by Robyn Young
The Earl of Gloucester, a beefy man with thinning auburn hair, got to his feet. On the bench beside the earl, Robert saw the elderly nobleman who had criticised the king at the feast the evening before.
‘He may have consulted them,’ said Gloucester, his strident voice echoing, ‘but from what I heard, our lord dismissed the advice of those closest to him in favour of his own counsel. The chancellor advised him to reject the terms from Paris, as the rest of us would have done if presented with them.’ He turned his belligerent gaze on the king. ‘My question, Lord King, would be why. If I did not already know the answer.’
As the Earl of Gloucester’s words rang accusingly, Robert’s gaze remained on the king. He had never imagined the man on that throne, above all others except for God, so privileged, so powerful, could appear vulnerable, but Edward did – vulnerable and alone – a rigid mast thrust above a sea of accusatory faces. Recognising something occasionally glimpsed in his father and grandfather, Robert realised he was looking at the isolation that came with power. Perhaps the Comyns had the right idea: to be close enough to the throne to control it, but not so close as to become the object of men’s discontent.
‘Earl Gilbert,’ warned John de Warenne, ‘you would be advised to keep a civil tongue.’
‘Why?’ demanded Gloucester. ‘When it is my sword that will be required to win back the duchy? My men who will have to be raised for the fight? Had all of us here been equally betrayed by France then we would stand with our king united in anger and defiance. But we were not given the choice of rejecting Philippe’s terms. Neither did any of us have the hand of a French virgin dangled before us on a hook. We were not the ones reeled in. Why should we be served up on Philippe’s platter?’
As a host of voices, some incensed, others concurring, broke across the hall, Robert looked over at the aged Earl of Gloucester, whose long history of antagonism towards the king was well known. Gloucester had recently been married to one of the king’s daughters, a surprise considering his reputation, but then by bringing the powerful earl into the royal family and keeping him close, Edward had no doubt hoped to avoid just this kind of altercation. Recalling his grandfather’s talk of the war between Simon de Montfort and King Henry, Robert guessed Edward must have learned well at the feet of his father how an unhappy baron could be a dangerous one.
More earls were rising, some adding their agreement to Gloucester’s accusations. Others were coming to the king’s defence. Robert saw that one man, who now stood to harangue the Earl of Gloucester, had been sitting beside Humphrey de Bohun. Gone was the young knight’s amiable manner as he looked up solemnly at the man speaking, whose broad face was so alike his own that Robert guessed he must be his father, the Earl of Hereford and Essex, and Constable of England. Hereford wasn’t the only one defending Edward. The voice of Anthony Bek boomed out, demanding Gloucester be held in contempt for his lack of respect for his king, who had been deceived not by lust for a new bride, but by the cunning of his iniquitous cousin, who, like a wolf garbed in the wool of a lamb, had offered peace and delivered wickedness. France, not their king, deserved their wrath, he fulminated, raising his fist to the gathering as if he were on a pulpit.
Edward rose from his throne. ‘Enough!’
At the harsh command all fell silent, those on their feet sitting back down, one by one. For a long moment, the king said nothing, but stood there in his black robe, a dark tower of rage. Then, all at once, the fury seemed to drain from him and he hung his head. ‘Earl Gilbert is right.’
Men glanced at one another. Many looked over at Gloucester, who was staring at Edward, his face filled with uneasy mistrust.
Edward raised his eyes. ‘I was a fool to trust Philippe.’
For a moment, Robert thought he saw anger still struggling within the king’s face, then it was gone and his expression was one of remorse.
‘I admit the marriage agreement seemed a blessing to me. Most of my children are dead. I have only one male heir and one is hardly enough.’
Robert found himself nodding, thinking of King Alexander.
‘It was not lust, but duty to this realm and to my subjects that spurred me to act as I did. Rash though it may have been, imprudent though it was.’
The barons were hushed to a man. Gloucester looked uncomfortable, no longer able to meet the king’s gaze.
Edward walked from his throne, down the steps of the dais. He paused for a moment before them all, then knelt on the floor in front of the benches. Robert sat up to get a better view of the kneeling monarch. His hair steely in the morning light, his robes settling around him in a black pool, Edward looked more regal in that moment than he ever had before.
‘I beg your forgiveness.’ The king’s voice carried through the hall. ‘Not as your king, rather as a man, fallible as any born of Adam’s line.’ He lifted his head. ‘And just as I beg your forgiveness for my folly, made for the sake of the realm, I beg for your aid to help me take back what has been stolen from us all. Stand with me, men of England, and I will not fail you again.’
The Earl of Hereford rose. ‘I will follow you, my lord. In life and death.’
Humphrey de Bohun got to his feet beside his father, head held high, his face filled with pride.
Slowly others followed, rising and pledging themselves to Edward.
‘Knights of the realm, mount your warhorses,’ Anthony Bek’s voice rumbled from the dais. ‘Take up your lances! We go to win back the lands of our king!’
Robert looked around him as the earls of Norfolk and Arundel and others who had challenged the king began to stand, either genuinely moved by Edward’s astonishing speech, or else too discomforted to be in the minority still seated. He sat there for a moment longer, then rose with the rest. It might not be a crusade, but there was no denying the opportunities presented by a war in France: seized estates, possible prisoners for ransom and a king’s gratitude. As the Earl of Gloucester got to his feet, grim, but defeated, Robert, standing among the barons of England, felt a jolt of anticipation. This was what he had trained for, all those months in Ireland and the years in Carrick and Annandale. This was his chance to win his spurs, serving in one of the most formidable armies in the world.
24
The mountains were shrouded in blue twilight. Stars crowned the vault of sky above the mass of rock and scree-covered slopes of Snowdon. In the shadows of the higher peaks a swift stream flowed down the spine of a ridge, its banks clustered with thorny trees and bushes. Along this stream ran two men, scrabbling over boulders and splashing down into sharp shingle, the rush of water loud in their ears. The stream was icy, even now in late August when the fields of Gwynedd, far below, were burned gold by the sun. The echo of a night bird’s cry made one of the men look up. He took a moment to catch his breath, the freezing water washing over his legs, then, as his companion glanced back, he continued on, digging his spear into the stream to aid him.
At a worn stone marker that jutted from the tumbling waters, the men climbed the bank into a web of trees, thick with night. Smells of earth and wild herbs rose around them and moths batted softly against their faces. After some time one of them stopped suddenly, holding out a hand to halt the other. With barely a rustle of undergrowth, several figures emerged from the hazy darkness.
‘Who’s there?’
‘Rhys and Hywel from Caernarfon,’ answered one of the men. ‘We must see Madog.’
After a pause, the shadowy figures parted and the two passed through their midst.
The trees thinned out and the ground rose steeply to a grassy plateau, beneath the hulk of Snowdon. In the milky starlight the fortress that thrust from a rocky mound appeared silvery and smooth. Rhys and Hywel knew that by day its scars would not be so concealed, the fire stains and gashes in the stonework a testimony to its violent past. For eight years after its fall the castle had stood as a ruin, inhabited only by industrious spiders and peregrines that hunted from the heights. Its restoration had been a painstaking process, scaf
folding still balanced precariously on the rocks around its western façade, the mossy stones being gathered from the crumbled piles they had been left to moulder in and slowly reassembled.
Making their way quickly up the track that wound around the rocks, the two approached the castle gate. Torches billowed on the parapets, where the outlines of men were moving. After being questioned they hastened through the courtyard, noisy with the bleating of goats and sheep. Men in woollen cloaks and hukes shared cups of beer around. Huts lined the walls, fashioned from turf and timber, and the smell of food mixed uneasily with the greasy stench of a latrine. Up the outer steps of the castle’s keep, passing more guards, the two men entered a dull-lit hall, where the floor and walls were green with lichen. A fire spat from a pit in the centre, smoke rising to the ceiling, which was riddled with holes. The tendrils swirled through the gaps to the floor above, then up to the roof, part of which opened into the star-strewn sky. There were several men seated on logs around the fire. They looked round as Rhys and Hywel entered.
One, the youngest, who had keen eyes beneath a fringe of soot-black hair, rose. ‘You weren’t to leave your post for another two months.’
Hywel stepped forward. ‘Where is Lord Madog, Dafydd?’
‘Here.’
A broad-shouldered man was heading down a set of creaking wooden steps from the upper floor. His black hair was tousled from sleep, his chin rough with stubble. He descended the last few stairs and walked across the hall towards them, pulling his fur-trimmed cloak tighter about his muscular shoulders. He glanced at the young man by the fire. ‘Be seated, brother,’ he said, before turning his gaze on the two men. ‘Why have you come?’
‘The English are leaving, Madog,’ said Hywel. His chest was heaving with the effort of the long climb, but his eyes were shining. He paused to clear his dry throat.
Madog gestured to one of the men by the fire. ‘Give them something to drink.’
‘It began over a week ago,’ said Hywel, gratefully accepting the cup of beer that was passed to him. He gulped at it, before passing it to Rhys. ‘Word came from England that the King of France had seized the duchy of Gascony and King Edward had declared war upon him. The garrison at Caernarfon was called to serve.’
‘The same happened at Conwy and Rhuddlan, according to our men there,’ Rhys cut in. ‘Everywhere in Gwynedd – everywhere in Wales – English soldiers are moving out. There are only a few who remain in the castles. It is our chance, Madog.’
‘But the towns will still be full of English settlers,’ said Dafydd, coming to stand beside his older brother.
‘Without soldiers to protect them they are nothing but lambs in pens.’ Madog’s eyes moved to the fractured ceiling, intent in thought.
‘There is more,’ said Hywel. ‘King Edward has issued writs that are being proclaimed by English officials throughout Gwynedd. The men of Wales are to fight. We have all been summoned to serve him in France.’
Madog’s face hardened in the gloom. ‘Gather the men,’ he said, before turning to Dafydd. ‘And bring me my cousin’s chest.’
The men around the fire, his chiefs, had all risen.
Madog nodded at the unspoken question in their faces. ‘It is time.’
Torches burned around the courtyard, sparks whirling into the black before winking into nothing. Madog stood on the steps of the keep wrapped in his fur-lined cloak, the scarred tower rising behind him. Beside him stood his chiefs, including his young brother, Dafydd, at whose feet was a wooden chest, engraved with silver words in the old British tongue. Below, the faces of his men were ruddy in the torch flames. Every one of them was silent, waiting. Madog stared at their upturned heads, seeing hope and fear, hunger and anticipation.
Some of them had been with him in the wilderness for years, ever since the death of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd. For a long time they had stayed hidden, licking the wounds inflicted by the English in the conquest over a decade ago, when their hopes for a liberated Wales had been shattered by the iron of the English cavalry. Other men, unwilling to live under the yoke of the English officials and their strange laws, followed him into the hills over the years, as the foreign settlers established new towns and filled them with their own people, forcing the Welsh to adapt to English customs and obey their rule.
Madog began to speak. ‘Down in the walled towns and castles, in the well-stocked halls of foreign officials they call us outlaws. But this is not what we are, for no English law do we observe, only the laws of the kingdom of Gwynedd. Some of you think yourselves prisoners, locked away in our mountain fastness. I say we are neither outlaws nor prisoners. Up here, in freedom, we are kings!’
A few scattered calls of approval followed his words. One or two men laughed appreciatively.
Madog went on. ‘For a long time we have waited for the chance to win back our lands. Now, that chance has come. Edward’s towns have been left undefended, the soldiers called away for his war. We have been summoned to fight by this king whose officials have long taxed our people into misery. But we shall not lift our spears for him, this tyrant.’
The calls of his men grew louder.
‘We shall lift them against him!’
A roar followed, men stamping spear butts on the ground.
Madog’s voice rose above their thunder. ‘We have allies in the mountains to the south and west, men who will rally to this cause. We have weapons. We have the will!’
The shouts continued, fierce now, all humour gone.
‘For centuries our people have spoken of the mab darogan: the warrior who will lead us to victory against the foreign invaders, the man who will usher in a new age. The prophets say he will come with signs and portents.’ Madog gestured to his brother. ‘I say this is our sign! Our portent!’
Dafydd crouched beside the engraved wooden chest to open it. Carefully, reverently, he lifted out a slender gold circlet, the metal of which was dented and scratched. As he passed it to his brother, the men’s shouts scattered away into silence.
Madog stood before them, his black hair whipping about his face in the night wind. ‘This crown was once worn by a man whose blood I share. Before the mighty Llywelyn fell in battle he passed it to me. I hid it from King Edward when he came searching, desiring its power for himself.’ Madog raised the crown, his heart hammering. His life, for more than a decade, had been leading to this point. ‘Now, it is time for us to come down from the shelter of these hills, time to raise our spears against our enemies. And I shall lead you, not as Madog ap Llywelyn, but as your prince, for I hold in my hands the Crown of Arthur and whoever wears this band, by ancient prophecy, shall be the Prince of Wales.’
Caernarfon, Wales
1284 AD
Outside, the birds were crying, calling the dawn as if they were God’s messengers, the first to hear His command to wake, as it descended from heaven. Gulls and geese, herons and ragged-winged cormorants, little dragons some of the English soldiers who had never seen the sea before had named them.
Edward lay in silence listening to their muffled cries as he stared at the wall through the gap in the bed drapes, where a patch of light had been growing for the past hour. Beneath his back the linen sheet was damp. He had slept maybe two hours of the night, but he wasn’t tired. A new wail joined the birds’ chorus, echoing down the passage and beneath the bedchamber door. Edward looked at his wife, lying warm beside him, her black hair veined with grey tumbling across the silk pillow. She didn’t stir. After a moment, he sat up, the fur-lined cover slipping down to his waist. The floor beneath his feet was softened by a rug, one of many Eleanor had insisted be transported with their bed and the rest of the furniture. All across the shires of England this bed and these rugs had travelled, across the border, into Snowdonia’s mountainous heart.
As Edward crossed the chamber the dawn air raised gooseflesh on his skin. He pulled on his braies and laced the thin cord around the top to keep them in place. As he reached for his shirt, he caught sight of himself in the looking-glass.
A tall figure stood in the gloom, long legs slabbed with muscle, broad chest and arms sharply contoured in the shadows. The campaign had toughened him, honing his body to the tower of strength it had been in youth. It couldn’t take the ash from his hair, however, or the lines from his brow, which had only increased. He had celebrated his forty-fifth birthday two months ago and those years were showing in his eyes and the roughness of his skin, burned brown and leather-like by sun and wind. Turning from the glass, Edward put on his shirt, then a robe pulled in at his waist with a belt and, lastly, a pair of hide boots, scuffed and dusty despite the vigorous clean his page had given them. Heading out of the chamber, he made his way down the passage.
The wailing was louder and had been joined by soft singing. Edward stopped by the closed door, his ears assaulted by the hungry cries that pierced through the wood into his mind. He heard the wet nurse’s footsteps pacing the floor as the infant silenced to drag in a breath before opening his lungs again. Edward closed his eyes and placed a hand on the wood, letting that sound shudder over him. It was only a week since messengers had come from London to tell him his eldest son had died at Westminster, taken without warning, like so many of his children over the years.
His first had been dead in the womb, no chance at life. His second, sweet Katherine, delivered in Gascony, had died six months after the battle at Lewes, aged three. Joan only made it to eight months, John reached five years and Henry six. Ten of them gone, one by one, and now Alfonso, his beautiful boy, whom he had been so certain would live to wear the crown, had joined their silent ranks. The raging child beyond the door, his sixteenth, born in a war and named after himself, was now his only son and England’s only heir. Those powerful screams were a comfort Edward lingered to listen to for some moments more, before moving on down the stairs of the royal apartments and out into the dawn.
