Braveheart (16 page)

It would not be so bad to have to tell the king that he had lost so many men to ambushes and raids by these rebels if he could present to the king the head of this man that so many Scots were looking to as their savior.

Pickering felt better. He went back to his berries. After a few minutes, he called for more wine and some cheese.

28

DURING THE TIME HE HAD SPENT WITH HIS UNCLE ARGYLE, William Wallace had studied all of the terrain of Scotland. Uncle Argyle had told him that the survival of any man who fought against outrageously superior numbers would depend on that man’s knowledge of the land through which he would be hunted. William had learned his lessons well. In a time when many people had never left their home village and could never find their way back to it if they were carried but ten miles away, William had crisscrossed his country with his uncle by his side, stopping here and there at the home of one of Uncle Argyle’s follow ecclesiastics to examine a new book or even at a monastery’s library, riding on to discuss the knowledge gleaned from those volumes, but always, always, studying the terrain.

So it was that after the ambush of Dolecroft’s cavalry, William Wallace led his men north into a deep woods, where they would find more shelter and protection. They needed rest and were laden with the booty they had taken from the English cavalry; extra weapons, clothing, food. Many of the men with Wallace, including old Campbell and his son Hamish, were experienced sheep rustlers and were familiar with the north-south trails that led across the ridge tops, but they found these forests that William led them into to be mysterious, mystical places. They did not see the trails that William saw. They didn’t like the unfamiliar noises they heard when they tried to sleep. They didn’t like the way the moon, especially when it was full as it was this night, seemed to be walking with them, looking down on their every move. Wallace realized their discomfort; as Uncle Argyle had told him, men will choose the familiar way, even when it appears less favorable. But they were safe here – or so William thought.

He walked along through the trackless forest, his heavy sheathed broadsword across his shoulders. They were all on foot; the horses they had taken from the cavalry were already on their way to be sold in the Highlands. William began to think of trade – another topic of discussion with Uncle Argyle. England wanted to control Scotland’s trade with other countries, but here was so much Scotland could produce that traders in other places might –

One of the men close behind Wallace staggered and fell from exhaustion. The men who tried to help him could barely find the strength to lift him to his feet. Angry at himself for forgetting the fatigue of his men, Wallace said to Hamish, “Stop here and rest.”

They collapsed to the leaves and loam and greedily squeezed water from the sheep belly canteens.

Wallace sat down on a pad of moss and leaned back against the trunk of a tree. He tried to think, to remind himself to keep thinking, but he as so tired. He had not realized it before.

Suddenly he froze; a shaft of moonlight illuminated a cloaked woman standing twenty feet ahead of him. Something about her was familiar, and then she pulled off the hood and revealed her auburn hair, cascading in the moonlight. It was ----

It couldn’t be! But it was! Murron! Her pale gray eyes held him, watching in absolute peace, a half smile on her lips, as if she had been anticipating his reaction to this surprise and had already played it out in her mind.

“Murron! Is ---is it you?” William cried out.

Joy exploded on his face; he heaved himself heavily to his feet and ran to her but stopped before he touched her, as if she might evaporate. But it
was
Murron without question! Overwhelmed, he clutched her.

“William ….,” a voice said. But it was not Murron’s voice, it was someone at William’s shoulder. “William!” the voice insisted. It sounded like Hamish. And Murron began to fade.

“Stay, Murron! I need you! Stay!” William pleaded.

Murron smiled softly at William, but his arms couldn’t enclose her. He wept as he understood, even before he awoke. He was lying on his new tartan, in camp, as Hamish shook him. Hearts were puddle in William’s eyes, and Hamish didn’t have to ask what he was dreaming.

William looked up into Hamish’s face and saw that his friend was alarmed. “What is it?” William asked, pretending he had not slept, much less dreamed.

“A noise, William! Listen! Hounds!”

Wallace jumped up, and heard the distant yipping of a dog pack. Stephen, the new Irish recruit, raced up and said, “We must run in different directions!”

“We don’t split up!” Hamish said sharply.

“They used hounds on us in Ireland. It's the only way!” Stephen shot back.

“He’s right, Hamish!” Wallace looked around him; old Campbell already had the men roused up. Wallace darted to him and grabbed his arm. "Divide them and run!"

Wallace, Hamish, and old Campbell shoved men in different directions, then ran themselves. Wallace's group was about a dozen; they raced through the woods, dodging trees, fleeing deeper into the forest. If was hard going, but the dogs were no threat without armed handlers, and if William knew the English, they would not come into this woods without strong numbers. The run would be as hard on them as it was on the Scots, and with so many on them as it was on the Scots, and with so many men scattering, the dogs would soon grow confused and discouraged.

They stopped and listened. The barks were getting closer.

"Split again!" William ordered.

The twelve divided into two groups of six and raced away in opposite directions.

But no matter how they ran and dodged, the barks grew nearer.

Hounds. They had to be following some scent! William looked for a stream to run along to try to mask the smell of the men from the noses of the dogs, but there was no running water near. He jumped up, grabbed a low branch, and pulled himself into a tall tree. He worked himself up the branches and peered into the woods beyond. This high in the tree the hounds sounded louder and more numerous; and through breaks in the tree, he could see the glimmer of many torches. To the English it was like a fox hunt, and William Wallace was the fox.

He scrambled to the ground where Hamish, old Campbell, and several of the others were waiting. William could see that old Campbell was ready to give up on running and make a stand here, but that was hopeless. The hounds would drag them down and the swordsmen that followed would finish what the dogs did not.

And so they ran. The barks were getting very close. Wallace could feel the rising instincts of panic. The blood beat in his ears, his breath scalded his lungs.

And the hounds were relentless. Wallace's group was down to Hamish, old Campbell, and the two new recruits; Faudron and that insane Irishman who called himself Stephen.

Suddenly William Wallace stopped running and turned on those with him.

"What is it?" Hamish said, "Come on, William, run!" The barks were getting closer and closer, but suddenly William was ignoring them.

"No matter how we go, they follow," he said, "They have our scent. That is, they have my scent."

Run!" You must not be caught!" Faudron pleaded.

But William Wallace just stood there.

"We can't stop!" the Irishman insisted.

"They're tricked us," William said.

"What's the crazy man saying, Lord?" Stephen of Ireland asked looking toward the stars.

"The dogs have a scent. My scent, Someone must have given it to them," William said quietly.

"Who could do such a thing?" Stephen said with a wide-eyed look of Irish astonishment.

"Exactly," William said. "Who?" And he pulled out his dagger.

Back among his contingent of swordsmen and royal hunting dogs, Lord Pickering felt the excitement of the impending kill. He sensed it from the dogs; he sensed it in himself. The prey had stopped running. The dogs barked frantically; they tugged so hard at their leashes that the handlers were almost dragged along. The lead handler turned and called back, "Be ready! We have them!"

The soldiers gripped their weapons, ready to take their prisoners. Pickering had already told them he wanted Wallace alive; it was always best to make an example of rebels by allowing those who shared their sentiments to witness the execution. Now he called again, "Remember, I want Wallace a prisoner!" Only a few of his soldiers heart it; most were strung out in a long line stretching far behind the dogs, but Pickering was not too worried, for he had made sure his most experienced and reliable soldiers were in front.

The dogs, their handlers, and the lead soldiers burst into the small clearing. The dogs found a body, stabbed, his throat cut; the dogs plunged their snouts into the gore and yipped wildly. The handlers had to fight furiously to tear the dogs from their bloody prize.

Lord Pickering approached the body and looked down. It was Faudron, mangled now but identifiable, with the new scarf he had given William in place of William's own tucked into his shirt.

"Damnation!
Damnation
!" Lord Pickering bellowed, and seizing the arm f his assistant, he dragged the man over for a close look at the body. "That is Faudron, isn't it"? Isn't it?"

The assistant peered down at the bloodless face; the dogs had gotten to it, but they had left enough for the assistant to be sure who it was. "Yes, m'lord," be told Lord Pickering.

Pickering ranted. He had conceived the plan of an infiltrator, had even picked Faudron from among the likeliest candidates. This should have worked! How could Wallace have known? Hell with it, he could wonder at that later. "After him! Get them going again!" he shouted at the dog handlers.

"Their noses are drowned in new blood. They'll follow nothing now, m'lord!" the lead handler said. The dogs were milling around, barking aimlessly.

And just as the realization, hit Pickering that he couldn't pursue Wallace any further, something else hit Pickering: the dagger of Stephen of Ireland, who had covered himself in a cloak and slipped in among Pickering's men. Pickering's eyes went wide, then rolled back as Stephen's dagger slid expertly through his back ribs and into his heart. As Pickering fell and his men realized what had happened, Stephen had already ran back into the trees.

The soldiers hesitated for a moment, then a captain said, "After him!"

Three men raced into the darkness of the forest in the direction Stephen ran. Suddenly they heard the whistling of a huge broadsword, and the unmistakable sound of steel cutting through bone could be heard with the faint death groans of the soldiers. Then the head of one of them came rolling out of the trees, into the clearing, to stop at the captain's feet.

The English soldiers crowded together, event he dogs whimpered and picked up the fear of the men around them. It was like they were surrounded by around them. It was like they were surrounded by something superhuman and demonic.

Then Wallace's voice came booming out of the darkness; he played up the spookiness of it all. "Eeeinglishmennnnnn!" William shrieked.

The soldiers were terrified -- and rightly so. They were realizing that they were lost in this forest; their leader had been murdered right under their noses. Suddenly they were not even secure in their numbers, for most of the other soldiers hadn't even reached the clearing yet.

The weird Scottish voice roared from the blackness around them: "You seek William Wallace. You have found him. Tell your masters -- those of you that make it home -- that when you come armed into Scotland, you come into hell!"

A pause; nothing but silence and fear. Then with a bloodcurdling yell, three wild men tore out of the darkness from different directions, their swords slashing. They cut down soldiers, and the others panicked. They ran anywhere they could. Terror spread through the forest.

Wallace, Hamish, and Stephen were left alone in the heart of the woods. They howled, barked like dogs, and snarled like wolves -- and then laughed like hyenas!

"I thought I was dead when ya pulled that dagger!" Stephen Said.

"No English lord would trust an Irishman!" Wallace said.

Hamish squinted down at the little Irishman, thought for a moment, and said, "let's kill him anyway."

They laughed again until their sides hurt.

Then William Wallace's laughter leaked away. He found the tree where he had fallen asleep and stood beside it now and stared into the dark forest where he had seen Murron in his dream.

29

THE NEWS OF WALLACE'S VICTORY OVER LORD PICKERING raced across Scotland like an Atlantic gale.

It spread to Inverness, where tow men were drinking in the town alehouse and one said, "William Wallace killed fifty men! Fifty if it was one!"

The same tale was exchanged by two farmers at a cross roads below Glasgow, only here it was said, "A hundred men! With his own sword! He cut through the English like -- "

In the taverns of Edinburgh, the story was going: "--like Moses through the Red Sea! Hacked off tow hundred heads!"

"Two hundred?!" doubted one of the listeners, still sober enough to b incredulous.

"Saw it with my own eyes," the speaker insisted.

But in the string of valleys where William Wallace had spent his boyhood, all looked absolutely normal: sleepy and peaceful. The clansmen who lived here never spoke of William Wallace. If an outsider mentioned his name, the farmers, their wives, and even their children all took on bewildered and rather dull expressions and seemed never to have heard of the man.

It was here, between the setting of the sun and the rising of the moon, that a Highlander, a runner, slipped through the inky blackness and tapped on the door of the house belonging to Stewart the farmer, who opened the door immediately and invited the man inside. But the runner did not stay; he whispered with Stewart for a moment and then ran on up the valley.