All four of them down healthy swallows of ale but, in the case of Maxton and Kress and Achilles, it was a very small swallow made to look like a big one. They wanted to get the Scotsman drunker than he was, but they didn’t want to follow suit. At least, not at the moment. Maxton smacked his lips and reached out, yanking the Scotsman back to the table by the collar of his cloak.
“You remind me of my mum,” Maxton said, pretending to get weepy. “Every time I see a Scotsman, it reminds me of her. She was from Edinburgh. Where are you from, lad?”
The Scotsman was too drunk to pull away from Maxton as the man threw a massive arm over his shoulders in a brotherly gesture. “Dumfries,” he said. “A beautiful place.”
“Not more beautiful than Edinburgh!”
Now, the Scotsman pulled away from Maxton and scowled at him. “Are ye mad?” he asked, incredulous. “Are ye blind, man?”
Maxton geared up to argue with him but then he backed down, pretending to be too drunk to really care. “Edinburgh,” he insisted calmly and feigned another big drink of ale. “What’s your name, Scotsman? I cannot keep calling you Scotsman, you know.”
The Scotsman’s gaze lingered on him a moment before replying. “Ye dunna need tae know.”
“Ah,” Maxton looked to Kress and Achilles. “He does not have a name. His mother hated him so much that she did not give him one.”
That brought a reaction from the man. “I’ll have ye know she gave me a great name,” he said, drinking from his cup and draining it. Achilles quickly filled it up. “I am Alasdair Baird Douglas. I am a Douglas of Clan Douglas and William Douglas is my liege. Do ye know the man?”
The name confirmed that he was, indeed, the double agent Alexander had been trailing. Now, they definitely had their man, and Maxton shook his head in response to his question.
“I do not,” he said. “But I have heard he is a great man. Let us drink to him, Alasdair.”
The cups were lifted again and when they came down, Alasdair pointed to Maxton. “What’s yer name, Sassenach?” he demanded, his pointing finger moving around the table. “All of ye; I would know who I’m drinking with.”
Maxton threw a thumb into his chest. “Magnus,” he lied, giving his father’s name. “Hugh and Archie.”
He pointed to Kress and then Achilles, giving their fathers’ names as well. Alasdair lifted a cup to them. “Now we are good friends.”
The cup was back at his lips but, this time, Maxton and the others didn’t drink. They were pretending to, but they had backed off of any more liquor because they needed their wits about them. Alasdair was far gone into his drink, more so now, so Maxton decided to start his interrogation before Alasdair grew too drunk to make sense.
“Aye, we are,” Maxton said, waving over the serving wench to bring them more ale. “Tell me of yourself, Alasdair. Why are you in London? Surely you’d rather be in Scotland.”
Alasdair nodded, bobbing his head up and down until he became dizzy with it and he had to stop. “Aye, lad,” he agreed quietly. “I wish I was.”
“Then you must be here because of a woman,” Maxton said, snorting. That caused Kress and Achilles to snort as well. “The only reason you would be away from your beautiful Scotland is because of a woman. Well? Is she beautiful?”
Alasdair shook his head, his good humor seeming to fade somewhat. “No beautiful woman,” he said. “I wish it was true, but ’tis not.”
“Then you must have business for your laird,” Maxton said, snatching the pitcher away from the wench when she came to the table and pouring it into Alasdair’s cup. “We are on business for our lord, you know. De Longley out of Northwood Castle. He’s right on the border of Scotland, far to the north. Maybe you have heard of him?”
Alasdair’s expression suggested that he was a million miles away, his mind wandering to perhaps the real answer to Maxton’s question. But he shook it off when Maxton grabbed at his shoulder, shaking him good-naturedly.
“De Longley?” Alasdair repeated. “Nay, lad. I’ve not heard of the man. Do ye fight Scots, then?”
“Only if they fight me first.”
Alasdair looked at him a moment before breaking into snorts of laughter. “Scots and Sassenach,” he muttered. “That’s not where the real battle lies, dinna ye know. There are battles greater than we can imagine.”
“What do you mean?”
Alasdair pointed at him. “I mean the battles we fight against each other are meaningless,” he said, taking another huge gulp of ale and then smacking his lips. “’Tis all for naught, Magnus. There are higher powers controlling our destinies.”
He said it with certainty and Maxton thought it might be a very good way to lead in to what they all wanted to know– what Alasdair was really doing in London. Maxton topped off Kress and Achilles’ cups, which didn’t need much refilling considering they had barely been touched. Alasdair was growing more inebriated by the moment.
“Is that so?” Maxton asked. “Do you know that for a fact?”
Alasdair nodded, nearly throwing himself off-balance as he did. “No man controls his destiny,” he said. “Do ye know who controls it?”
“Who?”
