But it wasn’t until the evening of Sunday the twenty-third of June, after a disastrous first day of battle, when Alex stood in the crowded Royal Pavilion, which had hastily been set up in the middle of the boggy Carse of Balquhiderock just north of the Bannock Burn—within the required three leagues of Stirling—listening to the king and his commanders squabble, that Alex knew Joan had been right: he didn’t belong here anymore—if he ever had.

Whether he’d thought he was doing the right thing two years ago no longer mattered. It had become painfully clear that it wasn’t right any longer. Even before Joan’s urging him to change sides, Alex had had second . . . third . . . God-knows-how-many thoughts. The early inroads he thought he’d been making with the English had been replaced by doubt and frustration. From the foolhardy attack on the Earl of Carrick, to them thinking he was the spy and shutting him out of meetings, to Despenser’s petty machinations, to the English attack on his people near Hailes, the realization that his efforts were futile had been building for some time.

But he’d ignored all the gut twists and all the twinges. His rigidity and refusal to see anything other than black and white had prevented him from admitting that even if well intentioned, he might have made a mistake. As MacRuairi had accused him, Alex had tried to make it too simple. But since leaving the Guard, he’d changed. Age and experience had showed him that the world was more gray than he’d realized—especially in war. It wasn’t always clear what was right and what was wrong. It wasn’t always simple.

After what happened with Gifford—experiencing the kind of desire and hatred that might make a man forget his honor—Alex also had to acknowledge that his line in the sand might be more movable than he’d first thought. But he’d always had one—whether he wore shiny mail and a tabard or a blackened helm and a plaid.

Joan had accused him of giving up on his former brethren, and maybe he had. Maybe he should have stayed and fought harder. Maybe he should have banged his head until they listened to him.

But it was too late to go back and do it over. The question was what he was going to do about it now.

The events of the day had made it clear he had to do something.