‘We have a king, my lord. He is called Edward. And if there is not him, then there is another, a Balliol one called King John, lest you had forgotten.’
Bruce leaned forward a little, his voice hoarse, his face, framed by the cowl of the hood, strained and seemingly anxious.
‘The truth of that is clear,’ he answered. ‘King John is a broken reed, unlikely ever to return to sit on a throne in this kingdom.’
Which was, Red John had to agree, a palpable truth but one to which he would never admit, least of all to a Bruce.
‘The clergy of this kingdom require a king,’ Bruce went on, galloping along on an argument which, Red John realized, he had long rehearsed. ‘They demand one, for a kingdom with no king is not a kingdom at all — Longshanks has reduced Scotland to a land, my lord, subject to the laws of England and the bishops here will not have an English-appointed archbishop. They will not have a king interfering with the right of the Pope alone to sail in the Sees of this realm.’
‘Sail in the Sees,’ repeated Badenoch with a wry smile. ‘Very good, my lord. Very good.’
‘Not my own,’ Bruce answered at once, which rocked Badenoch’s boat once again; he was not enjoying the pitch of this conversation and fought to bring the helm of it back to a course he was more comfortable with.
‘Bernard of Kilwinning,’ Bruce went on, ‘pronounced the words of that, together with the doctrine that a king of this realm has a contract with the community of it — and, if he does not fulfil it, the community is entitled to remove him.’
‘I have heard all the wee priests of Kilwinning and Wishart and Lamberton cant this from every pulpit and market square they can reach,’ Red John replied laconically. ‘It makes little difference to the reality of matters.’
Now it was Bruce who was brought to a halt, blinking.
‘The community are unlikely to choose a new king from any but a legitimate line,’ Badenoch went on smoothly. ‘Else any horsecoper or cottar — or a wee lord from Herdmanston — could put himself forward for it.’
He paused, looked at Bruce with a sly peep.
‘Or Wallace,’ he added poisonously.
‘Agreed,’ Bruce countered swiftly. ‘You should know, my lord, that the clergy favour myself.’
Now there was a flat-out treason, breathtakingly brazen as a lolling whore, so that Red John had a moment, of which he was all too aware, of working his mouth like a fresh-caught fish.
‘Wishart, Lamberton…’ Bruce counted off the clergy of the realm on his gloved fingers, while Red John’s mind raced. This had to have been agreed in a meeting. A plot, by God.
‘So you see it clear, my lord of Badenoch. The tide flows in my favour. I realize that you have your own claims to this, but our feud with it defeats the purpose our bishops urge us to fulfil. That God urges us to fulfil. For the good of the realm, my lord, we must resolve this matter.’
Red John found his voice at last, though it was a twisted, ugly parody of it, hoarse with anger.
‘You dare preach to me of the good of the realm,’ he said, his voice so low and trembling that Bruce could barely hear it. ‘You? You forget who it was who defended this kingdom, who put life and fortune at risk to fight. While you turned and twisted and bowed and scraped. What did we get from it, this honourable fight? Near ruin and imprisonment — I am only lately returned to freedom. Others are yet in peril, who would not bow the knee — Wallace is betrayed and murdered for one — while you, my lord of Annandale, gained a wife and all her lands.’
He paused, breathing heavily; he and Bruce locked eyes like rutting stag horns.
‘Yet I would do it all again,’ Red John added in a growl, ‘for a rightful king of this realm. And neither you nor your threats nor your promises will keep me from it.’
There was silence for a moment, which was only because Bruce was fighting his own temper, beginning to realize that Red John was not about to be swayed and that revealing his compact with the bishops had been a step too far. Yet he was on the path and the only way was forward…
‘There can be a rightful king of this realm,’ he answered carefully, ‘though it requires your consideration, my lord, as leader of the Comyn. If I am crowned, with Comyn approval, I will not be slow with reward — Carrick and Annandale would be laurels to the Comyn.’
Red John’s eyes narrowed; he knew Bruce’s brother coveted those titles, so the bribe was daring, if not a little desperate.
‘Do not oppose the bishops’ choice, whatever it may be, at the very least,’ Bruce added.
‘The bishops’ choice?’
It was hissed out, with all the venomous bile released by a knife in a dead sheep’s belly.
‘Yourself, of course,’ Red John went on, his face ugly with sneer. ‘You consider yourself a rightful king, chosen by God Himself.’
It was not a question and Bruce did not quite know how to reply, caught between his desire to shout it out and the shackles of prudence that had kept it secret for so long. In the end, he opened and closed his mouth a few times and said nothing.
Red John climbed up on to the tips of his toes and leaned a little, his scythe of red beard quivering as vibrantly as his voice.
‘Even if John Balliol is a broken reed,’ he declared, soft and vicious, ‘he has a son. Even if the son fails, there is myself. Even if I fail, there are other Comyn more fitting to be rightful king of this realm than you, my lord of Annandale. This you must know, for even if Plantagenet, that Covetous King, took advantage of the moment, the conclave that decided you were not fit to rule was fair and legitimate even then.’
He flicked one hand, no more, on to the Bruce shoulder, a sneering dismissal.
‘God has a plan for this realm,’ he spat, ‘but you do not feature in it as king, my lord. If you declare yourself openly as the usurping bastard you are in secret, you will find a Comyn opposing you at every turn.’
The flick tipped the pan of it, the arrogant sneer of it bringing the memory of when Red John had grabbed him by the throat — Jesu, actually laid hands on an Earl of Carrick. The rage filled Bruce, consumed him, for what he had failed to do then and what had burned him ever since when he thought of it.
He was aware of a bright, white light with a voice at the centre, which might have been God or Satan but was polite as a prelate’s servant as it put the question to him. He felt the dagger hilt under his hand, had it out and slammed into the ribs of the posturing little popinjay who opposed him, all in the time it took to answer ‘yes’.
Red John felt the blow, could scarcely believe that Bruce had dared to strike him and then, with a sudden, savage twist of fear, felt the tug and heard the suck of the dagger coming out. There was a burning sensation and his legs trembled.
Bruce stared at what he had done. The thunder of it was loud as a cataract in his head and he saw Badenoch teeter backwards on his high heels and start to bend and sag, so he dropped the dagger and reached out to support him, an instinctive gesture.
The blade clattered on to the stones, bounced and twisted, little drops of blood flying up like rubies, the sound ringing like a bell; every head came up.
Seton got to the centre of it first, with a bull roar to alert Hal and the Dog Boy, dragging his sword out with a grating hiss.
He was a step ahead of Red John’s uncle Robert, whose bellow of outrage drowned Seton and rang round the Greyfriars stones. He sprang towards Bruce, his own blade clearing the scabbard and whirling above his head.
Seton grabbed Bruce by one arm, spilling the Earl backwards even as he cut viciously down on the springing Robert Comyn. Hal saw the blow slice into the flesh of the man’s neck, heard the sinister hissing of it and the surprised little yelp Robert Comyn made as his head parted company with the rest of him, all save for a raggle of flesh.
‘Get him away,’ Hal yelled to the Dog Boy, who bundled the flap-handed, stumbling Bruce away while Hal and Seton, panting like mad dogs, closed shoulder to shoulder, backing away from the fallen, bleeding figures; Robert Comyn’s body writhed, his feet kicking furious splashes from the lake of his own blood.
Malise wanted no part of this. Cheyne of Straloch, equally paralysed, was starting to haul his blade out and Malise had no doubt that the thick-headed, barrel-bodied lout would plunge forward like a ravening wolf…
‘Murder,’ he yelled and sprinted for the back door of the chapel. ‘Murder. A Comyn! Murder.’
Hal and Seton looked at each other and backed off towards the kirk’s front door while Cheyne plunged
