Child of the Phoenix (135 page)

Eleyne was sitting at the king’s left hand. She eyed him surreptitiously. After the years of procrastination over this wedding, he appeared at last to have put every reservation aside and thrown himself totally into the joy of his new marriage. Yolande sat close to him, her face glowing with happiness, her hand straying often at the same time as his to the dish they shared so that their fingers touched in the sensuous warmth and scent of sauces and gravies and sweet creams and junkets.

Below the dais, in the crowded heat of the hall, the noise of talk and laughter had risen to a deafening pitch which drowned the playing of the minstrels in the space between the tables. Course after course of food continued to arrive, and with it a positive river of rich Gascon wine.

In one of the rare moments when he took his eyes off his wife, Alexander turned to Eleyne and was astounded. How had he ever imagined that Eleyne of Mar looked old? She was radiant. Her trained velvet gown was an exquisite deep green trimmed with gold, her girdle heavy with gilt, her mantle of russet silk trimmed with fox fur, but it was her eyes which caught his attention. They were as green as emeralds in the golden candlelight, large and lustrous. And full of laughter.

Outside, the thunder rumbled gently around the hills. He laughed and touched her arm. ‘Thank you.’

He mouthed the words above the noise and she smiled. He wasn’t sure what he was thanking her for – for helping sway him finally into remarriage, perhaps; perhaps for caring; for having loved the father he could barely remember but who came to him sometimes in his dreams.

He frowned, aware suddenly that there was someone standing behind them, between his great chair and Eleyne’s smaller one. He saw her look over her shoulder and her face paled, all the animation dying before his eyes.

He swung around, angry at the interruption, and caught his breath. There was no one there. Yet he felt it, felt it as clearly as she obviously had. Someone had been there, his shadow cutting off the light from the huge candelabra which burned on the dais behind them.

Eleyne closed her eyes, aware of the sudden cold in the heat of the great hall.

‘No.’ She didn’t realise that she had spoken out loud. ‘No, please.’

She felt Donald’s arm around her shoulders. ‘What is it, Nel?’

Her knife had fallen on the table. Gravy from the roast peacock had soaked into the linen cloth. Her hand went unconsciously to her throat, to the silver pendant she wore there, Donald’s pendant. The phoenix lay within a circle of power, imprisoned beneath the floor in the chapel of Kildrummy, sealed under the tiles with rough lime mortar.

It was Alexander. She had known that at once. But he had not come to Jedburgh to see her: he had come to be with his son.

The candles flickered and she was aware suddenly that a strange hush was falling over the great hall as table by table the hundreds of guests fell silent. Beside her the king had half turned in his seat and was staring into the wildly flickering candlelight, his normally ruddy complexion grey.

‘Holy Mother of God!’ She heard his whispered gasp. ‘Who are you?’

She could see something now, a shadow, tall and indistinct, hovering over the king, feel the anguish around them.

Below the high table every face had turned to stare. The new queen was as white as a sheet as she too saw the tossing shadows.

Beware.

Eleyne heard the words in the howling wind.

Beware, my son, beware
.

Alexander swallowed, and Eleyne realised that his hand had gone automatically to the ornamental jewelled dirk he wore at his girdle. She saw his knuckles white around the cruciform hilt.

In the quiet one could have heard a pin drop, then from the shadowy body of the hall a woman screamed. The sound tore through the silence, echoing up into the carved roof beams as she pointed towards the high table. It was a signal for total panic. Screams and the crash of overturning tables and benches almost drowned the words.

Too late
.

He was fading.

Too late, my son
.

The wind in the chimneys reached a crescendo and showers of sparks and ashes blew back into the hall from the two hearths.

* * *

Only a scant handful of people actually saw the ghost at the wedding feast of King Alexander III and Yolande of Dreux, but within days the story had spread around Scotland and beyond the border, south. Only three of them – Alexander himself, and Eleyne and Donald – knew who he was, but two whole nations knew that such a spectre was an omen of doom.

X

‘It’s all right. Please, my dear, calm yourself.’ Eleyne cradled the hysterical queen’s head in her arms. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of, nothing.’ She turned the queen’s face gently towards her. ‘He came to give you his blessing. He came to be with his son.’

Yolande lifted a tear-streaked face. ‘But everyone is saying the ghost spoke of death …’

‘No.’ Eleyne shook her head. ‘No, I heard him. He made no mention of death. He came to bless you both.’ She forced herself to smile. ‘Forget him, your grace, be happy with your husband.’

While you still have him
. The words hung in the silence between them until Eleyne shrugged them away.

She quickly became very fond of Yolande. The new queen made a confidante of her in the loneliness of her new country, explaining how apprehensive she had been, especially in the care of her solemn, humourless escort of Scotsmen. Her French companions, there for the wedding only, had nearly all departed, leaving only a handful of ladies with her. ‘But Alexander, he is different,’ she said in her heavy accent. ‘He laughs and he makes me laugh and he is kind.’

Eleyne smiled. ‘I’m glad. My godson is a good man.’

‘Soon I shall give him a son. And then another and then another!’

Eleyne laughed. ‘That will please him, my dear, but at the moment he seems perfectly delighted with you.’

Yolande looked away, embarrassed. ‘I know how to make him happy.’

‘I can see that.’ Patting the young woman’s shoulder, Eleyne hid a smile.

‘And you, you will stay my friend?’ Yolande became anxious. ‘Alexander says you live in the far north.’

‘I do indeed. But I spend my life in the saddle,’ Eleyne said, touched at the loneliness the remark betrayed, for all the queen’s outward happiness. ‘I shall come and see you often, have no fear.’

XI
KILDRUMMY CASTLE
December 1285

Isabella had brought cushions and a thick tapestry to her eyrie in the Snow Tower while her parents were at the king’s wedding. One servant had been allowed into the secret and now there was a fire up there, beside which Isabella read her books by candlelight.

‘You’ve turned it into a real bower.’ Eleyne admired it, pulling her cloak around her. In spite of the merrily blazing little fire, the vaulted chamber was dark and cold, the roughly plastered walls unpainted. Outside, heavy sleet lashed the castle walls and turned the heather on the hills to a black sodden mass.

‘Tell me about the wedding.’ Isabella sat cross-legged on the tapestry which she had spread on the floor. ‘What did the queen wear?’

Eleyne described the queen’s gown, her mantle, the jewellery she had worn and the golden chaplet in her hair, which had hung loose, brushed until it lay like polished ebony over the scarlet samite of her wedding gown.

‘It must be wonderful to marry a king.’ Isabella put her elbows on her knees, cupping her chin wistfully in her linked fingers.

She dreamed often of the man she would marry. He would be tall and handsome – a prince – like her heroic cousin Llywelyn – a poet like her father; gentle and kind and above all loving. Her father had promised her as much but no one who had yet sought her hand, and there had been many, was good enough for his beautiful Bella.

Eleyne looked away from her daughter’s face. ‘Isabella, while we were at Jedburgh, your father and Robert of Carrick had a long talk.’

‘About Gratney and Christian? Have you fixed a date for their betrothal?’

Eleyne nodded, and held out her hand. ‘They were also discussing young Robert’s future marriage.’

‘Oh?’ Isabella was studying her mother’s face.

‘He is an exceptional young man: charming, intelligent, full of courage …’

‘Why are you telling me this?’

‘We have always liked the Bruces. I have known Robert’s grandfather for fifty years and his mother and I were once very close – ’

‘So?’

There was a long silence.

‘I always thought you liked Christian’s brothers,’ Eleyne said at last.

‘Mama!’ Her daughter jumped to her feet. ‘You don’t mean it! You can’t mean it! Robert is a boy! He is years younger than me.’

‘Not so much younger,’ Eleyne coaxed. ‘Only five years. Your father is twenty years younger than me.’

‘That is different!’

‘How is it different?’

‘Because it is.’ Isabella’s voice rose passionately. ‘Mama! It will be so long. When he’s ready for a wife, I shall be …
old!
’ Her voice rose to a wail. ‘You promised! You promised that I should love my husband! You promised, mama!’

Eleyne flinched at the accusation. ‘You will grow to love Robert Bruce,’ she said softly. ‘I do promise. He will make you a good husband; and he will one day be an earl.’

It must be wonderful to marry a king
. Isabella’s wistful words rose between them for a moment. Eleyne repeated, ‘You will love him, my darling, I do promise it.’

That night in the bedchamber Eleyne sat beside the fire brushing out her hair slowly, watching the reflection of the flames throw glints into the curls. There was more white now, but it still crackled with energy as she pulled the comb through. ‘I hope we have done right.’

Donald was poring over some documents by the light of the great candelabra near the shuttered windows. Behind him they could hear the sleet rattling against the glass.

He did not look up. ‘She will get used to the idea. He’s a fine boy. He’ll grow up soon enough.’

‘It is a big gap, though.’ Eleyne put down her comb.

‘
You
say that?’ Donald grinned mischievously and she nodded vehemently.

‘Yes, I say that. You were a man when I met you. Isabella has to wait for him to grow. And she will have to wait while her blood is yearning for a lover.’

Walking across, Donald put his arm around her shoulder and dropped a kiss on her head. ‘If she were destined for the convent, she would have to wait forever,’ he said gently. ‘It will do her no harm at all. Take her with you when you ride to Fife and take her with you when you go to court; present her to the queen. Give the girl some fun, some distractions, and the time will soon pass. I’ll bet that boy could father a child in a year or two given half a chance!’ He laughed. ‘Who knows? Maybe the marriage will come sooner than she thinks.’

XII
FALKLAND CASTLE
March 1286

Mairi at seventeen was a tall, shy girl with huge eyes. To Eleyne’s surprise Joanna seemed happy to hand her daughter over to the girl’s care at once.