Highlander's Destiny, page 17
Given the history that Colum was trying to overcome, she would never be an advantage for him.
She’d always be a burden. An obstacle to getting what he wanted most.
She found her shovel and spent the whole day helping dig the pits around the road, then putting grasses and branches over them.
Despite the long, hard day, she and Colum still made love, and he made her come twice. Then she fell asleep in his arms. It was early morning when she woke to find him watching her. His face was completely relaxed, with a smile of pleasure and admiration. He stroked her hair gently.
“Did you watch me sleep?” Danielle asked, her voice hoarse.
“Aye,” he said. “Ye’ll leave me soon. I didna want to miss a moment with ye.”
She nestled deeper into his embrace. Through the canvas of the tiny tent, sunlight played through the branches. The sounds of a waking camp came through: the clanking of utensils against iron cauldrons, the cutting of food against wooden boards, conversations and orders being called out, horses neighing, feet shuffling. Someone put on a cauldron of something delicious-smelling to boil, and Danielle’s stomach growled.
“Colum—” she said.
“Nae, lass,” he said and planted a soft kiss on her lips. “We only have a short time together. Let’s pretend that this time is all we have in the world.”
He had broken her walls down. He’d been there for her—protecting her, unraveling her, introducing her to how she was always supposed to be.
How could she pretend all they had was this moment, when what she wanted was eternity?
Chapter 29
One day later…
* * *
“The English are coming!” The cry came in the early hours of the morning, and Colum scrambled to his feet.
The whole camp froze and stared at the sentinel who’d just ridden in through the trees, panting, his horse wildly shaking its head.
The camp had grown and expanded a bit since the day Colum had caught Danielle spying. More men had come to join Bruce’s camp and trained vigorously.
Today was the Eve of John the Baptist—that was the last day the English could arrive to fight, or Stirling would be given over to Scotland. Since the camp had first stirred to life this morning, the mood had been tense. Agitated. They knew the battle could be only hours away.
And yet, the news came almost like a shock. Schiltron formations stopped moving. Those sparring on swords stopped midswing. Men checking and polishing their claymores and Lochaber axes halted with cloths in their hands.
It was quiet. So quiet, Colum could hear the combined breaths of six thousand men, the cracks of finger joints as warriors tightened their fists around their sword hilts, the booming of their hearts as they knew…
Here it was. The day they’d been preparing for this past year, but also in every battle they’d ever had, with every warrior they’d lost and every castle they’d retaken from the English. This would be the battle that defined what it was to be a Highlander, to fight for independence, for freedom.
And in the next moment, they all moved. Everyone knew their place, the schiltron they belonged to. The commander they followed. Their place on the battlefield. The sounds returned—the pounding of feet, the urgent grunts of men as they hurried to put on their armor and grab their weapons. Armorers handed out pikes to those who didn’t have them.
Colum had spent the past three days training with his clan and the rest of the men holding schiltron formations and practicing quick echelons—diagonal formations of the schiltrons. Bruce and his commanders—Aulay MacDonald, James “Black” Douglas, and Thomas Randolph—had relentlessly trained them to make quick movements across fields while maintaining the shoulder-tight schiltrons.
At nights, he’d come back to Danielle and made desperate, sweet love to her. He was just thankful she was still here, that she still hadn’t left. He was grateful to have as much of her as she would give him.
He turned to her. She was on her feet already, the bowl of porridge in her hands forgotten. “Colum…” she said, her voice urgent.
She still wore a man’s clothes, and he sometimes imagined how beautiful she would look if she wore a lady’s dress, one that hugged her willowy figure, with her golden hair spilling over her shoulders.
But she’d needed the man’s clothes to dig the pits in the fields on the sides of the road leading to New Park forest—she’d insisted on helping and he couldn’t stop her. He’d even seen her training on swords with Owen. And he loved her in any clothes. He loved that she was spending as much time with him as possible. He loved that she was doing all that she could to help the Scots.
And yet, the end had always been in sight. And it came now.
He picked up his sword belt and sheath.
“Danielle, lass.” He took her face in his hands, and her eyes were wet. “Ye must leave now.”
She opened and closed her mouth. “Colum, I…”
“Ye what?”
To his surprise, she wrapped her arms around him and clung to him like a crab. He pulled her into his embrace so tightly, he thought he heard her squeak. He buried his face in her hair, shamelessly sucking in her scent.
Around them, the controlled panic that always came before a battle started to settle in. The cries of commanders, the sound of swords being put into the sheaths, the drumming of feet against the ground.
Sweat broke through his skin. He needed to go. His clan needed him. His king needed him.
“I need to let you go,” he rasped against her neck, then pulled back and looked deep into her eyes. It was the last time he’d see that aquamarine blue of a heavenly sky. The only color he wanted to see for the rest of his life. “Go, Danielle, or I wilna be able to let ye leave.”
She nodded. “I’ll always love you, Colum.” She sobbed softly.
He cupped her face with both his hands. “Be well. Be happy. I love ye, lass.”
But she wasn’t letting him go. Her wee fists held the collar of his tunic, and as tears streamed down her cheeks, he kissed them away.
“Don’t die, do you hear me?” she whisper-yelled into his face. “Don’t you dare die!”
Die…
“Lass.”
“Promise me you won’t die!”
It hurt him too much. How could she care if he lived or died if she wasn’t going to be here anyway? And what did he have to live for without her?
His clan. That’s what. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, she was right—his clan would never accept her. They would always think he was a traitor fraternizing with the enemy.
It hurt too much. He couldn’t wait another moment. He planted a quick kiss and tore away from her. “Goodbye, lass,” he said.
He saw other MacDonalds taking their Lochaber axes with them. Lochaber axes were excellent weapons against cavalry and proudly used by several Highland clans. They were as tall as pikes and had a long, narrow blade with a sharp point attached to the top.
“You’re not asking me to stay anymore,” she whispered.
He put on the chain mail coif, its weight cool and heavy on his shoulders. “’Tis what we both understood, is it nae?”
He put his sword into the sheath, then picked up the Lochaber ax and ran to take his place.
Bruce was on his horse and yelling commands for two schiltrons forming at the south end of New Park forest, where the Falkirk road led into a clear space between the burn and the woods.
He joined the Cambel schiltron that was forming at the edge of the forest. He knew his uncle Aulay was responsible for the MacDonald schiltron—where Colum should have gone.
But Aulay’s task was to hold on and protect the back of the camp that was facing north, towards Stirling Castle.
And now that Danielle was leaving, Colum needed to move. He needed to do something to distract himself from running after her and stopping her.
He needed to fight. To be useful.
As he stood shoulder to shoulder, squeezed between Craig and Ian Cambel, he exchanged a look with them. They both held a pike in their hands. Craig was in his forties now; so was Ian. But they were both still huge and powerful warriors.
“Colum MacDonald,” said Craig. “Are ye lost, lad?”
“’Tis Danielle,” said Colum, his throat tight. “She’s leaving.”
The two knew what it meant. Amy and Kate were both here, and they’d already met Danielle.
“Sorry to hear that,” said Craig.
But that was all he could say. Colum and the Cambels were in the front line of the schiltron. Behind them were man after man, each with a pike. Colum felt shoulders, backs, chests of his countrymen supporting him. They needed to be as one. One being, tied by loyalty and honor, fighting for its life.
Before them was the Falkirk road. Around it, on both sides of the fields, Danielle and dozens of others had dug pits and covered them with branches and grasses.
“Advance!” came Bruce’s powerful cry, and the schiltron moved forward.
They marched in their tight formation, feet and elbows scraping against Colum. Their pikes were up, shooting high into the sky like the trees they were passing. The pungent scent of sweat was sharp in Colum’s nostrils. Then the trees gave way to an open area, and they marched farther south down the road. Bruce was in front of them. Three more schiltrons—one to their left and two to their right—followed in the same, tight, hedgehog-like rectangles.
When Bruce held his arm up and gestured for them to halt, Colum watched the English army approach. The glare of the sun reflected from the armor of hundreds of knights blinded Colum, and he squinted, trying to see. Their swords glistened like slashes of light, hurting his eyes. He could feel the rumble of the thousands of hooves against the ground, thousands of feet marching to bring death.
Then the banners appeared—red with three golden lions. The King of England sat up front on his huge, white warhorse, countless warriors marching and riding behind. Proud, powerful cavalry with hundreds of mounted knights wearing expensive, solid iron armor. But their horses looked tired, sweaty, uncared for. They tossed their heads and stumbled a bit. The somber faces staring at the Scotsmen from under the helmets weren’t full of battle rage. They were tired, too.
Still. Exhausted or not, they outnumbered the Scots about four to one. And they were cavalry.
“They expect us to back down into the forest!” yelled the Bruce as he watched the approaching army. “But we wilna, will we, lads! They dinna ken what is waiting for them once they try to flank us.” He opened his mouth wide and glanced back at them. “Hold, lads! Hooooold!”
This was the moment they had been preparing for—training in the damned woods for moons, fighting smaller battles for years. The moment when the woman he loved was on her way back home and he’d never see her again.
Behind King Edward II flew the banners of several important noblemen who, no doubt, commanded their own units. All of them were mounted on warhorses, which were very different beasts than palfreys—regular horses used for riding long distances. A warhorse cost eight times as much as an ordinary horse, the yearly wages of four knights.
And then Colum saw the man who’d been in that dungeon eight years ago, menacing and huge over the Queen of Scotland, about to rape her.
Sir Henry de Bohun.
He approached from behind Edward on his horse and then leaned down to him and said something into his ear. He was in full armor—the most expensive armor Colum had ever seen. The breastplates and arming points were heavy and as shiny as new silver coins. He wore a heavy helmet with feathers in his colors—blue and yellow—at the back of his head.
Edward nodded, his eyes heavy on the Bruce. Then Henry lowered his helmet and steered his fully armored beast of a warhorse out of the way of the approaching English cavalry. He pointed his lance straight at Robert the Bruce and spurred his warhorse on, and it charged.
As gravel and dirt sprang from under its hooves and the ground drummed, Colum’s schiltron held their combined breaths, looking at the Bruce on his gray palfrey that stomped from foot to foot.
What was Bruce going to do? He watched the charging knight, unmoving, in his simple chain mail, without any iron armor, only a helmet over his chain mail coif. Was he in shock, just like the rest of them? A beast was coming for him, bringing his death. No doubt, just like Colum a few days ago, Henry knew if he finished the king, the war would be won.
Bruce knew it, too. He had a choice. Back away and run and save his life. Or confront the beast coming for him at full force, as inevitable as a storm, and come up against the impossible odds.
Bruce looked over his shoulder at his troops. His dark eyes glistened with determination. There was death in them. He opened his mouth and cried out.
It wasn’t the war cry of his clan. Or any other Scottish clan. It was a roar, but it was something that brought them all together. Combined the families and clans into one nation. Bruce’s roar caused a bone-deep shudder that ran across Colum’s whole body, and he opened his mouth and echoed it.
“Ahhhhh!!!” came out of his throat, just like it came out of the throats of Craig and Ian by his side, and Owen behind him. And there was one more voice that he didn’t think was real. And when he looked back, behind him stood Owen’s wife, Amber.
They all echoed their king as one.
And then Colum knew. “Yer Grace!” he called.
Robert turned to him. “Take the ax!” said Colum and threw the Lochaber ax to Bruce. Bruce caught it and measured its weight in his hand by tossing it slightly in the air.
Then he spurred his gray horse and charged at the knight.
The earth rumbled under Colum’s feet as the two headed towards and against each other. The Scotsmen around him cheered and roared.
Bruce had a smaller horse. He had minimal armor that would not protect him like Henry’s iron armor would. He had no lance. It seemed sure he’d be spitted on the English knight’s lance like a grilled boar.
But at the last moment, just when the horses would have met, Bruce turned his palfrey to the side, avoiding the lance, stood up in his stirrups, and crashed the ax blade into Henry’s head. It sliced through the helmet, but the haft broke from the impact.
The knight fell like a stone, no doubt dead before he touched the ground. A roar of triumph burst through the air around Colum. Bruce rode close to Edward. There was a moment where he lingered and the two glared at each other—Edward in shock, Bruce triumphant. Bruce pumped his fist into the air and roared again, only louder, then turned his horse back and rode to where Colum’s schiltron stood.
As he neared them, the English roared in anger and disbelief and charged after him like a storm.
“Staaand, lads!” roared Bruce, still coming towards them. “Stand!” He rode behind the four schiltrons. “Staaaaand!”
Colum tightened his fingers around the shaft of his pike. A storm was coming at them. It was a storm of war beasts and pure steel and lances. A storm of swords and rumbling hooves and the wild, searching eyes of the horses that were ridden to their deaths. Metal glistened, blinding Colum, closer and closer.
“Piiiiiikes!” roared Bruce.
They lowered their pikes, Colum and Craig and Ian in the front row, Owen and Amber and the others in the rows behind them. They were now a beast themselves. A hedgehog of steel and wood. One being. A being that stood between Scotland’s freedom and its slavery.
When the first wave of beasts crashed into his schiltron, the force stole his breath away.
And yet, the only thing he could think of was Let Danielle be safe.
Chapter 30
Danielle kept staring at the road leading between the trees, where Colum had gone with the Cambel clan and other clans following the Bruce.
A group of women came and stood by her side.
“Anything?” asked Amy.
Amy, Craig Cambel’s wife, was a pretty woman in her late thirties with naturally red hair that was going silver. She wore a simple homespun dress, her hair tied back with a sort of bandanna like World War II nurses. Next to her stood Jenny, a pediatrician from New York City, and the wife of Aulay MacDonald. Catrìona Mackenzie stood next to them, as well as Kate Cambel, the wife of Ian Cambel, who fought next to Colum.
“I don’t know,” Danielle barely managed. “All I can hear from here are yells and…cries and…”
She stopped herself from speaking before she burst into tears. Over the past few days, she’d connected to these women, and Amber, who was fighting alongside the men, and they’d become her friends. Unlike back in the twenty-first century, she didn’t need to keep people away with a job she couldn’t talk about. Her fellow time travelers weren’t interested in judging her personality or appearance.
The five women understood exactly what she’d gone through. Except for Catrìona, they had all been born in her century and chosen a life back in time, with minimal medical care and conveniences. All of them had chosen hardship for the Highlanders they loved.
Catrìona’s husband, James Murray, the police detective from Oxford, was with clan Mackenzie, over at the eastern front of the camp together with David and next to clan MacDonald—where Colum was supposed to be had he not chosen to run off into the battle like a madman and join clan Cambel.
“’Tis all right,” said Catrìona confidently as she rubbed Danielle’s shoulders. “Rogene was a historian in yer time and she told us how it would all go. If she wasna heavily pregnant with her next bairn and waiting for her labor in Eilean Donan, she’d be here to tell us. ’Tis all going to be all right.”
“She might have,” said Danielle. “We all know the Battle of Bannockburn will be won by the Scots. But none of us know if our men will come out of there alive.”
The women exchanged heavy, worried glances. She knew it was always on their minds.
“Danielle, why are you still here, sweetheart?” asked Amy gently.
Danielle glanced to the west, where the hill with her rock was. “My feet just won’t move there. I’m so freaked out about Colum. I just…I can’t leave until I know he’s safe.”
