Stronghold

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Earl Corotocus did not witness the death of Hugh du Guesculin. He never looked back once as he galloped hard along the causeway.

More of the dead were crossing it towards him. But he veered around them. He was no longer armed, but that was of no concern. All that mattered was flight. As the Gatehouse loomed towards him, he was struck by the alarming thought that they might now have closed the portcullis at its front entrance. This goaded him to spur his animal until its flanks bled.

Nobody else obstructed him as he charged in through the arched entrance and up the Gatehouse's central passage. To his relief the portcullis was still raised, though a fresh phalanx of corpses was coming in beneath it. Leaning low, cloak billowing, the earl snapped his reins with fury. Incitatus struck the dead like a streak of black lightning, scattering them on all sides. Corotocus hurtled out of the Gatehouse and into the entry passage. More of the dead streamed along it. He crashed through them one after another, though the main danger here was the charred human fat that seemed to smear every surface. His horse skidded dangerously on it, before righting itself at the end of the passage and bolting eastward along the berm path.

Corotocus might now have been outside the castle, but he was still far from safety. Hemmed against its ramparts by the moat, he knew he had to circumnavigate two thirds of the entire stronghold before he would reach the river, at which point perhaps the most desperate gamble of all awaited him — crossing to the other side in full mail.

The decayed horde was gathered en masse beyond the moat. Their demonic lament rose to a crescendo when they beheld him, but aside from throwing spears, rocks and other improvised missiles, they could not reach him. Small groups were still drifting along the berm in his direction, still seeking to enter the castle. But as long as they remained in these restricted numbers, he knew he was a match for them.

"Incitatus, the field!" Corotocus bellowed.

The mount was now galloping at full speed. Blood streamed from its flanks, not just where the earl had spurred it, but where the dead had clawed at it. Foam flew from its bit; its eyes burned like rubies, as if it somehow knew that these clusters of stick-figures cavorting towards it were responsible for its pain. It clearly relished the collision as, one by one, it bounced them out of its way.

Corotocus yelled with laughter. Occasional missiles hit him, but his mail or helmet deflected them. He rounded the castle's northeast corner, to find more of the dead approaching from the southeast. If such a thing were possible, they seemed surprised to be confronted by the fugitive. Again, he crashed through them, delighted as they were chopped apart beneath his hooves or smashed against the castle's skirted wall. At one point he encountered a dead woman carrying a dead child. Though pale of skin, they were barely marked by the grave. The clothes they wore — the woman's dress, her linen veil and wimple, the wooden clogs on her feet, the baby in its swaddling — they were all spotlessly clean. Fleetingly, they might have been alive, but, even if they had been, the earl would have ridden them down just the same. The woman was catapulted into the moat, losing the child as she fell. They both landed skulls first on the rocks below, their arms and legs spread-eagled. The earl rode on. Directly ahead lay his salvation, but also his deadliest obstacle. The Tefeidiad.

In normal times, to leave Grogen Castle, one would turn at its southeast corner, and follow the berm all the way to the southwest bridge. But beyond that lay the western bluff, from which the vast majority of Countess Madalyn's army were still pouring across. So only the Tefeidiad provided a possible escape.

As they reached the southeast corner, Corotocus reined his beast to a halt, its hooves ploughing furrows in the dirt. He loosened the strap beneath his chin, and threw his helmet off, shaking out his sweat-soaked hair. Then he unlaced his cloak.

The river glided past ten feet below. It was about sixty yards across to the far side. Only small numbers of the dead were visible over there, compared to the titanic horde on the other sides of the castle. But Cotorocus knew the river was too deep at this point for Incitatus to simply wade across. He had no doubt that his horse could swim such a short distance, but could it swim it with an armoured rider on its back? It was a chance Corotocus was prepared to take, because there was no time to remove his mail carapace as well.

He urged his animal to the edge. Breathing hard, lathered with sweat, the spirited beast might have been game for almost anything at that moment — but jumping into a broad, fast moving river? Snorting with alarm, it held back.

"Yaa!" Corotocus shouted, jamming his spurs into his mount's sides.

He could sense more of the dead approaching, both from the right and from his rear. He risked a glance. The dispersed groups that he'd thundered through with such ease had got back to their feet and turned in pursuit of him. Even greater numbers were headed towards him from the direction of the bridge.

"Yaa!" he cried again, goading his steed.

The first of the dead were only a few yards away, reaching out with their fleshless claws, when Incitatus's growing fear overcame its instincts. With a wild neighing, it leapt from the bank. Corotocus clung on as best he could. He knew that his extra weight would be a stern test for the beast, but, encumbered with mail, he couldn't afford to be dislodged.

Initially they both plunged beneath the surface, the icy, brown water closing over their heads. But then they broke back into the air again and, with a truly colossal effort, the horse began to kick its way forward. Corotocus hung onto the reins as the river flowed heavily against him. He tried to float his body as much as possible, but in his mail he wasn't buoyant. They were only a quarter of the way across when the poor animal started to sink, the water rising up its neck and up the earl's body.

"You damn coward, Incitatus!" the earl snarled. "Don't you dare fail me now! Not when we're almost home."

Of course, they weren't really 'almost home'.

Increasing numbers of the dead were appearing through the trees on the south shore. As they'd shown throughout the siege, these rotting cadavers appeared to be connected via some kind of inexplicable 'hive' consciousness. Several times during the siege, it had been remarked on by different men that they moved en masse and attacked together "like ants". In similar fashion, they'd now apparently become aware that the earl was escaping and were scrambling to intercept him. But in reality they were still few and far between on the far bank. Once he was ashore, he was sure he could get through them. From there it was only a day's ride to the English border and through woods and open countryside. No more blind alleys, no more embattled ramparts. Incitatus would make it for him, but, if the proud beast's heart burst asunder in the process, it was a price worth paying.

As if sensing the faith its master was putting in it, the horse renewed its efforts to reach the other side. They were now half way across, the icy flood breaking over their heads, the terrible undertow tugging at them. They'd already drifted maybe fifty yards. Without needing to look, the earl could sense Grogen Castle falling away to his rear.

But the rocks on the south shore were much closer. The trees loomed larger; he could see the spaces between them and the tangled undergrowth.

Then there was a crunching of shingle and the earl's heart leapt again. Incitatus had found the riverbed. The Tefeidiad was getting shallower. Suddenly, the charger was moving with greater strength and purpose. Corotocus alighted himself properly on its back. He tried to sit upright, though the water still came as high as his waist. He punched at the air with triumph — just as something being carried on the current collided with him.

It was below the surface, and at first he thought it was a fallen log or branch. Then he realised the truth. It was a body, so covered with weed and river-mud that it was only vaguely distinguishable as human. Not that it was human in any true sense.

With one hand, it grabbed at the earl's bridle.

With the other, it grabbed at the earl.

Corotocus shouted, but now he had no blade to fight it off with. An even deeper fear went through him when he realised that his assailant was wearing chain-mail and coloured livery — it was one of his own knights.

"Desist, you dog!" he cried. "You traitorous…"

Bracing its feet against the horse's flank, and with a single mighty heave, the dead retainer hauled its former master from the saddle.

Incitatus, weary but at last unburdened, continued on its way, wobbling ashore on foal-like legs, before trotting away to the east, dripping and shivering, unmolested by the ranks of corpses gathering there. A few yards away, Corotocus floundered, even though he was only now in three or four feet of water. His attacker had got to its feet and clamped one hand on his throat. Though hampered by his mail, the earl struggled back gamely. He hadn't come all this way to be thwarted at the final post. He struck his assailant over and over. They wrestled together, went beneath the surface again, broke back into the open air. The earl felt his strength ebbing while his assailant seemed tireless — but it was only when they came nose to nose that Corotocus of Clun suddenly realised the full peril of his predicament.

He froze with fear and disbelief as he stared into his opponent's face. Though smashed and wounded, though bloated from its immersion in the icy depths, and despite the brown river water gurgling from its gaping mouth, that face was horribly familiar.

"Ulbert!" Corotocus choked. "Ulbert, don't you recognise me, your lord and master?"

What had once been Ulbert FitzOsbern clearly did recognise Corotocus. For the grotesquely distended lips, which had once spoken only words of wisdom to the nobleman, now curved into a most fiendish grin.

Corotocus shrieked madly, insanely, as his former vassal tightened its one-handed grip on his throat, and, planting its other hand on top of his head, plunged him back beneath the water. And this time held him there.