Knight Triumphant (25 page)

“A man's virtues and his faults are certainly weighed differently when viewed by different eyes. No one denies that he is a powerful king. But does he have the right to rule those who are not his people?”

“We tried very hard to remain outside the fight at Langley—”

“That was your husband's choice. You've still not given me your own thoughts.”

“What do my thoughts matter to you?”

“Perhaps they will matter when I have to make a decision about your future.”

“My opinion is that I hate bloodshed and death,” she said, exasperated.

She was surprised that her reply brought another smile to his lips.

“Are you laughing at me again? Am I really amusing as well as repulsive?”

“I don't recall saying that you were repulsive—only that you remind me of pain suffered. And I'm not laughing at you. I am amazed at your ability to fool yourself. You won't speak against Edward. But I think that you believe that the Scots should be free, and ruled by their own king. Also, you're mistaken if you think your husband wasn't aware that he couldn't stay out of the fight forever. He had his loyalties, and I don't believe he was a fool.”

“What are you talking about now?”

“Afton would have remained loyal to Edward for the same reason many Scottish barons have done so. You were his wife. The estates he gained in England through his marriage to you provided a far greater income than his property here, though Langley might have been his ancestral home. That is why he opened the gates of Langley to Sir Niles Mason, and why, had the disease not brought everyone down or fleeing, he would have allowed every execution Sir Niles commanded to be carried out.”

Igrainia pulled on the reins of her horse, walking the mare some distance from the water, and mounting on her own. She knew that he followed her action, and he was mounted on Loki beside her. She turned on him.

“You're saying that riches meant more to my husband than honor.”

“I'm saying that your husband was not a stupid man,” he replied. “And he wasn't a hothead to behave irrationally, and God knows, enough ill has been done because of treachery and deceit and men's reactions to affronts against their honor. Robert Bruce killed John Comyn in a rage, or else he struck him down and his men finished the act, whichever, I don't really know, I wasn't there. It has caused him to fight a greater war than that against the English to claim the throne, but perhaps, without Comyn's death, he might not have been able to have himself crowned king when he did. War is bloody and horrible, as you say. But many things are done in the heat and fury of war which men rue in their consciences at later dates. I am not insulting your late husband. I'm trying to make you understand that war can be uglier even than what you've seen so far. And perhaps I'm trying to get it through your stubborn skull that you are more protected here at this moment than you might be were you to gain the freedom you think you want so desperately.”

“What does it matter to you what I feel, think, or understand. You've done an exceptional job at Langley. The walls are a greater defense than they've ever been. Your men are as loyal to you as a group of hounds raised by a man since birth. I spend my life now confined in a room, watching the world go by. There is no escape through your mighty highland guards. The secret tunnel has been walled. You're leaving, and I might as well be chained hand and foot to walls of steel.”

“For one, I don't believe you spend your hours in your room doing nothing—I'm sure you spend the time weighing every possible venue of escape that may become available. And I want you to write a letter.”

“What? A letter? Regarding what?”

“Your brother is in Scotland, madam. And it's my suggestion that you write to him, and let him know that your marriage to me did indeed take place, that it is real and consummate, and you have no desire to be rescued.”

She stared at him incredulously. “You must be mad! Perhaps you could half-smother me into a ceremony, and force my hand to a piece of paper and create the appearance of my signature, but you can't force me to write such lies to my brother! I knew there was a purpose to this ride, to these hours. Do you think me so desperate that I can be used in this way?”

Loki trotted around so that he was facing her. “I don't intend to force you to do anything. If you write this letter, it will not be for me.”

“It's for me?” She demanded.

“You told me that your brother is a young man, and honorable. He will try to come here, against the walls of Langley, to take you. If he does so, I'll be forced to kill him.”

“Perhaps you're mistaken, and he'll bring down the walls.”

“Do you really think that's possible, when he won't have the might of a great army behind him? Perhaps it's rude to remind you of this, but it seems you are not of a great value to King Edward, who is set upon destroying Robert Bruce before wasting time and men on such an effort as the siege of Langley would require. I said that I wanted you to write a letter, that I
suggested
it. The suggestion is because I recognize the fact that I might not have survived myself—if you and your priest weren't endowed with a certain sense of honor and compassion. I believe you love your brother. Therefore, I am trying to preserve his life for your benefit.”

She sucked in her breath, amazed at his confidence and audacity, and yet aware that he was speaking the truth. And it was the closest he had ever come to admitting that she might have saved his life.

“If you believe that Langley is so powerful, why doesn't your king take up residence within it?” she asked.

“Because he could be trapped. Robert Bruce keeps moving, and therefore, he can keep the English from the advantage of a planned and prepared assault. And from Langley, my lady, I can provide him with something he desperately needs—more men for his fight.”

She watched as the wind teased the golden length of his hair. His eyes were upon her, steady and serious. She was aware suddenly of the shape of his features, well combined to create a face with great strength and handsome lines. He was dressed for the ride in linen shirt, boots, and breeches, his ever-present tartan mantle cast over his shoulders. It occurred to her that in a different time and place, he might have been a man she would have admired.

Then she remembered that he was the captor who had made her life a hell of solitude and taken everything that she had loved.

“I will write the letter,” she said, and kneed her horse.

When they returned to Langley, she noted that the drawbridge had remained lowered all that time. As she moved across the bridge and through the entry, she noted the huge vats set over the slatted roof that crossed the parapets at the gate. If invaders were to kill the guard and reach the bridge, the first of their number would die a grisly death; heated oil would be set afire, and cast down upon them.

In the courtyard, she dismounted quickly, ignoring his presence behind her. He didn't follow her. He didn't need to. Jamie had been in the courtyard, discussing his horse with a groom. He finished his conversation, and seemed to wander idly in her wake. When she reached her room, she turned and saw that he had followed her and was leaning against the wall at the landing, watching her.

He waved and smiled.

She liked Jamie. But she didn't respond.

She entered the room and closed the door, and after a moment's sheer frustration, she walked to the desk and began to write to Aidan. She started out slowly, then wrote with greater haste. She loved her younger brother.

Halfway through the letter she paused. He was here to join the king's army. No matter what she said, he could easily fall in battle.

But if he joined with madmen ready to throw themselves against the walls of Langley, it was almost a certainty that he would die.

She dipped her quill into ink again. And wrote with renewed determination.

 

 

Eric kept his maps and correspondence in the room he had chosen, well aware that although the castle seemed to move with a cohesive efficiency, there were surely those who kept silently loyal to the English cause.

He was there, studying the map of Galloway, when a knock sounded at the door. He strode to the door and opened it to find that Allan had returned from his scouting mission.

“Eric, I've much to tell you,” he said.

“Come in, close the door,” Eric said. “I do believe that the halls may sometimes have ears.”

Allan nodded and entered the room. “Edward is ranting, but has not quite managed to leave his sickbed. The Earl of Pembroke is once more on the move. He knows that Bruce is encamped at Galston, where you planned to join him.”

“Aye, we knew another assault was coming.”

“There is more. King Edward remains at Lanercost. In a rage—but he believes that Pembroke will trap Robert Bruce this time, his forces so outweigh the Scots. It seems that he has greeted the news of the marriage of the Lady of Langley with irony. So, although he has put off the proxy marriage, he still intends that it will take place—as ever, assuming he himself is the law. But he is still allowing his clerical advisers time to make that judgment for him, and so satisfy any future question. Word has it that he was completely contemptuous of the claim that a real wedding took place. Any marriage performed in such haste is an illegal show, meant to flout him, and nothing but pretense on paper. And we are nothing but impotent savages, howling in the wind. When he again has the lady in his hands, her words will prove that it is so. Sir Robert Neville will receive the lands and castle of Langley, along with the lady, as soon as he has rid it of the vermin now abiding in it.”

King Edward's reaction was not surprising.

The marriage was nothing but words on paper, easily annulled. Still, for the action to be so dismissed was bruising—along with the scathing remark that they were nothing but impotent savages.

But there were more important issues at hand.

“We leave Peter again in charge of Langley. Jarrett and Angus will remain as well. Any man we've gained and trained ourselves rides with us; we can cut down a traitor in battle, but all of Langley could fall if one man destroys the defenses. The ride will be hard; the town and castle of Ayr are in English hands, and we don't want to be seen riding to join the king at Galston.”

“Aye,” Jamie said. And they continued to trace the route they would take, and what alternate paths they might take were they to run into English scouting parties as they joined the king.

Then Jamie left. Eric sat in front of the fire, studying the flames, and wondering why he was so irritated with King Edward's dismissal of his marriage to the Lady Igrainia. She meant nothing to him. His wife and child rested in the walls of the castle, far below.

But, perhaps, he realized, she did mean something. He enjoyed his verbal encounters with her; she was a challenge. She had not shied away from tending any illness. He had watched her compassion for injured men and seen her loyalty to those who had intended to help her. He had watched the fury of her fight against the cutthroat on the road as well, and known her instinct for survival as well as her courage and hatred.

And there was more, of course. He had taken Langley. They were engaged in a greater war, and he didn't know if he could hold what he had seized or not. But she was part of what he had taken, and therefore, his.

And then there was the matter of Sir Robert Neville.

She had said that she didn't want to be married to any man, but were she in the hands of King Edward, she would be given to Neville, and there would be no choice in the matter. Igrainia would prefer him to Eric, since he was kin to Afton and loyal to Edward.

But Eric loathed Neville, just as he loathed Sir Niles Mason, the Englishman who had rounded up his family and friends and dragged them to Langley to die. The pompous knight who had so easily seized women and children—and fled at the first sign of sickness.

Since Afton of Langley had been dead when he returned to free the prisoners, Neville had surely been giving the orders. The orders that had kept so many of the dead and dying confined in the wretched cells in the castle's dungeon.

His fingers curled over the arms of the carved wooden chair.

He'd die before he allowed Neville to take anything more from him.

Including the woman Neville coveted.

The prize. The beautiful, black-haired witch of a prize.

Now, his . . .

His wife.

The English army was three thousand strong. They were an incredible sight.

From atop Loudon Hill, a cone-shaped upthrust of rock that dominated the countryside, Eric, mounted on Loki, watched with Robert Bruce, James Douglas, and a few of the king's closest supporters, as the army moved.

The army gleamed. The sun touched upon the burnished basinets, mail and plate armor glimmered and glittered. Shields caught bright rays coming from a blue sky, and reflected light from every angle. Banners flew, pennants waved, and the horses were as well arrayed as the men, caparisoned in a multitude of colors, plumes lofty upon their headgear.

They seemed to come in wave after wave.

Bruce's men numbered in the hundreds.

But they knew the terrain, and they knew Loudon Hill. Below it, a highway stretched across a wide strip of high ground. On either side, the highway was flanked by morasses that were treacherous and deep, spans horses could not pass. They had cut trenches, three of them, in parallel lines from the morasses to the road, closing the gap of the space which they would have to defend.

Closer, closer, closer . . .

“So many,” Robert Bruce murmured. “Oddly beautiful, aren't they?”

James Douglas, at his side, spit into the mud. “Aye, like the old man's arse!”

“So many of them,” Bruce murmured quietly. In his mid-thirties, he wasn't just a powerful man, but one who had learned to use his wits, strategy, diplomacy, and raw courage.

“We've need of all the arms and armor they will leave when they fall,” Eric said.

Robert Bruce slowly smiled, casting him a wry glance. “Aye, and so we do. They've the numbers, but we've the battle cry to best them, as we've done before. It is time!” He raised his sword, and let out a cry as he began the descent to the assembled rank. “For Scotland, and for freedom!”

Eric and the others joined him as they raced down the hill, joining the men prepared to meet the first assault. The king called out orders, and each of his commanders shouted to their own body of men.

Then, the English trumpet of the Earl of Pembroke sounded. The English began the attack.

They came on, the first wave of English horsemen, at full speed. Their colors continued to wave brilliantly in the sun. Their armor glinted . . .

They hit the first rank of defenders, men with long poles forming a wall of lethal steel. And before the steel, the first ditch. Some men charged into it and were unhorsed, and those behind them floundered on the fallen. Those who avoided the ditch came racing at reckless speed, and came upon the wall of men and poles and pointed steel. In the first minutes of the attack, the outcome was decided.

Horse crushed horse. Riders and animals screamed alike. The ranks of the English were thrown into death, confusion, disorder, and more death. In the first few minutes, more than a hundred of their number went down. Then the second wave of Englishmen, sent too tightly upon the first, trampled those in their way, but by then, the order to advance had been called and the Scotsmen leaped from their places with their poles, swords, axes, maces, and sticks, rushing the enemy, picking up the weapons of the fallen, and rushing forward with a vengeance.

Eric slashed his way through the men on the ground. He toppled mounted man after mounted man, and they fell into the mire of blood and dirt and humanity that came to litter the ground. The knights who fell were weighed down with the beauty of their glittering armor, as the Scottish foot soldiers set upon them. The confusion was horrible, the numbers remained great, and in the midst of it, there was no room for anything but the knowledge that a man fought and fought, and moved forward, and trusted in his fellows to watch his back as he watched theirs. His sword swung again and again. The sound of steel against steel was shattering.

And then, it was over. The disorder in the English ranks had become too great. They were called to retreat.

Trumpets sounded, banners waved.

Colors still flooded the horizon, and the English armor glittered and glimmered . . .

In its wake.

A roar went up from the men. They pursued the English, and many more fell as they fled. Caught in the tumult of the pursuit, Eric found himself leaping from his horse to come to a highlander fighting kilted and barefoot, a sword in his hands, but no shield to protect him from the blows of his opponent. When a second helmeted and faceless man came up behind him, Eric accosted the enemy, then found himself fighting on both fronts, worthy opponents. He was being assailed with shattering sword slashes, barely meeting one in time to stem the other, and finding little time for an offensive. His chance came when he saw his opponents raise their swords simultaneously. Deftly stepping back, he let the enemy bring their weapons down upon one another.

Even as they fell, he felt a rush of air at his back. He turned in a fury, catching his opponent in the middle, but causing no mortal injury due to the man's heavy mail. His opponent's sword came down heavily, catching his arm, sliding off the mail, but numbing his limb. In desperation he swiftly cast his sword from one hand to the other, and sliced upward, slashing his enemy in the thigh and groin. The man fell. Prepared for another attack, Eric whirled at the sound of a horseman at his back.

It was Robert Bruce. He dismounted quickly, clapping Eric on the shoulder. “It's over, over for today. We've a victory that might swell our ranks anew, and bring more men to the cause of Scotland.”

Around Eric, the fighting had ceased.

A cheer went up from the men. A wild, sweet cheer, it grew loud, and echoed over the hill and the highway and even into the morasses. And words began to form amid the echoes.

“To Scotland!”

“To freedom!”

“To Robert Bruce, king of the sovereign nation of Scotland!”

Bruce returned to his horse, mounting to declare the victory loudly, then to thank each man for his love of Scotland over his life, and bid them gather up their wounded, and tend to them well. “The battle for Scotland,” he reminded them, “has just begun.”

Later that night, with the dead buried, the injured tended, strategy decided, Robert Bruce made a point of speaking to the barons and knights who had joined his forces, and brought men and arms as well.

He had learned from watching William Wallace the value of appreciating every man, and he was, by nature, a compassionate man with an innate charm. After the death of Comyn, he had learned as well the dangers of offending the values of others, and before setting on his crusade to prove himself king, he had done absolution for the act, though it was said he had stabbed Comyn and his companions had been the ones to finish him.

Eric had been consulting with Jamie when Bruce approached him, thanking him and all the men for their part in adding to his ranks, and bringing about the victory. Then he asked Eric to walk with him, and under a canopy of trees he paused and asked him, “Langley remains well in your hands?”

“When I left, all was well.”

“Since the earl's army has been here,” he murmured wryly, “I imagine it remains so.” He hesitated, then added, “My spies tell me, though, that Robert Neville and Niles Mason are gathering troops at Cheffington. And, you know, young Lord Aidan has made his way from England. Now these two men will have a nobleman in their vanguard—they will be able to put out the cry that he has been wronged, that his sister is not your wife but your prisoner, and they will make her a cause to awaken the hearts of my enemies—and those who might be neutral, waiting to see which way the wind will blow, for Scotland and me, or the English king.”

“They would still be fools to attack Langley.”

Robert Bruce nodded. “That is true, which is why I asked you to help goad the English through this marriage. The lady is a rich prize to any Englishman, to any man at that. I know her. Were you aware of that? At least, I have seen her several times. She was often at the English court, since her father was not just a titled man, but one of illustrious deeds in many of Edward's campaigns in France.”

“No, I was not aware that you were acquainted. She hasn't mentioned it.”

The king shrugged. “I imagine I am a vacillating traitor in her eyes, and we did not speak more than courtesies, ever, but . . . though Edward has stubbornly refused to exchange the lady, I'm certain that he will support a plan to get her back. He is studying the legalities of her marriage while denying that there can be any. I'm certain that he is plotting for her return. I used to see him watch her. He had an eye for such a beauty, and I could always see him estimating just what such a prize was worth. He bought the loyalty of Langley when he blessed her marriage to Afton, which, of course, had been arranged for years.” His tone suddenly changed. “Don't let him get her back. My God, the man imprisons my child! You cannot imagine the service you have done me by this small piece of vengeance. I know that it meant little to you, with Margot . . . gone. Yet I am grateful.”

“There was a certain sense of vengeance to my agreement, my lord,” Eric assured the king. “I have my reasons to despise those who want her.”

“Do whatever you must do,” Robert continued, his voice growing harsh and tight again. “In my name. And for Scotland.” The king hesitated, his teeth grating. “Edward thinks that he can make a marriage I have sanctioned null and void! That he can crush me as he crushes every man who vowed to free Scotland from his tyranny. He must not get her back. If he is ever able to seize her, there must be a way that he is prevented from using her in his plays for power, his alliances, his rewards for those who serve him. The bishops have written to Rome, but in the meantime . . .” He paused again. Then he smiled. “If there is a God in Heaven, and He loves us at all . . . she will have a child. That would definitely damp the value of the prize when Edward plays his dynastic games of marriage, riches, and barter. He will be forced to recognize Scottish authority. He will be defied at every turn. For the honor of Scotland.”

Robert Bruce placed a hand on Eric's shoulder, then walked on into the night.

A cool breeze whispered over his head.

God, how he had loved his wife. How Margot's unwavering, undemanding love for him had suffused his soul through time until she had been a part of him.

He was human. And battle camps were always attended by women.

But the king had just given him more of an order than a suggestion . . . to do something he had probably been tempted to do from the moment he had first watched Igrainia at the stream.

She had her own grief, and that he had understood as well. And just as well, the anguish they had witnessed with one another had made him hate her at times . . . as much as he had been enticed by innate physical urges, like the need to draw breath, drink water.

A breeze touched him again, and he laughed out loud, a hollow sound in the darkness.

She was, after all, his wife now.

And therein lay the tempest in his soul.

His wife. Beautiful, dark-haired witch, a prize, a pawn. And as tempting as a siren.

Another battle to be waged . . . with her. With himself.

Again he laughed. Another battle . . .

For the honor of Scotland.

 

 

Igrainia stood upon the parapets, looking over the field. Word had come that there had been a battle. That the lesser Scots had routed the great army of the Earl of Pembroke. Edward was spitting with fury, raging that he was the only man who could lead his army to victory.

She had found a certain freedom—within the walls of Langley. And she had realized that, with careful planning, she could escape.

But she wasn't certain that she wanted to do so. There was danger in escape. Here, at Langley, the “outlaws” were courteous and respectful. Eric was gone. She had written the letter he had “suggested,” and his men had apparently been left with word that she was to have the run of the castle—with a guard in tow at all times, she was certain, but in the past few days it seemed that they had grown lax. There might be many opportunities for escape. Merchants had begun to arrive here with their wares, with carts that rambled back through the gates before dusk. Farmers, milkmaids, servants, others, all came and went.

There was a way.

Jennie urged her on daily.

Rowenna pointed out the courtesies she received, and how she was loved by the people when she walked through the courtyard, how they looked for a word from her, smiled when she smiled, came running to do her slightest bidding.

She had come to love Langley.

But she would have escaped . . . to be free. Except that there really was no escape, because to leave here, she would have to seek help eventually from the English. And go to the king. And he had determined that she would be married to Robert Neville, and . . .

He had been Afton's kin. But it disturbed her that he was so desperate for Langley, so desperate for a quick marriage. He was not like Afton. Afton had loved books and learning, and the art of reason. In all the arguments regarding the prisoners, Robert had been irate, indifferent to the fate of the women and children, as determined as Sir Niles Mason that the men be executed. Most men would have accepted the king's decree that all such traitors should perish, but something about the way Robert Neville seemed to
relish
the judgment disturbed her. Just as his eagerness to claim what had been his kinsman's holding. And wife. Especially since her revenues in England were so great.

She didn't
dislike
Robert Neville. But it had made her uneasy, the way he would touch her at times, a hand on her shoulder, too fervent a kiss in greeting, a chance brush as they passed in the hall. She had never mentioned it to Afton. And at the time of all the illness and death at the castle, she had not thought of anything but the darkness and the pain.