Nigel Tranter - The Path of the Hero King

The man’s lethargic watching grew to interest and a sort of actual concern, as the fifth attempt again ended in failure, and after a momentary hold on the wall the creature was dragged back once more, again to recommence its laborious upward climbing.

The sixth effort showed intelligence as well as determination.

This time the spider swung itself at a slightly different angle, to reach a spot a couple of inches to one side and fractionally higher.

It looked as though this might work, possibly giving a slightly better foothold-but no, gravity was again too great, and once more thread and spider fell backwards, frustrated.

“It is of no avail,” the King muttered, shaking his head.

“Can you not see it? Too stark …”

But the animalcule would not admit defeat. Undeterred, before even its line stopped swinging it was clawing up again to the roof, to launch itself downwards with unabated resolve. And this time, when its pendulum swing brought it to the wall, it managed to hang on. Almost breathlessly the man watched it, willing the creature success.

It remained on the vertical rock, its thread pulsing gently in the smoky, flickering lamplight.

“Now, by the saints-here is a wonder!” Bruce exclaimed aloud.

“A sign, if ever there was one! If this creeping mite in a hole no in the earth can so set its will to conquer, can Robert Bruce, crowned King of this realm, do less? Six defeats did not deter it Shall I despair more easily?” He stood up, stooping since he must in that place.

“Here is my lesson-from heaven or from hell! I shall not give in yet awhile. Nor yet awhile to seek my death amongst the Saracens! That can wait. Yet, I do swear to God, if He will hear me this once, out of this pit, that, my battle here in Scotland won, I will go to His holy places, and draw sword for His name. By all that is holy! But … first, this my realm’s freedom!”

Filled now with a sudden access of restless strength and the need for action, or at least movement, Bruce strode out past the sleeping ranks of his men in the outer cave, out into the starlit night. A half moon was rising to the southeast, washing the crowding hillsides in wan pewter and inky shadow. With a brief word to the two watchful sentinels, the King paced away along the track they had made at the foot of the crags.

It was not long before he realised that he was being followed, at a distance. He turned.

“Who is mat? I would be alone,” he jerked.

“It is but Hay, Sire,” the Lord of Erroll called.

“In case you need aught.”

“Aye, Gibbie. Do not heed me. Go back and sleep.”

He moved on until he came to the burnside, where earlier he had brought the others across. And there, with the moonlight glittering quicksilver on the dancing waters, he sat himself on a boulder, to stare out into the night, unseeing. But now his mind dwelt no longer on the past, on his sorrows, even on his wife and daughter in their extremity. He counted and assessed and planned.

Galloway, partly his own Bruce sphere of influence, had stabbed him in the back, yes. Because the MacDoualls, who claimed anciently to have been princes thereof, had seen opportunity to strike a savage, grudging blow for their long lost hegemony. That might be forgiven-but not the sending of Tom and Alex, wounded and bound, to Edward of England. That must be avenged. But, more important than any vengeance, a gesture must be made to show all Galloway, all Scotland indeed, the royal cause was still potent, not to be flouted. That the King would avenge his own and strike down traitors. The English could wait awhile-if they would!

This was between him and his own subjects.

Galloway was a great and wide province, and ill to conquer-as even

Edward Plantagenet had found to his cost. No country for a handful of

men to assail. But its mountainous north was different, fierce, empty,

cut off by high passes, where a few, knowledgeable and desperate, could

make the land fight for them. Not far from these Carrick hills indeed

the one ran into the other. And he knew them well.

A limited campaign in North Galloway, then. Entice his enemies therein, to ambuscade, skirmish, attrition, raiding. Wallace’s warfare again. Even these sixty men in such territory could, skilfully deployed and led, engage hundreds. Where, then? The Glenkens?

The Rhinns of Kells? Merrick? Glen Trool?

Bruce was going over in his mind the North Galloway geography, visualising each stretch of that far-flung, lofty terrain, and the lowlying areas which might be successfully raided from each, when he started up, suddenly alert. Above the steady noise of the water, he had heard a different sound. It had seemed like the baying of a hound.

Tense, he listened. But the sound was not repeated. Could it have been only the call of some night-bird? Or a wolf? There were still wolves in these hills, though seldom seen now. Yet it was hound that his innermost mind had said, immediately-a hound baying in the night. And so far as he knew, there would be no hound within a dozen miles, with Loch Doon Castle in ruins.

After a while Bruce sat again, and sought to return to his possible strategies and tactics. But now he was listening all the time, his mind less wholly concentrated.

It was not a hound that he heard, presently, but the bounding clatter of a stone rolling down a steep hillside. From across the burn, some way to the left he thought, nearer to the main valley.

He cursed the noise of the waterfall above and the rapids below, which drowned all but higher and intrusive sounds. Rising, he climbed higher up the bank, in an attempt to rise above the rushing, splashing interference.

Suddenly movement close at hand made him jump like a nervous horse. But it was only Gilbert Hay again, coming down the track.

“Somebody comes, Sire,” the other whispered.

“I heard a hound, back there, I swear. As I sat.”

This was no occasion for berating Gibbie for disobeying a royal command.

“I heard,” Bruce nodded.

“Could it be Boyd, back already?”

“Too soon, by far. But it might be some of our friends. Returning with aid.”

They waited, staring towards the shadowy wooded hillside. Presently they thought that they caught the chink of metal against stone.

“If we can hear that, they are very near…”

“And come mighty quietly. Secretly! Would any of ours come go? I think not…”

“There, Sire! Movement.” Hay pointed.

The hawthorns and scrub ended perhaps thirty yards from the water’s edge, across there. Now there were darker shapes, and stirring, amongst the shadows of the trees. Peer as they would, the watchers could distinguish no details.

Then something about one of the foremost figures became plain.

It was the strained backward-leaning gait of a man who restrained a dog from too hurried a pace. This, and two other figures, moved out from the denser shadows into the moonlight cautiously. Obviously many more remained behind, hidden.

“So-o-o!” Bruce breathed out.

“No friends would so come. Led by a bloodhound! They must have followed Boyd’s and my cousin’s tracks, back here.”

“Quickly, Sire-back to the cave. While we are still unseen.”

“No. They have to cross this burn. And it is not easy. Here is the place to hold them. Go you back for our people, Gibbie.”

“You go, Sire. Allow that I wait here …”

“Do as I say, man. But, Gibbie -give me your sword.” Bruce, for his preoccupied moonlight walk, had come away unarmed save for the dagger which never left his hip. Hay had been more circumspect.

Reluctantly the other yielded up his blade. He slipped away.

Sword in hand the King watched. The three men and the bloodhound were crossing the open belt of dead bracken to the waterside. One of the trio was very tall and massive, armour glinting.