Freedom's Sword, a Historical Novel of Scotland

by JR Tomlin

  "Ready, lad," Andrew said. He stood in his stirrups. Cressingham's horse reached the shore. "Now!"

  The trumpet blared, once, twice, thrice. Wallace waved his huge greatsword and bellowed a command as he pelted towards Stirling Bridge. A thousand voices joined him. Others ran from the other side, flanking the English from both sides.

  The knights charged the schiltrom. Horses reared and screamed as they hit the pikes. The mob of knights spread, turning, circling, shouting. A wave of knights wheeled their horses and set them to a canter, racing towards Andrew and the banner that flew over his head. Andrew lifted his sword and shouted, "Scotland!" Other voices took up the cry. Hooves pounded. A blade screamed against his. A lance thudded against his shield. Waltir reared his horse beside him, slashing down at the foe. Andrew rode down an unhorsed knight, opened another from armpit to crotch, glanced a blow off a helm. He moved his head from left to right and back again to see through the slit of his helm. No sign of Cressingham. He spurred his horse, trotting over a scatter of corpses. His mount leapt a dead horse. "Scotland!" his men shouted raggedly. The pikes square held. Knights died, sharp steel ripping through their bellies.

  A splintered crash rang across the battlefield. One side of the bridge went down. "Scotland! Scotland!" a voice shouted over the others. Wallace is bringing down the bridge.

  Andrew laughed. Parts of the bridge were sinking. A groaning filled the air like the death cry of a giant. A knight rode at him and hacked at his shield. Someone thrust a pike up under the knight's arm, lifting him from the saddle.

  There was a crack as loud as thunder. The bridge broke apart. Men thrashed and screamed as they were thrown in the river. No more can cross. They will watch half of their army die, he had time to think. We have them!

  Men came at him. He swung at them, killed them, wounded them, rode over them. Cressingham. Where was the villain? He found more to kill. He lost his sword, jerked from his hand in a dead man's chest. He grabbed another as its owner fell. He swung it, scything, shouting a curse. Men ran from him and he rode them down. Time slowed and blurred and stopped. There was nothing but now. A blade to swing. Only his blade and the foe. This man. And this man. And this man. He laughed as he hewed. A knight grabbed his reins and thrust a sword in his face. He knocked the blade aside and buried his in the man's throat. His arm was red to the elbow, dripping gore.

  Someone shouted his name through the din of battle. Waltir was lost in the chaos. The ground was sodden with blood. His charger leapt over a corpse, splattering muck. He rode past a banner of Saint George planted in the mire and hacked it down with a swing. A man crawled from the river, coughing up a gush of water. Andrew rode him down.

  There, on his black warhorse, was Cressingham, ponderous in his gleaming armor, beyond a score of knights, boiling around him, hacking to get free. Cressingham jerked his horse in a circle, plunged into the edge of the water. The horse balked and reared. He wheeled. "To me!" he screamed. "To me!"

  To him, indeed. Andrew grinned beneath his blood-splattered helm. Mine! He sped to a canter.

  A knight thrust at his chest. Andrew lashed out, knocking the sword aside. He was surrounded by three knights, but only reaching Cressingham mattered. He lopped the head off the first lance that came at him and raked his sword across a face on the backslash. Reared his horse and its hooves crushed a chest. The third, tall and spare, met him sword in hand. Steel rang upon steel. His slash was blocked. Hard and fast his cuts came. Another man swung. Andrew dodged to the side. The tall man grinned as he closed in. Andrew lunged and struck, quick as a snake. He buried his sword in the man's head.

  As he jerked his sword free, Cressingham's voice rang out, "Die!" A blade speared into his belly--cut through steel and gut. A blaze of pain. If he went down, he would be dead and Cressingham would live. His mouth filled with blood. St. Andrew, aid me.

  He gripped his sword, clutched it like a drowning man. There was nothing else. His sword. His foe. He kicked his horse. His blade plowed into Cressingham's jowls. Andrew gave a rasping scream as he stood in his stirrups and clove him down to the breastbone. Blood rushed out in a hot crimson gush. Cressingham collapsed, Andrew's sword still in him as toppled face forward.

  Andrew grabbed for his horse's mane as the animal trampled Cressingham's body under its hooves. He was falling.

  He slammed onto the ground so hard the world shuddered. His body was numb, his hands empty. He tried to roll to the side. He could not get up, not even stir. Men and horses loomed around him, immense then strangely smaller. His vision blurred, and pain hammered his belly. He coughed, choked. The copper taste of blood filled his mouth.

  It grew quiet. Had the battle ended? All he could see was the sun blazing overhead, a ball of molten gold. A satire fluttered beside it. Then a young face was over him. "My lord," Donnchadh said. "Don't try to move. You are sore hurt."

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  Naked and alone he lay in a dark forest. Oh, merciful God! He had been here before. The giant pines--a barrier around him, the black shadows. On his back, he tried to move, to escape but something held him down. Hooves thudded in a carpet of needles.

  "No!"

  His father's men rode out of a black. Streaming cloaks of black shadow, eyes burning red in the dark.

  He scrabbled his hands against the soft ground, eyes darting, trying to push himself away. Aonghus. Brian mac Domhnaill. Lochloinn mac Rauri. Dozens behind them. A wall of ghosts--men he'd led to their deaths.

  "Why?" he begged. "I fought them. You know that I fought them." They surrounded him. His blood thudded in his ears.

  "Too late." Aonghus said sadly. "They spat on our graves." When they drew their swords, it was like ice shattering. "You let us die."

  They swooped down on him and he threw up his arms. "No!" The sword ripped though him. He screamed from the pain. It tore through his guts. Again and again. His bowels gave way.

  Angry hands held him down. He choked on something sweet and the swords drifted into mist.

  The sword through his belly rose against a hot sky. Corpses were strewn over the battlefield. Monks in white robes were stripping dead men of their weapons and armor. He watched the naked bodies carried by arms and legs to be tossed into wagons to join their fellows.

  So many dead. Are they all my men? The corpses swung limply as they were carried, swollen with gas so that they no longer looked human. He lay amongst the bodies. When he grasped the sword in his belly, he arched and screamed from the pain. He must have it out.

  "Help me."

  The monks walked past him. "We can't take you. You're not dead."

  Fluttering in a wind that stank of blood and shit, pennants flapped, ragged and torn, decorated with black stars, lions shorn of their claws, a satire with its blue running like blood. Armor, stripped from the bodies, was slashed and broken. Metal and cloth were thrown into a pyre putting forth a black column of smoke and white-hot ash. Are these my men? He struggled to remember.

  He would have asked one of the white-robbed monks, but, when he opened his mouth, only his moans came out. If he got the sword out of his belly, perhaps then he could ask. Mother of God, how it hurt.

  A silent battle raged not far below. Men surged back and forth. They hacked in a dead silence. One of his men would draw the sword out. He crawled to the battle, but it faded to smoke.

  It was night when he awoke again. A candle burning nearby threw a yellow light over dark hangings. He was lying in a bed, a pillow under his head. Not mine... Where am I?

  It was hot under the heap of blankets that covered him. Sweat trickled down his face. Fever. Woozy, he was too weak to fight the agony eating through him when he struggled to move. His belly burnt. The rest of his body seemed to float. How did I get here? He tried to remember. The fight at Stirling Bridge came back to him as fragments and shards. The glittering knights, the rumble of hooves as they crossed the bridge, their crash into the schiltron, impaled horses screaming, Wallace destroying the bridge and holding the flank.
Cressingham's blood gushing.

  Alone, in the dark, he fell back into a sweat-drenched sleep. He dreamed that Wallace was standing over his bed and Robert de Bruce with him, whispering together. It had to be a dream. His uncle looked down on him as a monk pulled back the blankets and sucked a breath through his teeth. Others came and went. They talked but their voices were like a noisy river burbling over rocks, and he couldn't understand them.

  He dreamed he was home in their bed, the curtains pulled and the sweet scent of the salt sea and sex all around him. Caitrina curled against his side, her red hair spilling across his chest. He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her against him, burying his lips in the curls. The swish of the waves drifted up from the firth, and a pine knot snapped on the hearth. Her soft body was a wonder to him as he ran his hands up her side. He cupped a breast in his hand. Lazily she wrapped her arms around his neck. "My lord husband," she whispered. "Andrew, don't leave me."

  "I'll come back. I promise." Tears wet his neck. But her face dissolved, fading like the others into mist. When she was gone, he could still hear the echo of her voice.

  "Andrew. Can you hear me?"

  Through the fog of drugged sleep, he saw a tanned face leaning over him. He was in a bed, but not theirs at Avoch Castle. The face was not hers; it was tanned, a tonsured head. "Where..." A croaking sound came out.

  "Drink this," a voice answered. "You're at Stirling Castle. It surrendered after the battle."

  The voice was familiar yet it took Andrew a moment to fight his way through the fog. "Uncle," he said groggily when it came. Water moistened his lips. He touched his uncle's hand. "You're real." A nest of vipers writhed in his guts. They struck and struck and struck again. He grabbed his uncle's arm and dug into the flesh.

  "I'm sorry, Andrew." David put the cup to his lips and tipped a little in. "Poppy soon. It will ease you."

  "No." Sweat ran down his face, but he had to know what had happened. Had to.

  He sipped the water. His stomach heaved trying to bring even that back up, and the cramping brought another surge of pain--fierce and hot as a forge. Panting, his body convulsed with it.

  There was the sound of the door opening and footsteps. "How is he?" It was William's growl.

  "I'm. Here." Louder this time.

  William came to near the foot of the bed and knelt.

  "Quickly, William," his uncle said.

  "Andrew..." Wallace passed a big hand over his face. "God ha' mercy, how can I do this? I need your seal, Andrew. Letters--sending out the news that Scotland is free again. They need your seal to them along with mine."

  "It wasn't a dream." He wanted to smile but the agony twisted his mouth, he knew, and his breath panted. "Take it. Use it."

  Wallace squeezed his leg and started to rise.

  "The Bruce. Is he here?"

  "Aye, he is. Brought his men from Annandale, two thousand strong."

  "Get him." He managed another swallow of water but gagged on it.

  "Easy, lad," his uncle said and slid an arm under his shoulder. He put down the water and used a damp cloth on Andrew's face to wash off the sweat.

  "Feels good." He closed his eyes for a moment.

  "Andrew..." His uncle cleared his throat. "I must give you the rites."

  Andrew opened his eyes. The room wavered and his head swam. "Caitrina. Oh, God." A sob shook him and he fought it more because moving filled him with pain than from shame to weep. How could he hurt so much? "The bairn." He could feel the strength pouring out of him like wine from a shattered flagon.

  "Hush. I will care for them. That I swear to you."

  Robert de Bruce opened the door and strode in, light coming around him. "Andrew." He shook his head. "You won. I didn't think it could be done. No one did. Pikesmen against knights. You proved us all wrong."

  Andrew licked his cracked, dry lips. "William... You... knight him."

  The Bruce looked over his shoulder, frowning. "Wallace?"

  "Do it." His mouth had moved. Had the words come out? He wasn't sure above the sound of rushing water. Where was there water? He tried again. "Make him Guardian."

  "Hurry," a voice said. "We haven't time to argue."

  The Bruce's head bent over him, fair hair gleaming like a crown. A hand touched his shoulder. "Rest easy. My most solemn oath, by St. Andrew and the Holy Virgin. Leave all to me, my friend."

  He struggled to raise his hand to take the Bruce's, but it didn't move. "A king..." He gave up the effort, and, strangely, the Bruce was gone. His body floated; he could hardly feel it at all.

  His uncle was saying something, touched his forehead with oil. "Forgive me," Andrew whispered. He had told her he would come home. Too much left to do... The English would return, and he would be gone.

  "Miserére mei, Deus..."

  "I promised..." With a sob of grief, Andrew de Moray went into death.

  Epilogue

  August 1314

  Robert de Bruce, King of the Scots, nodded in satisfaction as he watched smoke rise in a thick, roiling column before it spread across the sky. A rumble shook the ground. With the beams burned, an outer wall of Stirling Castle tumbled to its death--the last of the great Scottish castles he had at last seized from the English. Oh, they would return. But they would not take Stirling Castle or use it against him and his people.

  It seemed as though a thousand years had passed since, riding hard with a handful of men to join William, Lord of Douglas at his Ayrshire camp, he had first raised his banner against the conquering Edward Plantagenet. William Douglas... who was long since dead in an English dungeon and Douglas's young son his captain for seven years now--a man nearing thirty, called the second knight in all Christendom by some--by those who called the king of the Scots the first.

  He turned at the drumbeat of hooves and raised his eyebrows at the sight of James Douglas, riding in at a canter followed by a score of his men on rough-coated garrons. When James reached him, he pulled up his lathered mount and bowed over its neck. "An English party approaches, Sire, with the lad."

  "Only him and no others?"

  "Aye, but the others have farther to come. My men have orders to send word to me by the fastest mount as soon as any cross the border."

  The king nodded. "If they want the Earl of Hereford and the others back with their heads attached, they'd do well to heed my warning. I give you my word on it. They shall not see light of day until our own are returned to us."

  James flashed him a look, and the Bruce followed the thought in his eyes. How many captured Scots had the English put to most cruel execution? William Wallace... His own three young brothers... Sir Alexander Scrymgeour... The Earl of Atholl... Sir Simon Fraser... More loyal Scots and dear friends than he could count...

  Yet, he wouldn't serve thus those he'd captured at the Battle of Bannockburn, as they deserved. No, revenge was past seeking. There wasn't enough blood in the world to repay what this war had cost. Instead, he would force the English to return Andrew de Moray's lad whom they'd kept locked up for ten years and his wife, and his daughter and the other women, children and priests whom they held. Better to rescue the victims than seek vengeance.

  "There," James said.

  Around a bend in the road, horsemen came into view, perhaps fifty in all, led by two men brightly clad. In this day of the Lord's grace, no party rode across Scotland except well armed, so their armor and weapons clattered as they came.

  As they neared, a rider at its head left the group and came at a gallop to meet him, gold hair and dark cloak flying in the wind. The lad reined up sharply a few yards away and leapt down so that he was standing wide-legged, tense faced, panting a little. For long moments, the lad gazed speechless, with an intensity that was painful to see.

  Robert de Bruce took a step towards him. "Welcome home, Andrew."

  Andrew's mouth moved though at first words did not come. "Sire... Your Grace..." He looked around as though drinking in the sight of the pines, the heather, Stirling town in the distanc
e. "They told me--of the prisoners you took at Bannockburn. They said that you demanded my release; I could not believe it. That I would be free."

  The English party came jingling up and halted just short of young Andrew de Moray. He looked over his shoulder at the gray-haired knight who led them. "Here is Sir Roger Northburgh who was my..." His mouth twisted. "...my host these past years."

  The Bruce bit back angry words. What was the point? Northburgh had no doubt followed the commands of his own king. Young Andrew was not the only child they'd imprisoned these many years. It was over and past mending, except to get them home.

  The man frowned and shook his head. "I dealt with him as kindly as I was allowed, my lord. I've no taste for ill-treating children."

  James Douglas nudged his horse forward, gripping the hilt of the sword at his hip. Through gritted teeth, he rasped, "You will give the king his title. Or you will see a dungeon, Sir."

  The man's face drained of color. "I beg his grace's pardon. No offense..."

  "You may go." The Bruce gave an abrupt gesture of dismissal. "Mark you, though. The other prisoners had best be returned to us. Promptly. You have a month or Hereford and the others will meet my brothers' fate. I've sworn it." As the men turned their horses to leave, he said, "Come here, lad."

  The Bruce gripped the boy by the shoulders; he was wide-eyed and a little white around the lips. "Never doubt that had it been in my power, I would have brought you home sooner. Now I'll return you to Bishop de Moray and your mother."

  Andrew's color was coming back, but he swallowed hard. "My father's uncle? My mother? They're here then?"

  "They will be. You've arrived before them." The Bruce smiled and gave Andrew a gentle shake. "How does it feel to be home?"

  "It's a wonder. It smells like home. Isn't that strange, your grace? The scent of heather and salt sea. It's what I remembered most."

  James Douglas smiled, a soft smile for so feared a warrior. "Not so strange to me. I remember that from when I returned home from exile as well."