Will in Scarlet

by Matthew Cody

  A gloved hand grabbed her by the collar and hauled her to her feet. A harsh voice whispered in her ear, “Come with me!” and she was dragged off down the hall, away from the rest of the scattering servants.

  Much wouldn’t be taken prisoner. With a flick of her wrist, she produced a knife, and though she still couldn’t see well, the guard was holding her close enough that she didn’t need to. She flashed the knife in front of his face, just inches from his eyes.

  “Hey! Hey! Much, it’s me!”

  The hand let go of her collar.

  With her free hand, Much wiped at her eyes, her vision clearing enough to get a good look at the face she was about to stab. It was Will Scarlet beneath that helm.

  She lowered the knife. Just a bit.

  “Where are the others?” she asked.

  Will glanced worriedly at the blade.

  “I don’t know! We got separated.” His eyes drifted from the knife to her angry, accusing eyes. “What are you doing here?”

  Much hid the knife away in her belt.

  “You lot are not my masters! Just because you tell me to stay behind doesn’t mean I have to do it. The Merry Men are free men!”

  Will sighed heavily.

  “You’re a stupid boy who’s going to get himself killed.”

  Much seriously considered drawing the knife again.

  “You are calling me a stupid boy? Have you caught a glimpse of yourself in a mirror recently, Will Scarlet?”

  The argument ended there, though, as the sounds of commotion drew nearer. This time the voices were accompanied by the clanging of armor and booted feet running. Guards were approaching.

  “Come on,” said Will. “This way.”

  He started down the hall, and Much decided to follow. He knew the castle, and if he intended to hand her over to the guards, he could’ve simply stayed put.

  “We can’t reach the secret passage,” he said as they went. “These floors are thick with guards by now, but there’s another way. A slop gate that Milo and I used when Nan was …”

  He started to say something more but seemed to think better of it. For a moment, just a moment, the stern-faced young man who constantly ground his teeth at the world around him had disappeared. In his place had been a boy. A lonely boy.

  But he was gone as quickly as he’d appeared, and Much found herself blushing. She knew what it was like to hold on to a disguise and how it must feel to drop it like that, accidentally. It must feel like a violation. She was embarrassed for him, and for herself, too. It was a shame to find you were the kind of person who needed secrets.

  The two of them continued on, pausing now and again to listen for footsteps. They were near the castle’s foundation now, where the wooden walls gave way to stone. The air here had a damp coolness about it, and the musty smell of earth and rock. Was he taking her down to the treasure room after all?

  “We weren’t supposed to come down here,” Will was saying, almost to himself, “because it was too close to the cells. But there’s a slop gate down here that no one uses much anymore. Not big enough for a grown man in armor to fit through, but it’ll suit you and me.”

  Much nodded. She wondered who Will was talking about when he said we. This Milo person he’d let slip? Was he a brother? Friend? And what had become of him now that Sir Guy of Gisborne was lord and master here? The Horse Knight had a wicked reputation even among criminals.

  Will put his finger to his lips as they neared what looked like a row of cells. As quietly as possible, they snuck past the hall. An empty stool and pee bucket stood in a corner. The jailer was missing.

  “Must’ve gone to see what the alarm is about,” said Will. “We’re lucky we can—”

  Will was cut off by a low moan echoing from the farthest cell. It was haunting, pained. The sound of suffering.

  “What was …” Will let his words trail off as he began approaching the cell.

  “Will!” Much whispered. “What are you doing? We don’t have time!”

  But he ignored her as he looked into the cell door’s grated window.

  “I need light!” he said, pointing at a torch on the wall behind her.

  “Will!” Much said.

  “Light!” he suddenly shouted. If she didn’t do as he asked, he was likely to lead the entire castle-guard down here to them.

  Much took the torch from its sconce and held it out to him. She just hoped he saw whatever it was he needed to see quickly.

  “Oh Lord,” Will breathed as he peered into the cell.

  Will grabbed the cell door’s handle, but it was locked. He cursed and pulled on it with all his strength, but it wouldn’t budge.

  “The jailer must have the key,” he said, and started back up the way they’d come.

  “Are you mad?” asked Much. “Where are you going?”

  “To find the jailer,” answered Will.

  “You’ll get caught! You can’t go back up there.…”

  Will spun around, and his face was so full of fury that Much reflexively took a step backward.

  “I have to get into that cell!” he said. “Go if you want to. The slop gate is that way.”

  Then he turned and started back up again.

  “Wait!” said Much. “Will, just wait a moment!”

  Much turned and knelt next to the door. She searched her belt pouch for an oilcloth. Inside the cloth was a very special set of tools.

  “Now I need the light,” she said.

  Will looked at her for a second in confusion, then brought the torch near.

  “Wat Crabstaff may be an ignorant lout and a snitch,” she said, fitting a curved loop of wire into the lock. “But he’s the best lockpick in Nottinghamshire. And he’s been teaching me a thing or two.…”

  Much had only ever practiced on lockboxes and merchants’ chests. That’s really all they had call for in Sherwood. But the basic mechanics of picking a lock, any lock, were the same. Trick the tumblers with a wire. Listen for just the right sort of click and …

  “There,” she said, smiling. That was impressive, even she had to admit. “It’s open.”

  Will looked dubious, but when he tried, the latch turned and the door swung open on squeaking, protesting hinges. Much glanced over her shoulder worriedly.

  “I hope nobody heard that,” she said.

  “Here,” said Will, handing her the torch. “I need you to hold this for me.”

  Much followed him into the cell and was at once assaulted by the smell. It smelled of human waste and something else. Death.

  In one corner lay a man on a straw mat. He was old, his once-white beard stained yellow and filthy. His skin shone a sickly green in the torchlight and hung loosely on his bones. His brow was beaded in feverish sweat.

  Will gasped aloud when he saw him, but he didn’t rush over to him right away. Instead, he walked slowly, as if in a daze. As if he didn’t quite believe what he was seeing.

  Much knew what they were seeing. They were seeing a dying man.

  When Will reached the mat, he took the man’s hand in his.

  “Osbert,” he said. “Osbert, it’s me. It’s Will.”

  This Osbert opened his eyes and squinted up at Will. For a moment, he didn’t seem to recognize him, but then a small smile appeared on his lips.

  “Well … you are a sneaky one, aren’t you?” he asked, his voice little more than a croak.

  “Yes,” answered Will with something between a chuckle and a sob. “And I’m getting you out of here. I’m rescuing you.”

  Osbert shook his head.

  “I’m not … up for traveling, young lord.”

  The old man lifted a shaking finger and pointed to his feet. A dirty cloth covered his legs, but even in the dim torchlight Much could tell that the angles were all wrong. She lifted the sheet and saw that his legs were broken in several places, and the wounds smelled of rot. He didn’t have long to live.

  “After Sir Guy took your father’s castle,” the old man said, struggling for breath
, “he assembled all the men before him to swear fealty at swordpoint. Coward that he was … he left our hands in manacles.”

  Osbert took a moment to rest.

  “But he left our legs free, so you know what old Osbert did?” he asked.

  Will shook his head. “What?”

  “I kicked him in the balls!”

  Osbert let out a wet laugh.

  “Then he did this,” said Osbert, pointing again at his ruined legs. “But it was worth it.”

  “If you can’t walk,” said Will, “we’ll carry you.”

  “I can’t …”

  “Much,” said Will. “Help me.”

  “Will,” said Much. “He won’t make it.”

  “Please,” he said. He didn’t shout this time, or threaten. He just begged her, his voice breaking, his eyes brimming with tears.

  “Okay,” she said. “Get your arms under his shoulder. I’ll get the other one.”

  Will tried moving him, but the old man cried out in pain.

  “William Shackley,” he said, pulling away with as much strength as he could muster. “I don’t know how you got here, but the one thing that allows me to die in peace is knowing you are free.…”

  He pulled Will closer to him, his hands on the boy’s face.

  “I swore an oath to serve your father. I swore an oath to serve you. I won’t have you caught on account of a dying old man!”

  “I can’t leave you here!”

  “You will, my lord. For your father. For your family, for your uncle’s memory, you will.”

  Will looked around the room, as if help would magically appear. Much kept her eye on the door. They were running out of time.

  “I’ll find Guy,” said Will. “I’ll not leave until I have his head!”

  “Guy’s gone,” said Osbert. “He rode off on some errand of Prince John’s. Can always tell when he’s left because the jailer dips into the wine … and he never shares.”

  Will’s whole body seemed to crumple. Whatever tent pole of strength had kept him going thus far had broken with this news.

  “Leave me, lad,” said Osbert. “I’ll not last the day anyhow, but you can keep fighting.… Please, Will.”

  Will didn’t move. Didn’t make a sound. So Much stepped forward and placed a hand on his shoulder.

  “Will, he’s right,” she said. “We need to go. Now.”

  Will didn’t answer, but he stood.

  “Leave me a knife,” said Osbert. “The jailer is a spiteful piece of work, as well as a selfish drinker. I’d like to get one last bit of payback before I die.”

  “I’ll leave you two,” said Much, and she placed a pair of knives into his hands. “You’re a tough old man.”

  “Thank you, girl,” he said.

  Much’s breath caught in her throat. What did he just call her? She glanced quickly at Will, but if he heard, he didn’t show it. He seemed lost in his own black thoughts.

  As they turned to go, Will looked back at him.

  “May heaven open its gates to you, Sir Osbert the Bold,” he said. “Finest knight I’ve ever known.”

  Osbert nodded. “Long live Lord William Shackley. Wolfslayer.”

  With that, the old man’s head fell back against the mat, his breath coming in labored gasps. He was right—he wouldn’t last through the night. But they’d not live that long if they didn’t leave soon.

  Will led the way out without saying another word. The slop gate was indeed big enough for them to shimmy through, though Will had a harder time of it. It deposited them rather roughly outside the castle onto a slope filthy with rotten garbage and emptied chamber pots. But they were outside, in the night air, where Much could see the stars again.

  As they made their way back toward the hidden grove and the horses, Much thought about all she’d heard. Lord William Shackley. Wolfslayer.

  The boy walking next to her wasn’t some steward’s son, nor was he a thief. He was the rightful heir to Shackley Castle, and Sir Guy had stolen it from him.

  She now understood perfectly why he’d brought them there. Vengeance. A blood quest he’d been denied.

  With this revelation, she felt for him, even sympathized with him. Sir Guy had stolen everything from him. But with this new knowledge, Much also feared Will. He’d put them all in harm’s way to try to get his revenge, and John and Rob might still be in peril. She knew from experience that someone who’d lost everything was capable of anything.

  At least one of her instincts about him had been right—Will Scarlet was trouble.

  FOURTEEN

  William Shackley is dead.

  —WILL SCARLET

  Guy was still alive. Osbert was dying, if not dead already. And for the second time, Will was fleeing from his own castle. Only this time he’d escaped through a garbage hatch.

  Wolfslayer. Failure. Coward.

  As he and Much trudged through the muddy field back to their hidden horses, Will tried to remember Osbert as he once was—laughing, quick to anger, full of life. He didn’t want his last memory of Osbert to be of him broken and dying. The look of hope in his eyes when he’d recognized Will was a cruel joke. The old knight expected him to go on to do great things, and perhaps it was for the best that Osbert would die before he could realize his disappointment.

  Will had missed his opportunity to kill Sir Guy because of bad luck. It didn’t matter that there was no way he could’ve known that the Horse Knight was away; he’d still failed.

  “So that old man was a knight of your … father’s? Lord Shackley?”

  Much’s voice startled Will out of his morose thoughts.

  “Hmm? Oh.”

  Of course. Everything Osbert had said in that cell exposed the truth about Will’s family and his own identity. And Much had heard every word.

  “He was … not himself,” said Will. “You saw him. He thought you were a girl. Delusional.”

  Much wouldn’t look at him. Funny that the boy should be so easily bothered by this. He was so small and delicately featured that this couldn’t have been the first time he’d been mistaken for a girl.

  “But the way you answered him,” said Much. “Are you delusional, too?”

  Will started to protest but stopped. He’d been in trouble enough times in his life to know when he was caught.

  “Are you going to tell the others?” he asked.

  “Remember what I told you before? About not being so important that you’d be trouble? Well, you are most certainly trouble.”

  “I know.”

  “Where are your parents now? They say the lord of Shackley was killed.…”

  “That was my uncle Geoff,” said Will. “My parents are alive, at least I think they are, but they are both … overseas.”

  His mother, he dared to hope, was safely with her family in France. She would be heartsick with worry, but at least she was safe. His father was a different story. Since they’d fled the castle, there’d been no word of King Richard’s captivity. The best Will could assume was that his father was still imprisoned with the missing king. It was a bitter thing when the best a boy could wish was for his parent to be in chains, but better in chains than suffer Geoff’s fate.

  It was almost more pain than he could bear, and so he kept it buried deep down in an ugly, dark place within himself, bound up tightly with wire and shackled to his need for vengeance. He had to find Sir Guy. He had to find another way.

  “William Shackley is dead,” said Will. “I’m Will Scarlet now. I don’t know if you can understand this, but … I had to become someone else. I had to.”

  Much stared at him for a long time. At last the boy said, “I understand. I do. But then why are you obsessed with William Shackley’s unfinished business? You could’ve gotten us killed trying to get revenge on Sir Guy. John and Rob might actually be dead, for all we know.…”

  “They’re alive,” said Will. “Rob said they were leaving.”

  “Maybe, but they could’ve been killed looking for your treasure. A t
reasure that doesn’t exist! You lied to us, Will!”

  Will took a sudden step toward Much, his anger lit like dry tinder in his breast, and his hands balled up into fists before he could stop himself.

  “I lied to my captors!” he said. “Or did you forget that I’m your prisoner?”

  “I saved your life,” said Much.

  “Only to make me more valuable to ransom.”

  “How dare—”

  “You weren’t nursing me back to health; you were just tending to the money.”

  Will didn’t even see the blow coming, but one minute he was standing over Much with a finger in the boy’s face and the next he’d been punched in the jaw. A solid right hook. So Will returned the favor. He landed a blow across the lad’s cheek. He might’ve even given him a black eye.

  Much staggered backward as Will shook the sting out of his knuckles. That was settled, then. Lesson taught. The boy might be smaller and younger than he, but Will wasn’t going to stand here and let him pummel—

  All at once Much was on him like a wildcat. Hissing and hitting and biting—biting, for God’s sake!—as he tackled Will to the ground. Even though Will was larger and stronger, he couldn’t get a grip on the boy long enough to peel him off.

  “Gah! Stop it! Leave off!” Will cried.

  “Well, well, well,” said a voice in return, but not Much’s. A man’s voice.

  Will stopped struggling, and Much leaped off him, the boy’s hands going for his knife.

  Will looked up and saw Stout standing there, grinning.

  “Didn’t mean to interrupt your play-fighting,” he said.

  The outlaw had changed out of his uniform disguise and back into his own gear. Mace in one hand, a sack slung over his shoulder.

  “Got to give our young bastard here credit,” said Stout. “Tonight was a bounty to remember!”

  Will stood up and tentatively examined his swelling lip with his fingers. His ear was bleeding, too, from a number of teeth marks.

  “What are you talking about, Stout?” he asked.

  “There was no treasure, you dolt,” added Much.

  “Oh ho!” said Stout. “Really, now? Then what’s this?”

  He tugged at the sack and out fell a sturdy-looking lockbox. It was the one Crooked had been holding at the start of the fight.