The Spider and the Stone: A Novel of Scotland's Black Douglas by Glen Craney

belief
in his own invincibility blinded him. He formed up in the open fields against
the English knights.”
    “Where is he now?”
    “In the Selkirk, with what remains of his force. The North
is open for plunder. My own lands in Kirkliston are aflame.”
    “Wallace will fight again!”
    Eleanor reached for his hand to calm him. “Jamie … Ian MacDuff was also killed in the retreat.”
    James stared at the bishop, trying to make sense of what that welcome news might bode for his
future. Then, suddenly roused from his torpor, he shook the snow from his
cloak, determined to start out again and find Belle.
    Eleanor blocked his path to the door. “I know you having
feelings for the MacDuff lass. But her brother will now lead the clan, and he
is no friend to us. The Comyns are in league with the MacDuffs. You must forget
her. She’ll bring you nothing but trouble.”
    His vision tunneled from hunger and confusion. His
expectation of Wallace’s victory and of marrying Belle during the peace that
would follow was all that had kept him going. Inconsolable, he slid to his
haunches.
    Lamberton brought him back to his feet. “Come, lad. Serve as
my scribe and learn the ways of statesmen. You may one day find the knowledge
useful.”
    L AMBERTON LED J AMES ON HORSE down the old Roman road that skirted the royal hunting park south of Stirling Castle, the legendary keep that guarded the main passage to the northern provinces. Clifford had set a toll station on the King’s Table, a circular plateau at the base of the crag where the great Arthur had once gathered his Grail knights, and English soldiers were hassling a long line of weary Scots, forcing them to pay an exorbitant tax to suffer the indignity of crossing Stirling Bridge and pass a macabre gallery of heads severed from those defenders butchered at Falkirk.
    The bishop slowed their approach, and when the guards were
distracted with abusing the waiting Scots ahead, he reined off the road into a
thicket.
    Aghast at the trespass,
James resisted. “They’ll hang us for poaching.”
    Lamberton signaled for
him to follow on the quick, so James reluctantly obeyed. They gained the cover
of the trees, and the bishop cocked his ear to make certain their detour had
been accomplished without detection. The snowdrifts off the pike were too
difficult for the horses to navigate, so the cleric dismounted and walked his mount
along a frozen creek, the only path through this remnant of the ancient
Caledonian Forest. Assured at last that they had not been followed, he
revealed at last, “We are not going to St. Andrews.”
    James held back, angered at being deceived. “The Hell you
say!”
    The bishop tromped on
through the snow. “A galley awaits us in Argyll.”
    “The Isles? Why did you lie to me?”
    “Let this be your first lesson. Reveal your plans to no one,
not even your closest comrade. The English have ways of forcing one to betray
his loyalty.”
    “I’ll not hide atop the peaks like some vagabond!”
    “We sail from the Isles
for Paris on the fortnight. France is our only hope to stop Longshanks.”
    “What if the English discover you’ve left the country?”
    “By law, I answer only to
the Church. But I do not intend to test the immunity afforded me as a diplomat.
We will sail from the west, out of reach of their ships in the Channel. And
there is a landmark on our route that I wish you to see.”
    D URING THEIR WEEKLONG JOURNEY UP the west coast, James found the bishop to be a mysterious, elusive man with many pagan quirks. Lamberton neither honored the Sabbath nor offered prayers in the traditional offices of a cleric, but rode with the wary gaze of a soldier, scouting each ridge and zigzagging between copses for cover. One morning, passing a Benedictine abbey near Turnberry, the cleric shot a wicked eye at its crooked Roman cross, denying it the traditional signing. Yet the most queer of all his rituals was a penchant for stopping under ancient oaks and