Child of the Phoenix (149 page)

Isobel subsided on to her heels. The fire in her eyes had died. Then she looked up again. ‘Who do you believe should be King of Scots, grandmama?’

Eleyne sat back. ‘I must confess I favour the Bruces’ claim. Both John Balliol and Robert are descended from the royal house of Canmore through my first husband’s sisters, but Isabel Bruce, my friend, was John’s mother’s younger sister. Dervorguilla, John Balliol’s mother, as daughter of the elder sister, inherited Fotheringhay forty years ago when I forfeited my dower lands, and I believe the lawyers were probably right that Balliol has the senior claim.’ She raised her hand to fend off the storm of protest she could see building in Isobel’s eyes. ‘But I also believe that Robert is a leader of men. John Balliol, with the best will in the world, is not.’

She paused thoughtfully. Isobel had blushed scarlet. Seeing her great-grandmother had noticed, the girl buried her face in her arms on Eleyne’s knee. Eleyne put her hand on Isobel’s head. ‘So, that’s it,’ she said. ‘Oh, Isobel, my dear.’

Wordlessly Isobel shook her head without looking up.

‘Does he know?’ But even as she said the words Eleyne remembered her conversation with Robert the night after Marjorie was born.
She is trouble. Trouble for everyone near her. It’s when I’m
near her
…

Eleyne swallowed the wave of grief that it should be this child, this beloved great-grand-daughter, who had caused her own daughter so much unhappiness in the last weeks of her life.

As though sensing what her great-grandmother was thinking, Isobel looked up. ‘I know he was married to Isabella, but I loved him first!’ she cried in anguish. ‘I have loved him since I was four years old! By rights he is mine!’

‘My dear, you have a husband, Robert can never be yours.’ Eleyne kept her voice steady. ‘You should not even think about him.’

‘You had a husband when you were King Alexander’s mistress!’ Isobel cried rebelliously. ‘You just admitted it. And the whole country knew about your affair!’

‘I suppose Lady Buchan told you that,’ Eleyne said drily. Elizabeth de Quincy was the daughter of Roger, the Constable of Scotland, and thus her dead husband Robert’s niece.

‘So, you should understand how I feel.’ Isobel’s voice was passionate. ‘I thought you would understand.’ She sounded cheated.

‘I do understand.’ Eleyne cupped the girl’s stormy face between her hands. ‘Believe me, I understand. I also understand that John of Buchan is a very different man from Robert de Quincy! Be careful, my darling. Be very, very careful.’

There was a thoughtful silence, then Isobel looked up again. ‘Grandmama, don’t you see?’ Her eyes again blazed with excite ment. ‘It is I who am going to fulfil your destiny! My father told mama a long time ago – he didn’t know I was listening – that it was foretold that one of your children would be a queen. It’s me! It has to be me. John will die and I will marry Robert! Don’t you see?’ She knelt up, her forearms on Eleyne’s knees. ‘I am to fulfil the prophecy of your Welsh bard! All we have to do now is help Robert become king!’

‘Isobel – ’

‘I know it’s true, great-grandmama! I know it, I feel it here.’ She hugged her chest dramatically. ‘Please, you must understand, you’re the only one who can.’

Eleyne sighed. And so that foolish story went on, from generation to generation.

‘Great-grandmama?’ Isobel was looking up at her, pleading.

Eleyne smiled. ‘I shall certainly do all I can to help Robert become king one day,’ she said. ‘John Balliol is not the man to rule this country.’

XIII
March 1298

Duncan rode the horse on a loose rein, deep in thought. The snows were melting fast, the air was full of the clean wet cold smell of the newly released waters which cascaded down the hills.

They had killed a wild boar and he had left his men to load the carcass on to the garron and bring it home. There would be fresh meat at the high table when his mother returned to Kildrummy.

Christiana was waiting for him there with Ruairi. He should be content. Why then did he feel so strange? He reined in, his hand pressed to his chest. He could feel his heart thumping as though he had been involved in some violent wrestling match. His breath was constricted, labouring. Sweat had broken out on his brow; something was wrong.

Sandy is in trouble
… The conviction came to him suddenly. It was like that: if either of them were ill or hurt, the other would know immediately, however great the distance between them. And this time the distance was very great. Sandy was still Edward’s prisoner.

Duncan turned in his saddle, looking down the strath towards the south, as though he could see through the hills and forests and the high stone walls which separated his brother from himself. His eyes were, shamefully, full of unmanly tears.

XIII
KILDRUMMY

Eleyne was scrambling over the rocks in the marshy bed of the burn at the foot of the small waterfall. Her fingers were bleeding, her gown soaked and cold, dragging around her legs. She was crying.

‘Mama? Mama, please don’t.’ Duncan had found her there, and he leaped down the steep sides of the den, putting his arms around her. His own eyes were red with weeping. ‘What are you doing? Come back before you freeze to death.’

‘I’m looking for something I lost.’ Shaking with cold, she clung to him. ‘Something Sandy’s father gave me long ago.’

Sandy’s father. As she said the words she began to sob. Sandy’s father. Not your father. Duncan frowned as his arms tightened around her thin shoulders. ‘We’ll find it,’ he said gently, ‘whatever it is, we’ll find it, but you must come in now. It won’t help anyone if you get a congestion in the lungs.’ Carefully he helped her up the steep slope, half carrying her, conscious for the first time of how light she had become. He broke off an ashplant for her to lean on, and guided her feet on to the precipitous path. Below them the sun reflected on the water in the deep ravine, glittering like a thousand precious gems.

The letter from London had merely stated that Alexander of Mar had died of a sudden fever. His body had been interred in the precincts of the rebuilt church of St Peter ad Vincula within the great curtain wall of the Tower. The king had asked for his condolences to be conveyed to the Mars. That was all: a few lines of black, crabbed, clerical script on a regulation sheet of parchment from the king’s chancery.

‘What is it, mama? What did you lose down there?’ His arm around her shoulders, Duncan drew his mother down to sit on a tree stump to rest. Her breath was coming in painful gasps and her face was alarmingly white.

‘My phoenix.’ She smiled wanly. ‘A pendant. It was so beautiful, so precious …’

‘How did it get in the back den?’

‘I threw it there.’ She straightened her shoulders. ‘One day I’ll tell you the story, Duncan. One day I’ll tell all of you. But not yet.’ She sighed. ‘There’s no point in looking for it; if it wishes to return, it will. It always has in the past.’ She gave a faint smile. ‘Give me your hand. Let’s go back indoors.’ She rose stiffly, leaning on the ashplant. She stared at it for a moment, then she gave a light, astonished laugh. ‘And have someone cut me a proper walking stick. I give in, I need one at last.’ Her voice was still young and vibrant, even in her unhappiness. She reached up to kiss him. ‘Don’t grieve too much for your brother, Duncan. He’s still there, and he still loves us. We’ll all be together again one day.’

She walked ahead of him up the path. In spite of the bright, cold sunlight, the shadows were gathering over Scotland. She shivered. There would be more deaths before the year was out; she had seen them in the flames.

XIV
FALKIRK
22 July 1298

Macduff eased himself deeper into his saddle. His mail felt heavy on his shoulders; his sword dragged at the baldric across his shoulder. It was hot and muggy, the sun hidden behind a bronzed pall of cloud. It was the Feast of St Mary Magdalene and the whole army had heard mass at first light.

Macduff frowned. The vast English host was massed beyond the hill, in the direction of Linlithgow. He had been forward in the white mist of the pre-dawn two days before to peer through the trees towards the Burgh Muir where Edward had bivouacked, and he had felt his stomach clench with fear at the sight of the army camp there with its seemingly invincible cavalry – a cavalry feared throughout Europe for its massive strength. Even the Scots commander, Wallace, was afraid of that cavalry; it had proved itself again and again. He frowned. Well, they were as ready as they would ever be. The English might be superior in weight and numbers, but this time the Scots were ready.

Edward had returned from Flanders in March. Making it clear that the subjection of Scotland was now his top priority, he had made York his headquarters rather than London, and had summoned the host so that by the first of July he was ready for the advance into Scotland. The time for retribution was at hand.

Wallace had formed up his spearmen on the south-eastern side of the hill. They were grouped into tightly packed divisions, each massed behind a barrier of sharpened stakes and flanked by archers, with the Scots cavalry behind them in a solid mass. Macduff was proud of the men of Fife, with his own two sons at their head immediately behind him. They were smart and well trained and eager for battle. Somewhere beyond them, up the line, were the men of Buchan and Mar. Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, was there too, swallowing his pride to fight in the name of Balliol in this crucial confrontation. But not all the Scots nobles were there. It would be to their eternal shame that they were not behind Wallace today, keeping aloof because they did not wish to follow a mere knight, however well proven he was as a soldier in the field.

Macduff edged his warhorse forward a few steps, feeling its excitement as it plunged against the bit. Below them, beyond the spearmen and the archers, a broad shallow loch separated the two armies; he could see the first oblique rays of sunlight shining on the helmets and spears of the enemy and reflecting on the green water, every reed throwing a long black shadow horizontally before it. If only their spearmen could stand firm when the attack came, as it would come – soon. The men below were tensing, the English army closing formation. His mouth had gone dry. His gauntleted fist opened and closed on the hilt of his sword.

Wallace had addressed the army earlier: ‘Remember. Go for their horses,’ he had shouted to the assembled forces. ‘Without their horses, they are nothing.’ Then he had raised his arms, grinning at the spearmen, the men of Scotland who had come to fight for Scotland’s liberty. ‘I’ve brought you to the ring, my friends,’ he yelled with all the power in his lungs, as he gestured at the tight formation of the schiltrons, so like the formation of the popular dance. ‘Now, hop circles round them if you can!’ and the men had answered with a great roar of acclaim.

‘They’re coming, father.’ The voice on his right, tight with excitement, brought him back to the present with a jerk. He could see the two outer wings of the English cavalry wheeling towards them; dust rose in clouds and he heard the thunder of thousands of hooves.

‘Sweet Blessed Christ!’ He heard the awestruck, terrified cry somewhere to his left. ‘Oh, Sweet Jesus, we can’t fight that!’

‘Fight! Fight! Follow Macduff!’ Macduff hefted his shield more securely on to his arm and drawing his sword from his scabbard he raised it above his head with a flourish, then he drove his vicious, rowelled spurs into his horse’s sides. It leaped forward and charged straight down the hill. The men of Fife followed without hesitation, but beyond them men were faltering. The knight who had called out reined in his horse, fighting it as it tried to plunge after the others, then he swung it away towards the north. ‘It’s no good,’ he yelled. ‘It will be a massacre! Save yourselves!’

Macduff did not see the greater part of the Scots cavalry turn and flee. The bloodlust was on him, the glow of red already in his eyes. The weight of his sword carried it lethally back and forth on either side. He felt it hit bone and heard a scream of agony, but he did not know if it was horse or man. The air was thick with dust; behind his helmet he could see little now. Sweat coursed down his face and into his eyes. He was no longer thinking, no longer aware of his surroundings beyond the great swinging arc of his sword blade. Once he heard his eldest son, Jamie, shout, ‘A Macduff! A Macduff!’ and he grinned wildly, echoing the cry as he hacked on through the surrounding enemy.