Queen Hereafter (8 page)

Malcolm puzzled her. Sometimes he and his men would sit in the hall in grim, dark moods, guzzling ale or gambling; then Margaret sensed that war deeds and secrets lay heavy upon their shoulders and souls. Other times, when she met Malcolm in the bailey or the tower, he seemed no brute, just a big, clumsy man who lumbered past her, blushing like a boy.

Good day, lady
, he would say; or
Greetings, lady—the weather is cold today
. The scents of smoke fire, metal, and horse clung to him, along with hints of sweat and unwashed clothing. His gruff manner and masculine scents seemed compelling and oddly safe, somehow, reminding her of her father, who had been a warrior general under the king of Hungary and would have been a strong monarch for England had fate treated him more kindly.

Sometimes Margaret would stare after Malcolm and feel a longing, a sort of loneliness, stir within. He fascinated her in some ways—blunt and powerful, her clear opposite—then she would dismiss her idle thoughts and move on.

Her kinswomen judged him a dull-witted savage lacking refinement and princely bearing. He had been well educated, but his casual attention to intellectual matters did not show the training of a true prince, Margaret thought, compared to princes of the Hungarian and English courts. As for spiritual matters, Malcolm’s fortress had no decent chapel, and neither did the king go often to the church on the hill.

Yet he was widely praised as shrewd, powerful, brave, and even reckless, and the Saxon lords admired his persistence and purpose. Though he did not behave like a prince of state, though he was provincial and unsophisticated, he was a clever, ambitious ruler. Margaret found him intriguing, though she would not have admitted it.

But her mother and sister, and Kata, too, complained often about Scotland and spoke of leaving. They pressured Margaret, as the eldest, to talk to Edgar, who could influence Malcolm to let them go. Crossing the bailey with her brother one day, Margaret suggested that Edgar arrange a ship to take her kinswomen away from Scotland.

“It is their fervent wish,” she said. “They would prefer to sail to Denmark and then return to Hungary.”

“And you?”

“I would be content to travel by land back to Romsey Abbey. At any rate, your kinswomen would be safer in religious houses, away from war and raiding. Mama cannot bear it here.”

“I am fostering a rebellion with King Malcolm’s support, and so my family will accept his hospitality for as long as he will offer it. And at whatever price,” Edgar said.

“Choose rebellion and Scottish protection if you will, but let us leave, and soon.”

“We will stay,” he answered firmly. “Our only safe haven is here.”

EARLY, AFTER PRAYERS
in her chamber, Margaret ventured out into the clear, crisp air with Finola. The girl, perhaps thirteen, could barely manage English, but she made herself clear enough and was an
eager guide. She led Margaret outside into the wide, enclosed yard to visit the kitchen buildings, where one servant turned cakes on a griddle and another stirred steaming porridge in an iron cauldron and tended to sizzling bacon slabs. The cook gave each girl some porridge in pottery bowls, and Margaret tasted it, not used to much food in the mornings. At Romsey, they had shared dark bread and watery beer after dawn prayers, and at the English court, thin slices of fine white bread and some fruit might be taken. Now she ate the hot, salty porridge with a near sense of guilt, for Lady Agatha always said that showing a good appetite was coarse.

Finola led her to the outer gates, and Margaret was astonished when the guards let the girls leave the bailey, turning away without offering an escort. She held her skirts up, for the hems of her green silk gown and linen chemise, and her yellow silk shoes were mucky from the yard. But she was glad of unexpected freedom after more than a fortnight in the Scottish stronghold, and hastened after Finola, who pointed toward the little glen below the castle mound.

“You are wanting to pray today, lady?” Finola asked.

“In the little church across the glen? Oh, aye!” Margaret had noticed the chapel on the hillside opposite the royal tower. She followed Finola through a wooded glen with quiet paths and waterfalls, and as they walked along the track, she heard barking. Turning, she saw two long-legged dogs, as big as ponies, running after them, tails wagging.

“Dogs of the king,” Finola said in halting English, patting the animals, then walking onward.

The plain little church, fieldstone with a timber roof, had an oaken door carved with intertwining vines. She stepped into the cool interior and sighed at the palpable peace, as if the prayers of generations saturated the very air.

The altar was a large block of stone beneath a white cloth, and a wooden cross decorated with spirals hung on the wall behind it. Kneeling to pray, Margaret bowed her head, and Finola did the same. The dogs settled for a nap beside them, apparently used to being allowed inside.

Hearing footsteps, Margaret turned to see a man in the doorway who wore a belted, hooded white tunic. His head was balding in front, his dark hair long behind, and a wooden cross on a string hung from his rope belt. Margaret stood quickly, as did Finola, while the dogs whumped their tails on the floor as if recognizing a friend.

He nodded to Margaret and spoke to Finola in rapid Gaelic. “Ah, Lady Margaret! Welcome,” he then said in English. “I am grateful that you and your family were spared from the sea. I am Brother Micheil. I oversee this parish.” He bobbed his head and she saw that the front of his scalp was shaved from ear to ear above the forehead.

“Brother, may I ask to which order you belong? I am familiar with the Benedictines.”

“I am a monk of the Céli Dé, but most call us the Culdees.”

“Ah. I have heard of them but know little about their ways.”

“We are of the Celtic church, which was founded in Ireland long ago and celebrated in Scotland as well.”

Margaret concealed her surprise. She had learned from the Benedictine priests that Irish monks were radical sorts who mixed pagan practices with religious rites. “I did not expect to find Culdees in the royal seat of Scotland,” she said.

“We are all children of God. Heartfelt prayers always reach heaven.”

“Indeed,” she said. “Brother, do your parishioners understand Latin?” She thought of Finola.

“Most do not, lady,” he admitted. “Parishes in Scotland are widespread—we cannot teach the people so easily here.”

“Rome only approves prayers spoken in Latin. Do you not worry about the souls of your parishioners?”

“The blessed Columba taught prayers in Gaelic to his flock centuries ago. Was he wrong?” He spoke it like a challenge.

“I know of Columba from a manuscript in the king’s library at Winchester, copied from a work of Adomnán of Ireland,” she explained. “I am also aware that Rome has tried over time to help the Irish and Scottish church understand its proper laws.”

“We are content with our own,” Micheil said, smiling. “While you are here, you may like to learn more about Scotland. We have many holy places here that may comfort your doubts, lady, including an important pilgrimage route. I would be happy to escort you or arrange visits to some of our holy sites. How long will you stay?”

“I am not certain.” She wondered herself. Thanking him for his offer, she departed with Finola to walk back through the forested glen. The dogs rushed ahead, loping up the hillside toward the tower.

Pausing beside the stream to admire a cascade of small waterfalls, Margaret sat upon a large boulder to rest, taking in the rare and lovely peacefulness of that place. Birdsong and rushing water, the scent of pine, the cool mist and translucent, filtering sunlight—the little glen was perhaps the most beautiful place she had ever seen, except that it was in Scotland, where she did not want to be.

A
sweet blur of memory: I a small girl, watching my mother weaving at her loom while she sang to the shuttle’s rhythm. Her dark hair flowed like a raven’s wing, and she smiled when I sang with her. In the evenings, she would play her harp for the company gathered in her father’s hall. Her clear voice and her music fascinated me. From early days, I wanted to become a harper, and fate and heaven arranged that for me—along with other matters more surprising.

I still have my mother’s harp, all carved wood and metal strings, and I have two more of my own, often played. But the wood and strings of my mother’s harp retain her gentleness and emanate her songs, and touching them brings back to me the memories of my childhood.

My mother was named Leven for the loch near her birthplace, where she met my father when he visited Fife. I knew he was royal, and I met
him for the first time just before his death. Because of her, my first eight years were spent in Fife; because of him, the rest in Moray. I loved both places dearly.

Macduff, the mormaer of Fife, was a traitorous brute to some, but to me an indulgent grandfather. I was born at Abernethy fortress, his keep, where my young and unmarried mother kept my father’s name a secret from her father as long as she could; by the time he got the truth from her, he already loved me, and agreed to my protection and education due to my royal blood. When I was little, a priest tutored me in Latin and Gaelic, mathematics and theology. From a Saxon maid in our household I learned capable English, and in thanks, my grandfather gave her a plot of land and a husband.

Leven taught me to embroider, spin, and weave—though the latter was the work of common women, my mother loved its rhythms and results—and she taught me the melodies of loom and spindle, of smooring the hearth and rocking the cradle. I inherited her slight form and her shining black hair, along with her clear voice and love of music. She said I had my father’s eyes and smile and, she said, the boldness of a kinswoman I did not know. My grandfather said it was a relief that I combined the best of them; the worst of them was not explained.

My mother died of fever when I was seven, and my grandfather passed of the same soon after. His brother Kenneth became mormaer in the region next, and kept me in his Fife household for a while, wondering what to do with me. There I met my father at last—a fair and slender young man whose guard carried the banner of the king: himself. Startled to learn that, I only believed it once I saw his eyes, a changeable blue like mine, and his dimpled smile, my own.

“I am told you sing well, Eva,” the somber young king said when we met.

“I do.” Eight years old, I was truthful by nature.

“Will you sing for me?”

I did, standing before him at my uncle’s table. King Lulach wept a little and kissed me, and when he departed next day, he left gold
coins for my care, along with a ring of silver and crystal for me, and a promise to bring me north to live with him and our Moray kin at his court at Elgin. I was eager, for I would be a princess and would have a family—a father, a stepmother, two half siblings, a grandmother, and cousins—and a home where I truly belonged.

Shortly after his visit to us in Fife, Lulach was killed. We heard this was by done by order of King Malcolm, who ruled in southern Scotland after defeating Macbeth; war had split Scotland, and Lulach held the northern region of Moray and other northern regions that did not support Malcolm. Having scarcely met my father, I now mourned him—the idea of him, I suppose, rather than a father I had known. Shortly after, my Fife uncle told me that the south was no good place for me; I was too young, he said, to know how dangerous it was to be daughter to a dead king. Then he sent me by escort to live with my northern kinfolk.

Lady Gruadh, my Moray grandmother, was a tall, cheekboned beauty, youthful still despite years and strife. Her hair gleamed pale copper, and her eyes were silver-blue. She had been a warrior-queen beside Macbeth, and she had elegance and strength; she had the loyalty of the northerners, too. I was in awe of her—she was vibrant and fierce in her devotion to kin and land.

Gruadh acted as regent for my half brother, Nechtan, who trained at swords but preferred books and studying with priests. My half sister, Ailsa, went to live with cousins to be educated and readied for a good match one day. Quiet Nechtan stayed in Moray as its nominal mormaer; traditionally the leaders of that rich and vast province were like kings in the north. I learned quickly that the high kings of Scotland always tread carefully where Moray is concerned.

Now it is years later and I am grown, and Gruadh is still regarded as a rebel by King Malcolm. He sends occasional messages to cajole or threaten her to behave. She is hospitable to his messengers, and delights in crafting rude replies to the king, despite the pleas of her council.

With her gift of
Da Shelladh
—“the two sights,” or The Sight—my
grandmother can gaze into flames or water’s sheen and see what is unknown and what will come. She warned her Moray council that King Malcolm will bring even more change to Scotland in future, and told them to beware. Though I lack her knowledge of magic, I learned boldness as well as charm from her. Recognizing my interest in music, she arranged for me to be trained by a bard who had once served Macbeth. For that in particular, I am endless grateful.

And so I was schooled in the songs and tales of the Irish and Scottish bardic traditions, learning them by old methods and diligence. A bard must know a thousand songs, melodies, and tales—one for each day of the year, and more than that to fill rainy afternoons and winter evenings. Someday I might attain the mastery of a
filidh
, a poet-bard, though that needs twelve years of study. Or I could declare myself a harper and court singer, a status I have attained already.

Bard-craft is my joy and calling, and I hunger to know more of that as well as of the greater world. My grandmother would like to keep me in Moray, close and safe, where I have a right as bard and princess to a seat on that council. But life has more for me somewhere. I feel it so.