Blackstone and his men had followed the Río Arlanzón and saw the city of Burgos as they rounded the low hills rising from the valley. The walled city nestled on the lower slopes of the hills that rose to where the pale stone of the castle’s rounded turrets caught the light. The same light bathed the horsemen along the skyline who had been shadowing them since sunrise.

‘Here for trouble, do you think?’ said Meulon.

‘Doubtful. They’re Moors. More likely to be seeing who we are. They have been there for hours but now that they are closer it is easier to identify them.’

The riders wore flowing robes of various hues, belted with sword and knife; each carried a steel-tipped spear that glittered in a wave of light and a double ellipse shield across their backs. Their horses were small compared to those Blackstone’s men rode.

‘Light cavalry,’ said Killbere. ‘No use in a major battle. They’re used for skirmishing raids.’

‘Those shields won’t help them against English arrows if they ever tried,’ said Will Longdon.

‘North African shields,’ said Beyard. ‘They’re called adargas.’

‘I don’t care what they call them: they’d be useless in a real fight,’ said Longdon.

‘You should hope you don’t face such men,’ said Meulon. ‘They look as though they can ride like the wind and you couldn’t hit a baggage train wagon at three hundred paces if it was moving as slow as a legless leper.’

‘At three hundred paces I and any of my men could trim your damned nose hairs.’

‘Which is a useless skill. We don’t need archer barbers.’

Killbere twisted in the saddle. ‘What we need is for the two of you bickering washerwomen to look more closely at men who could be our enemy before nightfall.’

Meulon spat one side, Will Longdon the other. ‘Thomas,’ said Longdon. ‘Remember when we first landed in France and you were as green as young oak? I teased you into pulling your father’s war bow and you killed a crow high in a tree.’

‘I remember,’ said Blackstone. ‘And I felt Sir Gilbert’s slap around the back of my head for wasting an arrow. My ears still ring.’

‘And Will Longdon will feel my boot up his arse if he thinks I’ll put up with archers wasting shafts.’

‘I see no harm in bringing down that hawk to show them what an English archer could do.’

The men looked up but there was no sign of the raptor.

‘It was there. I swear it,’ said Longdon.

‘Now you are blind as well as stupid,’ said Meulon.

Will Longdon searched the sky. If the hawk had been there, it had clearly flown from view, but how it had done that so quickly he did not know.