A Kingdom's Cost, a Historical Novel of Scotland (20 page)

The leathery-faced man shook his head. "Sorry,
lass. But I'd given up hope of seeing a Douglas back where he belongs. I put
this lad on his first pony."

Recognition hit James. Gib had been his
father's stable master. "I remember. It's past time I was back." One
by one, they gave him their oaths and he promised them protection. So small a
start but one that meant much.

James sat down and motioned for the men to
join him and Alycie sat down as well, a bit of sewing in her had.

"Thomas told you our plans for Sunday?"

Thomas frowned at his daughter. "Alycie,
this is men's business. Best you take your sewing to your room, lass."

She stood, crumpling the cloth in her hand,
and started to the door but stopped. Whirling, she faced them. "Was it
man's business when the English ravished me? Was it when Maggie was left a
widow? When we suffer as much, why is it only men's business?"

"I'm sorry, lass." Thomas'svoice
softened. "But it's best."

James frowned. There was truth to what she
said. War left women weeping for the men they'd lost, or raped and dead in a
village, or locked in a cage. He stood and went to look down into the flames of
the little fire on the hearth. "Let her stay if she wants, Thomas. Women
in Scotland have more--"

Alycie tilted her chin up and sniffed. "Thank
you, my lord, but I'll be in my room until it's time to carry the water." She
closed the door so quietly behind her that it was better than a slam.

"She always was a stubborn lass and
what happened--I can't bear to think on it. Forgive her rudeness. I should beat
her for it, but I haven't the heart."

James could all too easily guess what had
been done to her. "By the saints, don't. I'd punish the English instead. And
mean to."

"Aye, my lord, that's what I want to
hear about," Gib said.

"Only thirty of them. Thomas, how many
men can I count on?"

Thomas grimaced. "Your father could
raise a thousand claymores, my lord. But--I fear at best seventy who are fit to
fight and can be trusted."

"With seventy we can do it. But we
must see that the women stay away." He chewed his lip. "Will they
notice no women in the kirk of a Palm Sunday morning?"

"They don't really look at us except
to take what's ours," Gib said. "It's like we're cattle in the field.
I think they'd forbid us the kirk if they could."

"That's good, though. If they don't
look, they won't notice a couple of extra men--though to be cautious mayhap Wat
and I should come in last."

Thomas beamed. "If you come in last
then we'll have them trapped."

"Weapons. In a close fight, I've found
dirks do as well as any other, sometimes better. But do all the men have them?"

"For any who don't, we can use
threshers' flails. Those we have in plenty. A blow with a flail is as good as a
mace."

"Good." James leaned back and
looked them in the eye, one by one. "You know the danger. Some of us may
die, but so will the English. Have the men come to me after dusk tonight and
tomorrow. I'll have their oaths and give them mine."

"I'll be off for the fields, my lord. These
days I'm no more than a serf and grateful to be left that much. But it'll give
me the chance to talk to those I trust." Thomas stood. "Mind you,
men, keep your mouths shut. One word in the wrong ear would be disaster."

"Wait, Thomas. There's something else
I'd say."

"What's that, my lord?"

"If the village is to be safe from
revenge after--" He took a deep breath. "--none of the English can
live."

The men all exchanged looks and nodded. Mayhap
they had known that.

"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 mayhap 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 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. "I'd die for
him."

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. Mayhap they'd 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 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 cornsilk-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 his
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 summer 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 would 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 was screaming.

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 a Sassenach 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, then he slid his other
arm under Thomas'sknees 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," he 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 amongstst 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 the 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.