The Raven's Heart

by Jesse Blackadder

  They set upon us as I crawl from the tunnel. One grapples with me and I can hear Isobel’s exclamation cut off as another takes her. The casket slips out of my hands, clattering over the rocks as I struggle. The bank is steep and slippery and it is dark, but I have a dagger in my hand. Over the roar of the water I hear a human cry of pain as I find my mark and the dagger sinks home into flesh. The hands loosen their grip on me and I throw myself toward the only safety I can imagine.

  The Blackadder Water rises up to take me with its icy touch. I hit the water and scrape over a rock. The current pulls me into the main body of the river where the water is fast and cold. I let her take me. I can hear nothing of Isobel. Just the roar of water in my ears.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  My eyes adjust to the darkness and I can make out the high banks rushing by as the river carries me. This is my own river, is it not? She will surely carry me to safety. I must only keep my head above the water and not allow the weight of my clothing to drag me down.

  Above me, stars wink in and out of the clouds. It is a relief for once to have only water to struggle against. There is no human hand here, my life is a matter for the Blackadder Water and me to work out between us.

  But as she carries me, and the cold water embraces my body, I realize something. The Blackadder Water is not water carrying my name; it is water holding nothing but itself. One day the castle will fall. Its stones will tumble and lie on the earth again, its timbers will rot, and there will be no more footsteps and voices. But the river will still run, even if our name is forgotten.

  The rush of the water is loud and I surrender myself to the flow. I smell the clean scent of water and soil and grass and at last I understand. In sweeping me away, the Blackadder Water has given me a gift, washing me clean of my longing for the castle. It has even swept away William’s casket with its weight of human concerns. The castle’s spell is truly broken.

  The cold begins to creep up my limbs and the weight of my cloak drags at me. My arms and legs feel heavy. I must leave the river’s embrace and make my way to shore.

  But it turns out she wants something in return. I start to paddle toward the southern bank but she drags me ever more swiftly, keeping me in the fastest part of the current. The river that gave me my name now wants to take me back to her bosom.

  A roar rises out of the dark ahead of me and I frantically try to recall the course she takes. Is there a waterfall in these parts? I kick harder to try and reach the shore and now I am truly afraid. There is nothing inviting about the river’s embrace. Now she has her claws locked into me and she will not let me go.

  Suddenly I am tumbling and tossing through foaming water. My head goes under and the fight to bring it to the surface again is exhausting. I break through and take a great gasp of air, and I remember. It is the confluence of two rivers—the Blackadder and the Whiteadder, above the village of Allanton. From here, the combined river runs swift and full down to the sea.

  I discover an unexpected passion to live. My leaden limbs come to life, I kick out and stroke. At last the water is shallow enough so I can get a grip and drag myself from one rock to the next, my numb fingers slipping and clawing, my feet scrabbling on the slippery river bed. The current tries to drag me back and twice she almost succeeds, pulling me from my feet and slamming me against hidden rocks.

  “Let me go!” I beg.

  In answer she flings me against a last rock and my head meets it with sickening force. I cry out with the pain of it and feel myself go limp. She has won.

  But now that she has me, she relinquishes me. The current takes me into a quieter eddy of water behind a rock. I spin for a moment and come to a halt.

  The world is weirdly slanting and whirling around me as I crawl on hands and knees out of the water and onto a patch of stones. I collapse, coughing, and it is some moments before I can see where she has flung me.

  It is too dark to pick out any kind of landmark, only that the bank runs high above my head. I can see stars, scudded by clouds, and a glimmer of light low down in the sky—the moon has risen, though as yet it casts little light. I am shivering so hard I can barely stand, but I force myself to crawl up the bank, then walk back and forth, slapping my arms against my sides and stamping my feet.

  By the time the moon clears the clouds and sends out a gleam of light, my legs have given way. I huddle under my sodden cloak in a crevice between two rocks. A cold wind blows up, cutting around the rocks. I pull the cloak tight around me and force my head up each time it nods onto my chest. I cannot feel my hands and feet.

  They say that in order to die, salmon come back to the very river where they were born. On this dark night, I think of William. I could die on any lonely hill in Scotland or in some stinking wynd at a murderer’s hand. Or in a bed of my own, soft and old, like Beatrice. He would be pleased, I think, that if I am to die in such a manner it is here, by the Blackadder Water. Whether or not we are noble, we share the name of this river and I have returned to it at last.

  It hurts to leave this life. The cold is knife cuts all over my body. Beatrice lies dying too, this night. She is my closest blood kin except for William. We will make this last journey together and find out if it is the priests or the reformers who are right about the judgement that awaits us. Witches believe in a great female spirit that takes us all back to her breasts to begin the cycle of life again. It is a heretical thought, but one that brings me a little comfort at this hour.

  Praying seems like a mockery to a God who knows my treacherous heart in matters of religion. I cannot ask for my life to be spared now. But I find myself asking for William’s forgiveness. The running water sounds like laughter.

  Sixty-three

  I awake from a dream of my mother’s arms, to hear my name being called, faint over the roar of the water. With great effort I raise my head. But my response comes out only as a whisper.

  The call comes again, closer. “Alison!”

  This time it cuts through the warmth of my sleep. I am curled between the rocks, my arms and legs so cold I cannot unfold them. The moon is high in the sky now.

  I raise my head and with my remaining strength I call, “Help me!”

  My voice sounds like a croak, but there is an answering call close by and then someone comes scrabbling over the rocks and I feel hands on me.

  “Alison,” she says and I realize she is weeping. “I thought you had drowned.”

  “I’m the daughter of a sailor; I won’t drown,” I try to tell her but having made one cry I cannot will my voice to work again. With a great jerk, I start shuddering with the cold. The pain of it is so terrible that an animal noise issues from me.

  Isobel disappears for some time I cannot measure. She returns and somehow makes a fire. She wraps her own cloak around me, forces brandy between my icy lips, and at last sits close to me, pressing her body against mine.

  The brandy burns a path to my belly, but no farther, and it seems I can feel ice moving toward my chest. I know I will die if it reaches there.

  “Don’t leave me,” she says, and that is the last I remember.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  Trying to wake is like coming up from deep underwater. I try and try and at last the weight lifts a little and my head breaks the surface.

  I am warm. There is a fire in the room and I’m in a bed. My body is still oddly distant—I ask my hand to move and it does, but reluctantly.

  “Alison?”

  Sophie comes into my field of vision and bends down, putting a hand on my forehead. I stare up at her mutely.

  “Can you speak?”

  I open my mouth, but only a croak issues forth.

  “Don’t try,” she says. “Wait a moment.”

  She brings a bowl and lifts me up a little so she can tip the liquid into my mouth. I have never tasted anything so wondrous and I suck at it eagerly.

  “Easy, easy,” she says. “That’s good, you’re hungry.” When it’s finished she lowers me.

  She pulls the covers up
again, and presses my forehead. “I would wake Isobel, but she has not left your side these two days and she is exhausted. Could you sleep again? It’s sleep that will heal you now.”

  I could not fight away sleep if I tried. Its embrace is as inexorable as the river’s current.

  The next time I surface, Isobel is close by. This time she cradles me and feeds me more broth and I lie in her arms at rest. For once it seems that I am not searching, I have nothing to do, no place to be. I fall back into the river of sleep.

  When I wake next, sunlight is coming into the room and Isobel and Sophie are both there. I sit up unassisted. My body is my own again. Isobel approaches with broth. I reach for it and down it in a few swallows.

  “Where are we?” I ask when it’s finished.

  “Allanton,” says Isobel.

  “It’s been a week,” Sophie says. “The cold nearly took you. That and the blow on your head.”

  “A week!” I sit up.

  They both nod. I look at Isobel. “What happened that night?”

  “There were two servants, loyal to my brother, waiting for us,” she says. “I heard you go into the river. I could not get my dagger out, but I kicked my attacker in his manhood and got away. I had to wait till the moon came up. The stableboy was loyal and was waiting for me with the horses. I watched for a long time, till I was sure no one was there. Then I went searching for you. Thank God you were washed up on the south bank.”

  I look down. “I am in your debt.”

  “Not only that.” She is grinning. “I heard you drop the casket on the rocks. I went back and found it.”

  She crosses the room, comes back with the casket, and puts it down on the bed. “You will have to break it open. The key is lost.”

  I take it in my hands and shake it a little. There’s a scuffle of papers and something rattles. I rest it down again.

  “It is William’s to open, while ever he lives,” I say. “He must see that I have not tampered with it.”

  Isobel looks downcast. “Surely you want to see what’s in there?”

  I shake my head. The effort of conversation is suddenly exhausting. “What now?” I ask.

  They look at each other. “The Queen and Bothwell are married,” Sophie says. “The lords are raising their armies. The country goes to war against its sovereign.”

  I stare at her in shock. “Does any lord stand by her?”

  “A few,” she says. “But the rest now call themselves the Confederate Lords and they go to take the Queen from Bothwell, who they say is a murderer, adulterer, and ravisher. There are still some in the Borders loyal to Bothwell. But most have turned against him.”

  I run my hands over the dark wood of the casket. “Are we still to leave from Berwick?”

  “I have ridden there to find us passage, but the English are interested in this rebellion and they have their own armies gathering,” says Sophie. “Berwick is watched even more closely than Leith.”

  “Then what?” I ask.

  She stands, shaking her head. “I do not know. Men are rising to arms all through the Borders, for the Queen or against her. Every road to Edinburgh is crowded. I do not know if they will fight in the capital, or where else a battle might take place, but the common talk is it will be south of Edinburgh. Perhaps we should try to make our way to Leith, after all. Anyone riding away from Edinburgh is likely to be questioned, whereas anyone riding toward it is presumed to be summoned to arms.”

  The casket is warm under my hands. If we return to Edinburgh, there is a chance I can give it to William.

  Isobel is grinning. “Another disguise.”

  “What this time?” I ask.

  “There is only one that is safe,” Sophie says. “We go north as soldiers of Lord Hume.”

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  It is some days before I can mount a horse again and, even after we set out, the weakness in my body persists and I cannot bear to be cold. Red rides close by my side.

  We ride as men going to war, in the colors of the Hume clan. The country is full of men like us, carrying weapons and wearing what armor they can fashion. Some are barefoot, carrying only sharpened spikes lashed to sticks. They say they go to save the Queen from the ravening clutches of Lord Bothwell but there is no love in their eyes.

  As we near Edinburgh, the word comes along the road. Balfour, appointed by the Queen to hold Edinburgh Castle safe, turned upon her. Barred from her own stronghold, the Queen fled the capital with Bothwell and made for Borthwick Castle, there to try to raise more men.

  The taverns in the villages surrounding the capital are crammed, but we beg lodging from a family loyal to the Confederate Lords and they bring us more news as we eat our dinner. The first forces of Hume, Morton, and Mar have met up south of Edinburgh to march on Borthwick. Bothwell fled out a window and left the Queen, and the lords did not know what to do next. They rode on to Edinburgh, leaving a guard stationed at Borthwick. But the Queen outwitted them. She dressed as a man, escaped the castle, and rode off on Bothwell’s trail.

  My heart lifts at the news. She will triumph. She always does, in such adversity, when she can rise to her daring best.

  After dinner, Red settles himself on the floor and Isobel, Sophie, and I crawl into the bed. I do not mind so much being in the center. I crave warmth and cannot have enough of it.

  “If Bothwell did ravish the Queen and force her to marry, then surely she would be glad of the lords’ rescue,” Isobel whispers, mindful of listening ears at doors, as we try to sleep. “Why has she gone to be with Lord Bothwell now?”

  Sophie, on the other side of me, shakes her head. “She has a woman’s heart, our Queen. Now she is wedded to him, she may have fallen in love.”

  “More likely she has fallen with child,” I say. “Her worst fear is an illegitimate babe. To avoid that, she will do anything.”

  Sophie and Isobel fall silent and after a time their breathing deepens. Red snores. We are packed tight as herrings in the bed, but I feel alone. I lie staring into the dark. The night is full of noise, of hooves and footsteps in the street, men’s voices. It is the feel of a pack of hunting dogs before they catch the scent of their quarry, every muscle straining, seeking. The very air thrums with it.

  It is Bothwell being named over and over: Bothwell who is still accused of having murdered the King, Bothwell whose name has been written on placards night after night in Edinburgh. But what shall happen to the Queen if they bring Bothwell down? What mercy will there be for her if she is with child?

  William, who has been Bothwell’s right hand all these years, will be on this battlefield. I do not know how I will get the casket to him, but I keep it close at all times.

  Isobel sighs and shifts in her sleep and her body presses closer to mine. I stiffen, but with Sophie against my other side, there is no way to move away from her.

  She is a child, younger than I was when I fell in love with the Queen, and even less able to hide her feelings. It is in her eyes. I ignore it; I give no answer to the question there.

  But one thing has changed since the night in the river. I make no more jibes about her untrustworthiness. I settle back in our rough soldier’s bed and force myself to sleep.

  Sixty-four

  We have thought ourselves safe in the colors of Hume, but danger comes from a new quarter. As we ride out of the stable yard where we have been lodged, a man canters up.

  “Hume men?” he snaps. “Hurry up; they’ll leave without you.”

  There is no chance to slip away. He rides behind us up the street until we join the rear of a huge group of fighting men.

  “The battle is at hand,” a man who seems to be a leader calls out. “We ride to Carberry Hill. Make speed.”

  I catch a glimpse of Isobel’s frightened face as the mob presses forward into a canter. Red rides close to Sophie and I know he will not leave her side. We surge up the roadway, a mass of moving horseflesh, men, and arms. The noise is deafening and around us men yell and wave their weapons as though
we are already in the charge of battle. The air reeks of sweat and horse and rage.

  At last we sweep around a hill and come into view of the battlefield. Even I, who have seen battles before, gasp. The Queen’s forces are arrayed on the opposite hill, with Bothwell’s standard fluttering in the sunshine. On our side, with far greater numbers, are the armies of Hume, Mar, Morton, and the other lords. Over them all, a massive standard with a kneeling child and the words Avenge my cause, o Lord.

  As we slow down, I look frantically from side to side until I catch sight of the others. I ride close to them, our horses jostling.

  “Keep with me, at the back. When the fighting starts, we will flee. If we are lost, we must try to meet at Sophie’s.”

  I have never ridden into a battle before. We had thought to leave Scotland’s danger, and now I find myself in the middle of it—on the side opposing my Queen, with only a dagger to defend myself.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  The easiest way to beat a Scottish fighter is not to let him fight.

  There are thousands of men on the field ready for battle, but this is a battle with the Queen and, faced with the reality of it, her lords would rather parley than fight against their anointed sovereign.

  The messengers ride back and forth across the field and the sun grows hotter and hotter. Even the horses are dozing, rocking on their legs, their heads hanging low. The battle rage, which roared at the start of the day, fades as the lords continue talking. Most of these men are farmers, not soldiers, and their battle-lust cools with the inactivity. Men on both sides melt away like snow, though it is the Queen’s army that dissolves the fastest.

  At last it appears some agreement is made. There is a stir up and down the field. The horses stop dozing and prick up their ears. Men who have been lying in the shade get to their feet. We crane our heads to see what is happening.

  From our vantage point, I see the Queen ride out to meet James Douglas, the Earl of Morton, at the center of the field. Oddly, for a man who is opposing her in battle, he bows to her. Then he takes her horse by the bridle and begins to lead her across to our side.