Authors: Marsha Canham
Lord George, seeing this new barrier of infantrymen six deep step up into firing position, realized the action was hopeless and screamed the order to retreat. That was when he saw, to his further horror, that the stone walls he had pleaded to have taken down were now lined with Cumberland's men, sharpshooters who propped their muskets on the topmost stones and took deadly aim at the unprotected backs of the retreating Highlanders.
Blinded by the rain, the smoke, the confusion, the clansmen
fought their way back over a field littered with their own dead and dying. MacGillivray had lost sight of Jamie and Robbie Farquharson in the frantic charge, but he saw them now, lying together in a tangle of bloodied arms and legs, the one shot while trying to pull the other to safety. Eneas was beside MacGillivray. At the sight of his slain brothers, he turned and raised his sword, screaming obscenities at the English. Two, three, five shots smacked into his chest, his belly, his shoulder and still he charged back toward the government line, hacking the hands and sword off the first man who stepped up to meet him, cleaving the skull of the next, and going down, finally, under the bayonets of a dozen infantrymen.
Just when it seemed some of the clans might make a safe retreat, Cumberland unleashed his cavalry, five hundred strong. These were the dragoons who had run at Prestonpans and again at Falkirk, and now that they could see the Highlanders were crippled and helpless, they took special glee in running them down, killing even those who threw aside their weapons and raised their arms in surrender.
The beating rain gave the smoke nowhere to rise, and the air was choked with sulfur. Lord George, wounded in half a dozen places, his face awash with blood, saw there was only one escape open to them and shouted for the clans to stay together and retreat along the moor road. The prince's standard had already been taken down. There was no sight of the royal figure or his white charger, and for that they could be grateful, for within minutes of the cavalry being unleashed, the high ground was overrun.
It fell to the Camerons and the MacKintoshs, both of whom had lost half their men in the slaughter, to protect the retreat. Alexander Cameron took the right, and on a waved acknowledgment from John MacGillivray, the MacKintoshes positioned themselves to protect the left flank. Throughout the charge and the terrible aftermath, MacBean and MacGillivray had managed to stay together, and they fought side by side now, rallying their men to hold off the assault of the soldiers who pressed toward them in an unrelenting sea of scarlet and white.
“Moy Hall is it, then?” Gillies snarled, fixing his gaze on a
pocket of soldiers who were advancing across the field and smirking along the lengths of their bayonets.
“Aye, we'll meet there, brither,” John said, his attention drawn to a cluster of Foot converging on three wounded Athollmen.
“Ye think we'll get some meat? An' a real bed tae lie on?”
“I'm sure of it, lad. That an' a crock o' sweet ale to quench our thirst.”
“Aye, well.” Gillies looked over his shoulder and grinned. “It might be worth the trouble, then.”
John reached out and the two men, who had been friends since their reckless youth, exchanged a fierce handclasp, then parted. Gillies ran screaming toward the startled infantrymen, slashing his broadsword with such ferocious power that two of their number lost their heads and a third saw his entrails spilling onto the ground before the rest could form up and bring him down.
John, unaware of Gillies's fate, went to the aid of the three wounded Athollmen, dispatching the first of the king's Royal Foot before the
Sassenach
was even aware there was a rampant lion behind him. A second and third redcoat were sent writhing on the ground with hideous wounds, while a fourth actually dared to turn and raise his bayonet. One swipe from MacGillivray's broadsword broke the musket in half and left the soldier gaping down at the bloody stump where his arm used to be. The injured Highlanders fell on another man and, because they were without weapons, wrested his own musket from him and clubbed him unconscious with the stock.
The last of the royalists, a lieutenant, flashed his saber in MacGillivray's direction and actually managed to cut the sleeve of his shirt off at the shoulder. John looked at the tear, cursed at the officer, then drove five feet of honed steel through his chest and punched it out the back of his spine.
“MacGillivray!”
He spun around in a half crouch and saw the blood-spattered face of Hugh MacDugal looming out of the mist. They had a long history of bad blood between them, and John knew by the snarl on the ugly face that it had worsened over the past twenty-four hours.
“Yer bluidy kinsmen killed ma brither Lomach last night.
Slit 'is throat they did, an' left him in the bog. I found him this mornin', drowned in his own bluid.”
“Must have been a sweet change,” John said, “from the shite you breathe all day with yer nose stuck up Thomas Lobster's arse.”
“Aye, an' you would know all about arses, would ye not? I hear tell The MacKintosh's wife bends over f'ae ye on a regular basis. Mayhap I'll try her a time or two maself after I'm done wi' you an' her rebel husband. Oh, aye, I know all about that one, too, an' I'll be the first tae raise a cheer when they string him on the gibbet.”
John wiped at a persistent trickle of blood over his eye. Coming up behind MacDugal were ten or twelve more infantrymen, and when they saw the golden-haired Highlander standing firm on the road, they started to spread out into a half-circle.
“Hold!” MacDugal roared. “This bastard is mine! I've waited too long f'ae this no' tae have the pleasure o' tearin' his heart out wi' ma own hands.”
He raised his broadsword and charged forward with an unholy scream of fury. John waited for the ugly Highlander to come to him; when MacDugal was half a dozen paces away, he gripped the hilt of his
clai' mór
in both clenched fists and swung it hard enough for the exposed muscles in his arm to bulge like polished granite. He caught the tracker low, hacking through a knee, slicing upward to sever through the artery and lodge the edge of his blade deep in the opposite thigh bone.
MacDugal was still screaming when he went down in a fount of blood, taking MacGillivray's blade with him. The circle of soldiers melted back in awe for a moment, staring in horror at the limbless and bleeding tracker, then, as one, looked up at The MacGillivray.
“If ye're going to kill a man,” he said quietly, “just kill him. Dinna boast about it beforehand.”
One of the soldiers swore and raised his weapon. John's hand moved to his waist and in the blink of an eye, the man went down clutching at the hilt of the dirk protruding from the split in his forehead. Another saw a flash of steel coming toward him a half-second before the blade struck his shoulder with enough momentum to send him back off his feet.
Having determined MacGillivray was now weaponless, the eight survivors spread out to close the circle and, confident of a kill, started to edge forward. John stood completely still, his black eyes defying each of them in turn, and when the first man lunged forward with his bayonet, MacGillivray bent over and snatched up a broken wagon axle that was lying at his feet. The swing caught the
Sassenach
full in the face, splitting it like a bladder. A second scything sweep tore the throat out of a second man and knocked a third senseless. He pressed forward, roaring his rage, downing seven of the eight foot soldiers before the last one was able to fit his trembling fingers around his musket and pull the trigger.
The shot caught MacGillivray high in the chest and spun him around. By then, another pack of soldiers had seen the encounter and rushed to give aid; several of them raised their bayonets and stabbed the unmoving Highlander repeatedly before running off in search of more challenging prey.
What they saw instead was a huge gray gelding bearing down on them. The screaming red-haired woman on its back raised two flintlocks and fired, blasting one man off his feet, sending another scrambling over a low stone wall. The wall proved to be the lip of a deep well, and while his scream was reverberating off the stones, The Bruce's hooves trampled another of his companions. Anne's sword made short work of the last.
She had witnessed the horror of the charge, the futility of the attack, the slaughter during the retreat, and at one point had been nearly swept away by the horsemen forcing the prince off the field and leading him to safety. Charles Stuart had indeed been weeping, but not out of pride this time. He had been weeping with shame and fear, screaming at the Highlanders to keep heart, that they would rally to fight another day.
The road had begun to clog with Jacobites retreating toward Inverness, but Anne had turned The Bruce toward the moor and fought her way to the verge, where she saw what was happening to the Camerons and the valiant men of Clan Chattan. She saw Gillies MacBean, bloodied head to toe but
still fighting like a dervish. There was no sign of her cousins, but she saw MacGillivray … and she saw what lay beyond him: a field of horror littered with the bravest hearts of Scotland.
By the time she recovered her shock enough to spur The Bruce forward again, both Gillies and John were down, the brutality of MacBean's wounds leaving no doubt that he was dead.
She thought MacGillivray was dead also, but when she slid out of the saddle and slumped onto her knees beside him, she saw a faint movement in his throat. When she touched his face, his eyes fluttered open and she cried out, rolling him gently onto his side, taking his golden head onto her knees.
“John! John, can you hear me?”
His eyes stayed open, but they could not seem to focus. There was blood everywhere, in his hair, spattered on his cheeks and lips. She wiped what she could with the corner of her plaid, and for the smallest instant he was able to look up and meet her gaze.
“John—?”
A sigh brought the copper-colored lashes down and the effort it had cost him to see her one last time was expended. His head lolled gently to the side. He was gone.
Anne clutched the folds of his doublet and hugged him close to her body, too stunned, too shocked, too numbed by the horror to even be aware of the danger coming up behind her.
The English soldiers were crossing the moor in pursuit of the straggling Highlanders, but victory was theirs and they were not in any great hurry. They moved across the field in packs, like ravening dogs, searching the fallen bodies for gold or valuables, killing and mutilating anyone they found wounded or helpless. Some were red to the tops of their thighs from moving through the dead; others looked like butchers as they hacked and slashed.
Anne looked wildly around for help, but the road was clear save for a few limping stragglers. She tried to haul MacGillivray's body up by the shoulders, but she knew she would never be able to lift him onto The Bruce alone. The thought of just leaving him there, however, was never a consideration.
She heard a shout and saw two of the king's soldiers running toward her. Snarling, scrambling to her feet, she snatched up her sword and braced herself to avenge her brave MacGillivray's death.
She was nearly blinded by the heat of her tears, but she saw enough to know both men were wearing scarlet-and-white tunics over the cursed dark plaid of the King's Royal Scots. One was an officer, and this was where she focused her rage first. She clutched her sword with both fists in the same manner as MacGillivray, and with the clan cry on her lips, she lunged forward. At the last possible moment she thought there was something vaguely familiar about the ashen face and dark chestnut hair, but it was too late to stop the momentum of her sword and she felt it punch through the hated scarlet wool and slice into flesh and bone.
Instinct more than anything else made Angus stagger back when he saw the blade coming. He threw up his hand and managed to deflect the blade from piercing his heart. Even so, he felt the raw edge of steel scrape between his ribs, and it was all he could do to shout at MacCardle to lower his musket and hold his fire!
“Anne!” He gritted his teeth and braced himself as she withdrew the sword and set herself to thrust again.
“Anne, it's me! It's Angus!”
He brought his saber up this time to block the second strike, but already he could see some of the confusion in her eyes clearing. On the third parry he was able to drive the point of her sword into the ground, after which she stopped cold and stared at him, her eyes as wide and haunted as those of a wounded, cornered animal.
“Anne … it's me, love. It's Angus.”
Her gaze slid to MacCardle and, seeing only the loathsome scarlet-and-white uniform, her lips drew back in another cry.
“Ewen, get behind me!”
“Aye, sar. That I'll gladly do.”
The subaltern stepped quickly out of Anne's line of vision, forcing her to focus all her attention on Angus.
“Annie,” he said as gently but as urgently as possible.
“Annie, listen to me, darling. We have to get you out of here. You have to leave here and you have to leave
now
. Let me help you up on The Bruce.”
“I'm not leaving John behind,” she rasped.
“What? John? Where—” Angus looked at the bodies scattered around the shallow scoop of frozen ground, shocked by the welter of gore. He saw one big body sprawled on its side, a hand still clutched around the broken axle of a wagon, and he almost did not recognize the tangled, bloodied ruin that was John MacGillivray.
“Oh, good God,” he whispered. “Good sweet God.”
“God was not on this field today,” Anne declared savagely. “Look around you. Is this the work of a compassionate, loving Creator?”
A commotion near the moor road drew Angus's attention. He heard two gunshots and saw a woman with long blond hair running away from a band of pursuing dragoons. One of the dragoons was Hamilton Garner, and he used the heel of his boot to knock the woman to the ground.
“Anne, we have no more time. We have to get you out of here.”
She bared her teeth and raised her sword again. “I am not leaving this field without John MacGillivray.”