Status Updates From The Archer's Tale (The Grai...

Thomas took off his helmet to find a bowstring, looped one end over a horn tip, then flexed the shaft to fix the other loop in its nock.

He fumbled and had to make three attempts to string the long black weapon. Sweet Jesus, he thought, but they were really coming!

Thomas paused and stared at the clouded sky that was thick with flickering black shafts that were as dense as starlings and deadlier than hawks.

'Nondum amabam, et amare amabam. I did not love, but yearned to love.

Eleanor gave him a sceptical look. 'A very elaborate way of saying you're lonely'

'Yes, Thomas agreed.

'So what will you do?' she asked.

Father Hobbe, his cassock skirts hitched up to his waist, was fighting with a quarter-staff, ramming the pole into French faces.

'In the name of the Father,’ he shouted, and a Frenchmen reeled back with a purpled eye,

'and of the Son, Father Hobbe snarled as he broke a man's nose,

‘and of the Holy Ghost!'

Catharism had died a hundred years before, scourged and burned out of the land. It was now a figment of the troubadours. But when Thomas looked at Sir Guillaume the man was not mocking the Cathars. He was staring at a crucifix hanging on the wall and mouthing a silent prayer. God help me, Thomas thought, but I am being asked to do what all the great knights of Arthur's round table failed to do: find the Grail.

'Jesus, Thomas said in disgust, 'that man spared you, and you'd not return the favour? You're not a bloody knight, you're just a bully. Go and boil your arse.'

The sword rose and so did Thomas's bow.

Sir Simon looked at the glittering arrow point, its edges feathered white through sharpening and he had just enough wit not to strike with his sword. He sheathed it instead, slamming the blade into the scabbard.

'Protect me!' Jeanette blazed. ‘You are all thieves! How can you protect me? There is a place in hell for thieves like you and it is just like England. You are thieves, every one of you! Go!'

'We're not going,’ Thomas said flatly. ‘And you and us will have to make the best of it. We'll not encroach. Just show me where your private rooms are and I'll make sure no man trespasses.’

'You? Make sure? Ha!'

'I'm bastard born, Thomas insisted.
'Your father was of good birth'
'You know what family?'
Sir Giles shrugged. ‘If I pressed him he would just say that God was his father and his mother was the Church.'
'My mother was a priest's housekeeper and the daughter of a bowyer. I shall go to France as an archer.’
'There's more honour as a man-at-arms.’
But Thomas did not want honour.
He wanted revenge 🏹