The heather-clad highlands echoed with the tramp of iron-shod boots and the distant roll of war horns.
From castle to croft, men had been summoned, chieftains from the Isles, nobles from the lowlands, and spear-wielding farmers with iron in their spines.
At their head rode King Duncan, his crimson cloak billowing like a war-banner in the cold wind.
He bore no crown this day, only a polished helm capped with antlered brass, a relic of Pictish kings long buried beneath standing stones.
His sword, the ancestral blade Calad Ri, rested across his saddle, unsheathed and hungry.
Behind him stretched an army fed fat on summer harvests and highland cattle, men with sinew and pride, led not by obligation but by fury.
England had burned Dalriadan settlements along the coast. Now Duncan marched to repay the debt.
