by Jack Whyte
Rob heard the meaty rip as the knife tore through the body, its exposed point strangely bloodless and bright between the dead man’s shoulders in the fading light; heard, too, the utter silence that followed, brief and quickly banished as a voice rang out in grief and fury and a third man sprang at the killer, whirling a short, broadbladed axe above his head. The killer, empty handed, did what Rob would never have expected. Instead of trying to leap away, he sprang at his attacker, almost on his toes, to place himself inside the axe’s sweeping arc. And as he went, quicker than thought, he snatched up the dead man’s swaying sword and thrust it straight-armed at his assailant, driving its point beneath the fellow’s chin. The blow was deadly, amplified by the momentum of both their bodies. The axewielder’s head snapped back as the blade pierced his neck, but his own hard swing and his determination were unstoppable. He was dead before his strike landed, but the lethal edge of his hard-swung axe took his opponent high on the shoulder, cleaving through cloth and flesh and bone and smashing him to the ground.
Another silence followed. Rob heard it clearly, as if in a waking dream. Sharp-edged yet less profound than the one before, it was disturbed by the shuffling of rapidly moving feet. All the men were moving quickly now, splitting into two groups and baring weapons, readying themselves to die if need be, crouching and sidling, searching for weaknesses among the others facing them. He heard his uncle shout in protest and felt himself pushed strongly back as Nicol stepped past him.
But the voice that stopped all movement was not Nicol MacDuncan’s. It was a roar of outrage, voiced by Angus Mohr MacDonald himself as the newly named Lord of the Isles strode into the gap between the opposing groups. He was closely followed by another Gaelic chief—defined as such by his dress and bearing— whom Rob had never seen.
Weaponless, MacDonald held his arms high, the look of fury on his face defying any to ignore him or challenge him, and the unexpected sight of him, appearing at that spot and in that moment, froze every man there. He was dressed splendidly, as he had been earlier that day when meeting with the King of Scots, in a bright, belted tunic of buff-coloured leather over a high-necked bright green shirt, with leather boots and leggings dyed to match. He looked every bit the Lord of the Isles, and no man there would meet his eye as he stood, arms raised, glaring around at the carnage.
“What started this?” His voice emerged now as a deep, angry growl, and no one answered it. He looked directly at one of the men in the forefront. “You, Donuil Dhu. What happened here?”
The man addressed, Black Donald in the English tongue, shifted from foot to foot, gripping his bared dirk, his eyes cast down before his leader. He muttered something to the ground.
Angus Mohr’s next words cracked like a thunderclap. “Look at me, man, and use the voice God gave you!”
Donuil Dhu drew himself erect and looked at his chief. “They had words,” he said. “Fergus and the Macdougall … Ill words.”
“Ill words … Ill words, you say?” The MacDonald scanned the crowd, and even from where he stood watching, Rob saw the fury in him, marked the bitter scorn that changed his voice. “Four dead men, over ill words?”
What he said brought frowns of perplexity to every face in the crowd, for all of them could see that the dead men numbered only three.
The thoughts of young Rob Bruce, though, had abruptly snatched his attention elsewhere. They had words … Fergus and the Macdougall. Suddenly Rob understood the bloodied corpses on the ground to be a mere consequence of who and what these people were. The MacDonalds of Islay and the Macdougalls of Argyll and Lorn were ancient enemies, goaded by mutual hatred bred and fed through generations of fear and well-deserved distrust. He had always known that; he had heard it spoken of throughout his life. The Macdougall lands lay to the north, largely on the western mainland bordering the MacDonald holdings in the Isles, and their people were a folk who, for a hundred years and more, had defended their long sea lochs against incursion and usurpation by MacDonald Islesmen. He knew that this spilling of blood was far from being the first such, but he nevertheless saw it as oddly inappropriate—the notion of irony lay years in the future for the boy—that this eruption should occur here in the neutrality of his mother’s Turnberry, and on such an occasion.
He sensed movement by his side and saw that Angus Og had moved closer, standing right beside him.
“Are you going to be sick?” Angus asked in a whisper, sounding both concerned for Rob and awestruck by what they had seen.
“No,” Rob answered, somewhat surprised that this was true. “Are you?” he whispered.
“No.”
“Who’s the chief with your da?”
“I’m not sure, but I think he’s the Macdougall.”
Of course he is, Rob thought. Alexander Macdougall was the King’s sheriff of Argyll and Lorn. And a strong Macdougall contingent had arrived with King Alexander’s party, that he knew. Since then, Macdougall’s followers and those of Angus Mohr had avoided each other. But it was clear to Rob now that the two rival chiefs must have been conversing close by when this fight broke out, and in apparent amity, since neither one was armed. And that explained how the rival parties had ended up together—each group was nearby as escort to its chief.
Angus Mohr’s voice suddenly rose again. “Hear me, all of you!” They were all watching him, not a man stirring, and he waved towards the bodies at his feet. “This is the worst kind of madness.”
Someone at the rear of the crowd dared to speak, muttering what sounded to Rob like an imprecation.
Angus Mohr stiffened, and his eyes sought among the crowd for the speaker. “Say that again.” His tone was reasonable enough, but Rob sensed pent-up anger lying beneath it. “Come, then. Speak up.”
Someone stirred towards the rear, glancing sideways at the man nearest him, and Angus pointed at the man thus singled out. “You. Iain. Was that you who spoke? What did you say?”
The man Iain, hulking and low browed, scowled. “Ye said four dead men. But that’s no’ right. There’s but the two. Tam’s no’ dead.” His speech was guttural, his words slurred and malformed, but everyone understood them.
All eyes went to the man felled by the axe. Sure enough, he was stirring, blood welling copiously but sluggishly from his shoulder wound, indicating that no artery had been severed. Someone hurried forward and knelt beside the man.
“Stand away!” Angus Mohr’s voice was icy.
The kneeling man looked up at him in astonishment, opening his mouth as though to protest, but his indignation withered before the chief’s flint-hard gaze, and he pushed himself erect and backed away as the Lord of Islay extended his hand. “Your dirk,” Angus Mohr commanded. “Give it.”
The other hesitated, then drew his weapon and held it out tentatively, hilt first. Angus Mohr took it wordlessly and reversed his grip on it, holding the point downward as he turned to face the man clearly dying on the ground nearby. Amid an appalled stillness he stepped forward, dropped to one knee, and used the index finger of his free hand to guide the dirk’s point to a precise point on the body beneath him. He gripped the hilt in both hands, braced himself above them, and thrust down quickly, the entire weight of his upper body behind the blade. The man on the ground convulsed, his legs kicking spasmodically, then went still.
Someone among the watchers moaned, a strangled, tortured sound, and Angus Mohr stood up and turned to them, his face white and expressionless.
“Murderers die,” he said, holding up his bloodstained hand. “It is the law, and I, his chief, have seen to it.” He waited, but no one moved or spoke. “He who takes any man’s life without just cause forfeits his own, and this man here killed twice, over ill words. You enjoy hearing ill words? Well here are more: two men were slain here needlessly and both were Macdougall. In redress, one MacDonald now faces his God, answering for the crime of that. But one is not enough. As I am your chief and that same God is my judge, one more of you will hang this night, for you were all involved in this abominati
on. I care not who it is, but one must die to make redress. Draw straws among yourselves, do what you will, but make your choice now.”
Rob sucked in his breath and held it, knowing instinctively that this moment was a defining one in the life of Angus Mohr. The new Lord of the Isles, at the very outset of his tenure, faced the threat of rebellion here among his own people unless he could convince them of the rightness of what he was proposing—and the outcome could alter everything in Scotland’s west. Rob felt, could almost hear, the drumbeat of a pulse in his neck, and the silence seemed to him to stretch unbearably as every man of the MacDonald group fought indecision, debated loyalty within himself, and searched for a response to something unforeseen, unimaginable. And throughout it Angus Mohr stood facing them alone, tall and straight-shouldered in the gloom of onrushing night.
“Angus of Islay!” The voice, loud and authoritative, was Alexander Macdougall’s, and all men’s eyes turned to him. “May I speak?”
“Say what you will.” Angus Mohr’s voice was harsh.
“I have no sympathy with what has happened here, but it was not one-sided,” Alexander began, turning to address the others. “Two of your number died, but only three men drew steel at the start, and the man who died last was fastest. Ranuff and Sian Morningstar were brothers, always hotheaded, as you all know, and that has cost them dear. And now the death of one more man has been ordained, a bystander like all of you, in expiation.” He stopped, and turned to look at Angus Mohr before addressing his own men again. “As witness to what has now been done and said, and speaking both as your chief and as high sheriff of Argyll and Lorn, it is my belief that the intent of that order is sufficient. All three dead men are gone and cannot be brought back. What’s done is done, and nothing worthwhile can be gained in throwing another life away solely to make amends.” He turned back to Angus Mohr and raised his voice yet higher. “And so, Angus of Islay, I would put to you two requests: take back your order on the hanging … And tell these men what we two have been doing while they waited on us.”
The MacDonald chief gazed at him in silence, his expression grave. Then he nodded. “So be it. No hanging will take place. And I thank you, Alexander of Argyll, for your forbearance.” He raised his voice. “Donuil Dhu, had you a fire back there?”
“Aye, lord, we did.”
“And have you readied torches against the dark?”
“We have.”
“Stir up the flames, then, and bring us some light, for soon we won’t be able to see a thing out here.”
As the guardsman hurried away to fetch the torches, Angus Mohr turned back towards the Macdougall chief, but stopped, catching sight of Nicol MacDuncan, who was still standing close by him, not having moved since the moment Angus Mohr arrived to stop the fighting. “Nicol,” he said. “How long have you been here? Come and join us. We may have need of an impartial witness.”
Rob felt a swelling of relief, for he had been worried that at this point—a natural end to one thing and the start of another—Nicol might remember that he and Angus Og were there and hustle them away to bed. Now, watching his uncle clasp his hands at his back and lean forward to listen to the two chiefs speaking quietly between themselves, he tugged at Angus Og’s sleeve, and they moved back quietly to disappear around the small grove of stunted hawthorn trees at the base of the hill, where Rob found a place for them to sit beneath the low-sweeping branches. No grown man would follow them in there, he knew. They would be safe enough, and still close enough to hear what Angus Mohr would say.
“Your da’s a brave man,” Rob said.
The other boy looked at him. “I know,” he said.
“D’you think he knew you were watching?”
Even in the dark beneath the trees there was sufficient light for Rob to see the small grin that twisted his friend’s mouth. “He scarce knows I’m alive. My da has too many grand affairs to tend to, to take notice of an ungrown, unimportant son. Don’t fret about my da seeing me. Look to your own father.”
While the boys were whispering, Donuil Dhu had returned with others, bearing lit torches that were quickly distributed. Now Angus Mohr MacDonald stepped among them again, taking his place this time within the half circle of flickering brands, his back to the boys. The others’ talk died away. Nicol MacDuncan, Rob noted, was no longer with them.
“Alexander Macdougall has asked me to tell you what he and I have spoken about today,” Angus Mohr began. “And I will. But first I must speak to you about yourselves.” He waited, hearing the curiosity in their silence. “You were hand-picked for this,” he continued. “Every man of you. By the two of us, Alexander of Argyll and Angus of Islay. That means we trusted you, above your fellows, to look to our safety while we talked.” He was speaking more quietly this time, so Rob had some difficulty hearing him, but he could clearly see what none of the others could see: the tendon-taut clenching and unclenching of the big man’s fists behind his back, concealed from everyone as he fought to control … What? Rob wondered. Anger?
“You were all with us this day when we met with the Scots King. You witnessed what we undertook, even if you did not understand all the words of it. I took up a new responsibility this day, to work with Alexander Macdougall who is sheriff of Argyll and Lorn, and I undertook it willingly, with an eye to your well-being and your families’. Between the two of us we swore to see to the peaceful governance of our lands in the west and northwest, Islay and Bute, Kintyre and Mull, Skye and Barra, Argyll and Lorn.” Rob could sense him looking each man in the eye, one after another. “On this day I, Angus MacDonald of Islay, was named Lord of the Isles by the King of Scots.” He took a step forward, closer to his clansmen. “I accepted the rank for the same reasons the Macdougall accepted his—honouring and being honoured by the King of Scots, who rules his people from Dunfermline. And I took up the responsibilities that accompany that title.”
Still the fingers flexed and clenched at his back. Macdougall of Argyll stood motionless beside him.
“Do any of you know what those responsibilities are? Or do you think, perhaps, that titles like Lord of the Isles and Sheriff of Argyll and Lorn come without any duties? Do you think me free of all obligation, now that I have a fine new title, or Alexander of Argyll? If you do, you are bigger fools than this day’s slaughter would make you appear.
“Your task here was to guard our privacy while we talked—not to fight among yourselves like diseased wildcats in some Highland cave.” Those hands at his back still flexing, kneading. “We had much to talk about, the Macdougall and I—still have—and little of it, you must know, for your ears and tongues to ken of. But we were speaking of an end to the warfare that has plagued our people for countless years. An end to hatred and needless, wasteful killing like this killing here. You wonder that I was angry when I saw it? Thank God instead that I was here to stop it before all of you lay bleeding.” He looked around at all of them, the Macdougalls as well as his own, and bellowed, “This folly, this madness, ends now! This minute! There will be no more of it, on pain of death. From this time forth, any fighting between the sons of Donald and of Dougall—any fighting—will bring death to the men involved. Do you hear that? Is it clear to you?”
He began pacing back and forth, holding himself straight as a blade and looking at their faces, watching for Rob knew not what, but then he stood still and added, in an almost whimsical tone, “It will not be easy.”
The listening men, hard, doughty fighters all of them, broke into sardonic laughter. It was not much of a jest, but it acknowledged the realities of who they were.
The MacDonald let them laugh, and when the silence had returned he repeated, “No, it will not be easy. But it must be done. We made agreement today to stop it, and to work together to stop it. And our solemn word was witnessed by this gathering of Kings, princes, and earls, from Scotland, Ireland, and England. We gave our bond, the Macdougall and myself. And within the same God-chosen day, your folly and these murders gave the lie to both of us, making us ap
pear fools and liars. If word of these events reaches the ears of any who is not here present, I swear every last one of you will answer to us in person with your lives. When I am done, you will take these three men and bury them, away from any watching eyes, and if any man asks after them tomorrow, you will say you know not where they went.”
A voice came from among the MacDonald men.
“Ye should’ve told us, Angus Mohr.”
It was the same uncouth voice Rob had heard earlier.
“They are not always right to call you daft, are they, Iain?” Again a ripple of laughter arose. “And what should I have said? That you were to have no more fights among yourselves with the Macdougalls? You would have laughed at me!”
They did, louder this time, and he waited for them to fall quiet. When he spoke again, Rob was aware of a difference in his voice, an altered, deeper resonance.
“Listen now. Much needs to be done after today’s great matters, and none of it to be easily achieved. We have old hatreds to bury, new alliances to forge, old customs to be abandoned and new ones to establish. We all—even you sorry rogues—stand now on the sill of a new age for our people. Our united people. This very day I pledged, on your behalf, to keep the peace here in the west, in conjunction with Macdougall here, for Alexander Canmore, King of Scots.” He whipped up a hand, intent upon silencing a protest that he believed must come, but no one even moved.
“Now, some may say—will say—that the Scots King has no presence here in the west, and thus no right to claim allegiance of any of us. Those people are wrong now and will be more so in time to come. Like it or not, Alexander Canmore is the King of Scots—it is his rightful title—and he claims this west of ours as part of his realm, with the full support of Holy Church. And that is a matter of great import. You might resent that, might deny it and rebel against it. But you will forfeit your own soul’s salvation if you do, in denying God’s own right to dictate the affairs of men.”