Worth Dying For (The Bruce Trilogy)

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  “Aithne,” I whispered, “you are so very beautiful.”

  “Still?” she murmured dreamily.

  I pulled my shirt off to toss it aside and positioned myself over her again. As if time had never passed since we were flung apart, as if we had never stopped knowing one another, she tugged at the cord on my breeches and slipped her thumbs beneath the top, sliding them downward. Her hips bridged upward, ready.

  “More than ever,” I said, running a hand from her milky thigh to the full curve of her hips.

  “Be my love, Robert. Let me give to you.”

  I eased into her, pleasure surging from my loins to envelope me.

  Ahhh, Sweet Mother of God. How long has it been since –

  She grasped my buttocks, pulling me deeper inside. A moan rose in her throat and I covered her mouth with mine to quiet her. If anyone hears us...

  My rhythm quickened. Her folds, warm and slippery. My blood, rushing. Her body an eddy beneath mine. I probed my tongue deeper into her mouth, faster, in echo. Sweat poured down my chest, dripped from my lowest rib.

  Outside, footsteps. The soft clop of hooves over drying mud.

  My hips slammed her hard, yearning for ecstasy. I thrust in mounting excitement, searching for that plateau of rapture that was always in the next moment. Quicker. Deeper. Her legs went around me, her ankles twining together. Her fingernails dug into my back. Aye. Again and again. Almost there. I grunted as I drove toward release.

  Voices. Closer... Randolph?

  ‘I would never dishonor my own wife so.’

  I stopped in mid-thrust, straining to listen above Aithne’s rapid panting and my own. Her mouth wide in mounting rapture, she continued to rock beneath me. Oh God, dear God, how I wanted to –

  The stomp of footsteps.

  “Ah no, nothing serious,” Boyd said. “A batch of bad ale.”

  My heart pounded in my ears. I ripped myself from Aithne.

  She gasped, reached for me. “No, please nooo...”

  I clamped a hand over her mouth to shush her.

  Boyd cleared his throat. “Nasty stuff. I, uh, would not disturb him, unless you fancy a fist to your jaw. He puked his meal into his lap. Not a pretty sight. Rather embarrassing for a king. Best to let him sleep until morning.”

  “It can wait, I reckon,” Randolph said. “But he’ll be glad to hear the numbers. Seventy from Buchan alone.”

  “That’s good, aye.” Boyd lowered his voice to a soft rumble. “Come along. There’s a bit of stew left, not the best of it, but...”

  Their words drifted off as they walked away.

  I flopped over on my back, my breeches yet halfway down my legs, the evidence of my desire now flagging.

  “Robert?” Aithne whispered. Her hand groped for my organ, fingers gently kneading, coaxing, until the blood began to gather there again. “Do you remember, when we were young? How we –”

  “No, Aithne.” I gripped her wrist, moved her hand away. I had let it happen again. And I had not stopped myself. After pulling my breeches up, I rummaged for my shirt and put it back on. “That was long ago. We are not young anymore. I... I have a wife.”

  She pushed herself up. “But I gave you a son.”

  A son? I tugged the hem of my garment down, fingering a loose thread as I groped for a tactful response. In the end, nothing came to me. “What do you mean?”

  Her skirts rustled in the darkness as she rearranged her clothes. “Why do you think your father married me off so quickly? Sir Gilbert was twice widowed, with no heir. Your father agreed to give Loch Doon to him if he claimed the child as his own. He kept his word until his death.”

  When I went to Perth that year with my grandfather and returned to find her gone, I had not asked the details. Some time passed before I learned of her marriage and Niall’s birth. His age made it possible, except... “But Edward. You were together.”

  “Not then. You only assumed so. That happened much later. Gilbert – he couldn’t... be aroused. He blamed me, called me ‘impure’, beat me for my sins. Edward gave me comfort. Made me feel desirable. It began innocently.”

  As Edward would have her think. And when he had won her trust, he bedded her and went away, returning from time to time to satisfy himself, while he mounted a dozen other willing women in between.

  But I did not want to talk or think about Edward. At times, my resentment of him far outweighed any appreciation I held for him. I stepped into my leggings, pulled them up and belted them, then squatted down before her. “I would give you Loch Doon if I could, but I –”

  “I didn’t come here so that you could promise me a castle to keep me quiet. I came to tell you that you had a son. I thought you should know, Robert. That’s all. And what happened, just now, that wasn’t planned, either.” Gathering her cloak, she stood and made for the tent flap. Without thinking, I grabbed her skirt and pulled her down. She tumbled backward, her rump hitting the furs with a soft thud.

  “Stay,” I told her. “As long as you like. When... if you decide to leave for Arran, I can arrange a small amount of money.”

  “I told you, I didn’t come here –”

  “Take the money, Aithne. The lad needs to eat, does he not?” Her jaw clamped tight, she swung her head away. I cupped her cheek and turned her face back to me. “Besides, my son’s mother should not be starving or wanting for clothes or shelter. Take the money.” I stroked her chin and neck, fighting hard not to lay a kiss upon those full lips and lose myself again. Aye, it felt like betrayal to admit it, but I still loved her – perhaps even more now, knowing her strength – but it could not be. Ever. “Sleep here. You’ll be warm. I’ll have more food brought to you in the morning.”

  I shared a tent that night with Boyd, although I slept not at all. In part because of his snores, but also because my conscience was again troubled. More than once, I had put Elizabeth from my mind in favor of another, simply because they were there and she was not. Miles and months, months that turn into years, have a way of making a man forget what it was about one woman that ever made him love her so much.

  Morning found Aithne gone again. This time not by my command, but of her own accord.

  And I was left alone with my shame.

  Ch. 27

  Edward II – Scarborough, May, 1312

  For two days after taking ship from Tynemouth, a southerly gale thrashed us about on spuming waves, nudging us so far northward we might as well have sailed for Scotland. On the third day, the wind relented and shifted to blow more gently from the west. Reinvigorated by the reprieve, the crew swiftly changed tack and we headed east, then gradually south, until we finally careened into the placid waters of Scarborough’s harbor. A five day voyage that should have taken no more than two.

  As it had been all my life, Fate was conspiring against me.

  Scarborough Castle was situated on a finger of land that curled out into the bay. The only means of access was through the gates of a stout barbican on an adjoining promontory and across a drawbridge that spanned a deep ravine. The fortress was deemed impregnable. Which left only one means by which an enemy could take it: siege.

  We had arrived without forewarning. Fed by a natural spring, the well was deep and untainted, but a cursory tally of victuals in the storerooms showed them to be inadequate to hold out for any length. And the garrison was woefully undermanned.

  Trapped here now, we were merely buying time. Delaying death, as it were. In heaven – or hell, wherever he was – my sire was shaking his finger at me. He had never expected anything more of me than failure. Just as well. I had never inclined toward triumph and glory. My birthright had cursed me with the burden of power, made me an object of blame. My only wish for wanting to be king was so that I could fashion my own destiny, live my own peace. Not spend my life fighting battles I did not want or choose. Oh why could I not have been born a peasant?

  I stumbled from the stairway out onto the fourth floor of Scarborough’s square keep. The sights beyond the open, arched
windows set my head to spinning. Perched on sheer, inexorable cliffs three hundred feet above the bay, for two centuries the fortress had absorbed the battering force of the sea’s assault: the wind always there, always merciless. On that day – that fearsome, fateful day – a mocking gale slashed at my cheekbones, ripped at my cloak, and yanked the breath from my lungs.

  Last night I had slept as if shrouded in the mantle of Death; but dawn had struck me with a fist of panic that hammered the breath from my lungs and left me gasping for air. Daylong, I had paced and fretted, doom gnawing at my innards like ship rats at a sack of grain. When the messenger arrived with the news, an odd, sickening calm overtook me. The inevitable was upon us.

  With the faint brush of a feather, hope would perish over the precipice’s edge.

  A deep, gulping breath sounded behind me. I spun around, fingers flying to the hilt of my sword. In the darkest of the shadows, a form slumped shapelessly against the wall in the corner. Cloth rustled.

  “He’s coming, isn’t he?” Piers croaked as he slid to the floor. The stones caught at his cloak, bunching it about his neck and shoulders.

  I unclenched my fingers from around my hilt. “I received word this morning. Lancaster is no more than a few days away. His numbers are... considerable.”

  “Has no one tried to stop him?”

  “No.”

  Piers slammed his head back against the crumpled pillow of his cloak. “The Bruce, then? You made an offer of peace?”

  “I did.”

  “Did he reply? Surely, he did not refuse?”

  A gull flapped at the window’s ledge, squawking in complaint before it took to flight again. The Bruce’s reply had reached me weeks ago, although I refrained from telling Piers of it then. “I went beyond extending peace terms. I acquiesced to call him ‘King of Scots’, if he would but keep you safe. He said he could not trust my word – as if his had any value. After six years of clamoring for his laurels, the ingrate has rebuffed me.”

  Piers’ hands, coated in grime, crept up to cover his face, scraping over week-old stubble and rubbing at eyes red with wretchedness. He let out a strained whimper. On his neck, a line of nail marks raked downward to stand out against blanched skin.

  This was not the Piers I knew, that brazen champion of tournaments, the reckless hunter, the merry reveler of song and drink, keen in wit, sharp of tongue, as lissome sober as he was drenched drunk... the one who held me close in familiar silence, long after we had exhausted ourselves in sensual delight. This, this was some apparition, some skeletal wraith plucked from the bowels of purgatory.

  A gust of wind tousled my hair, obscuring my vision, but I had no will to tuck it back or even to turn my face. Even for so small a thing, the fight had left me. “I’m leaving for York. The queen is to meet me there. There are –”

  “When?” He thrust himself away from the wall, eyes wild with terror. “I’m coming with you!”

  “You can’t, Piers. Shouldn’t. If I leave here, there’s every chance that Lancaster will follow. Even if he takes me –”

  “No!” He swung about and slammed a palm against the wall with a thunderous crack. Fingers clawing at the stones, jaw quivering, he wailed, “No! Dear God, no. He’ll kill us both and make himself king. Don’t you see?”

  “He can be king, if it means he’ll leave us in peace.”

  Piers turned slowly toward me, his head cocked in question. “How could you let it come to this, Edward? Why have you not done more for me? Kept this from happening?”

  How? Clenching my fists at my sides, I reeled away. It was desperation that made him speak thus. What else could it have been? With heavy steps, I went to the far window and gazed out at the neck of the headland on which the barbican squatted. There may have been gates and drawbridges enough to repel an attack, but all Lancaster had to do was encamp his army along the road from the mainland and we were trapped like hares in the hole.

  A wave of dizziness swept over me. I gripped the stones to steady myself. “I have done everything but pluck the moon from the sky and give it to you on a plate of gold – and gold aplenty I have given you. Three times I have called you back to me when they said you could not come, all at my own peril. What more could I have done?”

  Footsteps rushed at me from behind. Far below, the bailey loomed. I braced my legs, and began to turn, one elbow flying back in defense. But instead of a shove, he hooked my arm and yanked me into the shadows with such suddenness that my breath caught. His hands flew up to lock around my face like a vise, squeezing my cheekbones, holding my jaw fixed. Cold. His hands were cold. His eyes, overflowing with sorrow.

  “It is the end for us,” he whispered. “I see it now more clearly than the sun above, feel it more firmly than the ground beneath my feet. But what a sweet life it has been, yes? Full of adventure. Laughter. Danger. Heartache... Paradise, rapturous, heavenly paradise.” He stroked my cheek. Trailed shaking fingers around my ear, down my neck. “With every breath, every bone, every drop of blood, I have loved you, Edward. Damn them for ruining what we have shared, but more’s the pity that they will never know such purity of love themselves.”

  I sucked in the cool, salty air, held it in my lungs, clasped my hand against his, still pressed to my cheek. “I’ll give up my crown, if they –”

  His lips silenced mine with a kiss, our breaths one. He leaned his forehead against mine. “What a stupid... stupid thing to say. If you give them that, how will you ever have the means to get back at them?”

  Boots clacked on the curtain wall-walk somewhere. With a jerk, he drew back, stepped away. Soon, the sound of gathering hooves rang out on the cobbles of the bailey.

  “To York, Edward. Fly fast.”

  “Swear that you will not yield to him.”

  “God’s balls, do you think me so weak of will? Very well, I swear it. Now go. Godspeed and all that trifling midden. Just be certain that when you come back, you bring an army so big that Lancaster will piss himself and shed tears of fright on your feet as he kisses them.”

  My tongue was so thick and dry that I could not form the words I meant to say. He knew I loved him, more than my own worthless life, more than this prickly crown I had been born unto with all its accursed troubles. I had told him so a thousand times.

  If I did not go from there, I was sure the earth would open up and swallow me. Forcing my feet to move, I walked away. I had to save him. Had to try.

  Ch. 28

  Edward II – York, 1312

  Reunited with Isabella in York, I quickly found myself severed from Scarborough by Lancaster’s army. Pembroke and Warwick had descended on Scarborough and laid siege to it. I never thought to hear Pembroke’s name among the wicked, but it was so. For ten days Piers held out, while I issued orders that they cease in their assault. I even offered to sit down with them, as brothers, and arrange a compromise. But all my pleas were ignored. Finally, Pembroke made a solemn promise that Piers would be permitted to see me before the convening of parliament and that he would be given a fair trial. Piers agreed.

  What a fool he was! He may as well have delivered himself into the very Devil’s hands. What good trying to save him, when he would not save himself?

  When they sent their messengers to tell me of the deed, I was promptly reminded that any attempt to invoke war in my defense would open the door for the Scots to pour down upon us and inflict chaos and ruin. Yet if what Lancaster and his evil ilk had already done was not civil war, then what was it? Powerless, I could do nothing but plead for help. I prayed that Pembroke would honor his word and thus afford me time. But in the end no one would come to my aid. Not a living soul. Not the pope. Not the King of France. And not my people. I was their king and yet... a pariah.

  The scent of rain lingered in the air that June day. Clouds scraped the distant hills, the hollow roar of thunder echoing over the moors. From the highest window of the King’s Tower, I gazed down upon York. People straggled over the mired streets like beetles amid the mud flats, hawked
their wares from crowded stalls, and waited their turn at the city gates before passing through. A gust of wind carried the perpetual stench of sheep manure. My gaze passed over the verdant fields dotted with white beyond the city’s walls and along the southern road.

  There, a small group of riders, perhaps ten men, advanced swiftly. My heart hammered at the sight. The sun, which had not shone for three days, broke through a bank of clouds to the west and glinted off their plate armor. Cloaks heavy with rain hung from their shoulders, but before them a bright pennon occasionally lifted with the breeze. The colors were those of my nephew, Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester.

  I withdrew from the window. My back against the wall, I pressed my palms flat against the stones.

  Sitting on a padded stool at the other window, Isabella looked up from the book resting on the slight mound of her belly: a copy of a romance by Chrétien de Troyes, the leather straps of its spine loose from wear. She drew her finger from the page, marked it with a red silk ribbon and set the book on the floor. “Edward, what is it?”

  “Gilbert is coming.” Dare I to dream that some miracle had begun to play itself out whilst I rotted in this cloistered wasteland, robbed of hope? Surely, if they meant to force me to yet more impossible terms, it would have been Lancaster or one of his Hell Hounds bearing down upon me now, not my staunch companion and kinsman Gilbert?

  For once, let the tidings be good. Merciful Lord, end this interminable agony. Let it be done.

  Arms outstretched, Isabella started toward me, but I held a hand up to stay her. The minutes dragged by like days spent imprisoned and awaiting death. Eyes shut tight, breath held, I touched a shaking hand to my abdomen, searching for some indication, some presentiment, of what was to come. But I felt nothing. Nothing but an absence of what once was.

  A rap at the door stilled my heart momentarily. My hand flew to the knife sheathed at my belt. Another knock and my heart began with a thud, each pulse of blood slower and heavier than the one before. Jankin nudged open the door. Gilbert shoved his way past my manservant and then came... the Earl of Pembroke, Aymer de Valance. In one heartbeat, my dread turned to malice.