The Scotsman (41 page)

Behind the mockery lurked a trace of self-derision, and Alex heard it. He grinned. “Nay, for I think you put it out about yourself that you are so fierce just to enhance your reputation. Why, I have yet to see you be other than sweetly courteous and gallant.”

Douglas laughed heartily, and clapped an arm about Alex’s shoulders. “Aye, well that is just the face I show to you, Fraser, for I fear your wrath should I be other than courtly and kind.” Then he sobered, and after a moment, said to him, “You know I will see Lady Catherine to whatever destination she desires, and will do so with utmost care and chivalry. As long as I yet live, she will be protected for you.”

Alex nodded. “I did not doubt that you would, but
must ask for my lady’s sake. She is wont to think herself able to manage on her own, and though I am constantly amazed by her success, I fear that should I fall and the Scottish army be demolished, she may meet with a dire fate at the hands of her own people.” His mouth twisted in an ironic smile. “As she has championed me to her brother and over her own, she is reviled by diem. Do not let harm come to her, but see her to the nunnery she has chosen should all fail.”

Another silence fell between them, then Douglas said softly, “Take your leave of her, Alex, then meet us in our assigned positions before the midnight hour.”

They parted, Douglas to join the division opposite the vanguard of Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, and Alex to the small hut on the edge of Bannock hamlet where Catherine waited. It was a long summer night, when the gloaming lingered without growing dark, and the sun rose again only a few hours after midnight. Purple shadows lay soft on the land, but it was yet light enough to ford the burn without a torch, for the moon cast silvery light over all.

Robbie prowled watchfully outside the hut, glancing up when he saw Alex. He waited until Alex dismounted before asking, “What news?”

“The English approach, and we go to join Douglas above the north slope of the Bannockburn. She must leave now to join the others at Gillies Hill. Ts she awake?”

“Yea, she is awake and fretful.”

Alex smiled at the sour tone of Robbie’s words, and knew that Catherine must be waspish. Her moods were more frequent of late, a malady that was as mystifying as it was irritating.

Ducking to enter through the low door, he stood silent for a moment in the soft gloom that filled the one-room hut. A loft for sleeping was accessed by a small ladder on
one wall, but Catherine complained that it was too hot and stuffy in the confines of the narrow space beneath the roof. Besides which, she added crossly, there were too many insects.

All of this, Alex knew, and knew that much of her mood stemmed from exhaustion and worry. How could it not? She had suffered much, and still awoke shaking from nightmares.

“Alex?” The voice drifted from the shadows, soft and weary. “Is it you?”

“Yea, catkin. ’Tis I who have finally come.” He crossed the room as his eyes adjusted to the murky light. It smelled of candles and past meals, a not unpleasant scent that reminded him of his own hall. His throat tightened, for he thought of his mother and how she had wasted away, so that when she bore Jamie, her body was too weak to withstand the strain and yielded up what little strength she had.

“I am here,” came the murmur, “by the window where I can see the fading light.”

He went to her, and sat gingerly on the small cot where she lay beneath the window. Thin light illuminated her face, and there were circles under her eyes. She looked gaunt.

“Robbie tells me you will not eat,” he bed, and she smiled.

“Poor Robbie. He is sorely tried by us both, I think. Do you stay the night?”

He shook his head. “I must join Douglas anon.”

She reached for his hand and curled her fingers around it. Her grip was surprisingly strong, and he was encouraged by it. Bending, he kissed her, and she sighed softly.

“Alex … I must tell you something.”

He tensed, for the tone of her voice foretold trouble.
He straightened and gazed down at her, still holding her hand as he waited. She looked away out the window as if searching for the words or the courage, then turned her head on the thin pillow to gaze into his eyes. His heart lurched. Ah, God, he could not bear it if she left him, whether of her own free will or fate.

He set his jaw and waited, and after a moment she said in a faltering voice, “Once, I told you I loved you. Do you recall?”

Silence fell. Yea, he could recall it well, for the words had shamed and alarmed him then. He lifted his gaze out the window, to where twilight shadows muted the summer night. A bird called, and the hum of insects was a steady drone. How could he say what was in his heart when he may well be killed on the morrow?

“Catkin … ah, God.” Helplessly, he floundered, caught between his fierce desire to declare his love, and the fear that it would destroy her. He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them he saw tears tracking her cheeks. It undid him. Touching the silvery paths with his finger, he said softly, “Yea, my love, I recall it well. Twas the night before we left to ride north, and when I asked you what was wrong, you said you feared to go with me. I knew then you lied. I knew you waited to hear me say it as well.”

She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and silence fell again. Lacing her fingers through his, she drew his arm upward to bring their joined hands between them.

“You clasp my hand, and you call me love. Yet you do not say the words. I languish without them, Alex. If you feel them, say them, and if you do not, I wouldst know that as well, for I cannot bear to think I may lose you on the morrow and never know for certain if you loved me.”

“Have I not shown you how I cherish you?”

“Yea, you have. But I wouldst hear it.”

There was no escape, and he did not know if he erred or did more harm than good, but he could no longer evade the truth. Pressing their joined hands to his mouth, he said against her soft skin, “I love you, catkin. God help us both, but I love you far more than I ever thought ’twas possible for a man to love a woman. You are my world, and I pray that I do not slay you by daring to love you.”

A little sob caught in her throat, and she whispered, “How could you think your love wouldst kill me? ’Tis the lack of it that sorely wounded me, but now I will be whole. Oh, Alex, my love….”

Bending, he kissed her, and tasted the salt of her tears on his tongue. Then he drew back, still holding her hand, and said, “All I have ever loved in this life has been taken from me, catkin. I did not want to risk you by loving you.”

It sounded awkward and foolish even as he said it, but it was done. Her fingers tightened around his palm.

“Come back to me, Alex, and I will give you more love than you can hold.” She brought his hand to her mouth, and holding his gaze as she pressed her lips against the back of his fingers, she said, “I am to bear your child. We need you.”

Jolted, he sat staring at her for a long moment as the shadows lengthened and it began to grow dim. Her face was a pale oval shimmer in the fading light, and her eyes were like huge violet bruises as she waited for his response.

Then, gathering her into him, he crushed his face into the fragrant mass of her hair and said around the thickness in his throat, “I love you, Catherine, and if all goes well, I will make you my wife. Our child will grow up heir to the barony of Kinnison, and as Scotland grows and prospers, so will we.”

He meant it. Despite the sudden surge of fear that she
would be taken from him as Catriona Fraser had been taken in childbirth, he knew that he would fight to his dying breath for the lands that would belong to the coming child. This would be his heir, and though none could ever replace the two beautiful children he had lost, it was as if all had been forgiven and he was being allowed a new beginning.

A beginning that included this fair English flower who meant the world to him.

It was the Sabbath, June 23. Just after sunrise, the Scottish army under Robert the Bruce heard mass, kneeling on the battlefield to pray for their cause. As it was the vigil of Saint John the Baptist, they observed it as a fast, and took only bread and water as sustenance.

Alex marshaled his men into formation with Douglas, their division numbering near a thousand. The marsh was at their back, and Edward Bruce and his thousand men on the left. Almost directly across the old Roman road, Bruce waited with his two thousand foot composed of the wild Highlanders, and to his right were the hidden pits and bogs. Randolph, Earl of Moray, was left of Bruce and up near Saint Ninian’s Kirk with five hundred foot soldiers. Behind Bruce, Sir Robert Keith held his five hundred light horse in abeyance.

On the other side of the Bannockburn lay the English. The land sloped downward from their position, so that Alex saw Hereford’s standard fluttering in the midday sun as the enemy milled about the edge of Torwood Forest.

“They do not hurry,” he remarked, and Robbie laughed.

“Nay, why should they rush to defeat?”

Robbie’s optimism was not isolated. After the divisions had been formed, Robert Bruce had it proclaimed to each that any man who may be faint of heart could depart at once. The answering shout arose from near six thousand throats as one: “We will conquer or die!”

The muted clank of sword and armor rustled around them, and the sun beat down with a vengeance from a cloudless sky. Alex removed his helmet and wiped sweat from his brow, then tugged it back down over his damp head and gazed across the valley that separated the armies.

As the English finally emerged from Torwood and onto the grassy meadow that sloped down to the Bannockburn, sunlight glittered on the brightly colored banners and from their polished metal armor. His throat tightened. The Earl of Hereford’s pennant fluttered next to that of the Earl of Gloucester as they led the vanguard across the meadow and approached the ford over the burn. In the front, clad in full armor and mounted on a powerful horse, rode a well-armed knight bearing a spear and wearing Hereford’s colors.

“Is that Devlin?” Robbie muttered, and Alex shook his head.

“Nay, he would be wearing his own colors. I would guess it to be Hereford or his nephew, Sir Henry de Bohun.”

“Christ above, Alex—look!”

Blood ran cold as Alex saw the Bruce inspecting the tightly formed ranks of Scots who were partially hidden in the woodland near the burn. Alone, the king rode a small gray palfrey, and carried only an ax in his hand. The gold circlet around his helmet marked him as the Scottish
king, and apparently, Hereford recognized it and saw his chance.

Spurring his huge destrier forward, he couched his lance as he rode straight at Robert Bruce. There was a stirring among the men as all waited anxiously to see the king’s reaction to this bold challenge. Dare he answer it? Caution bid that he fall back within the safe ranks of his soldiers and let the armies decide the outcome of this battle, but that was not his nature.

“He must know ’tis his old enemy Hereford,” Robbie muttered in a tight voice, “for de Bohun wears the crest on his surcoat. Christ have mercy, for the king is mounted on a pony and has no lance or spear, yet Hereford is well armed!”

But Robert Bruce turned his horse toward Hereford and waited for the charge; at the last moment, he swerved aside and stood up in his stirrups to bring down his great ax with such force that it split through de Bohun’s helmet as he passed, so that skull and brains, along with his ax handle, snapped in twain.

For a stunned moment, there was silence on both sides as Bruce wheeled his small horse about, then the king’s Highlanders broke with wild cries of exultation, swarming over the breastworks and onto the field. They charged the English cavalry as they attempted to line up in formation on the open ground below, hindered by the fact that many had fallen into the pits and were badly floundering. Swiftly, Bruce halted the pursuit of the English as they broke and ran, curbing the Highlanders from giving full chase.

Galloping back to the commanders who awaited him in consternation, he did not reply to their remonstrations for what might have happened had he fallen to de Bohun, but only lamented the broken ax handle. All eyes had been on the confrontation, and when Bruce looked
up, he pointed to a body of English horse riding under cover of the bank along the Carse toward Saint Ninian’s Kirk.

“Moray, a rose has fallen from your chaplet,” Bruce called roughly, and Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, at once galloped to his men and deployed them in a schiltron to the open ground over which the English would have to pass.

From their position on the slope, Alex and the rest of the Douglas division watched as Randolph was assaulted by the English. The battle dragged on, and the Scots were hard-pressed to defend themselves as the dogged English cavalry tried to break their ranks with battle axes, swords, and maces. So great were their numbers that the tight-knit band of Scots was nearly hidden from sight by the mailed knights who assailed them.

Douglas asked the king if he could go to Randolph’s aid, but Bruce sent him back to his post. As it grew more doubtful, Douglas fretted over Randolph’s fate and was at last given permission to go to his aid. Yet as they drew close, Douglas halted his men and exclaimed, “The Earl of Moray has gained the day, and since we were not there to help him in the battle, let us leave to him the credit of the victory.”