Within the dark shadows of the bar, the assassins waited, their killing knives ready. Their leader was peering out a crack in the wooden planking above the stone side walls. “It’s William Wallace, sure !” he whispered sharply to the other. “And….. he’s given up his sword! Be ready!”
They positioned themselves along the side walls, backing and squatting into the deepest shadows and clustering around both doors and even the single window so that nothing could come in from any direction without encountering a swarm of blades.
Outside the barn, Wallace and his two friends dismounted, tied their horses to a scrub tree, and moved toward the door. The two men in the blue tunics nodded to him, and Wallace said, “You first.”
They hesitated only a moment and did not argue, proceeding through the door.
Wallace, instead of entering, grabbed the heavy bar and sealed the door! At this motion, Scots sprung from the woods in all direction.
The assassins inside had prepared for everything but this. The back door was blocked just as the front had been before they realized the ambush was being turned on them. Then when the window was chocked full of dead wood and all was suddenly dark inside, they began to panic.
But the Scots outside, scrambling up form their hiding places among the trees, did not notice the shouting from within the barn and the pounding on its doors. They placed tinder-dry brush and pitch against the barn and set it on fire. In moments the entire barn was blazing. The Scots stood back and watched the barn burn, their faces lit by the flames. After a while, there were no more screams from within.
From her castle, the princess saw the burning off in the distance, like a bonfire. She stood in a window of the old keep, staring out at the far-off glow. And then she saw, on a near hillside, silhouetted against the night and the fire, a rider.
He sat there motionless in his saddle, looking up at the castle.
Isabella ran from her room, up one staircase, then another, and still another, and still another, until she stood on the pinnacle of the castle, so that she too was silhouetted backed by the rising moon, praying that he could see her,
The lone rider was William Wallace.
On the northern side of the castle, the land fell away sharply form the castle’s rocky foundations and it was on that side of the compound that the stables stood. Beside them, built into the outer wall, was a cottage, intended as living quarters for the chief groom. But no groom was in residence since the princess had not yet stocked her stables, and it was in a window of this cottage that she placed a candle, backed by a brass reflector, that burned into the night like a tiny beacon.
For two hours the princess sat along beside that candle, wondering if her signal was going to work. It was a twenty-foot climb, hand over, hand up the mortared stones, to reach the cottage’s window; she knew that would not deter him if he was going to come.
At last she heard the faint noise outside. She drew back from the window and waited.
He reached the safety of the window cove and knelt on the ledge. He looked through the window and saw her inside.
For a long, long moment the two of them looked at each other. Then in one more quick movement he pressed his shoulders through the window opening and was inside.
They faced each other in the faint glow of the candle.
“A meeting in a barn. It had to be a trap. And only you would know I would be aware of it,” he said.
“It does me good to see you,” she told him.
“I am much diminished since we met.”
She wanted to say something — tell him that, yes, he looked hungrier, wilder, than he had looked before and that the very sight of him made her heart pound in her chest and her face burn, but instead she looked away and muttered, “There will be a new shipment of supplies coming north next month. Food and weapons. They will trav—”
“No stop. I didn’t come here for that.”
“Then why did you come?”
“Why did you?”
“Because of the way you’re looking at me now. The same way… as when we met.”
He turned his face away. She moved to him, touched his check gently, and pulled his face toward her again. “I know,” she said. “You looked at me… and saw her.”
He twisted suddenly back toward the window. He was leaving.
“You must forgive me what I feel!” she said. “No man has ever looked at me as you did.”
He stopped and looked back to her.
“You have… you have a husband,” he said.
“I have taken vows. More than one. I’ve vowed faithfulness to by husband and sworn to give him a son. And I cannot keep both promises.”
Slowly, he began to realize just what she was asking of him, and an unexpected smile played at his lips. Her smile lit up also. “you understand,” she said. “Consider, before you laugh and say no. You will never own a throne, though you deserve one. But just as the sun will rise tomorrow, some man will rule England. And what if his veins ran not with the blood of Longshanks but with that of a true king?”
“I cannot love you for a sake of revenge,” he said quietly.
“No. But can you love me for the sake of all you loved and lost? Or simply love me… because I love you?”
Slowly, he reached to the candleflame and pinched it out.
60
THE FIRST RAYS OF MORNING SPREAD YELLOW LIGHT through the room and across their faces, their bodies limp and entwined upon the warm and tousled blankets of the straw-mattressed bed. Wallace awoke with a start: sunlight!
He grabbed for his clothes, as she, too, awoke suddenly; she covered herself with the blanket and jumped out of bed, rushing to the window to look out, then drawing back quickly. “No one! Hurry!” she said.
He hurried to the window, leaned out, and saw a clear path down the wall to safety. He saw no guards along the base of the wall, no one between the castle foundation and the far rill where he had hidden his horse—and yet it was past dawn, already fully day!
In her arms he had lost all sense of danger, all sense of anything but her. And as much as he needed now to hurry, he stopped and turned to her and touched her face one last time.
He climbed out onto the ledge of the window. She touched his arm, and he lingered again. She had to ask him: “When we… did you think of her?”
He looked straight into her eyes and kissed her, not Murron—and climbed out.
She stood in the window and watched him all the way down the wall, across the heather, to the rill, until he was out of sight.
On his way back from the castle, William stopped at the secret grove where Murron lay. He remained there alone for many hours.
Night had fallen when he reached the cave and found Hamish and Stephen huddled by the fire, drinking whisky. They watched as he tied his horse beside theirs and took his place at the fire. He said nothing.
“Scouting?” Hamish asked, though he knew where his friend had gone.
Still Wallace said nothing. Stephen offered him the jug, but Wallace shook his head and stared at the fire.
When the fire had burned to smoldering ash, and Hamish and Stephen lay asleep, Wallace still sat awake. Without sleep and without dreams.
When Hamish heard a rustling and opened his eyes to the chill gray light of dawn, he saw William saddling his horse. Hamish punched Stephen, who opened his bleary eyes and squinted painfully at the same sight. Instinctively both men lurched to their feet, staggering with their hangover.
“Too fookin’ early!” Stephen groaned.
“Tell it ta God,” Hamish mumbled.
“He ain’t up yet,” Stephen said.
Wallace mounted and rode off; Hamish and Stephen had to scramble to catch him.