They had been traveling with fewer rest stops than on the day before, but with the sun high above them, they stopped for a midday meal. While they were stopped, Jim talked to Brian.
"How are we going to make contact with our men?" he asked. "They're probably still waiting for us back somewhere near Malvinne's castle. I thought of sending Sir Giles or yourself back to get them; but with the armies this close, time is plainly too short for either of you to go back there and bring them up before these two armies fight."
"Not so, James," answered Brian. "They should already be with the English forces. The word I left with John Chester was to hold the men near Malvinne's castle for two days only. Then if he hadn't had word of us, to go on to join up with whatever English forces, wherever they might be—that at least they might strike a few blows against the French."
Sir Brian's face was momentarily grim. "But needs we must come up with them," he went on. "Have you forgotten, James? Our armor and all our gear are with them. We're none of us ready to take part in a battle, unarmored and armed only as we are. To say nothing of lacking my good war-horse, Blanchard, without which I would not like to get into anything resembling a battle with full-armored knights."
"I hadn't forgotten that," said Jim, "but I may have another, special use for our men. We'll see. Assuming they are with the English forces, do you think we could find them?"
"Assuredly, James," said Brian. "All of us know John Chester and our own men-at-arms by sight. And they'd know us. But we would not find them in a moment, you understand. It might take as much as a quarter- or half-day of searching to find them in a host even of this size."
"Well, that's what I think we'll plan to do," said Jim, "and while we're searching, the rest of us will hold back a little ways and try to find some safe place to keep the Prince. If what Carolinus said was correct, the English have accepted the fact that the Prince has gone over to the French. They will take anyone dressing and looking like him as the impostor; not the one with Malvinne. On the other hand, if any of the French forces should happen to discover the true Prince, they'll be even quicker to try to take him. They may not know that the Prince with Malvinne is a piece of magic, but they'll know that there can't be two Princes; and the chances are they'll try to capture Edward and take him back to the French leaders to find out what's going on."
"You're right, James," said Brian seriously, "that's exactly what would happen. If you like, I can ride ahead now so as to start searching our army for our own men before you get there."
"No, I don't think that's wise," said Jim. "We should stay together, if possible. Also, the armies won't immediately ride at each other the minute they see each other, will they?"
"Usually, with large forces like these," Brian said thoughtfully, "getting into any kind of battle order takes time. Also, nearly always there are some parleys between them—invitations to surrender, and so forth. You're right. We should have the better part of a day, at least, after the French army comes in sight, before they line up in battle positions and actually begin an advance against us. That is, if it's they who are the attackers."
"Would you expect us to be the attackers, with a very inferior force; and, as we've been told, a lack of the usual complement of archers?" Jim asked.
"No," said Brian slowly, "I would not expect it. However, you never can tell what'll happen."
"Let me find out what I can about what the French are likely to do," said Jim; and went over to talk to Raoul.
The French knight, while with them all the way, had been maintaining a sort of distance between himself and them. It was not as if he had any actual dislike for them, or a reluctance to be closely in their company. It was almost as if duty required him to show that he was not one of them.
"Sir Raoul," said Jim, coming up to him.
Raoul, who was seated cross-legged on the ground, eating some of the meat and bread that their late host had sent them out with, got to his feet.
"Yes, Sir James," answered Sir Raoul.
"You'd have a better idea than any of us about how fast the French forces can move," Jim said. "I was just talking to Sir Brian; and the indications are that the English forces are less than a day away. How soon do you think it'll be before the French forces come up with them?"
"Not much more than that one day, Sir James," answered Raoul. "King Jean will be eager to come to battle with these intruders. And his knights will be no less eager. It's true, that once they sight the English forces they will have to arrange their own in battle array. That may take half a day or so."
"So you think that possibly tomorrow by this time, about noon," said James, "we might see a battle starting?"
Sir Raoul's lean face broke into a harsh smile.
"I would not doubt it at all, Sir James," he said.
"Then I'll tell the others," said Jim. "We'll need to push on as fast as we can. Today we're more rested; and so, today we ride!"
Indeed, they rode. Thanks to the padding and to two more days' experience in the saddle, Jim found in himself more strength than he had expected. He assumed it was the same with the others. They neither complained, nor showed the outward signs of tiredness they had shown the day before. They covered ground.
Soon after nightfall they came to the fringes of the English army and set up headquarters for the night in a thoroughly ruined stone chapel some distance behind the English camp-fires. The chapel was so small that it was hard to believe that so much work had gone into building something that could house so few worshipers.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Jim woke before dawn to the sound of voices and horses moving by where he had been sleeping. He peered out of the rubble of the chapel, amongst which they had all found places to bed down, and saw about a dozen lightly armed men-at-arms on horseback riding by. They had all the earmarks of a foraging party starting out early to see what they could sweep up from the countryside by way of food and drink for the English army.
They paid no attention to the chapel. From this Jim judged, much to his relief, that it had been investigated long since and dismissed as having nothing of interest about it. Their lack of interest was particularly fortunate because the horses Jim and the others had used were tethered in the woods behind the chapel, and if the foraging party had happened to have been going in a slightly different direction, it might have stumbled across them. As it was, they and the horses were safe—for the moment.
Jim threw off the saddle blanket in which he had rolled himself to sleep; and got up shivering from the morning chill, to go outside the chapel and look around in the beginning light of day.
A short path through the trees in front of the chapel brought him out into the open space where the English expedition was camped. It was on a small rise and from there he could look out some distance. There was light enough to see clear to the horizon, and the new day brought a new shock.
The French army was already here. It might not yet be in position. But it, too, was camped—perhaps half a mile distant across the open meadowland between the English army and itself.
There was no time to lose. Jim went back in and roused the others.
"Breakfast!" croaked Brian, on being awoken—as automatically, Jim found himself thinking, as a nestling squeaking with open mouth as its parent landed on the edge of the nest with a juicy worm in its beak.
"Cold food only," said Jim. "We can't risk lighting a fire, with foragers moving around us."
Eventually he had them all assembled outside, both Giles and Brian chomping on the last of the bread and meat.
"Giles, Brian, Dafydd," said Jim, "all of you will have to go out, as I will, and search through the English lines until we find John Chester and our men. Once we find them, we want them to slip away quietly, by twos and threes, from the rest of the line, attracting as little attention as possible and gathering here at the chapel."
"And I, Sir James," demanded Edward. "Would it not be better if I simply rode forward openly and announced myself to my own people?"
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"We don't dare let anyone see you, Your Highness," said Jim. "Not while, according to Carolinus, most of them believe you've joined the French king. You'd be surrounded immediately, and possibly treated as an enemy. In any case, you'd be mobbed; and the English forces would be thrown into a tangle of dispute between those who believed in you and those who did not; at the very time when they ought to be getting ready to face an assault from the French. Let's get our men here first. Then I may be able to arrange a situation in which you can be put into sight with the least danger to yourself; as well as confronted with this magically-made impostor of Malvinne's."
"Indeed," said the Prince, his eyes narrowing and his hand clasping almost convulsively, "I can't wait to meet such an impostor, weapon in hand."
"If all goes well, you shall, Highness," said Jim, "but for now, until we have our men about us, any attempt to bring you forth will be too risky."
"What do you suggest I do then, Sir James?" demanded the Prince.
"Stay hidden here, Highness," Jim answered. "I've had a good look at the chapel. There's one way in that's at all clear, though it's only wide enough for one man at a time. It's a former aisle of this place, and ends in a pile of stone that goes up to a still-standing part of the roof. It looks as if there's no way out beyond it. But actually, one of the lower stones is easily moved by one person and you'll find behind it a hole in what was formerly the back wall of the chapel. If you stay at the inner end of that aisle, you can easily slip out through the back wall, pulling the stone back into place behind you, if anyone tries to enter the chapel. Or stay where you are, if others are outside, and not be seen. Aragh, who'd better not go out among these humans in any case, and Sir Raoul, can stay with you, as guardians."
"I think I can put myself to better use than that, Sir James," came the voice of Sir Raoul.
Jim turned to look at the French knight, as did all the rest.
"I can make a circuit and penetrate among those of the French forces who don't know me personally," said Raoul. "That way I can learn a good deal about what King Jean and his troops intend. You may need that knowledge."
"I don't know, Sir Raoul," said Jim doubtfully. "The Prince needs protection; and while Aragh is more than a match for several ordinary light-armed humans like the ones I saw earlier, an archer or a crossbowman presents a real threat to him."
"I'll survive," said Aragh. "If not, then death merely comes to me here rather than elsewhere."
"Let Sir Raoul go," said the Prince, with a tinge of contempt in his voice. "Only, in any case, one of you give me your sword belt and sword. It is unseemly that one of royal blood and a Plantagenet should go unarmed."
This demand sent a wave of uneasiness through the group. No one of them there, particularly the knights, liked the idea of being parted from his primary weapon. On the other hand, it was hard to deny the Prince—particularly hard for Brian and Giles. Neither of them was wearing their golden spurs of knighthood; and, aside from those spurs, it was the sword belt that marked them as men of rank. For Raoul—even if he would give his sword to an English Prince—to go among the French forces with nothing but a poignant would be to put himself at a tremendous disadvantage, as far as learning the information he had promised to try to get for them. For Brian and Giles—and, for that matter, Jim—to be without their swords was less critical, but only slightly less so. The hard fact was that they had no extra sword to spare for the Prince; although his request was not something that could ordinarily be denied.
"I think I can be of some help in this situation," came the soft voice of Dafydd. "I will go to my gear and be back in a moment."
He was gone before any of them could ask him what he meant. He returned a moment later with a long bundle, which he unwrapped to reveal before them not only a knight's sword, but a sword belt studded with jewels.
"Indeed, it is a belt and sword such as a knight of consequence would wear," said the Prince suspiciously. "But how did such as you come by this?"
"One of your royal father's wardens of the Welsh marches," answered Dafydd, "—I will not name the name of that particular Lord, that no one may suffer for this—decided to hold a tourney. And it came to him that as part of the entertainment it might be amusing to his English audience, as well as instructive to the Welsh among them, to see three English knights, with lances and in full armor, ride down a certain Welsh bowman of whom they had all heard, who was supposed to be deadly even to knights in plate."
"The archer was yourself?" asked the Prince.
"It was that," said Dafydd, "and little say was I given as to whether I would play my part in this entertainment. Nonetheless, I went with them; and when the time came, stood at one end of the lists with my bow and quiver of arrows while the three knights rode down upon me."
"And then?"
"I had no choice," said Dafydd. "I slew them all, each with a shaft through his heart."
"Through plate armor?" said the Prince incredulously. "At what distance?"
"The full length of the lists," said Dafydd, "and for all that they had specially armored themselves as well, underneath their regular suit of plate, so that they wore chain-mail shirts below the solid metal. I had asked one thing only of that Warden before the tourney: that, since when two knights encountered in tournament, the loser gave up horse, weapons, and armor to the victor, I might have the arms and weapons of those I overcame—and, laughing, he said it should be so."
For a moment silence held them all.
"I do think that he was ready to change his mind and not make good on his promise, after he saw his three knights lie dead on the ground," went on Dafydd with no change of tone, "but there were too many watching, both English and Welsh. His word had to carry some weight of honesty for a man in his position. He let me take what I wanted; and I chose only one thing, this, the best of the swords and belts; for I had no use for armor, look you, nor for war-horses ordinarily. I had but asked for all to make my point."
He stopped speaking, but still no one else seemed ready to speak. They all merely stared at him.
"It is a strange thing." His voice became thoughtful. "You will remember, Sir James. Back in the matter of the Dark Powers and the Loathly Tower, when for a moment you turned your back on the duty of rescuing the Lady Angela as we were at banquet in the hall of Castle de Chaney ? In that moment of your decision, the flames of all the candles there leaned as if in a wind, but there was no wind. You will recall I remarked on this at the time, though the rest of you had not noticed? I mind me I mentioned then, that in my family, from father to son, and mother to daughter, for many generations, there had been eyes to see warnings, good and bad. So it was with this sword. I was sadly gathering my gear together to go with you; and I had no thought of taking it. But strangely, that morning, when my golden bird, Danielle, had as much as ordered me out of her sight, it seemed that everything I touched and would take with me felt cold to my touch. However, when by chance I touched this sword and sword belt, they felt warm. And the old feeling came upon me. So I brought it—I knew not then why. Perhaps the reason for my bringing it is now."
He laid it on a stone before the Prince.
The Prince reached a hesitant hand toward it, then drew the hand back.
"It is a knight's sword, certainly," the young man said slowly, "but I do not wish to wear it."
There was another moment of silence. Then the silence was broken by Giles's voice.
"If His Highness would deign to wear the sword and belt of a small but honest knight," said Giles, unbuckling his sword belt, "I would be proud to give him mine; and wear this one that Dafydd has brought, in its place."
He held it out to the Prince, who took it almost eagerly.
"I will accept this with thanks, Sir Giles," said the Prince, "and consider it an honor to wear the sword of a man who has used it in combat, when I have never."
Edward buckled on Sir Giles's sword belt and sword, while Giles took up the one that Dafydd had brought and put it on. The jewels
in its belt flashed in the morning light, so that belt and sword together seemed strangely out of place on this small, fierce man with his hooked nose and large pale mustache.
"That's settled then," said Jim. "Aragh will stay with you, Highness—and you will keep yourself well hidden until we return?"
"I shall take no chances on being seen, Sir James," said Edward with a touch of humor. "You may count on me for that."
"And you may count on me to guard him while I live," growled Aragh.
"It is a good wolf," said the Prince.
"It is neither good, nor impertinent," answered Aragh. "It is a wolf—few can say that. Further, it is Aragh; and only I can say that."
So, with a touch of embarrassment on the part of the listening knights, the gathering broke up. The Prince retreated into the security of the ruined chapel, Aragh vanished into the woods as was his habit; while the rest of them went to their horses and, once astride them, headed off in their different directions.
They fanned out as they approached the British lines from the rear. Jim had chosen to take the far end of the line from the chapel, which happened to be situated behind the right-hand side of the line near its outer edge. But he wanted to begin his present examination of the archers and men-at-arms on the left wing of the English forces, for that was the common position of the archers—out on the wings in what was known as the harrow formation—when they lined up for battle. Before a battle, therefore, the English archers were normally to be found at the ends of a camp, in preparation for movement into their combat positions.
Jim reached the far end of the camp line—or what he assumed to be the end of the line, because it was impossible to tell exactly where the English army stopped in that direction. People straggled in and out of the lines at all times. He turned back, riding along the line toward the center of it.
He passed over the archers fairly quickly, for none of the men he was seeking had been archers and it was unlikely that he would recognize a familiar face among them. Dafydd would be on the other end of the British lines, going through the archers there more slowly, and looking for any who might be recruited to help.