Shake Loose the Border

by Robert Low

  ‘Come ahead, ye skull-faced shit-eater. This sword has your name on it.’

  There was a moment of peace, where the sun lisped down on the scrabbling coal heavers backing away from Clem and his whip. He lashed it out once, a sharp crack that ruined air; people yelped and scattered.

  Batty saw at once that Clem wanted a knife in his other fist, the one that would not work for him. It was a standard – knife and six feet of coarse leather, tempered to a thin, fine leather end studded with barbs. Even when lashing bound slaves, a good whipmaster would have a knife ready.

  Clem drew back his arm and leaned into the strike. He needed distance but even a solid hit from the middle of the whip would ruin Batty’s day; as it was, the sharp snap of it near his face made him rear back in alarm.

  ‘I will blind you, you one-armed dog. Then I will string you up and finish what I started. I will lay your backbone open to the world…’

  Batty closed on him with a lumbering rush, knowing that the key to the whip was distance; the hiss of it was loud, he flung up his hand in panic and felt the cracking sear of it along his forearm.

  He yelped, lost the sword and ploughed on to where Clem sidestepped like a toreador, leaving Batty to stumble on until his foot caught and he fell, rolling over and over. The whip cracked again and again – his head reeled from a blow and his burgonet slid off and dropped to his feet.

  He fumbled out Brother Throw and flicked it, more hope than expectation – but he heard Clem yelp and took the chance to rush him again – with the same result.

  Crack – he fell sideways, the breath driven out of him with a strike to the jack; when he risked a look he saw a vicious slice in it, exposing cracked horn plates. He would not last long like this – he rolled over frantically as the whip sliced up spirals of coal splinters. It was here he found his sword and swept it up, feeling the black dust on his palm sweat like flour on oil.

  Clem laughed. Batty rushed him – and this time Clem seemed unable to wield the leather coil. He tugged and tugged and then panicked as Batty closed in; beyond him, Batty saw Megs, both booted feet planted firmly on the outstretched tail of barbs.

  At the last, Clem dropped the whip and hauled out his knife, but Batty was not waiting for any salle honour – he slashed the broken arm, which made Clem reel away, shrieking at the new pain. Then he slashed from the other quarter, hit Clem’s wildly flailing wrist and cut it almost off; the knife went spinning off like a bar of gold in the sunrise.

  ‘I will slay you…’

  The howl was heartfelt, seared with pain and frustration and fear. Batty did not care about it.

  ‘Away,’ he growled back. ‘You couldna pick your nose, even if you had one.’

  Clem went to his knees, babbling. Batty sheathed his backsword, bent and took up the handle of the whip.

  ‘I have only ever used yin on bullocks,’ he said in a growl, ‘but I ken the way of it…’

  He drew back his arm and was stopped by an imperious command. He turned into the lean, handsome face of the Captain of Hermitage, who smiled.

  ‘Ach, Batty – dinna spoil it. This is a legend waiting to happen – and if you sully it with vicious, you stain the brave act o’ yer light of love.’

  Men closed in and hauled Clem to his feet; he yelped once with pain and struggled a bit until a gauntleted hand smacked the back of his head.

  ‘I will get ye,’ he panted at Batty, who waved his wearied hand.

  ‘Come ahead if ye can unkninch yer neck from the tree the Captain of Hermitage will find for ye.’

  ‘Well done,’ the Captain declared, beaming.

  Aye, you would think that, Batty muttered to himself, given that you are young, fetching as a cavalier and full of that nonsense. Yet he saw Megs smiling, too and gave up the whip. When she crossed to him, drew him into her embrace, he felt the full sun of the day strike him like a furnace of gold.

  * * *

  They stayed at Hermitage, in a decent bolster bed and having had to wash all over for the privilege, a snell task that bothered Batty more than her. They ate well and paid for it by telling the Captain what had been done – or most of it.

  Batty watched Megs flirt with the Captain and marvelled at himself for bridling up like a spoiled dog. In the end, when they went to the room through the knowing looks and little jeers, neither of them had the strength for anything but sleep.

  ‘Tomorrow, Appleby,’ she said with finality and Batty was too weary to argue. Mayhap he would purchase a new horse, though the memory of a dying Fiskie lay on him like cold haar. That and the vanishment of his axe-handled dagg and Brother Throw – as if all the old accoutrements of a vicious life had been stripped from him.

  It was all part of the whole and he had learned that a long time ago. He had also learned that if you must leave a place, leave it the fastest way you can. Never turn back and never believe that an hour you remember is a better hour because it is dead.

  He said as much and got a tired grunt back. ‘Women too, I am betting,’ she said.

  Batty was clever enough to say nothing. He realised there might be a bit more of that in his future.

  Author’s Note

  Most of this is fiction, set against a true tale – the Rough Wooing (a later term) was the period where an ailing Henry VIII tried to assert his power to ensure the union of England and Scotland with a marriage between his young son Edward and Mary Queen of Scots. The more violence he used, the more violence he met from Scots who would not be forced.

  In the end, he died without having resolved what he had wanted. For a time the Lord Protector of the young Edward VI tried to carry matters on, but it was clear the English had reached their limits – and there were other armed bands causing trouble in the south.

  The Battle of St Monans was the last throw and it failed. I recommend you look up the work on this vanished epic written by Leonard Low (no relation). You can find it on Amazon and elsewhere.

  In the end, the war stopped, mainly because the French wanted it. They got Boulogne back and the Scots got all the English-seized fortresses and castles in Scotland.

  It might have seemed to many that, at last, there was peace along the Border lands – but there wasn’t. The raids continued for decades, right on until the death of Elizabeth I and the accession of James, already King of Scotland and now of England, too. There was no more Border and the reivers realised it, though the last to do so were the Grahams, who had to be sent out of the country.

  The Grahams were as wicked a crew as any in the Borderland, but none of their crimes justified the viciousness with which they were murdered, dispossessed, and banished in the name of law and order, and with the full approval of the King, whose hatred seems to have been acute. For too long a time at the turn of the 17th century, Jeddart Justice prevailed – which is to hang first and try later.

  As late as 1614 a proclamation was issued forbidding any Grahams to return from banishment in Ireland or the Low Countries, yet there were still those who were willing to run the risk of coming home.

  Batty, I feel, would have approved.

  Glossary

  APOSTLES – A collection of wooden, stoppered flasks filled with an exact amount of powder and ball for a single pistol or caliver shot, which made for quicker and more reliable loading. They were suspended by a cord from a leather bandolier worn by arquebusiers, seven flasks in front and five in back, for a total of twelve, hence the name.

  BARMKIN – A defensive wall built round a castle or keep, usually with a walkway for sentries.

  BATTLE OF ST MONANS – The Battle of St Monans doesn’t exist in any military credits of Scottish history and you can blame Oliver Cromwell for it. In 1650 Cromwell transported all the Scottish records to the safekeeping of the Tower of London where they remained for ten years until he was replaced by King Charles II. The records were returned to Scottish shores, but disaster struck when a ship sank near Newcastle, taking 85 barrels of papers down to the salty deeps. It took the records of 1548, 1550
and 1551 and among the losses were details of the Battle of St Monans.

  Some 900 died. The combatants were the High Admiral of England and James Stewart (Mary Queen of Scots’ half brother) who are not minor figures in the history of events. Bonnie Prince Charlie’s two victories 200 years later at Prestonpans and Falkirk did not have such a loss of life and both these conflicts have memorials and innumerable books on the subjects.

  BILL – An official warrant, issued by a March Warden or the like, demanding that a suspected miscreant present himself for judgement. If ignored – fouled – then someone appointed by the Wardens would go and bring him to justice. This was Batty’s job until the war stopped all Warden activity.

  BILL – Derived originally from the agricultural billhook, the bill consisted of a hooked chopping blade with several pointed projections mounted on a staff. The end of the cutting blade curves forward to form a hook, which is the bill’s distinguishing characteristic. English bills tended to be relatively short, putting them at a disadvantage against the commonly used pikes of other countries.

  BIRL – To spin round.

  BLACK MEAL – A payment made, in coin or bartered goods (grain or meal), to the more powerful family who could do you harm. In essence, the 16th century Borders were run like Mafia bosses and paying to keep them away was sometimes the only recourse. Origin of the word ‘blackmail’.

  CALIVER – An improved version of the arquebus, in that it had standard bore, making loading faster and firing more accurate.

  CRUCK HOUSE – A building made of a frame of curved timbers set in pairs. Used to build small huts up to large barns, it was the simplest cheapest building method of the medieval age.

  CRUSIE – A simple container with a wick that provided light.

  DAGG – A pistol as opposed to a long-barrel musket.

  DEBATABLE LAND – An area ten miles long and four wide created by edicts from both countries about settling it or raising any permanent structures. The area’s people ignored this and powerful clans moved in, notably the Armstrongs. For three hundred years they effectively controlled the land, daring Scotland or England to interfere. It became a haven for outlaws of all sides.

  FUGGY (or FOGGY) TODDLER – Affectionate name for the wild or moss bee because of its slow, droning, bumbling flight. They still make nests on the surface of the moors.

  HEMP – Hanging, from the material used to make the rope.

  HIRPLE – Limp.

  HOT TROD – The formalities of pursuing reivers, usually by the forces of the Wardens. Up to six days after the seizure of any cattle by thieves taking them across the other side of the Border, the forces attempting to recover them and apprehend the guilty were permitted to also cross the Border freely in pursuit. They had to do it with ‘hue and cry, with horn and hound’ and were also obliged to carry a smouldering peat on the point of a lance to signify the task they were on.

  HOW BULLS RUN AND CHUCKIES ROW – Scottish interpretation of what academics in university do all day. How bulls run is self-explanatory. Chuckies are small, smooth stones and row is simply a dialectic for ‘roll’. In other words – an explanation of how the world works.

  JACK – The ubiquitous garment of the Border warrior – the jack of plates. Most ordinary Border fighters had a jack, a sleeveless jerkin with either iron or the cheaper horn plates sewn between two layers of felt or canvas.

  JALOUSE – To surmise or suspect.

  KERTCH – A kerchief, usually used by married women to cover their hair.

  KISTING – Funeral. A kist is a chest or a box.

  LATCHBOW – A cheap crossbow, light enough to be used from horseback, with a firing mechanism as simple as a door latch. The power was light but at close range it would wound or kill an unprotected man and knock the wind out of one wearing a jack.

  PERJINK – Proper, neat.

  PRIMERO – 16th century poker where you attempt to bluff your competitors out of betting against you. Players vie or vye by stating how high a hand they are claiming to have and can flat-out lie to overstate it. It was played using a 40-card deck, but there are no surviving written rules, only descriptions.

  RIDE/RIDING – The raids mounted by one reiver family, or Name, against another, either for robbery or revenge. Depending on how many family members and affiliated Names you could get to join you, these were brief affairs of one night or ones involving several thousand men who could lay waste to entire villages and towns on either side of the Border. The usual Riding times lasted from Lammas (Aug 1) to Candlemas (Feb 2).

  SLORACH – Any bog or morass or filthy mess you might step in.

  SLOW MATCH – Early firearms were called ‘matchlocks’ because they were ignited by a smouldering fuse called a slow match, brought down into the pan. Keeping a slow match lit required constant vigilance, a good manufacturer – and no rain. By the middle of the 16th century, pistols with a wheel-lock mechanism were being made, which utilised an iron pyrite to create sparks and a cover for the pan, which was more reliable.

  SNELL – Cold, icy.

  TESTOON – Coin minted during the last days of Henry VIII, with more copper than silver in it, so that the portrait of Henry on one side wore down to the copper on his embossed nose becoming known as ‘coppernoses’ as a result. They transmuted, eventually into the English shilling.

  About the Author

  Robert Low is a Scottish journalist and historical novelist, with series based on the Vikings, and the early days of Scotland. He was also a war correspondent, reporting from Sarajevo, Romania, Kosovo, and Vietnam. He is now a full time fiction author.

  Also by Robert Low

  Brothers Of The Sands

  Beasts Beyond The Wall

  The Red Serpent

  Beasts From The Dark

  Border Reivers

  A Dish of Spurs

  Burning the Water

  Shake Loose the Border

  First published in the United Kingdom in 2021 by Canelo

  This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2021 by Canelo

  Canelo Digital Publishing Limited

  31 Helen Road

  Oxford OX2 0DF

  United Kingdom

  Copyright © Robert Low, 2021

  The moral right of Robert Low to be identified as the creator of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Ebook ISBN 9781800322134

  Print ISBN 9781800322585

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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