The Guardian (62 page)

“What is it, Morag?” Andrew said courteously. “You look concerned. Are we making too much noise?”

Her eyes shot wide and then she frowned immediately, making me want to smile. “Eh? Whit? Och no. We canna hear a thing oot there. There’s a man here to see you.”

“A man? Did he give you his name?”

“No, sir, but he asked for you.”

“What manner of man is he, can you tell me?”

Wide-eyed again, she nodded. “Aye. He’s big … Bigger nor you. And he has armour on, like Maister Wallace’s, but cleaner, shinier.”

“Shinier, aye. Is he old or young, though? Does he have a beard?” I had the distinct feeling that Andrew was teasing the woman, trying, albeit gently, to fluster her, but if that were the case he was wasting his time.

She pressed her lips into a slightly disapproving pout. “He’s young,” she said.

“Then be so good as to bring the young man in, if it please you.”

Morag nodded, still with that look of pouting disapproval, and pulled the heavy door shut behind her.

“I wonder who would come calling upon me at this hour of the day, and in shinier armour than yours, Will.” He sounded facetious, as though he was not really expecting an answer, but before Will could respond the door swung open again and the answer walked into the room and stopped short, gazing at Will and me in astonishment that quickly yielded to a grin of pleasure.

“God bless all here,” he said. “But as He is my God and witness, I did not think to find a house full of Wallaces! I but came by to make myself known and offer my respects to Master de Moray.” He turned immediately, smiling still, to where Andrew sat mystified, watching him with wondering eyes. “Pardon me, sir, for this discourtesy in interrupting you while you are conferring with your colleagues. No, stay,” he said, seeing Andrew gathering himself to rise and greet him. “No need to stand on my behalf.” He extended his hand and strode forward quickly to where Andrew could reach it without having to rise. “As I say, I came but to present my respects. I am Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, and I am here to place myself at your service.” He moved his eyes slightly to include Will. “At service to you both, indeed, if you will have me.”

Andrew had not recovered from his astonishment, and looked wide-eyed at Will, but my cousin was gazing fixedly at Bruce.

“Where were you last week,” he said bluntly, “when we were fighting at Stirling Bridge? We could have used your service then.”

“I was in the Carrick hills,” Bruce said, and shrugged. “In my
own lands, safe among my own folk. I know you are familiar with the outlaw life, Master Wallace, how it feels when you cannot openly approach folk that you meet for fear of being recognized and taken or betrayed. When you must live in hiding, it grows difficult to stay abreast of things well known to other people. I have been living with my head down these past three months, avoiding the attentions of the English since the surrender at Irvine, because I much dislike the terms imposed upon me there by Henry Percy and his warty familiar, Robert Clifford. I had no part in the discussion of those terms, and they demand that I give up my wee girl Marjorie as hostage to my good behaviour and obedience. They have required three oaths of loyalty from me in as many years, and now they want to take my daughter as an earnest of my honour and good faith. She is not yet a year old, and she is all I have left of my wife, Izzy, who died birthing her. So I removed her to safety, where she will not be found. And that is where I was last week.

“As for why I missed the Stirling fight,” he went on, “I was misinformed about de Warrenne’s movements—Cressingham’s, too—and by the time I discovered the truth, I was too late to join you. I knew you had come west from Dundee, and I knew you would block Surrey’s advance at Stirling, but I did not know how quickly it would come to pass. I thought to be here in time to join you. And for that failure, I am regretful, for I would dearly love to have been here with you when you sent them packing.”

I had been watching Will all the time Bruce was speaking and I could see he was impressed by the earl’s words. I had no doubt in my mind that Bruce had spoken truthfully, and my gut told me Will believed him, too.

“Let me say one thing more, Master Wallace, before you reject my offer to join you.” Bruce paused. “The offer is genuine. I know exactly what you think of Scotland’s magnates—people like me. We have spoken of it in the past, between we two, and so I am aware of your distrust and your suspicions when it comes to dealing with what the nobles of this realm delight in calling the nobility, with
their divided feudal loyalties and ancient ways of doing things. I know all that, and yet here I stand, to face you. I have little doubt you’ll be collecting finely worded letters of intent from every noble household up and down and all across the land these days, offering service and assistance whenever you might have need of it. Am I correct?” He was watching Will keenly, and even though his question went unanswered, he smiled. “That’s what I thought,” he said. “For my part, I believe you might have need of service and assistance here and now.”

“Why would you think that?” Will’s voice was soft.

Bruce glanced over to where the sweat-beaded metal ewer of untouched wine sat on the table beside its cups, and he turned to Andrew. “Would you object were I to pour myself some wine?” He moved without waiting for an answer, though Andrew was already shaking his head and waving him to proceed. He poured one cup of wine and then look up inquiringly at the rest of us. “Anyone else?”

“Aye,” Will said, nodding, and Bruce ended up pouring wine for all of us and taking Andrew’s cup to him.

Bruce tasted his, nodded in approval, then sat at the table, close to Andrew. “Why would I think that, you asked. Well, let me try to answer.” He sipped his wine again, then set down his cup. “You two have achieved a miracle. You took a ragtag army of ill-equipped and untrained men and led them to destroy an English battle force in its full panoply. And then, having broken and beaten them in the field, you chased them all the way back to England. And you did all of it without help from any of the great houses”—he glanced at Andrew—“with the singular exception of the House of de Moray, be it said. And now you are the two most puissant men in all the realm—victorious, triumphant, and with an eager, loyal army at your backs. The word throughout the realm, I’m being told, is that you have united all the folk, the ordinary
folk
of Scotland, as they have never been before. That is something unprecedented.”

“Then why do you believe that we need help?” Will’s tone was dry. He had not yet tasted his wine and was holding the cold rim of the pewter cup against his chin.

“Because I think you have no real idea of what you need to do next.” No one reacted, and Bruce’s eyes shifted from Will to Andrew and back again, sliding over me as though I was not there. “I did not say that to offend you,” he went on. “But you have no idea what is needed to govern a country, and yet that is what you have condemned yourselves to do from this day forth—you now need to
govern
.” He threw up his hands. “Where you may find guidance in doing that is in God’s hands. It is most certainly not in your own.”

Will pulled himself to his full height. “Grant us a trace of wisdom, Lord Bruce, at the very least.” His emphasis on Bruce’s name and title was slight enough to avoid outright offensiveness, but it was there nonetheless. He continued, almost in a growl. “We’re not quite as helpless as you seem to think. We have identified our priorities and we are well aware of what we need to be getting on with.” He nodded to me, because I had prepared the notes on all we had discussed before Bruce’s arrival, and I read the list aloud.

“How to deal with the nobles,” I began. “The magnates and mormaers. How to deal with the Church, when the three strongest bishops in the realm are all absent. How to get rid of English garrisons now left in Scotland, now that they are cut off and isolated. How to deal with the governance of the realm, so that the machinery of government, including the law courts and the royal court of chancery, keeps working. And last, but first in overall importance, how to replenish the treasury and rebuild the realm’s economy.”

Bruce’s eyebrows had risen high on his forehead as he listened to the litany, and now he placed his open palm on his left breast and bent forward in his seat in a mock bow. “Well done, my friends,” he said, with no trace of mockery in his voice. “I’m both impressed and relieved, for I believe you have managed to include everything that needs to be achieved in that short list. Achieving it all will take more lifetimes than we have among us all, for that kind of endeavour is never ending, but the fact that you have identified the elements so readily tells me you might be better prepared than I had thought.”

“You’re wrong on what comes first, though, Jamie,” Will said quietly. “Finding money is important, but the most important
consideration facing us now is what to do about the magnates and the mormaers, for until we find a way to deal with that, we won’t be able to do anything about the treasury.” He looked directly at Bruce. “And in that, Earl Carrick, you may perhaps be able to offer us some assistance.”

“With the magnates?” The look on Bruce’s face was not encouraging. “I doubt they’d pay much heed to me. I’ve been away too long, and I’m a Bruce now in a Comyn country.” He stopped, seeing how Wallace was shaking his head. “What?”

“We don’t need for you to go a-preaching on our behalf,” Will said. “We need more practical assistance, in the kind of thinking that people of your rank and station use. To begin, you can help us decide what to call ourselves. You were right about the letters from the noble houses. We have many of them and they all need to be answered, but
how
should they be answered? We are not magnates or mormaers and we have no grand titles. Andrew is of de Moray, but he is not a knight, though he will be soon. And I am a verderer, when not beyond the law. So what will we call ourselves in dealing with the dignitaries of the world?”

Bruce thumped a clenched fist on the table. “Hah! See? At one thrust you have punctured the bladder of empty air that keeps the majority of men from ever achieving anything worthwhile! What
should
you call yourselves, indeed. You should call yourselves exactly what you are, awarding yourselves the honours you have won and which no one can take away from you, and you should do it by honouring and including those who made it possible—the ordinary folk of Scotland. In all your writings, you should name yourselves Andrew Moray and William Wallace, commanders of the army of the kingdom of Scotland and the community of that realm.” He paused, looking from one to the other of them. “You might think it sounds pretentious now, but it is not. It is precisely who and what you are. So say it out loudly, then let the doubters and the sneerers try to fault you for any part of it. Any man who dares to challenge you will be declaring himself to be no friend of this realm or its community.”

I was stricken dumb by the beauty and perfection of what he had defined, and I was glad to see that both Will and Andrew were gaping at him.

“By the living God, Sir Robert,” Will said, “I openly aver I stand henceforth in your debt. That solution is perfect—you agree, Andrew? Perfect.”

Will stopped and gazed at the earl and then shook his head. “You know, I have no wish to like you or admire you, for you stand as an example of all the things I disapprove of in this land of ours. You appear much of the time to be more English than Scots, and your allegiance has, for years now, been freely given to England. But you’re a Bruce, and you were driven out when King John Balliol was chosen over your grandsire. Now, even though you have turned your back on England, there is a voice inside me that wants to ask, ‘Will he turn his coat on me?’ But for all of that, I cannot seem to help myself from liking you, and I believe we will be grateful for any help you can give us.”

The Earl of Carrick smiled. “It gladdens me to hear that,” he said. “So let us see about finding something to eat, and then we may settle in and come to grips with the items on your list. There are people, excellent people throughout the land who we can conscript to help.” He looked at me again. “Of course, most of them will be priests or monks—clerics of some description—since few others read or write well enough to help us keep the records that will be necessary or draft the number of letters and communications we might require.”

Will scowled. “What kind of
communications
?”

“Straightforward ones, explaining to people how you intend to run the country now that it is open to change. I am assuming, of course, that you have no intention of restoring the
status quo
to what it was before Edward invaded?”

“If you mean leaving all the power in the hands of the noble houses again, then you are correct. I won’t do that. Not without some form of accountability. And if that means that we may, in time, need an army of recruits from every monastery in the realm, we’ll
recruit them. And if we are to have accountability on such a scale, we will need courts and magistrates to enforce penalties for lapses of that accountability. The great houses will continue to administer their own affairs, but they will be held accountable to this community of the realm of which you spoke. Their days of ignoring the laws of the realm and simply riding roughshod over everyone in pursuit of their own ends are over.”

Bruce shrugged. “From what I know of such things, the great houses will benefit greatly by all that in the end, no matter how much it grieves them at the start. Accountability will bring stability, and everyone will gain from that. They’ll all get over their discontent eventually, one way or the other.”

Andrew asked him, “And are you sure you want to be identified with this? Your peers may deem you traitor to your own class.”

“I care not for that,” Carrick said. “But I will not be a part of it. I’ll do what I can do at this time, and I’ll help you to set things in motion, but I have much to take care of on my own nowadays. My earldom needs my attention and my father’s territory of Annandale has been neglected for too long, so I’ll assist you now, say, for the remaining months of this year, but after that I must be about my own affairs.”