“It’ll give them a fighting chance at least.” Will grimaced. “But we can probably get a dozen Lions, maybe more, to join with us. That I can guarantee. Then we can make a break for it.”
Arthur fingered the iron key between his thumb and forefinger. “What do you mean?”
“We’ve been building a rope ladder, hidden under the rubble of the spectator stands. When the fighting starts, we can probably get to the south wall.” Will nodded his head. “Sling it over, and get the fuck out of here.”
There was a small nick in the key halfway down its shaft, Arthur’s thumb graced over it over and over. The callus on his finger was too thick for the sharp metal, but again and again he rubbed his flesh over the barb. Someday, a dozen years from now, when this key broke in a lock, it would start at that little nick.
“What about the army?” Arthur asked, staring at their own bootprints in the dirt.
“They’re mostly to the north. Even if they see us, I don’t think they’ll worry about us,” Will laughed. “But all the same, faster we get away from them, the better.”
The key ring felt heavier now, he had to hold it with both hands.
“And the city?” David asked.
“Dawn Dog told me there’s tunnels that go past the walls. So if we get him, or any of the other Lions who know about it, we’re golden.”
Will wasn’t answering the right questions.
“We made this deal…” Arthur paced his words out, not sure he wanted to reach the end of this thought, what would happen when he got there, “… so that we can get these people out of gaol, and help defend the castle.”
“Exactly! Which most of them will do.” Will smiled. “They’ll never notice we’re gone.”
Arthur sighed. “Will, don’t you think…” he glanced up to David, whose worried features gave him the strength to keep going, “… don’t you think this is bigger than us now?”
He might as well have been speaking another language. Will’s face twisted, as if he literally couldn’t understand the words.
“There’s a French army out there,” Arthur continued. “They’re trying to sack the city, siege the castle, and kill Prince John. And if they do it … there’s no more England. The throne goes to Arthur. He’s got a good name, admittedly…” he earned a laugh from David with that, “… but he’s a child, a ward of the French. This is … this isn’t about us and the Sheriff or the Guard or any of that bullshit anymore. This is everything, Will.”
Will Scarlet squinted back, as if he’d misunderstood. “This is everything? There’s ‘no more England’? What are you talking about? They’re not going to … sink the whole country into the ocean! God’s heel, the world will not collapse in on itself. All it means is that somebody else will own all the castles we never get invited to anyway, so it’ll be somebody else that hates us instead of the current people who hate us. They’re not going to rampage the lands and kill every Englishman. They’re just going to tax us. That’s not exactly a big difference.”
David shuffled his feet. “But Prince John, he’s the rightful heir…”
Muffled sounds floated up from the tunnel on the other side of the gate, still locked. Will ignored them. “What do you care about Prince John?”
“Nothing, but I … I care that we’re not ruled by the French.”
“Why?” Will’s eyes were wary now. “Because everything was so good before? Hell, maybe the French will run it better.”
Arthur winced. “Are you serious?”
“I don’t know.” Will shrugged it off. “But neither do you, that’s the point. We can’t control any of this. Look at all these people, all these armies ready to start off against each other. You think a dozen of us can stop that? No. I don’t want to get killed in someone else’s war. Doesn’t matter if it’s the French or the English who win. You know—you know, deep down—nothing’s going to change. Nothing. It doesn’t matter who’s on top, it’s always shit for the people on the bottom. A little bit of chaos might even help us, people like us can ride that shit. Look. Look. We came to Nottingham to recruit some men. You kept on complaining that we weren’t doing that, and now we can. The Red Lions will follow me now—they’ll have to!—their city’s about to be destroyed! We get out of Nottingham, we go find the others. We win. It’s everything we wanted.”
Everything we wanted.
Arthur didn’t have a clue what that meant anymore.
He looked at his old friend, wondering what that path meant. What it meant to pursue a selfish victory. This was Will Scarlet, his hair plumed out like a peacock, red paint cracking over his face, the gruesome nub of his mutilated ear exposed to the world. The scar across his chest from Zinn’s rope dart, visible under his open neckline. The memory of Elena haunting him everywhere he went. This was the collection of things he’d gathered to get what he wanted.
Anyone who follows him is going to drown.
Arthur had his scars, too, the wide crusty gash that still wept across his forehead, but he’d never regretted it. The wound he’d received for trying to help someone else, instead of himself.
And the other scars, the far far worse scars, where his skin was smooth and healthy. The absence of scars, that he might have earned while helping someone who needed him. The bruises he should have earned, if he’d refused to break that cobber’s face. The broken bones he might have taken if he’d fought for people rather than stand idly by. The woman who cried on the other side of the wall. The many, many messages over the battlements. The times when he looked away, or said “not my problem.”
Arthur still had skin to scar, which meant he hadn’t yet done enough.
“A lot of people are going to die,” he said.
“So we should aim not to be one of them—”
Arthur raised his hand, begging a moment to collect himself. “Listen, I’ve never thought much about myself. Not in any important way, you know? I’m just … I’m just trying to get from one thing to the next, and not be too miserable along the way. Found a couple of people I like, and consider myself lucky for it.” He met eyes with David, whose every strained wrinkle spoke to his same struggle. “I thought we could just skitter through life, keep our heads down, and let the bigger things be handled by bigger people. But, fuck. I mean, just look at us.”
Both Will Scarlet and his peacock hair looked back.
“Will, you organized a hundred people in the middle of madness, to defend themselves, with everything against you. With nothing but a fake name. Just your personality, you literally became king! Me and David … you know, we just decide to do the right thing every now and then, and somehow people follow us. We suddenly stand out in the Guard because we’re willing to put ourselves out there. It doesn’t take … heroes, you know? It just takes someone who’s willing to do the work. Because there’s so many people out there who won’t take that step, who would rather be in the background, because they think other people will handle it. Well guess what, we’re those other people. We’re fucking … we’re fucking capable, you know?”
It might have actually taken that long for Will to realize where this was going. “Are you saying you want to stay? You want to actually fight in this war?”
“No,” Arthur said. He absolutely did not want that. “But I’m saying we should.”
“Will, you can go, if you want,” David added quickly, his voice weak. “I get it. You’ve been through hell, Will. The Nottingham Guard captured you, you’ve had it worse than us down there. And if anyone recognizes you, I mean, you killed the Sheriff, you can’t risk that. I get it. But they’re not … bad. The guards. They’re just people. And they’re on the shit end of everything, too. And the people in the city…”
“They need us,” Arthur finished his friend’s thought.
The messages they’d passed. The lives disrupted, ruined, thrown upside down, or lost entirely. People who needed the strength of others to protect them, and who were let down. Women, and children, trapped in the bailey—now carrying a sw
ord and shield they had no idea how to use, waiting for the French wave to break through. These weren’t the people who ought to be in charge of defending their city. Like it or not, that job was for people like Arthur.
“I’m good at smashing things, Will. Damn it, I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. This city is going to be wrecked. We can help that. I don’t know if we’ll make a difference, I don’t know if it’ll matter once all hell breaks loose, but I know what’ll happen if we’re not here.”
“Honestly, I’m thinking of Zinn,” David said, with no embarrassment. “Girl like her, pro’ly never knew her parents, she’s grown up unloved and unwanted, and she’s had to scratch her way for every little thing she has. That little wooden hovel of hers, full of knick-knacks, that’s her life. An army’s about to march right through it, going to destroy everything she has … and we’re thinking about walking away? I bet you she’ll be out there with that little knife whip of hers, doing everything she can, pro’ly get skewered in a heartbeat, because she loves this city. While we’ll be…” David’s voice caught, “… what, sneaking out the back door?”
“And the same goes for these prisoners we’re about to release,” Arthur added, looking down past the bars, fingering that same nub on the key until it hurt. “Those Red Lions, especially. I didn’t like them at first, but damn, they love this city. You’re going to try to convince them to leave and watch it burn? I don’t think they’ll follow you.”
David nodded. “And frankly, we need them here.”
“Alright.”
“So if you want to go, we can…” Arthur didn’t even register that Will had agreed.
“Alright,” he said again, nodding his head. “You’re right.”
Arthur blinked away some piece of shit wetness that’d come to his eyes. “Really?”
“Yeah.” Will reached up and tugged at the leather tie, letting his hair gently fall back on both sides of his face. “I’m just making this up as I go along. I’m in no rush to go back to Marion. Hell, I don’t think I’m interested in that at all. I miss John, and Arable, but … that’s it. But if we’re not going there, then I don’t know what else the plan would be anyway. So maybe it’s this. Why not.”
“You’ll stay, too?” David asked, rubbing his cheeks. “Not worried you’ll be recognized?”
He shrugged. “We’ll figure it out.”
Arthur was relieved, of course, but he had to ask. “What about … what do you mean you’ve been making it up as you go along?”
That smile. “That’s the only thing I’ve ever been good at.”
“Yeah, but—” He glanced at David to check that he was equally confused. “You always said you had a plan, that we were going to rally your forces … raise gangs across the county … live like kings. You sold us on that, you said you knew what you were doing.”
Will’s lips clamped together, his hands flopped down, his body sagged. “Yeah, well. I mean, what do you want me to say? I wanted to do those things, yes, but no there was never a plan. The plan was to figure it out.”
If there were time to do so, Arthur would have mourned that. Mourned the man that he once thought Will Scarlet was. The man he’d believed in, and argued for. He bit it off. There was no point in wasting time with disappointment now. After the war, if any of them survived, he’d deal with whether or not his future and Will Scarlet’s were still the same thing. But he’d spent the better part of a day convincing people with far greater differences that it was time to rally together, and he’d be the first fool to think that didn’t apply to him, too.
So he clapped Scarlet on the shoulders. “I think you ought to just go stand on the curtain wall in front of the army, and cut your other ear off,” he said with a smile. “And yell out, if I can do this to myself, what you do think I’m going to do to you?”
Will laughed. “Well, I don’t know French. So they might just think I’m insane.”
“You think they’ll figure it out that fast?” David asked, finally relaxing.
They each chuckled, but that laughter died at the sound of far-off horns. Not one or two horns, not a few riders announcing an approach, no. This started as a dozen, then joined by a dozen more, then doubled again, and again. A hundred horns in a hundred notes—more, a thousand maybe—all joining together raucously, jumping on each other, and beneath it a roar unlike anything Arthur had ever heard. Like a flock of birds taking flight, but trapped in a box. The sound of the French army rising, laughing, delighting in their ability to put everyone in the castle on edge. The horns didn’t die down but moved in waves, joined by others as the previous wave settled. There would be no sleep this night, the invaders would see to it.
And come morning, blood.
Arthur put the iron key into the hole. They would need every man, every damned one.
FIFTY-EIGHT
ARABLE DE BUREL
NOTTINGHAM CITY TUNNELS
“I SWEAR, I CAME to help,” lied the man who wasn’t Charley Dancer.
“He’s a Guardsman.” Arable fumed, the world had shrunk such that she could see nothing but Bolt’s face, hidden beneath his ragged long hair and thin beard. Later she might realize that she had become the sole focus of the cavern, drawing the interest of every single one of Gilbert’s followers toward the brazier. But for now all she saw was a traitor. “Not just any Guardsman, he was part of Captain Gisbourne’s private regiment. He’s lying to you.”
“I’ve never lied about it,” Bolt answered. The muscles in his face spasmed, as if he hoped to blink out of existence. “I just never told anyone neither.”
“Arable, are you sure?” came Tuck’s voice, and his hand found her shoulder. “Charley’s been with us since … well, since before you. He was one of the first to join after Bernesdale, which was … four or five months ago. He’s been with us all through the winter, he’s starved with us, he’s helped us survive. If he were some sort of spy … are you sure?”
“He joined with us,” Peetey added, nudging his brother. “He found us in Bernesdale. That’d be a long time to keep up a lie.”
“Arable.” Tuck almost laughed at it. After all, what was one woman’s certainty against three men’s opinions? “Are you sure?”
She twisted to give him a lifetime’s worth of spite. “Ask me if I’m sure again.”
His eyes shrunk into his skull, and the friar retreated.
“I’ve never seen him before,” Gilbert said idly, crouching down to inspect Bolt like he was some intriguing species of insect. “And I was in the Black Guard.”
“Well I haven’t seen you before, either,” Bolt eyed Gilbert up and down, “but I’m not calling you a liar. When did you join? After I left?”
Gilbert’s voice grew curious. “Four or five months ago. Just after Bernesdale.” His eyes widened. “Do you suppose we traded lives?”
“Charley, is this true?” Lord Robert asked. “You were a Guardsman? You don’t deny that?”
“I don’t.” His neck pulled in like a turtle. “And honestly—honestly—you’re right to be suspicious. When I volunteered, I meant to hide who I was. I wanted revenge.”
“Revenge?” Beneger perked up, his favorite word spoken.
Bolt nodded. “Robin Hood killed my best friend.”
“Reginold.” Arable had been there at the funeral pyre, along with most of the castle. Reginold of Dunmow and his so-called little brother Bolt had once been her favorite friends in the Nottingham Guard. They’d welcomed her and included her in their games, they’d flirted playfully—they’d been kind. Before de Lacy was killed, before William had returned, before all this. Before all this. Before the Nottingham Guard turned on her, before Gisbourne abused her, tricked her, used her. But Reginold had died before all that, she remembered, and Bolt had left immediately after the pyre.
He looked at her, his face soft, his mouth twisted into a knot and pulled away. “I left the Guard after Reg died. I didn’t know what to do. I just … wandered for a bit, but I knew what I wanted. I
wanted to kill whoever killed him. And I didn’t care if I had to die to do it. I didn’t have anyone else, you know, Reg was the only one who ever looked after me. I went to Bernesdale, where we’d been ambushed. We’d just been guarding the road and Reg went off to take a shit, and then some boy jumped out of nowhere. As soon as I moved to find him, someone hit me in the back of the head. When I woke up, they told me that Reg was dead. His head was smashed in, he was laying in his own shit.”
“I remember you,” Tuck said, shock in his voice. “Much distracted you, and … and I think Will knocked you out? I don’t remember anyone dying, though. I forget who went after the second guard … Arthur, probably?”
“Well, it happened.” Bolt’s face was a simple slough. “And when I went back, I found the Delaney brothers. Them and a few others who were talking about finding Robin Hood and joining him, and that was that.”
Peetey, rightfully, appeared to be mortified by that knowledge.
“Are you trying to make it worse for yourself?” Zinn laughed at Bolt. “I think he’s making it worse for himself.”
“But I didn’t do anything.” Bolt coughed, pulling against his restraints. “I thought Robin Hood’s gang would be full of evil … murderers, and monsters, you know? But they weren’t. They were just people. And I’ll admit it, I’ll admit it, at first I only idled my time because I didn’t know who killed Reg, and I wanted to be sure. I couldn’t exactly just ask everyone about it. Not to mention that when Arable joined, I had to hide half the time, keep to the edges, not let her get a good look at me. But the longer I stayed, the more … I don’t know. The less I wanted to do it. And eventually the friends I made became real, and I found that I cared. And I tried to help. Like I’m trying now.”
Arable laughed at his attempt at sympathy. “You want us to believe you just—what, changed your mind?”
“Yes.” His wide face folded. “Is that so impossible? Didn’t you do the same?”
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