Worth Dying For (The Bruce Trilogy)

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  He put his hand in mine.

  “Up with you and let’s away,” I said. “I’m cold already. Can you hear my teeth clattering?”

  That night we dried ourselves by a roaring fire while rain drummed upon the tiled roof. I had the Earl of Ross, Randolph and Keith at my side now. While all might have appeared well and good, my heart was ever empty.

  Winter came on quick and fierce and when the New Year had just come, I received a letter from Rothesay telling of the passing of James Stewart. The signature at the bottom was that of Walter Stewart, the very lad who had once sat snotty-nosed and hollow-eyed at my knee while playing with my daughter Marjorie. Their childhood was long gone. James Stewart and I had made a pact. He had held up his end by sending me men and money, unable to join in the cause himself because of a long-debilitating illness that had left him weak of limb and barely able to speak. As for my end, how could I give Marjorie to Walter when she was being held against her will in England?

  I could break the chains that bound Scotland to England and free an entire people, but I could not bring my daughter – or my wife – home.

  Ch. 21

  Edward II – Wallingford, 1310

  The little virago had been scribbling a stream of letters to her doting father in France. I doubted that she was extolling the joys of wedded bliss to him. I suspected that she spoke against me. I knew it when I learned that King Philip himself had been corresponding with Robert the Bruce, petitioning the rebel to join him on Crusade to the Holy Land. Naturally, Bruce declined. Too fraught with English troubles, he said, to depart his country.

  In the spring of 1309, the impudent Scots even gathered in St. Andrews to convene a parliament. They declared that Robert the Competitor had owned the rightful claim to the throne of Scotland and thus his grandson, that murdering Judas, was his due heir. Providence, they babbled, was the reason for Bruce’s deliverance of their people. How conveniently oaths are tossed away like spent rushes when they no longer serve.

  When my bickering barons arranged enough money for it, I sent troops into Scotland that autumn. It rained so incessantly that the supply wagons could not go one mile without getting stuck in the mud. When Edward Bruce gave one of my lieutenants a sound thrashing in Galloway, his brother made him Lord of Galloway. The arrogance! The lords of England begged for a reprieve. With my begrudging agreement, a truce was signed to last the winter.

  We may have lost ground in Scotland, but at home I had won my battle. Perhaps my barons were pacified because they had been afforded some time to return to their lands to hunt in leisure or father children by the scores instead of freezing their cocks while standing up to their knees in Scottish muck; but whatever the reason for their goodwill, they eased from their haranguing and conceded to allow Brother Perrot to return to my side.

  When Piers and I met in Chester that spring, it was a glorious reunion, made all the sweeter by our troubles. Oh, the Irish air had put a bloom to his cheeks. Hours upon hours riding over the verdant countryside had streaked his hair with bands of gold. If he had suffered from the same melancholy I had, he showed no trace of it. In his arms, I again found heaven. And I knew that every argument I had engaged in, every enemy I had made in the effort, every pain I had ever suffered to bring him back was worth it.

  That summer at Wallingford, all the most skilled knights in the land gathered to tourney. Piers had already advanced far in the ranks when I entered his pavilion. He stood there rigidly, with his shirt pulled up to his midriff as he waited for his squire to tie his chausses. The boy, with the first fuzz of manhood on his chin but all the innocence of an angel in his countenance, crumbled to the ground at the sight of me. I gestured for him to continue his work. His fingers fumbled at the laces, but he somehow managed the task. Piers swept him outside with a wag of his hand.

  “How is your fresh young bride Margaret?” I pried.

  “Barren as a tilled field of stones,” he stated. “The stable groom she so fancies poked her but could not get her stuffed. Neither could the butler, the lute player nor the local monk. My bet was on the cowl. Abstinence does miracles for fertility. There are more bastards of priests in Ireland than sheep, did you know?”

  “I would beg you not to speak so ill of Margaret. She is, after all, my niece.”

  “I jest, Edward. Where is your humor today? Expelled in the garderobe with yesterday’s meal?” He sat down upon a stool to strap his poleyns over his knees, then put his spurs on. Arching an eyebrow at me, he shrugged limply. “And what of your brood bitch?”

  “Cold as the driven snow and twice as pure.”

  “Still can’t bear to bring yourself to bed her? Come now, you know how it’s done. It’s expected of you, begetting an heir and all that. Maybe we should pour some wine down your gullet and watch the dogs go at it to get you in the mood.”

  “I think that would nauseate me.”

  He stood and tapped me playfully on the cheekbone with the tips of his fingers. “You’re looking quite useless. Help me on with my mail shirt, will you? I have a pain in my shoulder from unseating that goat Lancaster.”

  “I’ll call your squire back in, instead. I’m due for an appearance. My pretty wife would rival Cleopatra and as a pair we are quite radiant.”

  “Twin suns? Blinding. Rather, a pair of peacocks, you are. Cheer for me.”

  “I shall.”

  “And the queen?”

  “If any petals fall across your path, they will not be from her hand.” I turned to go, then stopped as my hand parted the flap. “Make it look harder than it is. You enrage them by being so good.”

  “Perhaps they should put up more of a fight,” he rejoined with a boyish wink.

  Outside Piers’ pavilion my page fell in behind me flapping a fan of palm leaves to keep the flies away. Jankin followed close behind, mute as always. I made my way through the row of pavilions, all decorated with pennons of azure, scarlet, emerald and gold. Even though his tent was the next row over, I could hear cousin Thomas of Lancaster lamenting over his misfortune at having too many lances splinter and his horse shying at an inconvenient moment.

  “Hear that, Jankin?” I said to my manservant, who had startlingly red hair and ears so large they only accentuated his accursed looks. I kept him about because he seemed so utterly pleased to serve me, as if following in my steps somehow graced him. I stopped and glanced at him as his head, winged in appearance due to the ears, bobbed atop a neck as thin as a willow switch. The breeze from the flapping palm leaf cooled my face. “Our cousin the swine complains that it is only bad luck that caused him to lose the joust with Brother Perrot. A farthing says he could not knock an apple off your head if he were standing next to you.”

  As we began on our way back to the stands, a black horse led by a squire emerged from between two pavilions. The squire also carried one of his master’s shields. He paused and bowed to let us pass, but then at his left stepped a stunted knight in dazzling armor.

  “Greetings, Lord Pembroke,” I said as he bent at the waist as much as his armor would allow.

  His pinprick sloe eyes sparked with ambition. He shifted his black-plumed helmet to his other arm. “My lord.”

  I opened my mouth to wish him a soft fall, but thought better of it as I granted him a perfunctory smile and continued on my way. We strolled across the trodden meadow, which stank of horse manure and, as I reached the stands, all those nearby but for the queen rose until I took to my velvet-cushioned seat beneath the bright silk awning. To Isabella’s left was seated my stepmother Marguerite and my half-brother Edmund, who was trying to pick his nose without his mother noticing. She slapped his hand away from his face and chided him in her nasal tongue. I lifted Isabella’s hand and placed a kiss upon her ruby wedding ring. A year-and-a-half in England’s amenable climate and lively court had put some fill to her face.

  Above her knuckles, I said so only she could hear, “Your beauty and youth make jealous enemies of the sun and moon, my love.”

  “Who
is next?” was all she said.

  “Lord Pembroke and Piers Gaveston. The last joust. Pembroke is an excellent rider and although Piers matches him at the tilt, if it comes to swords... Pembroke is too short of limb to be of any threat. It shall be swiftly done then. Although Piers may draw it out, if only for our amusement.” Her eyes had glazed over at the first word, but I kept her hand in mine and leaned close to push away a curl of hair that had fallen across her forehead. Just as I did so, Piers rode onto the field at a full gallop. The gentle murmur of the crowd died. He reined before the queen and me, spun his horse in a right circle and then just as swift one to the left. He swept off his helmet and bowed in his saddle.

  “For my lady!” he declared. From his gauntleted hand he tossed a bouquet of roses.

  Isabella closed her eyes as she turned her head away and they smacked her in the cheek to drop at her satin-slippered feet. With a smoldering glare at him, she whisked her hand across her cheek. “Did you not think to pick the thorns first?”

  “An oversight, my queen,” I said, picking up the blood-red flowers and placing them gently in her lap as shaken petals fell from the stems. “His enthusiasm overcomes his good sense at times. There now, there is no mark on your fair skin. You are preserved.”

  Standing, I paused as the roar of the crowd grew. “Our best wishes to you, Lord Piers. The Earl of Pembroke is a worthy opponent.”

  A bustle arose at the far end of the tilt field and Pembroke appeared on foot. Unhelmeted, he walked the length with his squire, who led his horse behind. Pembroke’s black hair glistened with oil in the powerful noon sun, but he kept his chin low, glancing occasionally to either side, nodding here and there, flipping his hand in subtle greeting whenever a familiar voice called out his name.

  “My lord and most fair lady.” Pembroke bowed again and handed his helmet to his squire. Then he turned toward Piers. “May the better between us win.”

  “Veritably, I shall,” Piers said.

  With a smart kick of his spurs Piers was off to his appointed end of the field, where his squire hoisted a lance up to him. Piers flipped his visor down and shifted impatiently in his high-cantled saddle. Someone in the stands hissed at him and in moments it sounded like a pit overflowing with snakes as others joined in.

  Isabella tugged free the gossamer veil attached to the back of her coronet and rising from her chair she dangled it out before Pembroke. The inferno beneath my collar was not from the sun’s heat. Pembroke tied the veil to the base of his lance and mounted, then sped off to his position. In anticipation, the crowd cheered and stomped their feet. I shivered at the noise, remembering another tournament during my youth where the stands had collapsed and ten people had been crushed to death. Trumpets blared. The two horses pawed at the sandy ground. Their tails swished as Pembroke and Piers both started forward. The rumble of hooves was swallowed up by the din of the crowd. Lances dipped. Piers hunkered forward. Pembroke leaned slightly to his left to steady his aim. Closer, closer... There!

  The tips of their lances skipped off either shield and both knights continued on with barely a twitch. They wheeled around, checked their lances and began another pass. This time Pembroke veered away at the last second, so that neither lance made contact. The crowd booed.

  Piers flipped open his visor. “Hah! Joseph the Jew – you are yellow-livered, indeed. Aim at my breast you dastardly Christ-killer. Or did you lose your courage when you took a shit in the garderobe this morning? That mad cur Warwick bared more fang than you.”

  “Mad dog, you say?” the Earl of Warwick bellowed from the end of the next box of stands. “Rather a dog than the bastard of a hung witch!”

  Warwick had picked open a barely healed scab of Piers’ in that comment. Piers was never proud of his mother’s ignominious fate, but neither would he stand by and let such a jab go without parry. His visor clanged shut.

  “Why does he call him a ‘Jew’, mama?” Edmund asked his mother, as the two flashing figures sized each other and dug spurs into horses’ flanks.

  She shrugged. Her thinly plucked eyebrows met above a sharp nose in perplexity. “I do not know. Because he is dark? I would say he looks more like a Moor.”

  “What’s a Moor? Mama, what’s a Moor? Is my hair dark enough to look like one?”

  “Tell your brat to shut up and watch,” I growled.

  Marguerite’s lips snapped together like a beak preparing to peck away at insects. I leaned forward, clenching the arms of my chair. The lances fell horizontal. Piers took aim, putting all his weight and might behind the point of his long-reaching weapon. This time Pembroke rode straight and unwavering at him. Which lance struck first was impossible to say. Perhaps it was Piers’, perhaps Pembroke’s. Pembroke’s blunt-pronged coronel clicked at the joint of Piers’ visor. The contact resulted in a barely noticeable jerk of Piers’ head to the side – nothing more than a twitch. The slight sideways jerk, however, ripped the lance from Pembroke’s grasp. It spun end over end through the dust cloud of Piers’ thundering horse. But Piers’ lance had struck true to center on Pembroke’s black shield with a deafening crack. Pembroke was jolted into the cantle of his saddle. His torso swung to the right. His horse, feeling the lean of his master’s weight, veered away from the chaos.

  With deft ease, Piers wheeled his mount. In his grip, rested a splintered lance. He flung it to the ground with vehemence. Then in one great, scraping heave, he loosed his sword from its metal scabbard. He bore down on Pembroke, still tottering in his saddle. Piers brought his sword back. The move, however, was signaled too far in advance. Pembroke blocked his body with his shield, but the power of the blow lifted him from his saddle and hurled him to the ground. Pembroke lay motionless on his back, as Piers’ horse danced in an angry storm around him.

  “Get up, you bastard!” Piers roared. “Fight, God damn you, coward! I can kill you standing or lying down like a beaten dog, however you want it. But at least let them say you fought!”

  Isabella gripped my forearm as Piers slid heavily from his saddle, encumbered by the weight of his mail, and moved in on Pembroke. Piers held his sword straight before him in challenge.

  “Stop him,” my queen begged, holding her breath. “Stop him before you lose one of your best knights to some meaningless quarrel of names. Do it now.”

  I laid my hand over hers, caressing it. “We should wait a moment,” I said, “and give Piers the benefit of a fight fairly won. Allow him his victory and Pembroke his honor. Pembroke will yield... if he yet breathes.”

  All was silent but for the crunching of Piers’ steps upon the packed, sandy ground. He unbuckled his helmet and dropped it to the ground, sure of his win and wanting everyone there to see his face and hear clearly what he had to say.

  “Up!” Piers kicked Pembroke hard in the kidney. “Or yield to the greatest knight in all of England and Ireland: Piers de Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall!”

  Pembroke jerked sideways and curled into a fetal position, gasping for air. Slowly, he dragged his gauntleted hand across the earth and fumbled with his visor, opening it only partway. His features were compressed in pain. His eyes rolled up toward his brow. His mouth gaped open, but no words escaped. The man had been dealt a blow hard enough to knock the air and wits from him.

  His blade aimed at Pembroke’s heart, Piers strode closer. Isabella dug her fingernails into my arm.

  “Now,” she whispered.

  I grimaced at the pain and before I could respond, she had sprung to her feet.

  “He yields!” she shouted. “In the name of his queen, he yields. Put aside your weapon.”

  Piers snarled at her, wanting to disobey, but knowing better. Grumbling, he sheathed his sword and began to walk toward the royal stands. I rubbed at the half-moons imprinted in my arm, then stood and gestured to Piers.

  “Today, Lord Cornwall, you are our champion. Come and be showered with your prizes. A feast this night in your honor. Drink and dance. Hail the greatest knight in England!”

  I clap
ped my hands together, but only silence answered. I clapped and clapped until my hands stung.

  Pembroke’s squire was at his side now, removing his lord’s helmet. The rattling he received had proven to be only temporary, as minutes later his senses returned and he was carrying on some small conversation with a few friends who had rushed onto the field to aid him. Warwick and Lancaster were both there with him – Lancaster holding his shoulders so he could sit upright and Warwick offering him a drink of water from a cup. A suspicious circle already. And so stinking, bloody obvious.

  Oh, they hate him more than ever for bettering them so easily. Is a man to hide his talents to allow others the false security of believing themselves his equal? Jealousy is an evil monster. I shall keep Brother Perrot close at my breast, safe, for they will not raise their hand against their king, else they desire their own deaths...

  Not only in my homeland was I being assailed, but abroad as well. Whilst King Philip was consoling his shrew of a daughter, he was also corresponding with the Bruce. The greatest insult of all was that when he did so, he addressed the rebel as ‘King of Scots’. I spilled out my anger in ink to my Janus-faced father-in-law. He told me, demanded of me, summoned me to come to France and pay him fealty for the lands I held there. I am a king, rightly born and acknowledged by nobility and holiness alike, unlike that mink Bruce, who flouted his own word. It does not behoove me to scrape my knees before another king. If I stepped one foot beyond this realm, the Lords Ordainers would be there like starving buzzards to swoop down on Piers and strip the flesh from his bones while he yet lived.

  Westminster, 1311

  My barons would not relinquish Scotland and yet they would not pay the price to keep it. The price of guarding the entry to all of Scotland – the castles of Stirling, Edinburgh, Berwick – were the leeches that drained the lifeblood from England. I told them so, over and over until my teeth nearly turned black from fury and they could not, would not listen. Neither would they vote me the taxes to raise a proper army. And while this quarrel raged on, they rallied against Piers, accusing him of insolence and undue influence over me. They said that he took from my money chests as he pleased and called my jewels his own. Did they believe me so mindless that I could not choose my own company or loan a true companion a few trinkets of finery?