by Sue Wilson
The Sheriff rounded on Gisborne. "Your cowardice has cost us this one. Cowardice!" he repeated, flinging the word at Gisborne as if it were a curse upon him. "When did it happen, Cousin? When did you turn? Was it that day? Or sometime later, when you realized what this lawless shire would make of both of us?"
He fixed Gisborne with a disbelieving stare, as if he did not know the man or recognize what he had become. "You have not learned, have you, Sir Gisborne, knight of the realm? Fear is not the enemy. Fear makes you strong. Try encountering it one day, instead of fleeing. Who can tell? Perhaps, put to the test, your courage will return. Until then, you are more a menace to me than the sum of Locksley's men."
"Cousin-"
"Enough!" Nottingham descended the dais and cut a swath through servants and soldiers to the arched entrance of the hall. "Have my horse saddled and ready to ride at first light. And alert my guard. I'll lead the troops tomorrow, turn some of these yellow-bellied fools into men. Mark my words, Gisborne. I sent you after a pathetic little pickpocket? I'll have him and that hooded serpent in my custody by nightfall. You can busy yourself here, preparing the gallows."
He turned to leave.
"And the woman who aided them?" Gisborne called out.
"She worries you, does she? Somehow, Cousin, I am not surprised." He smiled silkily. "Do not fear. Should I come across her in my travels, I'll do what you should have done to start with."
Gisborne frowned, confused, speechless.
"Swyve her, and be done with it!"
~*~
It was madness, of course, and the Sheriff knew it the moment he boasted his intent to Gisborne. He was the Lord High Sheriff of Nottingham, a post he had paid for dearly and earned thrice over. The day had long since passed when he derived any satisfaction from performing the menial work of a common soldier, work he preferred to leave to Gisborne and his troops.
Yet tatters of suppressed visions had tortured Nottingham throughout the night, and no amount of wretched tossing upon his bed, no amount of ale, not even the nameless wench whose supple body he held close had been enough to blur his gray-edged dreams. Be it madness or no, he had risen at dawn, lashed his rage about him like armor, and set forth wordlessly on his quest, while Gisborne-
Damn the man for the insidious creature he was! Gisborne was back at Nottingham Castle, undoubtedly warming himself with furs and some wench from the kitchen, while he was here in a watery mist that saturated his surcoat and drizzled between the links of his mail coif and hauberk.
Merde! Had he actually sought an appointment in this loathsome place?
Surrounding him, Sherwood was a vast sea of undulating green hills that crested in waves of birch and oak, in whose troughs ran a myriad of rock-strewn streams. To any other soul, the view would be majestic: an ancient forest, awesome in its quiet splendor, a mystical force of nature to be revered. To Nottingham, there was no hell more certain than the leagues of woodland that lapped at the edges of his domain.
Even before his arrival, the place crawled with dissident taxpayers-turned-highwaymen, who honed their skills in banditry on unsuspecting travelers. Indeed, Nottingham Castle owed its very existence to the need to protect the northern trade routes from such thieves.
The Norman fortress cut an imposing presence, its lime-washed stone rising like a ghostly apparition from sandstone heights along the River Trent. But it was, the Sheriff knew, merely a facade of order. His authority, though the king himself conferred it upon him, ended at Sherwood's tree line.
The murderous brigands who lived in the forest caves or dwelt among the towering oaks had been there, waiting on him, when the thick gold chain of office was still an unfamiliar weight across his chest. And, damn them all, they were there still, despite his best efforts to rake the assortment of criminals from Sherwood's mossy floor.
It was disastrous enough that the expanse of woodland invading his shire was purportedly haunted. There was enough of the old religion left that even his best men-even Guy, it would seem-hesitated to visit Sherwood. Lately, however, there was a nuisance far more substantial than rumored specters: one Robert of Locksley, misguided son of the Earl of Huntingdon, misguided Crusader, and now, to hear the reports, misguided organizer of thieves.
The Sheriff had known Robert only briefly-a somewhat arrogant youth, as boys were wont to be at his age, at odds with his father and sparing no amount of embarrassing vocal protest to make their differences known. Two years under the Saracen sun and another in the Infidel's prison had only hardened the young man. He was no longer the same brash boy who had left England bound for the Holy Land with the fiery ideals of youth, but a veteran of violence, seasoned in the dry heat of Acre's sands. He had seen his beloved king slay women and children, had, himself, silenced the cries of "Allah, be merciful!" in God's name. Now he had returned from that fruitless war and even his father did not know him, or the thing he had become.
The Sheriff could name it easily enough, for the word was simple, its meaning not difficult to comprehend. The earl's son was an outlaw, and had, for his efforts, acquired a price on his noble head.
Locksley had done what the Sheriff believed to be impossible. He had gathered together a disenchanted throng of fugitives, men who swore loyalty to no one save themselves, and won their allegiance. He had taken a rabble of robbers, pickpockets, and runaway serfs and made of them an efficient assembly of thieves.
The Sheriff was never sure with which promises Locksley tempted and bound his cohorts, whether it was the reward of a waylaid chest of silver or the feel of a longbow, and power, in hands that had known only the plow.
Regardless, Locksley and his men were inarguably dangerous. Now there was no guaranteeing safe passage through Sherwood, not even with an armed guard-and Nottingham had lost the men to prove it. The thieves spared no one, not noble citizen, not wagon of tax moneys en route to London. For pity's sake, they were even robbing the Church! Abbot Seward had just this week made grievance of the loss of a cart bearing two casks of the abbey's finest ale and an assortment of precious relics.
Nottingham's soldiers proved incompetent to overcome either Locksley or their fear of Sherwood's evil spirits. The thieves had earned a self-made amnesty, and Sherwood a reputation as the one area where the Sheriff was powerless to impose justice.
He glanced around uneasily, his vitals gnawing with suspicion at each stirring of shadow-dappled leaves. The lush growth of the forest had been pushed back to form a well-trod route, but there was not a stretch of road that the wilderness did not threaten to vanquish. Night was falling, and whatever tenuous connection to civilization Sherwood could claim had been severed hours ago.
Fingers of fog curled around the trees and beckoned him further into the wood's depths. The Sheriff peered into the shifting mists and leaned forward in his saddle, urging his horse ahead. The trail had narrowed, and his men were forced to ride single-file along the overgrown footpath. The day's last pale light filtered eerily through the dense stand of trees. Behind him, the rear guard was swallowed by the vapor that threaded up from the forest floor. The carpet of decaying leaves muffled even the sounds of shod hooves.
Nottingham considered turning back. The forest, despite its renown as a supposed haunt for ghosts and haven for Hood's followers, offered evidence of neither. His pursuit had proved useless, nothing but a too-damp tour of Richard's royal hunting grounds, abandoned by the king, as Richard had, indeed, abandoned all of England.
If they reversed course now, it was possible to make the inn at Blidworth by Compline. He could appease his men with a hearty meal and an evening of wagering among themselves who would bed the innkeeper's poxy daughter. They would forget Sherwood and why they had come.
But would Gisborne? And, more importantly, would he? Nottingham felt unease crawl down his spine. To have been driven into Sherwood by his own obsession without exacting some price in vengeance was unthinkable. To return home without an example of how justice was served in his shire would be humiliating.
Mist blanketed him in cold moisture. The sun had faded from sight and with it, the last light and warmth of day. It was impossible to see more than a few paces ahead, and then what he saw, or thought he saw, shimmered with the distortion of fine drizzle and twilight's unearthly color. Beneath his armor, his skin felt slick with rain and sweat.
"Place is filled with Saxon spirits!" a soldier muttered under his breath, as if the Sheriff were deaf to his words as well as to reason.
"God's blood, let's leave!"
Nottingham's lips tightened. It was like this then, he remembered. The fog, like thick smoke. An impenetrable vapor blinding them with drifts and coils of whiteness. His party, unable to see or move. Their voices and random wood-sounds, echoing back...then nothing.
A preternatural silence.
Sharply, his mind countered the recollection, consigned it to some dim part of his memory. The Sheriff swiped at his face and rubbed his bleary eyes. He found himself in a clearing, and brought his horse to a halt. Christ! He had let this journey continue too long. Nothing more to do than bed down for the night and let this mad mingling of air and water pass. Not the inn, and no ale or female bellywarmer to be certain, but he was a soldier, and not so long from the days of muddy bivouacs that he'd forgotten, though certainly he had tried.
"Here!" he signaled.
Perhaps they could procure a deer, while away the night with a haunch of roasted venison and regale one another with battle tales grown more glorious over time. Perhaps a fire would chase away the cold that had settled in the pit of his stomach.
He heard the jangle of reins and armor as men dismounted behind him. There were grunts of relief, curses of disappointment, familiar welcome sounds.
Beneath him, Chimera, his black warhorse, stepped backward, tossed his head, and snorted, nostrils flaring. The Sheriff reined him in, guiding the stallion with the steady pressure of his knees and thighs along the horse's sides. Tension streaked from the destrier to the Sheriff as if the pair was one, and Nottingham felt a sting of alarm race through his limbs. The animal knew, was bred and trained to know. The air was filled with more than mist. It reeked of alien scent.
Swiftly, he drew his sword, the metallic screech against the scabbard silencing the hubbub of men and horses. From a hedge of hawthorn, a covey of quail rose, shattering the quiet with squawking and the drum of beating wings. Through the clamor, he heard another sound, more ominous-the sound his ears would never forget: the warning whistle of air parting.
A mounted soldier next to him slumped forward, an arrow shaft vibrating from impact, embedded in his back.
Trained for war, the Sheriff's horse responded immediately to the ambush, circling tightly as Nottingham squinted through the miasma of fog.
"Draw on them, damn you!" he yelled, sweeping his sword in a wide arc through the air to rally his men. It was in vain, he knew; his sword was impotent against English longbows. An unseen enemy loosed their arrows from a distance, while his soldiers still struggled to winch crossbows.
The hum of arrows filled the air. Soldiers scrambled to their frightened mounts, only to have their horses cut from under them. A few arrows skidded harmlessly across the clearing. Far more found their marks with solid, precise thumps. A guardsman clutched his chest, another his belly.
The Sheriff knew retaliation was impossible, yet he heard himself call to his troops, his voice oddly resounding in his ears. He made a final effort to direct his mount away from the clearing, to find means to retreat along the narrow trail clogged with bodies and frightened horses. His animal neighed and reared in terror as an arrow furrowed through its shoulder. Nottingham molded himself to the stallion's back, ducking branches and arrows as he tried to calm the wild beast.
And then he saw. A human blur of faded green and brown among the leaves, longbow raised. As if events were playing themselves out in slower time, he saw the weapon poised, arrow nocked and loosed, every detail steel-sharp in his mind. He was not even surprised when he felt the hot strike in his side, only dazed, wondering what phlegmatic curse prevented him from dodging the arrow or crying out in pain.
His wounded horse reared again, threatening to unseat him. Disoriented, he saw and heard the pandemonium of defeat: animals tearing at the ground; men shouting, moaning, some, he was certain, fleeing the scene of chaos in panic.
"Locksley!" he cried out. "Show yourself!" The demand sounded weak, as if his voice knew what his mind had yet to reckon. His head swam with the echoes of confused shouting and vertigo. He felt himself tumbling backward as the reins slid through fingers grown numb, and he waited for the ground to rush up to him. Disgust at his mistakes swept through him.
The same oversights, repeated. Too few men...clumsy crossbows. Impossible even to see the enemy in this ghastly fog...impossible to know-
His head struck the ground, and he felt the bite of mail at his temple as blood and mud spattered his face. Arrows swarmed above him, and far away, as if the sound were lost in the mist, he heard the tumult of soldiers scattering in disorganized retreat, the screams of men and horses dying.
His vision blurred red and yet he could not raise his hand to wipe the blood from his eyes. The Sheriff lay very still, remarking how little pain he felt, how the ache of remembrance was far, far worse. He sobbed once, and prayed incoherently for release from the nightmare, for darkness, for nothingness.
For once, he was blessed. Unconsciousness folded around him.
~*~
He was not sure what roused him. Not light or movement certainly, for the day was spent and the forest was deathly still. No rustle of leaves overhead, no moan or ragged breath below. It was as if the wind itself had been chased away by the tornado of activity and feared to return, though the furor of battle was over.
Nottingham lay without moving, deadened to the patter of rain on his face and the churned black earth soaking through his mail and the quilted padding beneath. His hand felt staked to the ground by the weight of his gauntlet, but he struggled to lift it and touched the gash at his temple.
In an instant, the full range of physical sensation returned and washed through him. He grimaced at the bolt of pain his probing caused, moaned as a more fiery agony emanated from below his left rib. Gritting his teeth, he raised his head a few inches off the forest floor, and looked in the direction of the fire. A feather-tipped arrow protruded from his side. He let his head collapse to the pillow of mud and leaves, swearing at the helplessness and indignity that pierced him as miserably as the woodsman's shaft.
"Locksley!" he brayed at the canopy of trees overhead.
His rival did not answer, and the Sheriff found that the breath it took to roar the man's name was wasted except to renew his anguish. Moonlight reflected off the bodies of his men, strewn across the muddied path like broken poppets. He swallowed a chest full of air and called out again. "Farrington...? Colcourt...? Mallory...?"
None of them stirred, though he could hear the soft whinny of a horse nearby.
He was alone, then? The only survivor? Damn Locksley! The cutthroat. Why had the man not ended his life quickly with the blade instead of leaving him to die slowly, pitifully, on Sherwood's floor?
Nottingham's mind reeled with silent curses, then with determination. "The devil take you, Locksley," he hissed, pushing the pain away. "You have made your last fatal error."
He reached for a thick twig, placed it between his teeth, and bit into the wood. His hand shook as it closed around the arrow, grasping it as close to the skin as possible. He paused, steadying himself, eyes closed. Then with a sharp intake of breath, he snapped the wooden shaft close to the skin of his belly.
The Sheriff felt the tearing of muscle tissue, and the world grayed as he struggled to cling to the edge of consciousness. A warm gush of blood covered his fingers, and he clenched his jaw, willing his senses not to leave him. Bursts of yellow light bloomed and sparkled before his eyes, but he dug his fingers into the tangle of vines at his head and held tightly until the lights faded
and the urge to retch had passed.
Another interval passed-had he slept or merely lain there, lulled by the rhythm of his own breathing?-before he dared move again. He sucked in air, raised himself to one elbow, and rolled to his hands and knees, groaning with the torture of movement. There he waited, head sagging, eyes fixed on the drip of blood from his gut.
Needles of cold sweat pricked his forehead. He needed something to stanch the flow...something...anything...and spied, lying on torn moss and leaves amidst the carnage, a banner emblazoned with the triple horseshoe crest of his office. He crawled to it, tore the silk standard from its staff, and wadded it beneath his hauberk. Then he heard the moan.
Hope surged through his veins. Through the dark, he sensed movement, pushed himself to stand, and hobbled unsteadily over crumpled bodies and discarded weapons to the soldier.
"Morgan?" he said, sinking to knees that no longer braced to hold him.
The crossbowman's chest was a pool of red, and pink froth gathered at the corners of his mouth. Hope died. "Mortal, my lord," the soldier gasped.
"Not while I have breath! There are two of us, Morgan, still alive. By the saints, he has not taken us yet!"
He slid his arm beneath the fallen soldier's back and lifted his head and chest off the ground.
For a moment, Morgan seemed to breathe easier; his ashen face took on the tautness of feigned bravery. "It was him, Sir? Robin of the Hood?"
"And his men." The reply was curt, distracted. The Sheriff's glance fell to the scarlet blood on Morgan's lips, darker with each word.
"So it was them what left us to die. I never saw-"
"You aren't going to die, Morgan," Nottingham interrupted, the words an emphatic order. He thought briefly of his surgeon, wondered which blood-spattered body was his, then surrendered the prospect of any aid close at hand. "There is help," he said aloud, as much to convince himself as the wounded archer. "Somewhere. At the inn? The alewife, perhaps? Think, man! In all of this plagued forest, is there no one-?"