The Nameless Day by Sara Douglass

Edward did nothing but stare: eight thousand men at Chatellerault? Sweet Jesu!

“Charles sends his regards,” Philip continued. “And says that you may keep his grandfather. At John’s age he won’t stay ransomable for long!”

And then, laughing, Philip whipped his horse’s head about, motioned to his escort, and with a clatter of hooves and a final glinting of golden light, was gone.

CHAPTER TWENTY

After Nones on the Feast of St. Felicity

In the fifty-first year of the reign of Edward III

(early afternoon Tuesday 23rd November 1378)

— II —

THE BLACK PRINCE HALTED his entourage the moment they rode back into the open light. He waited until all the men were out of the tunnel, and until the fifty who had waited just outside its mouth—as well as Wat Tyler, who had recovered his own mount from some hiding place—had formed a protective ring about the core party, then he wheeled his destrier’s head to the south and spurred him forward.

Bolingbroke pushed his own horse forward, Thomas riding by his side, and the escort fell in behind.

The Black Prince turned slightly to make sure that all was in order, and spoke quickly to Thomas. “When we get back to the main camp, Thomas, you are going to tell us who this saintly damsel is that has inspired Charles and the damned Philip.”

Then he faced forward again, and urged his mount to greater speed, thundering south across the rolling low hills.

THEY RODE without a break for about an hour, until close to mid-afternoon.Then the Black Prince, still leading, slowed his horses and looked about wonderingly: the day was darkening as if the sun was about to set, but surely there were still some few hours until dusk?

Thomas and Hal, just behind the prince, likewise slowed, and Thomas turned to

look behind him.

There were only three men-at-arms to be seen. All the others had apparently vanished into a roiling cloud that swept up behind them.

He whipped forward again. “My lord! My lord!”

For a moment he thought the Black Prince hadn’t heard, but then the man halted his horse and turned to look.

The prince began to speak, then halted, his mouth part-way open as he stared beyond the small group of riders who still accompanied him.

Thomas and Bolingbroke pulled their mounts to a halt, the remaining three men-at-arms with them.

“What has happened to the rest of the escort?” the Black Prince said, his sharp eyes moving between Thomas and Bolingbroke, and then to the other three men.

“And what is this mist?”

No one answered immediately, all apparently as shocked as the prince that over fifty men had so easily vanished.

And so quietly.

Edward looked about. The first tendrils of mist were creeping around them now, and they would be enveloped within a few minutes.

“Ah!” the prince said. “We have another hour’s riding before us before we reach our camp for the night, and I have no yearning to sit here waiting for that damp fog to envelop us completely. The men will have to find their own way. They no doubt fell behind, and became disorientated … I have heard no ring of steel, nor the sounds of a battle.”

“Come.” He waved their small group forward, but rode only at a trot now. The mist was all about them, and to ride faster would risk a horse breaking a leg in a ditch or burrow.

Thomas rode a little closer to Bolingbroke, meaning to ask the man if he was well, for his face seemed pale, and his eyes introspective, when there was a shout from one of the men-at-arms.

“Ware! Ware! Ware to the left!”

Every eye swung in the direction the man pointed.

They were riding through uncultivated grasslands, the dry brown stalks of the meadow reaching almost to the horse’s bellies.

Through this tall grass shapes were moving, perhaps some ten paces away in the mist.

Large shapes, tawny, and as fast as the horses.

“And there!” Bolingbroke said, pointing in the opposite direction—they were surrounded by the creatures!

One of the men-at-arms cried out in fear, and the Black Prince angrily hushed him.

“What are they?” the Black Prince said. There was no panic in his voice, nor fear, and his face was calm. Thomas realized that at the first indication of danger the prince had slipped into his famed battle coolness.

For a moment or two no one answered, then Bolingbroke spoke hesitantly. “I remember tales of the Crusades, of when men moved through the grasslands of

northern Africa. There they encountered great cats—lions—that stalked their horses, and oft times brought them down. I… I have heard there are no creatures as fearsomely efficient at killing than these.”

The Black Prince turned his horse about in a tight circle, trying to get a better view of the creatures. Dons? Here in France?

But what eke could they be?

“Bunch up,” he said. “And face outward. There is no beast that a good English soldier cannot best.”

“They are not lions,” said Thomas quietly, a coldness seeping through him. He knew why they had come. “And they are not beasts such as we know.”

The Black Prince glanced at him sharply, while Bolingbroke turned about in his saddle and regarded Thomas with an unreadable expression.

“Then what are they, man?” said the Black Prince. All the men had bunched into a tight circle, each man facing his horse outward, his sword drawn.

All save Thomas, who stood his mount slightly apart from the others.

“They are demons,” he said. “Come to collect the remains of their brother.”

Then, as if to prove the truth of his words, a humped shape rose on its hind legs not four paces from the horsemen. It was clearly no cat, although it had some cat features—the squareness of face, the sharp white fangs, the swishing tail—and resembled nothing so much as the grotesque demons and gargoyles that crawled in lifeless stone over every cathedral in Christendom.

It had luminous orange eyes, shining like corrupted lanterns in the false twilight of the mist.

The men-at-arms murmured, and again one cried out in fear, but the Black Prince—as horrified as everyone else—did nothing to quiet them this time. The horses, terrified, tried to bolt, and the men only barely managed to keep them under control.

The demon grinned—although it could just as well have been a grimace—and spoke in a harsh voice. “Here’s Tom, pretty Tom, riding about the countryside without his angel companion. What’s wrong, pretty Tom? Have you lost your angel?”

Several other demons now stood up, staring unblinkingly at the horsemen, eyes glowing, tongues drooling between white fangs.

At last, thought Thomas, they have assumed their true forms.

The Black Prince turned and stared at Thomas.

Another demon sidled closer, sneering at the glint of swords pushed in its direction. “Hello, Edward, so handsome in your black armor. Has Tom told you that your world is sidling closer to a conclusion? Has he told you that all you hold dear and sweet will soon be lost… to us? Has he told you that the day of reckoning is not going to be quite what you’ve been told by your holy brothers?”

The Black Prince whipped his head around to the demon who had spoken, and then back to Thomas. “Tell me what this means, Thomas!”

“What? What?” Now several score of demons were either standing or circling about, all laughing and howling. “Hasn’t Tom told you what’s happening, Eddie? Has

he left you all in the dark? My, my, you’d best make sure he doesn’t work on our behalf.”

They screamed with laughter, and Thomas fumbled with the blood-encrusted bag that hung at the back of his saddle. He finally worked the thong free, then stood in his stirrups and threw the loathsome bundle into the midst of the demons.

“Take it!” he screamed. “Take the head of your brother and leave us be… in God’s name!”

The laughter ceased abruptly, and one of the demons, the largest of them all, now hopped to within a pace or two of Thomas. “God means nothing to us,” it said.

“Nothing! We mean to recreate the world to our needs, Tom, and your God will have little place in it!”

And with that it hissed, dropped down to all fours and bounded away. Thomas, as all the other men, twisted and turned about—all the demons had either disappeared, or were vanishing rapidly into the night.

The Black Prince kneed his horse dose to Thomas and leaned over, grabbing Thomas by his robe and pulling his face to within a handspan of his own.

“We are now going to ride in all haste back to Chauvigny,” he hissed, “even if it takes all night. And once we get there, you are going to tell us every one of the cursed secrets you harbor!”

He gave Thomas—pale-faced and silent—a hard shake, then let him go, wheeling his horse about. “Bolingbroke! You will guard Thomas with your life. If he escapes between this patch of cursed earth and Chauvigny, then you will die! Believe it!”