The Kingdom Series – The Lion at Bay

by Robert Low

  ‘Who … whit why in the name o’ God are ye up here?’

  The servant was astounded and truculent, his round face indignant. Hal clutched his belly and whimpered.

  ‘That way, ye jurrocks,’ the servant declared, pointing with his chin back the way Hal had come. ‘An’ dinna you mess the floors afore ye get to it.’

  Hal, obedient and scurrying, whipped round and left, his mind racing with the certainty that he had found the Master’s refuge. Behind him, he heard the servant berating the guard to follow Hal and make sure of him; in turn, the guard stolidly defended his remaining where he was, as ordered.

  He reached the spiral stair and went down, back to the level of the hall, paused to make sure the servant could no longer see him and darted downwards. Incongruously, he heard only one voice and knew it was Kirkpatrick’s but did not know why – if he had heard it right – the man would be discoursing about ploughboys.

  ‘The ploughboy,’ Kirkpatrick declared to his rapt audience, ‘whose name was Tam, then ran off, never thinking of what ruin this brought on his da and his brithers, left to pay the price to their liege lord. Tam ran to the nearest toon, for it is kent that if ye can stay hidden in a toon for a year and a day, ye escape the punishment o’ yer rash disregard for God’s plan for the world.’

  Kirkpatrick paused, to allow for the head-shaking and tutting of noble and friar.

  ‘He sleekit himself into work at the castle, though it was of the meanest kind – he became a gong farmer, covered in shite crown to toe every day. But paid well for it – as much as a good latch bowman.’

  The crossbow soldiery took the jeers of their comrades well enough, though some sharp words from the top table had to stop the drunken worst from rabbling there and then. Kirkpatrick waited patiently, ticking off the seconds and hoping Hal made the most of them; the sweat was trickling icy trails down his back and pooling where his tunic belt cinched.

  ‘The castle never smelled as sweet wi’ Tam at the cesspits, so that the Earl declared it a pleasure to turd and it was to be hoped that this sweet-smelling addition to life would please his daughter. She was a ripe beauty, right enow, with a chest o’ treasures in more ways than just the one – but had stopped speaking entire when she was nine and had not peeped once since then. Not a single person kent the why of it, neither.’

  The soldiery perked up at this – beautiful damsels with large chests of treasure made for a good tale in their eyes and Kirkpatrick, who had known this – and even tailored his speech from the neat southern English to the rawer north, where most of the men-at-arms came from – saw Fitzwalter had also noted this, was stroking his beard, thoughtful and considered.

  He is a creishie wee fox, that yin, Kirkpatrick thought, hoping he did not go dry-mouthed, hoping – Christ save us – that Hal remembered his place. One slip and we are spiked on some city gate.

  Hal had no idea of his place save that it was in the dim of the undercroft, a maze of cellars, most of them emptied. He knew the kitchen was on the other side of the hall and surmised that these cellars had been emptied to take captives, but the doors of most of them were locked tight.

  Then, in the grey gloom, he heard a door rattle open, the jingle of keys and a burst of red-gold light. He froze, trapped, then fell into the belly-curled whimper he had been adopting all along, so that Dixon stared, amazed, his blue bottom lip wobbling with the surprise of it.

  ‘Jakes,’ Hal groaned and Dixon stirred and frowned.

  ‘A garderobe in an undercroft?’ he growled. ‘Are ye slack-wittit? Go up, ye daftie. Get ye gone …’

  He lashed out with his only weapon, the heavy keys and Hal took it on a shoulder, wincing as he backed away and scuttled back up the stairs, to where a troubled earl wanted his daughter to speak.

  ‘The Earl declared that whoever teased his daughter to speak would be married on to her,’ Kirkpatrick declared. ‘Many tried – clivver nobiles from all the airts and pairts – but the lovely quine stayed silent.’

  ‘Now there’s a blissin’,’ called out one of the soldiers. ‘A perfect wummin …’

  The laughter allowed Hal to scurry into the hall again, but Kirkpatrick saw Fitzwalter staring past him and, when Hal arrived back at the table, knew the knight had been marking the return.

  ‘So Tam was busy digging out the cess this day when the Earl’s daughter passed, walking eechsie-ochsie with her wee pet dug, which was a four-legged clevery and seemed to ken what his mistress wanted without her speakin’.

  ‘So Tam began to talk to the dog: “I heard that you are very smart and I want advice from you. We were three travellers – a carver, a tailor and me, who journeyed on as yin. At camp that night, the carver took first watch and, because he had not much to do, he took a piece of wood and made a nice wee girl of it.

  ‘“Then he woke the tailor. The tailor saw the wooden girl and took scissors, needle and thread and began to sew a dress, which he put it on the girl. Then it was my turn to watch – and I taught her to speak, so that she came into life. In the morning, when they woke up, everybody wanted to have the girl. The carver said: ‘I made her.’ The tailor said: ‘I dressed her.’ I also wanted to have the girl. Tell me, wee smart dug, who should have the girl?” And Tam waited, cocking his head as if expecting a real reply from the wee dug.’

  There was silence in the hall as everyone mulled the problem; Kirkpatrick could hear Hal’s ragged breathing, glanced quickly down to see him nurse his shoulder and did not like what that revealed or the unease it crawled into him.

  ‘Well?’ demanded the young Ross truculently and Kirkpatrick was jerked back to the moment.

  ‘Well,’ he declared, spreading his hands, ‘of course the wee dug did not speak – but the Earl’s daughter did. “Who else than you should have her?” she says, tart as you please. “What is a carver’s wooden girl? What is tailor’s dress without speech? You gave her the best gift – life and speech – so you should have the girl.”’

  There was laughter at that, for they all knew Tam the gongfermor had won.

  ‘That put fox in the henhoose,’ Kirkpatrick declared, sweating now. ‘“So you have decided for yourself,” Tam said to the Earl’s daughter. “I gave you speech and life, so you should be mine.” Needless to say, the Earl had other ideas about his precious quine getting married on to a shit-covered chiel. He offered another good reward, but Tam had Reason in him, telling him that an earl’s word was law in his own domain and if the Earl wanted people to behave according to law, he must behave in that way too. The Earl must give up his daughter.’

  ‘This will not turn out well,’ the friar mourned and folk shushed him. Kirkpatrick acknowledged the priest with a wave.

  ‘You are right,’ he said, ‘for the Earl announced that Tam would lose his head for his impudence and the poor boy was bound and led to the block. The best axeman turned up and spat on his palms, then raised his weapon high.’

  Kirkpatrick paused for the effect and had gratifying silence.

  ‘Fortune stepped in. “Get well out of him,” Fortune declares to Reason. “See what a pass ye have brought the lad to.” So Fortune got in the boy, the axe swung – and the shaft snapped. Before he could fetch another weapon, the daughter had prevailed on her da to relent, that she would marry the lad.

  ‘So there was a grand wedding,’ Kirkpatrick declared with a flourish, ‘to which all were invited, Reason included, and most came. But seeing he would meet Fortune, he ran away – and, since that time, when Reason meets Fortune, Reason stands aside so Fortune can pass.’

  There was applause and laughter; with an airy wave, Fitzwalter had the steward deliver meat to the two packmen and the hall washed with new chatter and arguments over Fortune and Reason.

  ‘What was all that?’ Hal hissed, head down as if concentrating on his trencher.

  ‘Smoke and mirrors,’ Kirkpatrick answered grimly. ‘I hope it was worth the work – did you find anything?’

  Hal was suddenly ravenous, turned his black, g
reased, beaming face on Kirkpatrick as he reached for bread and meat.

  ‘I ken where your named kinsman is,’ he said between mouthfuls. ‘So there she will be also.’

  Kirkpatrick nodded, chewing and thinking of the fulfilment of his mission to his king – and the revenge he would take at the same time.

  He thought of the ring, the one he had taken from Creishie Marthe at Methven, the one she had cut from the hand of a throat-slit man-at-arms.

  The ring now snugged up in a purse under his armpit. Such a wee bauble, he marvelled, to bring such ruin to lives.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Closeburn Castle, Annandale

  Later that night …

  They went up, creeping from the snoring hall, stepping carefully over the sleepers; the friar stirred and yelped like a bairn in some deep dream and Hal stopped like a deer with a scent, one foot half-poised in his felted socks.

  He had his boots round his neck because Nichol’s cobbling had resulted in new, thick leather slats for grip, which now clacked like nails, loud as a bell in a rimed silence such as this cold hall.

  The sleepers here were all of Closeburn’s least – the servants, the dogs and the ill-considered guests; Kirkpatrick wondered if the friar was dreaming some idea of what the future held, when daylight revealed all that had happened.

  Hal stepped on, his breath grey-blue smoke; they wreathed out and up, Kirkpatrick’s soft, deer-soled boots making no sound. Hal envied him as the cold seeped chill through the wool and into his feet.

  They went along the corridor, the sconces burned to dark ash now, crept to the corner and poised, trying not to breathe, harsh with the tension. This was where the guard had been – Kirkpatrick, his mouth dry, risked a look, drew back and put his lips close enough for Hal to feel his hot breath on his ear.

  ‘The servant only – across the door. We will needs deal with him.’

  Hal locked eyes with him, knowing what Kirkpatrick meant. He shook his head, mimed a blow and Kirkpatrick, after a pause, shrugged. He moved close to the sleeping bundle across the threshold, knelt and put the fluted dagger in the man’s heart at the same time as he smothered his mouth. There was only a brief whimper and then stillness, so that when Hal came up, all bristling with silent outrage, Kirkpatrick straightened, wiped the dagger and shrugged.

  ‘Always best to mak’ siccar,’ he hissed and opened the door.

  The room was warm, the brazier on a slab still glowing like a fierce red eye. There were three beeswax candles in tall holders streaked with old meltings and the light was a glow on the two men, heads almost touching, bent over the chess set; they looked up with astonishment as Hal and Kirkpatrick stepped in, the latter dragging the body of the servant and closing the door.

  ‘Who in the name of God are you?’ demanded one, starting to rise, but Kirkpatrick was round on him like a stoat on a rabbit, the long dirk winking like gold in his fist.

  ‘Easy, kinsman,’ he said with a vicious grin and Sir Roger, the Master of Closeburn, sat down heavily, one hand at his throat.

  ‘Black Roger,’ he said faintly.

  ‘The same.’

  ‘Where is Isabel?’ demanded Hal, looking round in bewilderment and then at the other player. ‘Who are … wait. I ken your face.’

  ‘So ye should,’ Kirkpatrick declared and moved swiftly to disarm his namesake of his dagger. ‘Yon is the wee man who treated us both at times, for injuries gained in the service of his liege lord.’

  ‘The physicker,’ Hal said uncertainly. ‘Bruce’s doctor.’

  ‘What do you want here?’ demanded the Master of Closeburn, recovering enough to try and reassert himself; Hal saw him clearly for the first time and was struck how like Kirkpatrick he was. You could not miss the kinship, Hal said to himself, though the Master was older, heavier of face and body.

  It was a marvel Kirkpatrick had not been spotted the minute he stuck his face inside the castle – but then the face had been black as a Moor’s and no-one would have given a wee cheapjack a second glance. Still – Hal now knew why Kirkpatrick had looked so sweated, having to stand with all eyes on him and the possibility of his likeness to his namesake kinsman imminent.

  Kirkpatrick nudged him impatiently out of this, indicating for him to search the physician for arms and, when that was done, turned back to his namesake, now sitting upright and tensed as if to spring.

  ‘I would unlatch that look,’ Kirkpatrick said, ‘if I were you, kinsman. A word or deed misplaced will see you trying to stuff yer blood back in yer throat with both hands.’

  ‘Whit why are ye here?’ Sir Roger demanded again, though he unclenched a little.

  ‘He is here for me,’ said the physician quietly and Kirkpatrick chuckled and nodded. Hal looked from one to the other, then back to Kirkpatrick.

  ‘What is this? Where is Isabel?’

  ‘Isabel?’ repeated Sir Roger. ‘Isabel who?’

  ‘Coontess o’ Buchan,’ Kirkpatrick answered smoothly, then threw something on the desk, where it tinkled and spun slightly; a ring, Hal saw. The physician reached out one hand and lifted it as though his fingers had suddenly become fat sausages that did not belong to him.

  ‘I took it from Creishie Marthe at Methven,’ Kirkpatrick said, ‘who had fresh cut it aff the finger o’ a wee man-at-arms whose shield told his allegiance – Closeburn.’

  ‘Robert Haws,’ Sir Roger said, almost wearily. ‘He never returned. We never found trace of him at all.’

  ‘Aye, weel, he is dead, certes, since I saw Creishie Marthe slit his throat wide. Ye are goodly shot of him,’ Kirkpatrick answered, ‘for he was the thieving wee rat who stole James of Montaillou’s most precious possession. Being a prisoner, poor wee James could hardly protest and you would not have cared much then, kinsman – until ye discovered what secrets this physicker had to tell. Secrets to bring a rich reward from Edward of England.’

  He nodded at the doctor, sitting stunned and holding the ring.

  ‘A singular ring,’ he went on, ‘which I noticed more than once when ye were tightening wraps on my ribs and slapping stinging ointment on my bruises.’

  He stopped and grinned savagely at Hal, who stood like an ox, as stunned as the physician and the Master of Closeburn by all this.

  ‘If ye look closely at it,’ Kirkpatrick went on, speaking rapidly now, ‘ye will see it has a hand, a heart, a bag of gold, a death’s head and some fine wee writing in Langue D’Oc that says: “These three I give to thee, Till the fourth set me free.” I surmise the fourth has set the wummin free.’

  ‘She was my wife …’ the doctor said, then stopped and bowed his head.

  ‘Until ye became a Cathar. Did ye renounce the world as a Perfect? Or did she?’

  James of Montaillou groaned and turned his anguished face on Kirkpatrick.

  ‘You know. You have seen. You were there.’

  Kirkpatrick nodded grimly.

  ‘I was there. With Fournier and D’Albis during the risorgimento.’

  Hal heard the bitter venom in his voice, knew it for the shame it was and was surprised. He knew the names of Jacques Fournier and Geoffrey D’Albis, resolute prosecutors of the Inquisition; so that had been Kirkpatrick’s crusade – against the Cathars in Carcassone. Small wonder he knew the lands of Oc, songs and all – and the lingua franca of the likes of Lamprecht.

  ‘Was she a “Bonne Femme”, my wee runaway?’ Kirkpatrick went on, vicious and soft. ‘Yin of these women who have achieved complete denial of the flesh you folk say is the province of the Devil? Yin who would no longer suffer resurrection back into it and so could die happy?’

  The physician bowed his head and sobbed; Hal shook himself and growled. He did not know what Kirkpatrick was talking about, but the ‘bonne femme’ brought back why he was here and what Kirkpatrick was doing to the wee Bruce physicker. He might just as well have stuffed embers under the man’s fingernails.

  ‘Enough of this – the Coontess o’ Buchan,’ he spat. ‘Lady Mary Bruce and the chil
d, Marjorie. Where are they kept?’

  Sir Roger opened and closed his mouth a few times, then saw Kirkpatrick’s face and laughed, a sharp, nervous bark.

  ‘Is that why you are here?’ he demanded and laughed again so that Hal lifted his own dagger a fraction in warning.

  ‘They are gone, weeks since,’ the Master of Closeburn said. ‘Mary Bruce is in a cage at Roxburgh by now – the Coontess o’ Buchan similarly prisoned at Berwick. The wee lassie went south to a convent – Christ’s Bones, a man who had jaloused I had a Cathar here would have kent that the wummin were long gone.’

  He smiled, a lopsided sneer, looking at Kirkpatrick’s stone face, then at Hal’s stricken one.

  ‘Ye have been cozened, sirra – and ye will hang with this one, mark me. A word from me …’

  ‘And ye die,’ Kirkpatrick declared, then turned into Hal’s stare.

  Hal knew the truth of it; Kirkpatrick had known Isabel was long gone from here, had used him to help in this task – whatever it was. He did not know what business Kirkpatrick had with his kinsman or Bruce’s physicker, but the sick certainty in it was red murder, of which he had been made a part. Again.

  Kirkpatrick saw the sea-haar grey cloud Hal’s eyes, knew it well and grew alarmed.

  ‘Hal, there are matters here beyond ye …’ Kirkpatrick began and then reeled as he was struck. With a cry he stumbled back and fell – Sir Roger immediately leaped up, heading for the baldric hanging in the shadows and the sword sheathed up in it.

  ‘Ach – no. Hal – have sense …’

  Hal saw Sir Roger’s rabbit bolt and, by sheer instinct, went after him. James of Montaillou saw his chance and sprang for the door – caught a foot in the bundle of the dead servant and fell headlong, clattering loudly into the door.

  Cursing, Kirkpatrick spidered his way upright, scrabbled across to where James of Montaillou lay, moaning; there was blood coming from his head and Kirkpatrick found the frantic trapped-bird beat of his heart beneath his tunic, felt for the right spot with his fingers – individually wrapped, he thought with a vicious triumph – and slid the dagger in.