Exiles in Time (The After Cilmeri Series) (4 page)

Callum went up on the balls of his
feet and came down. “It’s important to be here for the birth of
your first child.”

David scoffed. “You and I are the only
men who think so. You should have heard the uproar among my
advisors when I told them I wasn’t going.”

“
The Scots might appreciate
your lack of interference,” Callum said.

“
That’s exactly what I
explained to my council.” David laughed. “The good news is that I
have managed to turn my selfish desire into kingly magnanimity. By
not journeying to Scotland now, I show the Scots that I mean what I
say: I do not want their throne.” He eyed Callum, still smirking.
“You will have to do.”

“
What about Gilbert de
Clare?” Callum said. “He could speak for you instead of
me.”

“
He is overseeing his
estates in Ireland,” David said. “I sent him a message that he’s
needed, but communication being what it is, he may not have
received it yet. I can’t predict when he will arrive in
Scotland.”

“
I will do my best for you,
my lord.” Callum bowed. He didn’t bow before David very often, but
this moment seemed to call for some formality.

“
I trust you more than any
of the other men I’m sending in the delegation,” David said. “I’m
counting on you to be my eyes and ears in Scotland. Bishop Kirby
thinks he’s the primary ambassador and will take all the
responsibility for the mediation if he can—as well as all the
credit for its success—but I don’t trust him.”

Callum met that statement with the
silence it deserved, taking a moment to pour David a cup of water
from a pitcher and hand it to him. Callum poured a cup for himself
too, and they both drank. David had told Callum about the
behind-the-scenes machinations that had taken place leading up to
David’s crowning as King of England. Kirby had forged documents
attesting that Meg was the daughter of King Henry and Caitir, an
illegitimate daughter of King Alexander II of Scotland.

Although David had declared time and
again that the documents were fake, nobody seemed to believe him,
especially since the Church had gone ahead and crowned him King of
England anyway. Other claimants to the throne of Scotland now
feared that those same documents gave David a right to the Scottish
throne too, and that David would back up his supposed claim with
military might.

“
I have ordered Kirby to
leave my rights out of this, no matter how acrimonious the
negotiations become among the Scots.” David poured the last of the
water in his cup over his head and then brushed the wet hair back
from his face with both hands. “Kirby has assented. I’m not getting
involved in a war in Scotland. As you and I know, it would be a
quagmire. Do try to head one off if you can.”

“
You’re sure about asking
Kirby to lead your delegation?” Callum said.

“
The task should have gone
to Archbishop Peckham, but he has been ill since the winter and is
still recovering. Kirby begged for the job, and while his desire
for it concerns me since it appears to me to be a thankless task, I
don’t want you to get sucked into the dispute. You are to stay free
of bias towards any faction. Your job is to be a calming influence
among the Scottish nobility, to ferret out what’s happening behind
closed doors and in the underbelly of the royal court,
and
—I want to know who
killed Princess Margaret.”

“
She died of what sounds
like the flu or pneumonia,” Callum said.

David shrugged. “So they say. I’m
reluctant to believe in so coincidental a death, even if it would
take an awfully cold heart to murder a small child.”

“
It has happened before,”
Callum said. “Maybe recently.”

“
That’s exactly my
concern,” David said. “It’s bad enough that I never discovered if
my predecessor, little Prince Edward, died of smallpox or was
murdered. I don’t want to place the crown of Scotland on the head
of the man who ordered Margaret’s death.”

“
I can’t
promise—”

“
I’m asking too much, I
know. Do what you can.”

“
Yes, my lord.”

David smirked. “My title never sounds
right coming from you, though it’s not as bad as when my sister
says it.”

Callum smiled. “Yes, my
lord.”

Then David held up a hand, having one
more thing to say. “To give you the stature you require in order to
move freely throughout the north, I am awarding you the earldom of
Shrewsbury.”

All the air left Callum’s chest. It
was an outrageous gift and one he didn’t deserve. David’s advisors
must have nearly had apoplexy when he suggested it. “My lord—you
can’t!”

“
The Earldom of Shrewsbury
was allowed to expire almost two hundred years ago,” David said. “I
can bestow it upon whomever I wish.”

“
I know for a fact that
Humphrey de Bohun covets it for his son, William,” Callum
said.

“
I’ve given Worcester to
William. He didn’t complain so I don’t see why you should. It’s a
done deal. I signed the document this morning.”

Callum was still staring at David, his
mouth agape.

Then Lili appeared through the archway
that led from the courtyard to the kitchen garden. She glanced at
Callum and grinned. “I gather you told him?”

David stood, clapped a hand on
Callum’s shoulder, and strode past him towards his wife. As an
excuse for David not to ride to Scotland, she was a good one. Less
than a month remained in her pregnancy, and he was determined to be
with her for the birth.

David had moved the court from
Westminster Palace to Kings Langley so she could have sunshine and
quiet as she waited. He had little of either himself no matter
where he resided, although this was better than the stink and press
of London. Even through Callum’s very modern eyes, the London of
the Middle Ages was crowded and polluted. Kings Langley couldn’t
compare to the mountains of Wales, but it was more like them than
the city.

David took Lili’s hand. “Are you well?
Is there something you wanted?”

“
I’m fine. I’m fine.” Lili
laughed at David’s attentiveness. “I won’t break, you know. I just
came to tell you that the men on the wall can see Ieuan’s banner in
the distance.”

“
Finally!” David gestured
that Callum should come with him.

Callum had met the rest of David’s
family at Christmas, after David’s tour of England as the country’s
new king, but he hadn’t seen any of them since then. In the Middle
Ages, travel was dangerous and difficult. While David’s rule had
brought peace to England and its roads were for the most part safe,
to travel a hundred miles still took three days on horseback. It
was too much of a challenge for a woman with a new baby, of which
David’s family suddenly had quite a few.

A few weeks ago, David’s sister, Anna,
and her husband, Math, had welcomed a second son. They’d named him
Bran after the original ruler of Dinas Bran, Math’s seat in
northeast Wales. Before that, in March, Meg had given birth to her
twins, Elisa and Padrig. Neither woman felt comfortable leaving her
children to travel to England.

Thus, the only family members who
could make the journey from Wales for the birth of Lili’s baby were
Bronwen, a fellow time traveler; her husband, Ieuan (who was also
Lili’s brother); and their six month old daughter,
Catrin.

Callum knew that childbirth
was one of the events that seemed to precipitate time travel. He’d
spent approximately one minute scheming as to how he might attend
the births, on the off chance that one of the women
did
time travel home, but
then discarded the idea just as quickly. What could he have done?
Hovered over Anna or Meg as they labored, waiting for that moment
when they might take him back to the modern world? It would have
been an obscene request and he’d stayed in England rather than be
tempted.

Callum accepted the clean shirt Lili
had brought for him, slipping it on and buckling his real sword
around his waist, before following David towards the gatehouse of
the castle. They reached it just as the visitors came to a halt in
the outer bailey.

Bronwen shot Callum a grin from the
saddle as she handed Catrin down to Ieuan, who had dismounted
first. “You’re here!”

Callum moved to help her to the
ground. “Why does that surprise you?”

“
I don’t know,” Bronwen
said. “You had the look a few months ago of someone whose feet were
itching to hit the road.”

“
And so they are,” Callum
said.

Aaron, the physician for the Welsh
royal court, held his hand to his lower back. “The journey from
Caerphilly to London was quite enough for me.”

“
You are a steadfast
companion, nonetheless, Aaron,” Bronwen said, and then looked past
him to smile at his son, “as is Samuel.”

If Callum had thought the day couldn’t
be improved upon, he was wrong. Thanks to a long-term (clandestine)
relationship with a Scottish woman who now lived in Carlisle,
Samuel spoke Gaelic. Because Callum did too, Samuel had been one of
the few people with whom Callum could communicate in the first
months he’d lived in Wales. Like English and French, Gaelic had
changed between the thirteenth century and the twenty-first, but
Callum had more easily navigated those changes, and Samuel had been
willing to help.

Although Samuel was of Jewish descent,
at six feet tall, with light brown hair and the body of a soldier,
he could be mistaken for a run-of-the-mill Englishman. Very often,
he meant to be. Until the death of Edmund of Lancaster, King
Edward’s brother in whose company Samuel served before 1285, Samuel
had denied his Jewish heritage and passed for an Englishman. In the
new world David had created, such deception was no longer required.
Not surprisingly, Samuel now served David instead of any English
baron.

Samuel had lived his life on the
outside looking in, pretending to fit in with Gentiles—and doing it
so well that he’d never been found out. Despite the vast difference
of time and culture between Callum and Samuel, Callum had found
that he could relate to Samuel more than to any other medieval man
and counted him as one of his few friends.

Callum strode over to Samuel and the
two men clasped forearms. “Sir.” Samuel bowed his head
slightly.

“
Welcome,” Callum
said.

“
Thank you for coming, all
of you,” David said.

“
Thank you for inviting us,
sire,” Samuel said, “but to what do I owe the honor of your
invitation?”

“
Earl Callum has agreed to
join my delegation to Scotland.” David shot Callum a grin. “He is
to be my eyes and ears. I want you to be his.”

Callum looked at David. “You’ve been
planning this for a while, haven’t you? Why didn’t you tell me—?”
He snapped his mouth shut as David tilted his head and gave him a
questioning look. “Right.” Callum turned back to Samuel.

“
It would be my pleasure to
serve you, my lord,” Samuel said, and then paused, his eyes
glancing towards David. “Did you say,
Earl
?”

David grinned. “Callum is the newly
installed Earl of Shrewsbury.”

“
A wise choice, my lord.”
Samuel bowed, a smile twitching at the corner of his lips. “May I
ask why you chose me for this journey?”

David narrowed his eyes. “Do you
object to the post? You speak Gaelic and English, you’re loyal to
me, and you’re good with a sword. Why not you?”

“
You have other talents as
well that make you particularly suited to the job,” Callum
said.

“
Such as what?” Samuel
said, but then nodded as he caught on. “Oh yes. That would be
lying.”

“
It’s a useful skill,
whether or not the leaders of our respective religions would
agree,” Callum said.

David clapped a hand on each of their
shoulders and shook once. “I, on the other hand, am very bad at it.
Lili despairs of me because I turn red, stammer, and look down at
my feet.”

“
I’m not sure that’s such a
bad thing,” Callum said.

“
When would you have us
leave, my lord?” Samuel said.

“
Tomorrow,” David said.
“Can you two work together?”

“
Yes, my lord,” Samuel and
Callum said in unison.

“
Good.” David nodded at
Samuel, indicating he was dismissed. With a final bow in the king’s
direction, Samuel and his father went into the hall. Then David
turned to Callum, switching to American English. “He’s a common
soldier and can ask questions where you cannot. Between the two of
you, I have a chance of getting at the truth.”

Callum sensed that David had mentally
checked Scotland off of his list of things to do. Callum had seen
him create the lists, scribbling on scraps of paper he carried
around with him at all times. Without warning, he would pull one
from an inner pocket to tick items off or add new ones. Callum
didn’t know how David managed to keep so many balls in the air at
once, even with two very efficient secretaries.

Meanwhile, Ieuan had fallen into a
conversation in rapid Welsh with Lili. It would have proved too
much for Callum, even if they had wanted to include him. Lili
squeezed David’s hand and went off with her brother, following
Samuel and Aaron. That left Callum alone with David and Bronwen,
who had been watching the various exchanges with little Catrin on
her hip.