The Forgotten Queen (25 page)

“Will young Lady Douglas be here for the wedding? What will she wear?” Ellen asked me once we had settled on the designs with the dressmaker.

I flushed at this, bowing my head. “No . . . she will stay at Edinburgh. She has stability there that I do not like to interrupt, with her tutors and her nurses.”

I did not want to admit, even to Ellen, that I had not thought of my daughter.

W
e were married in the chapel at Stirling. It was an understated affair, but not quite as clandestine as my wedding to Angus. This time I felt as a noble bride should. I was elated in my luxurious gown; I was restored and lovely again and happy in my choice for a groom. Harry was decked in a crimson doublet trimmed with brown fox fur, his black boots shining such that I could almost see my own reflection. He stood at the altar, blue eyes shining, full pink lips spread into his carefree grin.

I did not know what lay ahead for us and would not think on it then. There was only to be suspended in that moment, of being made whole again, of being what I was meant to be: a wife.

We exchanged vows. Rings slid up our fingers. Harry gave an awkward laugh when I could not quite get his past the knuckle. When at last I forced it with a little push, I said, “See? It will bend to my will as any subject should!” Harry’s smile faded at that, but I dismissed it.

It was done.

The feast commemorating our union was also quiet, and David Lindsay recited some poetry as our entertainment. I did not much feel like dancing; I wanted to be alone with my husband. We took to our chambers and held each other into the night, making love without guilt. Harry was kind and tender, as he always was; he did not make me feel ashamed of my body or my age. He made me feel like I belonged to something.

Perhaps now I could be at home.

 

No sooner had we settled into nuptial bliss, which may not have been altogether blissful, distracted as we were by Jamie’s cause, did Angus lay siege to Stirling, an act made more cruel by making Jamie attend it. He rode beside Angus, his face, so like his father’s, somber, his lips set in a grim slash. There was nothing we could do; I would not send an army against my son. Angus knew that.

The air was chilly, the wind whipping against my cheeks as I met the party beyond the castle walls on foot with Harry and our own meager guard. My heart thrilled at the sight of Jamie even as it knotted in fear. And Angus, he was as handsome as ever; it set me in awe, it still does, that I could regard him as such even at his darkest hour. And, at that same hour, I could even still admire him for his tenacity. Perhaps it was the statesman in me, that I could separate things as I did. I had always admired Albany, even when he was against me . . . and now Angus; perhaps, despite everything, we still had more in common than he liked to admit....

“We call for Henry Stewart,” Jamie said in a strong tone thick with regret. As the words fled his lips, I shook my head. I knew he was being coerced; what Angus was threatening him with, I had no idea.

“You can break free, Your Majesty,” I urged him in hard tones. “You can do it now!” I reached out my hand. Jamie, still on horseback, tightened his hands on the reins. They trembled. He averted his eyes.

My hand fell to my side.

“I love you, Your Majesty,” I whispered. I did not know if he heard me, but his deep brown eyes flickered a moment, as if fleetingly he was released from some evil spell.

“Dinna make it harder than it has to be; have you not made his life hard enough, shaming yourself before God and country and everything in between?” Angus spat. “Give up Stewart and we’ll be on our way.”

Harry stepped forward. Angus’s guard seized him roughly by the arms, dragging him into their midst. I reached out, my throat seized by sobs I choked back. I would not let Angus see me cry ever again.

“Please, please dinna hurt him!” I begged, which earned me a hard look from Harry and an abrupt shake of his head. I imagined he did not want me to humiliate myself by begging anything of Angus. But Harry was all I had; I would humiliate myself for him. I was growing used to it, as it were. Angus had put it aptly; I had shamed myself before the world, what more could begging for mercy on my husband’s behalf do to my already-sullied reputation?

Jamie swallowed; his Adam’s apple bobbed in his long throat. His face was stricken, his brow furrowed. His eyes as they regarded me were lit with pity and tenderness and I clasped my hands to my heart as if I could will into him my love and shameless strength.

Jamie turned his horse and the party rode off, Harry with them. I stood, watching them become little specks on the horizon.

 

I was sick with fear. As far as I knew, they had thrown Harry into a dungeon; I could only imagine their designs for me. We were not safe at Stirling, not without Harry. Margaret, my daughter, was fortunately with her own household at Edinburgh Castle or surely her father would have taken her as well. For once I was grateful she was kept in the background of my life. Perhaps there was a kind of reprieve in anonymity.

“Ellen, what does he mean to do to him? Will he kill him?” I asked as we readied ourselves to flee the castle. I knew she didn’t have the answer, but she was my Ellen and she would listen to any rhetoric I uttered.

By now it was made known that Harry and I were married. I wondered if Angus’s motives were more about his wounded pride and the feeble grasp he held on my son than about protecting Jamie’s interests.

Dressed in homespun, I rode with Ellen and a handful of servants away from Stirling, into the forest, where we hid in a crude hunting lodge. I did not know what Angus meant to do, if he would come for me next. It was not inconceivable to believe that he would have both Harry and me killed, thus securing his power base and hold over Jamie for good. No . . . I could not imagine that; slaying the mother of the king would not win him favor. The Scots could not even be so barbarous. And Angus, he could not hate me that much....

One evening a ruckus was heard outside of the lodge. They had come for us; we could not hold out against any battle. They might as well have claimed their victory. When the door burst open I steeled myself against what was to come, offering a quick prayer to the Lord that He might forgive me my many trespasses, recalling, strangely, when I had been made to confess to old Archbishop Morton all those years ago, trying to shock him with my great list of “sins.” Oh, if those had been the greatest of it, I would have been guaranteed a mansion in Heaven surely. . . . As it was now . . .

But it was not Angus or his men; it was my own Harry.

I abandoned ceremony, throwing myself in his arms, knocking him off balance.

“You escaped!” I cried against his shoulder, pulling back to admire his travel-weary face, which was caked in dust and blood and grime. “Did they hurt you?” I asked, reaching up to trace a jagged cut on his cheek.

His eyes were distant. “No . . . no, they did not,” he assured me, with a half smile that I did not believe. He took my hands. “We are going back to Stirling, Margaret. We will fortify it and stand strong against Angus.”

“But he already imprisoned you; might he mean us more harm?” I wondered, tears clutching my throat. Though grateful for my husband’s miraculous escape, I could not foresee the same fate for my son.

“You are the mother of his child, Margaret; no matter his personal grievances or ambitions, he will remember that,” Harry assured me. “Have faith, Margaret, and return with me.”

“Of course, Harry,” I agreed as we made ready. “I will go anywhere with you.”

Harry closed his eyes, squeezing my hand, expelling a great sigh.

I wondered if it was all becoming too much for him, as I had always been too much.

I wondered how much more it would have overwhelmed him to know I had missed my courses.

I was pregnant.

 

At Stirling we readied the castle as much as we could, fortifying it as Harry recommended. Whether Harry had a premonition or had some signal from Jamie he did not confide; it was not long after that Jamie sent word. He was escaping! We must await his arrival and lower the drawbridge, preparing to raise it as soon as he crossed over.

“Can it be true?” I asked Harry, holding the precious message to my breast. “Will he soon be here with us? Is it almost over?”

“It will only be the beginning,” Harry told me. “The beginning of the glorious rule of James V. This part is almost over, Margaret.” He turned to me, offering a smile that had become fringed with sadness since his imprisonment. “Soon our lives can truly begin.”

I cupped my belly, knowing those words to be truer than ever. I would not tell him till the quickening. By then, everything would be better and we could celebrate our joy without any encumbrances.

I waited through the night, my body rigid with tension, my ears pricking at every horse’s hooves that could be heard pounding in the distance, at every innocent clank of armor. At last, a lanky young man arrived, windswept and dusty, dressed in the rugged apparel of a yeoman.

Jamie!

We raised the drawbridge immediately as I embraced my son, now a tall young man with a beard no less! It was the closest I had been able to see him since his imprisonment. Even those few futile times we met on a field of potential battle, I was never able to take him in as I wanted to. I could not stop looking at him, touching his face, and running my hand through his silky auburn hair. How like his father he looked, so lean, with a poetic handsomeness that no doubt would be made immortal in ballads and break women’s hearts. I wondered how many had been broken already.

“Oh, Jamie, at last!” I managed through tears of joy. I took him in my arms again, my body quaking with sobs. I felt Jamie’s shoulders shake and began to cry harder. “Almost three years, it’s been,” I whispered. “I will never let you go again, Jamie, never!”

Jamie pulled away then, wiping the tears that were trailing through the dust on his cheeks. He cupped my face in his hand a moment. “Believe that you have always been with me, Mother,” he assured me, and my heart warmed at the sentiment, something else his father would have uttered with ease. “And when Angus laid siege to Stirling, I wanted nothing more than to be with you, than to break from him. But I could not, not with his army; it was not practical. I had to play it out as I did.”

“I understand, darling, truly I do,” I told him, and I did. I knew more than anyone how difficult decisions were to make when literally under the sword.

Though Jamie was king, I ordered him to sit and take wine while he regaled us with his daring escape.

“After all the attempts and battles fought in my name, it is not what I would call worthy of a ballad,” Jamie admitted with an arresting smile that was his father’s alone. “But after Lennox died, I knew I could not let his murder be in vain. I would honor him and all those who tried to rescue me and save myself. I would at last be king. I prayed to my father and my grandfathers before me, that they might lend their strength, their guidance, their”—he winked—“savvy. And they did. We were at Falkland Palace—”

“Oh! Your father’s favorite!” I blurted before I could help it, thinking of the beautiful castle where I had known such passion, and noting, with a painful lurch in my chest, that Harry’s expression darkened.

Jamie nodded. “Yes, Mother, indeed,” he said indulgently. “I was with James Douglas of Parkhead and asked for the forester of Falkland, the Laird of Fernie, as I thought perhaps a bit of sport in light of all we had been through would lift our spirits. I decided we should go deer hunting the next day,” he went on in a strong voice laden with authority and confidence from his adventure. “I said we should go to bed early, since the hunt would start at seven in the morning, and before bed toasted the men and our luck for the next day; I made quite a few toasts, letting the wine do what it does best. After they went to bed, I waited for just a bit, then disguised myself and rode off into the night with my two most valued servants. And you know the rest!”

“Oh, Jamie, how brave you were!” I praised him, once again unable to resist stroking his hair and patting his face. “Your father would have been so proud of you!”

“I am proud of you, Your Grace,” Harry interjected, bold enough to break protocol at this triumphant moment. “After my own narrow escape, I can only imagine how difficult it was, hoping to God every noise you heard behind you wasn’t them on the pursuit.”

“Too right, Harry,” Jamie concurred. “And I am certain they are in pursuit as we speak. Which is why we should set to action.”

“Jamie, you must rest, darling, you’ve been through so much,” I cooed, ever the solicitous mother, for which I earned a sharp glance from both Harry and Jamie.

“I know I will always be your little lamb, Mother, and I love you for it,” Jamie told me. “But I want to issue a proclamation. Angus and the Douglases are not to be within six miles of Stirling. Within six miles of my person, for that matter. Ever. We will see that it is done.”

I nodded, my heart swelling with admiration for my son. He was decisive, single-minded, and every bit the king he was born to be.

“The Douglases will be punished,” Jamie said then. “And you who have supported my cause with such devotion and at your own peril will be rewarded. You, Harry, will be created Lord Methven.”

Harry’s eyes widened at this. “Your Grace, I am touched and honored. And unworthy of such esteem. I canna thank you enough for your kindness.”

“Those who advise me will be men of my choosing,” Jamie went on, dismissing Harry’s thanks with a wave of his slim-fingered hand. “I want my Davie to be Snowden Herald. And I shall create my schoolmaster of old, dear Gavin Dunbar, Chancellor of Scotland.”

“Jamie, you have been thinking much about this,” I said, a bit awed still that my son was not the long-limbed youth Angus had first taken prisoner nigh on three years ago.

“It is what I must think on, Mother,” Jamie said, his tone hard. “I am king.”

It was, perhaps, though I did not know it then, as much a warning to me as a reminder to himself.

 

When the Douglases rode back to Stirling we were ready. The premier earls of Scotland, including dear Arran, who I believed had been beaten down by this struggle, rode with Harry and me to meet them. Angus, his brother, and his cousin were little more than a glorified group of thugs to me, and I made sure to meet him in a beautiful dove gray velvet gown trimmed with ermine. Despite being married, I allowed my most stunning feature, my coppery hair, to flow free down my back, and it whipped about me in the wind. I was as a Celtic goddess of old and I laughed at the comparison. Angus was nothing now.