“We thought it worth asking, since he won’t speak to us. Worst case, he tells us nothing more. But the way this plot fell out makes us feel as if there’s still another shoe to drop. Roger Mortimer remains defiant, despite David’s successful return from Ireland, not to mention his crowning as High King there. Balliol too. They’ve been far more confident, in fact, than it feels they have any right to be, considering who they’re going up against and how their plans have so far gone awry.”
“It is true that the king has proved himself time and again against what appeared at the outset to be incredible odds. He is blessed by God, as Gilbert—and now Thomas—learned too late.” Margaret sighed. “I am ready. Please take me to him, and I will see what I can do.”
Lili and Bevyn had agreed to allow Bronwen to handle Margaret, since she was Bronwen’s friend, and Bronwen was sorry she couldn’t watch the subsequent proceedings through two-way glass like in a police station, but it was worth the possibility of Thomas confiding in his sister to leave the two of them alone together. Bronwen didn’t have much in the way of experience with interrogation either—beyond scolding her children—but she hoped that even if Thomas started out antagonistic towards his sister, their familiarity with each other would eventually devolve into a genuine exchange.
Thus, when they reached the cell, the guard ushered only Margaret inside. But he didn’t close the door behind her all the way, and Bronwen pulled up a stool and sat near the gap between the frame and the door to listen. Bevyn had followed them into the prison, and he leaned against the wall beside Bronwen, his shoulder to the stones.
“So they dragged you into this too?” Thomas was all disdain. It wasn’t exactly the loving greeting Bronwen—or Margaret—might have hoped for.
But Margaret scoffed and her words dripped acid. “I’ve been in it, as you say, a long time. I’m lucky to have survived what Gilbert did. Now I have to negotiate your treachery too? It’s incredibly selfish of you to put me in this position.”
Bronwen looked up at Bevyn, whose eyes were wide. They had assumed Margaret would be the comforting sister. Instead she’d gone on the attack.
And put Thomas on the defensive. “It should have worked.” He sounded like a sulky six-year-old, defending his actions to a wiser sibling.
“You mean you should have killed the king? How did you think that was going to end?”
“With my death,” Thomas said. “I knew it, and it would have been worth it.”
“Thomas ... why?” Now Margaret’s tone changed to one that was both loving and despairing. “You think you owe Roger Mortimer—or John Balliol—that much?”
“You don’t understand.”
“Obviously.” The starch had returned.
Thomas sighed loudly enough for Bronwen to hear through the doorway. “When I lost Thomond ten years ago, it became clear to me that the only way to get it back was to enlist the aid of someone more powerful than myself. It was a humbling realization, as you can probably imagine, but I felt I needed to be realistic. Gilbert, of course, turned me down.”
Margaret gave a mocking laugh. “As he would.”
Thomas actually laughed too. “Indeed.”
Though she wouldn’t have gone about it the way Margaret had, and Bronwen herself had no siblings, she recognized the familiar banter as one rooted in family.
Thomas continued, “Then Gilbert made his ill-advised bid for the throne, and I knew that if I was ever going to achieve my aims, I needed to find help sooner rather than later, before David gave away Ireland entirely. John Balliol gave me that chance.” He cursed under his breath. “My mistake was in relying on others instead of finding a way to do the job myself.”
“You mean murder the king? You tried yesterday and failed.”
He made a derisive tsk. “My mistake. I didn’t know he couldn’t be killed.”
“If you had bothered to consult with me, I would have told you to capture him instead. You could have held him for ransom.”
At that, Bevyn’s head jerked a little, and his and Bronwen’s eyes met again. She held up her hand to stop him from saying anything. Margaret was playing along—or so she hoped.
“Don’t I know it! He’s gone to Avalon, hasn’t he?”
“So I understand.”
Thomas cursed again, and he began to pace. Or at least, Bronwen could hear boots thudding on the stones.
“You know why I’m here?” Margaret asked after a moment.
“To get me to talk.” The thudding stopped. “I wasn’t going to, but now—” Thomas raised his voice. “I’m ready to bargain!”
Bevyn straightened, stepped around Bronwen, and opened the door. Bronwen stood too, though she made sure to keep well back. She wasn’t afraid of Thomas attacking her, but he might find off-putting the fact that she was the one who’d orchestrated this meeting. Some men had a problem with a woman who knew her own mind. Though, of course, his sister certainly had no trouble managing hers.
Bevyn came to a halt beside Margaret. “I’m listening.”
“My wife and children are not to suffer for my crimes.”
“Done.”
“They must be allowed to stay with her parents and my son allowed to inherit the lands his grandfather designated for him before he died.”
Thomas and Gilbert’s father had been Richard de Clare. The vast majority of his holdings and titles had gone to Gilbert, as the firstborn son, but he’d had some discretion in distributing a handful of his minor estates. David had decided he wouldn’t punish Gilbert’s two daughters for their father’s sins, and they each had inherited a few of the over two hundred estates Gilbert had forfeited when he died. The earldom of Gloucester remained vacant, having been returned to the crown upon Gilbert’s death.
“Is that why you agreed to try to murder David, despite the poor odds?” This time there was pity in Margaret’s voice. “Balliol promised to safeguard your family?”
Thomas gave her a single nod. “With the failure in Ireland, I lost everything I had to lose except my life.”
“So you thought to throw that away too?” Margaret said.
For the first time, Thomas’s voice held a measure of humbleness. “For my son, I would do anything.”
Bevyn wasn’t interested in Thomas’s regrets. “What do you have for me in return?”
“The threat you don’t know about.”
“From where?” Bronwen took another step into the room, unable to remain silent.
“Norway.”
“Erik invades again?” Bevyn was disbelieving.
Thomas shook his head. “The threat comes from Hakkon, Erik’s younger brother. He has promised Balliol an army equal to the one his brother brought to Scotland four years ago.”
“Does Erik know?” Bronwen knew all about Erik from Callum and Cassie. Like Philip of France, he was the same age as David and very ambitious, as well as protective of his rights as King of Norway. She knew nothing, by comparison, about Hakkon.
Thomas laughed derisively. “No. He wouldn’t be supportive, seeing as how he married the Bruce girl last year.”
Thomas meant Isabel Bruce, sister to Robbie.
Then he shrugged. “By the time Erik finds out what his brother has done, it will be too late.” He eyed Bevyn and then Bronwen. “If you don’t move quickly, it will soon be too late for you as well.”
Chapter Twenty-five
2 April 1294
Christopher
They’d spent the night in an inn in Heptonstall, northeast of Manchester, having come well over sixty miles the day before—miles that would have taken a few hours at most to drive in Avalon. They’d arrived after sunset and slept eight hours in relatively clean conditions. Then they pushed on, spurred by a comment from the innkeeper that foreigners had been seen in these parts.
“Foreigners as in Scots?” Christopher asked.
“Or Welsh?” Huw said.
“Ach, the Welsh are a strange breed, but they’re not so different from us, are they, my lo
rds?”
Huw had insisted on introducing Christopher as the Hero of Westminster, so everybody knew he was the king’s cousin. “Not so different, no.”
“What about Irish?” Matha suggested.
The innkeeper looked him up and down. She was well into middle age, but her eyes flashed a little—not with disapproval at Matha’s accent but with approval at his appearance. Unlike his sister Aine, Matha’s hair was dark, almost black, though he still had that pale Celtic skin that would burn in the sun if it ever shone in Ireland. He was tall and well-built, and he carried himself in a manner befitting someone who knew his own worth. Christopher knew him to be arrogant, but that arrogance had been tempered by pain and loss and a measure of fear. Christopher wasn’t the only one who’d grown up in the last month.
But still, the innkeeper shook her head. “I didn’t see any of these men myself, you understand, but I heard of ‘em. And they weren’t Irish nor Scots neither.”
Christopher decided to defer any judgement about the foreigners’ nationality until he met them. According to Robbie Bruce, Highlanders could seem foreign to a man from Lancashire, but so would a Spaniard or an Italian, not that he was worried about a company of Italians roaming northern England.
“Where were they?” Huw asked.
“North of here.”
Matha shrugged. “We were going north anyway, so that works out.”
Thus, by noon, they’d gone another twenty miles, reaching Yorkshire and the Southern Pennines, taking it a little slower and searching all the while for any trace of the foreigners about whom the innkeeper had spoken. Having learned something from being captured in Ireland, every time they rested the horses, Christopher had taken the binoculars and found the nearest high ground. Not alone, of course, since that was another thing he’d learned in Ireland.
But this time, Christopher didn’t need to put the binoculars to his eyes to understand that they’d stumbled upon something Callum needed to know about. Before him lay a plain, cut by a winding river. A castle was perched on a cliff above the river, and an army was camped before it. He took one look, and then a second longer one, cataloging the various banners, only some of which he recognized.
For confirmation, he handed the binoculars to Huw, who’d accompanied him up the slope. “This is Skipton, right?”
“It is.” Huw’s expression was stony. “I’m guessing there are at least five thousand men down there.”
Christopher scanned the plain, trying to count tents and fire circles, but there were so many, he kept losing track. “There are a hundred fires in the bottom left quadrant alone.”
Giving up, together they slid from their perch and hastened back to where their companions waited.
“The news isn’t good.” Christopher took in the faces of the men before him.
“What does that mean?” Jacob said.
Last time, in Ireland, Christopher had been with his best friends. Callum had chosen these men, and while Christopher didn’t know them as well, he knew them better after spending thirty straight hours with them, and all of them had fought in battle before. They had all lost friends among David’s guard when they’d been murdered in France on Gilbert de Clare’s orders. None of them would be taking an army at Skipton as a good sign.
“Balliol is here, instead of at Barnard,” Christopher said. “Or at least his banners are here, and there are thousands of men in the fields before a castle just north of our position.”
“They’ve come fifty miles south without us knowing?” Though his words were ones of surprise, Jacob wasn’t aghast so much as grim.
“There’s more,” Christopher said, feeling grim himself. “Balliol has allied with someone else. There are banners in that field that Huw and I don’t recognize.”
Huw handed the binoculars to Jacob. “Everyone should take a look.”
There were only six of them, which had seemed like plenty when they’d set out from Chester. They’d been scouts only. Because they intended to ride fast and change horses multiple times, they’d needed to keep the company small so the strongholds they stopped in would have enough fresh horses to give them. Now, Christopher was longing to be part of a company, though he supposed he would have been more conspicuous and equally unable to do any damage against the army before them.
At the top of the hill again, Jacob shook his head, but Matha looked long and hard before saying, “Norway.”
“What?” Christopher took the binoculars back. “Are you sure?”
Matha pointed. “See the red banner that shows a gold lion with an axe? That’s the flag of Norway.” At the others’ skeptical looks, he added, “I know this because the King of Norway, not the current one but his father, met with us when I was a child, and I remember his banner.”
Us being the Irish clans, and Christopher was pretty sure he didn’t want to know what intrigue they’d been planning with Norway, even twenty years ago. “Anybody speak Norwegian?”
Nobody raised his hand.
“Why is Skipton being held against us?” Jacob said with clear frustration. “I thought it was a royal castle? We were supposed to change horses here.”
And get a hot meal, Christopher thought, but didn’t add. David might well lose other castles before this war was over, but the loss of this one was definitely not a good start.
Huw chewed on his lower lip. “Skipton belonged to Prince Edmund, King Edward’s brother, which he inherited from his first wife. He’s dead, of course, but his second wife has two infant sons. I don’t know why she would ally with Balliol, but it’s more likely she isn’t here, and her castellan gave up the castle uncontested.”
This was the moment for which, as Christopher’s mom would say, they paid Christopher the big bucks. He gritted his teeth. “Two of you need to ride right now, first to find our army and tell them to march here instead of to Barnard, and then to Callum at Beeston, though if all went well yesterday he might be heading north as we speak.”
Jacob took in a deep breath. “I should be the one to go, but I’m supposed to be watching your back.”
“I’ll be fine here. Watching King David’s back is far more important,” Christopher said. “The Stewarts and the Bruces are marching to Barnard Castle, which is no good now, and this army is large enough to flank both his and Callum’s. We need to flank this one instead. They need to know about the strategic value of this hill, for starters.”
Flanking was a basic military tactic, which, thanks to computer games, Christopher had known about before he came to Earth Two. Those were something he thought he ought not to mention either.
Jacob nodded and then gestured to John that he should come with him. The two men slid down the hill to their horses, and by the time Christopher and the others followed, they were mounted.
“What are we going to do in the meantime?” Huw said. “Watch and wait?”
“Not hardly,” Christopher said. “Someone else needs to ride to James Stewart, wherever he may be.”
Huw and Matha looked at each other, and Christopher could see them weighing the pros and cons of which one of them should go. Finally, they both said at exactly the same moment, “It should be me.”
“No.” Huw shook his head. “James knows you, but he knows me better. More to the point, I know him better. I can find him.” He wasn’t taking no for an answer, and within five minutes, he and Cedric were mounted too.
Christopher caught Jacob’s bridle before he could leave. “You must raise the countryside on the way. The general alarm has gone out, but the people have to know that this isn’t just Scotland we’re dealing with. Find the headman of every village and town you pass through on the way and make sure the people are preparing for war and ready to march this way when the army comes through. We really are going to need them.”
“Yes, my lord.” He spurred his horse away.
Huw and Cedric headed in the opposite direction. They’d have to go some miles to the west in order to avoid being spotted by the army in front of Sk
ipton Castle.
“That’s smart,” Matha said as he watched their companions go. “Some might not see a difference between one lord and the next. Norway, however, is another matter entirely. If they hadn’t already, men will respond to your summons now.”
Christopher had been thinking specifically of Paul Revere’s ride at the start of the American Revolution, but he didn’t mention that to Matha. Everyone knew that Avalon was a strange and wonderful land, but very, very few knew about the time travel part of it. He decided he didn’t feel guilty about taking credit for an idea that wasn’t his.
Still, he was a little shocked at what he’d just done. “I’m not sure what just happened.”
“You did what had to be done,” Matha said matter-of-factly.
“I suppose so.” Then Christopher looked hard at Matha. “Are you ready for the rest of the plan?”
Matha looked at him warily. “I assumed we were going to watch and wait. That’s partly why I volunteered to ride to the Stewarts.”
“Not exactly.” And Christopher told Matha what his real plan was.
“You want to volunteer? Are you completely out of your mind!”
“Am I? If that’s Erik of Norway down there, he has allied himself with Englishmen and Scotsmen. We will simply be two more who see the way the wind is blowing and go with it.”
“I’m Irish!”
“We are both former servants of Gilbert de Clare,” Christopher said. “He drew men from estates all across Britain, and that can explain our accents. But I don’t think we’re going to have to explain much. You and I were part of an army two weeks ago that was way smaller than this one. Even well-organized armies are chaotic. We just have to find someone who speaks English or French.”
“Or Gaelic, I suppose. I understand these Scots well enough.” Matha was still staring at him, and though Christopher feared he was going to point-blank refuse, all of a sudden, Matha’s mind began to work. “I can’t decide if this idea is brilliant or completely mad.”
“But you’ll do it?”
Champions of Time (The After Cilmeri Series, #13) Page 18
