Insurrection (5 page)

‘Robert!’

The boy straightened at the shout to see a figure striding down the beach towards him. His heart sank as he saw the broken lance, a smaller version of the great lances of men, in his instructor’s hand.

‘Why didn’t you shorten your reins?’ The man came to a halt before the soaking boy, brandishing the splintered lance. ‘Ruined! All because you couldn’t follow a basic instruction!’

Robert, shivering in the wind, met his instructor’s livid gaze. The squat bull of a man was red in the face and sweating from the race to catch him up. That, at least, gave him some measure of satisfaction. ‘I tried, Master Yothre,’ he said tightly, glancing up the beach to where the beast had come to a halt, reins dangling free. It tossed its head and snorted as if laughing. Anger rose in Robert as he recalled being led to the stables four weeks ago, his excitement at his new phase of instruction draining when he saw the only animal saddled in his father’s stables was the massive warhorse. He had learned to ride on a sweet-natured hobby and, more recently, had mastered a spirited young palfrey. The black beast was nothing like either of them. It was like riding the devil. Robert’s gaze switched back to Yothre. ‘My father has more than thirty horses in his stables. Why did you choose Ironfoot? Even the grooms won’t go near him. He’s too strong.’

‘It isn’t your lack of strength that’s the trouble,’ grunted Yothre, ‘it’s your lack of skill. The horse will respond if you follow my instructions. Anyway,’ he added, his tone losing a little of its acidity, ‘I didn’t choose him for you. Your father did.’

Robert fell silent. The sunlight glistened on his wet cheeks as he looked out to sea. His face, pale under his fringe of dark hair, was taut. Beyond the crashing breakers, the waters were a deep, lucid green. Further out, by the hump of Ailsa Craig, the Fairy Rock, they darkened to slate grey and, further still, towards the distant Isle of Arran, they turned black. Here on the Carrick coast it was a bright, windy spring day, but over the Arran hills a bank of clouds had built up through the morning trailing veils of rain, a remnant of the violent storms that had ravaged Scotland since the start of the year. Robert’s eyes picked out the smudge on the southern horizon that marked the northern tip of Ireland. Catching sight of that faint line, so often shrouded in mist or haze, he felt a pang of loss.

His brother was still somewhere on that strip of land in the care of the Irish lord, a vassal of their father’s, to whom they had both been fostered. No doubt Edward would have already finished his training and schooling for the day. He would probably be racing the small wooden boats they had carved down the river outside the manor house in Antrim with their foster-brothers, laughing and chasing through the shallows. Tonight they would eat salmon and, by firelight, drink sweet beer in the lord’s hall and listen to his tales of Irish heroes, thundering battles and quests for treasure. The twelve months Robert had spent in Antrim had been some of the best of his life, his foster-father teaching him all he should know as the eldest son of one of the most powerful families in Scotland. Robert had thought he would return home to take his proper place at his father’s side, no longer a boy, but a youth on the path to knighthood. The reality had been a crushing disappointment.

‘Come, we will start again,’ Yothre was saying, gesturing for Robert to follow as he headed up the beach towards Ironfoot. ‘And this time, if you do as I say, we can avoid any further—’ His words were cut off by a high-pitched shout.

A small boy was racing across the dunes towards them. Behind him Turnberry Castle perched on its promontory of rock over the surging sea, its battlements crowned by the circling silhouettes of cormorants and gulls.

Robert smiled as the boy ran faster, his short legs puffing sand into a cloud around him. ‘Niall!’

His youngest brother came to a breathless halt before him, blithely ignoring Yothre who looked infuriated.

‘Men have come, and’ – Niall sucked in a breath – ‘and Grandfather!’

Robert’s face broke into a wide grin of surprise. At once, he set off across the sand with Niall, his tunic flapping wetly around his legs.

‘Master Robert,’ barked Yothre behind him, ‘your lesson isn’t over.’ As the boys turned, the man thrust the broken lance towards Ironfoot. ‘You’ll ride him again before we’re finished.’

‘I’ll ride him tomorrow.’

‘Your father will be told of your disobedience.’

Robert’s storm-blue eyes narrowed. ‘Tell him then,’ he said, sprinting after his brother.

Once over the dunes, the two boys passed the little cluster of houses, fishermen’s boats and farmsteads that made up Turnberry village and raced on to the sandy track that led to the castle. Here, Robert picked up speed, his long legs punching into the ground as he left Niall far behind him. The earth beneath his feet was pocked with the fresh prints of many horses. His lungs burned, the exertion driving out the ice in his limbs, driving out too Yothre’s threat.

As he approached the gates, which had been thrown wide open, one of the guards called to him.

‘Master Robert!’ The guard grinned. ‘What did that devil do to you today?’

Ignoring him, Robert slowed as he entered the castle courtyard. There were many men and horses here being directed by the stable-master. In between the slow-moving animals, Robert caught sight of his family, all of whom had come out to greet the unexpected arrivals. He glanced impatiently over his two brothers, his mother and three sisters, one of whom was bawling in the arms of her wet nurse. His eyes lingered for a moment on his father, the Earl of Carrick, dressed in a crimson cloak trimmed with gold braid, then moved to take in the newcomers. He recognised, with some surprise, James Stewart. The High Steward of Scotland, one of the chief officials in the kingdom whose powerful family had held the stewardship for generations, was standing with a great earl from the east. There were others too, but all of them faded away as Robert’s gaze came to rest on the leonine man in their centre, with that great mane of silver hair and that hard, ancient face. Robert Bruce, Lord of Annandale. The man whose name both he and his father shared.

Hearing Niall come gasping up behind him, Robert moved towards his grandfather, who was clad in a dust-stained surcoat and mantle, emblazoned with the arms of Annandale. His smile froze on his lips as he saw the old man’s grave expression. It was reflected, he realised, in the faces of the other adults. His mother looked shocked, his father was shaking his head. Then, Robert heard the words. They sounded impossible, but the look of the adults proved their truth. He spoke loudly, without thinking, repeating those words in a question. ‘The king is dead?’

They turned to look at him, standing there sopping wet, seaweed in his hair and a graze of sand on his cheek. He saw his mother’s concern and his father’s disapproval, before his grandfather’s voice filled the silence.

‘Come here and let me see you, boy.’

And those eyes, dark and fierce as a hawk’s, were on him.

3

With the unforeseen arrival of the great lords, the castle’s servants were kept busy late into the day, lighting fires in empty chambers, finding fresh linen for beds and clearing space in the stables. Nowhere was more frenetic than the kitchen, the cooks faced with turning a meal for the earl’s already sizeable household into a grand feast for seven noblemen and their army of retainers. This number swelled, late in the afternoon, when another six men rode in through the castle gates. To Robert, watching from the window of the room he shared with his brothers, the day had the feeling of something portentous about it; something hushed and expectant that went beyond the news of the king’s death. He wondered what this meant and what would now happen as down in the courtyard the guards pulled the gates shut behind the six riders. Somewhere in the castle a bell clanged. The last of the light was fading in the west, where lightning danced silently over the hills of Arran.

As the men entered the castle’s hall, servants slipped in among them, pouring ruby-red wine into rows of pewter goblets. Outside, the sea’s muffled boom was ever present, the salty tang mingling with the smells of food and wood-smoke. Three extra trestles and boards had been put out to seat everyone and the hall was crowded, the air stuffy with the heat from the fire in the cavernous hearth. On the wall behind the head table hung the earl’s banner, emblazoned with the arms of Carrick: a red chevron on white. On another was strung a grand tapestry capturing, in twists of vivid silk, the moment Malcolm Canmore killed his hated rival, Macbeth, in battle and took the throne, beginning the illustrious dynasty of which the Bruce family were distant descendants. Robert had always thought the figure of the victorious king looked remarkably like his father.

He shifted impatiently outside the hall’s doors as the guests filed through, the magnates settling into their places at the head table, their knights and retainers filling the benches around the other trestles. With Robert were his younger brothers, Alexander, Thomas and Niall, and his older sister, Isabel. When the last of the men, a youth with startlingly blue eyes, one of which winked at the waiting children, entered, Robert went to step through, determined to find a seat as close to his grandfather as possible. He was brought up short by his mother’s voice.

‘You’ll be eating in your room this evening.’

Robert turned, thunderstruck by the announcement. The formidably tall figure of his mother, the Countess of Carrick, through whom his father had become earl of the wild county on their marriage, moved out of the shadows of the passage. Her abundant black hair was coiled on her head in a complex arrangement of braids, held in place by silver wire. Her white linen gown stretched smoothly over her stomach, swollen with her tenth child.

Her gaze fixed on Robert as she came towards him, holding the hand of a toddling girl. ‘Do you hear me?’

‘Mother . . .’ began Isabel.

‘Bid your father and grandfather good night, then upstairs with you.’ This she said in Gaelic, which the children knew meant the conversation was over. She only spoke Gaelic when she was angry or addressing the servants. ‘Go on now,’ she said, switching back into French, her husband’s preferred tongue.

Entering the hall, which was full of the low murmur of conversation, Robert approached his father, seated at the head table. He tried to catch his gaze, searching for signs of the anger he knew must come had his father been told he had shunned his day’s training. The earl was deep in conversation with a bear of a man, draped in black furs. Robert recognised him as one of the men who had arrived late in the day. ‘Good night, Father,’ he murmured.

The earl glanced at him, but continued his intent conversation. Wondering, with a burgeoning sense of relief, if the day’s extraordinary events meant Yothre hadn’t told his father after all, Robert moved swiftly towards his grandfather, seated at the table’s other end. The Lord of Annandale had picked up his little sister Christian, who had toddled in with their mother.

‘What have you been feeding her, Lady Marjorie?’ the old Bruce was saying as he set the child down with a grunt.

The countess smiled warmly at the old man. ‘Come on now,’ she chided, ushering her dallying children towards the door, where their nurse was waiting to lead them upstairs.

As Robert loitered hopefully, his father’s harsh tones struck out.

‘You heard your mother. Out!’

The Lord of Annandale glanced over at Robert, then focused on the earl. ‘After you, son, the boy is head of this household. He should stay for this.’ The old man nodded to Marjorie. ‘With your permission, my lady.’

Before the countess could answer, Robert’s father spoke again. ‘Head of the household?’ His voice was a whip. ‘At eleven and unable to stay in the saddle with a lance? I wonder why I sent him to Antrim at all if that is the fruit of my labour.’

Heat prickled in Robert’s cheeks and he lowered his head, thinking all the men in the hall could see his shame.

In truth, none of them was looking at him; their attention was divided between the two men at either end of the head table, whose eyes were locked in a silent war, one set black and fierce, filled with steel and arrogance, the other glacial blue, narrowed in contempt.

‘I do not mind if Robert stays.’ The countess moved to her husband and placed two calm hands on his shoulders.

The earl muttered something as his wife eased herself on to the cushioned chair set out for her, but Robert wasn’t listening. He bit his lip to hide his grin as his grandfather gestured to the bench closest to him. The three men seated upon it, one of whom was the high steward himself, moved along to make room. Robert caught a jealous look from his brother, Alexander, which made the victory even sweeter, and then the rest of the children were led away. Glancing round as he sat, Robert realised he was next to the blue-eyed youth who had winked at him. He inclined his head somewhere between a nod and a bow, unsure whether the young man deserved simple politeness or deep respect. The youth smiled in return.

‘Lord Steward,’ began Robert’s grandfather, his voice curt with authority, silencing the men around him, ‘would you open our council by sharing with my son and the Lord of Islay the news from the royal court that we now know.’ He nodded to the bear-like man in the furs, who had been in conversation with the earl. ‘My summons informed you, Angus, of the black tidings that are the cause of our gathering this evening, but there are other details I could not risk revealing in a message and—’