Read Chapter 21: The Second Sabotage

The eastern wood spilled them out onto the marshy ground beyond the palisade, and Thomas did not slow. Will stumbled at his side, stripped of his tunic and shivering in the dawn cold, but the boy kept pace, driven by something Thomas did not have time to name.

"Saw it," Will gasped between breaths. "When Jean—when he had me in the trees. He showed the others. A whole rack of arrows, laid out like they were waiting for inspection. He laughed about it."

"What did he do to them?"

Will's feet splashed through a frozen rut. "Nothing you'd see. He held one up to the light, turned it, then put it back. Said the English would loose a thousand shafts and every one would fall short or slip the string."

Thomas's stomach dropped. "The notch."

"Aye. He filed them smooth. The string's got nothing to grip."

They broke through the hedge line into the camp's edge, where the baggage carts stood in slumped ranks, horses already hitched and stamping. The muster horn sounded again somewhere beyond the tents, thin and insistent across the fog. Thomas counted the calls. Four. The army would move within the hour, whether or not he had an answer.

His own cart sat third in line, canvas cover lashed tight. He tore the ropes loose and threw the cover back. Inside, the arrow barrels stood like a rank of silent soldiers, each stave bound with iron and stamped with the fletcher's mark of York.

"Torch," he said.

Will found one guttering in a nearby brazier and brought it close. Thomas hauled the nearest barrel out and knocked the lid off. The arrows inside lay fletched and ready, goose-feather grey, bodkin heads sharp enough to prick a finger at a glance. He snatched one up and turned it toward the flame.

The nock was smooth as glass. No groove, no channel, no notch to seat the string. He picked up another. Same. A third. Same.

"God's teeth." He hurled the arrow into the mud. "Every last one?"

He tore through the barrel, then the next, checking at random, his hands moving faster with each shaft. The pattern held. Whoever had done this had worked with care, taking each arrow and filing away the nock with a fine rasp, leaving the shaft otherwise untouched. A man checking for cracks or warping would never notice. A man stringing his bow in the dark before a battle would not notice until he loosed—and the arrow would slide off the string and drop at his feet like a dead eel.

"They meant for us to discover it at the volley," Thomas said, quieter now. "First rank looses, half the shafts fall short, the French charge closes before the second rank can answer."

Will stared at the ruined arrows. "Can we re-fletch them?"

"Re-fletch? The notch is cut into the shaft itself, boy. You can't glue a notch on. They'd have to be re-headed, re-shafted, re-made from scratch. We've not got the time nor the tools." He slammed the lid back on the barrel. "How many barrels are in the forewheel's reserve?"

"Twelve," Will said. "Maybe more. They were bringing them up from the rear all night."

Thomas turned in a slow circle, scanning the baggage. The cart before his belonged to the sutler, sacks of dried peas and salted beef. The one after held spare bowstaves, unstrung, their curves wrapped in oilcloth.

"Strings," he said suddenly.

"What?"

"Strings. If the nock's smooth, the arrow won't stay on the string—not if you loose with a full draw. But if you wrap the string at the nocking point, build it up with wax and thread, it'll grip the shaft like a fist." He grabbed Will by the shoulder. "Every archer carries a spare string in his pouch. How many men in the forewheel?"

"Two hundred, near enough."

"Then we need two hundred spare strings, plus wax, plus something to bind them with." He looked at the ruined arrows again, counting in his head. Too many. Even with the reserve strings, a wrapped nock was a poor substitute for a true cut. The arrow would fly true enough for a close shot, but at long range, with the wind off the French lines, it would drift.

And the French would not be at close range. They would stand three hundred yards off and dare the English to waste their shafts.

"There's another way," Will said.

Thomas looked at him. The boy's face was still smudged with dirt and the blood of Roger's death, but his eyes had gone sharp.

"Jean's men. The ones at the outpost. They had arrows of their own—French shafts, with proper nocks, cut for their strings."

"For their strings. Not ours."

"Strings stretch," Will said. "A French string on an English bow draws short, but it'll still loose. Their arrows are longer than ours, heavier heads, but they'll fly."

Thomas opened his mouth to argue, then stopped. The boy was right. A French arrow from an English bow was a crude thing, but it would fly, and at the ranges the English archers would demand—close, brutal, volley after volley—it would kill just as well as a Yorkshire shaft.

"Their camp's still burning," he said. "But the dead won't need their arrows."

"I'll go," Will said.

"You're a boy who's been through hell tonight. You'll slow yourself down."

"I know where the bodies fell. I know the path through the hedge. And I'm faster than you over rough ground." Will squared his shoulders. "You need to stay here and make the strings work. I'll bring back what I can carry."

Thomas studied him. There was no fear in the boy's face now. Something had burned it out.

"All right." Thomas pulled the spare string from his own pouch and pressed it into Will's hands. "Take this. If you find arrows, wrap them in your tunic—bind them tight so the fletching doesn't crush. And if you find any English shafts among them, with proper nocks—"

"There won't be," Will said.

"No. There won't." Thomas watched him go, a small shape swallowed by the fog between the tents. Then he turned back to the ruined barrels and began pulling strings from his pouch, laying them out on the cart tail like a surgeon's instruments.

He had rope wax in his kit, and a length of linen thread. Enough for maybe a dozen wraps. He needed hundreds.

He was still working when Jack appeared from the direction of the marshaling ground, breastplate buckled crooked over his padded jack, bow in hand.

"Thomas. What's happened?"

Thomas held up an arrow, showing him the smooth nock. Jack's face went through a series of expressions—confusion, then horror, then a cold fury that settled into something harder.

"How many?"

"Every barrel in the forewheel, best I can tell." Thomas kept working, wrapping thread around his own string, building up the nocking point. "I've sent Will to scavenge French arrows from the outpost. It'll not be enough."

"It'll not be near enough," Jack agreed. "Two hundred men, three volleys each before they close—if we're lucky, we've the arrows for one. What does Greyhill say?"

Thomas didn't look up. "Greyhill's in the King's tent, trying to keep my head attached to my shoulders."

"And the King?"

"The King has given me until first light." Thomas bit off the thread and held the string up, testing the wrap with his thumb. It was rough, lumpy, better than nothing. He strung his bow and nocked the ruined arrow, drawing it to his cheek. The wrap held the shaft firm against the string. He loosed into the mud. The arrow flew ten yards and buried itself point-first.

"Won't be a killing shot at range," he said. "But it'll work at close quarters."

Jack shook his head slowly. "We don't fight at close quarters. We break their charge at two hundred paces."

"Then we'll have to pull them closer." Thomas unstrung his bow and slung it over his shoulder. "I need every archer who'll trust me. Men who know how to wrap a string and still loose true. And I need them to keep their heads down when we march."

"March where?"

"To the left flank. Where Jean's planning to hit us." Thomas looked east, where the sky had begun to lighten, a grey smear above the black line of the wood. "And we'll be marching there without a single arrow that's worth a damn."