Nigel Tranter - The Price of the King's Peace

No Cardinal, or other than the Pontiff himself, can excommunicate me, as Primate. Or over-rule me within my province. Therefore this pronunciamento is faulty. Faulty in one respect, faulty in all.

It is to be ignored. These are my instructions, as Primate.”

Bruce actually smiled.

“I thank you, my lord Bishop. We all do, I vow. Not only that you remove such great weight from our souls.

But that you end this Council on a light note. All shall hear of

this.

I thank you all, my lords, for your attendance and your advice. Let us now resume our celebrations. And mourn the Lord Edward, in our private chambers, anon …”

Chapter Seventeen

Robert Bruce wondered how many times he had sat thus, in the saddle, at the head of a company of grim-faced armed men, great or small, and gazed southwards across the Borderline into England.

How often they had looked, dreading what would sooner or later bear down on them from over there, the great enemy hosts, intent on the annihilation of Scotland. Lately, of course, it had been rather the other way, and it would be the folk over there, south of Tweed, Esk or Solway, who must dread and quake when the smaller but faster lines of steel appeared on the Scottish slopes. How much longer, he asked himself? How long before proud, stubborn men, in York and London and Rome, would accept hard facts, recognise his kingship, and come to a peace conference? How much longer before he could lay down his sword?

Not that July night of 1319, at any rate. It was still the unsheathed sword. The only question was in which direction to wield it. Along the gentle ridge of Paxton, above Tweed, only five miles west of Berwick, they waited, the great Scots cavalry host, stretched out along the escarpment behind Bruce for a full mile, ten thousand armed and horsed men, silent, menacing, the largest raiding-force that he had ever mounted. Waited for James Douglas, as the grey summer night settled on land and sea.

They had moved south through Lothian and the Lammermuirs and into the Merse, by quiet, little-known passes, by Garvald and Spartleton Edge and Cranshaws. At Edrom, Jamie had left them, four hours earlier, and raced ahead with half a dozen of his own moss troopers None knew Berwick and vicinity, nowadays, so well as the Douglas. He had spies and informants scattered all around the area. Jamie would gain the information they required, if anybody could. He had promised to bring tidings to the King, here at Paxton, by an hour before midnight. He was almost an hour late.

Ten thousand men fretted and fidgeted.

“Shall I take a troop? To seek him?” the Earl of Moray asked, at his uncle’s elbow.

”I know many of the places where he would go. To gain news …” “I

think Jamie would scarce thank you, Thomas!” Bruce answered.

“To play nurse. Give him time.”

“He should have taken more men,” Gilbert Hay, at the other side, declared.

“He should be less rash. More careful of himself.”

“Less rash? Gibbie, we are getting old when we talk so! James Douglas remains young at heart.”

“So did my uncle, the Lord Edward!” Moray murmured.

“No, Thomas. I said young of heart. Not young of head! Jamie’s head is not so young. He will not take undue risks. And sound tidings we must have.”

“You fear the King of England may have learned cunning, with the years?” Fraser the Chamberlain asked.

“No, Sandy. Edward of Carnarvon will never learn cunning. It is the loyalty, or otherwise, of his lords, that concerns me. Notably one Lancaster That man’s behaviour, of royal birth and five Earls in one as he is, could change all at this juncture. I must know his dispositions.”

Edward of England, stung by the loss of Berwick, the repeated Scots raids deep into his kingdom, and the Cardinals’ failed mission, had not proceeded to a peace-treaty, but had raised a new army and marched north to retake Berwickon-Tweed, summoning all his northern vassals to support him there. But his unpopularity was as great as ever, as even in the days of Piers Gaveston -for he had elevated new favourites, the Despensers. The northern lords looked towards Lancaster as their leader. If Lancaster came to join his monarch before Berwick, as commanded, then the Scots host, tough and potent as it was, would look puny.

“Lancaster hates King Edward-all men know,” Fraser was saying, when the drumming of hooves silenced him. All heads turned in an easterly direction.

It was Douglas and his half-dozen, lathered in horse-spume.

“My sorrow that I have kept you waiting, Sire,” he exclaimed,

panting.

“But the English have got two great rings around the town. Earthworks. A double circumvallum. Thick with men. Winning through these is no light matter. It took time …”

“Double earthworks? That bespeaks many men.”

“Many, yes. Too many. Lancaster is come. He has joined the King.

With unnumbered thousands. He came but yesterday.”

“A curse on it! I had hoped …” Bruce frowned.

“Did you learn anything of numbers, Jamie?”

“Not that I could rely on. The King may have brought some 20,000. But Lancaster and the northern lords have many more.”

“And you say that they have dug these trenches and banks. All round the town?”

“Save at the harbour, yes. The King’s force did that. He has brought a host of foreigners, Low Country men, versed in siege war. With many great and strange engines and devices, I am told.

He intends to have Berwick again. At all costs. The Steward must be sleeping but poorly!”

“Perhaps. But I am more concerned for ourselves than for Walter! Our

own attack. These trenches and earthworks may have been dug to

encircle the town. But equally, they will protect the besiegers

against ourselves. To assail the English dug into these, their

spearmen and archers, with our smaller force-and that cavalry-would be folly. That way lies disaster.”

“So fear I. With Lancaster’s host on the Sank. To sweep us up,” Douglas agreed.

“We cannot do this by assault, Sire.”

“What, then?” Hay demanded.

“Must we sit and besiege the besiegers? Call for more men?”

“The English could call up more men more readily than could we,” Moray pointed out.

“There are more of them nearer at hand.”

“They have brought a fleet of ships, with their siege engines, into the harbour,” Douglas went on.

“These also are a danger.”

“I much fear …” Moray was saying, when the King cut him short.

“Fear nothing, Thomas,” he said.

“This is not the way. I have not come so far to throw my people into hopeless slaughter. As it would be. No-we adopt the other project. We seek to draw King Edward off, since he is too strongly placed for us to fight. Or you do. For this will take too long for me to be away from Dunfermline.

You and Jamie will take the road south, once more.”

To none did Bruce have to explain why he wanted to get back to Dunfermline quickly. The Queen was pregnant again, and nearing her time. The King was on edge, for more reasons than he would admit. This time it might be a son. But Elizabeth was getting past normal childbearing age. And what effect might his sickness have on any issue now…?

Douglas nodded.

“Gladly. How far south this time?”

“York, I think, will serve.”

“Would not further serve better, Sire? To draw King Edward after us?”

Douglas suggested.

“The nearer to London we win, the better. The South will lie

unprotected, with his armies here.”

”Perhaps. But York should suffice, I think. I have word that Edward

Queen, Isabella, is presently there. He left her at York when he

marched north.”

“Ha! You mean …?”

“I mean that, unlike the English, I do not usually make war against women. But this lady, taken into your custody for a little-or even the threat thereof-would, I believe, fetch Edward south promptly, and shorten the siege of Berwick more swiftly than any other means.”