“They probably won’t let me in now anyway. That steward, oaf or not, was a King’s messenger. He’s probably complaining now to the seneschal and they’ll arrest me as soon as I show my face.”
If he expected any sympathy from the others he was disappointed, but Bigod looked at him levelly. “I agree with Percy,” he said. “You had better change into something suitable for a royal execution.”
“Shit,” Rob muttered, but he knew they were right and he went off to change into his best tunic.
Soon after, he was standing in front of the heavily guarded doors fronting the main building of the Palace of Westminster, the Great Hall. He was reluctant to move forward, wondering if the surly steward might, indeed, have lodged a complaint against them. He noticed one of the guards looking at him suspiciously, probably because he was the only person standing still among the tide of bodies shuffling towards the entrance, and so he drew himself up, squaring his shoulders and tugging beneath his light blue silk cloak at the folds of the dark blue French-style quilted tunic he was wearing for the first time. He took a deep breath and stepped forward, directly towards the guard who had been watching him. Without altering his expression beyond a querying twitch of one eyebrow, the guard lowered his spear shaft sideways, just enough to bar the way as Rob reached him.
“Bruce,” Rob said. “Robert. Of Turnberry in Carrick. Son of Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick. Summoned by His Majesty.”
The guard blinked once, impassively, and raised his spear to the vertical again, allowing Rob to pass through the open doors at his back.
Inside the main doors the vast anteroom was crowded with people, a brightly coloured confusion of noise and movement. Rob stopped just across the threshold, taking it all in with stirrings of awe. This was the first time he had ever approached the Throne Room alone and unescorted, merely one of the throng of hopefuls seeking admission to the world of power behind the tall, wide carved doors in the far wall. He recognized Sir Robert FitzHugh, the King’s seneschal, standing head-down at his post by the high lectern in front of the doors, candlelight reflecting off his thick, silver hair as he consulted his list of attendees. Behind Sir Robert, a sextet of Household Guards flanked the entrance itself, three on either side. Two of them had their hands on the doors’ handles, ready to pull them open. The other four, under the watchful eye of a plumed and polished sergeant-at-arms, stood vigilantly, their eyes scanning the crowd.
Rob made his way to the front, where he stopped, watching Sir Robert as the seneschal dealt with the importuning of a heavy-set, florid-faced merchant, whose equally portly wife stood at his side, frowning. Sir Robert murmured something soothing and glanced away, his eye meeting Rob’s by accident as he did so, and the change in him was immediate. His face lit up and he smiled and drew himself erect.
“Sir Robert,” he said loudly, causing every head within hearing to turn towards the young man. “His Majesty has asked for you. Be so good as to come this way.”
Rob heard the muttering behind him as he followed the seneschal obediently. Sir Robert?
The guards pulled the doors of the Great Hall open to reveal a gathering larger and more brilliant by far than the throng in the anteroom, and in the first moments of what was a revelation unlike anything he had ever seen before, Rob thought he heard stringed music underlying the babble of voices, and his breath caught at the rich mixture of odours and perfumes that filled the air: the unmistakable sweet aroma of hundreds of burning beeswax candles and the hot-waxen smoke from lamps and guttering wicks; sharper woodsmoke from what must be enormous fireplaces; and everywhere eddying smells of delicious foods and spices and the scents of laughing, excited women, all mixed with the musk of sweat and unwashed bodies. He heard the music again, faint and far away though in the room somewhere, but he did not even try to look for the source of it, for the floor was packed with people, many eating, most drinking. He heard snatches of French and even Catalan among the swirling voices on all sides.
The seneschal paused only briefly at the top of the two shallow steps inside the doors to stretch up on his toes and look over the crowd before he reached back and took Rob by the wrist, pulling him along as he swept down the steps into the vast hall, said to be the largest anywhere. Forty feet above their heads, supported by massive, arching rafters atop walls that were six feet thick, the ceiling was masked in darkness that the lights below could never hope to penetrate.
Rob followed on Sir Robert’s heels, weaving in concert with the older man and trying not to step on the skirts of the seneschal’s robe as FitzHugh twisted and wove expertly through the crush of bodies, skirting one group, sidestepping another, and, despite an occasional smile or tip of his head to one person or another, speaking to no one.