When Christ and His Saints Slept

55

Siege of Wallingford

January 1153

Steady rain had turned Stephen’s siege encampment into a morass. Knowing how wretched the roads were, Stephen was amazed to see William de Ypres ride into the camp, for after his sight had begun to fail, the Fleming rarely traveled beyond his own estates. But whatever had motivated Ypres to venture so far from Kent, Stephen was delighted that he had, for the gaunt, grizzled old soldier brought back memories of a happier time, memories of Matilda.

Horse litters were used only by the aged and the infirm and, sometimes, women. Most people would have agreed that a blind man could travel in a horse litter without shame. But pride was the only crutch William de Ypres would permit himself, and he’d continued to ride, as always, although his vision had now deteriorated to such an extent that he’d reluctantly agreed to let his mount be led. Theirs was an age in which the blind were too often condemned to a beggar’s fate, but Ypres was a very wealthy man, able to hire men to act as his eyes, and to judge by the conscientious way they watched over him, he paid them handsomely. The ground was treacherous, glazed and pitted, and even with their assistance, Ypres stumbled several times and once almost lost his footing altogether. But by then Stephen was there, guiding him into the shelter of his command tent.

“You remember my son?” Stephen said, beckoning his youngest forward to greet the Fleming. “Eustace is here, too, and will be right glad to see you. He always did think you walked on water, Will!”

Ypres was trying in vain to warm his hands over the brazier. “Eustace is in England?” he asked, surprised. “I heard he’d crossed over to France again.”

“He did, but he came back as soon as he got word that Henry Fitz Empress had sailed from Barfleur.”

“So it is true then? Maude’s son has come in answer to the Wallingford garrison’s plea? I was not sure if the rumors could be trusted.”

“It has been my experience,” Stephen said wryly, “that rumors and falsehoods are kin more often than not. But this time they speak true, Will.”

“Well,” Ypres said after a brief silence, “the lad does not lack for backbone, does he?”

“He comes by it honestly,” Stephen said generously, “for I’ve known few men who could match Maude’s grit. But grit alone is not enough, as her son is about to learn. All his strongholds are in the west, which means he’ll have to make a long and dangerous march clear across England, in the midst of winter, through shires hostile to him, whilst lugging along food for his army, since he’ll not be able to live off the land. And if and when he does reach Wallingford, I’ll be waiting for him. God Willing, I’ll be able to end this accursed war at last.”

There’d been a time when Stephen would have sounded jubilant in predicting victory. Now, he just sounded tired. “God Willing,” Ypres echoed, knowing that they were both thinking of Matilda, cheated of what she’d most wanted-to see peace finally come to her husband’s realm.

Stephen tilted his head, listening, and then rose. “I’ll be back,” he announced, and ducked under the tent flap. Riders were dismounting, stumbling toward the closest fire. “I thought I heard your voice,” Stephen said, moving toward his eldest son. “You found nothing out of the ordinary?”

“Nothing. We circled the entire camp, spoke with all the sentries. They’re as edgy as bridal-night virgins, flinching at shadows, as if they expect Fitz Empress to come charging over the hill at any moment.”

“It’ll get worse ere it gets better. Come back with me to the tent. You’ll not believe who rode into camp this afternoon-none other than Will de Ypres!”

Stephen was startled by the look that crossed his son’s face, one of dismay. “Eustace? I thought you’d be pleased. You always seemed so fond of him?”

Eustace shrugged. How could he explain that he was loath to see Ypres for that very reason, because the man had once loomed so large in his life? It was painful to see what he’d been reduced to, this man who’d once been feared by so many. It was like looking upon a lamed stallion, able only to hobble about when once it could race the wind. He glanced at his father’s puzzled face, then away, fumbling for an excuse to avoid the Fleming. But then he heard the shouting.

Stephen heard it, too, and felt a sudden unease. A lone rider was coming in, much too fast.

Within the tent, Ypres found himself alone with Stephen’s younger son. The Fleming had never had any dealings with Will, whose childhood had coincided with Ypres’s tenure as the king’s mainstay, the queen’s confidant. Doing some mental math, he concluded that Will was nigh on nineteen, although he seemed younger, untested. Ypres had heard it said that he’d inherited a goodly measure of Stephen’s affability. He hoped the lad had gotten some of Matilda’s mettle, too.

“May I ask you something?” Will spoke up suddenly, his curiosity getting the better of him. “Can you see anything at all?”

The question was oddly childlike, direct and without artifice, and Ypres answered in kind. “In one eye, nothing. In the other, I can still distinguish light and shadow…for now.”

Will nodded solemnly. But then he stiffened. “Did you hear that yelling? I’d best find out what it’s about.”

Straining to hear, Ypres could make out only a babble of rising voices. Once he would have been in the midst of the action. Now he must wait until someone remembered to return and tell him what was happening. It felt at times as if the very center of his world had become hollow, and try as he might to fill it with faith, the emptiness lingered. He was not sure why his faith was not enough, although he suspected that it was because it had come to him so late in life. If he were God, he’d look askance, too, at deathbed conversions. No matter what the priests might tell him, piety must lose some of its lustre when it was not altogether voluntary.

It was Will who eventually brought Ypres the news that had set the camp in such an uproar. “Malmesbury Castle is under siege,” he reported breathlessly. “The castellan sent my father an urgent plea for aid, saying the town has fallen to Henry Fitz Empress, and the castle is like to fall, too, unless the king comes to their rescue.”

Ypres showed no surprise; he’d been half expecting something like this. “I see,” he said laconically, and Will looked at him in bemusement.

“Well, I do not,” the youth admitted. “It sounds to me like Papa and the others are going to abandon the siege, and I do not understand why. I thought Wallingford mattered!”

“It does. Its fall would be a severe blow to the Angevins. The trouble is, lad, that Malmesbury’s fall would be a great setback, too-for us. It is the only royal stronghold of note left to Stephen in the west. Losing it would hurt us fully as much as Wallingford’s loss would hurt Henry Fitz Empress.”

Will frowned. “Well…would not the loss of the one offset the other? We take Wallingford, let them take Malmesbury…check and mate.”

“Unfortunately, it is not that simple. You see, the king cannot afford to ignore a challenge to his authority, lest others see that as weakness. If he did, he’d risk losing more than Malmesbury.”

“But that is not fair! If Henry makes Papa come to him, we’ll forfeit all the advantages we would have had at Wallingford.” When Ypres nodded, Will edged closer.

“My lord Ypres…do you think my father is a good battle commander?”

“Indeed he is,” Ypres agreed, reassuring Will by how readily he answered. “He is one of the best I’ve seen.” Leaving unsaid his private conviction that if Stephen were not, his kingship would never have survived this long, given how inept he’d proved to be at statecraft.

Will hesitated. “What of Henry Fitz Empress? Is he a good battle commander, too?”

“Yes, lad,” Ypres said grimly. “It is beginning to look as if he is.”

Despite the wet, frigid weather and the washed-out roads, Stephen responded to Malmesbury’s peril with commendable speed. Accompanied by those barons still loyal to him, he approached Malmesbury from the north, along the Cirencester Road. His scouts had warned Stephen that the River Avon was running high, but by the time his army made camp, darkness had fallen over the frozen Wiltshire countryside, and it was not until the morning that he discovered the full extent of the flooding.

The February dawn was storm-darkened, sleet and gusting winds assailing the king’s men with unrelenting ferocity as Stephen rode out to inspect the River Avon.

The Tetbury branch of the Avon narrowed as it flowed around Malmesbury, and was usually as easily forded as any stream. Despite the warning by his scouts, Stephen was unprepared for the sight that now met his eyes. The heavy rains had transformed the placid Avon into a churning cauldron, wide and deep and dangerous. Spilling over its banks, it swallowed up adjoining fields, sweeping uprooted trees along on its current as if they were twigs. Occasionally the men glimpsed a half-submerged body: drowned rabbits and badgers, an exhausted, foundering deer, a dog’s bloated corpse.

Stephen reined in his stallion, gazing out upon the floodwaters with consternation. Beside him, he heard men cursing. The wind was stinging, iced with sleet, and they soon turned back toward their camp.

Fortunately, the wind muffled the sounds of altercation coming from Stephen’s tent, for he would not have wanted this dissension to be overheard by his soldiers. He was stunned by the resistance he was encountering; it had never occurred to him that he might have to battle Henry Fitz Empress, Nature’s fury, and his own barons, too.

But that was proving to be the case. Led by Robert Beaumont, Earl of Leicester, they were arguing against launching an attack upon Malmesbury. The Earls of Derby and Arundel were most vocal in Beaumont’s support, but the Earls of Oxford and Warwick were murmuring muted agreement, too. Only Eustace and the Earl of Northampton showed any zeal for the upcoming battle. William de Martel and Stephen’s younger son took no active part in the discussion; they would do whatever Stephen willed. And in the shadows, William de Ypres listened in silence to the discord swirling about him.

“It would be folly to attempt an assault upon Malmesbury under these circumstances,” Robert Beaumont insisted calmly. He had none of his twin’s flamboyance, had always been overshadowed by Waleran, and had seemed content that it was so. But in the years since Waleran’s self-imposed exile from England, Robert had come into his own, and his sober, reasoned argument was falling on receptive ears.

Sensing that, Eustace focused his energies and his anger upon Beaumont, saying scornfully, “Just why do you think we marched on Malmesbury, my lord? To admire the winter countryside?”

That would have provoked a heated retort from Waleran. But Robert retained his composure, even his manners. “We had no way of knowing that the river would be impassable,” he pointed out coolly. “Now that we do, it behooves us to reconsider. I do not see how it will advance the king’s cause to lose half our army in the Avon.”

“If Robert Fitz Roy had been so leery of getting his feet wet in the Fossedyke,” Eustace riposted, “there’d have been no Battle of Lincoln, now would there?”

“Would that not have been for the best?” his brother asked, not meaning to be sarcastic, blushing when several of the men snickered and Eustace glared at him.

William d’Aubigny interceded before Eustace could turn upon his discomfited brother. “I do not believe this is a battle we can win,” he confessed, glancing apologetically toward Stephen. “Even if we get across the Avon, the wind is coming from the south. They’d have it at their backs, whilst we’d be getting hit in the face with sleet and icy rain. It is asking a lot of men to fight under conditions like that. Would it not be wiser to wait for-”

“Wait for what-the spring thaw?” Eustace raged. “Or for some of you to find your misplaced manhood? That much time we cannot spare!”

Robert Beaumont remained coldly impassive, but the hot-tempered Earl of Derby took immediate offense, and Stephen was forced to intervene. “It is obvious that we’ll do no fighting this day. If we must wait upon the weather, so be it.”

The squabbling subsided, but the ill will remained. And nothing had been resolved. Stephen was shaken by what he’d witnessed. Eustace’s gibes to the contrary, these men were not craven. But neither were they eager to do battle on his behalf. Was it truly just the vile weather that daunted them?

“My liege.” William de Ypres had risen to his feet, groping for his cane. “These old bones stiffen up in cold like this. May I ask you to summon my attendants, so they can escort me back to my own tent?”

Stephen was astonished, unable to believe he’d just heard William de Ypres, of all men, complaining of his infirmities and asking for help. After a moment’s reflection, he realized what the Fleming was up to. “It’ll be easier,” he said, “to take you myself,” brushing aside other offers, for he knew that Ypres wanted an opportunity to confer with him alone.

Sleet was bombarding the camp, the wind tearing at the tents, making life miserable for men and horses alike. Stephen gripped the Fleming’s arm tightly, steering him around the worst of the muddy sloughs. But Ypres stopped just before they reached his tent. “My men are within,” he said, “and what I have to tell you cannot be overheard.”

“We’ve braved worse perils together than winter weather,” Stephen said. “What is it, Will?”

“I can no longer wield a sword for you. But I can still be your ears, my liege. That is the real reason I asked to accompany you on this march, so that my men might listen and watch and learn. They’re quite good at it, as well they ought to be, for that was what I hired them for. And what they have told me is that you dare not fight on the morrow. You have more to fear than a flooded river.”

“What are you saying, Will? That I ought to fear treachery?”

“No, I’d not go that far. Your camp is rife with rumors, though. Supposedly, some of your barons have been in secret communication with Henry Fitz Empress. There is no proof to speak of, but I’d not dismiss these stories out of hand.”

“Who?” Stephen demanded, and Ypres shrugged.

“I would that I had evidence to offer, but I do not. Should you mistrust Beaumont because he keeps aloof from your court? Or because he wed his daughter to the Earl of Gloucester? Was he seeking a wealthy husband for his girl? Or a link to the Angevin camp for himself? Or both? And what of that private peace made between the Earls of Derby and Chester? Is that cause for suspicion? I wish I knew, but it would take a soothsayer to sort it all out. What I can say for a certainty is that these men have no stomach for this particular battle…whatever their reasons. If you force them into it, they’ll follow you. But I do not trust them to hold fast if the battle turns against you.”

Stephen sucked in his breath. “Lincoln,” he said hoarsely, and for an unsettling moment, it was almost as if he were reliving that nadir of his kingship, abandoned on the field by the men he had most reason to trust.

Ypres nodded. “Just so, my liege. I think they’d bolt at the first hint of trouble.”

A sudden blast of wind blew back Stephen’s hood, and he grasped at it with frozen fingers. “But what would you have me do, Will? How can I retreat without doing battle? How can I lose face like that?”

“Would you rather lose your crown?” Ypres asked bluntly. “You cannot risk it. How many Lincolns can you hope to survive, Stephen?”

It was the first time that he’d ever called Stephen by his given name. Stephen looked at him, realizing with relief just how much he trusted this aging, unscrupulous mercenary. Before he could respond, though, another voice cut into their conversation, as sharply as any sword thrust.

“I cannot believe it!” The wind had covered the sound of Eustace’s approach. His hood had fallen back and the rain had plastered his hair to his skull, running in rivulets down his face. His skin was reddened and chapped by the cold, but he seemed oblivious to the storm, staring first at his father and then, accusingly, at Ypres. “That you would betray us like this! When I was a lad, I…I thought you were a godsend, my father’s champion-” His voice choked. “More fool I, for forgetting what you really were-a man selling his soul to the highest bidder! How much is Henry paying you this time?”

“Eustace, you are wrong!” But Stephen’s protest went unheeded; his son had already spun on his heel. “Will…Will, I am sorry. I’ll make him understand…” Even in his agitation, Stephen did not forget Ypres’s need, and he hastily led the other man the few remaining steps toward his tent before plunging after his son.

Ypres caught hold of the tent moorings and stood motionless for several moments, shivering, in the freezing rain. He could do nothing for Matilda’s son. His kingship was already lost. The best they could hope for now was to try to save Stephen’s tottering throne. The Fleming was sure Matilda would have understood. He was just as sure Stephen did not, at least not yet. But Eustace did. The fear in his voice told Ypres that he understood all too well.

A wan February sun flitted between clouds, providing little warmth, but still a welcome sight to the winter-weary residents of Wiltshire. Ranulf and his Welshmen were pleased to see it, too, for as inured as the Welsh were to wet weather, their journey from Wales had tested even their proverbial hardihood. But they were young, eager for excitement and plunder, and their spirits rose as soon as the road started to dry out. Ranulf’s mood was less festive; if ever he’d viewed war as an adventure, those days were long gone. As they rode south, he was preoccupied and tense, spurred on by concern for his wife and child back in Wales and increasingly anxious for his nephew, as his hopes faltered that he’d reach Malmesbury in time.

Ranulf approached Malmesbury, therefore, with some degree of trepidation, not knowing what they’d find, sure only that he’d never forgive himself if evil had befallen Henry in his absence. As they’d ploughed their way along the waterlogged roads of Wales and western England, he’d done his best to reassure himself that Henry would be a match for Stephen. Stories of Henry’s spectacular summer campaign against the French king had penetrated even into the mountain fastness of Eryri, and he’d eventually gotten glowing reports from Maude, Rainald, and his niece in Chester, as well as a firsthand account from Henry himself. But as proud as he was of his nephew’s growing fame, he could not banish a nagging unease, for he knew what a capable commander Stephen was.

Much to Ranulf’s amazement, by the time he reached Malmesbury, it was all over. Stephen and Henry had agreed to a truce, and Stephen had then pulled back his army without ever taking the field. North of the Avon, Stephen’s camp was deserted, nothing remaining but the charred ashes of quenched fires and mounds of rubbish strewn about. Within Malmesbury itself, the mood was mixed: for Henry’s soldiers, jubilation, and for most of the citizens, relief, at least for those not mourning loved ones slain in the capture of the town.

The truce was all that people were talking about, and Ranulf had no trouble learning the terms-terms as favorable to Henry as they were detrimental to Stephen. It had been agreed that Stephen would retreat, a battle would be avoided, and Henry would halt his siege of Malmesbury Castle. Stephen’s castellan would then raze the castle to the ground, thus denying the stronghold to both sides. And Stephen, in turn, had agreed to end the continuing siege of Wallingford, nor to assault it again for six months.

Ranulf was astounded by what his nephew had accomplished-a reprieve for Wallingford and a humiliating setback for Stephen-all without a battle’s being fought. Once he finally located Henry, walking in the cloisters with the abbot of Malmesbury’s great Benedictine abbey of St Mary and St Aldhelm, he wasted no time congratulating his nephew upon his brilliant and bloodless victory. He knew at once that he’d trod amiss, for the stately abbot stiffened, then excused himself so abruptly that Ranulf realized he’d somehow offended.

Ranulf was not left alone with Henry for long. As Abbot Peter stalked away, Rainald came barreling up the walkway toward them. But Ranulf had not forgotten the abbot’s odd reaction, and once boisterous greetings had been exchanged with his brother, he asked Henry why the abbot had seemed so irate.

“Because my victory was not bloodless for the townspeople or the monks. Malmesbury has long been a royal stronghold for Stephen, and when we attacked, some of the citizens joined the castle garrison in the town’s defense. We were able, though, to get over the walls with scaling ladders. Most of the garrison managed to reach safety within the castle, but some of them fled into the abbey. Our men followed, and blood was spilled in the church itself.”

Ranulf crossed himself. “No wonder the abbot was wroth.”

“It was even worse than you think, Uncle. Not only were some of the men seeking refuge in the church slain, but so were a few monks who’d tried to intervene.” Henry shook his head, in remembered anger. “Breton mercenaries…all they know is killing.”

“Ah, but you’d have been so proud of our nephew, Ranulf,” Rainald interjected. “Harry acted at once to reassure the monks and townspeople, whilst also showing our men what would happen to those who dared shed blood in God’s House.”

“What did you do, Harry?” Ranulf was relieved that Henry had taken action, and curious to know what he’d done, for one of the most vexing challenges facing a battle commander was how to keep his army under control. Some did not try very hard; Geoffrey had been one of those. Others deliberately encouraged their soldiers to commit cruelties, as one more weapon of war, the way the Earl of Chester had turned his men loose on Lincoln. Even commanders like Robert Fitz Roy, who did attempt to rein in their troops, were not always successful.

“I got rid of them,” Henry said. “I do not expect soldiers to act like holy monks, but I’d warned them that I’d not abide sacrilege or wanton killing. If the Bretons are not yet out of England, they soon will be. I sent them under guard to Bristol, to be put on the first available ship back to Normandy. The only thing worse than keeping them bloody-handed in my hire would have been for them to turn up next in Eustace’s service!”

As they talked, they’d been walking briskly back toward the abbey guest hall. Ranulf explained that he’d been delayed first by family illness-the night before he was to depart, his young son had been stricken with a high fever-and then by the sorry state of the roads. Henry and Rainald gave him a more detailed account of their assault, and revealed their immediate plans: to remain at Malmesbury just long enough to make sure that Stephen’s castellan would follow through with the order to destroy the castle, and then head for Bristol. For with Wallingford no longer in immediate danger, they could take their time in deciding where they should strike next.

Henry paused just as they reached the hall. “It could not have been easy for you, Uncle Ranulf, riding away from your wife and son, not knowing how long you’d be gone. I’ll not forget that, you may be sure.”

“Introduce me to Eleanor and we’ll call it even,” Ranulf said, and Henry pushed him, laughing, into the hall. Within, it was full of familiar faces, and Ranulf spent the next quarter hour greeting friends and kinfolk. He was heartened to see how many of England’s barons had responded to Henry’s summons, and as he glanced about the noisy, crowded hall, it seemed to him that he could almost see the benevolent ghosts of his brother Robert, Miles, and Brien, watching in satisfaction from the shadows.

Laughing at his own sentimentality, he elbowed his way back to his nephew’s side. “Why do you think Stephen balked at doing battle with you, Harry? The talk I heard in the town was that he was thwarted by the winter storm and flooding, but there has to be more to it than that.”

“You’d be loath to fight, too,” Rainald said smugly, “if you had to keep looking over your shoulder.”

Ranulf’s eyes narrowed. “Was that it, Harry? Did Stephen distrust his own barons?” he asked, and Henry shrugged.

“You’d have to ask Stephen,” he said, but then he grinned. “It would not surprise me, though.”

It was clear to Ranulf that his nephew knew more than he was willing to admit, at least in public. He asked no more questions, content to wait until Henry was ready to confide in him, and followed his nephew as they started toward the high table being set up on the dais.

Trestle tables had already been brought in, and men began to wander over, claiming their seats for dinner. But before Henry reached the dais, Jordan de Foxley, Malmesbury’s castellan, was ushered into the hall. Henry greeted him amiably, for he had no personal animosity toward the man, who’d only been doing his duty as a soldier. “You’re welcome to join us for dinner, Sir Jordan. Afterward, we can discuss your plans for razing the castle.”

Kneeling before Henry, the castellan said, low and urgent, “Thank you, my lord duke. But I have need to speak with you now. If you spare me a few moments, I can assure you that you’ll not regret it.”

It was deftly done, and many in the hall did not even notice Henry’s discreet departure, although they did wonder why dinner was being delayed. They were not kept long in suspense. Less than half an hour had elapsed before Henry returned to the hall, strode up onto the dais, and called for silence.

“I have just met with the castellan of Malmesbury Castle,” he announced, “and I am pleased to inform you that he has offered to turn the castle over to me, intact and whole-”

Henry got no further; whatever else he’d been about to say was drowned out by a burst of cheering. Dinner was forgotten. For some time afterward, the hall was in tumult, a scene of triumphant and raucous celebration.

Ranulf watched from the dais as the castellan was escorted back into the hall, this time to be greeted as a hero by Henry’s elated barons. In the course of this war, there had been many defections; some men had switched sides more than once. Ranulf sensed that this defection was different, though, that the Malmesbury castellan’s action was a straw in the wind. He dearly loved his nephew and wanted very much to see Henry as England’s king. But he could not help the words that came unbidden now to his lips, too softly to be overheard. “Poor Stephen…”

Henry celebrated his twentieth birthday at Bristol, planning the next stage of his campaign. Soon after Easter, he was joined by Robert Beaumont. The earl’s holdings included more than thirty fortified castles scattered throughout the Midlands, strongholds now put at Henry’s disposal as this powerful and cautious lord publicly allied himself with the Angevin cause, formally acknowledging Maude’s son as the rightful heir to the English throne.