The Renegade: A Tale of Robert the Bruce (16 page)

If he expected any sympathy from the others he was disappointed, but Bigod looked at him levelly. “I agree with Percy,” he said. “You had better change into something suitable for a royal execution.”

“Shit,” Rob muttered, but he knew they were right and he went off to change into his best tunic.

Soon after, he was standing in front of the heavily guarded doors fronting the main building of the Palace of Westminster, the Great Hall. He was reluctant to move forward, wondering if the surly steward might, indeed, have lodged a complaint against them. He noticed one of the guards looking at him suspiciously, probably because he was the only person standing still among the tide of bodies shuffling towards the entrance, and so he drew himself up, squaring his shoulders and tugging beneath his light blue silk cloak at the folds of the dark blue French-style quilted tunic he was wearing for the first time. He took a deep breath and stepped forward, directly towards the guard who had been watching him.
Without altering his expression beyond a querying twitch of one eyebrow, the guard lowered his spear shaft sideways, just enough to bar the way as Rob reached him.

“Bruce,” Rob said. “Robert. Of Turnberry in Carrick. Son of Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick. Summoned by His Majesty.”

The guard blinked once, impassively, and raised his spear to the vertical again, allowing Rob to pass through the open doors at his back.

Inside the main doors the vast anteroom was crowded with people, a brightly coloured confusion of noise and movement. Rob stopped just across the threshold, taking it all in with stirrings of awe. This was the first time he had ever approached the Throne Room alone and unescorted, merely one of the throng of hopefuls seeking admission to the world of power behind the tall, wide carved doors in the far wall. He recognized Sir Robert FitzHugh, the King’s seneschal, standing head-down at his post by the high lectern in front of the doors, candlelight reflecting off his thick, silver hair as he consulted his list of attendees. Behind Sir Robert, a sextet of Household Guards flanked the entrance itself, three on either side. Two of them had their hands on the doors’ handles, ready to pull them open. The other four, under the watchful eye of a plumed and polished sergeant-at-arms, stood vigilantly, their eyes scanning the crowd.

Rob made his way to the front, where he stopped, watching Sir Robert as the seneschal dealt with the importuning of a heavy-set, florid-faced merchant, whose equally portly wife stood at his side, frowning. Sir Robert murmured something soothing and glanced away, his eye meeting Rob’s by accident as he did so, and the change in him was immediate. His face lit up and he smiled and drew himself erect.

“Sir Robert,” he said loudly, causing every head within hearing to turn towards the young man. “His Majesty has asked for you. Be so good as to come this way.”

Rob heard the muttering behind him as he followed the seneschal obediently.
Sir Robert
?

The guards pulled the doors of the Great Hall open to reveal a gathering larger and more brilliant by far than the throng in the anteroom, and in the first moments of what was a revelation unlike anything he had ever seen before, Rob thought he heard stringed music underlying the babble of voices, and his breath caught at the rich mixture of odours and perfumes that filled the air: the unmistakable sweet aroma of hundreds of burning beeswax candles and the hot-waxen smoke from lamps and guttering wicks; sharper woodsmoke from what must be enormous fireplaces; and everywhere eddying smells of delicious foods and spices and the scents of laughing, excited women, all mixed with the musk of sweat and unwashed bodies. He heard the music again, faint and far away though in the room somewhere, but he did not even try to look for the source of it, for the floor was packed with people, many eating, most drinking. He heard snatches of French and even Catalan among the swirling voices on all sides.

The seneschal paused only briefly at the top of the two shallow steps inside the doors to stretch up on his toes and look over the crowd before he reached back and took Rob by the wrist, pulling him along as he swept down the steps into the vast hall, said to be the largest anywhere. Forty feet above their heads, supported by massive, arching rafters atop walls that were six feet thick, the ceiling was masked in darkness that the lights below could never hope to penetrate.

Rob followed on Sir Robert’s heels, weaving in concert with the older man and trying not to step on the skirts of the seneschal’s robe as FitzHugh twisted and wove expertly through the crush of bodies, skirting one group, sidestepping another, and, despite an occasional smile or tip of his head to one person or another, speaking to no one.

They were making their way towards the enormous arched window that filled the entire south wall ahead, its soaring panels gleaming with multicoloured glass, and Rob knew that the royal thrones sat on a dais beneath it, for he had been here several times before. But on those occasions the Hall had been partitioned with folding screens and there had been fewer than a score of people in
attendance on the King and Queen, so that the atmosphere had been cordial and relaxed, in fitting with Her Majesty’s gracious presence. When he drew close to the dais, though, he saw that, despite the swarming courtiers in the massive room, both thrones sat empty.

Sir Robert turned sharply sideways, still clinging to Robert’s wrist. There was a single door in the corner, and he led Rob directly to it, releasing his wrist only when he reached out to open the door and step quickly inside. Rob followed him. This room was much smaller, and had two entrances, the second at the rear, facing the one they had used. The only furniture was a single square table in the middle, with an upholstered wooden armchair on one side. The table’s broad surface, large enough to accommodate four seated men on each side, was covered with books, bound scrolls, piles of writing paper, pots of pens and quills, and a full dozen stoppered inkhorns. A heavy chandelier hung over the table, suspended by chains, and the light from its several dozen candles warmed the entire room.

“Now, let’s have a look at you, young Bruce.” The seneschal studied Rob with narrowed eyes, then nodded. “Good. Most excellent. Her Majesty’s tailor has surpassed himself. The Queen will be most pleased.”

Rob felt himself flushing under Sir Robert’s appraising smile, aware that the seneschal knew the story behind his finery. About a month earlier, at Westminster, he had been engaged in a friendly scuffle with Humphrey de Bohun when he was peremptorily summoned to the palace by his father. Running to avoid keeping his father waiting, Rob had encountered King Edward and Queen Eleanor. He had skidded to a halt and had greeted the royal couple respectfully, not even mildly embarrassed. There was no formality or protocol in such informal encounters when they occurred. He was their guest, or his father was, and he was well liked by both of them and returned their affection. The embarrassment had occurred when he bowed and turned to leave them. The Queen immediately called him back and asked him what had happened to his tunic. He was unaware that the back of his tunic, between his shoulders, had been ripped out and hung behind him in a ragged flap. Queen Eleanor,
gracious at all times, had insisted that he remain with her while a servant went running to find the seneschal, who was in turn instructed to take Master Bruce to the royal tailor and see to it that he received some new clothes, suitable to his station as her honoured guest. Thus, informally and almost accidentally, was Robert Bruce introduced to the pleasures of wearing stylish and beautiful clothes designed for him by gifted craftsmen. It was a self-indulgence he would take delight in forever after.

“The gathering tonight is for Her Majesty’s pleasure, and the King indulges her,” FitzHugh was saying now in his dry way. “This day marks the forty-sixth anniversary of the day she first heard His Majesty named as her husband-to-be. They were wed in November that same year, in Castile, in the Abbey of Santa Maria la Real, and a blessed match it has proved to be. Her Majesty has celebrated this anniversary every year since then, for, unofficial as it is, she holds the memory dear. Forty-five times, and each year the celebration grows larger. But the King is meeting privily with others at this moment, for the affairs of the realm take no heed of celebrations, and we are to join them—
you
are to join them—as soon as may be.” FitzHugh hesitated. “Something is troubling you, I can see.”

Rob waved vaguely towards the door through which they had entered. “All those people out there … Did the King and Queen just leave them there?”

“Leave them there? No, that would be ungracious. Their Majesties have not yet made their entrance. Nor will they until the King’s business is concluded and Queen Eleanor announces herself ready. Now, shall we go? Are you ready?”

Rob drew a deep breath. “I am, sir. But for what? What does the King need with me, on a night like this?”

The seneschal merely smiled and led the way to the far door.

Another large room, its walls draped with brightly coloured tapestries that glowed in the light of hundreds of massed candles, some in heavy chandeliers above the heads of the crowd and others ranked
in sloping banks along the walls and against the central pillars like votive racks in churches. Leaping flames from a pair of roaring fires in the great hearths at each end added to the flickering light and shadow, for though the summer day outside yet had hours to run, in this windowless room it was night. There was no music here, though, other than the deep, murmurous sound of rumbling male voices.

Rob looked about at the score or more of richly clad men, many of them clerics, standing in separate groups, some talking quietly among themselves, others plainly waiting, though for what he could not have said. Sir Robert FitzHugh was already striding towards the largest group, near one of the fires, and as he hurried to keep up Rob saw the tall figure of Edward Plantagenet among the cluster of men there, dominant even had his height not been enhanced by the crown he wore. The monarch was in full regalia, and Rob noted that the coronet of heavy gold, with its studding of precious stones, appeared to sit very comfortably and naturally on its wearer’s head.

Edward was talking to the elderly John de Warrenne, seventh Earl of Surrey and grandfather to Rob’s friend Henry Percy. To the King’s right, Humphrey de Bohun, the Earl of Hereford, was listening intently, his heavily jowled, saturnine face scowling in the habitual frown he had passed on to his son. Roger de Bigod of Norfolk was there, too, on the King’s left and flanked in turn by Antony Bek, the Prince-Bishop of Durham, and two other clerics, both wearing the pectoral cross and crimson
scapulae
that marked them as bishops, too. There was one more man among the coterie, almost concealed from Rob’s view by the trio of bishops, and although he caught only a glimpse of him Rob recognized him at once, from a previous encounter. William de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, was one of the most powerful men in Edward’s realm, notwithstanding his French birth. He owned vast territories in both France and England and was a close associate of the King. As Rob approached behind FitzHugh, he looked more closely at the Anglo-French earl, noting the air of barely suppressed ennui with which he listened to the voices surrounding him.

The seneschal’s hand waved backward in a signal to Rob to stop where he was, and Sir Robert went on alone, clearing his throat deferentially as he approached the royal presence. A flash of garish colour to his left drew Rob’s eye away from the encounter, and he saw a youth of about his own age move into view from behind two others. Bare headed, with long, dark hair that hung smoothly to his shoulders, he was unmistakably a Highland Gael, and a wealthy, privileged one. Where Rob would have expected him to wear the normal brogans of his people, this young man wore burnished, calfhigh boots that were laced up their open front over tight trousers of saffron-coloured deerskin. He wore an open-collared shirt made of the same soft skin, its deep-cut front laced loosely over his bare chest and secured at the waist with a heavy belt of gold-studded leather. A fringed shawl of light wool in alternating squares of red and dark green hung down his back to his heels, anchored by a brace of magnificently jewelled brooches at his shoulders that were connected by a thick pendant chain of gold links.

Whoever he was, he seemed very sure of himself and completely unaware of Rob, his attention focused on the tall man who stood beside him, talking intently. Rob recognized that man as Sir Gervais de Blais, Edward’s personal attendant, a former Gascon cleric whom the King had knighted a few years earlier. Rob had first met de Blais six years before, when the Gascon, then a squire, had accompanied Edward on the King’s visit to Turnberry, but he knew him well enough by now to be on easy, first-name terms with him. The Gascon knight met his eye, though whether accidentally or not Rob could not have said, and inclined his head amiably but unobtrusively in recognition before turning his gaze to the last member of their trio, another young man of about Rob’s age who was richly dressed in the normal fashion of the English nobility. Rob assumed him to be the new English arrival, Bishop Bek’s protégé, Robert Clifford.

“Robert! Come forward, lad.” The sound of the King’s voice snapped him back to attention and he went forward, receiving a quick wink from Sir Robert FitzHugh as the seneschal passed him, returning to his post in the anteroom. As a man, the entire group
surrounding the monarch turned to Rob, and he felt himself flushing, knowing he could not return all their looks eye to eye without neglecting the King. He had an impression of hostility in some of their gazes, open dislike on de Valence’s face, and curiosity in the eyes of the two unknown bishops. Bishop Bek merely stared at him impassively. Edward, however, was paying attention to none of them.

“By God, boy, you look impressive, for a heathen Scot.” The King was smiling as he spoke, removing any sting from his words. “That tunic’s French, is it not? De Valence, what say you?” He did not wait to hear what the French earl might have to say, but carried right on. “Our Queen will be most pleased with what you have inspired her tailors to achieve. My lords, have any of you not yet met young Robert Bruce, firstborn son of our good friend Robert, Earl of Carrick?”