The Progeny of Daedalus

by Jeffrey MacLeod

  “The Scots didn’t have much chance. They were mainly foot soldiers who carried spears up to twenty feet long, as well some archers and light cavalry, but nothing to compare to the English. They were caught in the open and Wallace formed the spearmen up into something called a schiltrom,” and Dad started describing the formation with his hands, “a circle of spearmen, spears facing out like a large hedgehog – there were four of them. These were pretty difficult to break and were good against the English heavy knights in particular, but a schiltrom couldn’t move very easily without breaking formation and they were sitting ducks for archers. Edward had lots of heavy cavalry and over 10 000 Welsh longbowmen. Well, when the battle started, Edward sat back and shot the Scottish army to pieces, then as they started to break up he sent in his infantry and cavalry. The Scots must have retreated in some order though as the casualties weren’t as high as you’d expect, apparently, but on that day this man,” and here Dad indicated the grave in front of them, “Sir John de Graeme, was killed.

  “So I find it amazing that this is here. While just over there,” continued Dad, pointing to the High Street 30 metres away, “people are shopping and doing their banking and eating Gregg’s steak bakes, oblivious to the fact that this Scottish hero is actually buried right here – and was buried immediately after this famous battle, by William Wallace himself! I mean, 13th Century graves are rare enough, even when it’s someone no one remembers – some worn knight on a slab praying. But graves of heroes – there are hardly any. There is nothing like this for Wallace or Robert the Bruce, or even half the kings of Scotland from the middle ages. And here is this hero, in his original grave, buried straight after a famous battle by Scotland’s most famous legend, and hardly anyone knows about it!”

  Dad was extremely excited now and in send mode.

  “Think about it girls. He had lived and fought alongside the true William Wallace – not the character of legend or the movies. Not Mel Gibson and his misplaced kilts and blue face paint and Freedom! stuff. It was the real bloke. A bloke called William – John de Graeme might have called him Will or Bill or something. They must have talked, discussed, argued and laughed. They would have shared suffering and fears and after their victories probably got drunk together. They would have eaten together and probably cooked and been hungry and complained about rubbish food. John probably even had to wait around at times while William went and relieved himself behind the bushes!

  “And here he is, right here. Under this stone. And this stone, or the bottom one anyway, was put here while William Wallace looked on and probably cried.

  “John de Graeme must have been pretty tough. He had survived all the guerrilla fighting that he and William organised in the early stages of their resistance, and would have been in the thick of it at Stirling Bridge as well – in there in the swampy ground butchering floundering English soldiers. And it was here at Falkirk that he died. There is an old poet called Blind Harry and he wrote that as the Scots army disintegrated, de Graeme killed an English knight in single combat, before he was killed himself. Then Wallace is said to have carried him here – although I’m sure he had to use a horse as it’s a couple of miles – and buried him.

  “And here he is, right in front of us. Sir John de Graeme.”

  Dad was looking a bit teary, as he often welled up over stories he saw as noble. But there was excitement in his eyes as well as he turned to his daughters – and it would be fair to say that they were coming around to understand at least some of his excitement.

  “And you know what girls? You three might be able to actually see him! Just by touching this stone. Or maybe you’ll even see William Wallace himself!” Dad turned back to the tomb before him, looking at it somewhat longingly.

  “Well,” said Leda chirpily, “when you put it like that Daddy, it probably is worth trying at least!”

  Dad turned to her, smiling.

  “That’s my princess! Alright then – want to give it a go?”

  They all nodded and jostled one another towards the near side of the grave fence.

  “You won’t all fit on this side girls, one will have to go around the other side.”

  With a bit of a huff Ilia went around to the other side and, all three in front of the iron fence and looking in at their target, they paused.

  “I’ll look out for you girls. There’s no one around at the moment. But you’ll have to lie down and reach in through the bottom of the fence.”

  The ground was unusually dry for a Scottish spring day, but still a bit mossy from the damp winter. The girls were not too bothered though as the squatted down and each stretched an arm though the fence, reaching for the tomb. When they did this sort of thing they usually waited for each other so as to touch the object simultaneously. Leda was struggling to reach so the other two waited; in the end she had to actually lie down on the ground to get the stone within reach of her slim little arm.

  “I’m ready,” she announced, then all three of them stretched out and grabbed the side of the worn cold stone…

  There should have been a dramatic sound – a bang or thunder clap or great boom or something else – to appropriately narrate the shock of the transition from the bustling 21st Century town centre, to where the girls now find themselves. But there is nothing; just the shock.

  The reason it is so overwhelming is because the feedback from all the senses – sight, sound, touch, smell – change in an instant. The girls had made many of these transitions, but rarely across such extremes. You know how it is when you experience a sudden, deafening noise, completely unexpectedly, and the shock is overwhelming? It is because you transfer from one moment in which the sound stimulus to your brain is very mild, to the far extreme in which your hearing is assaulted with an explosion of noise that rockets that particular sense to the limits of its reception. It is a deluge of sound. And the quieter it is prior, and the louder the noise interruption, then the greater the shock that is engendered.

  This is the same when you experience visual extremes, transitioning from complete darkness to blinding light. Think of when you are in a pitch-black room and you have been for hours, your eyes totally adjusted, and then someone switches the light on without warning. In one moment your vision is non-existent, and in the next your eyes are blasted with so much light that they cannot possibly register any more. The eyeball is flooded with scorching whiteness, the retina literally detonates in response and the brightness seems to instantly gush up the optic nerves like a torrent and overload the part of your brain that recognises light. The shock is caused by a fanatical degree of change in sensory perception, from one moment to the next.

  For the girls, who move in time seven centuries in an instant, the shock is even greater. Sound jump; the background hum of car engines and horns and wheels on asphalt and shuddering diesel trucks and popping exhausts – it is all immediately gone. As are the voices and hard shoes on pavement and opening doors and rustling shopping bags. Instead there is a background of a sighing wind, birdcalls and fluttering leaves, but little else. The light is brighter; the sun is stronger on their skin and the breeze warmer. The claustrophobic enclosure of an urban town centre surrounded by walls and structures and tall buildings suddenly opens up to a wide and liberating expanse with vistas and distant horizons. The sharp lines and hard angles and artificial surfaces of dirty brick and grey harling and white-painted wooden frames and reflective glass and doors and gables and tall walls and guttering, these are replaced by the soft, gentle and irregular lines of trees and grass, of clouds, leaves and intersecting hills. The dull colours of pebbledash and asphalt and tiles and tin rooves and rubber tyres and footpaths, these give way to Nature’s soothing green shadows, a bright blue sky and, where the swaying trees stand, translucent emerald leaves shone through with light. And the smells of the city which we do not even notice any more, the exhaust and the acridity of spilled oil and diesel and petrol and trash and staleness – these are blown away by a light wind wafting across fresh fields of sw
aying grass, and bright new leaves, and cold chattering streams running through heather down the hillsides. All this and more – and it all happens in an instant.

  The girls are on a high hill in an immense land with a sprawling and dramatic panorama all around. To the north the ground falls away in slow, tumbling hills dotted with woods, down to a broad valley with the silver snake of a winding river. Beyond it a great wall of hills rises up and the girls recognise them immediately – the bare, brawny heads of the Ochils. In fact, by their position and distance, the girls know they are on the same hill which will be infested by Falkirk town, centuries later. To the West the great broad valley of the Forth and Clyde rivers extends through to the horizon, bordered to the north by the Ochils and then, further in the distance, the even more dramatic Trossarchs. To the East the valley opens out into the Firth of Forth, the great inlet of the sea that separates Fife from Lothian, creating the narrow waist of Scotland, and from there it extends out into the North Sea. All is green and beautiful and unspoilt. And around them, where the ugly urban sprawl of Falkirk had surrounded them in all directions, there are fields and woods of dappled shade, and sunlit grass in between. This was the Forth valley before it was scarred by pit villages and poor towns and industrial estates and refineries.

  But they are not entirely immersed in a pristine vista of virgin nature, as there is a small village of thatched stone that climbs up the slope behind them, to the south-east. This is the only evidence of the endeavours of mankind that they can see. There are no doubt other villages nestled in folds of the land – certainly Stirling should still be there, its fortified rock guarding the lowest crossing point of the Forth river – but from here nothing else can be seen. Perhaps at night one might see small yellow lights twinkling here and there, as fire or candlelight betray the location of settlements, or there might be curling spirals from cooking fires and hearths that give them away; but from this location and in broad daylight, this is the only human blemish on all this vast landscape.

  At this low end of the village is a church – the Church, they have no doubt. The many shades of the stone of the tower give it a somewhat inconsistent, haphazard appearance – the Speckled Kirk. However, all else forgotten, it is now the site of something rather special.

  In the churchyard is a large gathering of some hundreds of people – indeed there appear to be too many to have come from the village. Also, the demographic is imbalanced; most are men, and most of these are in some sort of armour. Here and there the sun gleams on extensive suits of steel – chainmail, breastplates, gorgets and vambraces. But most have heavy padded or studded hauberks or tunics. Over by the enclosure wall of the churchyard a great cacophony of shields and spears lean against it in neat order, ready to hand should need arise. On the far side of the church is gathered a collection of carts and pack animals and horses that must be the remains of the army baggage train. The most obvious thing among this crowd, however, is that every head is bear. No bonnet, no helm, no hat of any kind can be seen among the crowd. They are gathered in a circular mass, all looking inward, and at the eye of their attention in a small clearing a tall man stands, speaking.

  The girls have no doubt as to what this is, and are equally certain as to the identity of the tall man; it is the funeral of Sir John de Graeme and the speaker is his friend, Sir William Wallace, Guardian of Scotland.

  “Let’s get closer!” Ilia says eagerly; they are a couple hundred paces from the edge of the crowd and the speaker’s voice does not carry.

  The three of them run across the grass on this glorious summer day of 1298. It is only a matter of seconds before they are close enough to hear. The people are noticeably shorter than the girls would expect, indeed most of the men are no taller than Ilia or Danae; however, William Wallace appears as tall as legend holds him, a good head above his peers, and so he remains in clear view of the girls.

  He is a striking sight. Auburn hair flows to his broad shoulders; his jaw is framed by a close-trimmed beard. He is dressed head to foot in chainmail, the coif pushed back from his head and gathered in a cluster at his neck. Over the mail he wears a bright red surcoat, edged in blue and white, with a white lion rampant on his chest which, by the way it glistens in the sun, must be embroidered in silk or some other rich thread. But rich though it clearly is, it is now terribly stained with what must be the dirt and blood and gore of battle. His facial features are immensely strong, forged by a combination of genetic inheritance, an existence in which constant toil and sparse diets allow little opportunity to store fat, and a life lived with such purpose and drive that it has etched its intensity upon his face. And of course, the strains of the defeat at the recent battle, and the great responsibility he carries for this, are clearly manifested in his stern and grim countenance. But through all this the grief is what overwhelms, and his hard eyes red-rimmed testify to a loss that he cannot hide.

  For a few moments the girls are hypnotised by this man, as his resonant voice carries message to the gathered crowd. But they do not hear the words.

  Their attention shifts and they look around, taking in the spectacle. It is amazing – like being on a film set, but real. Most of the clothing is simple and coarse and clean; but some is quite gorgeous, and surprisingly colourful. There are greens and reds and purples, blues and yellows; cloaks and tunics richly fringed; belts and brooches heavy with ornate metalwork. But there is no tartan, no kilts, no bagpipes – and no blue-painted faces.

  “Dad would love this!” Ilia grins, her eyes glinting with excitement.

  “I’m loving it!” responds Danae emphatically. “We’ll just have to remember as much as we can and tell him all about it.”

  “Shhhhh!” Of all of them, the gravity of this occasion is least lost on Leda. She remains focused on The Wallace himself, her own little face set with concentration.

  Ilia and Danae exchange glances, then turn back to the speaker. They try, but they cannot understand what he says – which is strange, because usually, despite not knowing the language they hear, they can still understand the intent.

  “Do you understand any of it Ilia?” Even though they cannot be heard – indeed they are not really there in the normal sense of being – Danae whispers nonetheless.

  “None. It sounds a bit like Scots, but I don’t understand anything.”

  “Maybe we should ask our resident Scottish expert.” They both turn to their little sister.

  “Leda – do you understand any of it?”

  “Of course! Well, most of it. It’s a bit like when Ailidh puts on her strongest accent.”

  “Can you translate for us?”

  “Well yes, but I’ll miss it!” She looks to her sisters and then pulls a face that denotes accession. She tries to speak as much as she can in the pauses in his speech, and her translation is a bit broken, but the gist of it is this…

  “At Stirling it was John who wanted to go. The victory has been attributed to me, but we would not have struck were it not for John. We were on the Abbey Craig watching the English as they started to file back over the bridge. John could not contain his excitement. What fools! We have them! he kept saying. We have them. I was not so certain. It was still a huge army and their archers could shoot far over the river if deployed. But John did not want to wait. He wanted to go at them right then, as they withdrew. He was always most headstrong. And maybe it would have worked, but I deemed it too great a risk. We argued – we often did that over the years. I said we should wait, that the English were short on supplies and were weak and hungry, and that they might withdraw completely. Then we could follow them and harry them as they retreated back south. Maybe we would find an even better field to take them. But John would have none of it. He knew an opportunity when he saw it, did John.

  “Once they were back over the south side of the bridge, and it was clear that they were not packing to withdraw, I finally agreed. If they cross again today John, then we’ll have them, I said. We will do it your way. He was ecstatic. No sooner had I s
aid this than he rushed off and called the leaders together; he was never one to wait. Within a quarter hour he had the men in position and ready. And when the English did come back, he wanted to go straight at them again.

  “But this time I had my way. How much of the army do you think we can take, John? I asked him. In that position, down there on the causeway.

  “I reckon a about a third,” he told me. That was my reckoning too. So we waited. But I tell you, when he saw Cressingham crossing, he would wait no longer. I want him myself! he swore.

  “Well, the timing was about right, so we gave the word and set upon them. And I tell you the truth, there was none that fought harder or braver or better than John on that day. He was a man possessed with purpose. He knew we could do it and he drove and inspired every man to his best. But that was where John was at his finest, knee deep in the mud with sword and shield, enemy to his front and friends at his side. He never shirked a task or feared a labour, and there is no man I would have chosen above him to have at my side.

  “But in the retreat yesterday, I feared for him. I looked for him. I knew he would not give, not after what we had done together. Before the battle, we both feared we could not carry the day. We had not wanted to engage there, but there was no avoiding it. There is but one hope, John had said. We need to kill the King. And there is no doubt in me that it was that hope that kept John so late on the field. But we were pressed hard and there was no holding. Their cavalry were among us and the arrows were coming down like rain. Most of you were there – you know what it was like. But some of you were not and his story should be told to all. We worked our way back to the edge of the wood, and the men stopped there and held while I scoured the field for John. Then I saw him. On foot and alone, but face to the enemy. Mounted, a knight in the arms of Sir Colway bore down on him – but John took out the horse. Then Colway stood and John fought him sword to sword to the death, and brought down the only English knight to fall that day. But for John that was not enough and still was too slow to withdraw. I know in my heart that he still had hope to take Edward himself. The balls on the man! But the English errantry were surrounding him by then, and a thrust through his armour from behind brought down my brother.”