“We shall not go down to defeat,” he grated, “for we fight in the name of Robin Hood.”
“Fool!” Lambert bared his teeth. “Robin Hood is long dead.”
“Nay, he lives,” Wren cried. “Only look.” She cast back her hood, defiant of both rain and danger.
Lambert glared at her, and his blade faltered. “You!” Rage flared in his eyes as he turned toward her and away from Sparrow. “Vile bitch—”
Sparrow swung his sword with all his might. A half-score voices cried out behind him. It might have been a fatal stroke but for the fact that Lambert’s foot slipped on the wet stones as he spun. The sword struck both flesh and armor, and Lambert went down.
Without taking time to sheath his sword, Sparrow seized Wren’s hand.
They fled and melted into the exterior darkness. Martin, with Lil, had disappeared as completely as if he had never existed. Sparrow could see no glimpse, either, of other escaped prisoners. Had they all been recaptured or killed?
He did see another squad of soldiers off to his right, all hollering. He pulled Wren in the other direction.
When they could run no farther, they stopped in the shelter of the outer wall and fought for breath. Sheets of rain washed over them, and Wren sobbed softly.
“Which way?” she gasped. “The gate—”
Sparrow no longer knew. Flight, rain, and darkness beguiled his senses. He felt Wren lift her head as if listening. She said, “This way.”
“The gate will be guarded.”
“I know. One more fight.”
“I wonder if Martin got away?”
When they reached the narrow eastern gate, they discovered the answer: dead guards lay strewn in a spattering of blood. Martin, in fighting his way out, had done their work for them.
Wren wept even as they stepped over the bodies to freedom. “Oh, thank the sweet Lady for Martin.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Sparrow, do you know where we are?” Completely out of breath and wet to the bone, Rennie dragged her companion to a halt. They had been running for what felt like half the night through dark forest, lashed by rain, raked by thorns and branches, Rennie’s only anchor the strength of Sparrow’s fingers in her own.
Now they paused for the first time, and she heard Sparrow gasp for air. Had they fled blindly, or had he led her to safety?
“We are deep in Sherwood, some distance east of where we need to be.”
“How can you tell?” Rennie tipped her face up so water filled her eyes. She heard the wind in the trees but could not actually see them.
Sparrow admitted, “I am guessing from the direction we ran.”
“We have seen nothing of Martin, with Lil. Do you think they will hunt him down, the soldiers, I mean?”
“Not until morning. They do not like venturing into Sherwood, even in daylight. And Lambert is sore wounded. Are you hurt?” His hands brushed gently over her skin.
“Scratches. You?”
“The same. We were fortunate, all round. Come daylight, I imagine Lambert will organize a search. But, come daylight, we should be able to find our way home.”
Rennie shivered. “Not until then?”
“I fear not.”
Rennie moved closer to him. Just days ago, she would have been terrified, finding herself lost among the trees. Now they had become a refuge, and she worried only about Lil.
“Do you think Martin truly did get away? And what of Alric, who was waiting for us?”
“Alric can look after himself, as can Martin. Trust him for that.”
“Lil is in a bad way.”
“Very bad.”
“I cannot lose her, Sparrow. She is all I have.” Rennie did not realize she wept until he pulled her into his arms. There, all at once, her courage—so bright when she faced Lambert—crumbled, and she sheltered against Sparrow’s shoulder.
“Lil is strong, none stronger. But you are mistaken, Wren. She is not all you have.”
Were those Sparrow’s lips she felt on her hair, moving across her brow to her temple? She could hear his heart beating a deep, strong rhythm under her cheek, and once more his arms seemed as complete a refuge as Sherwood, a place she might stay forever safe.
“Surely you know I am here for you.” His voice was a mooring place in the darkness. “And will always be.”
So great was Rennie’s need at that moment, she did not question his motives or intent, did not ask whether he spoke as had Martin, out of desire for the place at her side, or to hold strong the magical bonds that protected Sherwood. Blindly she lifted her face and his lips found hers, as naturally as a flower finds the sun.
Sensation exploded, one point of heat amid the wet and cold. She felt his emotions as intensely as her own, knew when the fire kindled and raced through his veins like life returning.
Need, pure and raw, engulfed, strengthened, and then possessed her. She pressed herself closer, desperate for his heat, for his essence. She wanted to be inside him; she wanted him inside her.
Helpless against her feelings, she did not protest when the kiss deepened. His tongue belonged in her mouth, searching and caressing. She let her own meet it, slide, and tangle delectably, suddenly wild for the taste of him. This went beyond comfort and even need to a mingling of spirit, the very reason she had been born.
She moaned, and his big hands drew her still closer. Her flesh seemed to leap for his until she barely felt the sopping leather still between them. His heat and the rain both beat on her with equal intensity.
Not until she was desperate for breath did Sparrow break the kiss. She felt his lungs draw air as if they were her own.
Raggedly, he said, “I have longed to do that since last I kissed you, wanted it every moment, both waking and sleeping.”
“Then I think we needs must do it again.”
The fire leaped still more swiftly this time. Rennie lost track of everything but the feel of his lips, his hands when they began to move over her body, exploring, then caressing and possessing. They warmed her flesh wherever they touched—the skin of her back, up inside her wet tunic and, still lower, her buttocks, which they cupped, starting a whole host of new sensations. Rennie raised both arms and wound them about his neck, tasting an abandon never before felt. She buried her fingers in his sopping hair and rode the current of her burgeoning need.
She never knew which of them spoke the words, “I want you.” It did not matter, because their feelings had melded as surely as their tongues.
Sparrow caught her up in his arms and walked blindly through the windy darkness as if directed. Even as they went, she kissed him, little bites of kisses irresistible as comfort. She barely noticed when he set her down. The ground beneath her, though, felt soft and dry.
“Sparrow, where are we?”
“I do not know. Say my name again.”
“Sparrow.” She breathed it into his mouth and accompanied it with a kiss.
He begged, like a sob, “Again.”
Rennie laughed in delight and reached for him. Did she remove his clothes, or did he? And what of hers? The sopping leather should have been difficult to remove, yet it melted away just like Rennie’s uncertainty.
She no longer felt the cold; Sparrow’s body became a shield, a defense, a place to dwell. Heat followed his mouth, exquisite in the darkness. She could see nothing, not even Sparrow, but could feel everything: the calluses on his broad palms, the whispered abrasion made by the hair on his chest when it caught her bare nipples and teased them deliciously, the gentle strength of his fingers that seemed to call something from within her body and lit in her the unprecedented desire to give him anything, everything.
Sparrow. She continued to speak his name in her mind, when her lips were otherwise occupied. And he heard.
Wren. His breath poured into her. She nearly wept when his mouth left hers, but then his lips whispered across her throat and lower still. Aye, Martin had touched her breasts, but that had felt nothing like this. For when Sparrow’s hot mouth found her chille
d breast and he began to suckle her, he called forth her very soul.
Time suspended; Rennie died and became born anew, a woman of sensation, existing only for this one man. When his hands moved over her again, when his fingers slid between her thighs, she opened to him eagerly. When they slipped inside her, she knew she had never wanted anything more.
“Wren.” He raised his head from her breast. “I need—”
“Sparrow.” She tangled her fingers in the wet silk of his hair and pulled his mouth to hers. “I need.”
He kissed her with fearsome passion. “I would not hurt you, frighten you, harm you at all.”
Gentle soul, priceless soul, her soul, hers. “You will not.”
“Are you certain? From this, there is no going back.”
She could not see him; he was but heat, sensation, a spirit in the darkness. “I need,” she repeated helplessly.
She lifted her bare legs and wound them around him, drew him in. He slid into her as easily as if she had been made for him.
She had—oh, she had.
After that she did not know where her body left off and his began. She could not tell his thoughts and feelings from hers. His rush of pleasure, when he came, was hers also, triumphant.
Mine, mine, mine.
Her legs still draped around him, she kept him inside her, and felt complete for the first time in her life. Breath sobbed in her lungs, and she could feel his heart flutter, a bird held in her soul.
“Wren—”
“No need to speak, Sparrow. Only hold me.”
He gathered her in, though in truth she could scarcely get closer.
Never let me go, she beseeched.
I will not.
Only after the vow was given did Rennie realize the words had not been spoken aloud. Amazement coursed through her, followed swiftly by delight. Their joining had been no illusion; he was with her, in her mind.
Can you hear me? she asked.
How should I not? She felt his surprise as he grasped the truth. His soul rippled with gladness that matched her own.
By the Green Man’s horns, he said, it is a miracle.
“No,” she told him aloud, “it is destiny.”
“You believe that?”
“I no longer know what I believe in, save you.”
“Wren—”
“Hush, Sparrow. The night is long, and I need you again.”
Chapter Nineteen
“Sparrow, are you awake?” Rennie whispered the words even though she knew he slept still. She could sense his soul’s repose, feel him dreaming, like flickers of butterfly wings in her own consciousness.
But morning had come to Sherwood. Light streamed in radiant bars through oak and beech, making an enchanted bower of the place where they lay. Rennie could see it now, for the first time: an earthen burrow beneath the shelter of a massive oak, perhaps a former animal’s den, snug and dry.
And she could see the man whom she had welcomed into her soul.
Could a man be described as beautiful? She bit her lip in wonder, remembering how, the first time she had seen him in Lil’s kitchen, she had considered him ordinary. No more: he lay with one naked arm thrown across her in a gesture of unconscious possession. Brown hair, still crumpled from the rain, scattered in wild disarray and fell against his cheek. A bare chest—naked save for that line of dark hair she had felt but never seen—and burnished shoulders that rippled with strength. A big man, he had nevertheless fit her in a way that still had the power to make her tingle.
Aye, he was beautiful, and she wanted him again—no, needed him the way she needed air. But the need to find Lil pulled just as strongly.
Yet, how to wake him? A thousand possibilities filled her mind and made her fingers itch. With a touch? With a kiss? With a call of the mind?
Sparrow.
His sinfully long black lashes fluttered, and he opened his eyes, dark and wise as those of a wild creature, the eyes of a hart.
My stag, she caressed him in her mind.
He smiled and reached for her, as natural as breathing. Wren. Will you welcome me again?
She would, had they not duty before them. Aloud she said, “Lil.”
“Aye.”
He sat up in one glorious movement, stealing Rennie’s breath. She could see him now, oh, yes—and she might never be able to look her fill. Completely unselfconscious beneath her gaze, he sat with the morning light washing over him. Her eyes explored him freely, even to that part of him responding so magnificently to her nearness.
“Ah.” Rennie sat up also, her only cover provided by her hair. Helplessly, she reached for his face, now rough with beard.
His fingers caught her wrist. “Wren, you do not regret what happened between us last night?”
“Can you feel any regret?” She dared him to use the sense that had been forged between them in the darkness.
He shook his head with a rueful smile. “Then let us get you home.”
“Aye, but first—” She leaned forward and kissed him, something to hold against the fear and difficulty ahead.
****
They moved swiftly and almost soundlessly, their hands still joined. All last night’s rain had flown, and the light strengthened around them as they went.
They spoke only between their minds.
Do you know where we are?
Aye, Wren. He loved repeating her name, and every time he did, it sounded in Rennie’s soul, deepening the claiming. Not much farther.
I hope we find Lil well. Martin—
Martin.
Martin posed a problem from which they both flinched. Would Martin be able to tell what had happened in the forest? If so, how would he react?
But when they at last reached the camp site, they found chaos and upheaval. Alric and Simon came forward to meet them. The old man looked weary and grave.
“Children, I am glad you are come.” His gaze dropped to their joined hands for a moment before he went on. “We have had word Lambert is on his way with a squadron of soldiers. We are moving camp.”
“Lil?” Rennie managed but the one word.
Alric eyes filled with regret. “She lives, but only just.”
“I need to see her.”
“Aye, lass, I think you should.”
Sparrow asked Simon, “Where is Martin?”
“Arranging Lil’s transport. He is sore hurt, himself, and collapsed after he got her here last night.”
“Madlyn has treated him as best she can,” Alric added. “But the truth is, we need Lil’s healing hand.” He eyed them once more. “What of the two of you? You are not harmed?”
Sparrow answered, “We are well enough.” He released Rennie’s fingers. “You go with Alric. Simon, take me wherever I can do the most to help.”
Alric led Rennie to a shelter constructed of boughs, where Madlyn and Sally bent above a pallet. On the way, they passed Martin, who looked startled. He leaped to his feet and called, “Wren!” But Rennie did not pause. All her attention was on the swaddled form beneath the branches.
Lil. She looked so small lying there, scarcely bigger than a child. Her hair, pale gray, caught the light from above, but her face looked uncannily still. With eyes for no one else, Rennie dropped to her knees beside the pallet.
“Mother.”
Lil did not seem to hear. Eyelids like the thinnest parchment remained closed, bluish lips still. Someone, most likely Madlyn, had tried to ease the wounds that marked her flesh, covering them with salve, yet they stood out like brands.
Rennie’s heart twisted at seeing her so, this woman whose strength, wisdom, and indomitable kindness had made the one beacon in her life, yet now so weak, so frail.
Tears filled her eyes and threatened to choke her.
“Thank the Green Lord you have come,” Madlyn said. “She has been asking for you.”
Rennie reached out and touched Lil’s hands. “Mother, I am here.”
At that, Lil’s eyes opened. They held a blank, distant look an
d did not sharpen until they found Rennie’s face. “Ah.” Her voice held relief. “Daughter.”
They gazed at one another, and Rennie felt eternity rushing like a strong, oncoming wind. She had to swallow hard before attempting to speak again.
“Tell me what to do for you, so I can help make you well.”
Lil shook her head, and terror speared Rennie’s soul. “Please, Lil. I will do anything.”
“You know what you must do. You have your father’s courage, and your mother’s kindness. It has been a privilege to know you, and to have had a hand in raising you.”
Rennie’s tears began to fall, hot and slow. “Do not speak as if my raising were all in the past, Lil—I need you yet! You are the strongest woman I know. You will recover from this.” Even as she spoke, her eyes noted again the terrible extent of the wounds, and she faltered. “What did they do to you? Oh, Lil.”
“Hush. Do not fret for me now. My days are run out. And do not try to hold me. I go to follow Geofrey.”
“No—oh, no.”
“Would you deny me what you have found? Duty so often kept us apart in life. But I can feel he waits for me now.”
A sob rose to Rennie’s throat. Lil reached out, and Rennie took her hand between her own.
“You ask, child, what you can do for me. Take my place. Use your courage to fill it well.”
“I cannot. Oh, Lil, I—”
“It is the role for which you were born. For the sake of any love you bear me, promise—and let me pass on.”
Rennie struggled to speak around her agonized grief. “You know I would do for you aught you ask. You have been everything to me, each day of my life. But do not ask me to go on without you, alone.”
“Not alone. You have him.” Lil smiled, and it transformed her, made her suddenly beautiful. Her eyes no longer saw Rennie but reached for something beyond, and Rennie knew what she saw.
“I will not hold you here in pain,” she said, cradling the frail hand. “I will do my best to do as you ask.”
“Thank you, my child. I love—” Lil sighed then. Her eyes gently closed, and her hand, in Rennie’s, became light and lifeless as a dead bird.
For an instant the entire camp stilled. Men busy packing bundles turned their faces toward Lil and froze; all but Alric, who sank to his knees where he stood and covered his face with his hands. Life paused, and then began once again.
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