Sword Of State

by Nigel Tranter

Genres: Cultural Heritage; Historical Fiction

Synopsis

The youthful Alexander II, who ascended to the Scottish throne in 1214 at the age of sixteen, was delighted to welcome to his court a young man of royal blood, heir to the ancient - and all but rival - line of the Cospatricks, Earls of Dunbar. Rather than begrudge Alexander his crown, Patrick, Master of Dunbar, was to serve his monarch well and become his true and closest friend. And Alexander needed such a friend in those turbulent times, with the ever-present threat of King John of England lurking; not to mention the warlike Norsemen under King Hakon; the Lords of the Isles in revolt, and the Isle of Man and Ireland also causing trouble. This steadfast royal friendship was to withstand both treachery and danger, rivalry and heartache during a highly significant period in Scottish history. A story of drama and enduring friendship by Nigel Tranter, master of Scottish historical fiction.

Release date: December 20, 2012

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 394

Sample

Patrick eyed his father doubtfully, as well he might. This all seemed to signify a notable change of tune on the older man’s part – and he, it appeared, was to play the tune.

“You would have me to go to the dead Lion’s den, and salute his cub?” he demanded. “You, sir, who ever preferred the Black Boar to the Red Lion! You are changing your colours?” Patrick was noted for his sense of humour; but this, perhaps, was taking a risk with it.

The earl tightened his lips for a moment, and then shrugged. “Lad, you will do as I say. I do not change, but circumstances may. I desire to know these circumstances. And you are the only one who will discover them for me, for us. To go myself would not serve. But I must know, and be sure.”

“So! I am to be the pigeon to test the new young hawk!” Patrick was fond of his father, and they got on well normally; but he had been reared to speak his mind, like all of their ancient line.

Cospatrick diffused the incipient tension, smiling briefly. “Make up your mind, boy. Is it a lion’s cub or a hawk that you go to?”

It was the son’s turn to shrug. “Either way I am the bait, it seems. What shall I say? What excuse do I give? This Alexander, although only sixteen years, will know well enough of our challenge and claims. He is no fool, they say. And he will have his father’s lords around him, advising.”

“No doubt. But they, and he himself, will not wish to provoke us. Even that Dorward! Not at the start of the new reign. But to go myself would be unwise, I judge. As though seeming to yield in our claim. You they will not see thus.”

“But they may see me as possible pawn, a sort of hostage! For your good behaviour.”

“No. They will not wish to arouse me against them. See you, Patrick, here is a notable part which only you can play. Important it may be, for our line.”

The son shrugged again and then nodded. “I see it, yes. But will our line ever hope to come into its own? Whatever we say or do?”

“If right and justice prevail, one day it may. I told William that, after he shamefully paid homage to English King John in London. Until then I had given him support against the English. After all, your mother, Ada, was his bastard daughter. But after that, in London, no more. William the Lion he may have called himself, but he was no lion! Now, as to his young son, we shall see.”

None of all this, of course, was new to Patrick. Always the succession of Cospatricks, Earls of Dunbar, had cherished their right, on various grounds, to the throne of Scotland; and their wrath against Malcolm the Third, Canmore, Big Head. For Malcolm it was who had arrogantly, unlawfully, changed the line of succession to the crown after he married Margaret Atheling – if married was the word, for he already had a wife, Ingebiorg, the daughter of the Orkney Earl Thorfinn Raven Feeder, King MacBeth’s half-brother. And he had had two sons by Ingebiorg, Duncan and Donald, legitimate. He got rid of Ingebiorg, and named his successors on the throne to be the sons of the new Margaret, a dire act. But the two older sons survived, escaped with the aid of loyal men over into Northumbria and Cumbria. And from there, in due course, after Malcolm’s death, Duncan Ban had managed to seize his rightful crown, holding it for only one year as Duncan the Second. But the Margaretsons, all six of them, had put him down; and three of them, Edgar, Alexander and David, had reigned over Scotland in succession. And William the Lion, just dead after fifty years on the throne, was the grandson of David. These Margaretsons, two brothers, had left no competitors for the crown. But there had been a more lawful successor. The ancient Celtic royal house of Scotland had always been unique – save, it was said, for the Jewish realm of old – in that succession was matrilineal, that is the crown passing through the female heiress at each reign, not from father to son. MacBeth had not changed that, after Duncan’s death, not his own son but his queen Gruoch’s son, Lulach, succeeding. But Malcolm had done so. And there had been a more lawful candidate, Malcolm’s own cousin on the female side, Maldred, also a grandson of the Princess Bethoc, daughter of Malcolm the Second. But Maldred had been passed over by Canmore when young; and his son was the first Cospatrick, Patrick-Comes, Patrick the Earl, given the earldom of Northumberland and Dunbar by way of compensation. This should have been the royal line. The fifth of that line stood there now, in Dunbar Castle.

All this complicated and infamous story had been instilled into Patrick since boyhood – for one day he would be Cospatrick the Sixth, God willing.

“So, when do I go to Roxburgh?” he asked.

“Forthwith, lad. Young Alexander should be made aware of our ongoing claim without delay. At but sixteen, and unwed, his hold on the throne is scarcely secure. He has no brother, only three sisters. If he dies or was slain . . .!”

“Do I put it to him? That we should succeed? Would that not seem a threat?”

“I do not think that you should put that in words. But . . . implied. Meantime we would hope to support him. It is his advisers that I fear.”

“You send me on a hard task, sir.”

“I know it. But I have reared you to use your wits, have I not?”

“Very well. Tomorrow . . .”

In the morning it was a forty-five-mile journey almost due southwards, to where Tweed and Teviot joined. Only since King David’s days had this been the favoured seat of the monarchy, not Dunfermline in Fife where his kin had dwelled, nor at the great fortress of Stirling, previously the royal base in the centre of the land. Roxburgh was anything but that, within a few miles of the borderline with England. That fluctuating frontier was partly David’s concern in making his headquarters there, to emphasise his claims to Northumberland and Cumberland; but also to symbolise his good relationship with England, where he had spent many years as a kind of hostage for his brothers, and had married an English wife, Matilda.

Patrick rode through the Lammermuir Hills, a dozen miles, the greatest sheep-rearing lands in all Scotland and the property of his father, whence came their wealth; indeed much of the country he would traverse that day belonged to the earldom, the Merse as it was named, or the March, the shire of Berwick. By Ellemford and Duns he reached the limits of the territory to which he was heir, just beyond Home, and so passed into the royal lands of Edenham, or Ednam, where the religiously minded King David, in his efforts to promote the influence of Holy Church and limit the powers of his nobles, had established the first of the ecclesiastical parishes in Scotland, a most notable enterprise. From then on all the realm was divided into parishes, but this was the beginning of it all.

Soon thereafter he came to Kelso, or Kelshaugh, names becoming corrupted through time, where David had built one of his many great abbeys, a majestic towering building, another token of his godliness. If only the others of his line had been as excellent monarchs as David, Patrick thought, although his grandson, Malcolm the Fourth, the Maiden, unmarried, had sought to emulate him and had founded the first great hospital in the land, at Soutra in Lauderdale.

Just west of Kelso a mile the two great rivers of Teviot and Tweed joined, and on the arrowhead peninsula where they met soared the castle of Roxburgh, the royal residence, a great and elongated fortalice consisting of a series of towers in line, this positioning dictated by the narrow site above the two wide rivers. Above all these towers flapped the scarlet lion rampant on gold, adopted by the new king’s father William the Lion as royal standard, he not having liked wild boars, for long centuries the standard of the Celtic monarchy. If it had been Patrick’s father who had been riding here this day it would have been the black boar on silver that he flew. The son was perhaps a little less assertive, and carried no banner.

That may have been a mistake when it came to gaining admittance to the palace stronghold. One young man with only two attendants was not looked upon with any great respect by the royal guards at the gatehouse, despite announcing himself as the Master of Dunbar seeking the King’s Grace. He was kept waiting for some considerable time before an individual, declaring that he was the Under-Doorward, loftily came to tell him to follow him within. Patrick did not look for respect from anyone using that style. The Dorward himself, one of the hereditary officers of court – not that he would ever demean himself by acting the conveyer – had the reputation of being one of the most arrogant nobles in the land, far from favoured by Earl Cospatrick. And he spelled his name with only one O.

Led to the second of the free-standing towers within the outer walling, Patrick was left in an anteroom, his men in the courtyard outside, for a further quite lengthy interval. Then another official came to eye him assessingly and to enquire what was his reason for seeking the royal presence. Patrick curtly told him that that was between himself and the King’s Grace. Although the other frowned at this, it was presumably a sufficient response, or the manner of it, to gain further ingress.

Patrick was taken out to still another tower, the largest, a tall keep, where he was conducted upstairs to the withdrawing-room of a vaulted hall, hung with tapestries, and again left alone. He had not realised that gaining young King Alexander’s presence would be quite so protracted a process.

A burly man of middle years, richly dressed, anything but welcoming in attitude, arrived presently from the hall.

“You, I am told, are the Master of Dunbar, a Cospatrick,” he said. “I am Dorward.” Noticeably he did not say Doorward. “What, sir, is your business with the king?”

This, then, was the notorious noble from far Aberdeenshire, much decried by Patrick’s father. He was Earl of Atholl, as well as being one of the officers of court, and married to one of the late monarch’s bastard daughters. But the younger man was not going to concede him any undue deference, for he was of much lesser breeding than the Cospatricks, whatever his reputation.

“I come, my lord, on my father’s business with His Grace. And only with His Grace.” That was said quietly but firmly.

“Indeed! I could deny you audience with King Alexander, young man!”

“Could you? Coming in the name of Cospatrick? I think not.” As well that Patrick had been brought up to behave, on occasion, like Cospatrick.

The other, unspeaking, turned abruptly on his heel and stalked back through the doorway, the visitor at his back.

The hall into which he was led was large and well filled with men, all notably well dressed, standing or sitting round a long table, many with flagons in their hands. Patrick did not see any faces he knew. They all eyed him and Dorward, but none did more than that. None was young enough to be the new king.

Dorward strode on to another door at the far end, knocked briefly and, opening it, entered without waiting, and quickly enough to shut it again in Patrick’s face. None in the hall took any heed.

Standing alone, Patrick bit his lip.

Then there was a surprise after all this. Suddenly the door was thrown open, and a youth came out to gaze, eyes alight, a slender, good-looking but urgent-seeming character, lips parted. And behind Patrick, everyone in the hall stood.

There was no doubt that this was the king himself, Alexander the Second.

“You are Cospatrick!” the youth jerked. “My kinsman!”

“Not Cospatrick, Sire – just Patrick.” Not the ideal start perhaps, to correct the monarch. “Cospatrick is my father, the earl. Who sends his greeting and salutations.”

Alexander waved that aside. “You are my late sister’s son. And we have never met! This is good. I have ever wished to meet the Cospatricks. My father . . .” He left the rest unsaid. “Where have you come from?”

“Dunbar, Sire. On the coast of Lothian.”

“I have never been there. I have been to Haddington.” He gripped Patrick’s arm. “Why have we never met?”

That was a difficult question to answer, there and then, with all in the hall listening. “Our fathers, Your Grace . . . disagreed! Latterly. As I understand it. But, now – he sends me with goodwill.”

“So! I am glad. But come you!” Still clutching Patrick’s arm he turned to lead him into another withdrawing-room. “You have come from this Dunbar? Today? Long riding.”

The smaller chamber seemed full of men also, perhaps ten of them, only Dorward of Atholl known to the visitor. All were eyeing the pair heedfully.

“Here is Cospatrick. Or just Patrick, he says. Kin to myself. Is it not strange? A sister’s son. He has ridden far.” Alexander did not introduce any of the company there, all fairly elderly men, the late monarch’s officers and advisers.

“I am William, Bishop of St Andrews,” a tall stooping man announced. “I know your father, Master of Dunbar. The Earl Cospatrick. As do others here.” That was carefully said, as was not to be wondered at in the circumstances, the Cospatricks having long been not outlaws but uncooperative.

“It is, I hope, good to see you here, in His Grace’s presence,” another said, a good-looking, greying-haired individual. “I am Walter, the High Steward, Seneschal.”

“My lords,” Patrick said briefly, “I greet you all.” That committed him to nothing.

Alexander nodded. “These are all the realm’s great ones,” he declared. “The High Chamberlain. The Knight Marischal. The Chancellor. The Justiciar. The Crowner. The, the . . .” His voice tailed away, as though he could not remember all the styles and titles.

Men inclined their heads, and for moments no one spoke.

Patrick recognised himself to be anything but welcome, save by the young monarch himself. He had known that this was going to be a difficult mission admittedly, but his various notions, on the way, had been of what he would say to the king, rather than to an array of distance-keeping magnates. But he had to say something.

“I come to wish His Grace well, on his accession to the throne. As does my father. I, I have matters to tell His Highness.”

“Yes,” Alexander said. “We must talk.” He grinned. “I am your uncle, am I not?”

The High Steward it was who came to the rescue. “Sire, I think that we should leave you to speak with the Master of Dunbar alone,” he suggested, glancing at his companions.

“That is best,” Bishop William agreed. “Summon us when you require us, Sire.” And he moved for the door.

The others, eyeing each other, began to follow him, some looking doubtful, especially Dorward. But the king’s obvious approval of the move meant that none could refuse.

They filed out, closing the door behind them.

Alexander pointed after them. “They are all so old!” he declared.

Patrick nodded. “Your royal father’s men. But I am five years older than Your Grace myself!”

“Are you? But that is different. They are so grave, so long of face! The Steward and the bishop are the best. But I find them . . . trying. All telling me what I should be doing. Do not do this. Do not do that. Is your father so? It should be this way, not that. They are all wise, no doubt, but so heavy with it, so dull.” Clearly Alexander was badly needing someone to confide in, to spill his youthful frustrations upon, someone nearer to his own age.

He went over to a table whereon were wine flagons and goblets and sweetmeats, he reaching for one of the last. “Take what you will,” he invited. “There are wines and ales and these. Do I call you Patrick, then? Or Master? Not Cospatrick. Why this?”

That was as good an opening as any for what Patrick had to say. “Cospatrick, Sire, refers only to the one man, the head of the line. I know that we are called the Cospatricks, but only my father is that, meantime, the Earl Cospatrick. It is the ancient tradition. From the time, over one hundred and fifty years ago, when your forebear, and ours, changed the succession to the throne. Since then we have kept the style as a kind of token, a reminder.” He could hardly say a claim to the throne.

“I have been told this of the succession. A strange matter. My father never mentioned it to me. But others have. Do you say that I am not truly the king? That you, or your father, should be?”

“No, Sire. You are the crowned and anointed monarch, King of Scots. We do not dispute it. Only that our ancient right is not forfeited, the descendants of the elder son. Of the same father, Malcolm the Third. I am here to assure you of my father’s support. And mine. But to . . . remind you of all this.”

“What would you have of me then, Patrick? Thus, Patrick, I call you? Yes? What is your other name? Patrick what? Dunbar?”

“No, Sire, just Patrick. We have no other name. Nor have you! You are just Alexander. Alexander the Second. Unless you name yourself Alexander mac William, after the ancient fashion. We have the same blood, of the old Celtic line of kings. No family name.”

“I have it now. We are kin, then. In more than you being my sister’s son. I never knew Ada. She was . . .”

“Yes. A bastard daughter of your father the king. One of not a few! She died fifteen years ago. I have a younger brother, William, whom she died giving birth to. And a sister, another Ada.”

Alexander helped himself to another of the oatmeal cakes. “This is all good to know,” he said, his mouth full. “I like you, Patrick!”

“Your Grace is kind . . .”

“This of Grace and Sire. Need you so call me, Patrick? Since we are kin.” He smiled. “I would not have you call me Uncle! But when we are alone, Alexander will serve. Or Alex, as my sisters used to call me. I never see them now.”

“As you will, Alex. But only when we are alone. And my brother and sister call me Pate!”

“Ha – Pate! I like that. Pate and Alex. I have three sisters, all much older. And all were married to Englishmen, and live in England. Why this, I know not.”

“Your father, Sire – Alex – having made a compact with the English king, to pay him homage, chose to wed his daughters to English lords thus, part of the bond. This so that he could gain the return of Northumberland and Cumberland to Scotland. Our families’ lands. Also why he wed your own mother as his second wife. This was when my father fell out with yours. For making such compact with the English. We, the Cospatricks, had held Northumberland and Cumberland since Malcolm Canmore’s time. We were prepared to hold them by armed strength, not by paying fealty to the English king, as liege-lord. King William allowed himself to be brought into King Henry’s presence, as prisoner, with his feet shackled beneath his horse’s belly as sign of his homage. My father saw it, and returned to Scotland. Thereafter, William agreed with Henry, in the Treaty of Falaise, and he too returned to Scotland. That was before you were born, or myself. Since then, the Cospatricks have remained . . . aloof! Rightly or wrongly.”

This was one part of what Patrick had come to say. Whether he had said it well or poorly he did not know. Had he been somewhat unfair to the late William? But it was important that the new monarch should know the truth – if he had not known of it already.

“My father saw it all differently, I think. Not as I would, it may be. He saw peace as all-important. And would pay what price it demanded. And, and he reigned for longer than any other King of Scots!”

“That is true. But . . .” Patrick was doubtful indeed as to how to put the other vital matter that he had been sent to say, no easy task. “This of the succession,” he went on, somewhat hesitantly. “We, the Cospatricks, support you on the throne, Alex. But after you? What then? It is . . . uncertain.”

“After me? What mean you?”

“It is this of you being young. You have no close heir, no male heir. And Scotland has never had, nor desired, a queen-regnant. Only queens-consort. Your sisters, therefore, would not serve if you were to die. And with English husbands. You are not yet wed. You may have sons, yes. Probably will. But, if not?”

“Die? You fear that I may die?”

“No. Not that. But we all could die. Or be slain, see you. Especially if there was to be war with England. And then?”

“Then you would wish to take the throne?”

“Mmm. Would it not be just? Our line sprung from the elder son of Canmore. Who is your nearest heir, Alex?”

“I know not. My great-grandsire, David, had but the one son, Henry of Huntingdon, who died before his father. Henry left two sons, Malcolm the Fourth, my uncle, and William, my father. Malcolm never wed. And I am my father’s only son. Did David’s brothers, who reigned before him, Edgar and Alexander, leave any sons? I have not heard of such.”

“I think not.”

“So you, or your father, could be my heir! I had not thought of that.”

“It could be, yes. Let us hope, pray, that it would never come to that. That you would one day have your own son to succeed you. And you reign as long as your father. But . . .”

“We are more than just kin, then, Pate! We are closer than I knew. None has told me of this. If I have no son, you could be king one day.”

“I am older than you, and could well die first. But if it was accepted, understood, that the Cospatrick line would then succeed, that would be just, fair. An ancient wrong righted.”

“That is true. Good! We shall make it so, then. I will tell them all. Those old men!”

“Probably it will never come to that, Alex. You will wed and have sons. But the thing should be known. That was my father’s message. In all loyalty to yourself.”

“Yes. Then, you will be much at my court here? That will be good, Pate. We will be together much. I will like that. I get so weary of these men whom my father left to surround me. And I have no other younger friends. You will be my companion, no? You will do that? Come here to my side. And soon?”

“If so Your Grace commands.”

“I do! I do!”

It was as simple as that, Patrick’s task over, fulfilled, and satisfactorily. For he liked this royal youth, felt strangely close to him already. Somehow they seemed to match, to suit each other. And he, Patrick, could do with some getting away from Dunbar Castle, fond as he was of his family; a young man, now of full age, he often felt the need, as it were, to stretch his wings. This of attending on the king now and then would be an opportunity, a worthy one. And his father would see it so, undoubtedly.

“Are you an archer?” Alexander asked. “I much like archery. I am good at it. None of these others do it. I have to do it alone. I have many bows. I have a target-place down by the Tweed. But I shoot at hares, foxes, even roe-deer when I can. But these lords frown on it. They call it child’s play.”

“I have not done much at it,” Patrick admitted. “I can use bow and arrow, but only now and then.”

“I once shot a heron in flight! Tomorrow, Pate, will you come shooting with me?”

“If you wish it, yes. But I am not very good at it, see you.”

“I will teach you . . .”

A tap at the door from the hall, and Dorward appeared. “Sire, the evening meal is prepared. They are laying the tables now in the dining-hall. If Your Grace is ready, we will move down to it.” That sounded more like a summons than an intimation.

“Yes, Sir Alan, we will come. I am hungry. Are you, Pate? You have ridden far. Come.”

Dorward led the way out, looking with no favour on Patrick. Few men were now in the hall, and none was of the great ones.

Downstairs in the vaulted lower hall, near the kitchens, most were already seated at the three tables, two lengthwise and one crosswise on the upraised dais at the far end. All stood, however, for the royal entry, with the High Seneschal announcing the King’s Grace.

Patrick hesitated. The lower tables had benches for seating; but up at the dais there were chairs, nine of them, the central one and another at one end empty. Dorward strode on. Patrick hung back, looking for a seat at one of the lower tables.

But Alexander realised that behind him his new friend was no longer coming on at his heels. He turned. “Come you with me,” he said. “Up there.”

Decidedly doubtfully Patrick followed on again. There were only the two vacant seats up on the dais, the centre one obviously for the king, the other no doubt for Dorward. Officers of state and the like occupied the others. Where was he, Patrick, to go?

Alexander had no doubts. Climbing up the dais steps, he gestured to one of the servitors standing there on the platform’s rear, waiting. “Another chair,” he ordered, and pointed.

Dorward, conducting the king to his throne-like seat, eyed Patrick less favourably than ever. Other eyebrows there rose also. But Alexander knew what he wanted. He went to his central chair, beckoning Patrick forward. Reaching it, he pushed it a little to one side, and, smiling to the man standing next to it on his right, Walter the High Steward, indicated that he should move his chair a little aside to make room for another. The Steward, with a slight shrug, edged his seat sufficiently. Alexander remained standing, awaiting the extra chair called for – and so long as the monarch stood, all must stand.

Fortunately the servitor was not long in coming with the extra seating, and under royal direction this was pushed in between the Steward’s place and the throne. Alexander waved for Patrick to take it, and only then sat down, and all could do the same.

It was only a small and unspoken gesture, but a significant one, however many elderly lips were tightened.

Patrick sat on the king’s right, next to the High Steward of Scotland.

The Seneschal, whom most were not yet used to thinking of as the Lyon King of Arms, called on William, Bishop of St Andrews, the Primate, on the monarch’s other side, to say grace-before-meat.

Embarrassed by all this, Patrick, after the intercession, turned to the Steward. “I regret inconveniencing you, my lord,” he said. He was thankful that it was the Steward, one of the only two who had acknowledged his first arrival with anything like welcome.

“His Grace is to be obeyed,” the other said. “Your father, the earl – he is in good health?”

“Yes. He sent me, with his greetings, to His new Grace. With goodwill and support.”

“That is well. We see little of him, these days.”

Patrick was spared the answering of that by Alexander whispering in his ear. “The Steward is the best of them! I do not like that Dorward. Nor . . .” He left the rest unsaid.

The repast began to be served, a handsome one, to which Patrick did full justice, as did his liege-lord. It was not any banquet, but with salmon, venison, swans’ flesh and wild duck, all washed down with mead, wines and ale, it was the finest Patrick had partaken of for long. At the sweetmeats course, musicians struck up in the minstrels’ gallery, and Alexander told his friend that if he had known that he was coming, he would have had dancers, jugglers, even the performing bear, to entertain them.

The music and dancing went on and on, and presently Patrick was smothering yawns, for he had left Dunbar at dawn for his lengthy ride through all the ranges of hills. Alexander saw it, and declared that he was ready for bed also. So they rose, as must all others, the instrumentalists halted their offerings meanwhile, and the Seneschal announced that His Grace would retire.

Everyone bowed, and Alexander was led to a door behind the dais, none but Patrick following him. This gave access to a turnpike stairway, which they climbed.

Upstairs two flights, above the upper hall they went, where they were ceremoniously handed over to two armed guards and two serving women who waited there with great jugs of hot water. It occurred to Patrick then that these were the first women he had seen, none in the dining-hall. These Alexander waved away, and taking Patrick’s arm, ushered him into a chamber there, closing the door behind them.

It was a bedchamber, wherein were two great beds. But ignoring these, Patrick was led to another door beyond and a second room, this containing only the one bed, but a handsome canopied one, with a steaming tub of water beside it.

“You will share a bed with me, this night, Pate?” Alexander asked. “Then we can talk, before we sleep.”

Somewhat taken aback, Patrick hesitated once more. This unexpected royal association was productive of much hesitation. He had never occupied a bed with another in his life, not even with his young brother William, nor with a female, although he was not entirely ignorant of lying alongside a young woman or two, but this in a hay-shed or in a hidden woodland glade.

“If Your Grace so wishes,” he said. “But . . . I may not stay awake. It has been a long day.”

“You were to name me Alex, were you not? And we shall not talk for long. But in the morning . . .”

“Very well, Alex.”

“Mine is a big bed! Room for us both. Better than going to one of those others there. I have never slept beside anyone. Have you?”

“No.” Patrick was a little relieved at that last confidence. It sounded as though nothing unnatural was involved. This youth was just lonely. He had not realised how alone a young king could be, however many his elderly attendants.

“Do you wish to wash?” Alexander pointed at the steaming tub. “I will not trouble with that. And the garderobe is