Black Douglas (Coronet Books)

by Nigel Tranter

  Will did not hesitate, however dizzy. He had an unexpected second or two, and had no doubts about how he should attempt to use them. The bull’s tail-lashing rear was towards him. Running the two or three steps towards it, not away from it, he hurled himself in a great vaulting spring up on the brute’s heaving back.

  He knew that there would be swift reaction, but he was scarcely ready for the immediate and violent convulsion, as the animal arched its back steeply, thrust down its head and threw up its hindquarters. Only the shaggy mane saved him from being tossed forward right over those weaving horns, providing something for him to grasp with deep-clutching fingers, while he dug in thighs, knees and ankles with all the tenacity that was in him. Even so, he sprawled forward over the brute’s neck, slewing sideways as it bucked and shook itself. He all but lost his grip on his sword, as he clutched at the mane, only just saving it. Face buried in the creature’s coarse, strong-smelling hair, he clung.

  As well, in being thrown forward, his legs had been forced higher, however unhelpful this was towards his ability to cling — for the bull was lashing its head sideways, now left, now right, in an attempt to hook him off with its great horns, and would almost certainly have been able to reach his legs otherwise. As he sought to straighten up, Will saw that he dare not lower his legs to a more secure and natural position.

  He saw more than that. He saw that anything he might do he must do quickly, for the chances of maintaining this position on the see-sawing, heaving back, for more than a few moments, were negligible. Sprawling there, he took a grievous chance. Releasing the grip of his right-hand fingers, which clutched mane as well as sword-hilt, he tossed the sword up, to grab it again part-way down the blade — and almost bungling it, thought himself for an evil moment as good as carrion, with his horse and hound. But his fumbling clasp enclosed the steel again. The sword had been too long, before, to use effectively in his present contorted position. Now, twisting sideways, so that he could strike further back, he drove the stabbing blade down with all his power.

  He felt the bull beneath him wince and quiver to the wound. But he felt also the jar of steel on bone, and groaned aloud. He had not struck far enough back. That would be the shoulder blade.

  The brute’s jerkings and lashings and twistings reached new heights of frenzy, and its assailant would probably have been off had he not now something else to cling to — the sword itself, half-buried behind the creature’s shoulder. Hanging there like a limpet, he gasped deep breaths before seeking to make another attempt. He was aware of horsemen milling around him now, but aware also of how little anyone else could do in the situation — save only perhaps distract the bull’s attention a little.

  It may be that this was to some extent achieved, for Will thought that there was a momentary relaxation in the beast’s furious efforts to dislodge him. Not wasting an instant of it, he sought to withdraw the sword — but found it more difficult than he had bargained for, in maintaining his awkward position. Cursing, he tugged. His right knee was cramping.

  He got the sword out, and reaching further back still, but with a more forward-probing thrust, drove in the blade again, deep as he could.

  The bull heaved, staggered a little, and coughed hugely.

  That was the lung, he guessed — not the heart. Will sobbed another curse. Should he try somewhere else? The throat? In at the ear? Or the eye? He could not risk that, on the tossing jerking head. There could be little of the required accuracy in such stabs. Anyway, he was too far back, and dare not edge forward.

  He was tugging out the blade again, his fingers sticky with the blood that was flowing from his hand, lacerated by his own steel, when he perceived that there was a new motion in the brute beneath him. It was running now, bucking and tossing head and hindquarters as it ran, but running. And in a more or less straight line, not turning and pivoting in circles. Tripping too, and coughing and roaring, sore-wounded; but there were still great reserves of strength in that massive body.

  The creature was heading uphill again, back towards the huddled cows and calves. Will Douglas did not require his brother Archie’s shouted warning to inform him that the bull was not bolting, running away, seeking refuge in the herd. It was the tree that it sought. This was a forest bull, bred amongst trees. It would use them to rid itself of its enemy, to brush him off against the pine trunks.

  In no doubts that if the animal once got him amongst the timber it would be the end of him, the young man recognised equally clearly that, if he threw himself off into the heather, the bull would almost certainly round swiftly upon him and he would be at the mercy of those daunting horns. The foresters were carrying bows and arrows — but could he rely on any of them, once he was off the brute’s back, to put an arrow accurately into a vital spot of a running bull, before it could gore him? He knew the answer to that, also.

  There was only one advantage left to him; with the beast heading determinedly for the trees, it had stopped lashing its head from side to side. He could risk sitting up, instead of half-crouching, half-lying — and so be in a better position to use his sword. He raised himself almost to the upright. In that improved posture he could wield his blade much more effectively. He drove it down vehemently into the body beneath him. Again and again he struck, seeking the heart.

  When the bull started to lash its head again, and to circle in its tracks once more, triumph began to swell within Will Douglas. He had to raise his legs again — but he could feel that the animal was stricken. Its rush, as well as losing direction, had changed both momentum and character. Its motion was now a scrabbling unsteady run, constantly tripping in the heather. The great head, though swinging still, drooped now; heavily. One of the thrusts must have reached the brute’s vitals.

  The end came suddenly, without warning. One moment, the bull was still running and heaving, the next its forelegs had buckled under it. Over and down it crashed, its horns ploughing into the heather and peat, hindquarters still upright.

  No amount of tenacious clutching could hold Will on that collapsing back. He was thrown violently forward, and hit the hillside more awkwardly than in his previous fall. But the tough, springy heather saved him. Shaken, the air knocked out of him, he sprawled there.

  But only for a few seconds. He was already rising when eager hands reached down to help him up. Roughly he pushed them aside and staggered to his feet unaided, gasping for breath. He turned to stare. The bull lay a couple of yards from him, sides still heaving but mouth open and a scarlet stream of blood flowing from it. Even as he gazed the red-rimmed, angry eyes seemed to lose their heat. With a choke and a great shudder the brute died.

  His three brothers were round Will, loud in exclamation; James anxious, apologetic, declaring that he was ashamed of himself, asking if Will was hurt; Archie, the twin, laughing, clapping him on the back, vowing that it was well done — but why in the name of all saints hadn’t he hamstrung the creature before he jumped on its back, that time? And young Hugh, only fifteen, choking with mixed excitement and adoration, gabbling praise.

  Will Douglas ignored the last two, but swung on the shamefaced Jamie. Dark eyes blazing, he threw down his dripping sword, and clenching the bleeding hand, swept his fist up in a fierce buffet towards his brother’s cheek. Only an inch from the other’s face he managed to check the blow — and the fist quivered there for moments on end, scattering red drops on James’s flinching jaw. Then the obvious effort succeeded, and the hand dropped to the other’s shoulder and half-shook, half-patted it. Then thrusting his brother aside, and ignoring the other two, Will strode off. He was like that, a young man of vehement impulse, not always effectively controlled.

  Pausing for a moment beside the bull, he looked down at it, biting his lip. He stooped to touch, almost to stroke, the great horned head, not in any naked triumph now but with a sort of compassion, regret. One of the foresters spoke, in respectful congratulation. Will answered nothing, stalking off across the heather. A hound, which came near to fawn on him, he kicked a
way savagely.

  He made for where the sorry remains of the dead deer-hound lay in a shambles of blood and guts. Kneeling down, he raised the dog’s shaggy grey head, putting his arms around the neck, regardless of the gory mess which fouled him.

  “Luath! Luath, my hero!” he cried, rocking the carcase like a baby. “You only! You only of them all dared the onslaught. You only put courage to the test. I might have known it, old friend.” Tears streamed down his darkly handsome, almost swarthy features, unchecked. He did not try to hide them. “Great Heart — we will hunt together some other day, some other where, you and I! . . .”

  His voice broke. He laid the hound down gently, and rose to his feet, dashing the tears from his face now, and strode back towards the others. That also was Will Douglas.

  Young Hugh brought him his abandoned sword, almost reverently; Jamie had torn a strip from his shirt to bind up the bleeding hand; and Archie made a somewhat offhand offering of his own garron. Will accepted all without comment, as his due, almost impatiently. He shouted to the chief herdsman.

  “See to all this carrion, Wattle. I want the bull’s horns. Bring Luath to me at the castle, treated honorably. These others will bring down the cows and calves.” He mounted the garron a little stiffly, for he was bruised, and turned to his brothers. “Come, you.”

  Archie mounted on Hugh’s beast — though making the younger boy ride pillion — and the four Douglas brothers on three horses rode away from the scene of the encounter, down the long slope of Fastheugh Hill, eastwards, the sun at their backs now.

  “Will — do not be sore at me,” James pleaded, spurring alongside. “I am sorry. I did not see yon edge. I was watching the cattle . . .”

  “Your folly cost me Luath!”

  “Aye. But that was scarce my fault. If you had left the bull to me . . .”

  The elder youth’s bark of laughter was mirthful rather than sour — but it brought a flush to the other’s cheeks nevertheless. “You? Leave the bull to you, Jamie? Sakes — it would have eaten you! I would still have had to slay it — but one brother short!”

  When James did not answer, Will turned to glance at him — and seeing the dark stain of humiliation on those comely, sensitive features, he reached out a swift hand to grasp and shake the other’s arm.

  “Man, man — take it not so hard!” he exclaimed. “You are something slow with the eye. And the sword. Likewise the spur! That is all, Jamie. With the pen, now — or the tongue, i’ faith — you have us all beat!”

  “Say it!” his brother cried. “Say that you had to save my foolish life. That I would be dead now, like Luath and the garron, but for what you did. Say that you must ever watch over men, like a bairn!”

  “Have I ever said that?. . .”

  “I will say it for you, Jamie — if you must hear it!” Archie declared from behind them, laughing. “Not a bairn, perhaps — but a clerk. I swear that you should have been a priest. You would do better, ‘fore God, in a cloister, than on the hill. And with a missal than with the sword! Aye — and it is not too late. You could be an abbot, yet!”

  James turned to look back. Twins are commonly notable for their sympathy, close in feelings as in looks. Not so this pair. They had a superficial similarity in appearance; both were dark — all the Douglases were that — and well built, though Archie was the taller and broader, even if Jamie the more delicately good-looking. But in the natures they were poles apart. Archie was bold, brash, forthright, seeing all in black-and-white, where the other was quiet, retiring, hesitant, introspective. That neither knew which was first-born was another barrier between them — for in that family such primacy could mean much. Not that the meditative James would have wished for it; but others were concerned, and to the out-going, vigorous Archie it was a matter of continual nagging moment.

  “What is wrong with being clerkly? With learning? With books?” James asked. “In the end, is it not men skilled in these that rule this realm? All realms? Who make the laws? Is not the good Bishop Kennedy the greatest man in Scotland?. . .”

  “Save us! You, a Douglas, say that? Kennedy, that wheyfaced priest! Only because he has king’s blood in him rides he so high. He does not rule, besides. Nor do law and parchments, his or others. The sword rules, here and always. Ask Crichton, that murderous hound! Ask the Chancellor what rules in Scotland. Ask Livingstone, who holds the King by his sword . . .”

  “For the moment these seem to triumph. But the pen will triumph over the sword, in the end. Always it does. Holy Church will still prevail when Crichton and Livingstone are as dead as our cousins . . .”

  “Holy Church! Think you prayers and mouthings will bring down these butchers? You are a fool, Jamie. Only a sharper sword, more stoutly and shrewdly wielded, will cleanse Scotland of the like. Pray God it will be a Douglas sword!”

  “There! You pray despite yourself! . . .”

  “Aye — a Douglas sword!” young Hugh joined in. “You can have your missals and prayers and books, Jamie. See what good they will do! When Douglas rides we will have no need of such, I say!”

  “When Douglas rides — heaven pity us!” Archie said, with something between a snort and a groan. “When! In that day, when we can raise our heads again and look other men in the eyes, it will not be learning and law that wins the day, that is certain!”

  “In that day, nevertheless, Douglas may be glad to have the support and prayers of Holy Church,” James insisted. “Call me fool if you will . . .”

  “I do! And worse, man. It is such talk and such feeble flinching that has brought up to this pass. Such spineless, craven sloth that had made the name of Douglas a spitting and a byword! You are little better than, than . . .”

  “I say so, too!” Hugh yelped excitedly.

  “Quiet Enough! All of you.” Will turned in his saddle. “That is no way to speak — and you know it. Enough, I say. Archie — you have a tongue like a bell-clapper! Mute it — or I will mute it for you! Hughie — there are words which should never be spoken. Our father is . . . our father. And none speak so of him in my presence. Mind it. Mind it well. Jamie — all agree that you are a fool! The more so that you must provoke your still more foolish brothers! A God’s name, be quiet — all of you!”

  Frequently the eldest brother had to speak thus. And when he did, in that tone of voice, it was seldom indeed that the others, even Archie, disobeyed. He was, after all, Master of Douglas.

  From the skirts of Fastheugh Hill they crossed over on to the flanks of Newark Hill. They were out of the heather now, and down amongst the open glades of birch and oak and hazel, where the russet of dead bracken was just beginning to show a rash vernal green, with April only a day or two off. At the burnside below the hill they turned along the track there, and Will, in the lead, kicked his beast into a heavy canter. There was no more opportunity for unsuitable talk for a while.

  The brothers had emerged into the broad open cattle-dotted haughlands of Yarrow, and could see the tall grey keep of Newark Castle, chief stronghold and messuage of all the vast Ettrick Forest, rising on its mound above the river half a mile ahead, when they saw something else. Three horsemen were riding by the waterside towards them, from the castle’s direction, not on any shaggy garrons these but handsomely mounted on tall horses — which looked weary by their pace however. The men wore morion helmets, and steel breastplates, with red hearts painted on them, front and rear, over the blue-and-white livery of Douglas.

  “That is Pate Pringle, the steward at Abercorn, I think,” Will said. “What brings him to the Forest? And in some haste, by the looks of him.”

  “No good, you may swear!” Archie declared sourly. “From that airt blow only snell winds.”

  None disagreed with him, on this occasion. For years the brothers had more or less run wild, here at Ettrick in the Middle March of the Border. Seldom indeed was there any communication between them and their parents, at Court or at the Earl’s favourite house of Abercorn in Lothian — and when there was, it was not usually t
o their liking. For too long they had been neglected and left to their own vigorous devices, to take kindly to any fiats of far-away authority.

  As the two groups drew near, it could be seen that the three newcomers were indeed travel-stained and weary, their horses sweat-streaked and flecked with spume. One was a big, burly, grizzled man of middle years, the other two ordinary men-at-arms.

  Warily the Douglas brothers eyed them. Pate Pringle, the big man, drew up a dozen yards off, and dismounted stiffly, heavily, to come forward on foot, while his companions sat their mounts impassive. The steward paced to Will’s side, took off his morion, bobbed his head, and awkwardly got down on one thick knee before the youth.

  “My lord,” he said hoarsely.

  Will, unused to such respectful greeting, nodded uneasily. “Aye, Pate. Well? . . .”

  The man cleared his throat. “My master, the Lord Earl your father, is dead,” he jerked, flat-voiced.

  “Dead! He . . . our father . . . is dead?” Will stared at the speaker, and then at his brothers.

  “Aye, my lord. He died last night. At Abercorn. We have not been in our beds. We rode before dawn, nor stopped on the way.” He rose to his full height again, and stepping closer, reached out to take Will’s right hand between his own two. Holding it thus, to the youth’s embarrassment, he bowed grey cropped head over it, and made a gesture at kissing it. “I am your lordship’s man, now,” he said.

  “But . . . how did he die? What does it mean? Was he . . . slain?”

  “Aye — was this more murder? Treachery?” Archie demanded. “Was it Crichton and Livingstone again?”

  “Not so. My good lord died in his bed. He has been ailing, mind. This long while . . .”

  “Nobody told us so.”

  The man looked down. “Maybe no’. But . . . my lord was sair burdened. For long. Yokit by the flesh. He hasna been the man he used to be, these many years . . .”