Scottish Highlands, Autumn 1516
Screams echoed from the hills, little muffled by the trees surrounding Shona MacAnalen’s hiding place. She cringed and scooted deeper into the forest undergrowth. The clash and clang of battle rang through the early morning mist, and the air carried the bitter tang of blood.
Invaders overran her village on horseback, on foot, and leapt like wraiths from wagons, to fall on defenseless villagers. The horsemen bore fine weapons—swords and pikes and other things for which Shona had no name. Others carried pitchforks and sharpened scythes. Still more carried only stout clubs or eating knives. Shona had caused some to drop what they carried, but they only picked them up again. She couldn’t stop them. And there were too many of them and too few men in her village able to fight them off. What she heard as she crept farther into the forest was slaughter, not battle.
Against a few, she could do little. Against so many, she was as helpless as the dying.
Beside her, wee Dory lay in a shivering ball. Shona rubbed her back in small circles, desperate to keep her quiet, though who would hear a child’s cry over the shouts and screams filling the glen? She hoped her little movements would not be noticed against the melee. Then she stilled. Her gather basket lay at the edge of the woods, its contents of herbs and late-season berries spilled on the cold ground. Once the slaughter stopped, would an invader notice it and come this way searching for the lass who dropped it? She shuddered and urged Dory farther back into the undergrowth.
Instead, Dory surged up and cried out, “Mama!” She lurched forward toward the fighting.
Shona lunged and grabbed for her hand. But her plaid caught in the surrounding thorns, holding her back, giving the bairn time to scamper out of reach.
“Nay, Dory. Come back,” Shona hissed as she fought to free herself. The child either didn’t hear her or ignored her, intent on finding her mama. Shona tried topullher back, but feared what stopping her might do. In moments, the wean disappeared between two crofts as fighting raged before her. A moment later, her high-pitched squeal reached Shona’s ears.
Shona collapsed to the ground, overcome by the wean’s fate. It was her fault for letting Dory get away. Overwhelmed by the scent of dirt and leaf mold in her nose, she feared that childlike scream and those smells were an association she’d never forget. She should have stopped her, no matter the outcome. But an earlier attempt to stop a rabbit from digging through the fence around her garden had stopped its heart, and Shona couldn’t risk Dory. The lass was doomed from the moment she gained her feet. Terrified and exhausted, Shona huddled there for what seemed like hours while the slaughter raged on.
Then it was over. For a moment, silence settled heavily over the glen, broken only by a deep-pitched voice issuing commands. Then a wail rent the quiet, quickly joined by cries and moans. Male shouts and laughter erupted, followed by shattered screams of protest, cut off in mid-utterance.
Shona raised her head, but she could not see the center of the village from her hiding place. She imagined the scene, women kneeling over their dead husbands or fathers or sons in disbelief and horror. And in terror as the invaders pulled the most comely lasses away from the bodies for their sport. If she’d returned to the village when she saw the first mounted soldiers ride into the glen and heard the first clang of steel, she’d be one of them. Or already dead. Instead, her basket lay forgotten at the edge of the woods, her wee companion probably spitted on some invader’s sword.
She shivered and hunkered further into the brambles. Smoke wafted by, making her nose itch. She rubbed it to stop a sneeze that might give her away. The thorny copse hid and protected her from any save an armored knight who might glimpse a bit of out-of-place color from her clothing or her hair and force his way through the thorns. Now that the fighting seemed over, any sound she made might be overheard.
The smell of smoke grew stronger. Their rocky glen was poor farmland, but the village was built from stones pried out of those fields. The invaders might knock down walls, but there wasn’t much to burn save thatched roofs and the inhabitants’ paltry belongings. There was little enough food put by to see the village through the winter, and no rich spoils to entice the invaders to stay. If the invaders moved on quickly, the survivors might have shelter against the coming winter, but their survival was still in question.
Her mother, she prayed, would be among the survivors. Her parents protected her from those in the village who feared what she could do. Little enough, as it turned out, when she was most needed. Her chest ached, hollowed out by her impotence and grief. If only she were stronger! She held out little hope for her father or any of their male kin or neighbors. Perhaps the bairns, the weans and the most elderly males would be spared. Yet, she did not hear any more children’s’ cries.
She wiped an angry tear from her cheek with her fist. If only—but nay, such thoughts would do no good. Her first futile attempts had not helped. Her only course had been to save herself, and Dory with her, in the hopes that she could do some good later. After the invaders moved on.
She pulled her plaid more closely around her head and shoulders. Its dull color hid the bright copper hue of her hair and helped her blend in with the last of the autumn foliage. But it would not keep her warm during the long, cold nights. She wished she’d worn her cloak, but she hadn’t expected to be in the forest for more than an hour or two before she’d return to her parents’ croft and break her fast. Her belly rumbled as she pictured a bowl of hot pottage dotted with a few of the late-season berries she’d found. Now she wished she’d eaten them, but she’d saved them to share with her parents until she’d dropped her basket and scattered them on the woodland ground.
Now her father would never have a chance to enjoy them.
Her tears came faster and she stifled a sob on her fist. The little hiccuping sound made her realize the village had gone quiet again. Then she heard the horses moving out, northward, farther into the mountains, the creak of wagon wheels soon after, and the tramp of men moving afoot. The haze of smoke darkened; the smell of burning became stronger. They were setting fire to the fields as they left! Not that it mattered. They probably stripped them of the harvest as they passed.
They would not leave behind a garrison, not if they burned fields. Still, she waited another hour until she saw women moving slowly across the gap between the crofts where wee Dory had disappeared. Two at first, one supporting the other, then two more. Still, she waited. If soldiers remained, they’d show themselves eventually. None did.
Finally, she crept from her bower and stood for the first time in hours. She turned her back on the village as she stretched, trying to ease cramped muscles while she soothed herself with familiar sights. Nothing seemed changed. The forest stood as it always had, cloaking the hillside.
She passed her dropped basket before she entered the village, a few berries still plump, others crushed. She left them, food for animals.
In the village, everything was changed. Devastation choked the breath from her lungs. Several crofts still burned, roofs gone. Bodies, mostly male, littered the green. Women sat with their men, eyes glazed and staring. Some sat in twos and threes talking low. She ignored them and turned the corner, looking first for Dory, then her mother. She found the wean as she expected to find her—dead, the wee lass’s mother nearby, skirts pulled up to her throat, her lower body bloody. Shona shuddered and moved toward her parents’ croft. Her father lay dead at the doorway, her mother’s body slumped just inside the door, a cleaver still in her hand, seemingly untouched save for the wound piercing her breast.
Shona’s blood turned to ice. She had no doubt what had happened here. Her father had died defending her mother and her mother died trying to kill the man who murdered her husband.
Shona was alone.
She turned to group of women standing outside a nearby croft. Before she could speak, one challenged her.
“You could have stopped them,” the woman spat. “Why did you no’?”
Stunned, Shona froze. “I tried. There were too many. I might have harmed one of ours.”
The second woman, wife—likely now widow—of a council elder, shook her head. “Is what you see here better than what ye might have done if ye had tried harder?” She sounded more tired than angry.
“I did all I could…”
“You could have saved many. You didn’t,” the third woman cried and turned away.
