himself to be cheated; they too would learn that their elder brother had the wit and guile to outmanoeuvre those he felt had duped him.

The mercenaries had been broken up into bands of one hundred lances, and their first task was to attack a long false wooden shield wall William had had erected fifty paces from the front of the elevated pavilion and the assembled guests; let them feel some sense of what it was like to face a Norman host. Taking station to the right of the first line, commanded by Drogo, William ordered them forward, noting that no command was required for another captain, called Turmod, to advance his own century after a slight gap.