‘Nasty and deep, but the lacings in yer arm are intact, so ye will get the use of it back.’
Hal tried not to let the pain wash him, concentrated on staring at the sword and wondering at the keen edge which had slashed de Grafton to ruin. Too fancy, Rossal had admitted when he had handed the sword over and now Hal saw the extent of it: the Templar cross in the pommel and letters etched down the blade and now outlined clearly in de Grafton’s blood: C+S+S+M+L. Across the hilt was N+D+S+M+L and Hal wondered if there was a Templar left who could tell him what they meant.
Sim searched de Grafton for the key and vanished with it; not long afterwards the place was suddenly filled with the Bon Accord sailors. Hal let Pegy have his head, listened dully to him sending Somhairl and some men to check on the ship while he sat, fired with the agony of his arm and trying not to move at all.
The big Islesman was back all too soon; the ship was foundered and half-sunk at its moorings, the steering whipstaff cut.
‘Baistit,’ Pegy swore and kicked the bloody ruin of de Grafton so that the head lolled sickeningly. ‘He knew he had won afore ye arrived, Sir Hal.’
Hal, crushed with the black dog of it, fell back to studying the sword, half-numbed, watching the gleet and blood crust into the grooves of the letters in a haar of weariness, until light and voices burst over him, driving him up and out of it, as if breaching from a dark pool.
‘Christ betimes,’ said a familiar voice, ‘what a charnel hoose.’
It was an effort to raise his head and stare into the wide grin.
‘Kirkpatrick,’ Hal slurred like a drunk. ‘You are late.’
ISABEL
Thou deckest Thyself with light as if it were a garment and spreadest out the Heavens like a curtain. A sign, Lord, to silence my weeping and I thank You for it. I saw him, through the smoke, through the crowds howling at the shrieks of the burning woman, a dark and strange angel, hooded and careful but the only one not looking at the poor soul writhing on the pyre, but up at me. He knows I saw him, too. O Lord. Joy of joys – a sign. Matters are changing; winds are shifting.
Dog Boy.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Berwick Town, Berwick
Ember Day, Feast of the Visitation, May 1314
He should not have been there, in the thronged Marygate. He could hear Jamie say it even as he walked into the crowd of the place. You are not meant to be strolling inside Berwick town, Aleysandir. You are supposed to be observing the folk in it, their movements and their bought truce. You are supposed to be me, Aleysandir – so says the King – and I am too kent a face for you to be waving its like at the English in Berwick.
I am supposed to be kin, Dog Boy answered himself, grimly exultant with the daring of it, though he would never say it to Jamie’s face. My blood is your blood, Jamie Douglas – and your blood would bring you here if you were in my boots.
His boots were clotted with filth of alleys and wynds choked with ‘English sojers’, though the truth of matters was that they were not English at all, but the mesnies of those Scots lords still loyal to the Plantagenet and fearing for the loss of their lands in the north. Unable now to go home, they were lost men, all of their old lives torn from them and only soldiering left. Swaggering and roaring, they lurched through the streets in search of drink and whores and, above all, food.
That was part of what had brought Dog Boy into the town, mingling easily with the other travel-stained, just one more well-worn fighting man with an iron hat, a gambeson that had seen better days and a festoon of hand weapons dangling from belt and back.
He and Jamie knew the place was starving already, with ale a sight cheaper than bread, yet those Scottish nobiles bound to King Edward were clearly mustering – and food was arriving, grain and meat and ale, in carts guarded by English wearing the badge of Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke.
The presence of his own mesnie meant the Earl was here, but with just enough numbers to garrison the castle and keep all the food and drink safe. Not for the town, nor even for the garrison, nor the Scots lords, but for others – supplies, stockpiling here for the bulk of the army because the fortresses they usually relied on for invasion were all gone. That meant the English were due here in force soon – but where were they now?
Dog Boy had heard that labour on the Berwick town-wall defences had stopped because the workers were too weak and he saw for himself the ditch and rampart, half-finished and no more than a dyke. You could take the town, he thought to himself, with a jester’s bladder on a stick – though the castle was still formidable.
He had heard, too, that Isabel MacDuff was the sight to see, dangling from the Hog’s Tower in her cage, but in the time it took to battle for a leather jack of warm ale at Tavish’s Tavern, Dog Boy learned that her charms had been overcome by a new entertainment.