Worth Dying For (The Bruce Trilogy)

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  It was evening before the food was brought to the tables and by then most of the guests were belly-full of wine. The pheasant was cold. The pork charred to cinders. Piers spent most of the afternoon shouting at the kitchen help, until he spun himself into a frenetic state.

  My dainty French bride blubbered publicly. She declared the entire affair an outrage. I patted the back of her cold, delicate hand and called for the chief cook to be thrown into the stockades and for all his help to be immediately dismissed from service. It was not enough for her, but on what she truly wanted she bit her tongue.

  I would not condemn Piers. Not at the behest of my new wife, nor at the abusive menacing of a jealous cousin or snubbed barons.

  Their disaffection for Piers brewed, until finally, in late April, the barons convened and expressed their strong dislike for Piers and my favoritism for him. Favoritism – was that how they saw it? If only they would all replace their own ambitions with loyalty. Only Hugh Despenser the Older spoke out in favor of leniency. I would remember, in years to come, who had crossed me and who had stood beside me.

  In the end though, when I sat before the rumbling parliament at Northampton, I had no choice. I had to send Piers away.

  Leaving the pouting Isabella behind, Piers and I rode casually to Bristol. Cherry trees and hawthorn bloomed in unabashed profusion alongside the roads. Fledgling robins tested their wings and nightingales, the surest sign of spring, trilled from the hazels.

  “It will not be for long,” I promised, as we watched them loading the ship with his belongings. To ease the distance between us, I had steeped upon him a large entourage, piles of clothes, stacks of plates and carts full of furnishings. “Tempers will cool, in time. All will be forgiven. You will see.”

  Looking askance at me, he narrowed his eyes. “Forgiven, perhaps – but never forgotten. Once I return, how long before they take offense at some insignificant gesture of your affection, Edward?”

  “How can I know? Why even care? Lancaster thinks himself deserving of absolute privilege. He will forever test me, I fear.” I lifted my chin, trying to look and sound hopeful when truly I was not. “But let’s not taint this moment with such dismal talk. You’re to be my Lieutenant in Ireland. Soon, I shall hear of your accomplishments there and all your naysayers will be shamed into praising you.”

  A sad smile flitted across his mouth. “Is that the plan? Make them regret their words?”

  “Whatever it takes to silence them.”

  He scoffed. “I once said that your kingdom would command you, did I not?”

  “Power has its price.”

  Looking away, he nodded. “And your love for me is that price.”

  I pulled him into my arms so hard I forced the air from his lungs. As I eased my embrace, my cheek brushed his and the warmth of his skin flowed into me. I kissed his temple, his jawline, his chin, my lips finally meeting his.

  Piers shoved me back and stepped away, clenching his hands at his sides. “Edward, we cannot give them further cause to... to...”

  “How can I hide my longing for you, Brother Perrot? How? This parting is purgatory.”

  With a single finger, he dashed away the tear that threatened to roll from his eye. “Then let our reunion be a paradise that, when it comes, will never end.”

  Heavy hearted, I waved farewell to him on the dock as seagulls cried with me. The journey had been too short, our parting long. My chest heaving with sorrow, I turned back on the road toward London. Back to my miserable consort, Isabella, and harping cousin, Lancaster. Back to Bruce’s incessant havoc.

  Curse kingship. And curse those subjects who pretend to serve while trying to command.

  In my sire’s overdue death, I have traded one devil for three others. In his grave, he laughs at me.

  Ch. 18

  James Douglas – Peebles, 1308

  My men and I lay low in the bracken and purple foxglove on the gentle slope above the bridle path. In the forest near Peebles in the long dusk of June, while on our way northward to rejoin Robert, we had happened upon a mounted detachment of English, not more than twenty in numbers.

  Along the path that wound beside a crooked stream, the English rode. I thought to let them go by, for even though we had higher ground, they were far better armed than us. I might have let them pass, but...

  “William?” I whispered to the older soldier beside me. William Bunnock had joined with Robert shortly after I did. A common crofter in times of peace, he had been fighting for the Bruces longer than I had been alive. “That man near the front... do you recognize him?”

  He squinted until his eyes, permanently bloodshot, disappeared in the folds of his spotted, wrinkled skin. “Hard to say. Looks a bit like the king’s nephew: Thomas Randolph of Moray.”

  “Is it him?”

  “Could be, could be,” William mused.

  On the other side of me lay Sim of Leadhouse, who spoke little, if ever. He ran a calloused finger along his knife blade. Then, testing its sharp edge on a piece of birch bark, he smiled toothlessly.

  William scratched at his tangled, yellow-gray hair with dirty fingernails and kept his eyes on the straight-spined knight near the front of the line. Newly polished plate armor protected his arms and legs, the latest and most fashionable of its kind – German or perhaps Italian, I had not seen enough of such to know the difference in the workmanship. His horse was a chestnut roan of pure blood. Spanish, judging by its proud head and sweeping mane. Although his face was partially hidden by the tangle of birches obscuring my view and I could not yet place it, the surcoat was oddly familiar – brightest blue with a white emblem. Not until he doffed his helmet to shove sweat-soaked fair hair from off his forehead did I recognize him.

  “Aye, Thomas Randolph,” I confirmed to William. “Riding with the God-damned English.” Two years ago, Randolph had joined us at Kildrummy with word of Pembroke’s approach. But at Methven, he had been captured by the English. All the while, it had been assumed be was rotting in a dark hole somewhere, tortured at Longshanks’ wicked pleasure. A martyr, of sorts. Now, here he was riding with... no, at the head of an English force.

  William’s eyes bulged from their sockets. “Blessed Mary, ‘tis. Alive and well. Fancy that. Don’t look like no prisoner. Heard rumors he was in Carlisle with Clifford not long ago. Didn’t believe it then.”

  “And you do now?”

  “Aye,” he growled. “The whoreson.”

  I pulled the cord of my short bow from beneath my helmet and, lying on my side in the grass, strung it to the proper tightness – not an easy feat. I told William, “I want Randolph as my prisoner. Kill the rest and strip them. Wait two arrows, then set upon them.”

  I crawled on my belly to the trunk of a twisted hornbeam tree. Slowly, I brought myself to my feet. William went on his hands and knees to the next man and passed the order. The sun was long over the hills and I could see only shapes of gray against a darkening background. But I had not lost sight of Randolph. There were two footsoldiers behind him wearing hauberks but no helmets. Evidently they believed themselves in little danger. I pulled until the feather tickled my cheek and looked down my shaft at one of their naked heads. The arrow sang as it sought its mark. Its steel tip plunged into the soldier’s skull with a thump. As he clutched his head and tumbled, I brought up the second arrow from my belt and sent it into the neck of the other man beside him. He reeled backward and fell looking face up at the forest canopy.

  Randolph spun his mount around and searched the thicket wildly. My men swooped down, saving their war cries for another time, so that all that could be heard was the frantic rustle of grass and snapping of twigs underfoot.

  Half the English did not even have their weapons ready when my men dove upon them. I sent a third arrow to pierce an English chest, but I did not aim well and missed his heart. He staggered around, finally pulling out the shaft. Blood gushed from the hole between his ribs over his hands. He cried only once in agony before falling dead by another’s
weapon. With one more arrow I wounded a mounted man in his right arm, rendering him useless. In the chaos, three cowardly Englishmen had tried to run for their lives. The last to almost make it free fell to my blade as I descended the slope and blocked his escape.

  By then, Randolph was surrounded. Though my men parried with him, they did not advance on him. At first there were only three on him, but as the other English fell, Randolph soon found himself set upon by nine, then ten. He flailed his sword with deft accuracy, wounding two in the first raucous flurry. Suddenly, he put spurs to his mount, attempting to crash through, but one of my Scots slashed at his horse, cutting it deeply in the foreleg. As the beast stumbled, Randolph’s sword flew from his hand. He gripped the saddle to keep from being thrown. Someone grabbed the bridle and the horse – its foreleg nearly buckling whenever it tried to put pressure on it – backed and settled.

  My blade outlined his heart. “I would say you are in a state of dire despair, my lord. Your horse deserves to be put out of its misery and you – you need to come with us.”

  “Douglas?” Randolph feigned a smile of familiarity, but in truth he had never spoken more than two arrogant, disdainful words to me between Kildrummy and Methven. His left hand drifted downward.

  “Throw that knife at me,” I warned, “and you’ll have ten gaping holes in your chest before your next breath.”

  He shrugged and spread both hands outward while William plucked the knife from his belt. A moment later he was yanked from his failing horse and shoved to the trampled earth. The blood of his fallen soldiers stained his jaw.

  “Douglas, when did you become a brigand?” Randolph taunted.

  “I serve the King of Scots, my lord. I’m certain you will be delighted to hear we are taking you to him.”

  “Delighted...” – he scowled at me, as if I were to be chastised for my deed and not him – “more than you can imagine.”

  Sim shoved him to the ground and bound his hands with the twine that had tied up some of the grain sacks we carried. Someone brought him a horse taken from one of the dead English knights.

  “No, no horse for him,” I said. “Let him walk behind – and if he can’t keep up, we’ll drag him.”

  As Sim hoisted him to his feet, Randolph wiped his bloody chin on a soiled surcoat. “You should’ve shot me with an arrow, Douglas, and killed me when you had the chance.”

  “No sport in it, my lord.” I gestured for the horse that had been offered to Randolph and climbed into the saddle. Feeling a strange rider, it danced nervously, but my gentle hand upon its withers calmed it. “Besides, I prefer the cat’s manner: batting the mouse into a stupor before chewing its head off. Draws out the excitement.”

  I would have sworn on St. Fillan’s bones that every muscle in Randolph’s body screamed for rest, but even days after stumbling along tied to the tail of a horse he had not uttered a word of complaint. His wrists were purple with bruises from the constant yanking upon the rope, his knees red where he had fallen and scraped them raw, and his feet so blistered his boots were stained with blood. It would take a great deal, I realized, to break this man’s will.

  We came at last to King Robert’s camp northwest of Perth and were greeted with a host of curious stares. Men abandoned their tasks and trailed after us, eager to learn the identity of the prisoner on whose head William Bunnock had placed a sackcloth that morning. Thomas Randolph, long since stripped of his mail and clad only in shreds of his former dignity, was paraded into the midst of the encampment where Robert sat on a flat-topped rock, splashing his face and neck with water from a small bowl braced between his knees. He brought his knife up to shave. Just as he scraped the blade upward along his neck, he saw us. Setting the bowl aside, he waved his knife in the air to hail us, then bounded down and toward us.

  “My good James! At last, at last!” A broad smile broke across his cheeks. Last winter, we had all feared for his life, so grave was the illness he had suffered; but his swift recovery after Slioch was nothing short of a miracle. He may have been weakened, his breathing strained, but as soon as he could rise and walk – feeble though he may have felt – he was back on his horse. If we admired him before for his courage and vision, we now thought him in league with saints. He glanced with only passing curiosity at my captive before crushing me in a welcoming embrace. “Ah, how many months now? A year come next, can it be? We have so much to talk of. I’ve a good cache of wine to share it over. Ale would not do it justice. You’ve had stunning success, I hear.”

  “Great success, my lord,” I replied.

  His words poured forth in a flood of ebullience. “As have we – Elgin, Aboyne, Fyvie... and so many of the old Comyn strongholds I can’t even recall all the names. The best blessing of all – Aberdeen’s folk had finally sickened of their English chains. Rose up and slaughtered the soldiers in the streets. What a godsend after last winter’ trials. Ah, but time for my tales later, James. Time later. And so, what of you? Have you brought me Edward of Caernarvon himself?”

  “We destroyed a party of English knights several days ago. Fine armor – a pity we had to leave most of it behind. But their weapons and horses will be made good use of.” I guided Randolph forward by the elbow. “I’ve brought you a prisoner.”

  I lifted the sack from Randolph’s head.

  The echo of his name rolled through the crowd. A sword scraped free of its scabbard. Boyd roared a warning and swept his way through the crowd, blade leveled before him. Robert lunged forward, his knife clanging against Boyd’s weapon as he knocked it aside.

  He threw Boyd a scowl of admonition before turning back to his nephew. “So the rumors hold true?” he said to Randolph, his brow creasing in perplexity. “When we rode into Aberdeen, a merchant who had recently sailed from Berwick told me you were there keeping English company. That you not only rode out with English knights to put down insurgence among the Scots – you led them. My God, I called the man a liar.”

  Robert’s mouth was slack, the eyes kind to a fault, his voice low and controlled. One hand thoughtfully stroked his whiskers, the other was propped casually on his hip. “Thomas Randolph – you raised your sword against Englishmen at Methven. Yet now you, my own kinsman, fight beside them?”

  Standing straight as a centurial oak lashed by tempestuous winds, Randolph ground his jaws together. His upper lip twitched. The words cut through his clamped teeth. “In return for my life, I gave my word to do so. I had no choice.”

  Incredulous, Robert turned his back on his nephew. “No offers of ransom were discussed?”

  At that, Randolph smiled mockingly. “They were, but the price was absurd. Besides, a man swears things when his bones are stretched on the rack to the point of snapping. None of you know half my story, so don’t dare to declare yourselves my judges. In my boots, you would have done likewise. Even if the ransom had been within reason, what kinsman of mine would have paid it? You?” He laughed, then gulped back the irony with bitter suddenness. “With what? Clods of dirt? Stones? What chance did I have, Uncle Robert? I sat in a lightless cell so cramped that I could not even lie down and stretch my legs to sleep. Lice and spiders crawled over my flesh every wretched minute of every wretched day. But what was a day, or a night, or a week or month? I had no way of knowing. They slid moldy bread to me through a sideways crack in the door and gave me a pot to shit in that was emptied not often enough. I thirsted so much that I even brought a cup of my own piss to my lips to drink to keep myself alive, but it was so thick and stinking I couldn’t. I had neither blanket nor straw for a bed. I knew only darkness. Cold, damp darkness and no human voice. Even my guards were given orders not to speak to me. Isolated, weakened, wallowing in filth and fleas. Nothing but my thoughts to prey on my fears; my faith to feed me. Should I have cultivated my hopes of salvation in absurd dreams of a Scottish army marching on London to topple the Tower and set me free? This army? Where is the rest of it? Laying siege on York and Carlisle? I think not. I am just come from there and it is English lords
and English armies who command.”

  Robert swept aside his nephew’s bitterness and cynicism with a swift glare. Tucking the knife back into his belt, he walked to the rock on which he had been sitting before and leaned back against it. Only myself, Randolph and Boyd stood in the middle of the clearing now. Robert smirked. After a long pause, he tilted his head upward and spoke, each word measured. “And so feeling that you had no choice, you made an oath? That you would do as Longshanks bid you? That you would fight against me, your uncle... your own blood?”

  “I did.” Randolph looked about at all the faces gathered there, as if he thought he might find one among us to sympathize with him. “Besides, is this not Scotland where brother has fought brother since this land was first set foot upon? It goes on yet today – allegiance for a price, for land, for titles, for –”

  “For life?” Robert strolled back toward Randolph, perusing him from head to toe. “And you’re alive, aren’t you? A fair exchange. It bought you enough time to bring you here and that, I hope, will serve some purpose in the end.”

  “Your amusement at seeing my head roll downhill?” Randolph suggested dryly. His eyes shifted to Boyd’s sword, its steel flashing in the long light of a fading afternoon.

  Edward pushed forward, his eyes ablaze with a rekindled grudge. “And do you still uphold that oath, Randolph... even now that Longshanks’ puling son sits tottering on the throne?”

  Unnerved by Edward’s ire, he looked at him coolly. “I gave my vow long before I took up a sword beside you or Robert. When I was captured I was reminded of that oath and admitted my waywardness. I renewed it in the name of the crown of England, not Longshanks. I do not break my word.”

  “England?!” Boyd bellowed. He wrung the hilt of his sword in both hands, hoisted it high above his head and rammed its point into the stony earth with brutal force. The metal rang out cold and shrill. “Do we look like milky-arsed Englishmen? Did your mother whore herself out to an English bull to calve you? The cure for insane bastards the likes of you is to cut your heads off!”