Hello, ModernDayBard here! Welcome to the fifth chapter of Upon this Blasted Heath, my Macbeth fanfic. Finally, we have arrived at the part where I can let my creativity free! Yes, that's right—this is the point where I begin to answer my own question: how might things have turned out differently? I hope you enjoy!
Remember: I don't own Macbeth (plot, dialogue, or characters), and anything in bold and italics are words that are either Shakespeare's or part of the prologue of Regent University's production of this show. However, the words with which I narrate and the new direction this story takes are completely my own.
When the five Thanes discussed the best way to Forres and the king, Macbeth took the reinforcements' arrival as a sure sign that a day or two's forced march would easily bring them to their destination. But having seen the state of Glamis' men, the other four would not hear of it, insisting they take an easier route, a slower pace, and more frequent rests to preserve what little strength the weary fighters had left. The new Cawdor chafed at the thought of making the king wait so long, until Macduff suggested sending one of the fresh men ahead as a messenger. Reluctantly, Macbeth conceded at last.
Macduff shook his head as the other Thane stumbled wearily back to his tent. To speak truly, the others were as concerned for Macbeth's health as his men's, but they knew all too well that the proud general would not slow the pace for his own sake.
The next day's march began well enough, and the messenger had long since disappeared into the early morning light. From his place in the column, Malcolm kept a medic's trained eye on his commanding officer, but it seemed the extended rest had done Macbeth good, even if he had refused to let the young prince see to his wounds.
*The pride of Glamis may one day be his doom,* Malcolm mused, without much true reproach. That same stubborn pride was what compelled his men to follow orders on the battlefield, and had earned him their respect.
In the dreadful hours that followed the events of the next few moments, Duncan's son wondered if there were warning signs overlooked in weariness, or even if his own thoughts of battle had summoned up the hoard that fell upon them, harsh battle cries breaking through the thinning fog.
True to the king's prediction, it was the rebel Cawdor and his few remaining fighters that fell now on the loyal troops. Their numbers, which would have been more than enough to slaughter Macbeth and his men, were insufficient to face the unit now that reinforcements had reached them. Nevertheless, the traitors fought with the desperation of a cornered rat—not hoping to escape death, only to wound the executioner.
Macbeth wasted no time, barking a familiar order to his followers as the former Cawdor's troops charged down the hillside towards them: "Pincer!"
The single command was met with immediate result, Glamis' men splitting into three groups as they prepared to meet the would-be ambushers. Banquo led the group that peeled off to the right, and Donalbain the ones bound for the left flank, while Macbeth held the center with the remnant. The other Thanes recognized the strategy well enough: the hope was to come at the enemy from three directions, eventually encircling them. Lennox and Angus took their men to support Macbeth, while Ross peeled off with Banquo, and Macduff, feeling the weight of the king's trust, led his group to reinforce Donalbain.
As the cursed rebels fell upon the loyal men, at first it seemed to go well enough, with Macbeth's strategy playing out just as it was supposed to. Macduff, for his part, soon saw why Donalbain had been trusted to lead the third group. It was not simply her royal blood—now the Thane could see what Duncan had noticed all those years before: her fighting spirit. She'd earned her fellow soldiers' respect, and they responded to her shouted commands, taking out the rebels as they came.
The only worrying moment came early in the fight. The left flank was faced by an overlarge fighter in odd-looking armor swinging a poleaxe. For some reason, his own allies gave him wide berth, and kept grinning expectantly as the behemoth stalked towards the fighters on the left.
*Some kind of champion?* Macduff wondered. *Even that makes no account for why he has more armor—better armor—than the former Cawdor. He's completely covered!*
As the king's trusted Thane was shaking his head over the waste, a red-haired figure ran past him, bound inexorably for the solitary, hulking figure. Startled, Macduff began to run after Donalbain, but Malcolm stayed him with a hand on his shoulder. Looking at the prince's expression and the attitude of the other men who'd served with the twins, he knew.
*A berserker—by my father's sword, she's as much a berserker as Macbeth!* To speak truth, many of the best Thanes, and even several former kings had been as well. Still, it seemed to stand against reason to see the young soldier—hardly more than a small girl—charge the behemoth with nothing more than her favored dirk, ducking under a poleaxe swing and getting inside the strange fighter's guard, thrusting upwards at a small gap in his armor just beneath his chin.
Cawdor's men faltered momentarily as their 'secret weapon' was dispatched in seconds by a mere slip of a girl, but Donalbain's victory served to hearten her own allies, who charged with renewed heart. Still, the two berserkers, Thane and princess, were given ample berth to fight their own battles.
It was never wise to get between such a one and the enemy until their battle-rage burned out.
The rebel's resolve had been broken when the strange champion fell to Donalbain, and what little inclination they had to fight on vanished after Macbeth defeated their Thane, the former Cawdor. One by one, they dropped their traitorous weapons and surrendered, begging the mercy of the king.
Malcolm knew they would be weeks to go through the prisoners from this and many similar battles, trying to determine which men had followed simply out of fear of their leader, which had assumed their loyalty to Thane superseded their loyalty to the king, and which were as guilty as the rebel Thanes. The prince knew well enough his father would want him there for the trials, preparing him for the day when Malcolm would be king.
For now, though, that wasn't his main concern. Nor was he ordered to join with the soldiers ordered to dispose of the treacherous dead. No, while they dragged the limp forms into a single pile (around the behemoth that none had been eager to try to move) in preparation to lighting a single pyre to rid the earth of the last vestiges of their rebellion, Malcolm was neither prince nor solider—he was a medic.
Macduff had brought a battlefield medic with him, and the other man quickly saw to the few, not-serious injuries the men had acquired in the brief fight. He then began to approach the prince, intending to offer his aid, as Malcolm had volunteered to care for any in serious condition. He stopped, however, when he recognized the solitary patient the king's son now tended to—Donalbain.
At the end of the battle, when her berserker rage had faded at last, the king's daughter had stumbled away from the field and collapsed in a daze. Unable to find her, worried but unable to abandon his duty, Malcolm had tended to two other cases before one of Lennox's men had spotted his sister. The soldier hadn't dared touch the slumped form, as he had no medical training, and instead had ran back to make his report.
Since that moment, the prince had tended to his sister alone. The other medic well knew what Malcolm would say to any interference—there were some patients a medic would accept no help with. Alone, the king's son moved with practiced expertise around the unconscious form of Donalbain, cleaning and binding her wounds as the rest of the unit began to pitch camp.
As the darkened sky was lit by the flames of the rebel's pyre, Macbeth approached the impromptu medical outpost, where the young medic was still busy about his patient. "How does she fare?" the weary general asked, genuine concern in his voice.
"It makes no sense," Malcolm answered as he worked, "I may have been delayed for the span of an hour's time, but by all reckoning I got to her in time. It does not stand to reason that an infection would already be manifesting, even if I had failed to do so. But she is yet to regain consciousness, and already has a fever."
At that, the Thane of Glamis resolved to come no further. Infections of this sort may not have been communicable in the way of other diseases, but in the post-Virus society, the word 'fever' was often met with outright fear. "Do you have the supplies you need?"
There was a small crash as a jar of supplies slipped from the prince's grasp. Malcolm stared down at it, frowning as his tired brain turned over the clues before him. "These are not the symptoms of a typical battlefield infection." He blinked, his stomach sinking as the revelation became undeniable. He studied his sister, running down the list he'd already diagnosed. "These are the symptoms of..." his voice trailed off as he looked down at his own trembling hands.
Macbeth regarded his young cousin in concern. At the prince's next statement, which was all but shouted, the general was startled enough to take a step back.
"Stay back! Keep the other men at distance!" Malcolm whirled to face his kinsman, determination and grief mingled in his eyes. "Strike me down if I know how, but somehow her wounds have become contaminated with the Virus!"
The new Cawdor stiffened. He didn't question how his cousin knew—as a trained medic, it was the prince's job to know. "Leave her, then, coz. There is nothing you can do for her—"
"—or myself," the young prince cut in. "I have been exposed to the Virus as well. But no one else has, and there is yet time. You must move the camp and leave us here. This strain of the Virus has progressed faster than most accounts I have seen; my sister and I—" for just a moment, Malcom's voice broke, but he mustered his strength and continued, "—my sister and I will likely be dead by morning. You must burn our bodies so that the Virus dies within us, but you mustn't touch us."
The thought of the children of the king being given anything less than a noble burial was appalling to Macbeth. Worse, to suggest that they be burned as if they were no better than common rebels— "Highness—"
Malcolm met his general's gaze levelly, aware that his superior officer had just addressed him—nearly for the first time—as a prince and not as a soldier or kinsman. "Cawdor," he responded in kind, with his cousin's newest title, "we both have a responsibility to the men of this unit and the people of Scotland. As much as we can, we must stop the Virus here. Promise me—" Malcolm's voice broke again, and when he next spoke, his tone was no longer commanding, no longer forceful, "Promise me, coz, that you will do what needs to be done to protect our people. And tell my father—" Here the prince did pause. What could he tell his father that would mitigate the grief of the king that could be trusted to an intermediary—even one as noble as Macbeth? Unable to summon an answer, he abandoned the thought. "Move the camp over the hill, and I will keep Donalbain as comfortable as I may. In the morning..."
The general who had yet to lose on the battlefield at last bowed his head in acquiescence before the calm insistence of the prince. Who was he—a mere mortal—to argue against the ways of fate and disease? What could he do to save the children of his king? "I will do as you ask, highness. Is there anything—?" He knew not how to finish his query: anything he could do? Anything he needed? Anything that could prevent the inevitable?
"Blame not yourself, and bring our men safely before the king once more."
Macbeth, Thane of Glamis, could say no more, and the unfamiliar weight of defeat settled heavily in his chest. In silence, he saluted the two red-haired figures, then turned back to camp proper, preparing to give the most difficult order he ever had to.
The rebel's pyre burned low, and the sounds of the camp moving reached the prince who now sat beside the unconscious form of his sister, hands now shaking too much to aid her any more. Malcolm glanced at Donalbain, who tossed fitfully in the fever's grasp, breathing laboriously, but clinging to life with the fighter's spirit with which she'd first entered the world.
The young healer could feel his own fever rage, destroying his body from within, but refused to focus on his own discomfort, laying a trembling hand on the shoulder of his twin, trying to communicate comfort, solidarity. "It will be over by morning, sister; rest now. After the fighting passes, peace must come." In the silent pause that followed, a thought occurred to the prince, and in his fevered state, he found it almost amusing. "How fitting is it, sister of mine, that the two of us will enter and leave this world within moments of each other?"
The camp was now moved over the hill, the twins were left alone for their final hours on earth. Some hours later, Malcolm, himself on the verge of unconsciousness now, noted that his sister no longer breathed. He wanted to grieve, but in his state could not quite muster the effort. He squeezed her hand in farewell and turned his gaze to the stars, muttering, "What will Father think?"
But the cold expanse above gave the prince no answer, only watching as he soon followed Donalbain, still with his hand over hers.
I knew I would hate writing this chapter! I love the possibilities Malcolm and Donalbain, both form a writer and an actor's perspective—especially the brother-sister dynamic I picture between this version of these two. Still, there was no escaping this—this was a story about how Macbeth could become king without becoming a villain, and both of the twins stood in his way of that.
If you like it, or if you see something that I can improve on, don't hesitate to leave a review and let me know!
Oh, and if the titles of the chapters look or sound weird, all of them are lines or phrases from the actual play (with the exception of 'Prologue,' of course).