Sisters of The Bruce 1292-1314 (Abridged Version )

Sisters of The Bruce: Part 2; Chapter 1.7&8

                                                                           VII

England

July 1307

Kirsty raised her head from under the thin cover on her bed of rough planks. For the better part of a year, this cold, damp chamber, which lay deep within the walled compound of the priory of Sixhills, had been her prison. From here, there would be no escape.

As usual, the nips of lice ate away at her sleep and she scratched at the contemptible hair shirt beneath her tunic. Today, distant sobbing fractured the silence. It rose to a strident ululation and then faded away. Intrigued, Kirsty placed her feet upon the stone flags and took a few steps, before diving for the stinking chamber pot in the corner of the room. Floating on the scummed surface were the brown pellets vacated from her bowels several days ago. As steam rose from the full pot, a sharp, malodorous whiff assailed her nostrils. The overflow – a putrescent, yellow rivulet – ran across the sloping flags towards the bed, soaking into the coverlet which she had let fall carelessly to the floor. She had longed for the warmth of summer. Now, it brought with it a rise in the obnoxious stench. Stepping with care to avoid the puddles, she made a deliberate effort to breathe through pursed lips. Emboldened, she pressed her face against the bars of the grate in the thick oak door. She paused, to listen for more of the strange, wailing sounds.

Normally, she would have been roused before dawn and forced to kneel before the ugly crucifix which hung on the wall – a painful vigil on knees, already red and swollen. If she showed the least resistance, her clothing was forcibly removed and her back flayed with a leather switch, its vicious knots left her skin bruised and bleeding. Buckets of icy water were thrown over her. Even now, she could feel the welts being rubbed raw by the multitudinous spikes of hair. No one came. The day wore on and hunger began to gnaw at her insides, though, why she could not guess, for the food she was offered bore little resemblance to anything she had known in her previous life as the Countess of Mar. Steps sounded outside and the door creaked open. A red-eyed crone, dressed in a trailing black habit, carried a bowl of slops. Kirsty had long ago given up asking questions. This time, however, her expression of inquiry was met with an unexpected response.

"The great and masterful King Edward is dead!" the nun croaked as she placed the food on the trestle near the door. With a look of pure malice, she delivered a gobbet of slimy spittle into the bowl before turning on her heel. It was only when the door clanged shut Kirsty realised she had been holding her breath. For the first time in a long while, a smile of pure joy creased her thin, pinched features.

                                                                                    VIII

Scotland

August 1307

Hidden within the Galloway hills, Robert and his men ate well, feasting on the plump hind. They had killed the beast several days earlier and left it to hang in the cool confines of the cave in which they sheltered. Wine skins, dried beef strips and hard-crusted loaves of oat bread were shared amongst the gathering, courtesy of a troop of English soldiers foolhardy enough to have wandered into their territory. It made an enormous difference from the meals the men ate on the run: raw oatmeal, mixed with warm blood tapped from a vein in the hind leg of a cow – if they could find one; otherwise, they chewed the oatmeal, moistened with icy water from a burn.

With great relish, they set about celebrating the death of the English monarch and none more so than Robert, King of Scots. Someone produced a small set of hand-held pipes and began to play a lively tune.

In a state of near madness, King Edward bound his son with a deathbed oath to boil his bones and place the skeleton at the head of his army, so he might inspire the troops to greater ferocity against the hated Scots. His son was considered a lesser man, given his penchant for games and mixing with richly-dressed young men. However, the insouciant young king gained some credibility when he ignored this bizarre oath and took his father's body to Richmond, handing it over for burial at Westminster Abbey.

A month or more later, he proceeded into Scotland before a great army and up into Ayrshire as a token gesture to his father's obsessive hatred. Thankfully, he lasted but a few weeks before returning south to his home comforts. As the army left the borders of Scotland, Robert gave orders for the harrowing of Galloway to an extent never before witnessed. Such sweet revenge did little to ease the pain caused by the ignominious deaths of his brothers. Regardless, many Galwegians paid a heavy price. So fierce was this campaign that young King Edward granted the formal access requested by refugees from this unfortunate land into his own forests in northern England.

From then on, Robert left the south west in the capable, but sometimes reckless, hands of his brother, Edward, the Earl of Carrick, overseen by the 'good Sir James' Douglas, whilst he headed north to conspire with Bishop David of Moray, newly returned from Orkney.