“Leave this land, leave Nottingham, Gisborne, I will hunt you down and kill you if you don’t.”
“You owe me, Robert.”
“I owe you nothing.”
“I saved your sister.”
The bow quivered and the arrow aimed at Gisborne bounced off Robin’s finger. “Leave. Now.” The snarl held a world of rage wreathed through with agony.
Gisborne stood, he didn’t leave, the two men stared at each other and by increments Robin’s shoulders relaxed, the bow dropping. He released the string and pulled back his hood. “You need to leave, Guy,” he said with far more control.
I studied Gisborne. His grey eyes were hard to read, I had no idea what he was thinking but he looked as if Robin might hold all the secrets of the world in his rough hands. I found it unsettling. These two men knew each other, they knew each other well.
“It’s good to see you alive,” Gisborne said.
“And you,” Robin said, a strangled tightness to his voice.
“You and the minstrel?” he asked, flicking a glance at me.
“Yes.”
Gisborne nodded and a savage twist of his mouth gave me the final puzzle piece.
“You were lovers,” I whispered behind Robin. No physical danger existed in this small glade, not now. I pushed past Robin and stood looking at both their faces. Robin stepped back, his eyes hooded, face tight.
Gisborne looked down but his chest heaved as if he’d run a league. “You need to return Marion, Robert. You need to stop the raids or I will have to come after your people. I have no choice. Don’t make me hurt them.”
“Leave Nottingham, Guy. Go back to Normandy. There is nothing here for you but grief.” Robin’s words were so soft even I didn’t believe him.
Gisborne met his eyes again, an almost painful event the way he flinched. “I can’t. I can’t, the king has ordered me to shore up Marc’s power here. I have no choice but to hunt you and I will kill you all, you know that. You know what I am capable of… this is your only warning.”
“Guy –”
“I took this posting because King John needed a man he could trust up here. And I wanted to meet your sister, to tell her how you died.” He barked a laugh. “If only I’d known what I was walking into…” His voice ground to a halt. “If you give her back to me, I can protect her, but if I have to come and get her, people will be hurt, killed.” Guy took a step away from us, as if we’d become toxic. “I just wanted Marion to know how fucking brave you were. I didn’t want her to think you died a coward. That is why I agreed to come to this godforsaken country.”
“I am not brave, I am a coward, Guy,” Robin said.
A small smile graced the elegant face of Gisborne. “You are many things, Robert. A coward isn’t one of them. You are far stronger and braver than I am. Hold your minstrel close tonight and tomorrow leave Sherwood. Send Marion to me. I will fix what’s broken in Nottingham if you give me time.”
“The people don’t have time, Guy. They are dying from starvation.”
“That’s the fate of peasants, Robert.”
“It shouldn’t be,” Robin said. He reached out and drew me to his side, a strong arm around my waist. It made us vulnerable to attack but it gave us a power Gisborne couldn’t overcome.
The storm dark eyes watched Robin’s fingers flex on my waist and the hunger in his gaze scared me far more than his sword. “Get him away from Sherwood, Will. Make him leave.”
I didn’t say anything, or even acknowledge the words. Gisborne turned his back to stride into the darkness of the woodland. Robin released his hold on me and stepped forwards. “Guy, join us,” he said to the vanishing figure.
“Robin?” I hissed, reaching for his arm. Robin evaded my grabbing fingers.
“Join us, Guy. With you we will be unstoppable. We will forge England into a new land, one of freedom, where we don’t have to serve those who fight for pointless wealth and power.”
I saw Gisborne’s shoulders hunch, the words Robin sent to him acting like invisible arrows making his body shudder under their impact. “Forever the dreamer, Robin of the Hood,” Guy said before vanishing into the dark.
23
“YOU NEED TO KILL him,” I said watching Gisborne disappear among the trees.
Robin turned away from the direction he’d gone and away from me. “I can’t do that, Will.”
“What the fucking hell is going on, Robin?”
I watched the larger man fold into himself and drop to his knees, his hands covering his face. “I can’t do this, Will. I just can’t. You don’t know the burdens I carry.”
Fear shot through me faster than Gisborne’s sword would have if he’d chosen to act. I knelt in the frosted leaves beside Robin. “Don’t, Robin. Don’t…” I murmured. “Please.” I touched his shuddering back and he collapsed into me. My warrior, my knight, lay in my arms, a broken man, shattered for the moment into sharp pieces that could slice the unwary. I held him, rocked him, stroked and soothed. I used soft words and gentle phrases to repair him enough to bring him back to me. Back to us. Whatever Robin wanted in this moment he had a duty and I had to repair him enough to get him back to Marion and the others.
When he calmed enough to talk I helped him stand but he took my hand and dragged me into a patch of sunlight under a tree. He sat with his back to the old birch and pulled me down to sit between his thighs, my back to his front. He buried his nose in my hair and wrapped strong arms around my chest, pinning me to him.
“I’m sorry I ran, Will. What happened to Marion, the consequences of it, I just needed to escape, to figure out our options, to plan.”
“You should have taken me with you or at least come back to tell me you needed time,” I said.
“I know. But when I saw it was Guy looking for Marion… His hair was silver white even when we first met, I was young but he was still a squire. I had to confirm, when Alan described him, I had to confirm it was Guy. I haven’t seen him since we fought together in Palestine…” Robin’s silence meant he’d become lost in memories. I stroked the hand over my chest to return him to the present.
He heaved in a breath. “We met soon after I left England for France and the journey to the Holy Land. We travelled together, he is younger than me, the youngest son of an important noble, I was just plain poor but I would inherit the title and lands. In a strange way we were equals. We were blessed together in Rome and Guy was knighted. We boarded the ships together. We trained and drank together. Then one night… The ships were delayed taking us to Constantinople, we were drunk, other men would have found whores to keep them warm. We…”
“You found each other,” I finished.
Robin buried his face in the nape of my neck and nodded. “He gave me everything. He wanted me to love him but I… I didn’t understand, not then. I was cruel. I… God, Will, I broke him, broke his heart. I didn’t understand love until I met Ghaalib. If I had known, Will. If I had understood that the love between men isn’t something to be ashamed of, it would have been so different. I knew I loved him far too late, long after Ghaalib’s death. I realised what I’d thrown away so damned late.”
I felt sick. Sick with nerves, sick with jealousy and sick with fear. Of all the men the king could have sent to drive us out of Sherwood it had to be Guy of Gisborne. “How do we handle this, Robin?” I asked into the silence.
“I don’t know.”
Not what I wanted to hear. Time to take the reins and be in control of this runaway horse and cart. “Nothing has changed, not really.”
“Everything has changed, Will,” Robin whispered. The sickness inside me grew into a living fear, and a fine tremor wove its way through me. Robin, oblivious to me, continued talking and I tried to listen.
“I never thought I’d see him again,” Robin mumbled, his lips pressed to the nape of my neck. It made it even harder to think.
“I think he’s still in love with you,” I stated, the boldness fuelled by anger.
Robin’s chest
heaved. “I can’t lose you, Will. It doesn’t matter how he feels. What he needs.” Robin sounded sad and it twisted a knife in my guts.
“Feels like you need him, too,” I pushed. Why was I pushing? I should be holding tighter than ever. What did I hope to accomplish?
My lover stilled and remained quiet for too long. I twisted in his arms, kneeling between his thighs and forced his face up so he had to meet my gaze. His eyes were soft, full of fear, shades of spring’s bluebells making my anger dissolve. He might not have said it but I could see the words I wanted to hear.
Robin cupped my face. “You need something from me that’s very different to what he needed. What he still needs I expect.”
I frowned. “I don’t understand. You need him and you need me because we both need different sides of you?”
Robin closed his eyes and banged his head back against the tree, surrendering to something. “You need me to help you feel safe, warm, protected.” I wished I could deny it but he was right. “Guy needed something else, something far harder to express with compassion and love. At the time I didn’t understand. I do now and I’m saddened by how badly I failed him.”
“Alright, but I still don’t –”
“He needed, needs, discipline. A strong hand. Boundaries. Rules. They need to be maintained, kept in place with that firm discipline.”
I blinked, mystified. The last thing I ever wanted was someone’s hands on me in some weird power play. “Punishment, you mean?” I needed clarification.
“Yes. I didn’t understand it myself back then. We were younger, not exactly used to expressing emotions. We were travelling towards war with a ruthless, godless enemy. Hardly the time to discuss the emotional wellbeing of another man. And that’s what he was, another man, not a person who had emotions to protect. I didn’t think he could love the way a woman would but Ghaalib taught me that love is felt the same by men and women.”
I remained silent on the subject, I’d never had any trouble understanding men and women loved the same, whatever combination of genitals were involved, but I was a minstrel and sang about love – not a warrior.
“Alright, you didn’t understand then, but do you now?” I asked.
He opened his eyes, his expression tragic. “Yes.”
“Do you need to give him that? Me that?”
Robin shook his head. “Not from you. I don’t need it from you.”
“Nice evasion, Robin, answer the question.” He looked down. Answer enough. “Is this why he is forced to do what the king orders him?”
Robin nodded. “Yes, I think so. He’s the perfect weapon if someone orders him to do something. The king is the ultimate authority. If Guy has subsumed his emotional needs he’ll be functioning like a hunting dog obeying his master. He won’t be able to help himself.”
“What if you gave him the authority he needs?” I asked.
Robin blinked, not hiding his shock from me. “Will, that’s a very dangerous game to play. He’s a dangerous man and I cannot lose you. The connection you have to this world is a vital tether to help me cope. I’m not willing to break Guy of Gisborne again. I cannot be responsible for such a thing.”
I stroked Robin’s chest. “If he needs you…”
“No, Will. I cannot lose you and you have no idea what you are asking. You know enough now to understand Guy and I will not be adding more fuel to the fire of his misery.” The hardness in Robin’s voice warned me to back off, so I did, for the moment, but a plan started to form in my mind. We needed Guy of Gisborne and I couldn’t help but want to make him need us.
THE RELIEF OF ROBIN’S return to the camp overwhelmed any anger the others felt at his abandonment. Marion clung to him for a moment, slapped him hard – which I wished I’d done – then forgave him. Knowing Marion she’d have more to say on the matter but Tuck managed to prevent her temper from driving Robin off again. I remained quiet, watching and waiting for Robin to need me but of course he didn’t, not until much later that evening.
We were sat around the fire in the cave, sharing the last meal of the day, roasted venison again, and planning another attack.
“I still think it’s too dangerous with Marion here,” John said. “We are good, Robin, but Marion’s right, we need a new spy in the keep, we need information and without it we’ll be even more vulnerable than usual. I know you want to strike hard, and in many ways I agree, if this drags through the hardest part of the winter more people will suffer, but without the information the Lady Marion and Alan gave us, we’re blind. The sheriff now has highly trained men in his personal army, not just local thugs on the payroll.”
“I can go to Nottingham and get information,” I said into the silence.
“No,” Robin said. “It’s too dangerous.”
“No more so than it was before,” I said.
“But they are beginning to know who you are,” he said. I’d noticed he’d spent the entire day avoiding mentioning Guy’s threat to us, the man’s appearance in our lives didn’t seem important to mention to the rest of the outlaws – or his sister. “No, Will. I can’t go with you, it’s too dangerous and you are not going alone.” It sounded like Robin wasn’t expecting an argument.
“He’s more than capable of looking after himself, Robin,” Marion said from the other side of the fire. Over the week she’d been with us the lady of Nottingham began to dissolve into the Lord of Huntingdon. She wore her hair in the Saxon way, unbraided and uncovered, charms woven into its long tresses that my brother made for her. I sat back and let Marion fight for me, she would be more than able to back Robin into a corner.
“It’s far too dangerous and Will’s too valuable to lose to a stupid mistake,” Robin said as if that would close the subject.
“Will is not stupid. He can protect himself. You should trust him. I did and he proved himself time and again. He’d be perfect for recruiting someone else to our cause. He can charm the birds, you know that.” Her not so subtle dig at him made Robin glower at her but he couldn’t argue with the logic.
“Fine, but I’m going as well,” he stated.
I frowned. It would make the plan more complicated but I could work with it if I had no choice. “You’re very noticeable,” I said.
“I can hide if necessary,” Robin said. “And where do you think I’ve been for the last week? I’m not quite as useless as you seem to think.”
To be perfectly honest I had no idea where Robin had been that week, when I tried to ask he closed me down and made Alviva show him the new goat pens. The argument continued. No one liked the idea of Robin going but he remained firm. I could only gather information if Robin came with me for protection. Once we’d found a way to make it work, Robin rose and held out his hand for me.
“Bed, you made our home while I was away. It’s time to use it.”
I glanced at Tuck and Marion.
They were too engrossed in each other to worry about me, a wave of relief at their intimacy amused me as Robin led me outside the main cave. We ducked under the hide doorway I’d rigged up and the darkness swallowed us, the roof too thick to allow moonlight to filter through.
Robin grunted as his toes found the fire pit. He fumbled for a bit before a spark of light that he turned into a small flame took hold and the fire began to grow. He remained silent during the process of growing the light and heat in the small space and I watched him with an ever increasing sense of discomfort. When he finished he looked up at me.
“I don’t like being manipulated, Will. I know I must seem like a weak man to you –”
“What? No, how can you say that?” I cut in, kneeling beside him. “If this is about what happened today, don’t presume to think I consider you weak. How could I?”
Robin’s jaw worked, his eyes a stormy blue, shining from the deep shadows of his face. “I’m not a good man, Will. I’ve told you this before. I care a great deal about you, I came back for you. I don’t like being manipulated into using Guy. I know he can be useful but you are not to
go near him. The man’s unstable, I can handle him, but he’ll eat you alive. The only reason he didn’t kill you today is because I intervened and he cares about me but that won’t keep you safe again.”
The heat in my face did more to warm me than the small fire. “That obvious, huh?”
“Yes, Will, that obvious. You and Marion might like to think you have me pinned down between you but you don’t and I won’t be used.”
Mortification twisted my gut. “Sorry, I just want to help. To make this better. If Guy is on our side –”
“The king will send an entire army, not half a dozen good quality knights, if Guy joins us. We can cope with him where he is, we can move our people, the vulnerable ones, away from here, build a better fortress on the escarpment so we have a chance to escape when we force Guy to act against us, but provoke him into something rash and we’ll have far worse to deal with.”
“I guess you know best.”
Robin chuckled. “Glad you think so, cheeky bastard.”
“Am I forgiven?” I asked.
A hand gripped my arm and yanked me close to his hard body. “I’ve missed you,” Robin growled into my neck. His rough jaw and nips against my soft skin sent shivers all over my body and my cock woke with alarming speed. I whined as he sucked at my neck.
“We have more privacy,” I managed to mumble.
“We do,” he breathed over my skin.
“I’m ready, Robin. I want you. I want you inside me,” I said, pulling at his clothing.
This time Robin shuddered and a low moan escaped his control. “Will, if we do this, there’s a point where I can’t stop. I’ve wanted you for so long. I’m not sure I can be trusted to be the better man, the man you deserve.”
At this point I didn’t want whatever man he was talking about. I just wanted Robin to fuck me but the niggle in my head would not let me stop thinking about Guy no matter how distracting Robin’s hands were becoming. “We could turn him, Robin. We could offer what he needs…”
“Shut up, Will. It’s not happening.” Robin lifted me off the reed covered ground and onto the bed I’d built. The structure groaned under the weight of us both for the first time but the mattress was soft under my back.
Men of Sherwood (A Rogue's Tale Book 1) Page 19