And stealth would get her nowhere.
“Think of Martin,” she told her men. “And believe I am Robin Hood.”
Two of them—Edward and Stephen—nodded. Henry and Alfred stared with bulging eyes; she hoped they were not going to bolt.
“Mistress, are you sure you can win the challenge?” Alf asked.
Edward answered for her. “Of course she can, dolt. She is Robin Hood.”
“But she—”
“You just heard her say.”
Alf looked unhappy.
Kindly, Rennie told him, “You are free to turn back, if you wish. I will not force you to this.”
He shook his head.
“Then remember our purpose,” Rennie said firmly, “is to get Martin away, at any cost.”
Edward’s eyes widened. “Any? Even you—”
“Especially me.”
“Sparrow will not like it,” said Henry, grimly. “Are we to return to him without you?”
“Return with Martin, and let me take care of myself.”
They nodded reluctantly, and Rennie turned toward the castle and tugged her hood further forward to shadow her face. “Then, let us go.”
****
Even from a distance they could hear the commotion in the forecourt. It seemed every denizen of the castle had gathered, with a susurration of voices like a tide, and above it all, the screams.
Even the guards at the gate seemed distracted, all their attention turned within. Perhaps they had orders to admit anyone coming from outlying holdings, for they barely looked at the party of five before nodding them through the yawning gates.
A trap. Every one of Rennie’s senses declared it. She felt within for the presence that was, and was not, her own. As soon as she found it, she steadied and strengthened.
Edward muttered in her ear, “That cannot be Martin. He would not bleat so.”
It did not sound like Martin’s bold voice, rising and falling in a song of agony. Rennie, her men at her back, pressed forward through the outskirts of the crowd, though she did not truly want to see.
A lake of humanity spread before her—serfs, knights, and nobles, all cheek-by-jowl and caught in the drama before them. Rennie narrowed her eyes and stretched herself still taller and saw—
Lambert. He stood on a platform built in front of the castle’s main entrance, along with two other men. Two men, and also a strange contraption from which suspended something bloody, that swung slightly in the fetid air.
Rennie’s stomach contracted and roiled within her. At her ear, Alf swore viciously. “Martin!”
So it was, though barely recognizable now as a man. He had been stripped down to his trews and hung from the wooden frame by his arms, every exposed inch of flesh marked by wounds.
Rennie stepped forward instinctively, pushing other onlookers aside, and Martin’s emotions reached her, assaulted all her senses, a crashing wave of agony. She gasped, wavered, and fought to withstand it. She pushed harder against those in the way, who glared and then let her through. In such fashion, with eyes only for Martin, she battled her way to the front of the crowd.
And became aware of a voice speaking over those gathered, pronouncing statements with the authority of a king. She fought the distraction of Martin’s pain in an effort to comprehend the words.
“...are not exempt from the King’s law. No one is exempt. Those who think they can rise above and defy it, who set out to steal what rightfully belongs to the Crown, will meet but one fate.”
Lambert. Dressed in a deep blue cloak that flowed over polished armor, his stern features twisted into an expression of arrogant superiority, he stood beside the unspeakable figure hanging from the frame. He swept one arm over the crowd in a grand gesture and then pointed viciously at Martin.
The two other men on the platform—torturers—bent to their work.
Agony arced through Martin and, simultaneously, through Rennie. She quailed, stiffened, felt Martin valiantly strive to ride out the pain. Nay—no coward, Martin Scarlet. But streaks of blood curtained his bare hide, making his surname all too apt, and his eyes were wild.
“Behold the price paid,” Lambert bellowed. “And payable by all who breach the King’s law.”
The torturers’ blades bit deep. Against his will, Martin screamed. His staring eyes raked the crowd—was it possible he could feel Rennie here?—and found her.
He knew her. How, Rennie could tell not, for her visage remained shadowed and her very form changed by what resided within. Yet he knew her through their connection. His hope flared, and then trailed swiftly into despair.
She pushed forward another step and fed his hope back to him. I am here. Endure, and leave it in my hands.
His head drooped between his straining arms, and his eyes closed. Had his senses deserted him? No, for she could feel him still, a rush of pure love.
Save yourself. I am lost.
Not yet, you are not.
He groaned, and she felt it all through her body.
Lambert took up his rant. He spoke of those who defied the Crown, who took the King’s laws into their own hands, who dared steal in the name of rebels who should have been defeated long ago.
“Like this man.” He pointed once more at Martin. “A rebel. An outlaw—a wolfshead.” Lambert sneered the word. “What is fit punishment for such a man, who spreads lies and unrest, whose heart is untrue? I say that heart should be cut—living—from his chest.”
Horror—and some eagerness—suffused the crowd. Martin’s gray-blue eyes came open again, and Rennie experienced his flash of fear. Aye, and Lambert would see it done—here, before everyone.
She drew a deep breath, fought down her rising sickness, and called out into the ensuing silence, “And, high sir, would you wager his life on a challenge?” Her voice did not sound like her own. It had deepened, and it carried an edge of boldness—the voice of her father as she had heard it in her dreams.
Lambert’s head swiveled until he located her.
Martin cried out in his mind, No—no—it is madness.
She sent him a strong wave of love. Hush. Let me do this.
“Who speaks?” Lambert demanded.
“I—Robin Hood.”
Voices arose all around the courtyard, eager and disbelieving.
Lambert lifted his head arrogantly. “You are not Robin Hood. Robin Hood is dead.”
“If I be a shade, then you need not fear to accept my challenge.”
“I stand here in the authority of the King. I fear nothing.”
Rennie shifted her bow purposefully and pointed at Martin. “You say, Sir Lambert, men such as he have no right to freedoms not granted by their King.”
“I do.”
“And I say justice gifts a right granted by God, and higher than any earthly authority. I say that a man be a man, and worthy of dignity in his own life. I say if this man, here, exists under God, you have no right to hold and treat him so cruelly.”
“Cruelly?” Lambert’s sneer twisted his features into an ugly mask. “Should I then let wolfsheads such as this run the King’s roads? Kill the King’s deer? Steal from the King’s coffers with impunity?”
“I say we let God decide the matter of his fate, here and now. I come here as his agent—”
“The shade of Robin Hood, an agent of God? Enough of this nonsense.” Lambert waved a hand at her. “Seize him.”
Not so much as a guard, listening, moved.
Rennie called, “Do you, Sir Lambert, fear God’s justice?”
“I declare that a wolfshead such as you brings it not!”
“If that be your belief, what need you fear in my challenge?” Rennie glanced at Martin. His eyes, now well open, stared at her with burning passion. “Should I lose, you may finish the King’s business and pluck his heart.”
“And should you win this proposed challenge?”
“Then I win his freedom, along with the safety of myself and all who came here with me today. You give your word to our
safe conduct back to the forest.”
You are mad, Martin shouted into her mind.
Faith, she returned. Believe.
Lambert glared around the crowd. He had to sense the intense interest of all gathered, the power of the spell being woven. And most of all, he could not be seen to fear a mere wolfshead, either living or dead.
“And the nature of this challenge?”
Rennie tossed her head and lifted her bow in her hands. “Bring your best archer—set up any target of your choosing—and I will best him.”
Chapter Thirty
“Clear a path and make some room. Give us a sight line. And send at once for Master de Breche.”
Lambert’s voice boomed through the castle forecourt, the first thing Sparrow heard as he passed between the gates. His eyes narrowed on the scene within, and his mind struggled with disbelief. A virtual sea of people lapped at the castle entrance, all focused on the unfolding scene. Even the guards had virtually deserted their posts and barely noticed Sparrow as he pushed in.
And Wren—Sparrow’s senses sought her amid all the rampant distractions. Emotions beat at him from every side and tangled with his own. When he saw the figure hanging from the frame on the platform, virtually naked save for blood, his stomach heaved.
Martin: Sparrow’s rival, lifelong companion, sometime friend. Sparrow knew Martin almost as well as he knew himself, and had never seen him other than bold, daring, full of fire. Now fear gripped Martin, as well it should, for he hung in Lambert’s power, and on the knife’s blade of death.
Even upon that thought, Martin twisted his head painfully, and his eyes found Sparrow and knew him. And in that instant, Sparrow knew Martin’s fear was not for himself.
Stop her, Martin beseeched.
Eh?
Wren—
Lambert’s voice boomed again, cutting through the fragile communication. “Master de Breche is foremost among my archers, wolfshead. He has won tournaments in York, Lincoln, London, and Normandy. By great good fortune, he arrived at Nottingham not two days since. Now whom do you think God favors?”
“Bring him hence and we shall see.” The answering voice was, and was not, Wren’s. Sparrow pushed against the intervening, resistant backs, and began to force his way forward.
And he saw her. She stood, hood well raised and bow in her hands, at the very front of the crowd facing Lambert on his platform. Sparrow’s heart began to thump in his chest, and his gaze narrowed still further. For all around her, encasing her from head to foot, he saw a glow of soft radiance. And a trail of it, like a single ray of light, extended to Martin.
Could the others see it? Sparrow did not think so; he suspected that, like the emotions that linked them and the sometimes audible thoughts, this was something only the three of them shared.
“Wolfshead, Robin Hood,” Lambert called out, with hard mockery, “will you meet any challenge I set, in order to win your prize?”
Sparrow shuddered with foreboding as he heard the reply, “I will.”
Stop her, Sparrow. Sparrow! Martin called again. Sparrow could feel his pain, his desperation.
His love.
The last was almost strong enough to knock Sparrow down where he stood. In that moment he knew Martin, perhaps the strongest man he knew, was willing to sacrifice himself to save Wren, and that humbled Sparrow to the heart.
How? He cried the word into the void. Before him, the crowd shuffled aside, bunching impossibly to clear the room Lambert demanded. Not a soul departed the scene.
“I am here.” De Breche. Even in Sherwood, folk had heard of him—a knight of renown and an archer beyond compare. They said King John had once pitted him against the King of Spain’s best man, to settle a land dispute, and won. And now he would face off against a legend—the people’s hero—for a far greater prize.
Sparrow reached for Wren with his mind and hit a wall. Aye, she was there, but another spirit wrapped around her, enfolded her. Neither seemed aware of him.
Amazement suffused Sparrow, along with awe. To Martin he said, She has brought her father.
And Martin raged, She risks her own life.
All too true, but she did so in an act of heroism such as Sparrow had never witnessed. If she succeeded, it would be the thing of fame and story. If she failed: terror hit him, staggering him. If she failed, far more than her life, and Martin’s, would be lost.
De Breche stepped out onto the platform, a polished bow in his hand. He wore a cloak of bright blue, and confidence rode his every movement. Sparrow looked from him to Wren and felt a jolt of shock: she no longer looked at all like Wren, and her confidence matched that of the Norman.
To Lambert, she called, “We are agreed? If I win, all who belong to me leave here, free?”
An ugly smile curled Lambert’s lips. “And if Master de Breche wins, I cut out this wolfshead’s heart personally—before putting you in his place.”
And, Sparrow thought gravely, the rest of the Sherwood party would never make it out of the forecourt alive, most likely including himself. For he would stay and fight for her, to the end.
Lambert spoke to one of the torturers, who spoke in turn to a lad standing by. The lad went running. Lambert and de Breche consulted, their heads close together.
What was afoot? Sparrow did not trust the man.
The lad swiftly returned with an unidentifiable object in his hand. He passed it to Lambert, who held it high. “You see what this is?” He addressed Wren, not the crowd, but everyone there leaned forward. “A mere lump of raw meat, fit only for the Sheriff’s dogs. A fit crown for the head of this wolfshead you value so high, Sir Legend.”
Sparrow strained to see. The chunk so described was little more than a morsel, perhaps the size of a fist, an ugly knot of gristle and bone.
Lambert stalked, with his rooster’s walk, to where the prisoner hung suspended, and set his trophy on Martin’s head. “Do not shake it off in your trembling,” he warned. “If it falls and is not shot cleanly, your life is forfeit.”
Wren called, “That is no part of our bargain.”
Lambert gestured. “My ground—my rules. So, Master de Breche, are you satisfied with the challenge? First man to shoot the target cleanly, without putting an arrow through the wolfshead’s forehead, wins.”
The crowd inhaled as one. An impossible challenge, for Martin dangled, swaying slightly, and his head drooped in pain.
De Breche made no answer beyond a nod, and Wren called, “Who shoots first?”
“My setting, as I say—my champion shoots first.”
De Breche leaped down from the platform and took up a stance at Wren’s side. A tall man, he nevertheless topped Wren by no more than a hair, and Sparrow marveled. Aye, Wren was tall for a woman. But just who stood there beside the Norman champion?
He looked at Martin, who strained to keep his head upright, and knew that Martin’s fear was all for Wren. Wren looked at Martin also, and the current of light that linked the two of them wavered, and then strengthened.
If Wren protested the favor that allowed the Norman to shoot first, she did not say so. De Breche lifted his bow and notched his arrow in one beautiful movement.
From where Sparrow stood, the target looked impossible to hit cleanly. The shooters stood below the platform, making a difficult angle. Sparrow doubted he could make the shot, and he had been the best Sherwood had to offer since Robin’s death.
Sparrow closed his eyes and began to pray. The courtyard fell silent, so silent he heard de Breche release his shot.
The crowd roared; Sparrow’s eyes flew open.
Martin swayed slightly on his ropes. The gory lump of gristle rested still on his head.
Wren stepped forward and set her shoulder toward Sparrow. He could not see her face, but her hands looked sure, far steadier than his would have been. The onlookers hushed again. The glow around Wren that connected her to Martin brightened unbearably, and Sparrow knew it for what it was: pure magic.
Wren raised her bow
, she notched her arrow, she stood posed with power in her every line. The breath caught in Sparrow’s throat—he knew he saw a legend a score of years dead.
Robin Hood.
The legend drew back his bowstring with a grace that caught at Sparrow’s heart. The arrow flew, following the path of light that connected the shooter to the target. Martin lifted his head and his eyes went wide; the arrow seemed to aim for the very center of his forehead.
It brushed his hair instead and lifted the lump of meat from his skull, as cleanly speared as if impaled on a knife.
The crowd reacted with thunderous cries. Voices rose, wild and ragged, leaving no doubt as to where rested the sympathy of the onlookers. Did these folk know what they had just seen? Could they feel the magic now crackling through the air?
“Cut him down.” Robin Hood’s voice silenced the clamor.
Sir Lambert did not move. Still on the platform, he stood apparently frozen in disbelief.
Robin drew his bow again, his second arrow aimed at Lambert’s heart. “Is a Norman noble incapable of keeping his word? Must I end this differently?”
Lambert looked at him, and he added, “Do you doubt I will loose this shot?”
Lambert moved suddenly and gestured at the torturers. “Cut him down.”
They hurried to obey. Robin—or was it now Wren?—spoke to the rest of the Sherwood party. “Bring him.”
Martin fell to the platform with an ugly thud; Sparrow shuddered in responsive pain. Wren’s men gathered him up and brought him down from the platform onto the courtyard.
“Take your prize,” Lambert taunted, “and go, proof that I keep my word. It is not as if we do not know where to find you.”
“Go,” Wren told her men. She turned to follow the struggling party, for whom the crowd cleared still another path, and de Breche, standing beside her, reached out casually and pushed the hood back from her face. There stood Wren, indeed, her hair bundled in a knot and her golden eyes wide with sudden alarm.
“You!” Lambert seethed. “Wench!” His hand went instinctively to his cheekbone. “Impossible. You are no wolfshead. And you are no Robin Hood.”
In answer, Wren loosed her arrow. It cut so near Lambert’s ear he ducked wildly and fell from the platform. Chaos broke out then; hastily, Sparrow turned to follow Wren, who fled in the wake of the departing outlaws.
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