The Honor Due a King (The Bruce Trilogy)

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  “Indeed, I have. Although I don’t think she saw me. Not long ago. Entering on the other side at the door to the south transept.”

  I bid the smiling Walter a good day and left him.

  Sidestepping puddles of slush, I climbed the stone steps into the north aisle of the nave and went through the door. I glanced toward the choir and far transept, but saw no one there. My steps echoed emptily in the expanse as I moved toward the center nave. It, too, was empty.

  I nearly turned to go, thinking Marjorie must have merely passed through, when the bubbling murmur of voices in song – one airy and animated, the other softly lyrical, but resonating and deep – reached my ears. I paused behind the bulky support column that divided transept from nave, then took one silent step further. Half hidden by one of the lofty columns, Marjorie and James stood just within a bay of the south aisle, facing one another.

  “I’ve been in England eight years, James.” Marjorie braced her hands upon her small waist, her head cocked to one side. “Shut up in the nunnery at Watton, forced to utter vespers twenty times a day, sweep the floors and pull turnips until my hands were purple. Only hymns were permitted. I would have been punished for even a verse of such secular frivolity. You’ll have to teach it to me all over again, I’m afraid. Word by word.”

  “Very well. The refrain, again is ‘Ja m'amour ne te lerai’.” He held up a finger, punctuating each syllable with a jab. “Once more: Ja m’amour –”

  “And it means what, precisely?”

  James heaved a sigh. “It means ‘Never my love shall I give you’.”

  “And I am to say this? Wait. You learned this as a boy in Paris? Did you truly go to school there or did you frequent taverns instead? I’d think you were making it all up, if it weren’t so absurd. This ‘Fauvel’ ... is a horse?”

  “That is my part, aye. And you are Dame Fortune. Now, you asked to learn a French romance. That is what I am trying to teach you.”

  “Mon cuer vous doins sanz retraire.”

  He rolled his eyes in exasperation. “That is my part. It means –”

  “I know what it means. It means: ‘My heart I give to you without restraint’.”

  Silence stretched between them. Moments in which they drifted closer. I crept forward, piqued with a father’s protective curiosity.

  Marjorie forced a teasing frown. “How can I possibly concentrate when I’m so distracted?”

  He tossed back his head, breaking the trance, a rumble of nervous laughter escaping his throat. “By what?”

  “Have I been too coy?” Marjorie plucked at a loose thread on his tunic. “I thought it was obvious.”

  She gazed up at him then. But it was not with that same fluttering, girlish admiration she bore for him in her youth. And the look he returned to her now had a longing in it, something of desire. Not a look I was accustomed to seeing in the laconic, guileful soldier who was more comfortable slipping his knife between the ribs of Englishmen than wooing vulnerable maidens. For certain, it was not an innocent invitation that she extended to him as she slipped her arms about his neck.

  James touched his forehead to hers. With light fingertips, he traced one of her ears, then cupped her chin as he brought his mouth to hers.

  The church bells tolled prime, each clang reverberating from tiled floor to domed ceiling.

  “James?” I stepped fully into the open, my fists clenched in barely contained rage.

  With a gasp, Marjorie pulled back and clutched her hands to her breast. “Father, you frightened me. You should have made yourself known sooner.”

  “Should I? I think it is well I found you, before –”

  “Before what?” Her voice was sharp with indignation.

  James stepped further back from her, but did not, would not look my way. I wondered how far it might have gone had I not intervened. Or what more had gone on while I was tending to my sick wife, trusting in James, the one man I thought I could always rely on to keep my daughter safe. Marjorie was young, an innocent, impressionable. Again, I had failed to protect her. I gazed upon her, her lip quivering, chin held aloft.

  Abbot William shuffled around the corner and flapped his hands at his sides. I nodded in understanding and he ambled away, muttering to himself. I closed my eyes a moment. Inhaled.

  No, James would never betray me. Never. What I saw – it was nothing more. It can go no further. Give them time apart to be reminded of virtue. Myself time to cool my wrath. They will soon learn and understand: Marjorie is to be betrothed to Walter. I gave my word.

  Remembering why I had sought my daughter in the first place, I turned her by the shoulders to impart a stern look. “I need to speak to you. Alone.”

  James shifted on his feet, cleared his throat. “M-m-my lord, I –”

  “Find my brother Edward,” I interrupted, not being of a mind to entertain feeble excuses. “Tell him he is to leave with you on the morrow for the north of England. I want reprisal for the damage done here. Until then, you are to keep from my daughter, understood?”

  Although he nodded his assent, it was Marjorie’s stomping foot that drew my attention.

  “And are we to avoid so much as speaking to each other until then,” she demanded, “penned up here like sheep to keep us from the wolves? One can go the whole day in this place and not hear a word, unless it’s a verse of Latin scripture. The silence is enough to madden an ordinary man. What do you mean by interrupting a simple conversation and insinuating that –” She broke off, eyes narrowing acutely. Her tiny chin jutted forward. “I may be your daughter, but I am not some senseless child who needs your protection!”

  “Please, Marjorie, let it be.” James shushed her with his hands upheld. “I’ll go, find Lord Edward. We can discuss this later.” He bowed his head, a thick mess of curls hiding his eyes. “With your leave, my lord.”

  “Go,” I said, stifling a growl, my lip twitching. As his steps quickened away, I called after him, “But we will indeed speak of this later!”

  James gave no indication that he heard me, only hurried away faster, letting the outer door slam shut behind him in answer.

  Marjorie’s eyes widened. “Where are you sending him? Tell me! Where?”

  A line of monks, hands folded in prayer, floated past. I waited until they were at the far end of the nave and had filed into the choir. More monks entered through the main door and northern transept. I lowered my voice to a whisper. “James Douglas is in my service. He goes where he is commanded.”

  I had not armed my heart for the hurt in my daughter’s eyes. “And would you command me never to speak to him again? We were ... are friends – dear friends.”

  I took her hand and held it, even though she resisted. The solemn chanting of monks flowed over me, easing my anger. “For months after I lost you, I went to sleep wondering where you were, if you were well ... or even alive. Forgive me if I watch over you too closely. Shouldn’t a father be given time to reacquaint himself with the daughter who has just returned home?”

  A weak smile flitted across her mouth. “You said you wanted to tell me something.”

  I nodded. “As soon as Elizabeth can travel, I want you to come back with us to Turnberry for Christmas, then on to Edinburgh. Walter Stewart will be coming and staying with us. I have agreed that you and he are to be betrothed.”

  Her brow furrowed. “Walter?” As if I had struck her, she spun away. “You agreed?”

  “Aye. He’s a good man, Marjorie, from good stock. The betrothal will be long enough to give you both time to –”

  “Why Walter?”

  “I made a promise to his father long ago, when you and Walter were children.”

  “Children,” she echoed hollowly. “So it is to be?”

  “It was not an oath lightly sworn, Marjorie. Besides, there are other ... matters that play into this. Elizabeth is of an age at which it is difficult for a woman to bear children sometimes, especially their first. From what Christina tells me, she has also been ill often the
se past years. There is yet hope, should God so bless us, but you must understand: you are my daughter. If you wed, and bear a son, if I never have one of my own, then your son shall be my heir. Scotland must be strong from within. I knew I would never give you away to some foreign prince, because I could not bear to have you gone from me, not after all that has passed.”

  She wrapped her arms about herself.

  “The people,” I continued, “must have conviction in their king and his heirs or else we will be shattered again and again into factions that cannot stand against forces from outside. I know this, because for eight years I have toiled to make Scotland as one. The Stewarts are as noble and loyal a family as this kingdom has ever seen.”

  Slowly, she turned and, with a cool edge to her voice, said, “So a Douglas is not good enough to share my bed, but his cousin is? I don’t quite follow.”

  “Share your – ?” I clamped a hand on her upper arm. “You speak of things I pray you know nothing of.”

  She glared at me defiantly. “And you know nothing of me.”

  The abbot scurried around the corner and darted up to us, wringing the sides of his robes. “I beg you to take your quarrels elsewhere.”

  He had no sooner said the words than Marjorie whirled about and fled through the nearest doorway.

  “Marjorie,” I called. Then, more forcefully, “Marjorie!”

  Balling his fists, the abbot huffed at me. “I beg you, my lord, not to disturb the sanctity of God’s house. We are men of peace, devoted to the service of Our Lord. This is not some squalid inn where –”

  The rest of his words fell on unhearing ears. I walked from him, down the long aisle, the carved figures of angels surveying my every step and the carriage of my shoulders, while gaunt-faced saints weighed the probity of my soul ... and the forgiveness in my heart.

  In bringing my loved ones home, God had given me new battles to wage. And these were ones I knew not how to fight.

  Ch. 5

  James Douglas – Kirkwold, 1315

  Tiny Kirkwold hugged the River Eden in sleepy innocence. Curls of smoke meandered low over thatched roofs that glistened with the hoarfrost of a January dawn. The village stirred groggily to life. A flock of chickens wandered the streets, a dog barked in frenzy, sending them scattering in a dozen directions, and a small boy clutching a tattered blanket popped out of a doorway to scold the mongrel.

  Come afternoon, the place would be one more heap of sputtering ashes to mark our trail through Westmorland and Cumberland.

  Edward Bruce pulled a dinged and scuffed steel cap over his mail coif. His breath hung in lingering clouds about his dark-stubbled face. Snot was freezing on his upper lip. The two of us stood at the edge of a wood half a mile from the village. Behind us were sixty men, lightly armed and mounted on swift ponies. We had ridden deep into the north of England – as far as Richmond – and on our way home were making good use of the journey by gathering up whatever spoils we came across.

  “One more,” Edward said. “Then we’re home, aye?”

  “Home?”

  “Edinburgh for the time being.”

  “No, not Edinburgh. Not for me.”

  Over the low crest of a hill, where a road cut across an open meadow, a horse and cart appeared. Edward eased his weapon out of its scabbard. Some of the men who were still on foot lurched forward. I waved them back into the wood, begging patience. The wobbling cart turned out to be nothing more than a hay cart driven by an old woman and so we let it pass.

  Edward was still clutching the hilt of his weapon. “Where will you go then?”

  “Selkirk or thereabouts. Wherever I’m needed. They’ll want retribution for this, Edward. You know.”

  “You’ve months before the English will come north in full force again.” He grinned wickedly and slid his other hand through the straps of his targe. “For now, there are spoils for the taking.”

  “I wager every man in town is armed.”

  “Likely. If they’ve any sense, though, they’ll have sent their daughters elsewhere.” He glanced at me sideways. “And if you’ve any sense, Douglas, you’ll abandon thoughts of her. Aye, I know who’s caught your eye. I wasn’t in Melrose a day and it was as bloody obvious to me as the tail on a rat. And don’t think anyone else was blind to it. Robert is no more a saint than the rest of us, but you’re damned if you alter any of his plans and you, man, have stepped in the middle of one.”

  “Plans?”

  “Aye. Heard him talking to that nursling Walter Stewart the night before we left. Seems the bastard is to wed Marjorie before the year’s out. That would put a fat stretch of land in the royal holdings from Bute all the way to Lothian. Robert’s wise that way.”

  I never knew if I should believe anything Edward Bruce said. But the news, whether true or not, left me momentarily numb. When we were gathered in anticipation of Bannockburn, I had heard Walter speak in passing of some agreement tendered between his father and Robert. But men say senseless things when they are staring at death. I thought nothing more of it than a lad’s wishful ramblings, for he had grown up with Marjorie on Bute and doubtless harbored some lingering affections for her.

  But if, if it were true ... how long had Marjorie known of it?

  As the weeks at Melrose had gone by, I found myself watching her, even as she passed at a distance on the other side of the courtyard, and wanting to be with her if it meant only standing next to her at Mass in a room full of people. The years had put a bloom on her and I was achingly aware of the curve where her neck met her shoulders and the easy smile that danced across her lips every time our eyes met.

  None of it had gone unreturned. When we passed in the corridors, she had returned my glances, sometimes veering closer just to brush my elbow. At meals, her hand had lingered on mine when she passed me a cup of wine. One morning, I found her in the orchard, watching a pair of doves that were nestled wing to wing on the branch of an apple tree. We talked for hours that day. What began as a renewal of friendship had, in a very short time, blossomed into something more. Something undeniable. If Robert had not intervened ...

  An infatuation. She worships you as a hero in her youthful innocence and you, good James, are intrigued by the change in her. Find yourself a wife more suitable than Robert’s daughter and fill your house up to the rafters with bairns. Forget her.

  Somehow though, I could not convince myself I could do that.

  Edward Bruce took a few steps back, grabbed at his mount’s saddle and leapt up. He leaned over and said lowly so that only I could hear, “Word of advice from one who knows of such matters: When it comes to women you can’t have, if you want to get under their skirts, wait until after they’re married. It’s that much more exciting and if anything ...” – he winked subtly – “anything unexpected comes of it, no one’s the wiser.”

  God knows, Edward Bruce would never earn my confidence, but the man had peeled back a layer of my skin and left something of my soul exposed. I would go back to Edinburgh. I had to now.

  Sim Leadhouse eased his pony close behind Edward and me. He cleared his throat and spat. “Day’s getting on.”

  “It is, Sim.” Edward stared at me unnervingly.

  Sword drawn, I climbed onto my saddle and gave the signal.

  ***

  Edinburgh, 1315

  When Edward and I rode through the gates and into the courtyard at Holyrood Palace on the east end of Edinburgh, the whole place was abuzz. Barrels of ale and casks of wine were arriving from the port in carts to fill the cellar. Menservants, prodded along by a squawking seamstress, hoisted bolts of linen onto their shoulders. Highborn lords and ladies meandered, pausing to mingle with their equals and tipping their noses up at any churls who dared come too close.

  We dismounted and I passed my reins to an eager stable groom.

  Edward scraped mud from the heels of his boots on the cobbles and surveyed the goings-on. “I’d like to say this is all in celebration of our homecoming, but somehow I doubt so. Go
d’s rotten teeth, this place is overflowing and smelling of armpits and manure. Is that ...?” Suddenly he ducked behind me, lowering his voice to a mumble. “Mother Mary, it is him. I should have veered off to Galloway when we passed by. Excuse me, but I need to disappear. I just saw someone who might still be a wee bit cross with me for a meaningless little dalliance I had with his sister.”

  I looked about, but it was impossible to tell who among the crowd he was referring to. “When do you have time, Edward?”

  “My good man, I make time for pleasures. And I recommend you do the same. Life is meant for living. Now, shouldn’t you go find her?”

  We had not spoken any more of Marjorie since that morning several weeks ago outside Kirkwold. In fact, I had managed to ignore Edward quite well since then. He dashed behind a pair of sweating men, who were lugging slabs of salted meat on their backs, and disappeared just as he had promised.

  I wove through the bustle of bodies and went up the steps into the hall. Being an unusually warm day for mid-February, the opportunity to air the hall of its sooty odor had been seized and the doors thrust wide. The floors had been scrubbed with copious buckets of vinegar water and the smell stung at my eyes. Already, they were bringing in fresh rushes and dried herbs to lay down.

  “James!” Randolph called through the crowd, thrusting a hand above his head.

  I made my way to him and we clasped hands heartily. There was something different about him ... Ah, his appearance. Gone were the sensible clothes and armored trappings of a soldier; they had been replaced by a statesman’s attire: a slate-colored tunic that hung to just above his ankles, its tight-fitting sleeves lined with buttons from wrist to elbow, and over it a dagged edge quintise of light blue.

  I pointed to his tapering shoes. “Those look entirely impractical.”

  “My wife,” he said, his lip curling ever so slightly, “has become quite enamored of court life and thinks I should look the part. The enthusiasm is not mutual, I assure you. This morning I tripped twice. Ah, but tell me, James. Did it go well? You’re unscathed, I hope.” He snapped his fingers at a passing cook and peeled off a list of items to be checked. Indignant, the cook gave answer that everything was in good order and strutted off.