I shook my head again. “I have never met or seen Sir Robert Bruce, Uncle. But Will’s father, Uncle Alan, was his man, and though I only heard him speak of his master once, he said he pitied any fool who dared to offend Annandale. That said, I agree with Will.”
The manservant came in bearing a heavy jug of the household’s weak, home-brewed ale, known as small beer. He crossed to a table in the corner that held a pile of earthen mugs, and we watched in silence as he poured four measures and then served each of us, beginning with Lady Margaret and Sir Malcolm.
“Good,” the knight said once the door had closed again at the man’s back. “Your support of your cousin’s opinion pleases me. It shows loyalty, as well as reason, though I confess I hoped you might point out that Lord John Balliol and his House have also been neglected here. So let us look at this senselessness, as Will calls it, for what it truly is.” He glanced at each of us in turn. “Are you ready?”
We both nodded.
“Let us suppose, though God forbid it should, that everything goes wrong from this day forth. The Queen fails to produce an heir and, even worse, some tragedy befalls young Princess Margaret. What would happen then?” He did not wait for an answer. “There would be dire competition for the throne among the magnates. And among those, who would have the paramount claim?”
“Balliol and Bruce,” Will said immediately, for he and I had discussed this very matter the previous week.
“Exactly. Balliol and Bruce. And which would take precedence?” When neither of us responded, he nodded. “Wise lads,” he said. “For no one knows the answer to that question. Both men have valid claims and both are descendants of David II, though one claims through the female side and the other through a male but arguably less direct descent. The settlement of their dispute would require abler and more subtle minds than ours to arbitrate. And seen from that viewpoint, it would clearly be madness to appoint either of them to serve as a Guardian.
“But take it one step further and consider this supposedly senseless Council of Guardians. Of the six, three are close bound to Balliol by family ties and loyalties—Fraser of St. Andrews, the Comyn Earl of Buchan, and Lord John Comyn of Badenoch, who is wed to Balliol’s sister. The other three align themselves with Bruce—Wishart of Glasgow, MacDuff the Earl of Fife, and James the Stewart. A balance of power, lads. Three Guardians in support of each claimant, and equal representation from north and south. Ask yourselves now, does it truly seem so senseless?”
4
On an afternoon towards the end of autumn in the following year, our sixth year as students, William Wallace turned on the churlish monk called Brother James, picked him up, and flung him headlong to the ground. I was there, and it was in my defence that Will had acted, but in doing so he broke the greatest of the Abbey’s unwritten laws: anyone who laid angry hands on one of the brotherhood was guilty, ipso facto, of a crime against the fraternity that the Abbey represented. Certainly no Abbey student had ever done such a thing before that moment.
Appalled at what had happened, I knew we would both suffer for it, regardless of the provocation that had spurred it. Stunned as I was by the sight of the monk sprawled at my feet, I was amazed that my cousin had restrained himself as much as he had. Mere moments earlier his face had been wild, his huge fist upraised, ready to smash the older man’s face into a pulp. Now, the downed man squirmed in terror, the skirts of his robe soaked by an involuntary voiding of his bladder, while above him Will struggled with himself, his face suffused with blood and his hands clenching and unclenching as he swayed back and forth with the power of his emotions.
Will looked around for the object that had precipitated this disaster. It lay almost beneath his feet—the solid walking staff that Brother James had smashed across my shoulders without warning, driving me to my knees. Will bent slowly and picked it up, hefting it in one hand. It was a heavy, sound staff of hazel wood about five feet in length and worn smooth from long use. The monk had risen to one elbow and now remained motionless, staring up, aghast, at the fury he had provoked. Without looking at him, Will took the hazel staff in both his hands and snapped it in half across his knee, then held both halves together and did the same again, a prodigious feat of strength. He then extended his arm, allowing the pieces to drop one by one onto the man on the ground.
“You spineless, Godless lump of excrement,” he growled in his newly acquired adult voice. “If you ever dare bring your foul presence close to my cousin again I will cripple you so badly that you will never leave your cell thereafter. Do you understand me?” His voice was profoundly deep, rolling and sonorous, yet also calm, but its pitch left no doubt that he was waiting for an answer.