by Lisa Hendrix
“Is she?”
“No.”
“Yes, I am,” she called.
“She is not. Get out of here, Ari. Take the stallion and see he’s fed and watered and ready to go. I will bring her back on the mare. We will leave as soon as I return. Make certain Robin is ready.”
Ari nodded and took off, and Marian came to stand beside him.
“Will you lace me, monsire?” she asked after a moment. She turned her back to him and waited.
Back. A half-remembered image from those first moments returned. He pushed her clothing aside. A darkening bruise, the shape of teeth not quite human, marked her shoulder. He touched a finger to the places he’d broken the skin and she flinched.
“Ah, sweet Marian, forgive me. I hurt you.”
“There is nothing to forgive.”
“But I was—”
“Animal? Aye. You were. But so was I, in that moment. It excited me as it did you.”
“I could have killed you. Do you not understand? The scars the horse bears are from when I attacked Torvald. I put those marks on him.”
She turned and cupped his jaw, her thumb caressing the line of his cheek. “No. It did. The beast.”
“But you …”
“It is the lion within you that drew me from the first, even as it frightened me. Do you not understand?”
“It has been growing stronger.”
“Aye, and the fault for that lies with me. There are times when my mind opens to you and stirs the wildness of the beast.” She turned back so he could continue with her laces. “Sometimes when our eyes meet. And when we tup.”
“When you come.”
A wash of pink colored her neck. “Aye. Especially then.”
“Do you … open like that when you touch yourself?” He tried to control the jealousy that rose at the idea of anyone else knowing her in that way, even by accident.
“Devil,” she said. “No.”
“Did it ever happen when you watched the servants in the barn?”
This time she laughed, rich and deep. “Not even a little. It happens only in your arms. I feel you then as at no other time. As with no other being, man or beast.”
“As I feel you.” He tied the knot and pressed a kiss to the patch of skin just above it, still glowing pink. “I did not know what it was, only that you gave me ease beyond what your body offers—though your body offers much.”
She leaned her head back against his shoulder. “For the first time, I am truly glad of this ability of mine. Until you, it was only a tool—at best, an amusement—but now, it is—”
“A blessing,” said Steinarr firmly.
“Aye. But only because you make it so.”
“I …” Unable to find words in the tumble of emotions that were his, he picked up the blue gown given her by Lady Nichola. “Here.” Awkwardly, he gathered the yards of cloth so she could work her arms in, then helped pull it over her head and settle it down over her body. These laces went quickly in the silence between them.
When he finished, she smoothed the gown and tested the fit. “You grow skilled at this. Perhaps I should keep you about to dress me.”
“I would rather undress you.” He ran his hands down, shaping her waist and hips, then up and around to cup her breasts. “I could spend all day doing nothing else. But we need to be back. We should have been on the road well before now.”
“Aye. We should.”
“Marian …”
“Come, my bounden knight, we will discuss it on the way.” She started for where the mare was tied, and he had no choice but to follow his lady. His love.
By the time they reached the road, the tenderness of the morning had dissolved into a heated argument that lasted all the way back to camp. She dug in her heels, every bit as willful as she had been that first day outside Maltby. The worst of it, though, was that her reasoning was sound: among all of them, she was the only one who read Latin and could cipher numerals and not just peg marks. And she knew her father better even than Robin.
“It is not safe,” he insisted, his sole argument but sufficient, so far as he was concerned. “Guy is dangerous.”
“I know precisely how dangerous Guy is,” she said. “I have dealt with him my whole life. The reason father decided against him as heir is because he grew too free with me and made it clear he wished to be freer.”
“But you’re his cousin.”
“Aye. But it did not stop him from trying to make me his mistress. Nor, I suspect, will marriage to Baldwin.”
Steinarr growled his disgust. “Another reason to kill him.”
“Another reason I want to—need to—help Robin.”
“And for me to want and need to have you safely out of Guy’s reach.”
“Then keep me with you. How can I be safer than in your arms?”
“And you call me devil,” he grunted as his body tightened. “But you still may not go.”
They veered into the forest, and as they reached the clearing, the children came running to meet them, Goda chattering as usual. “Are you fighting? Sir Ari said you were fighting. You look angry, Marian.”
“Because I am,” she said, jabbing Steinarr in the side to prove her point. She slid off the mare without waiting for his help.
Robin came crutching toward her, face thunderous. “You were gone all night. Alone. With him!”
“God’s knees, Robin. I have been alone with him for the best part of a month. What is one more night among so many?”
“I should never have let you go at all. If he has ruined you …” Robin glared at Steinarr.
“For Baldwin? I do hope so.” She stormed off toward the fire, calling over her shoulder, “And I hope you are ready. He wants to leave.”
“You had better not …” he began, but Marian’s obvious vexation must have convinced him he had nothing to worry about, for he fumbled to a stop midsentence. He turned and hobbled away, muttering to no one in particular, “You had better not.”
By the time Steinarr put the mare away, Marian had filled a bowl with pottage and a slab of cold venison, and as he came to the fire, she held it out to him, along with a spoon. “You are starving. Eat.”
He was starving. All times she’d ever offered him food came tumbling forward in his mind. Of course. She knew. She’d always known. He accepted the bowl, letting his fingers skim over hers. “My thanks.”
She hoisted one eyebrow. There may have been a glimmer of forgiveness in her eyes, but if so, the firm line of her lips denied it. Yet, a moment later as he gobbled down the meal, he heard her whisper to Ivetta. “You were right. I needed to go after him.”
Ivetta’s brow wrinkled. “Pardon?”
“ ‘Twas a good thing to go after him. I needed to know, and now I do. I am glad you said to.”
“What are you talking about? I never said for you to go after him,” insisted Ivetta, louder.
“But you did,” said Edith. “I heard you myself. You told her to go just as Sir Ari and Sir Steinarr rode off. And you told Robin you had said for her to go.”
“That cannot be,” said Ivetta. “I was not even here.”
“You most surely were, woman,” said James. “I saw you as I came in.”
“You did not.” Ivetta folded her arms across her chest stubbornly. “I was in the woods. I felt ill and lay down for a time. The prioress sat with me until I woke. We were by the brambles.”
“The prioress?” Ari came into the circle. “Prioress Celestria? From the manor?”
“Aye, of course, monsire. What other prioress would it be? She was there, in the woods, and she sat with me until I felt myself again. She said it was only a little, but I remember it being midday, and then suddenly ’twas almost dark.”
“But you walked back with me,” said Marian. “We were back well before supper.”
“We all saw you,” said Robin. “You spoke with me about why you sent Marian after him, and then you went off toward the privy.”
“I was at the bram
bles, I tell you, swooned away.”
“Ah, balls.” Ari tipped his face skyward and switched to Norse to ask the gods, “Why trouble me with them at all, if they are of so little use?”
“What?” demanded Steinarr.
Ari motion him off to the side and lowered his voice, but kept to Norse. “While Robin was at the manor. I had a glimpse of … I don’t know. Not a vision—I could not make one come—but a sense of something awry.”
A cold sense of foreboding tightened the muscles across Steinarr’s shoulders. “What does this prioress look like?”
“I never saw her. She was always gone or in prayer.”
“And you saw nothing suspicious in that?” Steinarr demanded angrily.
“She’s a nun. What do I know of nuns and their customs?”
Steinarr switched back to English and called out. “Robin, what does your prioress look like?”
“Black eyes. Black hair, I think, from her coloring, though of course, ’tis covered by her habit. Near as tall as me. Thin as an eel.” Robin scratched his wisp of beard, grown a bit thicker over the past month, then touched the right corner of his mouth. “And she has a dark mole, just here.”
“Cwen,” breathed Ari. He went back to Norse. “She must have taken Ivetta’s form, as she did the nurse’s in Alnwick.”
“And then sent Marian into the woods after me.” Knowledge of what the lion could have done—would have done if Marian hadn’t been able to reach him—wrenched Steinarr’s gut. “She wanted me to kill her. She wanted me to know what I had done.”
“Aye. She schemes to take from us what we love. To wound us as we wounded her. I should have …” He looked to the heavens again. “I bled for you, and you would not show me even this?”
“Is something wrong, my lords?” asked Marian, coming to join them.
He looked past her to Ivetta, who still frowned in confusion and argued with James that she had not been in camp, and suddenly the weapons Guy could wield seemed less terrifying compared to what Cwen might do.
“I have changed my mind,” he told Marian. “You are going with us. You, too, Will Scathelocke. Get ready. Now.”
And then he went to warn Hamo Collier about the evil residing in Headon Manor.
CHAPTER 19
“ THE ABBEY IS quiet, but the road shows heavy use since the last rain. It appears the king has come and gone.”
They sat in the woods not far from Newstead Abbey, having managed the trip in two and a half days despite avoiding the roads, driven as much by Cwen as by Robin’s quest. Steinarr had sent Ari off to reconnoiter, and now he was back, making his report.
Robin sagged at the news. “We are too late. I slowed us too much.”
“You did fine,” said Steinarr. He had, too. By the end of the first day, Robin had been barely upright and looked like little more than a corpse. But he had awakened the next morning a little pinker and willing to ride again, and had clung to the mare’s back that day and this with that stubborn grit he shared with his sister. Not bad at all for a man who’d been bled nearly to death within the sennight. He might make a decent lord after all. “The king cannot have gone far. We will find him.”
Ari added his agreement. “A train that large moves no more than a few miles in a day. He is nearby, likely hunting. We might have crossed paths if we’d come by the road instead of overland, but it would have done us little good.”
“ ‘Tis better this way,” agreed Steinarr. “Any sign of Gisburne?”
“Not on his own, but he may have fallen in with the king. ’Tis what I would do, as well as set men along the road.”
Steinarr nodded. “We will worry about that later as well. For now, we keep to our course and follow the riddles to the end. Come, we have time for the abbot today.”
They approached the abbey from the forested lands behind it, circling around to the front only when they must to reach the gatehouse. The same square-shouldered monk that had greeted them before stepped out.
His eyebrows shot up when he saw Steinarr and Marian. “My lord abbot said you two might be back, though he thought it would be before this. He said to pass you in, but only if you brought the boy.”
“I am not a boy,” said Robin.
The monk squinted at him. “No. But you are not much of a man yet either.”
“Man enough to have my sword at his disposal, should he need it to deal with insolent monks,” said Steinarr.
The monk glared at him, but opened the gate. “I will fetch Abbot Talebot.”
“Do that.” Steinarr turned to Will. “You stay here to watch the road. I do not want to be surprised. Ari will come with Robin and Marian and me.”
They soon found themselves waiting in the same small chamber as before. It was not quite so long this time, however, before the abbot came in. One by one, they knelt to kiss his ring.
“Not you, my son.” He lifted his hand so Robert didn’t have to take a knee. “So, you truly did break your leg.”
“Aye, Lord Abbot. I broke it, and Sir Ari set it.”
“I thought perhaps it was a ploy by your sister to beguile the riddle from me.” He paced a circle around Robin, sizing him up. “Do you remember me, Robert?”
“You were at the Gate when my lord father and I were on pilgrimage. You shared some good wine with us, as I recall.”
The abbot laughed. “Indeed. What use is there being an abbot if you cannot have good wine? That was a long time ago and you were young. I am surprised you remember.”
‘“Twas very good wine, Lord Abbot.”
“I wonder what else you remember of Sudwell. Your father gave me a gift. Do you remember that?”
Robin’s lips pursed as he considered. “Aye. ’Twas a girdle book.” Robin pointed at the little book at the abbot’s waist, hanging from a long tail of leather that looped through his cincture. “Not that one, but much like it.”
“Very much like it, though that one was a breviary while this is a book of Proverbs.” Smiling, the abbot carefully pulled the book off his belt, wrapped the long tail around the book, and held it out to Robin. “He did not think you would remember, and truth be told, neither did I. You were carving a little—what was it?—ah, yes, a little horse at the time, rather than paying attention.”
“He thrashed me later for my rudeness to you,” said Robin. “He never understood that I listen better when my hands are busy.”
“The very reason I use these.” Abbot Talebot patted a string of paternoster beads that also hung at his waist. “They will feel lonely now without my beautiful Proverbs at their side. Ah, well, Lord David said it was only lent for a time, but I have enjoyed it greatly these several years. ’Tis good I have the breviary to hang in its place, though it is not nearly so well wrought.”
“If I am successful, I will bring this one back to you, my lord. In fact, if I am successful, I will have a matching one made for each of your canons.”
“That would be a fine thing, though perhaps breviaries would be more useful. This was far simpler than either of us thought, was it not?” The abbot threw open the door. “Now be on your way, for you have little time. The king planned to go to Rufford and then to Clipstone. If you are quick at following your riddle, you will find him still there, otherwise, you may have a chase on your hands. The Lord’s blessing on your search, Robert.”
The door hardly shut behind him when Marian, who had been leaning forward in anticipation like a hound on a leash, pounced on Robin. “Show me.”
“Not here,” said Steinarr. “We will get well away and make camp before we run out of sun. You can read it later.”
“Hold on.” Ari went to the tiny shrine in the corner and relieved it of two slender candles. “If you are going to read tonight, you will need something to read by.”
“Put those back,” said Marian. “You cannot rob an abbey.”
Ari tucked the candles inside his gown and pulled a penny out of his purse, which he laid on the little shelf. “There. That should pay for twice
as many candles.”
“ ‘Twould be better if you asked,” she said.
“Better to make apology afterward than to ask beforehand and risk being told no,” said Ari, chuckling. “I am surprised Steinarr has not taught you that yet.”
They went to collect their horses at the gatehouse and found Will and the gatekeeper monk in deep conversation. The monk looked at Robin and grinned. “Are you truly Robin Hood?”
“Will!”
“ ‘Twas not me, my lord. He heard you call him Robin and asked.”
“And how would a monk have heard of Robin Hood?” asked Steinarr.
“I am not a monk, my lord, nor Austin canon. I follow the rule of Saint Francis.”
“Monk or friar, how did you hear of Robin Hood?” asked Marian.
“Since you were last here, I went to Nottingham Town on business for the abbot. There were players in the square, and after they did the mystery, they sat in the tavern and told of Robin Hood and how he was outlawed and of Maid Marian and Little John.” He looked at Steinarr as though he must surely be Little John. “I thought it only a tale until I heard you call them Robin and Marian in one breath. And then young Will here confirmed it.”
“Will here is an ass, and will be a skinned ass if I hear that story again,” said Steinarr.
“And I may help you do it,” said Marian cheerily.
Will went bright red. “All I said was that you truly are called Marian, my lady, and that Robin is Robin. Well, maybe I said a bit more than that. But he already knew all the stories.”
Steinarr shook his head, disgusted. “Friar, I must ask you to keep silent about this. No one must know we were here.”
“Especially not the sheriff, eh? I understand well, my lord, and I would not say a word. But you can be certain of that by taking me with you.”
“What?”
“Take me with you. I am not bound to Newstead. I move from abbey to abbey, Fountain Dale to Nostell to Wakefield to the Fountains to here, as I please. They oft put me on the gate to earn my keep, as I am worldly while the monks and canons are not.”