Child of the Phoenix

  ‘He and Alexander get on well, they always have. There is no reason why Edward should threaten us. We are an independent kingdom with a strong king and an effective government.’ He frowned. ‘Though I could wish Prince David had not died. The king’s eldest son, Lord Alexander, is not a strong boy either. He is a fragile defence to have between the king and destiny, especially since the queen died and the king has not remarried.’

  His words sparked off some strange warning bell inside Eleyne’s head. ‘But the king has chosen a wife,’ she said.

  William nodded. ‘It’s not yet announced, but he has talked to the Count of Flanders about his daughter. There has been too much delay.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘He’s a strong, robust man; he needs a woman now, and a dozen new sons as soon as possible. In case.’

  Eleyne frowned: her vision of Alexander on his horse had never returned. It was as if by telling him about it she had pre-empted fate. Certainly it was well known now that he would never ride a grey.

  She stood up and dropped a dutiful kiss on her father-in-law’s head. ‘I must leave you now. You are tired.’

  He scowled. ‘Yes, Goddamnit, I’m tired.’

  Two weeks later William of Mar was dead.

  VI

  GWYNEDD 1281

  The new Earl of Mar and Thane of Cabrach travelled to Wales with his wife in November. Their intention was to spend Christmas with Prince Llywelyn at Aber and meet at long last with Joanna.

  On the way they stopped at King Edward’s great new castle of Rhuddlan, with its canal diversion of the River Clwyd. Solemnly they allowed themselves to be given a tour of the new building by King Edward’s castle builder, Master James of St George, admiring not only the provision for stables and granaries and workshops in the outer ward but also the king’s and queen’s halls with their painted timber walls and, already, the start of the queen’s garden and her little fish pond.

  In their lavishly appointed guest chamber Donald turned to one of his coffers and brought out his writing materials. Within minutes he was deeply engrossed in a sketch of the lay-out of the castle.

  Eleyne stood behind him, watching. ‘Are you going to show it to Llywelyn?’

  He glanced up. ‘I doubt if there’s any secret about the strength of this place, my love. And it bodes ill for Llywelyn. No, I’m taking these drawings back with me to show to my stonemasons. We could gain some useful ideas for strengthening Kildrummy, with the king’s approval.’ He reached up and pulled her down to kiss her. ‘Are the children settled?’

  She nodded. ‘They’re all tired and excited.’

  He gave her a fond, sideways glance. ‘So are you?’

  ‘Not as tired as all that, Donald!’ She raised an eyebrow sharply. ‘As you will see, later!’ She left him to his sketching and wandered across to the window which overlooked the broad waters of the diverted River Clwyd. The east wind was beginning to scream through the half-built sections of the inner towers and darkness was setting in.

  They had spent the previous night at Chester, a strange echo from earlier times. Tomorrow they would spend the night at the guesthouse of Conwy Abbey, so she could pray at the tombs of her father and her two brothers. Then at last they would be at Aber.

  The low cloud racing in on the wind had cut out all views from the castle now. The inner ward was dank and murky as it grew dark. A boy had come in to light the candles and throw logs on the fire. All ought to be well, but she could not throw off a feeling of unease.

  At Aber Llywelyn and Eleanor greeted them with enthusiasm and made them all at home. But at once Llywelyn had disappointing news. ‘Lady de Bohun has written to say she is not well enough to travel, Aunt Eleyne. I’m so sorry.’ He handed her Joanna’s letter.

  Eleyne gazed unseeing at the parchment in her hands. ‘I knew she wouldn’t come.’ Her voice was flat.

  Eleanor frowned at her husband; he needn’t have told her so soon. He could have allowed her the pleasure of coming home first. She smiled at Eleyne. ‘It just means you must come again, next summer perhaps. When the weather is better and she has had a chance to recover.’

  ‘And when we will have a new member of the family to show you.’ Llywelyn put his arm around his wife’s waist fondly. ‘June or thereabouts would be about right, I’d say.’

  Eleyne put Joanna’s letter away. ‘So, you are to have a daughter, I’m so pleased.’ She spoke without thinking as she kissed Eleanor’s cheek.

  ‘A son, Aunt Eleyne,’ Llywelyn said sharply, ‘we are expecting a son.’

  She looked at him. His handsome face had aged since she had last seen him, and the shadows of exhaustion surrounded his eyes. She shivered slightly as a cold draught whistled through the great hall, gone as soon as it had come.

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘A son.’

  VII

  ABER

  Einion was not there. Almost defiantly she stood by the river in memory of Rhonwen and threw a late frost-hardened rosebud into the whirling waters as an offering to the past. Her children watched in silence. Gratney was tall and handsome, very like his father, as were the twins; at fourteen, he was a squire now, in the household of his cousin, her nephew and friend of so many years, Robert Bruce of Annandale. The twins were pages with the Earl of Buchan at Slains. All three had been summoned home for the pilgrimage to their mother’s birthplace, and were enjoying for the first time the fact of her royal birth.

  She showed them Yr Wyddfa; she showed them the strait and Llanfaes and the views of the great cloud-covered mass of Eryri, the high cwms already deep with snow, but it was Sandy alone who rode with her to the site of Einion’s grave. So like his brother in looks, he was a gentler, dreamier version. Dismounting, he held his mother’s horse as she stood looking down at the lichen-covered stone.

  ‘These woods are strange,’ he said with a shiver.

  ‘In what way?’ Squinting at him against the frosty sunlight, she studied his face. Handsome, square-jawed, his nose liberally sprinkled with freckles, his sandy hair as usual awry beneath his cap, he was gazing into the distance, his grey eyes unfocused.

  ‘There are ghosts, spirits.’ He shrugged, dismissing the thought, and began to fondle the horse’s muzzle. ‘Duncan doesn’t notice, so I don’t talk about it much.’ His voice was carefully casual.

  ‘You mean you’ve seen them before?’ Eleyne asked softly. She had a vivid memory of her own cautious questioning of Isabella de Braose when they were children, her withdrawal when Isabella’s scorn told her other people didn’t see the things she did.

  Sandy nodded.

  ‘At Kildrummy too?’

  He nodded again. ‘And at Slains. And on the mountains.’ He hesitated. ‘You see them, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said quietly, ‘I see them.’

  ‘There’s one in particular,’ he went on in a rush, the words tumbling over each other in his eagerness to speak to her on her own at last, now that he had dared to broach the subject. ‘I sometimes think he follows me about.’

  Eleyne forced herself to smile. She felt suddenly sick with fear. ‘Perhaps it is your guardian angel,’ she whispered. She put her hands on the boy’s shoulders. ‘What does he look like? Have you ever really seen him?’

  Sandy met her gaze steadily. A slight blush had coloured his cheeks and was spreading to the back of his neck. ‘He’s shadowy, tall, with dark, watching eyes. I’ve never seen him clearly.’ He broke away from her, his embarrassment overcoming his longing to confide. ‘It’s silly. He’s not really there … I just feel him.’

  Eleyne could hardly breathe. ‘And he watches over you?’

  Sandy nodded.

  Alexander.

  ‘Well.’ Eleyne took a deep breath. ‘Whoever it is, he must love you very much.’ She kissed him on the forehead. ‘Having the Sight is hard to live with, Sandy. It’s a burden. The people who don’t see into the other worlds are very lucky.’ She paused. ‘Does Duncan ever see anything?’

  He shook his head violently. ‘It?
??s the only thing that comes between us. We’re so close otherwise. It’s as though we’re part of each other. I know when he’s hurt, I know when he’s sad, even when Lord Buchan has taken one of us to court and left the other at Slains … he makes us take turns. But Dunc never sees. Not like me.’

  ‘Then the gods have chosen you for some reason,’ Eleyne said quietly. ‘You have their blessing and their protection.’

  ‘And Dunc hasn’t?’ Sandy was uncertain whether to be pleased for himself or upset for his twin.

  ‘Duncan has other blessings.’ Eleyne smiled reassuringly and with that he had to be content.

  She turned away, unable to school her face any longer. She was shaking like a leaf. Was the spirit who watched over her elder twin Alexander of Scotland? Had he after all fathered one of her sons?

  That night, alone in the bedchamber in the tower room at the end of the ty hir, while Donald lingered in the great hall with Llywelyn, she went to the north-facing window and tore open the shutters, staring out across the black sea towards Llanfaes and the beaches which stretched in the direction of Penmon.

  ‘Where are you?’ she cried out loud into the darkness. ‘Where are you? Why don’t you come to me and tell me the truth?’

  There was no reply. Alexander had not followed her to Wales.

  VIII

  KILDRUMMY CASTLE February 1282

  Isabella was the most pleased to be back. She had enjoyed their month-long stay in Gwynedd and she had grown very fond of her splendid glamorous cousin who was the Prince of Wales, but she missed her home. She had spent all her twelve years in Mar and had grown used to the mountains and the broad straths of north-east Scotland. The violent crags and the ice-hung gullies and cwms of Yr Wyddfa were to her sinister in their wild beauty and, back in Eryri, her mother’s remote feyness seemed more threatening.

  Isabella had a special hiding place which even Meg and the nurserymaids did not know about: a small storeroom in the tower, right under the roof, and there she would sit for hours, dreaming or reading her mother’s precious book of the Mabinogi, or playing with one or other of the dozens of castle kittens. Best of all, Marjorie and her brothers had never found her there. Twice her younger sister had plodded up to the storeroom, calling her, but on both occasions she had missed the little door, carefully hidden behind some empty wooden chests, which led into the small room beyond, her own private sanctuary, and she had heard the plaintive calls getting fainter again as Marjorie went away.

  Only a few hours after reaching the castle she made her way up to her hidy-hole clutching a new treasure, a new book of stories, laboriously copied for her by one of Llywelyn’s scribes. It too told of kings and princes; of fairies and magic, and of wonderful princesses with whom she passionately identified.

  Wrapping herself in her cloak, she huddled closer to her candle for warmth. Outside the narrow slit window snow flurries whirled up the valley. Soon it would be time for supper but in the meantime she had already forgotten the long ride and the black cliffs and icy crags of Gwynedd. She was lost in her dreams.

  It was a severe shock when her mother came into the room, silent as a shadow, and sat down next to her on the dusty floor. ‘So, this is where you hide away.’ Eleyne smiled. ‘Do you mind me knowing?’

  ‘Not as long as you don’t tell Marjorie.’

  Eleyne laughed. Isabella loved the way her mother’s eyes crinkled at the corners when she laughed. It made her look young and carefree. ‘I won’t tell her, I promise.’ Eleyne was studying her daughter’s face. ‘You didn’t like Wales, did you?’

  Isabella knew better than to pretend. ‘It was frightening. And sad.’

  Eleyne sighed. ‘I wish you could have seen it in the summer, when the snow on the mountains has gone and the cwms are full of flowers.’ She smiled. ‘So. You come up here to read.’

  Isabella nodded shyly.

  ‘I’ve always loved to be alone. But all my special places have been outside – or in the stables. Are you going to come down now? It’s so cold up here. And the horn will call us to supper soon.’

  ‘Mama.’ Closing the book, Isabella tucked it carefully into a small coffer by the wall. ‘Can I ask you something?’

  ‘Of course.’ Eleyne wrapped her arms around her legs and sat, chin on knees.

  ‘Who am I going to marry?’

  ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Haven’t you and papa arranged my marriage?’

  Eleyne shook her head. ‘We’ve talked about it, of course, and we’ve thought of various possibilities. But there’s nothing arranged. There’s plenty of time to think about it yet.’

  ‘Did you ever dream about who you would marry?’ Isabella edged closer, her eyes huge in the candlelight.

  Eleyne nodded. ‘I did, but you see, it was different for me. I was married when I was a young child, so I always knew who my husband was.’

  ‘And was he very handsome?’ Isabella sat forward on her knees.

  ‘He was very handsome and very kind.’

  ‘And he was Joanna’s father?’

  Slowly Eleyne shook her head, ‘No, John and I had no children. Joanna’s father was my second husband.’

  Isabella was silent for a moment. ‘And was he handsome too?’ she asked.

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘And then came Macduff ’s father.’

  Eleyne smiled. ‘And then yours.’

  ‘Will I have four husbands?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I think you’ll have just one. Someone you’ll love very much.’

  ‘Is that written in the stars?’ Isabella loved Eleyne’s almanacs and star charts. She and Marjorie had both spent hours poring over them, seeing the pictures in the heavens.

  ‘Yes, it’s written in the stars.’

  ‘And will I have lots of children?’

  Eleyne leaned forward and took Isabella’s hands in hers. ‘That’s enough questions, sweetheart. I don’t know how many children you’ll have, or when, or who you will marry. Come on, let’s leave the future to take care of itself and go down to supper.’

  IX

  MAR April 1282

  Morna looked down at the woman lying on the straw pallet on the floor at Mossat. She was pale and shivering, the sweat pouring from her body. She shook her head. ‘The fever hasn’t broken. She’s worse.’

  The woman’s husband had brought her down from the high shielings in the autumn, carrying her on his back. Her fever had returned a dozen times since then and he had had to let the other men go to the lambing without him.

  ‘Last summer I went to the well. I thought the water would cure her,’ he admitted unhappily. He was twisting his cap in his hands in agitation as he looked down at his wife.

  Morna frowned. ‘That wouldn’t help for this. What we need to do is break the fever once and for all,’ she said practically. She turned to her bag of remedies. The woman needed medicine now as well as spells.

  She knelt, propping the woman’s head on her arm as she fed her the hot green tea. The man felt in his pouch and produced a scrap of sacking. ‘I took something from the spring,’ he said shamefaced. ‘I shouldna have done it. I knew it would bring ill luck.’

  Morna was shocked. ‘You stole from the guardians of the spring?’

  He nodded. ‘Will you take it back for me? Please. Will you make it all right? She won’t get better until it’s done.’

  Morna helped the sick woman drink the last of the decoction, then she laid her gently on the ground and covered her with sheepskin rugs. ‘I’ll take it back, but I can’t promise the spirits will withdraw their anger,’ she said sternly. ‘You’ve done a terrible thing, Eddie, stealing from the gods.’ She held out her hand and taking the sacking she slipped it into her herb bag without looking at it. ‘Keep Jinnie warm. Give her some more of this tea at dusk and again at dawn. I’ll come and see her in the morning.’ She crouched down and laid her hand for a moment on the burning forehead, then she slipped from the house out into the village street.

&nbs
p; It wasn’t until Mairi was asleep that night and Morna was sitting exhausted as her fire died, trying to summon the strength to go to her own bed, that she remembered the package and reaching for her bag of dried herbs took it out. She unwrapped the fraying piece of sacking in the firelight and sat looking down at what it contained.

  He had packed the phoenix in dried moss. Tiny curls of it clung to the creature’s beak and claws. In the flickering light its eyes were red and malicious, glaring up at her. She, like the old man, could feel its energy.

  For a long time she looked at it, then with gentle reverence she wrapped it up again. The fire was dead and the embers cold before she went to sleep.

  X

  April 1282

  Robert Bruce, Lord of Annandale, was always a welcome visitor at Kildrummy. With him was his son, another Robert, a grown man and father himself now, who had taken the title of Earl of Carrick from his wife, Marjorie.

  ‘So, how was Wales?’ Robert of Annandale raised a goblet of wine and toasted Eleyne and Donald cheerfully.

  ‘Beautiful, as always,’ Eleyne replied. ‘But you haven’t come all this way to ask us about Wales, Robert.’ The two men had not so far divulged the reason for their visit. ‘I trust you haven’t come to complain about your squire.’ Gratney had gone back to the Bruces at Lochmaben two months before.

  ‘On the contrary, he’s a charming young man. He does you both great credit, doesn’t he, father?’ Robert of Carrick said. ‘You should be very proud of your children.’

  ‘We are.’ Donald stretched out and took his wife’s hand. ‘As you should be of yours.’

  Carrick laughed. He already had a clutch of sons and daughters, and his wife, Marjorie, was pregnant again. ‘I am. My eldest son is so like his grandfather! They get on too well by far.’ He looked fondly at his father. ‘Though Robert is only seven, he is a bright, ambitious boy. And Christian is like mama in looks. She’ll make someone a good wife one day.’ He glanced at Eleyne sideways.