Medieval Ever After (134 page)

“The castle will seem empty without them,” Daniel said, nuzzling her hair.

“You read my mind,” she replied, her throat tight.

“Then again…”

Daniel burrowed through her locks to nibble on one earlobe. “Perhaps we will enjoy some peace and quiet.”

She turned and looped her arms around his neck.

“And if we do what you have in mind,” she said with an arched eyebrow, “the castle will fill up quickly again, but with children.”

“A man can dream,” he said with a grin. “I hope they have your fiery hair, and your temper to match.”

She feigned outrage as he wound a lock of her red hair around one finger. “And I hope they have your mulish stubbornness!” she shot back with a half-scowl, half-smile.

“Somehow, those characteristics seem to work well in combination,” Daniel replied wryly.

She gazed up at his face, which was illuminated in the afternoon sun. His dark hair was pulled back, though a few strands whipped around his face in the breeze rising from the loch. His eyes looked more blue than gray with the sky behind him, and as was so often the case, his firm jaw was covered in dark stubble.

This was the man she loved, the man whose life was inextricably bound to hers. Her heart soared higher than Bhreaca could ever fly.

The End

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NOTE FROM EMMA PRINCE

Though this is a work of fiction, some events, places, and characters are based on historical record.

This story takes place during the Scottish Wars of Independence from English rule. King Edward I, also known as Longshanks or the Hammer of the Scots for his brutal response to Scottish uprisings, died in July 1307, leaving his son, Edward II, with an unfinished conflict on his hands. Edward II is often considered ineffectual and weak when compared with his father, especially when it came to dealing with the Scottish rebellion.

Despite receiving training in warfare from his father, and despite campaigning in wars starting at age sixteen, Edward II was more a man of culture than a man of war. He surrounded himself with musicians and artists, and enjoyed such pursuits as sailing, dancing, and theater. England’s nobles grew unhappy with their young King, leading to in-fighting and conflict. This provided Robert the Bruce with the opportunity to advance his cause in Scotland, reclaiming and razing castles and eventually defeating the English decisively in the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314.

Loch Doon Castle, the main setting for this novel, was built in the late 1200s by the Earl of Carrick—possibly Robert the Bruce himself, who became Earl of Carrick in 1292, or by his father, Robert Bruce. It was originally built in the middle of Loch Doon on a small, rocky island. The castle did indeed boast an eleven-sided curtain wall of the highest quality. It had a main gate with a door and a portcullis, as well as a postern, or back gate. Some say the iron portcullis still lies at the bottom of the loch. Though in this story there is a tower keep within the curtain wall, such a tower probably wasn’t built until around 1500.

Shortly after Robert the Bruce crowned himself King of Scotland in 1306, he and his army suffered a crushing defeat at Methven. The Bruce’s brother-in-law, Christopher Seton, and perhaps the Bruce himself, sought refuge at Loch Doon Castle briefly before retreating to the Outer Hebrides Islands and eventually Ireland. In my fictitious world, Garrick Sinclair also accompanies them in their retreat, explaining why he’s been to Loch Doon before.

While the Bruce was busy with his campaign for Scottish independence, Sir Gilbert de Carrick, Laird of Clan Kennedy, was charged with holding Loch Doon Castle. Historic record indicates that Sir Gilbert surrendered the castle to the English, but that Robert the Bruce’s forces eventually recovered it. This created an interesting opening for me to insert the fictitious Daniel Sinclair to step in for Gilbert Kennedy and save the castle for the Bruce. The Kennedys eventually held Loch Doon Castle for many years, though their clan seat remained at Dunure, near Turnberry, on the western coast of Scotland.

You can visit the castle today, though not on its original island. In the 1930s, the loch was dammed to generate hydroelectric power. The loch’s water level was raised roughly twenty-seven feet, which would have covered both the island and Loch Doon Castle. In 1935, the castle was moved, stone by stone, to the western shore of the loch to preserve its remarkable and historically significant curtain wall. Today, you can still see vestiges of the original internal buildings inside the curtain wall, including a large fireplace that would have heated the great hall. During low water, the island on which Loch Doon Castle originally stood, along with a few remnants of the castle itself, are still visible.

Though Loch Doon Castle remained (mostly) in one piece throughout the Wars of Independence, most castles in the Lowlands and Borderlands were razed or “slighted.” When the English captured a castle or stronghold, typically the structure would be garrisoned and held to use against the Scottish. But the Bruce didn’t want to risk Scottish-held castles falling back into English hands, so his forces would tear down walls, towers, and other defenses, razing some castles to the ground so that they were completely useless to either side. Sir James “the Black” Douglas gained a reputation as a castle-destroyer at this time for his service to the Bruce.

A medieval arms race of sorts was underway during this time, and sieging castles was arduous, dangerous work that could last for hours or months. As castles erected better defenses, siegers developed more effective tactics. As is mentioned in this story, some of the tactics used against castles included trebuchets, tunneling, battering rams, fire, hot oil or animal fat, and sometimes simply waiting for the castle’s inhabitants to run out of food or water.

Edward I had a massive trebuchet, thought to be the largest ever built, called “Warwolf,” that could hurdle boulders at a castle’s walls. Attackers sometimes tunneled under curtain walls, causing part of the wall, especially at corners, to crumble. Multi-sided or circular curtain walls protected against tunneling. Boiling water or animal fat was also poured over walls to scald attackers. Sulfur and saltpeter, which are components of gunpowder, were sent inside walls to “fire” a castle. James Douglas once penetrated a castle under cover of night by scaling its walls using rope and grappling hooks. I give a nod to such tactics with Daniel, Robert, Garrick, and Burke entering the fictitious Dunbraes Castle in such a way.

I based Raef Warren’s chess set on the famous Lewis Chessmen. By the end of the eleventh and into the twelfth centuries, chess was a very popular game among Europe’s aristocracy. The Lewis Chessmen are a series of chess pieces elaborately carved from walrus ivory and whale teeth that date from the twelfth century. They were discovered near Uig on the Isle of Lewis in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides, though they are thought to be of Norse origin. Because the pieces make up four distinct (though incomplete) sets, and because they were in excellent condition, it is thought that they were being transported from Norway to Ireland by a wealthy merchant.

They were discovered in 1831 in a sand dune on Lewis. When they were found, some of the pieces were stained red, leading historians to believe that early chess boards and pieces were red and white rather than the black and white we use today. Perhaps most interesting are the rook pieces, which were carved to look like the fierce mythical Berserker warriors of the Viking Sagas. These Berserker rooks have bulging eyes, and they bite their shields wildly. Today, eighty-two of the ninety-three artifacts found are on display at the British Museum in London, while the other eleven artifacts are at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Falconry, which plays an important role in this novel, was indeed a tightly regulated pastime of medieval nobles. Though people of many different social classes practiced falconry in the British Isles, there were strict hierarchies in place regarding who could fly and train birds of prey, and who could use which kinds of birds. Lower-status citizens could fly birds like sparrowhawks and goshawks, while birds such as peregrines and gyrfalcons were reserved for nobility.

Falcons and falconry were considered status symbols. Most nobles kept a falconer on-staff to train and look after hunting birds. Nobles would trade falcons in peace talks or as ransom payments. Falcons were literally worth more than their weight in gold. Thus, it was considered a felony, as well as an act of rebellion against the social order, to keep or fly a falcon above one’s class station.

According to the Book (or Boke) of St. Albans, a 1486 guide for the gentlemanly arts such as falconry, hunting, and heraldry, the punishment for those who would keep a bird above their social rank was to have their hands cut off. Taking a bird from the wild was punishable by having one’s eyes poked out. The Book of St. Albans also lays out a hierarchy of hawks and the social ranks permitted to fly them, from a king’s gyrfalcon to a servant’s kestrel. A female peregrine falcon like Bhreaca was reserved for princes.

Peregrine falcons make excellent hunting birds in part because of their thrilling diving attack, or stoop. The peregrine falcon reaches faster speeds than any other animal on the planet when performing the stoop, which involves soaring to great heights and then diving steeply. In the dive, a falcon can reach speeds of over two hundred miles per hour (or three hundred and twenty kilometers per hour).

I took liberties with the wearing of kilts in this book. Though Scottish clans have long worn distinctively woven plaids over their shoulders or as cloaks, kilts as we know them today weren’t worn until the late 1600s. However, in this novel, I found the kilt to be a useful way to distinguish between not only the Scottish and the English, but also between Highlanders and Lowlanders.

As many Scots have attested, tensions have long existed between the Highlands and the Lowlands, with Highlanders thinking Lowlanders are soft and too much like the English, and Lowlanders thinking Highlanders are uncivilized and far too rough around the edges. I wanted to bring out this tension between Daniel, the coarse Highlander, and Rona, the Lowlander who has seen the need to compromise with the English. Besides, when I read and write Scottish romances, a man in a kilt is a central part of the fun!

TEASERS FOR

EMMA PRINCE’S BOOKS

THE SINCLAIR BROTHERS TRILOGY

Go back to where it all began—with Robert and Alwin’s story in
HIGHLANDER’S RANSOM
, Book One of the Sinclair Brothers Trilogy. Available now on Amazon!

He was out for revenge…

Laird Robert Sinclair would stop at nothing to exact revenge on Lord Raef Warren, the English scoundrel who had brought war to his doorstep and razed his lands and people. Leaving his clan in the Highlands to conduct covert attacks in the Borderlands, Robert lives to be a thorn in Warren’s side. So when he finds a beautiful English lass on her way to marry Warren, he whisks her away to the Highlands with a plan to ransom her back to her dastardly fiancé.

She would not be controlled…

Lady Alwin Hewett had no idea when she left her father’s manor to marry a man she’d never met that she would instead be kidnapped by a Highland rogue out for vengeance. But she refuses to be a pawn in any man’s game. So when she learns that Robert has had them secretly wed, she will stop at nothing to regain her freedom. But her heart may have other plans…