Alan leaned closer. “What about us?”
“Naught for us,” Tuck said.
“Naught?” Scarlet was outraged. “How can there be naught for us?”
“Because we come last,” Robin explained.
“Last! Why last? ’Tis us doing the thieving!”
Tuck began dividing the coins and rings into separate pouches, carefully counting them out.
Robin glanced up. The others all loomed over him wearing various expressions ranging from Will Scarlet’s hostile affrontedness and Alan’s speculative smile. But the minstrel had always been an observer, using what he saw as fodder for his ballads. “Because we are not doing this for ourselves.”
Scarlet was scandalized. “Of course we are!”
“Not first,” Little John told him. “We come last. Marian, Arthur of Brittany, the poor, and then us.”
It did not mollify. “None o’ them are living here with us, are they? I still say we should come first.”
Robin stood. “Will, when your wife was alive, who ate first?”
It baffled Scarlet entirely. “Meggie served me first.”
“Did you eat?”
“I waited for her.” He shrugged. “Only fair.”
“But you might argue that you were more deserving, having worked in the fields all day.”
“Maybe.”
“But you, being a fair man—you have just said so—wished to share the meal with her.”
Scarlet shook his head. “What are you getting at?”
Alan laughed softly. “He’s getting at that we may be more deserving, having worked to steal the money, but ’tis more fair to share it with others first.”
“Will,” Robin said quietly. “We need you. I need you. But you are a free man. You may go, if you prefer.”
“And rob by myself?”
Little John made a sound of derision. “We’re not known through all of England, are we?”
“You are,” Alan observed, smiling cheerily. “The Hathersage Giant.”
The Hathersage Giant shot the minstrel a quelling glance and went on. “You could go down to London if you liked, look for work there. ’Tis a big city; they’d likely not know you at all. No need to be an outlaw there.”
“I am an outlaw. I murdered Norman soldiers. I’ve silver pennies on my head, like a wolf.”
“You were pardoned once,” Robin said. “We all of us were.”
“But King Richard is dead,” Tuck pointed out.
Robin nodded. “So long as John is king in his place, we are outlaws. Yes. But if we aid Arthur, there may be a pardon in it.”
“ ‘May,’ ” Alan emphasized.
“We stole the taxes before with no expectation of a pardon,” Robin observed mildly. He looked at Will. “Are you with us in this?”
Scarlet ducked his head, kicking at leaves as if to excavate each one. When he looked up again, his eyes were less hostile. “They’ll hang you, too, aye?”
“Me?” Robin nodded. “Of course. I am, as you say, an outlaw like the rest of you, groveling in the dirt.”
“Even being an earl’s son.”
He very nearly laughed. “Oh, I imagine it is possible they would do me the honor of chopping off my head with an ax instead of hanging me, but I believe I would still be dead.”
“Well, then.” Will Scarlet nodded. “We’re all wolf’s-heads, aren’t we?”
Much tipped his head back and howled.
Alan sighed. “Thank you, Will. He’ll be doing that for days.”
Robin reached over and planted a hand on Much’s mouth, cutting off the howl. “Birds,” he said sternly. “Not wolves. Birds.” He glanced at Tuck as he released the grinning boy. “I’ll take the pouches with Marian’s taxes, Arthur’s money, and what is meant for the poor, and deliver them to Abraham the Jew.”
Little John was startled. “In Nottingham?”
“They’ll not expect me there,” Robin told him. “Abraham will see to it Marian’s taxes are paid, and that Arthur’s money is sent on and the portion for the poor is distributed.” He received the pouches from Tuck. “When I return, we’ll need to discuss what to do when the sheriff sends the tax shipment. It won’t be for a few weeks yet. But we must be ready.” He hooked the pouches through his belt.
“You’ll be wanting your bow,” Scarlet reminded him as he turned to go.
“No. Too obvious.” He dropped his hand to the sword at his hip. “But I have this. In fact, you all have swords, with thanks to the soldiers we robbed yesterday. I suggest you set about learning how to use them.”
“Swords?” Little John asked doubtfully.
Scarlet nodded. “Lords use swords.”
“Then consider yourselves lords in Sherwood. Lords of Sherwood.” Robin, laughing, made an elegant leg in tribute, then took his leave to fetch his horse.
Behind him, Alan began a song about parfait gentil knights wielding swords on the field of battle, seeking glory and honor and entry into Heaven, even as the others set up a chorus of groans.
“Well,” Robin murmured, striding toward Charlemagne, “somewhat better than wolves.”
Somewhat.
DeLacey, in the inner bailey, was in the midst of assigning a man to report at once should the earl’s steward ride out of Huntington Castle at any time, when Mercardier arrived in a flurry of iron horseshoes ringing on the cobbles. Everything about the mercenary’s tight, jerky motions bespoke his anger; deLacey repressed a smile and prepared to be outraged.
As Mercardier dismounted—he said something in a quick aside to the horseboy—he stripped off his helm and thrust it into the crook of his elbow. His strides were long and militant, sharply clipped in the sound of their mailed tread. One hand gripped the hilt of his sword, as if it needed to be doing something to feel competent.
With carefully measured amazement, deLacey demanded, “What are you doing here?”
Mercardier drew himself up. His mouth was compressed into a taut, angry line, and his color was somewhere between the red of rage and the sweaty pallor of injury. Dark eyes glittered with a feverish intensity; Mercardier, the sheriff realized, was very, very angry.
And hideously embarrassed.
Oh, but this is sweeter than I envisioned. “Yes?” he asked in feigned alarm. “What has happened?”
“Robbery.” It was ground out between clenched teeth.
It played out so well that deLacey was not even remotely at pains to sound genuine; it was all too easy to imagine it real. Because if the taxes had been stolen, it would certainly spell his ruin. He tapped the outrage easily. “The taxes? The taxes?”
Mercardier nodded once.
DeLacey did not shout. He spoke with exceeding gentleness. “Where are my men, Captain?”
“Chasing outlaws.”
He permitted contempt to grace his tone. “Then why are you here? Should you not be out with them? Should you not be doing your duty? The command was yours, Captain. And you did assure me, most assiduously, that the shipment would be safe with you. It was, in fact, why the king sent you: you were the most able man for the job.” With quiet pleasure, he saw the words strike home. “I think I shall send you to inform the king of this travesty.”
The color had completely fled Mercardier’s face. “It is my duty, Lord Sheriff.”
“Your duty, and your downfall! God in Heaven, Captain, but do you realize what this means? This is disastrous!” He wiped a trembling hand over his face. “My God, my God . . . we are both ruined, Captain—both ruined by this!”
“Lord Sheriff—”
“How did this happen? Explain to me how this happened. How this could happen, with you as escort!”
Mercardier drew breath, composed himself, then began in soldierly fashion to report what had occurred. How arrows had sprung out of the trees on either side of the road; how they had been ordered to halt and stand down, or die where they stood; how he had been struck a terrible blow on the head by one of the outlaws. He had roused, he said, to find th
e wagon gone, the soldiers gone, and his horse missing.
“Then you don’t know where the taxes are. You don’t know where my men are.”
Mercardier allowed as how he did not, not with any certainty.
“Who was it?” deLacey snapped. “Did you see anyone you might recognize?”
The hard face did not flinch. “I was not to see many before I was rendered unconscious.”
“Anyone, Mercardier?”
“They wore hoods,” he said briefly. “Six of them. One was quite tall; another remarkably stout. Yet a third was slight and quick, like a boy.”
“And?”
A muscle jumped in the dark-stubbled jaw. “I believe it was the men who rescued the cutpurse.”
He made it statement, not inquiry. “Robert of Locksley.”
The thick neck was unbent, the head unbowed. “My lord.”
DeLacey turned his back on Mercardier. Let the mercenary interpret the motion as outrage, as disgust; but he was hard-pressed not to smile.
And then he heard shouting and the sound of many horses, the rattle of iron-rimmed cartwheels and hooves against the cobbled outer bailey. “Lord Sheriff!”
DeLacey swung sharply back, even as Mercardier turned. Coming through the gates into the inner bailey was a wagon, and mounted soldiers. And Philip de la Barre.
“Lord Sheriff!” The wagon was halted at de la Barre’s gestured order. “We have the taxes, my lord!”
“You have them?” DeLacey sprinted toward the wagon. “God in Heaven, swear it, de la Barre!”
“We have them. I swear it.” De la Barre reached down to the wagon, gestured for one of the small chests to be handed up, and carried it to the sheriff. He leaned down from the saddle. “There, my lord. Will you be certain of it?”
As Mercardier came up, deLacey unhooked the latch and lifted back the lid. Inside lay a pile of coins spilled from their careful stacks. He looked hard at the mercenary, then displayed the contents. “And so we are redeemed.”
White-faced, Mercardier nodded once.
“Did you see them, Philip?”
“Not all of them, I regret, not to attach names; they know the forest well, my lord—better than we, I am ashamed to confess. But the one who mattered, yes: ’twas Locksley, my lord.”
“You captured none of them?”
“My concern was for the taxes. I did dispatch four men to hunt the outlaws in the forest and, if possible, come back with their location. But the rest of us returned so as to safeguard the wagon.”
“Well done.” Satisfied, deLacey closed and latched the lid, then handed the small chest back to de la Barre. “Thank you, Philip. You have saved us all.” He flicked a glance at Mercardier, then looked back at his castellan. “Have the wagon unloaded and the chests placed back in the dungeon cell. I think it best that we do not immediately send the shipment off again; why tempt fate a second time? It is early yet in any event; we shall wait a few weeks.” He turned now to Mercardier. “Captain, you will forgive me, I am sure, if I do not ask you to oversee the transfer. You have been injured, that is plain to see, and should rest.”
Mercardier, clutching his helm in rigid fingers, jaw muscles jumping, inclined his head.
“And now, if you will excuse me, I must contemplate how best to capture Locksley and his men.” DeLacey turned on his heel and departed.
Marian, after supper, wandered listlessly up the stairs to the room under the eaves. Her bundle was mostly finished; she added a handful of items to it, then tied it up into a pack with rope and leather thongs. Still listless, she lay down on the bed, propped her head upon the bundle, and thought about Ravenskeep as the sun went down. About Robin. About the others: Tuck, Much, Scarlet, Alan, and Little John. About men whom she admired—and the one man she loved—but who would nonetheless be hanged if captured.
She could not bear the idea of losing the manor. But there was something far more important to her than lands and a hall. Something for which she had been willing to trade Ravenskeep to the sheriff, and would again.
Marian closed her eyes. Put both hands over her face, shutting out the sunset, hiding in self-imposed darkness, and said her prayers. “Don’t let them die. Don’t let any of them die. Don’t ever let them be caught.” And then, very softly, “Please.”
Forty-One
He found the weight oppressive. Attempts to dislodge it failed. He lay trapped, unable to move, breathing painfully.
“My lord?”
That voice. Ralph? He opened his eyes. Indeed. Ralph.
“My lord.” Ralph bent down over the edge of the bed. “My lord, if you please—shall I go and fetch your son?”
His son. He had three, did he not?
“May I go and fetch Robert, my lord?”
Ah. That son. The youngest. The weakest.
“My lord. Can you hear me?”
There was nothing wrong with his ears.
“My lord, I think he should like to see you.”
He closed his eyes again.
“Please, my lord. May I go?”
He had no strength for speaking.
“My lord . . . you may dismiss me, if you like, but I am going to fetch Robin home.”
Robin? Oh. Robert. The youngest. The weakest. The one his wife had ruined.
“Forgive me, my lord.”
The door shut behind Ralph.
DeLacey was smiling broadly when Philip de la Barre came into the hall, passing a small, stooped man on his way out. The castellan glanced at the elderly man casually, frowned briefly, then approached the dais as deLacey motioned him forward.
“Who was that, my lord? Do I know him?”
The sheriff raised his brows. “Has it become my business to be aware of whom you know?”
De la Barre had the grace to blush. “No, my lord. My apologies.”
“I daresay if you have borrowed money from the Jews, you may well know him. He is a money-lender. Just now, a very unhappy money-lender; his mission has failed.” He straightened in the chair, noting how the other’s color deepened yet again; perhaps he had borrowed money from the Jews. So many Christians did. “Now, Philip, what business have we?”
“I have received word that the steward has left Huntington Castle, my lord.”
DeLacey laughed. “Splendid news!” He glanced at the hour candle burning upon the table where he conducted the business of the shire, then looked again at de la Barre. “It will take time for him to ride all the way to Ravenskeep, and for Marian to lead him to Locksley. Give it until midday, Philip. Your men are ready?”
“They are, my lord.”
“Good. Reacquaint them with our goal. In a matter of hours we shall be taking up residence in Huntington Castle for as long as necessary, though I suspect the response will come today. Collect Gisbourne—I daresay he will enjoy this—and I will join you later.”
“Yes, my lord. Shall I ask the king’s mercenary to accompany us?”
He snickered. “Alas, the captain is in my bad graces, as well as suffering from the headache. We shall leave him behind, I think.” DeLacey scooted down in the chair again, stretching booted legs out as he indicated with a gesture his castellan was to leave. As de la Barre bowed and departed, the sheriff permitted himself an intense pleased glow of anticipation. “I do believe this is the most delicious day I have enjoyed in some time.”
Marian was cutting roses for her table—taking far more care than when she had sliced open her hand, so as not to repeat the experience—when the man rode in at a gallop. Dust drifted; she waved it away in irritation as it settled on hair and clothing, then went immediately to learn the man’s business. He was down from his horse by the time she reached him, clearly intent upon entering the hall even as Sim, come up from the pigs, remonstrated with him.
She gestured thanks and the servant fell silent. “What is it?” she asked the stranger.
He turned sharply, hair disheveled, clothing disordered, his spirits clearly as agitated as the horse whose reins he clutched. T
he animal dripped foam from a bit he chewed steadily. She smelled the salty pungency of the lather streaking the animal’s chest and flanks. “Lady Marian?—yes, thank God in Heaven! I am here for Robin. He must come home at once.”
“Home?” she echoed, startled.
“To Huntington.” He seemed well cognizant of what he said, by the expression of his face. “Lady, I beg you . . . is he here?”
And so it is come. Marian slipped the pruning scissors into the pocket of her loose overdress and folded her hands together, straightening her shoulders. Indeed, it had come. “Who sent you?”
“No one—that is, I came myself.” Color stood high in his face. “The earl would not say I should, but I felt it necessary.” His eyes implored her. “He is dying.”
She felt extraordinarily calm, strangely serene. It was her game to win or lose, and a man’s life in her hands. Without compunction, without hesitation, she accepted the weight of that responsibility. “The earl is dying?”
“Indeed, yes.” He gestured helplessly. “He may even be dead as we speak.”
“And so you wish Robin to go back.”
“Yes, lady—”
“He is disinherited.”
“Yes, of course, but—”
“The earl, you say, did not send you.”
“No, lady, but—”
“This is a trap,” she said crisply.
He stared at her, mouth agape in unfeigned shock. She realized abruptly she knew who he was: the earl’s own steward. “A trap? Lady—no, it is no trap! Why should it be a trap?”
“To catch an outlaw.”
But Ralph flung out a dismissive hand as if the last thing in the world that mattered was what the sheriff called Robin. And perhaps it was; no guilt graced his face and eyes. “Lady—” He was desperate. “Shall I stay here, then? As surety? Will you give him the message and let him decide?”
Marian looked hard at Ralph, assessing the language of his body, the expression of face and eyes. If there was truth in what he said, she had no right to keep the news from Robin. But neither did she have the right to lead him into a trap if Ralph played her false.
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