Chapter 8

Paris, France. May 1067

One week after leaving York, Benedict Martin stood before King Philip I. While Philip was angry, Benedict had failed in his primary mission; the information brought back moderated the king’s anger. After hearing the report, Philip was white as a ghost. Every piece of information was saying the same thing. If France wanted to stop the English rise to power, they were running out of time. Every day, England grew stronger while French power, at best, stayed the same.

The most distressing news was that Scotland had been conquered, and Great Britain would replace England. Nobody in the French court could get their head around that fact. Hearing nothing more of interest, Philip dismissed everyone so he could pray and think of what course to follow. As the English under Marion became more united, Philip’s nobles pushed hard for more autonomy. Even some of his closest allies, like the Duke of Orléans, were pushing the king since Philip seized control of William of Normandy’s lands.

Philip wondered why God would bless the uncivilized English with such a ruler and a man that might be the world’s most powerful sorcerer as a husband for their queen. While the English economy was growing in leaps and bounds, the French economy was lucky to grow most years. The biggest army that Philip could bring to the field was about thirty thousand men if he was lucky, while Marion could put an army that size in the field with no problem. What was worse was the deeper pools of manpower the British could tap. Most people living in France were serfs or slaves, thus making them ineligible to be soldiers. In Britain, everyone, be they man or woman, was eligible to be a soldier.

In the end, Philip decided that the French sin God was punishing them for was the disunited nature of the French government. If he could only persuade some of his nobles to support him, they might make some progress in securing God’s favor again. To gain some time, he started to pay subsidies to several of England’s enemies, with Wales, Brittany, and British nobles at the top of the list.

After Benedict Martin left the palace, he went home to his wife and children and learned another of his children had died from disease. This made five children so far that had died before they lived to see their fifth birthday. Although he and his wife still had four children, the last death seemed to take the fight out of his wife, something Benedict noticed as soon as he laid eyes on her. Now he had to do something and knew what he had to do.

It was time to move, and he knew where. Something Benedict had noticed but not reported was the much higher survival rate of children in York compared to France. The hope was if they moved to York, his other children would have a chance to survive. Benedict was unusual for a minor French noble of the time because he was loyal to his wife and children. If he could do anything to make them more comfortable, he would gladly do it.

That night he discussed the idea with his wife after getting reacquainted with her soft body. Cateline couldn’t believe her husband at first, but something in his expression told her that he wasn’t making things up. If they moved, they might have a chance to save their other children.

Cateline had been one of eleven children but the only one to survive long enough to have her own family. The more she listened to her husband, the more she was convinced this was the right move. They had enough money to buy passage to England if they sold most of their possessions. In Britain, their children could get an education and could go on to be almost anything they wanted. The only limit was their abilities. If one of their daughters wanted to be a soldier, she could be a soldier. If their son wanted to be a nurse, he could be a nurse.

The following day dispensed of any doubt Cateline or Benedict had when they learned two of their neighbor’s children died. After learning the news, the couple looked at each other and nodded; they would be moving as soon as possible. Their land would be easy to sell because one of their neighbors was one of the most powerful nobles in France and was always looking for more land.

Benedict got a meeting with the noble later that day, so he spent the morning figuring out what price he wanted for the land. His family owned some of the most fertile lands in the area and produced the best wines in the region.

While Benedict determined the asking price, Cateline started organizing the household to move. Most of their servants would be staying behind. At first, she wanted to take them all with them, but Benedict informed her that serfdom was illegal in England, and the family would lose all their possessions if discovered. The plan for living in England was for Benedict to get a job in the English government since he spoke eight languages.

As Benedict walked through the front door of the residence of Viscount Guiscard of Orléans, he wondered if he wasn’t making a mistake. His family had owned the land going back to the Roman Empire and always did well. Passing a window, Benedict looked out and saw the Orléans family cemetery. Seeing the markers steeled Benedict’s resolve to leave France and make a new life in Britain. All that was left was to sell his family’s land.

Viscount Guiscard was no fool and was suspicious of Benedict’s offer to sell his ancestral lands to him. The proposal to sell for two thousand French Livres was fair, and both men knew it. Guiscard had dreamed of owning that land since he was old enough to understand the concept of making money. With Benedict’s land, the viscount could almost mint his own money. He would have direct access to an old Roman road that led to Paris and access to a small river that drained into the Seine that, with some improvement, could host barge traffic.

When Guiscard tried to negotiate the price down, Benedict threatened to take his offer elsewhere, which worried Guiscard. If his rivals got that land, he would be shut out of several important markets and wouldn’t be able to sell most of the crops his land produced. After going back and forth for most of the afternoon, Guiscard signed the contract to buy Benedict’s land for two thousand Livres. Benedict had thirty days to vacate the property, and if his family wasn’t gone before then, they would be thrown out. The serfs that worked the land would stay on the land after the sale.

Over the next few weeks, Benedict’s household worked furiously to prepare for the move. He had agents negotiating for passage to England for his family and possessions. A wrench was thrown into his plans as they were finishing preparations when his serfs came to him and begged to go with him. Guiscard was notorious for the cruel treatment of serfs on his lands, while Benedict was known to be kind to his serfs. He didn’t care about the serfs, but his wife was well-liked by almost all the serfs. Again, it was Cateline who changed his mind about the serfs. She knew the life they would face if left behind and didn’t believe any person deserved such treatment, especially since the serfs wouldn’t have been subjected to such treatment if her family hadn’t sold the land. The serfs would be allowed to come along but would be in debt to Benedict. Once the debt was paid, the serfs would be free to leave.

One month after leaving England, Benedict was on his way back to the island. His entire family and many former serfs were with him this time. When they left, Benedict led the wagons, not wanting to be tempted to look back at what his family used to own. They had to move fast to ensure they were out of reach before Guiscard realized almost all the serfs were gone. With the serfs leaving, Benedict saw no reason not to strip everything of economic value from the land.

The group had nearly a week before Guiscard was due to take over the land, and Benedict figured this would be enough time. The fact they were headed to England had been kept a secret until the very end, and the remaining serfs still didn’t know that fact. This secrecy had been the work of Cateline. She knew if they were detected, Guiscard would slaughter everyone. Everything worked as planned, and a week after leaving his lands, Benedict watched as his family, plus almost one hundred former serfs, loaded two ships bound for England.

Finally arriving at the Port of Hull, Cateline and the serfs were in complete shock because sitting on the docks were steam cranes loading ships. The group watched as large amounts of cargo were lifted off rail cars and lowered onto the deck of the ships. The ships didn’t have large enough hatches to lower the cargo straight into the hold, so it was set on the deck, and the crew would move the cargo below deck.

On the opposite bank of the River Hull, the group could see a massive amount of construction going on. Not knowing what they were looking at, Benedict asked a passing stevedore about the construction.

“That is the navy shipyards, sir.”

Soon their attention was pulled toward other remarkable sights, and Benedict forgot to ask for more information about the naval shipyard. Cateline and the children were frightened by the steam train pulling into the port’s station. Benedict was the only one in the group who had ever heard of such a thing, never mind actually seeing one. Benedict had ridden on a train during his recent mission for King Philip and loved every minute of the ride after becoming accustomed to the speed. He moved to the ticket window and bought tickets for the entire group to ride the recently completed train to York. It was only completed because Luke had ordered that line moved to the top of the list.

Benedict was glad the train’s crew was used to dealing with people who had never ridden a train before because he could have never dealt with the reactions from his group of travelers. Many serfs were scared, while most of the children shouted with glee as the train pulled out of the station. Soon everyone became accustomed to the speed and began to relax.

What didn’t help was the number of uniformed soldiers on the train. Soldiers and serfs didn’t get along, and the soldier’s presence made many of the serfs nervous. However, the soldiers were very well-behaved, much to the serf’s surprise. Cateline was also staring at the soldiers, but for a different reason. The number of women in uniform caught her off guard because no other army had female soldiers unless they were in special units. Her husband had told her about the women in the British military, but Cateline hadn’t believed him. Benedict wondered about the number of soldiers until he noticed the insignia on their collars; they were from an engineering unit. Having been a former French diplomat and spy, Benedict knew how to read the insignias of the British Army. When he saw their shoulder patch, he knew that Marion had gone through with her threat to integrate Scotland and England into Great Britain.