Randall Wallace - Braveheart

Hamish and William lay flat to the ground on the edge of the hilltop above the entire valley. They could see no details from this distance, could barely make out the light pile of neatly placed stones that mounded Murron’s grave. They had ridden an extra half hour to come into the valley from this direction and the last ten minutes of that in stealthy silence. But now Hamish whispered, “You sure they’re down there?”

William answered nothing. He had already told Hamish exactly what he had planned to do, and while Hamish was sure that William’s eyes could penetrate the shadows no better than his own, it was unsettling to the big redhead that William seemed to see the soldiers lurking there, had already seen them in his mind, before they even left their horses behind and crawled the rest of the way to this spot to peer down into the valley on their bellies.

“William…. I wish you wouldn’t ask me to do this,” Hamish said.

“The earth will still be soft for quick digging. You’ve got to help me. I won’t have the strength,” William said.

“But I—” Hamish started to protest.

William had already crawled off into the darkness. Hamish swore under his breath and crawled after him.

At the edge of the Highland graveyard, between the treeline and the graves themselves, was a rill in the earth from which underbrush sprang. This underbrush had been thickened by cuttings brought in from the forest beyond, and beneath this added camouflage lay four English soldiers. When they had first taken their places here, just as darkness fell, the promised reward for the head of William Wallace had made them alert and optimistic. Then they had grown edgy from the long vigil in a dark graveyard; now they were drowsy. But they perked up at the first sound of muffled hoofbeats.

They reached for their weapons — short swords smeared with dirt so that no gleam of moonlight could betray their position; they knew that to catch this William Wallace they would have to be crafty. Barely breathing, they lifted their heads to peer toward the stack of new stones in the center of the graveyard. They saw the lone rider moving up the valley, keeping close to the shadows, guiding his horse in a quick quiet trot rather than a louder gallop but stopping every twenty yards or so to listen and scan the shadows.

Three of the soldiers in the underbrush were new recruits, first-timers in Scotland; they now blessed the sergeant who had led them there, concocting this whole ambush. The sergeant knew these Highlanders!

He had positioned his corporal and four more men at the far side of the graveyard, so that even if Wallace escaped their first charge, he would run directly into their spears.

The soldiers in the underbrush worked themselves into crouching postures, ready to spring as soon as the rider dismounted. They strained to make out the face of the horseman as he neared the grave… and they stopped listening.

By the time they heard the hoofbeats on the soft earth behind them, it was too late. It didn’t make sense. They couldn’t make out their direction, then they whirled, their eyes bugging, as a cloaked figure galloped in from the woods behind them. The figure was swirling fire! He hurled burning torches into the clustered soldiers and the clustered brush. The four soldiers tied to scatter from the flame, and the rider — William Wallace —— cut them down with his massive broadsword.

Meanwhile, Hamish had reached Murron’s grave and was digging frantically. The stones he had scattered with a few kicks of his huge feet and a swat or two of his massive hands. The new dirt parted easily and he began to free the shrouded body from the shallow earth. He cringed, not with the effort but from the very idea of what he was doing.

Hamish could feel a charge coming. William had plotted the entire English ambush in his mind and had already warned him exactly where the soldiers would be. And now sure enough they came, more soldiers rushing in from behind the rocks at the far side of the graveyard. Hamish didn’t even look at them coming, he just struggled to get the shrouded body out of the ground. Wallace charged the soldiers and drove them back. One he rode over, another he hacked, but the others scrambled back in their shock and confusion as the ambushers became the ambushed.

William galloped to Hamish and jumped down beside him.

“I’ll take her,” William said.

He had ignored a charging soldier; Hamish cut the man down just as he reached William’s back.

William clutched the body to his chest and climbed into the saddle, a tremendous physical feat that he seemed not to feel at all. Hamish ran and bounded into the saddle of his own horse, wheeled, and drove back two more soldiers with the slash of his own broadsword. Then he galloped after William.

William rode through the moonlight as he clutched Murron’s shrouded body to his chest. Hamish rode behind, protecting against any pursuit.

At the grove on the precipice, William dismounted and stretched Murron’s body gently on the ground. Hamish dismounted, too, with the spade he had used to dig up the old grave. He lifted his eyes to William’s face and saw the moonlight shining in the tears at the edges of his eyes. “I’ll wait… back there,” Hamish said.

“Hamish, I… thank…” William stammered.

Hamish put a hand on his friend’s shoulder, then quietly led the horses away.

William started to dig.

Later in the grove William sat looking at the new grave covered with leaves, completely hidden. He touched his hand to the earth.

Hamish was waiting by the stream as William came out of the grove. There was nothing to say. They mounted their horses and rode away.

WILLIAM SAT CROSS-LEGGED BESIDE A SMALL HOT FIRE OF dry peat and wet twigs. It had rained through all of that day and most of the previous night, and the woolens he had his men wore were soaked through; this made them wet but warm, for the woven cloth was an even better insulator when it thickened with moisture. Most of the men in the encampment were drowsy; the rain splattering on the canopy of trees above them was like a lullaby to the tired Highlanders.

But they had placed sentries at the perimeter of their camp; old Campbell had seen to that. Now he was lovingly honing broadswords to razor edges as he shared a whiskey jug with Hamish, who sat beside the fire next to William and looked from time to time at the darkness all around like a dog sniffing for danger.

For the last hour William had been staring, not at the glowing embers of the fire as Scots sharing whiskey were inclined to do but into the smoke rising above it, as fie he saw in its twists and curls some action unfolding there. But now he picked up a stick from the pile gathered to feed the fire, and brushing away the broken leaves that matted the forest floor, he began to scratch on the wet ground. It wasn’t writing; Hamish couldn’t read, but he knew letters when he saw them. These were patterns: squares, triangles, circles. Finally Hamish demanded, “What’re ya doing’?”

“Thinking,” William replied.

“Does it hurt?”

“What do we do when Longshanks sends his whole northern army against us?”

Old Campbell stopped what he was doing and sat down beside the fire. “Aye,” he said. “I’ve studied on the question myself. They have heavy cavalry. Armored horses that shake the very ground. We have spears and broadswords.”

“They’ll ride right over our formations,” Hamish said.

“Uncle Argyle and I used to talk about it,” William said. “No army in history has ever been able to stand before a charged of armored horse. No infantry has ever had the courage. And if they did stand, it wouldn’t be courage but foolishness. Without a barrier of fortifications, the horses are unstoppable. And if we are outnumbered, as we surely will be, then giving up maneuver by hiding behind earthworks is equally stupid, for the king’s archers would kill us all.”