Robert the Bruce--A Tale of the Guardians

by Jack Whyte

“Aye, that’ll do it.” The old man picked up his cup in both hands and held it to his nostrils, sniffing appreciatively. “Aye,” he murmured again, “there’s nothing like toddy to keep the chills away on a cold night. Drink up.”

  Rob sipped with great caution, knowing the water was very hot, but even so the sharpness of the drink snatched at his breath and closed his throat, and he had to set the cup down quickly lest he spill it in the coughing fit that racked him. His grandfather watched him in astonishment.

  “What—what is that?” he gasped eventually.

  The old man’s eyebrows were still arched in surprise, but now his expression was altered by an unexpected smile. “It is uisqhebaugh. Have you never had it?”

  “No, sir, I have not.”

  The old man’s smile grew wider. “Well, don’t sound so scunnert, boy. You will soon grow used to it. But it is a taste to be learned, and that is truth. It is the distilled spirits of barley, and it is powerful stuff. When served hot like this, though, mixed with honey and boiled water, it is medicinal. Try it again, but wi’ care. You’ll find it grows on you.”

  Rob sipped again, and found that the liquid, while still tasting alien and bitter, was not as unpleasant as he had thought. He lowered his cup slowly. “It’s … good, I think … Sweet. Warming.”

  “Aye, it’s all of those. Try some more.”

  He did, and this time found it almost pleasant. “May I ask a question, sir?”

  “That’s what you’re here for, boy. Ask away.”

  Rob frowned down at his cup. “This drink. If it’s medicinal when it’s served hot like this, what is it when it’s served cold?”

  That brought a bark of a laugh that Rob could scarce believe he had heard. “It’s dangerous,” the old man said. “And many’s the thousand men who have learned that to their cost, to say nothing of the tens of thousands who went to their deaths having learned it too late. It is called the water of life, but it can drown a man more quickly than any other water. It breeds drunkenness far quicker than ale or mead. But you won’t be drinking it cold in this household. Stand up. Take off that covering and let me look at you.”

  Rob rose and shrugged out of the heavy woollen robe, then stood as the old man scanned him up and down.

  “Put it back on,” the old man said when he had finished. “You’re big. Near as big as your father, even now. How old are you, seventeen?”

  “Sixteen, your lordship.”

  “I’m not your lordship, I’m your grandsire. Call me Grandfather.”

  “Grandfather.”

  Another abrupt laugh. “You sound as though you’re tasting it on your tongue for the first time, like another new drink. You’ve never liked me, have you?”

  Cautiously, his slow movements belying his racing thoughts, Rob sat up straighter and pulled his shoulders back. He looked directly into the fierce old eyes.

  “You have never given me reason to, sir.”

  “Explain. What do you mean?”

  There was no passion in the question, no anger. And that gave Rob the courage to continue. He set his cup down with great care on a small table by his chair.

  “In all my life you have never spoken to me directly, other than to order me out from under your feet when I was a child … Except for once, in the stables when I was seven. I was passing through on my way to the tower, and you came in the far door, in haste. I stepped aside to give you room and came close to some fresh hay, and you shouted at me to stand away from it and not make a mess of it. And then you saw it was already scattered and you cursed at me for having done it … I felt unjustly condemned, since I had touched nothing, and I cried as you rode away, still muttering to yourself. That is my single clearest memory of you.”

  Lord Robert stared at him, his face expressionless. “I did that? I don’t remember it. But you most obviously do, and I don’t doubt you … I cursed you? What did I say?”

  Rob shrugged. “I don’t remember that, sir. I knew only that you were angry at me without cause, and I was hurt … by your readiness to think ill of me.”

  “Hmm…” The patriarch looked down at his cup for long moments, then raised it and sipped deeply before looking back at his grandson’s pale face. “That memory has festered in you these what, nine years?” he growled. “I jalouse it’s too deeply rooted now to be pulled out easily. But hear what I am going to tell you now, for I speak not only as your grandsire but as the Lord of Annandale and chief of the House of Bruce. I am Bruce, and I never lie. Many resent me for that. It makes them uncomfortable. But it is a part of me that none can question or deny. My word is my worth and I do not deal in falsehoods. Do you hear me, boy?”

  Rob nodded.

  “Then hear me further. I was not angry at you that day, all those years ago, no matter what you thought. Had I been, I would not have forgotten it.” He held up a hand, as though to cut short a protest. “I am not saying I was not angry. In all probability I was, for I anger easily, even now, and I was worse when I was younger, unwilling to accept the behaviour of fools or the uselessness of idiots. Someone else must have angered me that day and you but caught the brunt of it, I fear. But you were certainly not the cause of my foul temper, though you fell victim to it. So I would make amends, if that is possible. Is there something that would serve, this late, to counterbalance the hurt you took that day?”

  Rob sat numb, overwhelmed by the differences so quickly shown between the man who had spoken those words and the man he had believed him to be. He shook his head. “No, sir,” he said quietly. “You have already healed it. I see now that the fault was more mine than yours. It was the child who saw what was not there, too young to see or understand the reality of things.”

  “Partly so,” the old man said. “But that does not excuse the heedless hurt of it. You would not have been the first innocent I treated so … nor the last. Your father believes I think too much, brooding and ever mulling, scheming and anticipating things that never come to pass, forbye trying to live other people’s lives for them. And he may be right. But in my own mind, within the conscience that the churchmen tell us we all have, I sometimes rue my lack of thought, the thoughtlessness that leads to needless hurt such as we are talking about.” He broke off suddenly, peering keenly at the boy. “What is it? You look troubled.”

  “No,” Rob said, but even to himself he sounded less than certain, and the elder Bruce leaned closer.

  “Don’t start hesitating now, boy. Remember who you are and speak out, whatever is on your mind.”

  The words, and the stern gaze that accompanied them, made Rob want to squirm, but instead he merely shrugged. “There’s nothing wrong, Grandfather. It was but a thought—a question—that came into my mind while you were speaking … But it’s a question, I think, that I have no right to ask.”

  The old man’s eyes narrowed and he leaned slightly closer, leaning his weight on the arm of his chair. “Every man with a brain has a right, and at times even a duty, to ask questions of anyone, Grandson. Questions demand answers, and understanding those answers leads to greater awareness of this world we live in. Even a refusal to answer will tell much to the man who is wise enough to watch and listen closely, for from the very silence he can jalouse why no answer is being given. Besides, while we’re talking of rights, I might dispute your right to take your old grandsire to task for past failures, but you did it and I respected you for it. That took courage—the more so since you expected me to rend you from top to bottom, if I suspect correctly. So ask away. What was your question?”

  What was the question, exactly? Rob knew he could not simply blurt it out in the crude words that had sprung to his mind, not without angering the old man. The matter was impertinent already, without adding insult to the form of it. He bought some time by sipping again at his neglected drink, enjoying the taste of it more now that it had cooled, but he could feel his grandfather’s eyes watching him. He coughed gently, feeling the fiery liquor catching at his throat, then shuddered and set the cup down aga
in.

  “It was what you said about thoughtlessness, sir,” he began. “You said you sometimes rue it, your lack of thought about people’s feelings … And you were speaking of my father at the time.” He drew a deep breath. “Is that why … Is that why you and he are not close?”

  The old man frowned. Then he sank back into his chair. His eyes narrowed to slits, and Rob sat waiting for the quiet wrath that he was sure must come. But his grandfather merely pursed his lips and scratched at his beard as he had done before, and when he did speak his voice held no trace of anger.

  “I was about to ask you why you would think such a thing,” he said, “that we are not close, your father and I. But to you it’s clearly obvious that we are not, and I won’t insult you by pretending you are wrong. Your father is my firstborn son and I love him dearly, as a father does. But I also perceive his weaknesses, as fathers do in their sons, and that is what has led to our … estrangement. It is a frequent thing between fathers and their sons, a clash of wills and ongoing petty quarrels that can grow into deep resentment and in turn breed dislike. And yes, to answer your question, there are times when I rue the gulf that stretches between us now, for my own thoughtlessness, my lack of concern for his true feelings over too long a time was largely what drove us apart.”

  “But he is a good man, Grandfather.”

  “I know he is, Grandson. As the Earl of Carrick he has prospered and conducted himself in a way that is beyond reproach. His marriage to your mother was the best thing that ever happened to him. It made a man of him when I had despaired of ever seeing him become a man. But by then, of course, the damage had been long done.” He sipped from his cup, and then continued. “He is a different kind of man than I was—not worse, nor better, I see now, simply different.” He gave a matter-of-fact shrug. “And truth be told, though it pains me to say so, I did not want a different kind of man, even when he was yet a boy. I wanted a reflection of myself. Do you know the words ‘alter ego’?”

  “Latin,” Rob said. “Father Ninian explained it. It means another self.”

  “Good lad. That is precisely what it means, and it was precisely what I wanted in my son. Another self. And when I saw it was not to be, I was … displeased would be one word for it. Your father was my firstborn son by my first wife, Isabella. She was a de Clair, the daughter of Gilbert de Clair, who was both Earl of Hertford and of Gloucester, and her mother—your great-grandmother—was Lady Isabel Marshall, a daughter of the great William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, Marshal of England, and, some say, England’s greatest hero. He was tutor and master-at-arms to King Richard the Lionheart.”

  He grunted then, his expression wryly amused, and pushed himself out of his chair. Rob twisted around and watched him as he reached up and took down a large, sheathed sword that hung from a stout peg on the partition behind the door, drawing the long, silver blade from the scabbard as he returned to his chair. “He was also your great-great-grandsire—one of eight from whom you can claim descent—and this was his, the marshal’s own sword, given to me by your great-grandmother herself on the day I wed her daughter. She told me she believed her father’s sword would lose no honour in my hand.” He swung the heavy weapon gently, then sat down again, resting its point on the floor between them, close to the fire. “You would think, with such an illustrious heritage behind her, that Isabella would have bred fiery sons. But that was not to be, for she bred much of herself into her children and too much, I thought, into her firstborn son. I was a brash, ambitious young hothead, and Isabella was a delicate and gentle creature—too much of both, you might have thought, to live long in this brutal world, but she lived for thirty-eight years and was my wife for twenty-four of those, from the age of fourteen, bearing me two daughters and four sons.”

  He sighed deeply. “To my own shame, though, I believed the sons she gave me fell far short of what I needed. I suppose had I been a different man that might not have mattered greatly. But I was who I was, Robert Bruce, the fifth Lord of Annandale, and I had vast territories to govern and the need for a strong, hard son to stand with me and follow me. I had high hopes for the sixth Bruce of Annandale—a son to be forged and shaped and tempered by me, as I had been by my own father. He reared me to govern strongly and dutifully, to live solely as he expected me to live. And when I found out that I could not forge my son in the same way, I became bitter. And harsh. And cruel…”

  The old man fell silent, his face, which had been so animated earlier, now empty; his eyes dull and unfocused. But then he shivered and clutched at the woollen shawl that draped his shoulders, pulling it closer about him, and only then did Rob notice that the brazier fire had dulled. He rose quietly and stooped to replenish the fire, thinking that his grandfather had no need of being watched in his grief. He chose short, thick logs of apple wood from the rack by the hearthside and thrust them deep into the glowing coals, one by one. When he was satisfied and went back to his seat, he found Lord Robert watching him, all evidence of his temporary lapse gone from his eyes.

  “Well,” his lordship said in a more normal tone. “There’s time enough to fix all that, eh, boy? Especially with your help, for I assume you will help me, eh? To make amends?”

  “I will, Grandfather.”

  “Good, then we’ll do it together. Now, where were we, before that?”

  I was crying in the wilderness, like John the Baptist. Rob felt his throat swell painfully from the realization of how wrong he had been in his lifelong dislike and fear of this man.

  Lord Robert sat up straighter, stretching his hands towards the newly rising flames, and Rob took note of those hands. Old they might be, but they were huge and still powerful, as evidenced by the casual way the old man had swung the enormous sword that now rested against his chair.

  “You heard the talk between your father and me this morning. How much do you know of what’s going on today?”

  “The Queen’s death?” Rob shook his head. “Only what you told us, sir, and I was shocked to hear of it. I have talked about the Birgham Treaty with my father, though, on several occasions, and I understand what it entailed. It seems a shame that all that effort should have been for naught.”

  “You approved of the treaty?”

  “I did, sir.” He hesitated. “Did you not?”

  “I did, but that is neither here nor there. What did you like about it? Was there anything in particular that appealed to you, or perhaps troubled you?”

  “Troubled me?” Rob frowned. “No, sir, nothing that I can think of. I liked the provisions for the marriage between our new Queen and young Prince Edward of Caernarfon—two realms, each free and independent of the other, yet ruled in unison and amity by man and wife. And I liked, too, that the council of Guardians did not quibble over approving the girl’s claim.”

  “Nor should they have,” his grandfather said. “She was the true heir. King Alexander was her grandsire. How could they quibble?”

  Rob shrugged. “Because she was female, a woman and a child at the same time, too young to rule.”

  Lord Robert’s eyebrows rose. “You’re right, but she would have had a regent to guide her, as I guided her grandfather Alexander, standing as his regent while he was but a boy. Did you know about that?”

  “I did, sir. It was before you went on crusade with young Prince Edward, before he became King.

  “Aye, so it was. You’ve met King Edward, have you not? What is your opinion of him? And do not tell me you have no right to an opinion.”

  “I admire him, sir. I believe him to be a great man and perhaps an even greater King.”

  “Why?”

  “Because of who he is and what he has done since becoming King. He is a warrior and a conqueror.”

  “He conquered Wales,” his grandfather conceded. “But he still has his hands full, trying to control his own barons after decades of his rule. And he gave a good account of himself on crusade, until brought down by an assassin’s poisoned blade. But he has troubles with the King of France a
nd with rebels in his own Duchy of Gascony, and the combined costs of those campaigns in France threaten to beggar him and his kingdom. His barons know that better than he does, which does nothing to help his case with them. What else do you admire in him?”

  Rob shrugged, as if dealing with self-evident truths. “His laws and reforms. He has reorganized his whole kingdom. You must admit, Grandfather, that his ongoing efforts there have been magnificent.”

  “Ongoing, yes, I’ll grant that. But magnificent? I wish I still possessed your youthful optimism. To an old cynic like me it appears as though Edward’s entire legal efforts since the beginning of his reign have been to win back the freedoms lost to him when his grandsire John Lackland ceded power to the barons in Magna Carta. And it’s a losing fight, no matter how heroic his struggle. The barons will not support his wars across the sea and they will never relinquish the powers they gained in the Great Charter.”

  He held up a placating hand, seeing the confusion in his grandson’s face. “Differing points of view, Robert. No more than that. Life is all about discerning such things and adjusting to them, whatever it may take. I am but offering my opinions versus yours, in the spirit of debate and temperance. Personally, I like the Plantagenet as a man. As a king, though, I find he has many characteristics that I wish were different. Did you know that he annexed the Isle of Man three months ago?”

  The words meant nothing to Rob. “The Isle of Man?” he said.

  “Aye. It’s ours, part of this realm, has been so since sixty-six, when Alexander made treaty with Haakon of Norway after we drove his minions out of the Isles, after the sea fight at Largs…”

  “But—” Rob sought for something profound to say, to express his grasp of those events, but gave up. “I don’t understand what you are saying, Grandfather.”

  “You will if you think about it. The Isle of Man is an important place, with a significance beyond its size to anyone who thinks in terms of kingdoms. And you, Robert Bruce, must now start to think that way, as I do. Man was Norwegian for centuries, but then it fell to us. Consider that now from England’s point of view: a large island, strategically placed thirty miles from England’s coast, fifty miles from Wales, and set square across the sailing routes from England to Ireland. It could offer a very real threat to England’s trade and commerce, should any conflict ever develop between our two realms. Edward did not like that development. But there was little he could do about it without offending Alexander, his friend and kinsman.”