The Ghost (Highland Guard 12) (45 page)

After what happened with Gifford—experiencing the kind of desire and hatred that might make a man forget his honor—Alex also had to acknowledge that his line in the sand might be more movable than he’d first thought. But he’d always had one—whether he wore shiny mail and a tabard or a blackened helm and a plaid.

Joan had accused him of giving up on his former brethren, and maybe he had. Maybe he should have stayed and fought harder. Maybe he should have banged his head until they listened to him.

But it was too late to go back and do it over. The question was what he was going to do about it now.

The events of the day had made it clear he had to do something.

Since leaving Falkirk that morning, Alex had been marching with the center or main body of the army, which was under the command of King Edward. But he’d ridden ahead to give information to the vanguard—under the disastrous joint command of the young Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, the king’s favored nephew, and Humphrey de Bohun, Earl of Hereford, the Constable of England and rightful commander—just in time to see one of the greatest (or most rash, depending on your perspective) displays of chivalric warfare by a king that he could ever recall.

Sir Henry de Bohun, the young nephew of Hereford, had caught sight of some of Bruce’s men coming out of the New Park on the main road, where Bruce had positioned his men to block the English approach to Stirling. Realizing that one of the men was Bruce himself, de Bohun—no doubt thinking of the glory that would be his if he brought down the king in single combat—raced his destrier forward, lance in hand, intent on ending the war with one dramatic strike.

Rather than retreat into the forest of the New Park to avoid the charging knight, or leave his men to dispense with the attack as he should have, Bruce not only accepted the challenge, he skillfully maneuvered his palfrey at the last minute to avoid the lance, and then stood up in his stirrups to deliver a powerful blow with his axe into the helm of de Bohun that had not just cleaved through metal into the skull of the young knight, killing him, but had also broken the handle of the king’s battle-axe.

This was a king to fight for. It was just the kind of extraordinary feat of warfare that had made Bruce an almost mythical figure to his men. The Bruce had more chivalry in his little finger than Edward would have in a lifetime. No doubt MacLeod and some of the other captains were reprimanding him for taking foolish, unnecessary risks—the entire Scottish cause might have died on the end of one lance wielded by a rash young knight—but the story would inevitably add to Bruce’s popularity and his growing legend.

Some might also say that this one decisive single combat was a harbinger of things to come.

The spurious charge by de Bohun provoked an attack by the English cavalry on the Scot position before the New Park that was haphazard, ill-conceived, poorly executed, and ultimately repulsed by the Scot schiltron formations of pikemen. Alex had taken one look at his former compatriots across the battlefield and knew Joan and Boyd were right. There wasn’t a middle ground. He had to choose, and he’d chosen the wrong side.

Hereford had tried to pull the men back into some semblance of order, but with no clear command it had been an exercise in futility. The English had been forced to retreat, giving Bruce if not his first victory, his first nondefeat of the battle.

The second had come slightly to the east of the New Park, where Clifford and de Beaumont, also in advance, had led a force of eight hundred cavalry on a quest to find an alternative route to Stirling through the boggy, inhospitable carse. They’d nearly surprised Thomas Randolph, the Earl of Moray, who with his men was positioned near St. Ninian’s and was supposed to be guarding the flank for Bruce. Moray recovered in time, and after a hard-fought battle, his schiltrons of infantrymen, too, forced the English into their second retreat of the day.

King Edward had arrived at the Bannock Burn to the shocking news that not only had the vanguard of vaunted English cavalry engaged the enemy twice—without his knowledge—but both times they’d been repulsed by Bruce’s infantry pikemen. The flower of English chivalry defeated by farmers! It was inconceivable! Humiliating! At least it was to Edward. The armies weren’t that unbalanced, of course—Bruce’s men were skilled warriors—but to say that the mood among the English was disheartened was putting it mildly.

A situation that grew worse when the English were forced to set up camp for the night on the boggy, damp carse of mud, streams, and peaty “pols” of water, as the Scots called them. Most of the carts and infantry had to stay on the other side of the Bannock Burn, unable to cross, despite the doors and shutters that had been ripped down from houses to give them traction and make the ground more solid. There was plenty of water to water the horses, but moving them about in this type of terrain was slow and difficult.

It wasn’t the retreats, low morale, or uncomfortable night that had convinced Alex what he had to do—no matter what the risk—it was the utter ineptitude of the English leadership. The army was unorganized and hampered by a ridiculously long train of supplies that stretched for twenty leagues—Despenser had even brought furniture, for Christ’s sake, for the earldom of Moray that the king had promised him. Furthermore, King Edward had no real battle plan (arrogantly believing that Bruce would retreat or be no match for the “superior” English troops—despite recent proof to the contrary), and he’d not only failed to put an end to the squabbling among his commanders, he’d actually made it worse by fueling the bad blood between Gloucester and Hereford by appointing them joint commanders, leaving the important vanguard of the army without clear directive.

What chance did the English have to end this war when no one was in charge, the commanders were at each other’s throats, and the king wouldn’t listen to reason? And even if the English did manage to end it, could Alex count on Edward to protect the Scots in the Borders? Or would they just exchange one kind of suffering for another?

Alex listened in disbelief as Edward humiliated the very nephew he’d foolishly favored with co-command of the vanguard—young Gloucester—and ignored his sound advice.

“We have arrived in time to relieve the siege,” Gloucester pointed out. “There is no need to force the Scots into a confrontation tomorrow. The men are tired after marching for a week. The carts and infantry are still straggling in. Let us rest a day, get the men organized, find better ground for our troops, and wait and see what Bruce will do.”

“And give him a chance to slink back into his fox hole?” King Edward demanded furiously. “Are you a fool, nephew, or merely a coward?”

The word fell like the slap of a gauntlet. Gloucester’s face turned nearly purple with anger.

Hereford, his enemy who’d been forced into joint leadership with Edward’s favorite nephew, smirked.

And that is how it went in that crowded, hot, and pungent tent, teeming with angry and disheartened knights in battle-scuffed mail: fractious discord made wider by the king, and any effort to urge caution met with scorn and derision.

If Edward had troubled himself to walk around the camp through the boggy ground and look at the disarray and exhaustion of his army, he would have seen the truth. But like the unfortunate Sir Henry de Bohun, he was so caught up in the perceived glory of defeating Bruce and the Scots in a pitched battle that he would not heed caution. With nearly eighteen thousand men—three times as many as Bruce—Edward would not conceive of anything other than an English victory.
If
Bruce could be persuaded into taking the field, that is.

At least on that they agreed. Bruce needed to take the field. And if Alex wanted an end to this war—the right end—he knew what he had to do.

“It’s not too late.”

He sure as hell hoped she was right.

Despite it being close to midnight, the sky was not yet completely dark as Alex crept through the shadows, winding his way through the tents and fitfully sleeping soldiers. The English were on alert, half expecting a middle-of-the-night attack by Bruce. Still, Alex was stopped by sentries only once.

“I carry a message from the earl”—Pembroke, Alex meant—“to my men guarding the carts.” The carts that were on the other side of the Bannock Burn.

They let him go.

It was partially true. When Alex arrived at the carts, he explained to his men what he planned to do and told them to be ready when the time came.

If
the time came.

Though there were signs that Bruce might be considering doing what he’d avoided for eight years—meeting the English in pitched battle—Alex knew that prudence and caution would be urging the king to take the small victories he’d won today and slip back into the mist, leaving the fight for another day. Alex intended, however, to convince him to stay and fight.

So far Bruce had surprised him, and Alex wondered whether Bruce, too,
wanted
to fight. Was he looking for a definitive end to the war? Had he grown tired of the cat-and-mouse game they’d been playing?

The fact that Bruce had let the English army march unmolested this far—a complete change of tactics from the previous English invasion—and had stayed in the area to face them today, suggested that he might.

But Alex knew that if he did not act, there was every chance the Scots would leave the forest of the New Park by morning.

He couldn’t let that happen. He knew with every fiber of his being that this was the chance Bruce had to defeat the English and end the war. So he swallowed his pride—knowing he would have to do so many times before the night was over—removed the surcoat that identified him as a knight, and told himself that even if he felt like a dog slinking back with its tail between its legs, he would do whatever it took. In this case, the ends definitely justified the means.

As he slipped through the English perimeter and headed toward the New Park, he entered the eerily quiet buffer of land between the two armies. After stumbling into a pit carefully hidden beneath leaves and branches and nearly becoming impaled on one of the wooden stakes at the bottom, he was more careful about where he stepped. But the honeycomb-like defensive pits dug by Bruce’s men were one more indication that Bruce might want to fight.

Each step Alex took closer to the Scot camp he knew well could be his last. If one of their scouts didn’t put an arrow through him first, he knew Boyd and MacRuairi would be fighting for the honor of doing so with a blade. But if he was going to die, damn it, it wasn’t going to be fighting behind Edward Plantagenet’s banner.

Joan was right; he had to take a chance.

He held his hands up in the universal signal of surrender as he approached, but that didn’t stop the arrow that whizzed right by his ear—too perfectly directed to be a mistake.

Alex stopped and cursed. There was only one man skilled enough to make a shot like that. Of course Bruce had his best men on watch tonight; it was Alex’s bad luck that he’d run into one he knew too well. “I’m here to see the king, MacGregor.”

Two men stepped out from behind the trees. He didn’t need to see their nasal helm–covered faces to recognize the shadows of Gregor “Arrow” MacGregor and Arthur “Ranger” Campbell.

Alex swore again. Christ, not one but
two
of his former brethren.

“I think your king is in that big fancy pavilion there on the other side of that burn,” MacGregor quipped.

What had he expected, open arms? He’d known it would be like this. They wouldn’t make this easy. No, they would make him pay for his betrayal—he knew that. And he would take it, damn it, until he convinced the king.

Alex gritted his teeth and said patiently, “I have important information that Bruce will want to hear.”

“I’m sure you do,” Campbell said. “And perhaps an assassin’s dagger as well?”

Alex knew they had no cause to trust him—and every reason not to—but still, the accusation stung. Gritting his teeth some more, he removed his sword, dagger, and even his eating knife, and held them out. “Check me if you wish, but this is all of them.”

Both men came forward. MacGregor took the weapons and Campbell, after a cursory search, stood back. “He’s clean.”

“This better be good, Seton,” MacGregor said. “Make one false move and it won’t just be my arrow that strikes you.”

Alex understood. They would all be vying for that honor.

They took him to the king. Just outside the royal tent, which was about a third of the size of Edward’s and not half as fine, Alex passed by a handful of tied-up men whom he recognized; they were some of the more important English soldiers who’d been taken prisoner by Randolph today.

“Seton,” Sir Thomas Gray said with obvious relief. “You’re a sight for weary eyes. Did the king send you to negotiate our ransom already?”

Alex answered with a shake of his head. They would find out the truth soon enough.

After entering the tent—or rather being shoved through by MacGregor—a glance at the hardened visages surrounding him told Alex that he’d come at the right time. He’d interrupted the king’s war council. For gathered around the king were his chief advisors: Douglas, Randolph, Neil Campbell (Arthur’s elder brother and one of Bruce’s most loyal and longtime companions), Edward Bruce, the Abbot of Inchaffray (who brought the relics of St. Columba), and every single member of the Highland Guard.