The Lion of Mortimer (The Plantagenets Book 3) by Dymoke Juliet

Author:Dymoke, Juliet [Dymoke, Juliet]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Three Castles Media Ltd.
Published: 2016-03-23T04:00:00+00:00

It seemed to the King that nothing now could prevent his victory. His troops must outnumber Bruce’s, so Pembroke told him, by perhaps three to one and he was confident of the strength of his mounted chivalry, of his own strength. To the knights gathered about him he smiled and said, ‘Look, the enemy are on their knees already. Do they see my crown, my royal standard?’

Ingram de Umfraville answered, ‘Aye, maybe, my lord, but I think they kneel to God, not to you.’

Edward stared across the open ground as the Scots rose and began to move forward again. ‘They seem poorly armed, and I see few horsemen and those not to the fore. Do they mean to fight on foot?’

‘They’ll use their pikemen,’ Clifford said. ‘Please God our cavalry can disperse them.’

‘It’s a strange way for knights to fight,’ Badlesmere put in scornfully. ‘They should fear what our charging war-horses can do to them.’

Mortimer the elder was more wary. ‘I learned in dealing with the Welsh that superior arms and numbers don’t always count.’

‘Oh, the Welsh,’ Edward said vaguely. ‘They ought to know I’m their prince and wish me well and,’ he added more forcibly, ‘never will I yield my suzerainty of Scotland. It is my son’s right, as my father passed it on to me.’ A fleeting memory came to him of the dying old man ordering that his body should be burned, his bones boiled down and pulped and carried in triumphant procession to Scotland. He had not carried out that macabre wish but today he felt as if he had his father’s spirit with him. ‘My lord Montacute,’ he glanced to his right, ‘you have fought the Scots more than most, what do you make of the situation? Shall we have a great victory?’ Simon de Montacute was prepared for battle, an old hand who knew how best to use his weapons, his horse, his own body. ‘If God wills,’ was his answer. ‘Don’t underestimate the enemy, sire, that is all. Our men must be wary of their schiltrons, I’m sure my lord of Pembroke will agree to that.’

‘Indeed,’ Aymer de Valence said. ‘Great God, do they mean to attack already? Herald, send out the summons.’

Henry Percy glanced at the van. ‘My lord of Gloucester has his men ready. He will halt their first essay.’

Edward sat with Pembroke on one side of him, Sir Giles d’Argentan on the other, and watched as the van charged those impenetrable pikes, the Scots shoulder to shoulder, tough, wiry men prepared to die for the land they defended.

Gloucester broke into a gallop, all his knights with him, a surging mass of mounted steel, but they could make no inroad into the rigid line of pikes. The Earl withdrew, reformed and charged again, stung by the taunt that had been levelled at him.

‘Is there no way to break them?’ Edward demanded, and Pembroke said, ‘The archers must try the flank,’ and sent the command to move the bowmen over the Pelstream burn.

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