Earth boomed, mud-water splashed, hoofs broke into gallop. Will did not draw steel. Instead, he removed his loaded scrip and whirled it by the strap. Rupert gave him a puzzled look but had no time to say more.
The leading Roundhead was on him.
“Yield thee or be cut down!” the man bawled.
Rupert stood firm. The horse reared to a halt. A blade whined from above. Rupert’s met it in mid-stroke.
Metal screamed, sparks spurted. Sheer violence tore the rider’s weapon loose, sent it spinning free. Before he could skitter off, Rupert’s left hand had him around the jackboot. A heave, and he was out of his seat, entangled in one stirrup. His charger whinnied and bolted, dragging him through the mire.
Will had let fly the bag. It struck the second cavalryman in his jerkin. He whoofed out air and slumped across his saddlebow. Now Will unscabbarded sword.
He and Rupert came in on either side of the third trooper. The fourth tugged pistol from belt. Jennifer sped his way. “Aye, to me, good lad!” he encouraged her.
“Indeed to thee,” she said. “Accept my staff.” She gave it to him across his wrist. He yelped and dropped his firearm. She whacked him in the nose. He bellowed and clutched at red ruin.
Rupert and Will got their quarry disarmed and dismounted. The prince soared into the saddle. He went after the first horse, which had slowed, caught its bridle, released its erstwhile master, and led the animal back for his friend. Together they rode at the remaining two. Dazed, Jennifer’s victim offered no resistance when Rupert relieved him of weapons and commanded him to earth. The man of the book recovered sufficiently to spur his own beast into headlong southward flight. No one bothered to pursue.
“O Jennifer!” Rupert cried. While he rode about rounding up prisoners, he kept blowing her kisses. She clutched Prospero’s emblem and glowed.
“One escaeped but three captured,” Will said, “Not a bad bag.”
The peasant had sat open-mouthed. Will cantered to him, reined in, and exclaimed: “Why, it be my neighbor, Robin Sledge!”
The other must swallow several times before he got out: “Will Fairweather… back from tha dead?”
“Not yet. However, quick ere I bogie thee, how’s my house?”
“Tha last I heard or zaw, unharmed. Ye be lucky, dwellin’ offzide as ye do.”
Will wiped his forehead, albeit he said merely, “Foarezighted, Robin, foarezighted. When I war after a croft to rent, an’ zaw how thic un zits vizzy-vizz tha coney runs—Well. How’d’st thou fall in’mongst theeazam bad companions?” He jerked a thumb at the muddy, bloody, and disconsolate Parliamentary soldiers.
“Scouts, wantin’ of a guide; not that there be aught left for Croom’ll to fear, or war till you three caeme.”
“Thou’d’st help them cantin’ rebels, Robin? Thou?”
“I’d scant choice when asked,” Sledge said bitterly. “Two zons o’ miane, Tom an’ Ned, be’listed under tha King. I’d better do what I can to win mercy for’em, do tha’ live.”
Rupert had trotted up, stopped, and listened. “How goes the war?” he inquired.
“It rocks tow’rd an end, zir,” Sledge sighed. “Tha last o’ tha loyal pulled out o’ Glastonbury an’ onto tha Tor.
Thic should’a been better to defend; but him Croom’ll—rebel commander—Well, I zoldiered a bit whan I war yound, an’ zince ha’ downed many a pint along o’ veterans what ben’t all witless bags o’ brag; but never have I zeen or heard o’ one liake Croom’ll.’A must be wiald to catch tha King; for’a’s drawn in everything’a got, ne’ miand hoaldin’ tha countryzide peaceful;’a’s laid’em’round tha hill tighter’n Jack Ketch’s noose; an’ his guns only stop hammerin’ whan they crunch cloaser inward. From what I zeen, zir, I doan’t give tha King three days, nor no chance to slip free.”
Rupert and Will exchanged a look more bleak than the wind.
Abruptly the prince said, “Thanks for thy word, goodman. Thou might’st as well play safe by conducting these fellows further, after I’ve interrogated them about dispositions and so forth.’Tis not thy fault they were overpowered.” He laughed, not blithely. “True, they’ll have to fare afoot. We’ve need of three horses, also of buff coats and the rest. Well, let them walk, and in their natural buff. They’ll doubtless be grateful for such help in mortifying the flesh and bringing down sinful pride.”
He turned back toward Jennifer.
Sledge stared after him. “Who be thic wight?”
“An acrobat,” Will said.
“A what?”
“One what treads a tightroape’bove hell. Come, let’s away an’ talk as long’s we can.”
XXIII
Cromwell’s army had started well up the staggered flanks of it. Few men were readily seen on either side.
Taking what lee they could in dug trenches or behind trees, bushes, boulders, bluffs, they lay waiting for their officers’ call to make the next advance or the next resistance. Musket fire crackled only irregularly.
This was the hour of the cannon.
Those roared steadily, in masses, from the Round-head stations. Muzzles flashed, missiles rumbled through air, solid shot hammered down and canister burst in shrieking thousandfold, over and over and over. Smoke hung in a bitter blue haze. For the wind had died with afternoon. A pallid sun glimmered, vanished, struck through again, out of slowly dissipating chill gray. Given such calm, the attackers employed a lately invented device: two hot-air balloons they had brought, tethered to float higher than the hilltop, observers in the baskets using telescopes and surveyors’ instruments to spot for the artillery to which they wigwagged down their signals—grotesqueries hanging above town and land like the future itself.
The Royal positions made slight reply. Riding, Rupert said to Will and Jennifer: “The guns are plainly few which our people could drag to the top of this mount. No doubt they’re equally poor in ammunition. They’d’ve been overrun erenow, were it not such labor hauling ordnance uphill against fire.”
“It costs, thic,” said Will. (A dead man sprawled in withered grass. ) “Why not just lay ziege?”
“We are the reason.” Rupert’s grin writhed. “Inadequate; quite likely soon refuted.”
“Too laete, I think we should’a cut our hair short, thee an’ me.”
“With Occam’s razor? Nay, not every Parliamentarian goes polled, the more so after weeks of dispute. I think best I be quickly recognizable at need. Meanwhile, wear thine Ironside outfit as if it belonged to thee.”
“Thine plainly does not,” Jennifer murmured.
“Well, I hate seeing a soldier sloppy-unlaced as myself,” Rupert admitted. “However, we mustn’t act apologetic, or timid, or unsure in any way. That’s death—or capture, which could be worse.
Behave as if we own the place.” His neck stiffened. “We do.”
Jennifer’s fingers tightened on Prospero’s staff. “ ’Twould be too cruel if thou… any of us got killed by a loyal sharpshooter.”
“Aye, we’ve a gap to win across, and must build our bridge with whatever wreckage we find;—Hold!”
Rupert drew rein. “I spy… Follow my lead, say naught, obey any command on the instant.”
A trio of fieldpieces—one sacar, two lighter falconets—had appeared as the riders passed a thicket. Shot and bags of powder lay heaped around; wagons and horses must have gone on elsewhere, for none but the crews were in view. Two men to a weapon, they swabbed, loaded, corrected aim, touched match to fuse, swabbed, loaded… An ensign squinted through his glass at the balloon which was visible from here, notepad held ready for a calculation of how best to lay the next barrage.
Rupert cantered toward them. Discharge crashed; his ears hurt, smoke rankled in his nostrils, echoes tolled.