Falconer's Prey

by April Hill

  As she came nearer, the man she thought to be Robin turned and inspected her, quite openly allowing his gaze to slip appreciatively over her body. She saw immediately that he was an uncommonly handsome man with fair hair, flashing blue eyes and a roguish smile – features that were rumored to have charmed countless women even as they were being robbed.

  “And this must be the bold fugitive Will has told me of – the reluctant nun. Mistress Johnstone, is it?”

  Alice flushed, extended her hand and gave a brief curtsy. “I am honored, sir. All of England thrills to your braveries on King Richard’s behalf, as do I. I have seen your likeness carved on more than one road post in Nottinghamshire.”

  “Nonsense, lass,” he scoffed. “We’ll all die old men and unremembered and the foolish likenesses of which you speak will soon rot. If we are very fortunate, our poor efforts here may feed a few good people and pull a few more from under the heel of John and his thieving Sheriff. Still, I welcome you to our midst, Mistress. Henry Burden has helped us on a great many occasions and I was grieved to hear of his bad fortune. Still, Will tells me the charges are no doubt frivolous and that the Sheriff is merely flexing his flabby muscles in arresting your good uncle.”

  “I pray you are right, sir,” Alice said unsurely.

  “Well, if not, we shall have to tweak the Sheriff’s nose a bit, shall we not, men?” Robin cried, turning to rouse his men to a cheer. “What say? Is a foray into Nottingham not a grand idea for a cold winter’s afternoon? We’ll quaff down a few good brown ales at the ‘Trip to Jerusalem Tavern’ and perhaps pinch the bottoms of a buxom serving wench or two!”

  A second cheer rose from the crowd, but Alice saw the disapproving frown cross Will Fletcher’ s handsome face. Little John shook his head glumly at almost the same moment, signaling his own disagreement with Robin’s plan.

  “Such a move could be very dangerous now, Robin, with the Sheriff’s men all close to the hearth, as they are,” Fletcher cautioned. “Henry’s in no real danger as yet and spring is very near.”

  Robin scowled, but nodded his head. “Aye, Will, you’re the cool–headed one and that’s a fact. You’re right and John here seems to agree. It will wait until the men return. Three weeks, if the weather holds and we’ll be at full force again.” He turned to Alice. “Friend Will is right, Mistress Johnstone. Haste will only bring harm to all of us and to your uncle as well. We shall wait.”

  Alice’s shoulders slumped. Bold Robin of Sherwood had proven to be a very great disappointment.

  As she left the crowd, Alice passed Arthur and several other lads playing at draughts, and drew the boy away from the game for a moment to speak about an important matter. However reluctant she might be to ask another potentially dangerous favor of her young friend, her cause would depend on his answer and there was no further time to waste.

  * * * * *

  While the cold weather meant that fewer travelers came through Sherwood Forest, it brought with it a large number of hunting parties. The long dreary winters often drove the bored and overfed young lords and knights from their vast manor houses and castles in a search for recreation. A boar hunt, perhaps, in the King’s private greenwood at Sherwood, where only the princely and privileged were granted such free access. Or a reckless chase on horseback through the same dark woods in pursuit of a thick, soft wolf pelt to warm a chosen lady’s dainty feet. Such young gentlemen out for pleasure were also as like as not to be drunk on mead or brandywine – and drunken gentlemen often grew careless.

  Alice was among the younger women in camp and her youth and an undeniably genteel prettiness proved a valuable asset to the outlaws’ own winter recreation – robbing these same carelessly drunken gentlemen. And indeed, once Alice discovered that she possessed an unexpected and innate skill at highway robbery, she fell into the activity with a good deal of enthusiasm. When an unsuspecting and very drunk young lord came upon a dazed and well–born damsel in distress, apparently thrown by her mount and wandering afoot on the perilous wintry road, he was always eager to offer assistance.

  At which point, of course, the eager young lord was knocked rudely on his head and relieved of his jewelry and purse, his arms, his steed, and, often as not, his clothing – most certainly his hunting boots and fine saddle. Had he been fortunate enough in the hunt to have brought down a handsome stag or boar, he was also relieved of the additional bother of carrying the dead beast the long distance home. While Robin’s men stripped the luckless victim of all he owned and sent him on his way, barefoot and shivering, Alice and the other young female decoys searched through his discarded garments and removed what they found of value. These same young men were wont to go off hunting while festooned in an astonishing quantity of gold jewelry and ornament. It was a rare gentleman whose soft white hands did not yield two or three heavy gold, jewel–encrusted rings, many of which bore his family’s crest.

  By aiding Robin Hood’s band in this enterprise, Alice had proven both her loyalty and her usefulness. Not coincidentally, it had also freed her from many sweaty hours over the bubbling, oily stewpots that had become a daily torment for her. And by choosing her moments carefully, she had managed to pocket a coin or ring here and a gold or silver chain there, and collected a hefty purse of her own. She had heard it said that robbing the rich to aid the poor was Robin Hood’s creed, and at this moment in her life, Alice had never felt poorer. Soon, the small pouch beneath her mattress had grown to such a size that she was forced to replace it with a larger one, and before long, a larger one yet.

  As her willingness to steal and her prowess at stealing increased, Alice found that she was more accepted in the camp, and as the men began to return, Robin walked with her around the clearing and introduced her to each of the veteran members of his band.

  “This handsome fellow here with the lute is called Allan a’ Dale,” he said with a chuckle, presenting to her a slender young man dressed all in blue. “As fine a troubadour as you’ll hear in all the country, who can coax a wench into bed quicker with a song than most of us can with four pints of mead. He has a fine, bonny wife of his own at home, but if I were as likely a lass as you are, dear Alice, I’d keep my skirts and my wits close about me.”

  Allan smiled and kissed her hand graciously. “Worry not, Mistress, for I am no longer a threat to any winsome maiden’s virtue. It was Robin himself that saved my own sweet Ellen from a bitter marriage with the cruel and elderly knight who had falsely claimed her hand. We were married thereafter in Papplewick Church and Ellen will bear our first child within the month.”

  “My best wishes to you and your good wife, sir,” Alice said. “And who is your slumbering companion there?” She indicated another man, apparently sound asleep and balanced precariously on a fallen log.

  He laughed. “That drunken lout? He is but a shabby tinker called Wat O’ the Crabstaff, a tinker more apt to steal your household silver than repair your pots. Be not fooled by his slovenly manner. The guise of filthy tosspot serves him well. Although this morning I’m afraid it is not purely guise. The fellow has swilled down a great many measures of beer. Wake up, Wat, and greet the new lady wolf’s head!”

  “Wolf’s head?” Alice asked curiously.

  “It is what the Sheriff’s men call us all,” Robin explained with a smile. “Wolves’ heads. Thieves and villains, I suppose, whose heads would look well above the sheriff’s mantel, perhaps?”

  “I meant it as no insult, lady,” the troubadour added hastily, “though both Will and Robin here tell me you have an enviable talent in that regard. Indeed, Robin, did you not boast that were the lady as good a hand with a longbow as she is in stripping a stranger of his goods, you would have her in a Lincoln green tunic and tights by the morrow?”

  Robin nodded, and though Alice blushed, she still glowed with pleasure at his words. She made a silent vow to learn the use of the longbow as quickly as possible, and by whatever means necessary. She would be seen by no man, even Robin Hood, himself, as merely a winsome
face.

  Allan a’ Dale winked a dark brown eye. “Of course, I do fear that such a costume on a lady of your attributes might well prove a serious distraction to the men,” he remarked with a smile.

  “When was it your lady wife is to make you a father, sir?” Alice chided him.

  “Soon, lady. Very soon. Next week, it is thought. “

  “I think that will be an altogether good thing, Allan a’ Dale,” she said, laughing. “And not a moment too soon.”

  Chapter the Fourth

  In Robin Hood’s Camp, On the Twenty–Seventh Day of March, in The Year of Our Lord 1193. And May God Keep King Richard!

  Spring had fully arrived at last. It was still cold, but with the arrival of spring came word that Henry Burden had been released from jail. A courier arrived in camp breathless with the great news that Burden and his men had left Nottingham that very morning, in good health and spirits. They were riding directly to Burden’s manor house in Lincolnshire, some twenty miles distant.

  “You do not seem pleased, Mistress, by the good tidings of your uncle’s release,” Will Fletcher remarked, observing Alice’s crestfallen expression at the news.

  “Of course I’m pleased!” she cried. “My heart is full, and exceedingly glad of his safety, but I had hoped he would come here upon his release. Did you not send him word of my presence?”

  Will nodded. “Indeed we did – in a coded form, of course – but it would still not be safe for your uncle to come to Sherwood at once. He will no doubt be watched. Our friend the Sheriff cannot be pleased to have achieved nothing by Burden’s imprisonment. Information about Robin’s whereabouts is often the Sheriff’s true reason for persecuting men such as your uncle, who are known to be in sympathy with our cause. And to return you to St. Mary’s would be a feather in the Sheriff’s cap.

  “The rumor is that your step–mother and the Bishop of Hereford himself are still surpassingly distraught about your disappearance,” Fletcher explained, grinning. “Although, for the life of me, I cannot see why they would want you back. How can it be that you are such a sought–after treasure to both the church and to your step–mother, when I myself would be so exceedingly glad to see you gone?”

  “I believe I am more like a thorn in my stepmother’s side than a treasure,” Alice said, with not a little pride at his comments. “And in the Bishop’s as well, I hope. But, truly, am I such a bother to you still, after all these weeks of such excellent and cooperative behavior?”

  Fletcher sighed. “True, I have had no serious complaints of late, from either Fanny, or the others with whom you work each day. Is it possible that you have profited so richly from the brief but painful lessons we – or more precisely, I – have provided during your stay?”

  “You need not praise yourself so highly, Master Fletcher,” Alice replied smugly. “It is only that I wish to be of service to the cause and to Robin’s good works, as I have tried to prove of late.”

  Fletcher smiled. “Ah, yes, of course. How could I have missed such fervor for our cause. Your ardor has been almost religious in its intensity. Or is it possible that you are a cleverer wench than I thought? Simply biding your time, in order to have your way?” He paused for a moment to scratch his head thoughtfully. “Is it also possible that you have helped yourself to the occasional shiny coin from each and every purse you were given to search, and a precious bauble from every unfortunate victim you disrobed?”

  Alice’s anger flared. “How dare you accuse me of such a thing,” she hissed, looking around to see if his words had been heard by anyone else. “I am no true thief, sir, nor a common cutpurse.”

  He shook his head and his finger. “An uncommonly careless thief, actually, but a thief, nonetheless. Have you any idea what the penalty is for stealing from Robin Hood, in Robin Hood’s own camp?”

  “Stealing!” she cried. “Me? My God, sir, have you forgotten that you are all a nest of thieves?”

  “Ah, yes,” he said with a sigh. “And that is why we are so distressed on those rare occasions when we ourselves are the victims of theft. Do you think it an easy thing, to be bested by a beginner and a mere woman, at that? I fear things will not go easy for you, Mistress Johnstone. There are many in this camp that insist upon branding a thief, and others who tend to favor the chopping off of some unimportant body part – such as an ear or hand. On occasion, even a nose, although that does make for a very ugly woman. There are even those among us who advocate beheading or hanging as the best – and certainly most permanent – cure for theft.”

  Alice leveled a suspicious look at him. “But you, of course, have something else in mind, do you not, Master Fletcher? You have no intention of even reporting my supposed offense, have you?”

  “On the contrary, Mistress. I have already reported it – to Robin himself – almost a fortnight ago, when I became certain of the crime of which I had begun to suspect you.”

  “And what was his decision on my fate?” she asked.

  “Well, as we know, Robin is a forbearing fellow, at most times long in patience and mellow of temper. He appears to believe that your unattractive behavior springs not from inherent avarice, but from a desperate need to achieve a specific aim – your escape to London, presumably. He believes your crime should therefore go lightly punished, if at all.”

  Alice beamed. “Robin is a very wise and merciful man!”

  “Robin is a bloody fool,” Fletcher said mildly. “And a frequent victim of his own weakness for a trim ankle and a nicely–filled bodice. I have, therefore, overruled his male silliness. No, Mistress, like the disobedient child you have been, you are to be spanked long and hard on your bared buttocks, before the entire camp – in lieu of hanging or beheading, of course – and I would advise you to count yourself extremely fortunate for such an extremely generous act of mercy.”

  Alice swore.

  The “act of mercy” was to be performed by none other than Bri’n the Blacksmith, whose job it was to dispense bare–bottomed and over the knee justice to the camp’s miscreants. Alice’s own crime had been put before the entire camp and with bold Robin himself counseling mercy, a rough vote agreed that a sound thrashing was sufficient punishment for a first–time offense such as hers. There was a great deal of drunken merriment among the men during the “vote,” and not a little gloating among the women at the “high–born lady’s” approaching humiliation.

  And on the very next evening, the sentence was carried out. The blacksmith attempted to preserve a small degree of Alice’s modesty by positioning her so that most of her backside was in shadow. (Her improvised “drawers” had succumbed to age and her own poor sewing skills, and had fallen to pieces just days before.) As the prescribed punishment began, Alice noted –from her acutely uncomfortable angle (upside–down) – that Will Fletcher was, gratefully, nowhere in sight. Robin of Locksley, the Prince of Thieves himself, however, lounged idly against a tree, watching the proceedings from across the clearing at a politely discreet distance.

  Not quite so distant, however, that Alice could not see a look of amusement on his handsome face as her ordeal commenced. Bri’n the Blacksmith began by announcing the sentence, after which he picked up the thick black strap from the ground, raised the hem of her dress and tucked it about her waist. Alice grimaced and closed her eyes, trying to lessen her embarrassment and to prepare herself for what was about to happen. A moment later, the first two of the assigned forty blows landed across her trembling buttocks, with two loud cracks that seemed to echo around the camp. Alice groaned. The whipping had barely begun and she felt as though her backside had been branded with a red–hot iron. Thirty–eight blows remained and the giant blacksmith was just warming up his well–muscled arm.

  By the tenth blow, Alice was biting her lower lip in what would prove a futile attempt to avoid crying out. Her humiliation was enough to bear, without adding to it a show of weakness or cowardice. A lady wolf’s head could do no less.

  By the twentieth excruciating blow, however
, the lady wolf’s head was pounding her front paws on the ground and grinding her teeth. Soon she began emitting small, helpless moans. And at the thirtieth blow of the strap, she surrendered her wolf’s pride entirely and began howling in pain.

  The final lash of the strap was greeted with shouts of approval and Alice sagged across the blacksmith’s thick thighs with both scalded cheeks of her bottom on fire, her face red and tear–stained and her dignity in tatters.

  “It’s over now, lass,” Bri’n said gently, lifting her up and setting her back on her feet. “And it’s a brave lass ye were. Go back to your duties, now. I’m thinkin’ ye’ll not be stealing’ from Robin Hood again so quickly.”

  Tentatively, Alice touched her swollen buttocks, winced in pain and silently agreed. She had stolen her last farthing.

  * * * * *

  In celebration of the end of winter, a great bonfire had been set that night, and a succulent whole pig now turned slowly on the long spit above the glowing coals. After the thrashing ended, a miserable Alice went back her cooking duties, where she turned the crank of the long spit, pausing every few minutes to baste and pepper the pig. Being so close to the open fire further inflamed her own roasted backside and she had to struggle against the urge to embarrass herself further by rubbing the throbbing areas. It was with some irony that she realized that the bright red rump of the hapless beast skewered on the spit bore a close resemblance to her own.