“From what I’ve been able to glean from the instructions here,” she said, “it seems that we must overcome challenges by three different guardians, in order to reach the heart of Sherwood.
“According to Cardinal Francis,” she continued, “the heart of Sherwood is actually a tree, the Oak of Thynghowe. The book refers to it as an ancient guardian at the center of the forest.”
“Well, that’s something, at least,” he said. “How we’re supposed to know it from all the others I guess we’ll have to wait and find out.”
“The first guardian is of the body,” Marian said. “I gather that the challenge is a physical one of some sort.”
Robin frowned. “In order to take the black arrow, I had to best the creature that was guarding it. That challenge was a physical one, but there was also a component of strategy. I had to be willing to use the arrow, and it had to pierce my skin, then choose to spare me instead of killing me.”
“So, with each of these challenges we must keep our wits about us, and see what is beyond the obvious.”
“Yes.”
“The second guardian is of the mind and the third is of the soul. Not that I’m sure knowing that helps us at all. How much longer do you think it will take us to find the first guardian?” Marian asked.
“I’m not sure, but this is the farthest I’ve ever been in this direction. With our next steps the forest will be new to me as well,” he warned.
A few minutes later Marian woke Champion from his nap, and the three of them continued on, Robin in the lead and Marian a few steps behind, with the fox keeping mostly between them.
What had to have been a couple more hours passed and worry began to settle into the creases of Marian’s mind. It was as though she could physically feel the sands of an hourglass running out as time slipped away from them.
She found herself praying that they would locate the first guardian soon. It was growing even colder as the afternoon was waning, and even though she was moving, the chill was making everything ache—particularly her nose and her fingers.
She could only imagine what they would do when night fell. Robin might be able to see at night in the woods, but she certainly couldn’t, and she was already growing weary. She was starting to trip over roots in her path, and feared that they might have to stop for the night without having made any progress.
One more day until all is lost.
Then, suddenly, up ahead of them, directly in their path, Marian noticed two particularly tall, thin trees that grew exceptionally straight. They appeared to be birches, with smooth white bark, and looked like perfect twins. They stood with three feet between them. There was something about them that struck her as peculiar, and she slowed, touching Robin’s shoulder and indicating that he should do the same.
Indeed, they were exact twins, mirror images of each other with leafless branches alike in number and placement. She knew that in the world identical people might be born, but she’d never seen trees such as these. They were such an odd sight that they took her mind off the cold and the pain in her fingers and the aching in her joints.
Robin stepped ahead, moving closer to them, then swerved to pass to the left of the trees, instead of walking straight between them.
“Robin!”
He stopped and turned to look at her.
“You’ve been marching us straight as an arrow all day,” she said. “Why are you angling around those trees, rather than passing between them?” she asked.
He blinked at her. “I don’t know,” he said, frowning. “I just… don’t feel like walking between them. For some reason it feels wrong.”
“Doesn’t that strike you as strange?”
“I suppose so,” he replied, still frowning.
“Can you walk between them?” she asked.
He looked as if he was about to take a step forward. His weight shifted, his muscles flexed, but he didn’t move.
“I don’t want to,” he admitted.
Marian could feel excitement growing within her. “There must be magic at play, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know.”
She walked forward, catching up to him. As she stepped close to the two trees she felt a sudden aversion to them, a wave of deep dislike. Her eyes slid off them as though she didn’t want to even look at them. Something inside her urged her to go around.
She moved toward the side of the one tree then stopped and forced herself to reach out and put a hand on it. It took all of her determination, as though she were actually fighting the muscles in her own arm to make it happen. At last her fingertips touched bark, and she yanked her hand back with a cry.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s… hot to the touch. It nearly burnt me. I definitely think magic is at play here,” Marian said. “There’s nothing else it could be. Something doesn’t want us to walk between them.”
She felt a glimmer of hope again. Maybe this was the first challenge. From what Robin had said, she had expected to find a fey standing guard. There was nothing that said it had to work that way, though.
“Which leaves us no alternative,” Robin said with certainty. “It’s exactly what we need to do.”
Marian tried to lift her foot, to force it in the direction of the opening between the two trunks, but she couldn’t. It was as if her foot had grown roots and was anchored into the ground.
“I can’t do it,” she gasped at last.
“Nor can I,” Robin said, the strain clear in his voice.
“I don’t have the strength,” she added, and she blinked as she heard the words she’d spoken.
Strength.
“Robin, this is the first test,” she said with a gasp.
And we’re failing it, she told herself.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
A failure. You are a failure.
The words had been rattling around in Friar Tuck’s mind for hours.
The last man of God, and you are worthless.
When the voice of the evil one came to him, it was sometimes disguised as his own. Other times it had a silken, oily quality to it by which he could tell its true origin. Never before, though, had the voice been that of someone he knew. You let everyone die. You have disappointed God.
It was the voice of Cardinal Francis.
Hot tears burned in his eyes. It was hard to denounce a demon when you agreed with it.
A hand touched his shoulder and he jumped, spinning around to see Alan standing there, eyes wide with concern. The elixir had healed his wounds but it didn’t have the power to give him back that which had been taken. The bard would never again speak words of wisdom and counsel, never sing and move men to acts of courage.
“I’m so sorry,” Tuck whispered before he could stop himself. “It’s all my fault. I should never have involved you in all this.”
Alan shook his head fiercely. He turned and gestured to the rest of the camp. Then he turned back and touched, first Tuck’s heart, then his lips.
“You want me to speak to them?” Tuck asked, gazing out over the survivors. He didn’t need to see their faces to feel their fear, their pain. It was evident in their hunched shoulders, their downcast eyes, and the silence with which they were going about their daily rituals.
“I can’t speak to them,” Tuck said. How could he give them hope, when he held onto none himself?
Alan tapped him again in the chest, harder this time, and nodded, adding an intense glare that seemed to lay bare Tuck’s soul.
“He’s right,” a voice said softly. “It’s you they need to hear from.”
Tuck turned to find Old Soldier standing beside him, where a moment before there had been no one. It startled him again.
“Would it kill you to make some noise?” he snapped without thinking. He instantly regretted both his tone and his choice of words.
“It might,” Old Soldier said, nodding slowly.
“I don’t know what to say,” Tuck admitted.
“Then you’d better pray for
some words,” the man told him. “Those people, they don’t need a soldier right now. They need someone to minister to them, to remind them that right is on their side and that they’re fighting for a higher purpose. I don’t think a one of them had ever seen evil quite like that until yesterday. Most are still in shock. If they’d given any thought to demons at all, it was to believe that they might possess men. I guarantee you none of them ever expected to see a devil walking around wearing its own face and skin.”
He was right. What Old Soldier was saying was true. Evil had stopped masquerading in England. It had stopped dressing up as men, and had started to wear its own face. Which meant evil didn’t think it had anything to fear.
Suddenly he knew just how wrong that was. He puffed out his chest, and took a deep breath. Evil was very much mistaken.
He gave Old Soldier and Alan brief nods, and then he strode toward the center of the activity.
“Good Christian folk,” he called out.
Everyone stopped and turned to look at him. Taken aback, he calmed himself for a moment. Then he pressed forward.
“Gather ’round, for there is something I must say to you.” He threw his arms wide. “We have seen the true face of the enemy, and that is how we know he can be defeated. Christ cast out demons, and he has told his servants to do likewise. We will not let the devil take root here in England. We will eradicate him, yank him out by his roots and burn him until there is no trace left.
“I know you are tired, but God says not to be weary in doing good deeds. And there are no greater deeds than those entrusted to you. I tell you this much, every man and woman of you is carrying out the Lord’s work. You’re holding this land for all good Christian men, and protecting it in the absence of King Richard, God save him.”
“God save him,” they said together, quietly.
He had their attention. Turning slowly, he sought to connect with each and every one of them. A few refused, keeping their gaze fixedly on the ground. He knew in a sudden flash of enlightenment that those who wouldn’t fight would be slaughtered like animals.
That must not happen.
“We have a plan,” he said. “Lord Robin and Lady Marian are even now doing their part to help us win the day. Now is not the time to lose heart. Now is the time to redouble our efforts, because we know the face of the enemy, and we know that greater is the God of the heavens than John the usurper.”
Around him heads nodded. He was getting through. He wasn’t the most eloquent speaker, but he had truth on his side, and righteousness, and they would speak for themselves.
“When the time comes to strike the final blow, we must be ready,” he said. “See to everything that needs to be prepared, weapons first.” He paused, then added, “I need two people to spend time with me in prayer.”
One man still had his head down, eyes on the ground. He wouldn’t fight, Friar Tuck knew that for certain. So he reached out and touched the man on the arm.
“Will you pray with me?” he asked.
The man’s shoulders hunched even more, and he shook his head. It was the barest of movements, but his intention was clear.
Tuck dropped his hand.
“I’ll pray with you.” Tuck turned to see Haylan, the youngest of the stonecutter’s boys, standing there, eyes wide.
“Thank you, my son,” Tuck said, putting a hand on the child’s head.
He turned expectantly, looking for another volunteer. To his surprise Alan stepped forward, his hand raised.
Tuck nodded, keeping a sigh to himself. A mute druid and a small boy. It wasn’t exactly what he had been looking for. The Bible did say, though, that wherever two or three gathered together in His name, that God was in the midst of them. Christ also said that truth came from the mouths of babes.
“You two, come with me,” Tuck said.
As the encampment began to buzz with activity once again, they moved a short distance away, where they would not be disturbed by the work being done. Placing blankets beneath them to protect them from the frozen earth, they settled themselves on the ground, Tuck on his knees.
Before they could begin a girl ran up to them.
“I’m told to tell you that Jonah ran away,” she said. “He won’t fight anymore.”
Tuck nodded heavily. Without asking, he knew who Jonah was, and he wasn’t surprised. He wondered if Old Soldier had sent anyone after him, to bring him back. The location of this place was a secret. Still, the Sheriff and his demons could not enter the forest, so perhaps it wasn’t as great a worry as he thought.
“Thank you, child,” he said.
“May I pray with you, too?” the girl asked, eyes wide.
“Of course. Sit down here. What’s your name?”
“Esther, my mum’s a cook in the castle,” she said, eyes wide as she sat down and folded her hands.
“That’s a good name, Esther. She was a strong woman who saved all her people with her courage,” Tuck told the girl who beamed proudly at him.
Alan unfastened his harp. It was a miracle that while the monsters had been cutting out his tongue, they had not destroyed the ancient instrument as well. The bard’s fingers touched the strings so gently that the sound was but a whisper, as of an evening breeze. Still, Tuck felt the music wrap around him, emboldening him. He had been wrong. Even without his tongue Alan was still a force to be reckoned with.
Friar Tuck bowed his head and began to pray. He could hear the children joining in from time to time, and underneath it all he heard the golden melody of Alan’s harp. There was a lesson in this, too, for him. It mattered not how small or weak the group of faithful who prayed. What mattered was the mightiness of their prayers.
* * *
The mighty oaks of Sherwood might as well be made out of straw, for all the notice Guy of Gisbourne gave them. His antlers scraped the lower branches, and occasionally sent one crashing to the snow-covered ground.
Only the thickest, mightiest of trees did he bother to walk around. The rest he walked through. Animals fled before him, but he let them go. They were not the prey he sought.
At last he heard something walking through the forest that did not sound like an animal. It wasn’t as swift and sure of foot as the deer and the rabbits. Nor was it as stealthy as the fox or the wolf. This creature walked upright on two feet, instead of four.
He had found a man, one which had become separated from its fellows. One which was not at home in the forest, and knew not its paths nor how to walk them. Guy breathed in deeply. He could smell the creature’s fear and desperation. It was a heady aroma, and he breathed deeply.
The man was nearby and coming toward him. Guy concealed himself behind a fallen tree and waited. At last his prey drew nigh. He leaped out from behind the tree, grabbed the man’s shirt, and hoisted it high into the air.
“Where are the others?” he roared.
The creature in his hand screamed, and then went limp. Unconscious. Guy dropped it with a snort of disgust. Now he’d have to wait until it regained its senses, before he could torture the location of the others out of it.
* * *
“Amen,” he said.
Friar Tuck’s knees were killing him. He and his small band had been praying for several hours. His stomach rumbled angrily, reminding him that he had missed a couple of meals. They would grab some bread and cheese, he’d see how things were progressing, and discover where his help might be needed.
“Amen,” the two children said.
Friar Tuck rose unsteadily to his feet. There was a flash of light so intense it nearly blinded him. It drove him back to the ground.
He gasped as he saw the antlered man-beast from his vision. It was the creature the imps had told him would kill Robin. The thing had a name.
Gisbourne.
His muscles went tight. His eyes were frozen wide as the vision unfolded itself to him. He saw the monster walking through the forest, a mighty scythe in its hand with which it cut down both tree and shrub with equal ease. Then it enter
ed the very clearing in which the camp was located.
Shouts of alarm went up too late. Five men ran forward, led by Old Soldier, and in a moment they were all dead, necks snapped like twigs. The monster roared. It was looking for Robin, but he wasn’t there, so it began to kill all who came within its reach. Including the little boy who had been praying with Tuck these many hours.
Hot tears coursed down his cheeks but he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, all he could do was watch as the vision continued to play itself out. Then, suddenly, it was over. All his muscles went slack at once and he fell face forward onto the winter grass.
Then there were hands grabbing at him, trying to lift him. Failing that, they pulled him over so that he was on his back staring up at the sky. Slowly his eyes focused, and he saw worried faces looking down at him.
“Are you alright?” Old Soldier asked.
“None of us will live to see sunset if we do not leave here right now,” Friar Tuck said.
* * *
All about them was chaos as everyone tried to grab what weapons and provisions they could in preparation to abandon camp.
They decided to move a couple of miles away, to a place where a giant tree had died, but had left children standing in a ring around it. The giant tree had rotted away until it was just a stump but the ground right around it was suitable for making camp.
One that was less exposed.
Much knew the place to which they were heading. As he looked around, he realized that no one at the camp needed him to help carry anything. One look gave him a harsh truth, though. They were far too few, and they possessed far too little—they would need a great deal more, if they were going to defeat John and the Sheriff.
No one was thinking about that battle right now. The immediate concern was survival. A monster had been sent to kill them.
Someone had to think about the days and weeks to come, though.
He waited until he saw his moment and then he slipped unobserved into the trees. Once separated from his fellows he moved as fast as he could, heading for the village. It was good and right that he should do so. He was the only one who could go.
As he made his way through the forest he kept listening. The birds and the beasts who dwelt there might give him a warning if the monster was close by.
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