by J. R. Tomlin
When he looked back down, Douglas had turned to the onlookers and stated in a voice intended to carry across battlefields, “As you ken, the late king’s chancellor, Bishop Cameron, was called to Bologna by the Pope Eugene and may be detained there for some time. But the kingdom’s urgent business cannot wait for his return. As the most senior earl in the kingdom—” A buzz interrupted him. Of course the Earl of Atholl was more senior, but he was not here, and when the queen laid hands on him, he would not live long. Douglas slammed his palm down on the table with a resounding bang. “As the most senior earl in the kingdom not under attainder for treason, I call for the election of a new chancellor.”
There were cries of agreement, so Douglas continued, “We must have a chancellor in the kingdom to keep order. Otherwise, we are too tempting a target for an invasion. Or God forfend, there could even be an uprising. Therefore, we need a chancellor with experience in leading armed men. Bishop Cameron has done great service to the realm, but it is time for skills that are not those of a churchman.”
To Patrick’s surprise, his father stood to speak. “The keeper of one of the royal castles, known to be trusted by our dead king, would be best for the position. I suggest we name Sir Alexander Callendar of Callendar. As the keeper of Stirling Castle, few men stood higher in the late king’s trust.”
There was a general murmur of agreement, but the Earl of Angus, head of the Red Douglas clan, jumped to his feet. “The king trusted many men, some to his grief. Another high in his council was Sir William Crichton, keeper of Edinburgh Castle. Edinburgh Castle is essential to the defense of the realm. I believe he is best placed to defend the realm should such be needed and trusted as much as Callendar. As Master of the Royal Household, no one was higher in the esteem of our late king, or better placed now to defend our kingdom.”
When the queen gave a faint murmur, Patrick glanced sidelong at her. She looked down, frowning for a moment, but smoothed her expression as she raised her gaze. Patrick realized that the Earl of Douglas was looking up at her, his heavy features stolid, but an eyebrow raised.
Patrick’s father had turned to stare at Angus, his lips squashed into a thin line. Obviously, this was a surprise and not a pleasant one. Did this mean that the power of the Douglases would be thrown behind Crichton? The Earl of Angus, from the branch of the family known as the Red Douglases, did not speak for the Black Douglas.
Canon Kennedy rose. “Sirs, I believe that Sir Alexander—” But he was cut off by a dozen voices arguing. The Thane of Glamis jumped to his feet and shouted something that was lost in the noise. The Lord of Dalkieth, another Douglas, was shouting at his cousin as well.
The Earl of Douglas grabbed up the gavel and pounded on the table. “Silence!” he bellowed. “Silence!” He paused until the tumult had died down and said, “I second the nomination of Sir William Crichton. Does anyone second that of Lord Callendar?”
Someone cursed. Patrick craned his neck but couldn’t decide who it had been. No one spoke. For a long moment, the hall seemed frozen, but Sir James of Lorne slowly rose, his face twisted into an angry scowl. “I do.”
The Earl nodded and asked if anyone else had a nomination.
Patrick snorted softly through his nose, and the queen glanced his way. She gave a tiny shake of her head. As he expected, no one cared to put forward another nomination in opposition to the Douglas factions.
The earl called for those supporting Crichton to raise their hands. Almost every hand in the hall went up. Lady Janet sucked in a noisy breath; the queen gave her arm a brief pat. Lady Anabella was biting her lip. Patrick wondered what she thought of the affair. On the floor of the chamber, Crichton was striding briskly to the table on the dais. He bowed to the king and took up the chancellor’s gavel. He hammered it a few times although the hall was already in silence as men glanced at each other. There would be many whispered conversations once the hall cleared, Patrick was sure. Already power alliances were shifting.
Crichton cleared his throat. “Nothing is more important than preventing an invasion from the south, so the first order of business is to declare the Earl of Douglas as Lieutenant General of Scotland. Is there any objection?”
This had been a foregone conclusion, and in effect, Douglas had already been functioning as lieutenant general since the king’s murder. The declaration was met with profound silence.
Douglas bowed first to the throne and then to the assembly. “I am already gathering my forces in the border lands.” The Earl of Angus rose to say he would join his forces to maintain the peace.
Patrick studied the men below. He could not see their faces, but shoulders were gradually relaxing and backs losing their stiffness. The position of the Black Douglas was clear and that simplified everyone’s course, for few would care to dispute him. Patrick almost smiled as he thought probably none would, not even Kennedy or his father. But neither man looked pleased.
An hour of discussion of whose forces would take up which position and who would invade the lands of the Earl of Atholl to bring him to Edinburgh for trial had Patrick stifling yawns behind his hand. This was followed by arguments over appointments to some minor offices and the raising of revenues. When his stomach grumbled loudly, Annabella giggled softly.
At last, Patrick’s father stood. “My lords, we have not yet decided on a Council of Regency. This is a matter of such import that it cannot be delayed. Money must be allotted for the queen. The king’s household must be discussed.”
“Aye,” Crichton said. “But that is not a matter for the full parliament.”
Patrick’s father was scowling when Crichton named a committee to choose the Council of Regency that did not include him. He made no response when Kennedy was named to it, but a glance passed between the two men.
Suddenly, one of the doors banged open, and a man-at-arms rushed in, a guard protesting futilely behind him.
“He’s captured! Word just came from Lothian.” He was beaming. “Atholl was taken as he fled for England.”
Chapter 4
Patrick knew it was a dream because he had dreamt it before.
In his dream, his father was with him as he had been on that day. The walls of Longforgan manor were draped in mist that shifted and moved as he looked up the stairs. Torches high on the walls cast shadows that twisted and writhed. Margaret screamed and his skin crawled with horror. How long had she been screaming?
He could stand it no longer. He had to go to her. When he started for the stairs, his father blocked his way.
“They’re hurting her,” Patrick shouted.
“It always hurts. You can only wait,” his father answered.
When another shriek rent the air, Patrick dodged around his father. Hard fingers grasped his arm. “You would only make it worse. It’s no place for a man.”
When he stopped his struggle, his father patted his shoulder. “It has been a long time coming. Poor lass. But it will soon be over.”
“Two days. She has been screaming for two days, and the bairn will not come.”
When his father turned away, Patrick bolted. The stairs were so thick with the fog he could not see the top. It wrapped around him so tight it was like running through deep water. She shouted, “Patrick!” He thrashed to get free of the binding wrapped around him.
“Patrick!”
“I’m coming,” he whispered. “Margaret, I’m coming.”
“Patrick,” a man’s voice said.
He half-woke and kicked free of the blankets tangled around his legs and stared at a stone wall, not Longforgan. The stone was darker and grim.
“Patrick, are you all right?” Boyd asked, half-dressed in braies, chausses, and a linen shirt.
Patrick gaped at him. “Huh?”
“You look like you just found the gates of hell in that wall.”
Patrick looked at Boyd for a second, and then back at the wall. God’s bones. He sat up and pulled himself together. “Aye, I just had a dream about…” He shrugged. “It does nae matter
what it was about.”
He nodded. “The queen wants us to attend the king early,” Boyd said.
“Does she?” Patrick muttered. It was a duty but a new one that he longed to throw off. The chamber was cold, and Patrick’s head felt muzzy, as though he’d not slept at all. Some nights like the last he did not sleep well, nights when his memories and his grief crept out of the locked room of his heart where he stored them. They had been too young when they’d married. She too young for having a child, he too young to know how to protect her. Such nights he might sleep, but such sleep was not rest, and the following day his head ached. But he had given his young king an oath that no harm would come to him, so if the day filled him with dismay, he had his duty.
Boyd grabbed up a green doublet, shoved his arms into it and said, chattering jauntily, “I am going to go down and find a bite of bread and some ale before I go to the queen’s solar. Who knows when we’ll have a chance later? You’d better hurry up, or I’ll eat what there is.”
After he was gone, Patrick arose and opened the shutters all the way. The sky above was clear and glittering for a day that would soon be so grim. He shuddered and turned from the window to pour water from the pitcher into a bowl and splashed his face until some of the fog cleared.
He was only twenty-two but on mornings like this, he felt a decade older. He’d have to become accustomed to being surrounded by the youths of the child king’s household and the chattering princesses. They flitted around him with their untouched lives, full of hope and confidence. Patrick wanted to shake them and tell them to stop being so happy; it would go to the devil in no time. And then he remembered that the queen’s life had done exactly that. Self-pity was a venal and ugly thing, he thought.
The water was tepid. Servants must have brought warm in at prime, but it had long since cooled. He felt his cheeks. He had to shave as well, so he grabbed up the soap and lathered his face, shaved, and ran the cloth over his arms and legs.
When he had toweled off, he opened his small kist. Eventually, clothing from home would reach him, but for the time being, he had little to choose from. He had to wonder what garment was appropriate for an execution. He supposed whatever he had would have to do, so he donned a shirt, dark chausses, and his second-best doublet, the one of heavy blue wool brightened with yellow ribbons. He gazed out over the vista that was beyond his new home. Arthur’s Seat towered high above Edinburgh Town, and even higher, a hundred feet in the air loomed David’s Tower, casting a long shadow in the morning light. Below, he could see the inner bailey and the stable where horses were led out looking like toys. Beyond were the hills bathed in splashes of purple and yellow and green.
He considered going below, for there would be bread and cheese and ale for breaking the fast, but he was not sure he wanted food in his stomach for what was to come. Instead, he ran down the winding stairs a single flight to the queen’s solar. Patrick heard the murmur of voices even before he opened the door. Queen Joan sat as Lady Janet fastened the mesh of jeweler’s work that formed the queen’s headdress. Janet tutted slightly as she patted it into a stylized horn shape. Isabella, the next oldest of the king’s sisters, a lass of twelve years, was reading aloud in French to her mother from some book.
Joanna, the little mute lady they called her, held a doll with one hand and made motions with her other to another princess. Was that Princess Mary? Yes, he was sure that was Mary who was so close to Joanna in age they might almost have been twins. Mary made a motion back and the two seemed to understand each other perfectly as they put the doll into a toy crib and covered it. James was on his knees working the arm of a wooden knight up and down and crowing, “Have at you!” to an imaginary opponent. Lady Annabella stood at a large cabinet putting away some of the queen’s clothing.
His father nodded to him, looking grim.
Patrick bowed low to the queen and, for a moment, wondered if he should also bow to the young king, but the lad paid him no mind.
“Ah, Sir Patrick, how are you settling in this drear place?” She offered her hand for him to kiss. “I hope you do not find your chamber too grim.”
“I’ve been made most comfortable, my lady. You’ve been kindness itself and my belongings will soon arrive from home.”
“It has been sunny for the season,” Lady Janet said as she gave another pat to the queen’s glittering headdress. “I pray that it will last through the day.”
“Oh, leave off, Lizzie. My headdress is well enough. And I care naught for the sun.” Her jaw tightened and her voice grew harsh and low. “Let the sun, the sky, and all the world see Robert Stewart pay for his treachery. Foul murderer that he is.” She tightened her slender hands into fists and held them before her, a look of intense hatred washing over her features. “Our cousin. Our chamberlain. The foul traitor.”
Patrick was left speechless and a hushed silence fell over the room as the children stared at their mother. Robert Stewart, who had done foul treachery at his grandsire’s behest, would be executed shortly, leaving only the Earl who had planned it yet to die.
She took a deep breath and stood, forcing a smile that curved her mouth but did not reach her eyes. She waited until the children went back to their games before she continued. “And when we return, we pack to leave. My lord husband hated this grim pile and we shall not abide here.”
“Where will we go?” Patrick burst out. If his father or Kennedy knew of this plan, they had not mentioned it to him. He was sure they did not, and his father silently raised an eyebrow.
“First to Holyrood Abbey. We have pleasant chambers there. From there, we’ll go to Dunfirmline Palace for the nonce. With the miscreant Atholl dead, it will be quite safe for my son. And it is certainly more pleasing than…Edinburgh Castle.” She spit the name as though it were poison.
Lord Gray opened his mouth, but then closed it, looking thoughtful. After a moment, he said, “It will be a relief to all of us when the traitor is dead.”
The queen stood and nodded sharply. “My ladies, gather the children. They have a right to see justice done.” Head held stiffly high, she turned for the door.
As Lady Annabella and Lady Janet herded the children after her, Patrick shot his father a questioning look, but received only a shake of the head in response. And then he followed the others out the door and down the stairs to join Sir James of Lorne and Lord Crichton.
All the way up the slope of Calton Hill, the air was filled with shouts from the crowd lining the way. “God save our wee King! King Jamie!” It was a press of men and women, shouting, faces flushed with excitement. A group of boys chased, screeching after them as they approached the gallows. Men-at-arms took their horses’ reins as they dismounted. The roar of the crowd was deafening.
Patrick followed the queen and her children up the wooden steps of the pavilion. Above their heads the red awning rippled in the breeze. There was a chair for the king, piled with a couple of pillows so he could easily see over the low barrier in the front. Beside him, the queen also took a chair. There were long benches on each side for the court.
Patrick watched as the dozen of their party took their places. There was room, but he propped a shoulder against the back wall and crossed his arms, frowning. This thing of hanging, drawing and beheading was the way of execution of traitors in England, so he had heard tell. Everyone knew it was how Sir William Wallace had been so foully murdered by England’s King Edward Longshanks. But it left a bad taste in his mouth. Their ways weren’t English. Still… the queen had a right to her vengeance. No one could deny that.
The screams of the crowd reached a crescendo as an armed guardsman reached the top of the hill. Behind him, dragged by his bound hands, stumbled Robert Stewart, naked, bloodied from head to foot from the torture used to extract his confession. On each side marched a line of men-at-arms to protect him from the enraged crowd. A rock thudded between them to land at the miscreant’s feet.
The black-hooded executioner stood arms akimbo on the gallows. Next to him was
a long table. A couple of men-at-arms grabbed Stewart by the arms and hauled him, feet dragging, up the steps. The executioner draped the hanging noose around the man’s neck and motioned to the men-at-arms to hoist him up. He would be lowered before he could die. The hanging was humiliation, not a death sentence. Patrick winced when Stewart thudded back onto the wooden boards to be hoisted onto the waiting table. He glanced at the young king who turned white and pressed a hand to his mouth when Stewart shrieked under the executioner’s knife. But he never took his eyes from the man who had murdered his father as again a shriek ripped the air.
Shortly, it was all over.
Chapter 5
When they returned, everyone was quiet. Lady Janet took the white-faced king to his chamber. The lad had never looked away as Stewart’s intestines were cut out while he still lived and thrown into a fire. At the stench, Patrick had had to swallow down sour bile.
It should have been a clean beheading, not the tradition of torturous execution from England. But none could gainsay the queen. Only once he was tortured to death had his head been cleanly cut from his body.
The queen looked as though a huge weight had lifted from her. For the first time since yesterday’s coronation, her forehead wasn’t creased or her mouth drawn up in a tense line. The hall was quiet. A sole guard stood beside the doors while a servant boy knelt, adding a faggot to the flames in the hearth. A manservant set a tray with a flagon of wine and goblets on the table and poured. Crichton took one and handed another to the queen. Boyd took one as well, but Patrick shook his head. Annabella, who still looked quite pale, just turned away.
Patrick’s father looked out one of the high arched windows, his back to them.
The queen smiled into her goblet and said, “At last, that worry is done. My son is safe.”
“Of course, Your Grace.” Crichton’s self-important tone grated on Patrick’s raw nerves. “I shall see that he is always kept safe, but you ken that Stewart and Atholl were nae the only threat to the king.”
