Read Chapter 28: Debts Paid

Greyhill came striding through the dawn murk with two men-at-arms behind him, their kettle hats gleaming with damp. Thomas had just finished checking the girth on the captured destrier—a fine bay with the Viscount's brand burned into its shoulder—when the knight stopped three paces off and planted his fists on his hips.

“Barrow. A word.”

Thomas knotted the lead rope and turned. Greyhill’s face was hard to read in the half-light, but his jaw was set in a way that suggested he had not come to wish anyone luck in the coming fight.

“Sir Hugh.”

Greyhill jerked his head toward a stand of willows thirty yards off, out of earshot of the mustering archers. Thomas followed. The men-at-arms peeled away and stood watch at the tree line.

“You know what’s coming,” Greyhill said, keeping his voice low. “The French will hit us before the sun burns this fog off. One push, maybe two, and then they’ll throw everything they have at the center.”

Thomas waited. He had learned long ago that knights liked to circle a thing before they said it, and Greyhill was no different.

“The King will be on foot in the center with his household,” Greyhill went on. “He’ll be in the thick of it when the French commit. His bodyguard is good men, but they’re shire levies and household knights. Good steel, but untested against a massed charge.”

“You want me to stand next to Harry?” Thomas asked.

“I want you in the ring around him. You’ve got eyes that see what others miss. You’ve already saved this army twice. Hal is asking for you by name.”

Thomas felt the weight of it settle on his shoulders. The King’s person. The safest place on the field, and the most dangerous all at once. A man who guarded the King would be surrounded by the finest armor and the most desperate loyalty. He would not be at the sharp end of the wedge, not in the mud with the common archers where the arrows flew thickest.

It would be easy. Safer. Honorable.

And he would be useless.

“I can’t,” Thomas said.

Greyhill’s eyebrows lifted. “You’re refusing the King?”

“I’m refusing the posting, and I’ll tell him myself if he asks. My company’s on the right wing. They’re boys and old men with a handful of arrows apiece and a knight who’s already dead twice over. If I’m not standing with them when the cavalry comes, they’ll break. And if they break, the flank folds, and the King’s precious center doesn’t matter because the French will roll us up like a wet cloak.”

Greyhill studied him for a long moment. The fog curled between them, carrying the smell of woodsmoke and horse sweat and the distant, sour tang of the French camp.

“You think you’re the only man who can hold them?” Greyhill asked.

“I know I’m the one they trust.” Thomas met his eye. “They’ll stand for me. They might not stand for anyone else.”

Greyhill’s mouth tightened, but something flickered in his gaze—not anger. Respect, perhaps. Or recognition of a debt already half-paid.

“I’ll give you someone better,” Thomas said. “I’ve got a marksman. Young, but steady as a stone wall. He put an arrow through the Viscount’s horse at two hundred paces, and he didn’t shake when the man came at him with a blade. He’ll stand in the ring around the King and put shafts through any Frenchman who gets within range. And he’s got nothing to prove, so he won’t do anything stupid.”

“The boy from the baggage train?”

“Will. Aye.”

Greyhill was quiet for a moment, then let out a short breath that might have been a laugh. “You’re arming children and putting them in the King’s guard.”

“I’m putting a cold-eyed boy with a war bow where he can do the most good,” Thomas said. “You vouched for me. This is how I repay it. Not by hiding behind halberds in the center, but by holding the wing that keeps the French from getting to the King at all.”

Greyhill took a step forward and put out his hand. Thomas clasped it without hesitation, grip hard through the worn leather of his gloves.

“You’re a stubborn bastard, Barrow,” Greyhill said.

“York-shire born.”

“I know your kind. That’s why I trust you.” Greyhill squeezed once, hard, and let go. “Stay alive. If you fall on that wing, I’ll have to explain to Hal why I let his best archer die in the mud instead of at his side.”

“You’ll have worse to explain if I come back and find the boy dead because you put him too far forward.”

Greyhill’s mouth twitched. “He’ll be at my shoulder. I’ll see to it myself.”

Thomas nodded. The knot in his chest loosened a fraction. He had expected Greyhill to argue, to pull rank, to drag the King’s authority into it. But the knight had simply accepted the refusal and taken the offer instead. That was worth more than a dozen royal commands.

“One more thing,” Greyhill said. “The Viscount’s still out there. He’s lost his horse, he’s wounded, and he knows this ground better than most. He’ll come for you when you’re knee-deep in fighting and can’t watch your own back.”

“I’m counting on it.”

Greyhill’s brows drew together. “You *want* him to find you?”

“He’s been one step ahead of us since Calais. He’s burned our arrows, killed our people, and he’s wearing a face I’ll remember until I die.” Thomas touched the hilt of Greyhill’s sword at his belt. “Better he comes to me in the chaos of battle, where I’ve got a bow in my hand and mud under my feet, than he waits for some quiet moment and puts a knife in my back.”

Greyhill looked at him for a long moment, then shook his head slowly. “You’re a dangerous man to know, Barrow.”

“Aye,” Thomas said. “That’s the point.”

They walked back toward the muster ground in silence. The fog was thinning, and the first pale light was beginning to leak through the clouds to the east. The camp had become a hive of motion—men hauling stakes, stacking sheaves of arrows, tightening buckles and checking edges. The horns had sounded six times already, and the army was nearly formed.

Thomas found Will at the edge of the archer’s line, honing the head of a bodkin point with a whetstone, his movements slow and precise. The boy looked up as Thomas approached.

“Change of orders,” Thomas said. “You’re going to the center.”

Will’s hands stilled. “Sir?”

“You’re to be part of the King’s bodyguard. You’ll stand with Sir Hugh Greyhill and put shafts into anyone who gets close to the royal standard.” Thomas crouched beside him. “You’ve got the eye for it, and you’ve got the nerve. The King needs someone who can actually shoot.”

Will stared at him, his face unreadable. “I’m not leaving you.”

“You’re not leaving me. You’re being sent where you’re needed more.” Thomas put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You’ll be closer to the fight than any boy your age has a right to be. And when this is over, you’ll be able to say you stood with Henry of England.”

“What about you?”

Thomas smiled, and it came easier than it had all morning. “I’ll be on the right wing, making sure the French never get close enough to the King for you to earn your wage.”

Will looked at him for a long moment, then took a slow breath and nodded. He held out the whetstone.

“You’ll need this more than me. Your edges are rough.”

Thomas laughed and tucked the stone into his pouch. “You’ll do, Will. You’ll do.”

The muster horn sounded a seventh time, long and low, and the camp began to move as one body toward the field.

Thomas rose, checked the strap on his borrowed quiver of twelve grey-fletched arrows, and started toward the right wing with the weight of Greyhill’s sword and the Viscount’s horse and the whole damned army on his shoulders.

Somewhere out in the thinning fog, he knew, a wounded French nobleman was loading a crossbow and thinking of him.

Let him come.