Conqueror

XXII

Orm stood with the Norman heavy infantry, near the centre of the Norman line.

There were three blocks of infantry. Before each of the divisions were the missile-men, archers and crossbowmen and slingers. And behind them were the cavalry on their restless horses, the mailed knights with their mail coats and boots of steel.

Orm wasn't in the front row. Only Normans took those places, at least at first; Orm, a mere mercenary, was one rank back. But Orm was taller than the average, so he could see quite clearly to the north, across a marshy field and a steep rise.

And there stood the English, a vast row of them on a ridge, their colourful shields bright in the low sun. Harold faced William, then, for the first time since that fateful oath-taking in Bayeux.

Orm knew that the Normans preferred not to fight pitched battles at all. Easier to break a few peasants' heads than take on professional soldiers; easier to drive a country into submission with terror than to defeat it by force of arms. Today, it seemed, the Normans were going to be forced to fight the English way.

Orm's own hauberk, much battered and patched, was already hot and heavy on his shoulders. The hood that protected his neck and cheeks was a stiff mass over his head. Under the mail coat he wore a quilted tunic, with sleeves of boiled leather to protect his arms and legs. His conical helmet sat heavy and secure on the crown of his head, laced under his chin. His shield was a leaf-shaped slab of alder with a tip that swept down to his feet – awkward in the charge, but useful when the shield walls locked because it went low enough to protect his feet and ankles.

He weighed his axe, with its long ash shaft and blade of hardened steel. It was a massive weapon, heavy enough to cut through mail or fell a horse, another memory of Viking days. His sword was ready too, and he reached back with his gloved hand to grasp the hilt between the pommel and crossguard, testing the smoothness of the scabbard on his back. The long tapered blade of thick mild steel had a double edge and a central groove to reduce its weight. For most of the Norman infantry the sword, mace and lance, with leaf-shaped head and heavy shaft, were the main weapons. But Orm was a Northman and fought like one – indeed he fought more like the English, who were half-Danish now, like their King, and he hefted his big two-handed battleaxe.

Over the rumble of the voices of thousands of men he could hear the snap of the standards carried by the Bastard, where he rode with his half-brothers Odo and Robert behind the infantry lines. Orm looked over his shoulder. There was the white Pope's flag with its gold cross – and William's own standard, the black raven, a symbol of his pagan Viking ancestry, a memory of hell. The mood tightened, wordlessly; the men could sense the moment of attack was near.

The commanders of Orm's unit, Guy fitz Gilbert and Robert of Mortain, walked before the lines, their own bright swords drawn. 'Here we go, lads,' Gilbert called. 'If you need a shit or a piss do it now before you strap up your hauberks.' From the smell around him Orm knew that some of the men didn't need telling twice.

There was courage of a brutish sort in the faces of the men around him. They were restless, the burning energy that had been gathering since they had been roused before dawn surging; they longed for the killing to begin. But most of them were too young to know what was to come today.

And it was going to take a long day, Orm suspected, to dislodge a warrior like Harold.

At last the trumpets sang. The missile-men to the Normans' left were the first to go running across the field towards the English. Lightly armoured, they moved quickly.

So it began. The men roared.

The English on their ridge clattered their shields and shook their swords and axes. Orm could hear their cries of defiance: 'Godwineson!', and 'Bastard! Bastard!', an insult aimed at the prickly Duke. The Normans around Orm roared back: 'God aid us!', 'Holy Cross! Holy Cross!' As the missile-men ran on the noise became tremendous, pealing back and forth across the field. Orm, immersed in it, yelling himself, felt his heart beat faster, his spirit burn like fire. But through it all he could hear the most basic and brutal of the Englishmen's chants: 'Ut! Ut! Ut!' – Out! Out! Out! This was their home, and they were here to drive the Normans back into the sea, and that single word repeated over and over, a rhythmic animal grunting, communicated their determination as did no other.

Now horns blared, and at last came the order for the infantry to charge. Suddenly the world was full of motion and noise.

Hefting his shield on his left arm, his axe in his free right hand, his sword on his back, Orm strode forward with the rest. Around him powerful men in their heavy mail pushed forward, not quite running, their advance a fast determined pace. Looking over the heads of the lead troops Orm was able to see that the whole of the line was in motion, Normans at the centre, Bretons to the left, Flemings and Frankish to the right, thousands of men tramping down the hill.

The Norman missile-men were closing on the English lines, and Orm heard the cries of their commanders: 'Notch! Draw! Loose!' The archrs' bows were taller than they were; they held them up and drew their strings back to their chests, and the crossbows spat cruel iron bolts that splintered English shields. Orm could see a few of the English fall, and the day's first blood had been spilled. But the English had the benefit of the height of their ridge, and most of the arrows fell short.

The lead infantry reached the field's lowest point and began to slog up the marshy hill towards the English line. The going was hard over ground that was cut up by spiteful little ditches and gullies and ravines, and in places was too soft to bear the weight of an armoured man. Around Orm men fell, cursing, and hauled themselves to their feet, their mail coats covered in mud. Even if you didn't fall it was exhausting to battle through this heavy English clay. Orm was reminded of how he had fallen in a bog in Brittany, not unlike this land, and how Harold himself had saved his life. But still the Normans marched, still they kept formation, still they screamed their insults and clattered their shields.

When they got close enough the English responded. Missiles fell from the sky on the Normans, a hail of arrows, javelins, and stones from slings. Orm raised his shield, and took blows from falling rocks that jarred his shield arm. Again the height helped the English; their rocks and bolts fell hard. Your mail coat should protect you from the arrows: the English had no crossbows. Even so men fell around Orm, unluckily picked out in the face or neck by an arrow or a javelin. Blood blossomed bright, its first iron stink as shocking as ever.

Orm sensed the men around him flagging, tired even before they closed to fight, young faces showing fear at the first nearby spilling of blood. He raised his axe above his head. 'Let's at them, lads! Let's go in running! Those motherless English cowards won't expect that!' The shield wall in front responded. With a renewed roar they ran, their feet driving into the muddy ground. It was hard going up the brutal slope, but once he had the momentum, once his blood was up, Orm felt himself fly.

And suddenly they came on the English. The shield walls closed on each other with a slam. Orm was trapped in a struggling crowd, only one rank behind the Norman shield wall. The sheer momentum of massively armoured men smashing into their line pushed the English wall back, one pace, two. But they were held by their own ranks behind them, and the battle compressed into a long line of men, pressing. Metal flashed, blood splashed bright, and the screaming began.

Orm could barely move, let alone raise a weapon. But right before him a Norman infantryman went down under an English sword, and suddenly there was a hole. Orm stood on the still-writhing body of the fallen Norman to fill the gap.

A big brute of an Englishman faced Orm, swinging his sword under the Normans' shields, hoping to hamstring his opponents. But Orm got his axe over his head, free of the melee, and slammed it down into the face of the Englishman. Bone crunched, and the man's head was split like an apple from forehead to nose. His jaw gaped, wrenched loose of its joints, and blood gushed from the ruin of his face, drenching Orm's tunic. For one heartbeat Orm felt something quail in his soul. This first instant was always a shock in the head and the gut, when your arms and hands first felt the ache of the sheer effort of ending a man's life.

Then the man fell back. Orm dragged his axe out of his face.

Another Englishman came screaming out of the mass at him. He looked very young. Orm had a bit of space, and he dropped his axe and reached over his shoulder for the sword on his back, and swung it down with all his strength, once, twice. You didn't fight with the heavy weapon, sword on sword. It was essentially a sharp-edged club, and he just battered the Englishman down to the ground. Orm felt a stab of pity for the fallen boy.

But another came at him, screaming, and Orm raised his weapon again.

So it went on. All around him men fell, from both lines, but there were always more to replace them. There were no insults now, no chanting, only the meaty gurgle of torn flesh, iron scraping on bone, the liquid gurgle of blood, the rending screams of the fallen, and the stench of sewage and slaughter. It was the stink of the shield wall. And Orm, working at his gruesome butchering, knew that at any moment if he lost his concentration or dropped his guard he too would be scythed down.