by Robyn Young
As Robert turned his attention back to the field his gaze fell on the tournament’s host. King Edward, several rows in front, was erect in a cushioned throne, his surcoat embroidered front and back with three golden lions, his ash-white hair neatly curled at the ends. Around him the royal box was filled to the boards with prominent barons and lords from all over England, along with ladies in jewel-dappled gowns and precarious headdresses, the silks of which flew like flags in the brisk wind. Pages in turquoise tunics hovered on the edges like kingfishers, waiting to dart in and attend to any command.
Robert’s gaze lingered on the king. Shortly before the Christ Mass, obeying his grandfather’s command, he had written to Edward from the Essex estate, explaining he was representing his family’s interests in England and wished to pay his respects at court. In the new year of 1294 a message came bearing the royal seal, inviting him to the spring parliament, called to discuss the king’s plans for a new crusade. Robert hadn’t yet been offered an audience by the king, even though he’d arrived in London a week ago, something his brother had already commented on darkly. He had found some measure of relief in the king’s reticence, however, for he still harboured resentment towards him and knew it wouldn’t do to make this apparent. Not here in London’s seething grandeur, where the court seemed full of wolves.
Robert’s attention fixed on the two new opponents trotting down the field, followed by their squires holding lances. He felt a twinge of envy, wishing it was him out there on the best horse money could buy, adored and admired. The difficulties of dealing with the English estates – listening to tenants’ complaints and resolving petty squabbles – had weighed on him this past year. But the thrill of the tournament and the drama of London had reawakened him to possibilities beyond the burdens of responsibility. This grand display epitomised the knighthood he had longed for as a boy: the exhilaration, the glory. The rewards.
He applauded with the rest of the crowds as the knights did a circuit of the field, punching their fists into the air to elicit ever more fervent support. One was emblazoned with a silver lion, while the other was dressed in yellow silk adorned with a green eagle. Robert faltered in his applause as he saw that the knight with the green eagle bore a blood-scarlet shield with a golden dragon in the centre. He leaned over to his brother. ‘Do you see his shield?’ he said, raising his voice above the din. ‘It’s the same as the last winner’s.’
‘Perhaps they are from the same household?’ suggested Edward, as the knight spurred his horse past the royal box with a bow towards the king.
‘Why the different devices on their surcoats?’
Edward shook his head, not knowing. As the knights cantered to their places at either end of the field he pointed to the lists, where other men were waiting with their squires. ‘Look. There’re more of them over here.’
Robert saw thirteen knights, all distinguished by their own coats of arms, yet all carrying the same shield, decorated with the dragon. He had never seen anything like it. Usually, a knight’s shield would be painted with the arms of his house. He glanced around, thinking to ask one of the lords in the stands, but they were all now rising to watch the joust. Not wanting to miss the action, Robert rose with them, as the knights levelled their lances in a storm of mud and thunder.
The royal procession wound its way along the dusty road, the drums announcing their progress. At the head rode King Edward with his chief officials, among them the Earl of Surrey, Sir John de Warenne, and Anthony Bek, the Bishop of Durham. Behind came the knights from the tournament, most of whom had changed helms and mail for linen shirts and embroidered mantles. They were flushed and triumphant astride their chargers. Several still bore the favours from ladies that they had carried into the joust, scraps from veils and sleeves, gossamer as butterfly wings. Their good mood was a pleasant change after a subdued few days, the court preoccupied by rising tensions in France, where King Edward’s younger brother, Edmund, was engaged in fraught negotiations, following a sea battle the summer before between English merchant ships and the French fleet.
Squires followed in the wake of the knights, bearing the detritus of the tourney: broken lances and swords, shattered shields, and one man, dazed and bloody, on a litter. Pack-horses carried the rest of the equipment. For a time, in the muddy streets beyond Smithfield, grey-faced children had run alongside them, calling for pennies. Now, the procession was entering the Outer Liberties, passing through quiet, breezy orchards, where white blossom fell from the trees like snow.
Robert, riding with his brother and their squires, glanced down at the muddy slush of petals, trampled by so many feet and hooves. He and his men were far back in the procession, with other foreign lords and those perhaps once close to the king who had found themselves out of favour. It was what they had grown up with, these systems of rank and favouritism, where the top table in a hall and the prime lodgings in a castle were used like bait to reel in recalcitrant vassals, or else reward faithful followers. But here in London, so clogged with nobility, from the most powerful earls in the realm down to the most rapacious knights, hungry for scraps of land and wealth, these symbols of status existed in a bewildering maze of etiquette that Robert wasn’t sure he would ever understand. In Scotland he had just been finding his feet as one of the elite. By comparison, he felt decidedly out of his depth here. In his mind, his grandfather’s rough voice reminded him of his illustrious heritage, sprung from kings and lords. He sat a little straighter at the thought.
A cheer sounded as one man rode out from the column of knights, clad in blue with a bold white stripe slashed across the back. It was the winner of the tournament, who had unhorsed his first opponent and had gone on to break fourteen lances. He wielded aloft his prize, a beautifully fashioned dagger, as another cheer rose. Robert had been surprised when, at the end of the joust, the man had taken off his helm and stood before the royal box to accept his trophy, for the fresh-faced knight couldn’t have been any older than him. There was a flash of red from the ruby embedded in the dagger’s hilt, then the victorious young knight was gone from view, sucked back into the ranks. As the procession emerged from the cover of the orchard trees the Tower of London appeared to the left. The massive walls of King Edward’s citadel stretched to the sky and fell sheer to the moat below. Built by the Conqueror, the Tower had been added to over the centuries by a succession of kings, but none, Robert had been told, had done as much as Edward, during the twenty years of his reign.
The head of the company had already reached the stone causeway at the edge of the moat and soon, Robert and Edward were riding through the first defences that guarded each step of the way into the king’s fortress. Once over the causeway they entered a semicircular barbican, surrounded by water and guarded by soldiers. Next came the first of two gatehouses, reached by drawbridges, over which iron portcullises hung suspended and murder holes opened into blackness. Below, the green waters were filled with the shifting shadows of fish. Beyond the royal docks that enclosed the moat the Thames flowed sluggishly along the south walls where the king’s apartments, cornered by flute-like towers, were built out into the river.
After the second gatehouse they were moving through the outer ward between a double line of walls. The procession slowed to funnel through an arched opening, the noise of the drums echoing off the towers. Making their way with the rest of the company, through one archway and then another, Robert and Edward passed the water gate, where the royal barge was docked beneath the king’s quarters. Here they were in the shadow of another colossal gatehouse, the last and most impressive before they entered the inner ward. As they moved through the long dark, then out into sunlight on the other side, the White Tower rose before them. The radiant gem in the heart of Edward’s crown.
A wide avenue, flanked by walls, led them to the immense tower, where they found themselves dwarfed by its God-like scale. Robert thought of his grandfather’s motte and bailey at Lochmaben, a toy castle by comparison. One more gatehouse, this one strung with b
anners, and they were in the inmost ward, where a giant stone staircase marched up to the tower’s entrance. As the knights and lords dismounted, grooms escorted the horses to the stable blocks, while attendants ushered the nobility towards the tower.
Robert handed the reins of his horse to his squire, Nes. Out of the small entourage of six squires, two servants, a steward and a cook that had accompanied him and Edward from Scotland, he had formed the closest bond with the quiet, young Nes, son of a knight from Annandale, one of his grandfather’s vassals. As the squires led the horses away, the brothers headed up the grand stairs. The din of the drums had faded and the sweeter sounds of pipes and lyres drifted to them. As they approached the oversized doors, they heard people ahead of them murmuring in surprise. Together, they entered a huge hall. Rows of marble pillars flanked the cavernous space, the walls of which were covered with tapestries, but it wasn’t the architecture that transfixed the brothers, rather the scores of plants and trees that filled the place with such abundant greenery it was as if a forest had sprung up inside. Dark trails of ivy snaked around pillars and the scent from the carpet of petals that covered the tiled floor perfumed the air. Edward let an appreciative breath through his teeth as a string of girls dressed in ethereal gowns wove in front of them between the trees. They were being chased by cavorting men who wore grotesque masks.
The music was louder. A timber staircase ahead led out of the enchanted forest and up to the next storey. So intent on what lay above was he that Robert didn’t see what guarded the foot of the stairs until Edward gripped his arm and pointed. There, restrained by three pages, was a massive beast with a shaggy black mane. Thick chains were fixed to the collar of iron around the creature’s neck, but even so the pages were clearly struggling to hold it as it shifted and snarled at the passing crowds. Muscles rippled beneath its ochre skin, scarred with pale, bald lines, made by whips. Robert had only ever seen images of these creatures on shields and surcoats. The lion was far more menacing than he had imagined. Its growls were thunderous, echoing in his chest and gut, the bestial reek of it setting all his nerves on edge. Up the stairs, Robert looking back over his shoulder as the beast roared, they entered the great hall.
22
As King Edward and his officials made their way up to the hall’s dais, ushers showed the guests to their places. Those seats nearest to the platform were reserved for knights from the tournament. Robert and his brother were in the middle of the hall, a polite yet aloof distance from the king’s table.
The boards were laden with glazed jugs and goblets, and silver basins filled with water and rose petals for the guests to wash their hands in. As lords and ladies sat, servants entered bearing roasted swans, the flesh crackling with heat. There was pickled salmon from Ireland garnished with sweet lemons from Spain, bowls of yellow butter, sour-smelling cheese from Brie and wrinkle-skinned figs. After everyone was seated, Bishop Bek led them in saying grace. The king’s pantler tested the dishes on the top table in case of poison and servants began to pour the wine.
‘You are Sir Robert Bruce?’
Robert glanced up as a thin, well-dressed man spoke across the table over the clatter of knives. He inclined his head.
The man, leaning to cut a wedge of cheese from the block between them, didn’t offer his own name, but addressed a fleshy woman beside him, who wore a too-tight gown, the ribboned sides of which were bulging. ‘From Scotland.’
‘Truly, sir?’ The woman stared at Robert. ‘I hear it is a wild place.’ She shuddered. ‘Poor, desolate lands, blighted by cold and endless rain.’
Before Robert could answer, Edward nodded soberly. ‘It is, madam. So cold, in fact, that we can only bathe for three days in June, when the ice that covers the lochs melts just long enough.’
The thin man frowned sceptically as he cut the cheese into neat slivers.
The woman was shaking her head. ‘How you must relish being in England.’
Edward grinned. ‘Well, I no longer stink like a pig.’
The woman tittered nervously and focused on a slab of beef that was running blood across her plate. The man looked away, his mouth pursing.
Robert leaned in to his brother as the couple struck up a conversation with someone else. ‘You’ll not make many friends if you keep doing that.’
Edward’s grin faded. ‘You’ve heard how they talk about our kingdom. The only good thing is we’re seen as civilised, rather than barbarians like the Welsh and Irish.’
‘Can you blame them for thinking anything less than this is inferior?’ Robert picked up his goblet and gestured at the crowded opulence of the great hall. ‘You cannot tell me you’re not impressed.’
‘Impressed I may be, but that doesn’t mean I like being treated like a churl.’ Edward’s eyes narrowed in challenge. ‘The king hasn’t even greeted you yet, brother. We’ve been here a week. You should be welcomed as an honoured guest.’
‘I doubt the king has had the chance to speak to many here,’ responded Robert, nettled by the truth in the words. He might be glad he hadn’t had to face the king immediately, but the lengthening wait was passing out of respite and heading towards insult. He couldn’t well do what his grandfather expected and raise the Bruce family’s standing in England if the king wouldn’t even bid him welcome. ‘I imagine the matter of France has taken up his time.’
‘France?’
At the gruff voice, Robert glanced round to see an elderly man in a brocaded mantle, fastened at his wrinkled throat by a jewelled clasp.
‘So, even our distant Scottish neighbours know of our troubles?’
Robert had heard of the battle that started the conflict soon after it occurred the summer before. The French fleet had attacked several merchant ships crewed by English and Gascon sailors off the coast of Brittany, apparently without provocation, but in the skirmish that followed it was the English who were victorious, capturing three ships and putting the rest to flight. Before he could explain that he had been in England for the past year the old noble continued.
‘Mark my words,’ rasped the man, gesturing with his knife, a slice of meat slipping off the end on to the table, ‘tournaments and feasts will only buoy up the barons for so long. Their high spirits will sink as swiftly as a stone ship come the parliament.’
Robert’s interest was snared by the mention of the parliament. Despite his reservations, he had been looking forward to hearing the king’s plans for a new crusade and the opportunity therein, for one way he would be certain to further his family’s standing would be to take the Cross under Edward’s banner. He could still hear his father’s bitter words the night they learned Balliol would be king, clear as the moment they were uttered.
The blood runs thin in all our sons. Thin as watered wine. How will we make crusaders out of such diluted stock?
He had suffered those words for a long time, the last of any feeling his father had said to him before leaving for Norway. Part of him had fought against them – they had come from one of his father’s drunken rages and were of no substance, just sour bile like all the rest. Another, more persistent part had told him this was true. He couldn’t live up to the crusaders who had gone before him; he who had been raised in years of peace with only a quintain on a deserted beach to tilt at. This, perhaps, was his chance to prove the man wrong. Robert had been envisioning the prospect of heading home to Annandale with grants of land, bags of bright Saracen gold and a reputation as formidable as his grandfather’s to present the old lord with a new palm frond for his mantle, taken from Jerusalem itself.
The elderly noble’s attention, however, was far from crusading. ‘The king is in for a difficult session,’ he told Robert, nodding enthusiastically. ‘Yes indeed.’
The thin, well-dressed man across from Robert cleared his throat meaningfully, his stare full of warning.
‘You know I’m right,’ the old man growled at him. ‘King Edward never should have sent his brother to treat with Philippe on his behalf. If he’d gone himself he woul
dn’t now be facing the loss of English rule in Gascony.’
‘From what I’ve heard,’ said Robert, looking between the two men, ‘the surrender of the king’s lands in Gascony is only temporary, until a peace agreement is sealed with King Philippe. It was meant as a gesture of good faith.’
‘That is correct,’ said the thin man emphatically. ‘King Edward was to return the captured ships and cede the duchy. When he goes to France to make peace with Philippe, Gascony will be restored to him. Those are the terms Earl Edmund has agreed in Paris.’
‘Bah!’ spat the old noble. ‘Did you not wonder how a couple of merchant cogs managed to defeat the French fleet in the first place?’
The thin man frowned. ‘What are you saying?’
‘I’m saying it was a trap and our king walked right into it! Philippe made it clear from the start of his reign that he didn’t want an English king to rule in any part of France. He told the captains of those ships to let themselves be captured and give him a reason to demand the surrender of Gascony.’
‘Preposterous,’ scoffed the thin man. But his tone held a note of discomfort.
‘And I know too why King Edward agreed so readily to Philippe’s terms,’ said the old man, pointing his knife towards the dais, where the king was seated with his officials. He arched his shaggy eyebrows. ‘It was the promise of young flesh.’
Robert leaned forward expectantly. He had heard rumour of the marriage agreement that had been part of the French negotiations for the ceding of Gascony, but it hadn’t been confirmed.