Shake Loose the Border

by Robert Low

  The man nearest Clem gave a grunt and lolled sideways like a half-full bag of grain; the horse, annoyed by the imbalance, took two steps sideways to correct it and the man toppled off into the stream; the men nearest to him laughed.

  Then another man gave a yelp and clutched his leg, a horse shrieked and Clem saw the fletchings of a big war arrow sticking from its neck; it collapsed on the muddy bank, kicking out more chaos. When the night was cracked open with the noise and flare of a caliver, he knew what was happening.

  The dark erupted with bodies, most of them dismounted and screaming ‘Never forget.’ Clem heard the great bull bellow of Tam Forster, shouting ‘Tarset and Tyne – to me’ and he knew the Forsters were turning and running, knew that it was all rotted. He saw all his plans, all his dreams whirl off into the dark like wisps from a carding of wool.

  He wrenched round the head of the hobby and beat a path through the frantic throng of his own panicked men, using the butt of the whip.

  Up behind the trees, Batty heard the shouts and the shots, saw Fergus take the bridle of a horse nestled up to his own and yell out: ‘Follow me, bonnie lads. Never forget.’

  Then they were off and it wasn’t until Fiskie, jostled and bumped to stumbling, caught the rear haunch of the horse Fergus was leading that he realised who as on it. The thump made the figure cry out and jerk, so that the hood fell back as she turned, angry and anguished.

  Eliza Graham.

  Chapter Eleven

  Blackscargil tower

  They rode, watching the moon get dressed and undressed by clouds. A fox squealed amorously and then, suddenly, they were circling some dark, dank ruins, hauling to a halt and looking down on the garth and the tower. The garth was surrounded by a tall timber stockade with walkways – there’s where all the local timber went, bar one copse, Batty thought.

  It was studded with buildings and, off to one side was the tall bulk of the tower itself, like the hunch on a twisted man’s back; there was pale light spilling from the upper shutters. The garth walkways blazed with torchlight, flaring and flattening in the wind. They are on alert, Batty thought, and Fergus growled it out, tense and terse.

  ‘They will see us, soon as we move. Sim, Buggerback, Richie fetch the ropes and climbing irons. Batty – get your wee baubles unfettered. When we go down, they will start a hullabaloo and shooting. We will gie back what we get, but the only way in is through yonder timber gate and that’s your job, Master Coalhouse. If ye can do as ye boast.’

  ‘Aye, aye,’ Batty answered, less mild than he would have wished. ‘Tell ye what, Fergus – I will keep yon wummin company here and you run down to the gate with a flask of black powder and a slow match.’

  He felt the Frasers at his back, all wanting to know the one thing. Batty knew why she was there, but he asked just for the Frasers.

  ‘She is to be put back like a dove in the nest,’ Fergus said flatly. Then he raised his sword above his head and bellowed: ‘Never forget’ so hard it rang Batty’s ears.

  ‘Watch out for Will Elliot,’ Batty shouted as the Grahams shrieked out of cover and spilled down, sliding horses almost to their haunches and then, as they neared the stockade, hurling themselves off and shooting bows and latchbows and the few calivers they had.

  ‘He’ll no’ be in the garth,’ John Dubh offered as they slithered towards the stockade. ‘He’ll be in yon accursed tower – Christ’s blood, look you. You can see the cage where Malcom still dangles.’

  ‘Are you well enough for this?’ demanded Ewan Fraser and Batty scowled back at him. ‘Your humours do not look good.’

  ‘Physicker now are you? I have been slathered in the blood of Christ and drunk from the Grail,’ Batty said, which was true enough if you believed. He had a momentary glimpse of a lined, seamed comfort of a face and hoped Sister Faith and her charges had found peace.

  Ewan did not understand, but he nodded, reassured by Batty’s vehemence. The Frasers formed a huddle round Batty and they went down to the timber gate and war.

  It was a chaos of shouts and flying bolts, the odd arrow and the even more rare pistol or caliver blast, splitting the rising dawn with a brief, bright sun. Mostly, the defenders waved blades and shouted at the attackers who were waving blades and shouting back at them.

  A shape lurched towards Batty and he hauled out the axe-butt dagg, knowing it was empty save for the priming – but the man was Jamie Graham, panting out demands from Fergus while things hissed and spat in the dark.

  ‘Ye are to blow the door, soon as ye like. Sooner, Fergus says.’

  ‘Imagine,’ Batty said, aiming for blithe calm and falling far short; it seemed to impress the Frasers, all the same, who grinned feral fangs at him. ‘I had not considered that at all – run back and tell Fergus to get ready.’

  He moved to the foot of the gate and felt himself struck on the back by something heavy enough to make him gasp at the blow and the fire it flared on his old wounds. He fell flat, felt a hand under his good armpit and was hauled up into the bright, mad grin of Red Colin.

  ‘Aye to the fore,’ he said, then indicated the lump of stone nearby. ‘They are chucking stanes at us, Batty. I wid hurry.’

  Batty got to the lee of the door, started to dig out the dirt at the foot of the double gate, where the slight gap showed the join. He saw a barrel poke through – someone with a caliver thinks I am trying to raise the bar. He stood up and stamped on the affair, heard the shriek as the butt slammed up into someone.

  Then he unfettered the first of the black flasks from his waist and stuffed it in the hole he had made, scraping the dirt back over it, all save for the portion with the dangling fusse. Someone yelled from up above him and he risked a look to see a figure half-bent over the walkway, trying to get a decent aim with a latchbow.

  Red Colin cursed. Big Tam picked up the stone thrown at Batty and hurled it up two-handed, so that it bounced on the sharpened point of one of the timbers, flew up close enough to make the man with the latchbow rear and lose his balance. He gave a short, pungent curse as he toppled over the parapet and fell with a sickening wet thud into the clotted earth near where Batty crouched; the stone hovered in the air for a moment, then arced back down and struck Big Tam between neck and shoulder, a sickening crack that let Batty know something had broken.

  The man who had fallen moved and moaned, so Batty found Brother Curve from his family of daggers and slit his throat with it. Then he stuffed it back in its sheath, hauled out the axe-butt dagg, pressed the trigger and watched the wheel spark and flare on his slow match. He blew it to a soft sputter of orange embers and started to scuttle away, round to the left, to the lee of the other timbers.

  He saw Red Colin hauling Big Tam by the shoulders, but he was a dead weight and Colin wasn’t strong enough. He struggled, inch by inch, a man’s length from the middle of the gate.

  ‘Leave him,’ Batty urged, seeing the horror that would unfold. ‘Get tae cover man…’

  ‘Almost there,’ Colin gasped and Batty should have gone to him, should have helped, but the slow match itch was all over him and he knew there was no time.

  ‘Drop him and run…’ he bawled.

  He knew Colin would never run, not ever – not again. The flask blew with a harsh, coughing roar. Blew the doors wide open, blew a slew of sharp metal inward – and some back out, despite Batty’s attempts to minimise that with the covering of dirt.

  Red Colin seemed to jerk, rise up like he wanted to fly. He gave a long shriek and fell on Big Tam; the next moment they disappeared from view amid a storm of bodies, all stamping and shrieking their way into the garth.

  Ewan and John Dubh elbowed into them, then stood like a breakwater on the tide, two big men with scowls and big swords; the Grahams slid right and left of them, then suddenly were gone.

  Batty got to the fallen pair, but it was clear both were dead – Red Colin had part of an old door hinge in one cheek, something else buried in his chest and a peppering of nails and worse all over his back where he
had tried to shield Big Tam.

  Tam looked untouched, until you saw how his head was cocked at a strange angle; the stone which had rebounded on him and cracked his neck and his life, so he was already dead when Colin had started dragging him to safety. There was something witchy and strange about it all – a man killed by his own thrown stone and another killed while saving a dead man? God and the De’il, Batty thought morosely, who rule the world turn and turn about and nobody notices the difference.

  Ewan and John Dubh stared and said nothing. Neither did Batty – what could you say? What could you do? There were other ragdoll shapes lying around, all of them Grahams felled while waiting for Batty to let them through the timber gate. Beware of war and witches Batty had been told more than once; it was all too late for that now.

  ‘Will you wait with them?’ Ewan asked John Dubh. ‘Make sure anything of value remains with us. When this is done with, we will kist them up along with Malcolm.’

  John Dubh nodded. Ewan looked at Batty. ‘There is one more door to blow open.’

  They went into the garth, stepping over the litter of splintered wood and another body torn to shreds by Batty’s metal; the wee man wi’ the caliver, Batty thought, who shoved it through the door gap and tried to shoot me. His ma would not know him now.

  The garth, studded with buildings, shadows in the rising dawn, boiled with people and shouts and one of the loudest came from a big man, helmet off so folk could see and hear him better; he had black hair like crow wings.

  ‘Buggerback, ya moudiewart bastard – drag that smoulder out of the thatch afore it catches. This is Graham land now – do not burn, rape or loot anything or you will find yer neck in a cinch. And spread the word lads – the heidman wants nae black flag here. Nae black flag – d’ye hear? Round up The Scar’s people and guard them – but nae deaths.’

  Fergus appeared, still mounted and dragging the bridle of Eliza’s hobby. He grinned down at Batty and nodded admiringly to the red-head.

  ‘By God Pate’s Davey is fine, though is he not? What d’ye think Eliza?’

  Batty thought she looked scared witless, but she sat, pale as winter and said nothing while Fergus snarled in what he thought was winsome at her.

  ‘Consider him well,’ Fergus said, ‘for this will be your new man when the smoke has cleared from here.’

  He leaned forward so that Batty could barely hear the next. ‘If he catches as much as the snotters, or falls off a low stool, ye will find Dickon less accommodating to your tale of it.’

  He glanced down and seemed surprised to see Batty and Ewan there. ‘Get on, Master Coalhouse. We need the tower as well.’

  When Batty and Ewan crouch-walked, looking warily around, they could hear shouts and shots, but just from around the tower – the rest of Blackscargil was cowed.

  To the left, Batty saw shapes darting back and forth, aiming big warbows and latchbows to keep the defenders on the roof from firing. There was at least one caliver up there and the men on the ground would not stand still to be shot.

  They had to provide cover for the hookmen, who had three-pronged grappin tied to long ropes; the whirling of them sounded like some huge unseen bird flying hard through the night on a hunt.

  It was a long throw and most of the attempts clattered off and fell back, the throwers dodging backwards because they could not see in the poor light. One or two of the hooks had lodged and the arrows and bolts from below were to stop the defenders leaning out and cutting the rope free. Still, Batty thought, I widna be daft enough to skin up that even if I had two arms.

  Instead, while Ewan put his head on a swivel and his big two-hander on guard, Batty knelt by the door. He knew, from the first time he had passed through, that there was an outer wooden door, well fitted and thick, studded with nails to thwart axes. Immediately behind it was a metal grille that slotted spikes into holes in the floor. It wasn’t all that thick, but good enough to thwart any who had exhausted themselves beating through the outer door.

  ‘Ewan – fetch me the sacks from that cart there.’

  Ewan stuck his sword in the scuffed earth and did as he was asked; the sacks were heavy with winter feed, made worse because they had been carelessly left and were soaked. He brought them and placed them as Batty directed, then Ewan watched him burrow between them and the door with his last two black flasks.

  He realised the sacks were to direct the blast inwards and soak up some of the spray of metal which would go out, so that there would be no repeat of the tragedy at the gate; he thought of Red Colin and Big Tam, of Malcom hanging on the basket. Slowly, bit by bit, God was snipping the last threads from the hem…

  ‘Get in behind me,’ Batty yelled and Ewan realised the match had been lit; he scurried to obey while the men hurled their little anchors like the thrum of wind in the ratlines. Something flared from the top of the tower and Ewan flinched, but it was the caliver and no-one screamed, so it had missed.

  He realised he had left the two-hander and started back for it, only to be hauled up short by Batty’s strong hand.

  ‘Leave it. Use a knife. If you are lacking one, I can lend you one of the Brothers.’

  ‘I have another decent sword,’ Ewan said, appalled at what he had been about to do. Batty looked dubious but said nothing.

  The flasks detonated, almost together and Batty’s face was a rictus of smile in the sudden flare and bang. No match wi’ a slow match…

  The sacks shredded and blew back, but the effect was enough. Ewan heard the crunching ruin of timber and the shriek of stressed metal and, when Batty moved, he followed.

  Batty kicked at ruined planks; Ewan tore at them and then they saw the metal yett, leaning drunkenly to one side. Beyond it, two bodies writhed and there was blood on the stair, dark and viscous in the sconce light.

  ‘Never forget,’ Batty howled and the cry was echoed; suddenly, Ewan was being elbowed to one side by snarling, wide-mouthed men with vengeful steel, who battered through the remains of the timber and flattened the yett to the floor in a shriek of tortured, broken hinges.

  Batty watched them go with a jaundiced eye and caught Ewan’s sleeve as he made to follow.

  ‘Will Elliot,’ he said. ‘Let’s find him afore these wolves bite him as well as everyone else.’

  * * *

  The noise woke him and, for a moment, he thought he had fallen asleep in his chair in Hermitage and was appalled enough to scramble upright. There was a faint flicker of light from the dying crusie, one of the luxuries he had been given but only as long as the reeking fish oil in it lasted.

  But the wall it hung on was a damp mould, slick with running water and the cold sluiced him so that he shivered. He heard shouts and what seemed to be the ringing of bells, then worked out it was steel on steel; there was a fight going on.

  He had a wide bowl of water, the second luxury he’d been permitted and he went to it, aware that it was too heavy to lift and that he’d have to lap from it like a hound. Which was part of the humiliation, he thought.

  When he bent to it, an apparition goggled back at him in the poor light, a floating face with a ragged beard and matted hair, lips chapped and braided to a tight line, cheeks clapped in, the eyes like small creatures hiding in the caves of the face.

  He lurched upright and staggered on his ruined feet, stretching out one hand to steady himself on the slick wall. If he stood as straight as he could, he could reach out the other hand and feel the opposite wall with his fingertips.

  ‘Will Elliot,’ he screamed. ‘Will Elliot.’

  There was no answer, not even an echo; the mouldy walls sucked up the sound and he had expected no less – but he did it every so often so that he heard the sound of his own name, hurling itself at the black stones, the door, to remind himself that he had once been Land Sergeant at Hermitage, second to the Keeper of Liddesdale, later Steward to Lord Sandilands in Fife.

  He grew angry and lashed out a kick, then recoiled in horror at the sick pain of stubbing his foot. There were
toes missing there, but the pain came from the instep, driven through by a sadist with a two-handed blade; the other foot was the same.

  He had called on God and all the saints he could recall but now he knew the bitter truth. We live in ignorance, make up stories to find sense, to make the thunder the wrath of a falling angel, to make the sunrise a gift from a deity to brighten our lives and take us from darkness. We tell ourselves stories that make us the centre of everything, invent knowledge to prove it. It is all noise and flummery. I have let God go…

  * * *

  Batty led the way up the wind of stairs, stepping over the first lolling body just inside the ripped-open doors; the man wore only a doublet so the spray of metal from the blast had shredded him to bloody pats; one of the enemy, Batty decided, since all the Grahams wore jack of plates and had helmets.

  There was another further up and round – another defender, it seemed, run through the body and leaking little rivulets down the steps. Up yet again was a door to the left, covered only with a brocade curtain against the draughts. It should have been torn free to allow anyone coming up to see in and it let Batty know the bitter truth – none of the Graham men were thinking, only charging for the topmost room and killing anyone in their way.

  ‘Watch right and left,’ Batty warned and Ewan nodded, then moved to the curtain and tore it free; Batty snaked in to the room, going left so his good hand with its length of steel was ready.

  It was empty, windowless, with a trestle table and benches, a cold brazier with a scuttle of coals next to it and a nightpot, which Ewan stumbled into. While he cursed, Batty decided that this was the neat warm cubby of the luckless two outside, the doorwards.

  They came out and went on up to where the noise was greatest, a snarl of shouts and clanging metal, shrieks and pleas.

  Another doorway, this with a plank door set in it on leather hinges. Batty nodded to Ewan, who ostentatiously shook his piss-wet foot and scowled – then booted the door.