by Robyn Young
After a pause, he placed the web of twigs on her chest. He remembered Affraig telling him his father had once come to her, drunk, demanding that she weave him his destiny; that he would be king. She had done so, but when one of his men assaulted her and the earl refused to give her justice, she had torn down that destiny and left it in pieces outside the castle walls. The curse had come to pass. His father had never been crowned king. The memory made him wonder if what he was doing here was right, but Brigid had told him this was what Affraig had commanded before she passed.
Tell him to burn it. Burn it with my body.
Robert stepped back into the crowd, still holding the parchment. He caught Brigid’s eye and she inclined her head. Elena was beside her, clutching a spray of ferns. At a gentle push from her mother, the girl approached the vessel. She had to stand on tiptoe to place the ferns into the boat with the old woman’s body. When she was done, she turned and hastened back to Brigid.
Christiana moved through the gathering to stand at Robert’s side. ‘My lord?’
Robert met her questioning gaze with a nod.
Christiana motioned to those of her men who bore torches. Together, they moved forward, surrounding the vessel with a ring of fire. One by one, they thrust the torches deep into the cradle of logs beneath the boat. As the pyre smouldered, tongues of fire flicking along the undersides of the vessel, the men moved back into the solemn crowd, watching as this rite from the old world was performed once again on their shores. No Christian burial for a witch. Affraig had wanted to burn. On Robert’s request, Christiana had spoken to the elders among her people, those who had lived here under the Norse and remembered the ship burnings for the Viking dead.
‘Thank you, my lady,’ he murmured.
Christiana smiled, but said nothing, her green eyes filling with firelight as the breeze fanned the flames and sent sparks swirling into the evening sky.
The fire grew quickly, engulfing the small boat and lighting the faces of the assembled gathering. Robert’s gaze drifted over their silent ranks. Lachlan MacRuarie was standing nearby, a jewelled goblet clutched in his hand. A fresh wound carved through his cheek from the fight at Turnberry, a new scar for the collection on his face. The captain had lost fifty in the skirmish. Angus MacDonald three times that. The Lord of Islay was standing with his men, his eyes on the flames. Edward was there, with Nes and Neil Campbell, Cormac among them, his injuries still livid. Malcolm and Gilbert were behind, the Lord of Erroll towering over his companions, his face unusually sombre. James Douglas stood close beside his uncle. On the high steward’s other side was Alexander Seton.
Seeing many heads bowed and eyes closed in prayer, Robert was surprised. He had asked them to join him in honouring Affraig, but none, apart from Brigid and Elena, had known the old woman. He realised, looking from Edward to Cormac, James to Angus, that each man was caught up in his own private grief. Affraig had become an embodiment of all their losses; a hundred deaths bound in her ancient body to be mourned as one. Looking back at the blaze, he thought of Niall, John of Atholl, Christopher Seton and Donough, holding each in his mind for a moment, before letting go.
Eternal rest grant them, O Lord, and let everlasting light shine upon them.
He thought of Marjorie and Elizabeth, Mary and his other three sisters, Robert Wishart and William Lamberton, his nephews, little Donald of Mar and young Thomas Randolph, Isabel Comyn: all locked up in English prisons for their loyalty to him. He thought of Thomas and Alexander, their fate unknown, but the worst feared. Tonight was for mourning the dead, but tomorrow was for the living. Whether with an army of ten, or ten thousand, he would liberate Scotland from his enemies and bring back his family.
There was a rush of heat as the flames caught Affraig’s body, consuming flesh in a crackling roar and with it the crown of heather. As the web went up in smoke, Robert imagined his destiny being forged in the fire, taking life in its dazzling heart. He looked down at the parchment in his hand. Brigid had given it to him last night, shortly after his arrival on Barra. The soft, yellowed skin was covered with writing. It was surprisingly neat given Affraig’s infirmity in her last days. His eyes lingered on three lines in the centre.
And when the covetous king then dies
The Britons, to reclaim their kingdom, shall rise.
This is the truth, as spoken by the prophet Merlin.
Handing it to him, Brigid had told him her aunt’s final words.
‘She said, my lord, that you must embrace your ancient heritage. The blood of the old world flows in your veins, passed down from your mother and the kings of Ireland. Remember that, out here in the heartlands of the west. She said do not fight Edward with his own fire, but rather use it to light your beacon – your fiery cross. Speak to restless Ireland. Call on conquered Wales. King Arthur was ruler of the Britons. He is their champion, not Edward’s. You must take him back.’
‘My lord?’
Robert looked up from the parchment at the voice. He realised Alexander Seton had moved up beside him. While he had been reading Affraig’s prophecy, the crowd had begun to strike up quiet conversations.
Alexander’s face was cast in the shifting glow of the fire. ‘Sir James told me you are planning to send a message to the English – offering to exchange Henry Percy for your family?’
Robert nodded.
‘My lord, I beg you, let me take that message for you. Let me make amends.’
PART 4
1307 AD
Let their noble examples animate you; rouse up the spirit of the ancient Romans, and be not afraid to march out against our enemies that are lying in ambush for us in the valley, but boldly with your swords demand of them your just rights.
The History of the Kings of Britain, Geoffrey of Monmouth
Chapter 26
Glen Trool, Scotland, 1307 AD
The rain swept in over the peaks, drenching the heather-clad slopes and falling in long, misty ribbons to the depths of the glen, which cut a great rift through the mountains. It needled the surface of the loch that filled the valley and drummed on the helms of the fifty men running fast along a narrow track that wound through the woods on the southern shore.
James Douglas, breathing hard, glanced over his shoulder, blinking rainwater and sweat from his eyes. Through the dark tunnel of trees he glimpsed riders in the distance behind him. The enemy was gaining. At Neil Campbell’s warning shout, James twisted round to see a fallen tree looming up, blocking the path. He would have run straight into it. It looked as though it had collapsed recently, yet another victim of the spring storms. So far, such obstacles had aided the Scots, hampering the pursuit of the English cavalry, but the gap was closing. They couldn’t outrun them much longer.
Throwing Neil a look of thanks, James clambered over the splintered trunk. Plunging down into the mud on the other side, he pushed himself up and sprinted on behind his companions, trying to ignore the throbbing ache in his legs and the burning in his lungs. There was nowhere to go but forward. To the right, the bank fell sharply into the deep waters of Loch Trool. To the left, the slopes climbed steeply through a dense forest of ash, holly and birch up into the craggy heights of the mountains.
Above the hammering rain and the harsh gasps of his own breaths, James heard the thud of hooves and the shouts of their pursuers, rough with triumph as they closed in on the Scots. In a sudden break in the trees to his right he caught a flash of fire away across the loch. The flaming arrow rose into the sky like a comet from the hills on the northern shore. At the sight of the signal, relief flooded through James, giving him an extra surge of speed. Moments later, he heard a faint rumbling sound. It began as a distant roll of thunder, echoing somewhere up in the heights. Ahead, his companions were slowing, turning now, as the rumbling swelled to fill the valley, along with a great wave of tearing and splintering sounds.
‘Get down!’ yelled Neil.
Reaching the others, James threw himself against the steep bank, just as a huge boulder came hurtli
ng through the woods above the track. Hunkered down, hands over his head, he glimpsed the English, still some distance away, wheeling around, their horses rearing in panic. The boulder smashed straight through the first few lines, crushing one man and sweeping three more into the loch before it struck the surface with a great white rush. More rocks followed; scores of them, tumbling down the hillside in a flood of loose stones and felled trees, picked up by their momentum. The cavalry tried to spur their mounts out of the path of the danger, but there was nowhere for them to go. Cries of pain and terror rose as the rockslide thundered on top of them.
One boulder veered off course and came thumping down, dangerously close to James and his companions. Smashing through a tree above the Scots, scattering them with broken branches, it entered the loch in a plume of water. After it had gone, a strange silence descended, broken only by the mad chatter of birds and the faint cries of wounded men and horses. James stared up through the trees, listening intently. After a moment, a distant roar of voices sounded in the heights, building quickly to a crescendo.
Neil wrenched his sword from its scabbard. Eyes gleaming with fierce intent, he met James’s gaze. ‘For your father.’
James tugged free his own blade. ‘For Wallace.’
Together, the fifty Scots raced back along the track towards the beleaguered English, their battle cries lifting to join with those of their countrymen, now pouring down the hillside in the wake of the boulders.
Ayr, Scotland, 1307 AD
As Humphrey opened the door, Aymer de Valence looked up, his face taut. The earl was standing over a table in the centre of the room, across the surface of which was scattered a confusion of maps and rolls of accounts. Chests and crates, as yet unpacked, lined one wall. Candles made a brave, but futile attempt at brightening the dingy chamber. The leaded windows were fogged with rain. There was a bucket in one corner, catching the overflow from a leak in the ceiling.
Aymer had a parchment in his fist. He raised it as Humphrey shut the door. ‘Does the king not trust me?’
Humphrey frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
Aymer came around the table towards him. ‘You gave the impression Edward sent you here to aid me in my hunt for Bruce.’
‘What is this about, Aymer?’
‘I have just received word from the king. He demands to know why I haven’t caught our enemy yet. He accuses me of being timid!’ Aymer batted the parchment with the back of his hand. ‘Lacking in decisiveness! Without any sense of urgency! Did Edward send you here to spy on me, Humphrey? To observe my methods and report back to him?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Have you told him about Percy?’
‘I haven’t sent any reports to the king, not since I arrived. As for Percy, I am the one who counselled you to keep his capture quiet for the time being. I am still hopeful we may be able to retrieve him without the king needing to be troubled.’
A loud banging started up outside, the labourers returning to work after their midday meal. Humphrey’s brow creased as the hammering reverberated through the chamber. He had arrived several weeks ago to find the town in chaos, carts congesting the streets, the English barracks bristling with scaffolding and piles of rubble everywhere. After Bruce’s fleet had been repelled from Carrick, Aymer, fearing another attack, had returned to Ayr. Sending Ralph de Monthermer to man the garrison at Turnberry, he had remained to oversee the refortification of the town’s defences. Ayr, razed during the course of the war by English and Scots forces alike, was still recovering from its last destruction.
Aymer stalked back to the table and tossed the parchment on to it. He took up a jug and poured himself some wine, lifting it questioningly at Humphrey, who shook his head. ‘Damn that fat fool! How did Percy let himself get taken?’ Exhaling, Aymer sat heavily on a stool. ‘It’s almost a month since they took him. Do you think he is dead?’
‘Robert isn’t stupid. He will either ransom Percy for money, or else, if he knows of his family’s imprisonment, exchange him for their freedom.’
‘I was so close, Humphrey.’ Aymer clenched his fist. ‘So close to catching the bastard.’
Humphrey planted his hands on the table and stared down at the maps, his gaze drifting over Scotland’s fractured west coast: long slits of sea lochs, barriers of mountains and tiny clusters of islands in vast expanses of parchment. Where are you, Robert?
The two men glanced round at a rap on the door. One of Aymer’s knights looked in. ‘Sir, there’s a rabble at the gates, begging for food.’
‘Get rid of them,’ growled Aymer. ‘And, next time, kill a few of them to show the rest you mean it.’ He shook his head as the knight withdrew. ‘I would have banished the entire population if I didn’t need them to help me rebuild it.’ He scowled. ‘The whole stinking place is beset by vagrants, bleating about how their crops and livestock were destroyed by Prince Edward and his men, leaving them destitute. I tell them to look to Bruce if they want someone to blame.’
‘We could exploit that,’ suggested Humphrey, his thoughts on the recent executions of Thomas and Alexander in Carlisle. His worry that the king’s harsh justice would only inflame the Scots, making them more likely to rise under Bruce’s banner, had been steadily growing. ‘Right now, the people of Ayr are scared. They know better than most what an English army is capable of. That makes them compliant, yes. But perhaps, as more benevolent masters, we could begin to breed loyalty among them? Make them realise they cannot rely on Bruce to help them. Give them no reason to support him.’
‘Do I look as though I have time to till the land in order to feed peasants?’ Aymer’s tone was acerbic. ‘Our supply lines from the east are stretched thin enough as it is. We can barely maintain our own garrisons.’ He drained his wine and got up to pour more, his voice rising as he continued. ‘We have no idea where Bruce is or when the bastard will surface again. We do know he has strong support among the men of the Isles and added to that are these rumours James Stewart is alive and raising his vassals for war. I am one man, with limited resources at my disposal. The king may wish me to perform miracles, but I simply cannot rebuild Ayr, coddle these damn Scots and patrol every glen and loch in this godforsaken hole searching for that traitor!’ With a vicious sweep of his arm, Aymer sent half the maps and rolls flying off the table.
Rarely had Humphrey seen the earl so agitated. He bent to pick up some of the fallen charts, keeping his voice calm to mollify the man. ‘If the high steward is in his lands I have faith Robert Clifford will find him. Dungal MacDouall is patrolling Galloway with a host of our men. John MacDougall and the Black Comyn are out in force in Argyll and Lorn, and John of Menteith remains at Dunaverty Castle. When Bruce does surface we will be ready for him, Aymer.’
Just saying these words made Humphrey bristle with impatience. His need to find Robert had never been so acute. His last conversation with King Edward burned in his mind, inflaming his doubts and his growing suspicions. Where did truth end and the lie begin? He no longer knew – only that Robert might hold the key to unlocking the questions.
The door opened again and the knight reappeared.
Aymer glared at him. ‘Blood and thunder, Matthew, just get rid of them!’
‘It isn’t the beggars, sir. Ralph de Monthermer has come. He’s caught two of Bruce’s men.’
Aymer and Humphrey met one another’s eyes. In a moment, they both strode to the door.
The courtyard was chaotic, scattered with rubble and noisy with labourers working on the scaffolds. Following Aymer out of the building, Humphrey saw of a group of riders dismounting by the stables, the legs of their horses slathered with mud. Ralph de Monthermer was among them. The Earl of Gloucester’s yellow mantle, emblazoned with a green eagle, was a splash of brightness in the dreary afternoon. Humphrey and Aymer crossed to him, pulling up the hoods of their cloaks against the rain, boots splashing through puddles.
Turning at their approach, Ralph’s long, lean face, framed by a black beard, showed surprised pleasure. ‘Sir Humphrey, I didn’t
know you would be here. Well met, brother,’ he said, extending his hand.
As Humphrey clasped it, Aymer cut in, curt with impatience. ‘What word from Turnberry, Sir Ralph?’ He peered over the man’s shoulder. ‘You have prisoners?’
Humphrey noticed Ralph’s expression cool, but the earl called to his company, five of whom approached, marching two men between them and leading a pack-horse. The animal had large sacks strapped to its sides, the sodden material straining with the weight of whatever was inside. Humphrey studied the two captives. One met his gaze, defiant despite the bruises on his face. The other, the younger of the two, kept his eyes on the ground, flinching as Ralph’s men compelled him before Aymer. Humphrey didn’t recognise either of them.
Evidently neither did Aymer, the dissatisfaction apparent in his tone. ‘I was told they were Bruce’s men?’
Ralph nodded to one of his knights, who tugged aside the defiant prisoner’s threadbare cloak to reveal a tunic. Once white, it was covered in layers of blood and dirt. Humphrey’s eyes alighted on the red chevron, just visible beneath the filth.
‘One of my patrols caught them in southern Carrick. Show them,’ Ralph said to the man leading the pack-horse.
The man complied, untying one of the sacks. The rain pummelled him as he worked. Humphrey glanced up, realising the sky had grown darker. Menacing clouds were flying fast and low overhead. As Ralph’s man hefted the pack free with the aid of one of his comrades, both men struggling under the weight, the sack split. Humphrey and Aymer watched as a bright stream of silver gushed into the courtyard mud.
‘I believe they’ve been collecting rents for Bruce,’ said Ralph, turning to them as his men fought to stem the flow.
