Robert Low - The Lion Wakes

But it was not Bek and herschip raiders Hal feared. Buchan was leashed by the fact that Herdmanston was on the same side as himself, but that was a thin cord – if he snapped it and came for his vengeance, there would be no half-hearted exchange of bolts and arrows and taunts. Buchan would bring the deep hate of the robbed and cuckolded, the unrelenting vengeance that had made him send Malise after Isabel in the first place.

Hal heard the Auld Sire’s voice, as if he was at his elbow – he will come at you sideways, like a cock fighting on a dungheap. Even from the dark…

And he might not be here to defend her. The thought embered up into his eyes and she saw it and balmed it with smiles and calm.

‘Besides,’ she added lightly, ‘who would dare take on Maggie and Bet and hope for life?’

Hal smiled, remembering how she had taken them on herself. Alehouse Maggie ran the brewhouse, with arms muscled as hams from stirring her vats, an arse like the quarters of a destrier and breasts, as Sim had mentioned, that you could see Traprain Law from if you reached the top. Once she blew the froth off her moustache, he added, she was a rare rattle on a cold night.

Bet the Bread ran the bakehouse and did the cooking for all in the Keep. Chap-cheeked, breasted like a pouter-pigeon, she had hair so long covered by a tight headsquare than no-one could swear to the colour of it – not even Sim since, as he had once confessed, it was the only thing she never took off.

They had sniffed a little, like bitches round a strange animal, when Isabel had first arrived, then given it a day or two before testing the steel of her. Alehouse Maggie had begun it, when Hal and Isabel had gone to the stone cross, ostensibly for him to pay his respects to the Auld Sire and, she knew, in some weird way, present her to the other occupants that lay beneath.

Isabel had stood beside him in the shadow of the great stone column with its coffin bell and chains – disconnected, she knew, after a violent storm had set the heavy bell ringing in the night and brought everyone to trembling wakefulness – and hoped to feel something from the mound.

There was nothing but wind and the wheep of birds, no word of greeting or condemnation from the dead, not even from the newest, the Auld Sire himself, who had winked and leered at her that day in the makeshift chapel on Abbey Craig.

Then Alehouse Maggie had lumbered up with a brown, glazed jug in one hand and, to Isabel’s questioning eyebrow, lowered two of her own.

‘First of a new brew,’ she rumbled, ‘goes to the Auld Sire.’

She was intrigued and shocked when Isabel reached out, took the jug and gently but firmly plucked it from her hands, then handed it to Hal.

‘First of a new brew,’ she said as Hal, taking his cue, drank and handed it back to her, ‘goes to the lord of Herdmanston. After that, you can water what graves you choose.’

Hal smiled at the memory of it, then uncurled one fist and held up an amulet on a leather thong; Isabel arched a quizzical, mocking eyebrow.

‘Did that wee pardoner promise redemption, or just the Hand of God?’ she demanded and he looped it over the tousle of her hair, then kissed her soft on the lips.

‘We are all in the Hand of God,’ he said and she clutched him. The Kingdom was a guttering candle in the high wind of Edward Plantagenet and Hal knew that the next few days and weeks would make or break it. I would not leave here for anything less than this, he said to himself, but he did not need to say it to her.

Yet, even now, he knew that Buchan would be scheming harder on how to bring down one wee Lothian lord than all the Plantagenets in Christendom; he threw the thought from him with a flick on the medallion.

‘That holds the secret of making a king,’ he said to her, smiling. ‘Keep it safe. Give it to The Bruce if… matters turn out badly. Serve him right to have to uncouple the puzzle of it, as I did.’

She did not know what he meant, but clutched the lead medallion in one hand as he turned away, clumping and clattering carefully down the worn stone steps in his hobnailed shoes. She heard the shouts and neighs and armour clatter, finally dragged the coverlet tight round her for modesty and went to the great window.

Below, Hal and Sim were mounted and surrounded by a score of riders, all local men come to join him. I have to go, Hal said to himself, feeling the heat of her eyes on his back even after the curve of land hid the tower from view. There is no other Sientcler to do it.

With luck, he thought to himself, there will be no battle and the English, half-starved and thirsting, will be forced to abandon their campaigning for another year. Wallace was no fool and was not about to give Longshanks the battle he craved – particularly as the English king had finally reached Scotland with the largest army anyone had ever seen, with hundreds of heavy horse and a great mass of foot, almost all of them Welsh, or Gascons – even some Germans.

Isabel watched the Lothian men cavalcade away, the younger ones on their first such great endeavour, whooping for the joy of it. She felt the lead settle in her heart for the life that might be ripped away from them all.

And afterwards… the chill of that sleekit a way in to her, unwanted and unloved, so that she could not ignore it.

Afterwards, there would be sunshine and a gentle life with a man I have come to hold dear, as much a surprise to me as it is to him.

Even as she warmed herself at the idea of it, she knew it was a lie. Afterwards, win or lose, would come the reckoning – and she was not sure she wanted to visit on Herdmanston such a hatred as Buchan would wreak.

Yet, for now, there was the hope of something else, forlorn and ragged though it was.

‘Aye,’ said a voice, ‘it is a hard matter to watch yer man ride away to war, Lady.’

She turned to see Alehouse Maggie and Bet the Bread at the top of the stairs, the former holding a limp swatch of cloth.

‘You’ll be missing Sim,’ she managed and saw the pair of them smile and look at each other.

‘Pleased to see the back of him,’ Maggie declared. ‘He has wore us both out, the muckhoond.’

They did not look worn to Isabel and she did not want another game of tests with them. To her surprise, Maggie held out her arms, full of the limp cloth which Isabel saw was a dress.

‘We made ye this,’ she said awkwardly, ‘seeing as how ye came with no furbishments and have, we heard, refused to wear the mistress’s auld cloots.’

Isabel’s gaze flicked to the chest that held the clothes. It had not been hard to refuse the offer: she did not want to parade in his dead wife’s leavings.

She took the dress, which she knew would fit perfectly. It was good linen, dyed the colour of sky, festooned with ribbons and frippery and she dropped the coverlet under their gaze and slipped it on.

‘Bigod, Lady,’ sighed Maggie wistfully, ‘I wish I had yer slim. I did, a long time since. But too many bairns has ruined it.’

‘Ye never did,’ Bet replied scornfully. ‘Ye were a byword for sonsie, you – and every laddie for miles came to get a grip of some, which is why ye have had too many bairns.’

Maggie laughed, so that bits of her trembled like a quake, and admitted she had not been short of suitors. Then she saw the bleak of Isabel’s eyes and realised, suddenly, that this woman would trade slim for bairns at the cock of a head; her heart went out to her in that minute.

‘It is very fine,’ Isabel said slowly and Bet nodded.

‘Needs an underkirtle, mind. I have one which will fit – and some small clothes as well. Now your man is away ye might get a chance to wear them.’

Both women started to laugh, shrill and loud and Isabel, after a pause, saw there was no malice in it and joined in. Then she looked wistfully at the dress.