The men walked slowly, loose-hipped, their eyes straight ahead, their heads and
shoulders still, their arms wary by their sides.
Two groups of men approaching each other across the newly harvested barley field, each
equally watchful. Every man among them wore smiles of disdainful confidence on their faces.
It was all show, all gamesmanship. Every man expected treachery to leap out at him from
the night.
Above them hung a heavy moon. A thin haze of clouds gave it a sickly yellow sheen, as
if it had somehow caught the miasma that had so recently enveloped the English army. It
drooped dully in the sky, as if tired of hanging on amid the exuberance of the stars.
The air was hot and dusty, and most of the men glistened with sweat. But better this dark
activity than tossing and turning sleepless on a pallet in camp.
Hal Bolingbroke, King of England, led the group of twenty-five Englishmen. He was
finely dressed in a crimson and forest-green tunic above ivory leggings and dark red Italian
leather boots, wearing no armour and only a slim sword at his hip. His silver-gilt hair was left to
lift in the breeze of his passing; his light grey eyes did not falter in their regard of the group that he approached.
A small purse hung at his waist.
Behind him walked seven nobles and eighteen sturdy and trustworthy men-at-arms who
led the party‘s horses.
They had one spare.
The group who walked towards them were of a similar composition to the English party,
save that they were led by a man in the rustling silken robes of an archbishop. The cleric walked
as confidently as did the English king, his head held as high, his face as arrogant.
His eyes slipped to the small purse at Bolingbroke‘s waist, and he permitted himself a
small smile of satisfaction.
―Greetings, King of England and Pretender to the French crown,‖ said the cleric as,
finally, the two groups came to a halt some two paces apart. ―I am pleased that you appear so
hearty, given the disease that has decimated your army.‖
Bolingbroke‘s face tightened. ―Greetings, archbishop. I regret to say that your concern
has no grounding. My army is well, and fit. What little illness there was has passed.‖
Archbishop Regnault de Chartres smiled cynically. The reports that he and Philip had
received put the English army at a fraction of its previous size. Eight thousand, perhaps. No
more. Bolingbroke was finished.
But he was still useful.
―I have what you want,‖ de Chartres said, seeing no point in wasting anyone‘s time. He
gestured slightly with his left hand, and two of his men-at-arms bought forward a hooded and
hunched figure.
The figure stumbled a little as it hit a raised sod of earth, but made no sound.
Bolingbroke stared at it, his eyes raised. ― This is the mighty Maid of France? Where her
powers? Her miracles?‖
De Chartres shrugged dismissively. ―I have not brought you miracles, Bolingbroke. Only
the maid, Joan. Do what you will with her.‖
The men shoved the hooded girl forward, and she tripped, falling to her knees before
Bolingbroke.
Bolingbroke smiled.
―And I have these for you,‖ de Chartres continued. He snapped his fingers at one of the
noblemen behind him, and the man handed him a packet of documents, tightly bound and sealed.
De Chartres took them and stepped forward, handing them to Bolingbroke over Joan‘s bowed
figure.
―You will find these useful, I think,‖ the archbishop said. ―They relate the girl‘s various
heresies, and her sorceries.‖
Bolingbroke took the documents readily enough, but raised an eyebrow. ―You are being
generous, de Chartres.‖
―I am a man of God,‖ de Chartres replied, and now it was Bolingbroke‘s turn to smile
cynically.
―You have been careful, I hope,‖ he said to the Frenchman. ―It would not go well for you
were your countrymen and women to discover your treachery to their Maid.‖
―I have been careful,‖ de Chartres snapped. ―Have you brought the money?‖
―The twenty thousand gold pieces?‖ Bolingbroke laughed, and took the purse from the
belt at his waist. He opened it, tipping a pile of silver coins into his hand. ―I have brought only
what you deserve, de Chartres. Thirty silver pieces, the regulation payment for any Judas.‖
He flipped the coins towards the archbishop, and they caught the moonlight as they arced
into the night, glittering like magical dots of light as they fell in a tinkling heap, one by one, at de Chartres feet.
He stared at them, but did not condescend to bend and pick them up.
―Do not think that she will do you any good,‖ de Chartres finally said softly, lifting his
head. Then he swivelled about on his heel, and gestured to his party to return the way they had
come.
Bolingbroke stared after him for a moment, then waved several of his men to come
forward, grab Joan, and hoist her onto the spare horse.
Then, just as Bolingbroke was mounting himself, de Chartres stopped in his tracks, and
spun about to shout a final message.
―Good King Hal,‖ he cried, ―I almost forgot. Philip of Navarre says that the final part of
the bargain between you is now also concluded.‖
Bolingbroke froze in the act of mounting, one leg hanging awkwardly over his horse‘s
back.
―He says that he hopes for your very best wishes,‖ de Chartres continued, and all could
hear the laughter in his voice, ―on the occasion of his marriage to Catherine of France. A happy
ceremony which I was glad to perform two nights ago.‖
Very, very slowly, Bolingbroke managed to lower his leg across his horse and settle in
his saddle. His face was completely expressionless.
―But at least you now have Joan,‖ de Chartres concluded. ―And with her, Philip says, you
must be content. Perhaps you shall not wish to burn her after all.‖
He laughed, mocking and triumphant, and Bolingbroke swung his horse about, and
spurred him into a gallop.
They arrived back in Rouen at dawn, Bolingbroke still stony-faced at the head of his
party. He led them to the entrance below the castle which he had made his headquarters, to the
dungeons, then commanded them in curt words to lift Joan from where she‘d been roped across
her horse and to follow him.
He led them deep into the underground vaulted chambers. The stone walls were damp
with constantly dripping water, and splotchy-dark with mould. Torches sputtered in infrequent
sconces, and everyone, save Bolingbroke, stumbled, cursing, from time to time. Joan was in a
pitiful state, for the hood still covered her features, and her hands were bound behind her back.
Had not two men kept their fingers buried in the shoulder material of her tunic she would have
hardly been able to walk at all. As it was, she had twisted her left leg at some point, and now it
dragged behind her.
Eventually Bolingbroke came to a halt before a door. Several men stood at guard outside,
and to these men Bolingbroke nodded curtly. ―Is it done?‖
―Aye, your grace,‖ replied a sergeant. ―Exactly as you ordered.‖
―Good.‖ Bolingbroke nodded to the sergeant, who produced a key from a bunch at his
belt, unlocking and swinging the door inwards.
Bolingbroke took a torch from one of the sconces, and stepped into the chamber.
After a moment he emerged, his face satisfied, and nodded to the two men who held a
half-fainting Joan between them.
They hustled her inside, Bolingbroke a half step behind them.
He closed the door as he entered.
Joan whimpered, hating her weakness that she did so. Her entire body ached from the
bruising ride tied across the horse‘s withers, and her head and ankle still pained her from her fall
three days previous, but worst of all was the pain in her heart and soul.
Betrayed in such brutal fashion. But then she had expected that.
What had distressed her more than she had known was to be treated in a more worthless
manner than was a common pig.
Brought here, to the heart of the hated English enemy camp, where, no doubt, they had
tortures aplenty devised for her, to be applied with brutal glee that they‘d finally got their hands
on the Maid of France.
Christ be with me, she prayed. But here, in this dankness, and surrounded with
Bolingbroke‘s enmity, she wondered if even Christ would be able to aid her.
Rough English hands grabbed at her simple clothing, and Joan cried out involuntarily.
They tore from her body her tunic, and her breeches, and the plain undergarments she wore
beneath.
Their hands rubbed against her breasts and belly, pinching, hurting, and she heard a snort
of derisive laughter.
―No,‖ she whispered, her face twisting in humiliation beneath the still-covering hood.
―No!‖
―You‘re too ugly for us, girl,‖ said one coarse voice, and then the hood was lifted from
her head.
Joan blinked, her eyes unaccustomed for many hours to any light at all. She crouched,