Conquest

He fought his demons and held Torfida even tighter. Whether it was an omen or not, Hereward knew that mountains were dangerous places and he feared that lightning could indeed strike twice. He resolved to get as far away as possible, as quickly as Torfida’s recovery would allow.

Everyone remained subdued for the next few days; they all wanted the mountains to be out of sight and for Torfida to regain her vitality.

Eventually, after several weeks and a detour to avoid the French strongholds of Paris and Chartres, they entered the Norman province of Evreux. They had not been so far north in a very long time and everyone shivered in the fresh autumnal winds. But, more importantly, Torfida was happier. Hereward stayed close to her. She seemed to be back to her alert, purposeful self. She had cut away all her singed hair, leaving a boyish bob that made her look much younger. Her eyes had regained their brightness and her skin its clarity.

Torfida’s decisiveness was also back, and she advised Hereward that they should head for Rouen, the seat of Duke William’s power.

They arrived in Rouen three days later.

It was a bustling city with new buildings being erected everywhere. The markets were busy and the people seemed affluent. Normandy was thriving. Duke William was on his way home from the cathedral at Jumieges, after giving thanks for victory over the Province of Maine. His invasion earlier in the year had been successful and he now held sway over the whole of northern France above the Loire. Not only that: the King of France, Philip II, was still a minor and the Duke’s only other serious rival, Geoffrey of Anjou, had recently died, leaving little threat from the south.

After finding lodgings in the city and bidding farewell to their retinue from Melfi, they prepared to watch the Duke on his triumphant return.

The streets were bursting with people and hundreds of sentries were deployed to keep clear the processional route. The Bishop of Rouen, flanked by the entire hierarchy of the Norman Church, and the newly appointed Bishop of Le Mans, the capital of the conquered Province of Maine, waited at the great door of the cathedral to anoint the conquering hero. Fanning out from the bishops, on both sides, were the abbots from Normandy’s monasteries, the sheriffs from its provinces and the great and the good of the city of Rouen.

At the centre of the group, and a pace or two ahead, was a woman who, at first glance, could easily have been mistaken for a child. At not much more than four and a half feet tall, she was dwarfed by everyone around her. Matilda, Duchess of Normandy, daughter of Baldwin V, Count of Flanders — William’s most important ally and guardian of the young King Philip of France — was a direct descendent of Alfred the Great of England and had a personality which belied her diminutive stature. It was known throughout Normandy that her marriage to Duke William was happy and that she was quite capable of standing up for herself, even in the presence of her formidable husband. Her tiny frame did not prevent her from enjoying robust health, producing three sons, five daughters and being now heavily pregnant with a ninth child.

Hereward and Torfida found the mood of excitement in the city infectious. As the horns sounded in front of the cathedral to signal the Duke’s entry into the square, they cheered along with everyone else. The Duke’s archers and crossbowmen came first, followed by a column of infantry, all marching four abreast in excellent order. The bowmen wore leather jerkins with brown woollen leggings, small leather skullcaps and, in addition to their bows, carried seaxs. Wearing mail hauberks and distinctive pointed helmets with long nose-guards, several columns of infantry and cavalry came next, carrying both sword and spear and holding the famous Norman conical shield. Then came the Duke, in the midst of at least a hundred colourfully dressed knights, many of them lords in their own right. With their huge destriers strutting beneath them, most carried a small pennon on their lance to affirm their chevalier status, but some carried much bigger and more elaborately designed gonfalons, which asserted their nobility as barons. The crowd could recognize where each knight came from by the local colours of his pennon or gonfalon; those from towns close to Rouen, such as Fecamp and Yvetot, were greeted by particularly fervent cheers.

The Duke finally came into Hereward’s view. His ducal coronet covered a mane of thick red hair and his ruddy complexion was framed by a neatly trimmed beard, slightly darker than the hair on his head. He wore an unexceptional woollen cloak over his mail coat and had the same armour and weapons as his knights. However, resting on the pommel of his saddle was the legendary ‘Baculus’, his formidable wooden war club. A weapon of war dating back generations to the Normans’ Viking ancestors, all previous Dukes of Normandy had carried it as an icon of authority and virility.