The Doomsday Code

CHAPTER 48

1194, Sherwood Forest, Nottinghamshire

‘So … the pig says back to the farmer, “If ye sees what I seen yer wife’s up to, ye’d ’ave a curly tail too!”’ Eddie’s ruddy face crumpled like an old rug on a smooth polished floor. The other soldiers behind him, those within earshot, cackled along with him like a bunch of fishwives, their voices echoing off into the forest either side of the track.

Liam looked at the captain of his escort. ‘Sorry, Eddie, I’m not sure I get it.’

‘Well, sire … See, the pig’s been watchin’ the farmer’s — ’

Behind Eddie, one of the soldiers suddenly lurched forward. He dropped his shield and started clawing with both hands at his throat.

‘What’s …? Whuh?’

Then Liam saw a bright spurt of crimson gushing from the young man’s flapping mouth, and for the first time noticed the stub of a crossbow bolt protruding from the front of his throat.

Eddie responded far more quickly. ‘FORM UP!’ His parade-ground voice filled the forest trail just as another dozen projectiles whistled through the air towards them. Two arrows thudded into the horse’s flank either side of Liam’s right thigh. The horse reared up and he rolled backwards over the beast’s rump to land heavily on the hard mud track. The horse bolted, leaving a wake of dust behind it.

Liam was winded, lying on his back gazing up at a rich blue summer’s sky punctuated by blurred slithers of movement — arrows and bolts passing overhead. He struggled to get a breath in him and then eventually, suspecting he’d spent the better part of a minute on his back, he hefted himself dizzily up on to his elbows.

Through a cloud of dust he could see his men, shields raised above their heads as they clustered around him, squatting down in a protective circle. The peace of the forest was lost in the deafening rattle of arrow tips clattering off their shields.

‘It’s an ambush!’ Liam struggled to gasp as he pulled himself on to his hands and knees.

Eddie looked back over his shoulder and nodded. ‘Worked that out, sire!’

Over the rim of shields, Liam could see their attackers now: flitting dabs of olive and brown rags among the trees and bracken. Impossible to guess how many of them but far more than his escort of twelve, he figured.

He cursed himself for not having Bob come along with them yesterday. But he’d been far more concerned that the rest of the column, laden with wagons of food and several bags of coins, made its way back to Nottingham Castle without incident.

Too cocky, by half.

He’d made the mistake of believing the bandits had fully moved on from Sherwood Forest. That he’d done a better job of shooing them off than he apparently had. If he’d only just taken Bob with him … even just another ten or twenty men?

You idiot.

One of Eddie’s lads grunted deeply and rolled flat on his back, an arrow through one eye. One of his legs twitched and drummed against the hard-baked mud as he went into shock.

‘Sire!’ barked Eddie. ‘We should keep moving!’ He nodded up the forest track, the way they’d been heading. He was right. They’d been well on the way home. Another two hours … and the forest gave way to open fields across a rolling hill down to Nottingham. If they kept in tight formation, kept their shields up, kept moving, they’d have a better chance than they would staying put here.

‘Right … yes!’ Liam nodded.

Eddie barked at his men, ordering them to tighten up closer together. ‘With me now!’ he yelled, and began to step forward. The other men followed suit, with Liam huddled in the middle, pulling the thick velvet cloak round his neck, as if it had any chance of stopping an arrow.

They began to make painfully slow progress along the forest track, little more than a shuffle that kicked dust into the air and filled their eyes and mouths with grit.

Another man went down, howling in agony and clutching at an arrow shaft through his shin.

‘This is no good!’ shouted Liam. ‘We’re not going to get very far!’

He saw Eddie nodding under the shadow of his shield, its thin metal peppered with gashes and dents through which rays of sunlight streamed.

‘We could make a break for it, sire!’

Liam chanced a quick look up the trail. Some of their attackers had spread across the track, a thin line of men in rags casually stringing arrows and firing opportunistically their way. More than a dozen up ahead, but none of them armoured, none of them equipped for close combat.

Eddie and his remaining nine could probably take them, break through, and then after that it would be every man for himself: drop shields, drop swords and just run for it.

‘All right,’ Liam nodded, his mouth dry. ‘Yeah … L-let’s do that, then.’

Eddie cleared his throat and spat. ‘Men! On my word … we charge down the archers ahead! Clear?’

Several heads nodded. A mixture of young and old faces. Some of them he knew had seen a fight before, most of them hadn’t; they were little more than farm workers who’d been taught how to bear a shield, swing a sword and march in a straight line.

‘Make ready!’

Liam felt naked, no chain mail, nor shield or sword. He unclipped the robe from his neck and let it fall to the ground. It was only going to slow him down. He pulled a ceremonial knife from the belt round his waist. An ornate dagger with a beautifully decorated haft and a pointlessly blunt and useless blade. Still, it felt better than having nothing in his hands.

‘Sire?’ Eddie nudged him gently. ‘Ready?’

He nodded, working his tongue round his mouth, trying to find some spittle in there.

The hell I am.

He saw Eddie doing the same and realized in that moment that he wasn’t the only one scared out of his wits. ‘On my word we rush them,’ Eddie’s voice rasped, ‘and make as much noise as ye can, lads. We’ll scare the devil out of them.’

A couple of the older faces grinned at that.

‘Right, then …’ Eddie took a lungful of air. ‘AT ’EM!’

Without hesitation, the men he’d been drilling these last few months, uneducated field hands that he’d managed to build a bond with, surged forward as one, a defiant roar coming from every mouth.

Liam found himself sprinting forward, shoulder to shoulder with them, his own screaming voice filling his ears.

The thin line of archers, twenty yards ahead of them, regarded them with comically round eyes. He saw a couple of them fumble to string and then drop their arrows in panic. Others fired hasty and ill-judged shots that whistled too high over them. But then as the gap quickly closed, he saw one, then several, then the rest, take the first faltering steps backwards which swiftly turned into a full-scale rout.

‘GO ON! RUN, YE COWARDS!’ screamed Eddie, a wide manic grin stretched across his face.

Ahead of them, the archers pelted down the forest trail like startled rabbits. Liam chanced a glance over his shoulder and saw more of them emerging from the woods behind them, loosing off arrows their way, many of them falling short.

We’re gonna do it, he found himself thinking, for the first time daring to wear a defiant grin on his own face.

But then, on to the trail ahead, a tall figure emerged.