by Robyn Young
‘This is Isobel,’ said his father. ‘Your bride.’
PART 4
1296 AD
. . . the Britons, by merit of their faith, should again recover the island, when the time decreed for it was come. But this would not be accomplished before they should be possessed of his reliques . . .
The History of the Kings of Britain, Geoffrey of Monmouth
37
Black skies filled with storm and the beating of war drums ushered in the autumn of 1295. Doom-laden omens abounded, from a child born with two heads to a fisherman who claimed to have seen the ghost of King Alexander haunting the cliffs near Kinghorn, his spectral hand raised towards Edinburgh.
In towns and villages across Scotland word spread quickly that John Balliol had been replaced by the new Council of Twelve. Men conversed in worried tones, wondering what would happen. A few were pleased by the change, blaming the king’s weakness for the loss of Scotland’s liberties at King Edward’s hands and believing the establishment of the council would restore their rights. Many more were troubled, in light of Edward’s bloody conquest of Wales. As rumours flew, saying the twelve had sent a delegation to the King of France seeking a pact of strength with England’s enemy, all awaited the approach of the new year with bated breath.
Robert, whose return to Scotland had been greeted by the toll of a wedding bell, had been preoccupied through these portentous days, mourning the loss of his grandfather and coming to terms with the arrival of his father. But even he hadn’t failed to hear the growing beat of conflict. The feast of All Souls came with gales that battered the east coast and caused a new wall of St Andrews Cathedral to collapse, killing five masons. The day after word went up that the Scottish delegation had sealed an alliance of swords with King Philippe against Edward. War, men said, must surely come soon. Robert, whose young wife had fallen pregnant, had expected the English king to come to some agreement with the Council of Twelve. He knew how much the victory in Wales had cost Edward and doubted the king or his barons had the stomach for another conflict, especially when English soldiers remained entrenched in Gascony. Edward’s response had surprised him.
On learning of the alliance the king demanded the surrender of three castles in Scotland and banned any Frenchman from entering Scottish territory. Where Balliol would have crumbled the council stood firm and, led by the Comyns, denied the surrender of the castles. In retaliation, Edward confiscated the English lands and property of these men, and ordered his sheriffs to arrest any Scot found in his realm. These, it was soon clear, were final acts before the inevitable. Rising through the bottleneck of the negotiations, the tension could only erupt.
Before the Christ Mass orders arrived at Lochmaben bearing the seal of King John, but witnessed by John Comyn on behalf of the twelve. The message demanded that the Lord of Annandale and his son be ready for a weapons’ inspection in the new year. It was a stark choice: either fight for a king they hated and lose their English estates, or betray their kingdom and lose their Scottish lands. Robert had felt torn in two, his Scottish heritage and his oath to the Knights of the Dragon and King Edward pulling him in opposite directions. For his father, however, the choice seemed clear. He had been scathing, telling the king’s messengers that he would rather lose his lands and his life than lift his sword for the pretender on the throne. Robert, disturbed by his father’s rebelliousness, hadn’t known that the lord had already been in contact with his ally of old, King Edward. Soon after, the Bruce led his family and his men out of Annandale. Bearing as much as they could carry, Robert’s wife Isobel now five months into her term, they had made their way across the border to Carlisle, where his father was made governor of the city, in the name of the English king.
Scattered reports had come to them in the weeks that followed, but none so clear as a message from King John himself telling Robert and his father that their lands of Carrick and Annandale were forfeit and had been placed in the custody of John Comyn’s cousin, the Earl of Buchan, head of the Black Comyns. The Bruces weren’t the only Scottish nobles to face such losses. Their old comrade and member of the alliance at Turnberry, Earl Patrick of Dunbar, also declined to fight for Balliol as did the Earl of Angus and both, in choosing to remain loyal to Edward, were summarily disinherited. But this didn’t make the loss of Robert’s lands in Carrick, the place of his birth and the right of which had been bestowed upon him by his grandfather, any less unbearable.
As the snows of February receded and the ice on the ground turned to slush in the March rains, carts of grain and beer began to move north through England, shadowed along the coast by ships loaded with stones and timber for siege engines. They were followed by companies of knights and squadrons of infantry, all marching to converge on Newcastle, the staging ground for the campaign.
War was upon them.
Robert rode through the dark streets of Carlisle, Hunter’s hooves skidding in the wet. In the distance, the castle squatted on its low hill, its red walls bloody in the light of torches. Clouds raced across a bloated, yellow moon, the spectral glow of which filled the puddles on the ground. Across the city, a bell continued to clang.
With Robert rode his brother Edward, knighted at the beginning of the year in a hasty ceremony. They were joined by two knights from Carrick and two of their father’s vassals. Fires burned, illuminating huddled groups beneath the overhangs of buildings, where water dripped steadily. The faces of men and women showed fear and uncertainty, the children sleepy confusion. Many had handcarts piled with sacks and blankets, tools, pots and the odd silver plate or candlestick, not a necessity perhaps, but something they couldn’t bear to be parted from in their race to the protection of the city’s stone walls. Inns, churches and stables were crammed with these refugees from the outlying areas, the last people in forced to sleep in the streets.
‘Make way!’ shouted Edward, as they cantered down the fire-lit thoroughfare towards the market cross. ‘Make way for the Earl of Carrick! Make way for the governor’s men!’
At the market, teeming with penned livestock, they turned on to the street that led to the north-eastern walls, where a gate-tower loomed over the road to Scotland. The bell was louder now, its disjointed clanging coming from the tower ahead. As they approached, Robert saw men offloading baskets of arrows and sacks of sand from a wagon. Bringing Hunter to a stop, he dismounted, leaving the horse with his knights. The square tower straddled a passageway between two arched openings. The gates at the end of the passage were closed and more men were there, hammering timbers across the wood. The bangs echoed in the confined space as Robert entered, followed by his brother. They hastened past a frenetic guardroom on the ground level, then up uneven steps to the second storey, where an opening led out on to the city walls.
Three men were on the walkway, their clothes whipping in the wind. They turned as Robert and Edward emerged. Smoke swirled from a torch that lit their troubled faces.
‘Thank Christ,’ greeted one, the captain, going to Robert. He wore mail beneath his cloak and had a helm under one arm. His broad English sounded much like that of the men of Annandale, which lay less than ten miles away, beyond the crumbling Roman wall and the treacherous mud-flats of the Solway Firth. The captain had to raise his voice over the monotonous chime of the bell. ‘I was about to send one of my men to the castle.’
‘We heard the alarm from the English Gate,’ said Robert. ‘What is it?’
‘Tom here saw it first,’ said the captain, nodding to one of his guards, whose face beneath the rim of his kettle hat was grim.
Tom pointed through an arrow slit. ‘Out there, sir. See for yourself.’
Robert crossed the walkway and stood beside the man to peer out. He could smell boiled meat on the guard’s breath. Far below, the moat that encircled the city reflected the torchlight on the walls. Beyond, the land disappeared into murk. Robert discerned the ghostly River Eden and the outlines of distant hills, but little else. ‘I can’t see anything.’
‘Over n
orth aways,’ insisted the guard, frowning up at the scurrying clouds obscuring the moon.
Robert felt grit from the wall prickling his eyes as he stared north. Above him, the bell continued its hollow clanging. For a long moment he saw nothing, then the moon sailed into view. As its sallow light bled across the land, Robert picked out what appeared to be a long, narrow river glinting in the distance, except he knew there was no river where his eyes were fixed. It wasn’t moonlight shining on water, but on metal: spear tips and helms, shields and mail. Robert felt a spasm in his gut. The small part of him that all through the troubled autumn and winter, and even into the turbulence of these past months, had hoped that this could yet be resolved died with the sight of the advancing army. ‘Come,’ he said tightly to Edward. ‘We must tell Father.’
‘What are the governor’s orders?’ the English captain called after him.
‘You’ll be told with the rest of us,’ responded Robert, hastening along the walkway.
‘This cannot be happening,’ said Edward, catching Robert’s arm as they exited the tower and headed for their horses. ‘Earl Donald? And Atholl?’
‘You’ve just seen the truth of it for yourself,’ Robert said flatly.
‘Your father-in-law is coming to raze this city to the ground.’ Edward flung his hand towards the castle, a red block in the distance. ‘His daughter is carrying your child! How did it come to this?’
‘You know how. The Comyns.’
‘These men aren’t just our countrymen. They are kin. We should be fighting alongside them!’
Robert met his brother’s gaze. He knew how Edward felt; that sensation of being pulled apart. But they had made their decision on the eve of this war, unbearable though it had been, and now they must face it head-on. ‘You’ve heard the same reports as me,’ he told his brother harshly. ‘Those men out there, my father-in-law and John of Atholl included, have burned our lands to ash. They aren’t comrades and kin any more. They are enemies. Would you stand with them now?’
Edward didn’t answer. He turned his eyes skyward, where clouds raced through the dark. ‘Our grandfather wouldn’t have let this come to pass. He would have found another way. A way that didn’t mean we had to betray our country.’
‘Our grandfather is dead. And we’ve made a pledge to defend this city.’ Pushing past his brother, Robert strode to his father’s knights, waiting with the horses.
Edward shouted after him, but as Robert mounted he could only follow.
As they rode, more bells joined the toll from the north-east tower. The cacophony echoed through the city, causing citizens to throw open shutters and stumble sleep-dazed and frightened from doorways. A few people hailed the six knights as they cantered down Castle Street, but none of them answered the worried calls. Riding swiftly, they made for the bridge across the city ditch, which led through orchards to a second crossing over a moat below the castle’s walls.
After passing through two heavily manned gatehouses, where guard captains were shouting orders, the brothers entered the inner bailey, which was crammed with men. Some wore the red chevron of Carrick on their surcoats and gambesons, and were under Robert’s command, but most wore the colours of their father. There was no sign of the blue lion, the ancient symbol of the lordship of Annandale favoured by their grandfather. These knights all wore the device preferred by their new lord: a red cross, banded at the top and set against a yellow background. Some were hauling sacks of grain off carts into the stores. More were handing out weapons. Robert dismounted in the chaos. He guessed his father must be aware of the danger now, but he still needed to be given his own orders.
After questioning one of the knights, who told him the governor was with his commanders in the castle’s hall, Robert was making his way through the mass of men when he saw a young woman struggling through the press towards him. It was his wife’s maid, Katherine. Her face was agitated, a high flush of colour on her cheeks.
‘Sir Robert!’ Her voice carried over the rough din of the soldiers.
Robert went to her, filling with concern. ‘Is something wrong? Where is Isobel?’ He looked past Katherine up to the window of the room he had moved his wife to last week, when scouts had seen the smoke across the border. Torchlight glared behind the drapes.
‘She’s in her labour, sir. She begged me to find you.’
‘The child isn’t due for another month, at least.’
‘The midwife thinks her fretting about her father caused it to come early.’
‘Brother,’ said Edward, moving up behind him.
Robert turned distractedly as his brother nodded to the doors of the hall, out of which had come their father with three commanders.
The Lord of Annandale, imperious in a gleaming coat of mail given to him by his new son-in-law, the King of Norway, stood on the steps of the hall, looking down on the crowded bailey. His surcoat, partitioned in red and yellow with the cross over his heart, was pulled in tight at his thick waist by a belt, from which hung a broadsword. He began to speak, his voice sounding over the soldiers below, who quietened to listen, the men who had been emptying the supply wagon setting down their sacks of grain.
‘All of us here have paid a high price for our honour. I, more than most, am aware of the great sacrifice made in the service of loyalty these past months.’
Robert felt his chest tighten at his father’s words. Great sacrifice? he thought bitterly. His father still owned his rich lands in Essex and Yorkshire through his continued loyalty to King Edward. He himself had been left with nothing.
‘My scouts inform me that the Comyns’ host has laid waste to my lands. All of us here have lost things dear to us. All of us here have reason to hate the men who now come for us in the dark, like the cowardly sons of whores they are!’
Some of the soldiers in the yard shouted in vehement agreement.
‘Annandale is burning and the Black Comyns and their kin will build upon the ashes. If we let them. But I say we defy them! I say we stand against these seven earls and their false king! I say we show them what the men of Annandale and Carrick, and Carlisle are made of!’
The men roared their approval, the din reverberating around the bailey.
‘King Edward waits to our east in Newcastle with the English host. We are the bait and while the bastards dangle on our hook, he will attack where they have left themselves vulnerable. Stand with me and you will see your homes returned to you. Stand with me and you will be rewarded!’ The Lord of Annandale drew his sword and raised it.
The soldiers unsheathed their own blades and began to beat the flats of them against their shields.
Robert turned to Katherine. The maid had pressed her hands over her ears. ‘See that my wife has everything she needs,’ he shouted, as the clattering of swords beat the air. ‘I will come when I can.’
38
Over Carlisle, the last city in England, dawn was breaking. A veil of smoke hung in the air above the hordes beyond the walls. In the cold light, fire pits flamed, from which foot soldiers lit torches that were carried across the moat to the north-east gate where a mass of men held shields above their heads to form a screen. It was under this protective canopy that the foot soldiers bore these flaming brands. More men followed, carrying bundles of hay.
On the walls, defenders crowded the narrow walkway, wary of the arrows darting up from the banks of the moat. To them, the upturned shields were a confusion of colour, shifting like an uneasy sea with the tide of men beneath. Their faces pressed to arrow loops, the men of Carlisle watched as the soldiers with the torches continued to disappear beneath. Smoke filtered through the gaps between the shields, all the way up to the gates at the foot of the tower.
Robert was shouting orders, his voice hoarse and the siege barely begun. What started as a steady deployment of his troops along the walkway had descended into chaos, the enemy’s horns blaring and arrows flying up to clatter against the walls or arc into the streets below. His father had posted him in command of the nort
h-east gate with his brother and soldiers of Carrick. Bolstered by men from Carlisle, they formed a company of twenty-five knights, with more than twice as many squires and foot soldiers. Having been in charge of only a small number of men in Wales, Robert swiftly discovered how hard it was to remain in control of a large division. It was harder still since the men of Carrick had been his father’s liegemen for so long. He had spent only a few months in his earldom before leaving for England and many remembered him more as a boy in Turnberry than their lord. As Robert had gathered these scarred veterans in the dawn, he felt they listened to his orders out of duty, rather than respect. There had been no time to dwell on this, however, with the enemy advancing, the fields filling with their mass.
Robert had watched their approach in silence, his eyes on the banners of Mar, Ross, Lennox, Strathearn, Atholl and Menteith that followed behind a black standard bearing three white sheaves of wheat, the arms of the Black Comyn, who had taken his family’s lands. Menteith, once their ally, had been succeeded by his red-haired son. Robert remembered Menteith’s son from the gathering in Turnberry, sitting opposite him at his father’s table. Who would have thought he would be facing him across the walls of an English city, or the fiery Earl John of Atholl – his own brother-in-law? Of them all, though, it was the banner of Mar that was the hardest for Robert to behold. Earl Donald had been one of his grandfather’s closest comrades and it was the earl’s sword that dubbed him on the day of his knighthood. He was wed to Mar’s daughter and his sister, Christian, was married to the earl’s son and heir. It seemed inconceivable that this elderly man, whom he’d always thought of with great fondness, was now seeking his destruction. But the truth of it was there in that standard, lit by the glare of the fires. His grandfather would be twisting in his grave.