by Jack Whyte
“You have my thanks and gratitude, my friends, and I will detain you no longer. And now farewell.” He nodded with finality and deliberately turned his back on them, relieving them of the need to walk backward from the royal presence. As they clustered at the door in leaving, however, the King’s voice halted them.
“My Lord of Annandale! One more thing, if you will. And you, my lord of Carrick.”
The two Bruces turned back, leaving the others to depart, and as they neared him Edward sat down again.
“Tell me, my lord Bruce, have I your loyalty?”
Bruce, from the corner of his eye, saw his father draw himself erect, and Edward raised a hand. “Be at peace, Lord Bruce. I had no wish to insult you, but the question was necessary.”
Bruce saw the tightening of his father’s lips as the older man nodded. “Yes, my liege,” he said stiffly, “you have my total loyalty, given freely and under oath.”
“Good. I have a task in mind for you, and Robert here will witness my request, for I will not order you to do it. Will you renew that oath, publicly?”
“Of course I will, my liege.”
“It will do you little good among the Scots, I warn you.”
“I can do little good among the Scots as things stand now, sire.”
“Excellent. Then here is what I have in mind.” He surged up out of his chair and turned to stand behind it, leaning against it and looking keenly from one to the other of his two listeners. “I need a man whom I can trust absolutely in a certain place in time to come. Not today and not for several months, in fact. But the need is there and urgent.” He paused, eyeing the elder Bruce. “I would like you to accept an appointment as my royal Governor of Carlisle Castle. It is the only gateway to this realm’s northwest, and as it sits today it is vulnerable.” He raised a hand, holding up two fingers to forestall anything Lord Bruce might think to say. “I mislike this notion of a new council in Scotland, and Christ Himself knows the magnates have caused me grief enough up there already. And therefore there are things—the safety of the realm in that whole region—that I dare not trust to mere blind chance.
“I have to leave for France as soon as I may, with an army large enough to win a war there. That need is far beyond debate. But some of my own barons are set to cause me trouble, the last thing I need. They disagree with my assessment of the need to bring the war in France to a quick, decisive end.” The contempt with which he emphasized the word was withering. “They can see no farther, in truth, than the insides of their sweaty purses, but they have somehow convinced themselves that my French concerns will look after themselves, without their stirring from their fat arses and wasting money in what they think to be a needless cause. They seem content with the debacle going on over there. Our armies barely hold their own and the barons acknowledge that, but their argument, God save the mark, is that at least our leaders in France are persistent in striving for success—even if they achieve nothing—and as things stand their current needs are not likely to bankrupt the treasury. And so my nearest and supposedly most trusted are disputing the need for me to go, and though I will stamp out their opposition, one way or another, I am left unable to trust many of them in the moment. If trouble should then break out—serious trouble—with this new council in Scotland, Carlisle Castle will hold the fate of England in its hands, and the man who governs it will wield the kind of strength I dare not allow into the grip of any man who might defy me. You see my point, I trust?”
Both Bruces nodded, and Edward eyed them as he weighed his next words.
“The closest lands to Carlisle are Bruce holdings, as you are well aware—Annandale and Carrick, your lands, but no longer home to Bruce. My trust in you was strong enough without that, but with it, with the knowledge that you face your own usurpers, I know beyond a doubt that you will fight to keep them outside my gates while I am occupied elsewhere. You will stand firm there while another, less contented man might seek to make alliance for his own purposes. You hear what I am saying, my lord of Annandale?”
“I do, my liege.”
“And will you take the post? I said before I will not force it upon you.”
“I will take it gladly, my liege.”
“Good man. Earl Robert, have you anything you wish to say?”
Bruce shook his head slowly and emphatically. “No, my liege. It is my father’s decision. I will support him, come what may.”
“So be it. Here, then, is what we’ll do. Your wedding will take place within the month, Robert, and that will keep you here as Earl of Carrick, preparing for your nuptials. Lord Bruce, you, on the other hand, may fill that time most usefully with a visit to Carlisle. No one will question your interest in seeing from close by the depredations being carried out in your home lands. In reality, though, you will be there to decide what you will need in the way of provisioning, strengthened defences, and garrison improvements. You will then return here for the wedding celebrations at month’s end, and in the course of those, in company with your son and his young wife, you will renew, publicly, your oath of fealty to me as your liege lord. That might provoke reaction from the Scots—indeed I hope it will, for we will be watching closely and may read much from it. You will be recompensed for any losses you incur from that, of course, and I will increase your holdings here in my domain in recognition of your dedication to our cause. All being well, towards the end of August you will assume your place as governor in Carlisle and I will be able to make my arrangements for France with an untroubled mind—about the northwest, at least. Are we agreed?”
“Yes, my liege.”
“So be it, then. And now I really must go. Farewell, my friends.”
Father and son bowed together as Edward, every inch the careworn king weighed down by affairs of state, nodded sombrely to each of them and walked to the door, leaving them alone together in silence. The door had barely closed when the two turned to look at each other speculatively, each waiting for the other to speak.
“Now that was the Edward I remember best,” Bruce said quietly. “The man I first met and admired that time he came to Turnberry. I confess I like him better than the distant and forbidding king he has become since Queen Eleanor died, may God rest her soul.”
His father nodded. “God bless her soul, indeed.” He spoke on without a pause, but the tone of his voice cooled noticeably with his next words. “But are you saying you mislike him? I hope not, for we have much to thank him for.”
“No, sir, I meant no such thing.”
“And what think you of this new appointment? You may speak plainly.”
“Governor of Carlisle Castle. A great honour, Father, on the face of it.”
“On the face of it?” Lord Bruce’s frown was instantaneous. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means I believe the King is exercising kingcraft, Father. That was what Grandfather Robert called it. He said there was none in Christendom better at that craft than Edward Plantagenet. He is forever involved in it, to the exclusion of all else. He never stops, never neglects it, and never relents. Everything he does, every decision he makes, every step he takes is done in that cause and with great deliberation.”
“Have you gone mad, boy?” The elder Bruce glanced over his shoulder, as though expecting to find someone listening. “Those words are impious! They impugn the King’s majesty. You could be thrown in prison for mouthing them.”
“Forgive me then, sir, but you did invite me to speak plainly, and the plain truth is that ever since Grandfather Robert brought that observation to my attention, I have been paying more heed than ever before to what King Edward does. And I have come to believe Grandfather was right. Edward Plantagenet does nothing without forethought, and most particularly so when he is manipulating those about him, those in power, with an eye to the welfare of his realm. Your appointment is a great honour, Father, beyond a doubt, and it will bring even greater honours with it. I merely wondered what, in fact, it portends. Will it prove to be a blessing or a curse? T
here’s nothing you can do about that, either way, for you accepted it and now we must all live with it.”
“We must all live with it … ” The repetition of his son’s words was cold and flat. “You sound as though you resent that. As though you think it an imposition of some kind. As though, in fact, you believe I should have refused the appointment.”
“No, Father, with respect I believe no such thing. I wondered only about its ultimate intent. You could not have refused the appointment, sir—not after the way in which it was put to you. Had you done so, in the face of such apparent personal trust, you would have appeared selfish, ungrateful, and undependable. But that is precisely my point. You could not refuse, Father. You were used— manipulated and perhaps even abused into having no other choice. It was magnificently done, masterfully presented, and, I would take my oath on it, most carefully engineered long in advance.” He shrugged, without even a glance at his father. “I was reminded, too, of something else Gransser said about Edward, as both man and king. He liked and admired him in some ways, but he warned me once never to let down my guard in my dealings with him, least of all when I was unsure of what he wanted. And he drove home that lesson the next day, by taking me to watch the Lochmaben potter at his wheel. Edward, he said, could mould and shape men as easily as that potter shaped wet clay, making of them what he would and sometimes spinning them too far until they collapsed upon themselves in ruin. It was a powerful lesson.” He shrugged again, very gently this time. “That is Edward, master of his kingly craft, bending all men to his royal will and to his own ever-mysterious ends. Nothing wrong with that—it’s what kings must do, I suppose. But it leaves simple men like us shaking our heads, perplexed at the layers between layers in the plainest, seemingly least important things.”
He had been lost in his own thoughts as he spoke and now he became aware of his father’s silence. He glanced over almost apprehensively and found Lord Bruce looking at him with an expression Bruce had never seen before.
“Forgive me, Father,” he said quickly. “I was havering—”
Lord Bruce waved him to silence. “How long have you thought that way?”
“What way, sir? I don’t understand.”
“Of course you do.” There was asperity now in Lord Bruce’s tone. “You understand far more than I ever suspected you could. You speak like a philosopher, a theorist, not like the son I thought I knew. You have insights I never saw or heard until now. You make me feel a fool, though I believe you had no thought of doing so. Where did you learn to think this way?”
“I have no idea, Father … unless it was in listening to and being around my grandfather. He had no tolerance for fools or dimwits, and he hated to waste time. And he was never silent when he was with me.” He stopped, smiling suddenly. “He was teaching me constantly, about a thousand things at once, yet all of them were built around my own need to learn to read men, discerning their characters and motives, their weaknesses and strengths, their foibles and their follies. How to read men and how to trust in my own mind, its perceptions, its observations, and its conclusions. He taught me, I suppose, that a man with a supple mind—” Again he broke off, smiling again. “That a man with a supple mind can find perfect clay for the potter’s wheel. Gransser taught me to trust in my own judgment.”
A long silence followed that before his father said, “Remind me, should I ever appear to be tempted, never to ask what you think of me.” He disregarded his son’s astonished look as he continued. “So, then, we must take stock of our position. We are committed, as you say, for better or for worse. All that remains for us to do is make the best of what we have. I will ride north to Carlisle at once and take Jardine and Nicol with me. They can cross the border easily from there without being noticed and both of them will be better off at home. Domhnall is too old to be galloping about the country at the kind of speed I hope to maintain, and even in Carlisle he would still be hundreds of miles from Mar, with no retainers to escort him safely home. So he will stay here with Isabella until after you two are wed, after which he may do as he chooses. He holds no lands in England so I doubt he will wish to remain here, though that will be determined by Balliol’s reaction to the news of your marriage. Your own part is preordained—you must remain here and take care of Isabella and her father. Were you to come north with me it might cause questions that I see no need to excite. Good, then. That’s it.”
“What about the boys, Father?”
“What boys?”
“My brothers. And the girls, too. If you’re to be in Carlisle, they’d best be here with me.”
“Damnation, that would have come to me, but to this point I haven’t given it a thought. I’ll have them sent down.”
“No, leave that to me. I’ll send up a suitable escort for them as soon as I return to Writtle.”
“That should suffice. Can you think of anything else?”
Bruce shook his head. “No, nothing. But I do have a question that has nothing do with any of this. The Earl of Mar looked perplexed when Edward asked about Bishop Fraser of St. Andrews, and it seemed to me Sir James took pains at the same time to look at no one. Do you know where Fraser is, Father? It does seem strange that no one should know the whereabouts of the senior bishop in Scotland.”
Lord Bruce shrugged. “I have no idea. Bishops are bishops, as secret in their dealings and movements at times as any other magnate. Why should we care where he is?” He looked around again, gazing for a moment at the lower end of the table where the two scribes had sat. “Some good might come of this morning, if Edward truly means to make known what we talked about—the misunderstanding in Scotland of his role as lord paramount.” He sighed, sharply, and moved towards the door with Bruce in tow.
“I’ve much to do, if I’m to take the north road tomorrow, and I think I should. The more time I can spend in Carlisle, the better the picture I can form of what’s there and what’s lacking. I’ll be obliged if you would find Domhnall and Jardine and ask them to meet me at the stables within the hour.”
Bruce said he would, and closed the high doors carefully at their back as they left the room.
CHAPTER TWENTY - ONE
KINGS ’ PLEASURES
Sir Henry Percy had said something, during that brief encounter as they dined around the fire, about the astonishing difference in the way time passed depending on what one was doing and the amount of enjoyment involved. He had been talking about his recent marriage, and how the months following his wedding had gone by in a complete whirlwind of activity and pleasure. He had been a married man for nigh on six months already, he said, but it seemed to him as though only a week had passed, because his military commitments—the campaign against the Forest outlaws being just one of several—had combined with the domestic upheaval of plunging into married life to leave him with no more than a blurred series of vague impressions of unaccustomed domesticity to recall, instead of the store of pleasant, cumulative memories he had expected.
Bruce had smiled at the time, he remembered, mildly surprised at the wistfulness that had underlain those words, for Percy, with his humourless dedication to duty at all times, was the last person he would ever have expected to hear complaining, however gently, about the personal sacrifices involved.
Now, at the end of July, with all the pomp and ceremony and the blinding, confusing brilliance of the wedding ceremony in Westminster Abbey behind him, he knew exactly what Percy had meant that evening. The month between Edward’s decision to host the wedding at Westminster and the event itself had simply vanished, engulfed by the headlong urgency of preparation. He had laughed, at first, at the mere idea of an entire month being insufficient time to prepare for a ceremony that would last less than an hour, but that laughter had been short lived as other people’s urgencies quickly began to press in on him. Within two days he had lost count of the multitude of people who converged on him from every direction, clamouring for his attention to an incomprehensible plethora of niceties and trivia to do with the ceremony
itself. There were preparation and content to consider; protocol and seating arrangements and form and substance, each petty but pressing detail the be-all and end-all of existence for the swarm of functionaries charged with their responsibility, and every last one of them required his personal attention. On top of that, there had been the ridiculous amount of time he was forced to spend with the royal tailors, since it had been tacitly agreed by everyone save him that the sacrament of marriage demanded the provision of an entirely new wardrobe for the bridegroom—Isabella’s involvement in her own wardrobe arrangements had been far more intense and time consuming than his, but from what he had gathered in passing, she had enjoyed the experience far more than he had.
Less than two weeks into those hectic days, the train of escorted wagons carrying the entire Bruce brood arrived at Writtle and settled in, and as soon as word came to him of their arrival, Bruce mutinied against the tyrants surrounding him. He had made swift arrangements, brooking no argument, for things to continue without him for a week, and had then abducted Isabella, along with her father and her ladies, and taken them directly to Writtle to meet his siblings.
There, for two full days, he had enjoyed himself thoroughly among his own kin, wearing Isabella on his arm like a trophy the entire time. It was the first time in weeks that the two of them had been able to spend more than a jealously snatched hour or two a day in each other’s company, and they were determined to make the most of every moment they could spend together.
This gathering marked the first time in years that all the siblings had been together in one place, and the changes in all of them delighted Bruce. The girls were too young to hold much interest for him for any length of time, but his four close-grouped brothers, Nigel, Edward, Thomas, and Alexander, more than made up for that. The only two missing were the eldest, Christina, who Bruce hoped would soon be joining them from her home in Mar, and Isabel, who was in Bergen on the far side of the North Sea where, at the age of twenty, she had been Queen Consort to King Eric II of Norway for two years.