Scarlet jumped for an arm. “I’ll have you down—”
Much kicked at Scarlet even as the golden-haired man laughed and said, “A horse requires a rider, not an oxen-driver!”
“Oxen-driver, am I?—By God, boy, stop your kicking ...” And yet again to the rider, “I’ll have you down—”
Much clung to the rein, making furious, inarticulate noises. The bay squealed and set back again, pawing clots of track, snapping his head skyward in a bid to break free.
The rider pulled the reins taut. The horse, steered so cruelly, swung his hindquarters and nearly trampled Much. Will Scarlet jerked the stranger’s right foot out of the stirrup, then grasped handfuls of hosen, hauling him bodily down from the saddle even as the rider grasped at mane and rein.
“Mine!” Much shrieked.
The horse backed up quickly, shedding its rider over a shoulder as Scarlet dragged him free. Much, still clinging to rein, was jerked off his feet, but refused to release his find. He was dragged several paces before the terrified animal stopped, quivering and snorting.
“Hold!” a voice shouted.
Much, spitting dirt, craned his head around.
Four men stepped out of the trees. Three of them had bows; one did not. He was the Hathersage Giant.
Will Scarlet, tangled on the track with the golden-haired stranger, let go of the man. “The horse is mine,” he snapped. “My portion of the fee.”
“Is it?” Little John retorted. He strode forward, caught the stranger by tunic and shoulder—and a handful of hair—and dragged him to his feet, swinging him to face the three men. “Then this one’s mine! His coin is my fee!”
“Wait—” the man protested, but Little John shook him sharply. “No noise out of you. This doesn’t concern you.”
“But it does—”
“No noise, I said!”
Much got up on hands and knees, watching closely, and slowly backed toward the horse. If he could get up without them noticing, then mount the animal—
One of the nocked bows was lifted in his direction. Much stopped moving. “Here,” the outlaw ordered. “And bring the horse with you.”
The Earl of Huntington waited in the bailey as both men dismounted, handing their mounts to the horseboys. They were similar in appearance: both tall, both slender, and both powerful barons of ancient families and established titles: Geoffrey de Mandeville, the Earl of Essex, and Henry Bohun, Earl of Hereford.
Mandeville was the eldest, a spare, gray, dignified man. Bohun was younger, darker, more fluid in movement. Each man came forward, offering outstretched hands to the earl and his companion, Eustace de Vesci.
“Well timed,” de Vesci said. “Prince John has only just left.”
“Yes,” de Mandeville said. He was terse and austere of feature. “We met him on the road.”
De Vesci’s arm dropped away from the handclasp. “Did he say anything?”
De Mandeville’s tone was frosty. “To me he says little, as if fearing he will condemn himself to his brother’s man.”
Bohun’s expression was sober, but less severe. “He fears Essex, as is to be expected. But to me he was more forthcoming. He suggested we make haste, if we were to wish well to Huntington’s son.” His tone was dry. “He left no doubt as to his suspicions.”
“He would not,” Huntington agreed. “That is John’s way, to sow discord as he can. Now. Come in. There is much to talk about.”
The others followed him, murmuring comments about the castle. De Vesci was gloomier than de Mandeville and Bohun, remarking on his fears that John would contrive a way to learn of their discussion. Huntington signed him into silence, then led them all into a private chamber.
“Ralph will bring wine,” he said. Then, to de Vesci, with dry deliberation, “If you desire John to know, do say so in the hallways.”
The gentle chiding found its mark. Red-faced, de Vesci scowled back. “Do you not trust your household?”
“As much as you trust yours.”
Bohun laughed harshly. “John disunites us even in his absence.”
De Mandeville’s gray eyes flicked from man to man as he stripped off his gloves and moved to unpin his cloak. “I think it important we waste no time here. John moves quickly—”
“Softsword,” de Vesci remarked in contempt.
“But not his wits,” de Mandeville retorted. “He is the Old King’s son in many ways, and Henry was not a fool.”
Huntington’s smile was cool. “He would not thank us for this.”
“He would not have brought us to this.” De Mandeville dropped cloak and gloves into a chair. “Nor would Geoffrey; he was less stubborn than John.”
Bohun scoffed politely. “But a vain fool, withal. To die in a tournament—”
“An accident,” Huntington said.
“One wonders. He was older than John, and would have been named Richard’s heir ...” Bohun turned, found a chair, seated himself. “But we are not here to speak of dead men—”
De Vesci’s voice was harsh. “Geoffrey had a son. Arthur of Brittany may well be our best hope.”
“Richard is our best hope.” De Mandeville’s voice was crisp. “Do we forget ourselves? Our loyalty is to the king, not to destroying John merely for our own sakes.”
Huntington turned as Ralph came through the door with a tray bearing a flagon and silver goblets. “Thank you, Ralph. There, on the table. I will pour for my guests.” Ralph set the tray down and turned to leave. Huntington delayed him with a gesture. “My son?”
The servant shook his head. “No, my lord. Not yet.”
Huntington’s mouth crimped briefly. “Send him here at once when he arrives.”
“Yes, my lord.” Ralph pulled the door shut behind him.
Huntington moved to the table and began to fill the goblets. “Now. I am informed that John has sent a message to Philip of France, suggesting their mutual interests are best served by the Lionheart’s continued captivity. I am also informed he has written to Germany, offering Henry money to keep Richard there.”
“But—” de Vesci frowned. “So long as the king lives, John cannot rule. Everyone knows Richard is held prisoner.”
De Mandeville shrugged. “All Henry need do is raise the ransom demand. The realm is near bankrupt now—when the people realize they cannot afford to meet Henry’s demands, they may well give it up as a bad risk.”
Bohun nodded. “And if Richard should meet with an accident—”
De Vesci shook his head. “No one would believe that.”
“No. But dead is dead—and England would require a king. Since Berengaria has not conceived ...” Bohun gestured. “John is the obvious choice.”
“There is Arthur,” de Vesci insisted. “Geoffrey was the oldest, after Richard—his son would take precedence. Richard himself is said to favor Arthur. That is why John was given the Gloucester heiress and all the honors with her, to take what his brother chose to give him and be silent the rest of his life.”
Huntington shook his head as he handed out the goblets. “Arthur is eight years old. A boy would stand no chance in a fight for the throne of England.”
“And he’s in Brittany,” Bohun added. “His mother is sister to the Scots king—she knows too much is at stake. And the Bretons prize him too much to risk him now. Later, perhaps, when he is older—”
“When John holds the throne?” De Vesci drank, then glared at them all. “You know what he will do. He will have the boy killed.”
De Mandeville sipped his wine more deliberately, then lowered the goblet. “Not if he poses no threat. And he won’t, for a time ... and if we succeed in this, we’ll have no need of Arthur. For Richard will be home, and England safe.”
De Vesci was openly skeptical. “You are so secure in that. You wear the king as your banner.”
De Mandeville’s temper flared. “By God, I should! He made me Justiciar of England—it is your folly to forget it!”
Huntington spoke quietly in the sudden silenc
e. “Old friend,” he said to the Earl of Essex who, with the Bishop of Durham, personally administered England in the king’s absence, “no one forgets it. You risk more than us all.”
The older man sat down suddenly, clutching at a chair arm. “This foolish Crusade—it strips England of her king when she needs him most.”
“The Crusade is ended,” Bohun said. “Already our soldiers return home—as Huntington’s son does.” He flicked a glance at the earl. “Do you intend to inform him of what we do?”
“He must know. And you must allow him to know. He was close to the king himself.” Huntington’s face was masklike. “After all, it was the Lionheart who personally ransomed him back from Saladin.” His slight smile was stiff. “Not his father.”
Locksley was hungry, sick, and out of sorts, but he said nothing of it, because Marian faced the circumstances with a fortitude and spirit he had not expected to find in a gently bred young woman.
She stepped over tree roots, picking her way with care. “I imagine this is not what you are accustomed to.”
He smiled faintly, thinking she negotiated treacherous footing easily enough in borrowed shoes, with an unaffected, coltish grace he found peculiarly engaging. In no way did she resemble the decorous and subdued young woman who had come to the dais to give him a colorless if circumspect welcome home. Then she had been very like the others, watching him sideways, as if weighing him with an eye toward a future relationship.
Or was it she judged me against other soldiers? Perhaps even her father.
“Walking,” she elaborated. “That was a fine horse ...”
It pinched. “Yes.”
She scraped tangled hair out of her face, tucking a lock behind her ear. “Perhaps he will make his way home.”
She meant to be kind. He was less so. “Perhaps. I rather think he will find his way to someone else’s stable.”
“If they know he is yours, perhaps they will bring him back.”
He looked at her levelly. “Do you really think so?”
She gazed back a long moment, then sighed. “No. I wanted to lift your spirits.”
He smiled crookedly. “My spirits will do well enough without discussion.”
Her expression was skeptical, but she did not address the issue, choosing instead another tack. “What of your fever?”
“It also requires no discussion.”
Marian was clearly undaunted, no longer intimidated by his tone or expression, which he found both curious and puzzling. “You sound like my father.” The hem of her kirtle caught. She jerked it free. “Then what would you prefer to talk about?”
He bent a limb back to keep it from her face. “We need talk about nothing.”
She thrust out an arm to steady herself. “There is no sense in punishing ourselves because someone stole your horse ... we may as well make the best of it.”
Leaf mold hissed beneath his boots. “I have not found talking to be the best of anything.”
She slanted him a look under lowered lids. “No. I recall that about you—you said very little that Christmas Eve.”
It took him a moment to recall the one she meant. When he did he was moved to smile, but forbore to let her see it. “Perhaps because I was somewhat taken aback by the forwardness of a knight’s daughter who took it upon herself to trick me under the mistletoe.”
Marian’s face flared red.
“Well?” he prodded. “You did trick me.”
“I told you,” she muttered self-consciously, “I had kissed everyone else.”
“There was no need to kiss me, merely to count me as a conquest.”
“It wasn’t—you weren’t—” She shrugged awkwardly. “Never mind.”
He scrubbed briefly at his forehead, faintly amused he had managed to discomfit her. She had a ready tongue and a readier wit and was quick to defend others, but now, when she required it for herself, she offered nothing in her own defense save a self-conscious silence. “And I thought it was for the man to seek out the woman.”
She cast him a sideways glance. The tangle of her hair framed an exquisite face, even bruised as it was. “You wouldn’t have. You barely spoke to anyone. You stood in the shadows and watched everyone ...” And then, as if realizing she might yet offend, she let it trail off as if inconsequential. “I just thought ...”
Oddly it intrigued him, to discover what she had thought. “Yes?”
“I thought you needed it,” she murmured, mostly to herself.
“Needed it.” A strange observation.
Marian’s tone was level. “You looked very lonely. Very—solitary.”
He broke dried limbs beneath his boots. “Solitariness is not so bad a thing. There is some security to be gained in relying on oneself.”
“But you weren’t,” she said quietly.
He looked at her sharply, aware of an undertone. “You recall the evening more clearly than I.”
Her face was red again. “You were not relying on yourself. You were there in the midst of many people celebrating Christmas, a happy time for all, yet you hung back and stood in the shadows. Even when my mother attempted to draw you out.” Marian’s expression warped very briefly. “It was her last Christmas.”
His tongue lay dead in his mouth, stilled by the simplicity of her statement and the knowledge of what it meant. Both parents dead. And no brothers or sisters. No more family holidays.
He wanted to apologize. He wanted to tell her he could not recall why he had been so reluctant to join the festivities, save he was not a boy who showed much of himself to others. He wanted also to express condolences, that her mother had not lived to see another Christmas.
Mostly, looking at her, he wanted to tell her very plainly he wished for mistletoe now, so he could be the one to ask the forfeit of her.
Alan hitched a shoulder, trying to jerk it free of the massive paw that held him still. “Since when did the Hathersage Giant take to outlawry?”
The grip slackened only a moment, then clamped down again. “You see?” the giant asked. “Even he knows the truth!”
Will Scarlet laughed harshly. “Aye! He called you outlaw.”
The Hathersage Giant swung Alan around. “Have you coin?” he barked. “Have you anything of value with which I can pay my fee?”
As if I would tell him. Alan shook his head, glancing at the others. He knew none of them.
The sandy-haired one beckoned to the boy. Only three fingers were wrapped around the longbow. The fourth was missing. “Here. Bring that horse here.”
The boy approached. Alan was faintly surprised to discover he recognized him: the cutpurse he’d caught in Nottingham, who’d told him Marian FitzWalter was taken. What was he doing with a fine mount?—unless he’d taken to stealing horses as well as men’s purses.
The other archer lowered his bow, slackening the string. He was young, younger than Alan and nearly as pretty, though dark instead of golden. He grinned at the giant. “Little John,” he said, “in Sherwood we take coin, we don’t ask if a man has it!”
Will Scarlet was truculent. “Have I paid my fee, then? The horse is enough, I’ll warrant.”
The boy clutched reins. “Mine. ”
The slight, dark man gestured slightly. “Clym.”
The arrow was loosed. It sped the brief distance, then drove into the earth between the boy’s bare feet.
Alan jerked briefly. “He’s a boy—”
The archer, Clym, didn’t smile. “So was I, once.”
Little John released Alan’s shoulder. “By God, Adam Bell, I’ll not have you harming the boy! D’ye hear me? He’s done nothing. What threat is he to you?”
Alan stared hard at the slight man. Adam Bell? Adam Bell? “Wait,” he breathed.
“D’ye hear me?” Little John repeated.
“Is it enough?” Scarlet asked.
“Mine,” the boy declared.
A soft hoot came from nearby. Adam Bell and the two archers turned sharply toward the sound. In a moment a man st
epped out of the trees.
“You!” Alan said. Then, more urgently, “Have you damaged my lute?”
The one-handed man grinned, hoisting the instrument up to display it. “Buy it back, and find out!”
“Wat.” Adam Bell glanced back briefly to the archer called Clym. “Take the horse. Cloudisley will relieve our new friend of his purse.”
Adam Bell. Clym—of the Clough? And Cloudisley. Alan stared. My God—I’ve stumbled across the most notorious outlaws in England!
William of Cloudisley came forward, arching suggestive brows at Alan. He waggled beckoning fingers. “You can give it to me—or I can take it myself.”
“He’s not gentle,” Clym declared. “Though pretty as you are, I might do it myself.”
Alan fell back a step, but the giant’s body prevented him from further retreat. “This isn’t fair,” he said. “I’m not a wealthy man. I’m not a lord. I’m not a Norman. You’re robbing an Englishman.”
“Lute-player!” Clym’s tone was contemptuous. “You live off Norman bounty.” He looked at Much, lingering much too slowly with the horse. “Boy, what did I say?”
The boy reached down and plucked the arrow from the track. He threw it back at Clym in a mute but rebellious gesture.
“Leave him alone,” Little John rumbled.
“That horse is my fee,” Scarlet declared.
Adam Bell still looked at the one-handed man. “Did you bring the lute-player here?”
“I relieved him of his lute because it would have given him away to the Watch.” The man named Wat came further onto the track, gripping the instrument’s neck. “He’s one of us, Adam—though only just come to the life. He’s the fool who tupped the sheriffs daughter.”
Clym laughed harshly. “Fool to tup her? Or fool to be caught?”
“Both,” Alan said glumly. “Though she is an active woman.”
Adam Bell nodded. “Worth hanging for?”
“He wasn’t going to hang me. He meant to cut out my tongue.” Alan’s gaze lingered briefly on Wat’s stump. “At least you can still steal ... I’d lose my living.”
Wat grinned. “Aye, but I’m a thief because of this....” He looked beyond Alan to Little John. “So, you’ve come, too? Aye, well ye might—the sheriffs asking for you.”
Jennifer Roberson - [Robin Hood 01] Page 40