(Notes: I parked Kyle at Dublin because I didn't have anything else to do with him. He stayed there right through the end, and looking back it provides a perfect excuse for running the realm rather better than Alexander might have. It also keeps me from having to follow several different 'voices' in the narrative. The fifteen further turns won't be far behind I hope.)
A Secret Account of the Last Years of the Reign of King Alexander the Mad of Scotland.
My name is Kyle Feniss, husband of Mariot Canmore, daughter of Edmund Canmore who rules Scotland in all but name. My position was secured by agreement and through my childhood companionship with Edmund's son Donnchadh. We have both recently come of age in Edinburgh in the year of our Lord 1240. I am to be appointed the guardian and manager of King Alexander, who is touched by God and subject to frequent tormenting visions, no few of which come out of a bottle.
Some of the less reputable members of the nobility, my own father included, have been attempting of late to take advantage of the King's madness for their own benefit and my job will be to prevent this and to attempt to mitigate some of our Lord's more, ahh, unusual commandments. My father hopes to use me to secure his own ends, while Edmund, the de facto ruler, imagines that placing me in this position will give the nobles just enough room to hang themselves.
Both of them are in for some surprises, as God has blessed me with more wit than all of them put together. I have a plan for my people and I mean to see it enacted no matter the cost. Unfortunately Edmund's brother David rules our rich holdings in the Levant with all the care and aplomb one would expect of a madman. His sons may be rather easier to manage if I can only get David out of the way, especially his eldest, Mac Bethad, whose chivalry is so great that it is the tail that wags Mac the dog.
At Antwerp Prince Cennedig can be seen to shudder when his father's name is even mentioned. The city he wards is rich and large, and leaves him with little time for questioning orders from a man whom he does not wish even to recall. The Prince will be happy so long as I keep him wealthy and out of the homelands.
The last person of note is old King Edward's son Eion, whose hate for the English has utterly sidelined him politically and left him powerless and despised. He can rot at Caernarvon for the rest of his days for all I care.
In the first year of my reign Jerusalem is under siege by an army of Egypt with Mac Bethad inside and under orders from his father not to sally out and risk damage to the holy city. David has sworn to ride out of Damascus to his relief, and in that cause attacks the Egyptian Sultan who camps nearby.
Under the concealing moonlight David compells his crudest militiamen to make a frontal assault against one of the most immense defensive positions in the entire world held by nearly three hundred fine archers. They die in droves, but as they do David and his Templar allies climb the hill along a narrow back path to reach the enemy's position.
Shocked Saracen spearmen struggle to reposition themselves to halt the Templars, but when David's guardsmen arrive the rout is on.
With spearmen still advancing in front of them the Egyptian archers cannot withdraw in time to avoid crushing simultaneous charges from David and his Templars. Hundreds of them die or throw down their weapons in terror, leaving the Sultan and the spearmen he managed to rally alone against our overwhelming force. Sultan Moussa is no coward, and he can see how exhausted our numerous militia spearmen are. Calling his own spearmen to his side he launches a charge at a weakened company of town militia.
Immediately the Templars answer his charge with one of their own, but the Sultan's men are mighty and they hold. His spearmen are slowly being ground down by three companies of our own, but their will refuses to falter with Moussa fighting so near. Shockingly it begins to look like the Sultan will turn the tide of battle singlehandedly. His bodyguard is butchering the militia and the Templars alike. Though outnumbered and surrounded they kill and kill, even when David personally leads his own guard back into battle the tide is still against us. Only David's immense personal charisma and reputation keep the men fighting this day, especially as his personal guard is reduced to only one grizzled veteran.
In the end, it is enough. A lowly spearmen, worn out and uncertain, strikes the Sultan's horse in the face with his shield, and Sultan Moussa is thrown to the ground. A dozen spears break his body, and the will of his men.
A bloody battle, but a great victory in the fact that David the Mad drove his men up so massive a mountainside and brought some back down again with the enemy's banner and the head of their king.
Prisoners from the battle are ransomed to the Egyptians for nine hundred florins.
David then calls his son Comgell to send reinforcements from his army near Acre. Comgell retreats to secure Antioch, where there is a plague of heresy, and sends a mighty host to the aid of his father, who moves to attack the new Egyptian Sultan, Allam.
After this bloody day the Egyptians will dub David a Merciless Mauler. The Saracens retreat from Jerusalem rather than risk him coming south against them.
The next two years see the launch of my economic reforms and the armies trained to full strength under the guise of demands from King Alexander. My arrival in Dublin revealed precisely what I'd expected, dealing with the King's shifting demands and claims of prophecy is so horrific a burden that no other will accept it. My God, I must even aid the man in the toilet. This, though, makes it all the easier to shift his public pronouncements to my own end, and to issue proclamations of my own devising as though in his hand. Scotland may acknowledge Alexander as their King, Edmund as their ruler, and David as their champion, but I am the hand that holds the tiller. My wife, Marion, is becoming a cow of the first order, but she prevents Edmund from acting against me even if he suspects something. Meanwhile David's demands for coin make him quite amenable to instituting the reforms I ask.
In short my rule is secure. As I have no wish for war to disrupt my complete assumption of power I am sending a diplomat to seek peace with the Danes. Additionally to prevent conflict from breaking out neaby in Europe I have arranged for Prince Cennedig to marry a pretty princess from France named Isabelle. The French are paying eleven hundred florins for the privelege, and with firm lines now connecting them to the English there should be little risk of war close at home in the near future. I suspect the girl will keep Cennedig busy for quite some time, though she may be popular enough to increase his influence as well.
David sends word of a mighty victory over rebels east of Damascus, and a request for more funds for increasing his armies.
Rights of passage are secured for our armies across English soil in exchange for the reverse consideration as well. Seeking to influence our standing with the Pope a travelling group of priests is established in the Levant and begins converting heathens south of Damascus while David, at the slightest suggestion of mine, has marched south towards the mighty Egyptian castle at Gaza. It is time to bring an end to Egypt's ability to make war against us.
Two years later Edmund Canmore, the prime impediment to my absolute rule of our northern lands, passed away peacefully in his bed. Mariot is distraught, but he was quite old and I am now able to divert the funds to provide her with any comfort she might seek. Unfortunately my heretofore quiet brother in law, Malcom Forester, is now stirring up trouble about who is to assume leadership of our Clan. My position is solid but I have no wish to see a serious challenge emerge. I must find something more permanent to occupy Malcom, but for the nonce he is given governership of Edinburgh.
Meanwhile Mac Bethad the Honest has taken a wife at Jerusalem and the last heretics around Antioch have been sent to the stake. The realm is peaceful, and is starting to become profitable as well.
The further passage of two years brings me more trouble with David the Mad. Despite swearing to lay siege to Gaza he is now expressing reluctance on the claim that a vision from God seemed to show a new enemy emerging. I must have Gaza to lock down the south of the Levant and allow for the eventual conversion of the northern castles there into more profitable cities. The fall of Gaza will inevitably presage the fall of Egypt. With that goal in mind I craft a letter to the Pope in King Alexander's hand showing the need for a Crusade to unite Christianity. Obviously I would prefer an Egyptian target, but the Pope is a Dane, and though he has excommunicated his own King he is displeased that we have not yet declared a ceasefire with them. As well the Sicilians have sent armies against Papal forces, so the Crusade is called against Palermo.
David immediately sends a request to join the crusade. I agree to this, with one caveat, his crusaders must first capture Gaza. The siege begins within the year.
The tenth year of my reign sees many nations answer the call to Crusade. England, France, Milan, The Holy Roman Empire, and the Papacy all form up armies. In Jerusalem David's youngest son, named Edmund for his uncle, comes of age and is sent to Damascus to manage the city. The ruler of Jerusalem, Mac Bethad, is dubbed 'the Saint' by his subjects for his benevolent rule. My reformation of the economy has a steady flow of coin entering our coffers and substantial improvements on the way throughout the cities of the realm. I assure you, noble reader, that even King Alexander himself is happier under my rule than when the stress and worry of guiding the nation broke his mind and turned him to drink. The peasantry have better churches to attend, the nobles have more money to spend, the soldiers get their wages on time, and the priests of Scotland are increasingly viewed as the most effective in the known world. Of course in the better off race you might say I am first among equals, though few will ever realize it.
Scottish PBM Write-up thread.
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