by J. R. Tomlin
"What of you? Afterward you return to the king?"
James tapped a finger on the mantel. He'd given it much thought but couldn't see any way to decide until after they'd attacked here. "From the Clyde, from within Ettrick Forest, I could wait with men who are willing to follow and do more before I go. And I've sworn to take any who will to the king. But we'll talk on that after."
As the men left, Thomas turned to James. "Bar the door after us, my lord, and mind you and Wat stay indoors and out of sight. At dusk, I'll return with others."
James did so and walked around the house. It felt strange to be locked inside. He loathed being idle. For a time, he sat to finish sharpening his weapons, but both his dirks were sharp enough to have shaved with which made him think of trimming his beard. He hated when it got long and he didn't like his cheeks covered with hair. He smiled remembering that Boyd laughed and said he was vain. Of a fact, he knew he was no fair knight as poor Nigel had been.
Wat was snoring in a corner. James sighed and walked around again. He couldn't even open the shutters to look out.
Alycie... He kept putting her out of his mind and she kept popping back in. Thinking of what must have been done to her made him grind his teeth in frustration. Another debt to pay.
When he couldn't stand it any more he knocked on her door.
She opened it, and he leaned against the doorjamb, smiling at her. "Would you keep me company?"
She sniffed. "You're sure there's nae men's business to conduct?"
"Lass, I didn't say for you to go. I'm like to drive myself mad with only my own company and nothing to do."
Finally, she relented and smiled. "I need to stir our supper anyway and carry some to my father."
"Take it out? Is that safe?" How could she go out where he'd seen all they were doing?
"I keep as far from them as I can. I can't always stay inside, can I? Like you, I'd go mad." She lifted the lid off the pot, and the savory onion smell came up on a wave of steam. Moving it off the heat, she smiled. "From the way you sniffed, I take it that you're hungry?"
He laughed. "No, it's early yet. But you don't know how long it's been since I've eaten a meal that smelled so good. In our camp, we do well to roast a half-burn a rump of venison over an open fire."
She sat down, arranging her skirts around her legs, and motioned for him to join her. "May I ask you something?"
He sat, smiling. "Of a certainty."
"What is he like? The king, I mean."
"I--I'm sworn to him." James didn't know how to put it into words and fumbled for them.
Her eyes were laughing at him. "But that tells me about you and not him."
James frowned, realizing that he'd never put his thoughts about Bruce into words even to himself. "There's something inside him--it's hard to explain, except that God gave him to us to be king. It's what he is. And yet--"
She was frowning, listening, and nodded for him to go on.
"I've seen him in battle, seen him kill with a blow. I'm no weakling, but I couldn't match him on the field. He's born a warrior. Yet, there's something kind inside him. A kindness." James shrugged. "He'll be a king for us."
"You love him."
James looked away into the fire for a moment. "I'd die for him. And gladly if it would get him the throne and get us quit of the English."
Alycie touched his arm but then pulled her hand back. "I hope you don't die for him."
He grinned. "I don't mean to if I can help it."
She dropped her eyes and blushed. "But you're still not married?"
"No. I think my father had talked with my uncle the Stewart about it before he died. They might have planned something, but then everything changed. And there's been no time to think of it." He tilted his head looking at her. Why was someone so beautiful still unmarried? Surely, her father had thought of a match for her. Any man would want her. So he asked.
Her blush deepened and she twisted her fingers together. "He talked of it. But things have been hard. They sent me to Elgin to St. Mary's Convent when you were sent away. Father didn't think it was safe here. Later, I didn't want to take vows. I'd be a poor nun. So I came home and then--" She looked away. "I don't want to tell you what happened. It makes me ashamed."
James shook his head. "I can guess and it's no shame to you." He would have liked to offer her some comfort but feared it would be an offense. "It was men of the castle who hurt you?" His voice was soft, but he had to know.
She looked into the fire. "The commander knew that my father is the leader of the village. It was a warning what they'd do to us if we helped you. There were three of them from the castle." Her voice choked. "I tell myself I'm lucky they didn't kill me. That my father and brother were gone, so they didn't try to stop it."
He rose and stood behind her and stroked her arm with his fingertips. "They'll pay, sweetling. I promise you."
She looked up at him and he felt as though he was eating her with his eyes. "I don't care if they pay. But, oh, I want things the way they used to be."
So did he, and knew it could never be. He looked away, trying to ignore the tension in his groin. Stilling his hand on Alycie's arm, he fixed Isabella's face in his mind. "They'll pay for you and all the others. And to protect my people."
She stretched up. Her lips were soft on his cheek. "I must take my father his noonday meal." He stared into the fire until she was gone.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Douglasdale, Scotland: March 1307
All through that night, men came. They knelt and swore themselves to the service of the Lord of Douglas. The next day again he stayed locked inside the house whilst Alycie sewed a rent in his cloak and prepared clothes for him to wear over his armor.
He kept telling himself that she wasn't truly fair, that had only been courtesy. Her face was rounder than Isabella's, too round for true beauty. Her eyes were too far apart and her nose was turned up instead of straight and regal. But when she smiled and handed him a mug of ale, he thought the laughter in her eyes made them pretty anyway. She sang in a soft voice as she sewed, and it stirred him. Later she sat by the hearth, hugging her knees, and combed out her long corn silk-colored hair, and that stirred something in him so hard he rushed into the other room.
But he had a lady; he had sworn her love. She had wept when he sent her away without him. He had told her never to forget that he loved her. A man might lay with a woman for his needs--as the king had with Christina of the Isles. Everyone knew that. But to love another and whilst Isabella suffered for her courage, he couldn't betray her that way.
"I'll never understand lords and the like," Wat said when she had gone to take her father his food. "If a lass looked at me the way that one does you, I'd be doing something about it."
"I'd not dishonor her father," James said. "He's a loyal man and his daughter deserves better of me."
"I'm thinking he'd not hold it dishonor. Would you mistreat her?"
He looked blankly at Wat for a moment. "I might get her with child."
"A lord's bonny lassie or laddie wouldn't be no bother to Thomas. But if such worries you, did your father never tell you to spill your seed on a woman's belly?"
"Yes, but--" He couldn't bear to talk about Isabella, so he just shook his head.
"I'll never understand lords," Wat muttered, "but even the king has made a bastard or two."
As he slept that night, James dreamt he and Isabella walked beside the water with the tall spire of Scone overhead, that Alexander and Thomas laughed, running ahead of them. The king, wearing his crown, walked down from the crest of the hill, talking to Wallace beside him. When James stood with Isabella in the shade of a spreading oak, he drew her into his arms. Her mouth tasted of sweet red wine, and he awoke aching and angry.
He pushed open one of the shutters and breathed in the soft piney scent of near dawn. It was time. He pulled on his hauberk and the mail chausses that came to below his knees. After belting on his weapons, he donned soft leather boots so no mail woul
d show under the worn thresher's robe. He picked up the mantle with a grim smile. It was patched and worn and still smelled of another man's sweat.
He heard the murmur of Alycie's voice and her father answering.
She looked up at him when he stepped into the room. "I'll have bandages and herbs if we need them."
He nodded shortly. Thomas and Wat waited by the door. "Thomas, go ahead so you can be sure you get a place inside. We'll follow. I want all the English inside. I'm not so nice of a holy day as they. I'll be at the back. When I raise the cry, you know what to do."
When the door closed behind Thomas, Wat sucked on his teeth with a click. "There's much that could go wrong, my lord."
"If it goes wrong, then I must put it aright. You just see no one reaches the castle from the kirk if any get past us. They mustn't have a chance to close the gates."
James looked over his shoulder. Alycie crouched by the hearth, crushing a cloth in her hand, her eyes wide. "Bar the door and only open it to one of us, lass." Not that a bar would keep the English out if this went awry so he'd have to be sure that it didn't.
"I'm not afraid," she said and he knew it was a lie.
As James walked towards the village, he could see the top of the keep poking above the trees. Ahead, thatched roofs clustered along the edge of the river and a small pier jutted out into it. Wisps of smoke rose from some of the chimneys and part of a cart stuck out from behind one of them. At the end of the dirt track, the gray slate of the kirk gleamed like silver in the first shafts of daylight.
James stopped beside the road under a skeletal beech tree. Weeds grew up through the pebbles in patches. A wind sighed through the bare branches and they rustled and creaked.
Then there was laughter.
Two men in mail hauberks walked around the bend in the road. A third man came into view dressed in blue and yellow velvet, talking to another beside him. Their voices were loud, but they were too far away from James to make out the words. A flock of crows took off cawing as the men passed. Behind them in two rows marched in men-at-arms in mail jacks.
James leaned back against the tree and crossed his arms. He took a deep breath. Look afraid. His face showed too much. He stared at the feet of the guards as they passed, counting. Forty-two, including the commander in his velvet. Their feet thudded in the dirt, weapons and armor clanking.
Once they were past, he watched their backs. Even to the kirk, they wore swords and daggers at their belts. He nodded to himself. Then it would be a fight of it. Straightening, he followed.
Thomas stood beside the door to the kirk with Gib behind him. Clusters of men meandered towards it from the houses. A door slammed. Thomas motioned to Gib as soon as the English had crowded inside. They entered, going in opposite directions to each side. In ones and twos, his other men entered. The bell of the kirk clanged and clanged again. James realized his heart was racing. These men weren't fighters. Holy Mary, please let him not have made a mistake.
As one of the English would have pushed the door closed, James caught it with the flat of his hand and stepped inside. The priest stood before the altar, his hands raised.
A barrel-chested man at the front swung to face a guard. "A Douglas!" he screamed and swung his flail at a man-at-arms’ head. As he stumbled back, the man swung two-handed again. The wooden bar thwacked against the guard's head and blood splattered.
Too soon. They weren't yet at their prayers. The English commander jumped to his feet. The priest scrambled behind the altar.
Thomas shouted, "At them! At them."
James cursed under his breath. With both hands, he ripped the tunic and mantle to get to his sword.
"Guards," the velvet-clad commander screamed.
By that time, James had his longsword in his hand. He scythed it, catching a southron in the back and cleaving him like a loaf of bread. A guard swung a sword at Thomas who managed to catch it on his own.
James jerked the blade free. "A Douglas. A Douglas," James shouted. His men took up the cry. It rose over the clang of steel on steel and the groans as men died. There was no time or room for fine blade work--just swing and hack. He had to get to the front. Thomas was trapped, back to the wall. A sword swung at James and he dodged backwards, loosing a blow between helm and shoulder that took the man's head halfway off.
Two were at Thomas. James thrust hard into the belly of the guard in front of him. He kicked the body out of the way. Their ranks were thinning. He jumped over another body and shoved one of his men out of his way. He hacked an Englishman down. Swung his elbow into the nose of another whilst he caught a third with a backswing of his sword.
He was almost to Thomas, but the man was on his knees in a pool of blood. The guard above him swung. Thomas folded up into a bundle surrounded by gore. Too late, James lunged. The man caught the blade on his. James leaned his weight into him and shoved him, taking him off his feet, sliding on the blood-slick floor.
"A Douglas," James shouted as he brought his blade down in a killing stroke. Blood sprayed in a red fountain.
"I yield," the velvet-clad commander threw his sword clattering at James's feet. "I yield."
James spun looking for another opponent, but the two men-at-arms still standing dropped their weapons. "Gib, get to the castle. See to the gates."
Gib jumped over a corpse as he went and he yelled, "Will, come with me."
James kicked a body out of the way and bent over Thomas, rolling him onto his back. His mouth gaped and his eyes were blank. The rent in his neck was a bloody grin. James supported his head with one hand to lean it on his shoulder. It was half off and the white of his spine showed through the gore. For a moment, James closed his eyes, and then he slid his other arm under Thomas’s knees and lifted him. He should have been heavier. He was a big man, James thought as he laid the corpse gently on the altar.
Someone shoved the commander down on his knees in front of James. Men were going amongst the bodies gathering weapons.
"Looting can wait." He flexed his hands. "Tie them," he growled, "and bring them." They'd have to be taken care of. He flexed his sword hand.
The worst choices were when there was no choice.
He strode into the sunlight. His hands were sticky with blood. It was caked on his chest and specks were drying in his beard. It didn't matter. He walked on. A corpse lay in the middle of the road, Wat standing over it.
"You let one get away," Wat said.
"We still have business to attend to," James rasped.
Gib and Will waited in the gateway, the portcullis like teeth above their heads. Will caught James's eye. His face was drawn. James shook his head. The man had seen his father fall. "I should tell Alycie," Will said.
James frowned. Mayhap the news would be best coming from her brother. James wouldn't blame her if she said it was his fault. He should have kept Thomas close to him. If he had-- But any of them might have died.
In truth, he didn't have time. Besides, she wasn't his. He'd made that decision, hadn't he?
"Yes, she needs to know. Return with her. I have work to do here."
The doors of the Great Hall had been thrown open and Wat came running out. "My lord, they've left us a feast." He laughed.
"Gib, see that the prisoners are tied and secure. Any get away and it's people's lives when they return with aid."
He let out a long breath. The last time he walked out those doors, he'd been at his father's heels. He should remember it more clearly, but at the time, they'd just been leaving for Berwick. The excitement of seeing the city had been more important than leaving home. His baby brother had cried. He remembered that.
"If there's a feast then it's ours now," James said as he walked through the doors.
The gray stone walls of the Great Hall were draped with banners, blue, gold, green and amongst them the banner of the Cliffords. The arched ceiling was supported by age-blackened beams. The air was heavy with the smell of roasted fowl and fresh baked bread. At the end of the hall, a fire roared in t
he great hearth and sent forth a smell of oak.
He turned and shouted to the men who crowded in the doorway behind him, "Get your women and children. We'll feast on what's ours."
His people were hungry. They'd had little enough left after the English took the best of everything. He wanted no food, but they'd expect him to take the lord's place.
"Bring water." He waited until he could plunge his hands into a basin. The water came away dyed red.
James sank into high-backed lord's chair at the head of the raised high table. A honeyed chicken sat on a platter. He reached out to tear off the rear quarter. He forced down a bit and then dropped it onto the trencher. The thought of what was to come stole hunger.
As men and a few women straggled into the room, laughter and talk filled the air. James's head thrummed with pain and his hand twitched. He couldn't sit here and feast. His gut twisted. Sitting still had never been easy.
He shoved back the chair and stood. "My people," he raised his voice over the noise. "Eat. Drink. Afterward await me here, and you'll have what you can carry away. There will be food, supplies. No one leaves empty-handed."
Cheers and shouts followed him as he slowly climbed the steep stone steps that corkscrewed the keep, trying not to think that this would be the last time. He reached the landing and stood for a long moment, memories flooding. His father, hounds at his heels, shouting that they must start on a hunt. His brother running from James's step-mother to throw arms around James's legs. Thomas carrying a hound pup up the stairs shouting for him.
Now he must destroy it. He entered the room that had been his father's. The bed hangings were the same blue that matched the family crest. The chest under the open window the same golden oak. The shouting that drifted up from the yard below was different though. He threw open the lid of the chest. Light caught on armor. He turned it in his hands--gold inlay on the helm, the mail beautifully crafted and a plate cuirass instead of a mail hauberk. Clifford must reward his minions well, James thought as he handled the pieces. Underneath he found a bag of silver groats and that went into his belt. One last time, he looked out the slit window. High in the sky, a hawk rode the wind in lazy circles, the last sight he'd see from here. Victory wasn't supposed to be so bitter on the tongue.
