Everything I Do: a Robin Hood romance (Rosa Fitzwalter Book 1) (44 page)

“I thank you that you did not kill my father…”
her own words from only a few hours ago were haunting her as she went.

…

The Sheriff’s funeral was to take place in two days’ time, and Rosa was determined to attend.

“The chief would murder us if we let you go,” Will told her, frantic.

She simply pursed her white lips together and stood there, silent. She had spoken little in the past days, content to watch the arrangements from afar and to work alongside Father Tuck to keep the men fed and clothed. There was nothing more she could do.

She didn’t know herself how she kept so calm in the face of such sorrow and pain. Merely the thought of the men needing her, and of Robin’s disappointment in her should she collapse in a corner crying, kept her moving most of the time. At night she fell apart. But then when the sun came up she was one of the first to be up, and went about her work with miraculous energy, hugging her pain to herself, and keeping her torn heart together by sheer force of will.

“Ju, don’t just stand there, do something,” Will went on, turning to Julian.

Julian swallowed. There were dark circles under his eyes and his cheeks seemed to have thinned overnight. He ran a hand through his mane of golden hair.

“Leave us,” he said to Will simply. Then he turned to his sister and took her hands in his. “Sweet Rosa,” he said to her, “sister, I worry about you. You have given your heart to mourning for the man who was once your father in name only. The man who stole me from you, who hurt you, who almost killed you…”

She turned sharply away from him, and he shut his eyes briefly as tears threatened to overcome him.

“Why do you grieve for him so?” he asked her, taking her by the shoulders and turning her to look him in the eye. “Why do you insist on…”

“On loving him?” she interrupted him in a low, sad voice. “Still? After everything?”

Julian nodded, helpless.

“For penance,” Rosa answered.

Julian kept a firm hold on himself, or his anger would explode. “Penance?” he spat. “Penance for what?!”

Rosa’s eyes filled with tears for the first time since the terrible news had reached the camp. Julian’s arms were around her immediately and she melted into them, dissolving into pure pain.

“You did no wrong,” Julian kept murmuring against her ear. “It never was your fault. None of it. None of his hatred was your fault.” Still she cried as though her heart was breaking.

Which it was.

The next morning, as the day of the funeral and Robin Hood’s execution dawned, Julian announced to the gathered men that he could not, would not keep his sister from attending.

“Which one of the two?” Matt asked, trying awkwardly to lighten the mood.

“The funeral,” Little John turned to him sharply. “Nothing else is going to happen on this day.”

He was trying to fit inside a monk’s garb that Rosa and Father Tuck had quickly tried to sew for him yesterday, and it wasn’t fitting correctly, making up for some very comical scenes in front of the men. No one was in the mood for merry-making, however. Not today.

“You look like a sack of carrots, my boy,” Father Tuck told him dryly.

Everyone looked at Rosa’s direction, expecting her to take the fabric in her deft fingers and make new stitches where it had torn.

But for once she sat unmoving and stared into space with sad, haunted eyes.

“Will Scarlet and Matt,” Julian said solemnly. They immediately snapped into attention. “I need you to not lose her from your sight. Not for a second.” They both nodded. “Maybe a few more men should follow from a distance,” he added after a moment’s consideration. “The crowds will be running wild.”

“No…” Rosa whispered, and she had to clear her voice before continuing. “No one should be put in danger for my sake,” she said. “Please,” she added.

“Alan, you’ll come too, only stay a bit further behind,” Little John said.

Julian placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed tight.

“We’ll do anything for our chief’s reason for living,” he replied. “As for me and John, we’re going to take his last confession.” He stopped to cast a knowing look around him. “And, hopefully, relieve him of the noose about to go round his neck.” Rosa shuddered violently.

Father Tuck began explaining once again what they should do and say once they were standing in front of the hangman’s platform, before their chief, and Rosa turned aside to her brother.

“Tell him I don’t fault him for what he did,” she whispered. “Tell him… whatever happens, promise me.”

Julian assured her that he would.

“And I promise you that we’ll get him out of there…” he went on, but Rosa interrupted him.

“Don’t,” she said. “Just try to keep yourself alive. I will pray for you, for God’s will and for His mercy. And I’ll… I’ll pray for him as well.”

He crushed her in one last embrace, and was gone to get ready in a flash.

Rosa was already wearing her black mourning garb, and she slid a thick black veil over her face and hair, so that she was almost completely shrouded in darkness. She would be nearly unrecognizable, and entirely indistinguishable in the midst of a mad, moving crowd. At least that was the plan.

…

It all went wrong when it started to rain.

The skies had been grey and thickly overcast all morning, and at precisely the moment when the ceremony began, they began to pour. The crowds shifted, trying to gain protection from the pelting water by proximity, and Will and Matt pressed even closer to Rosa, scared that she would be pushed away from them and they’d lose her in the throng. And then the first unexpected thing of the day happened.

A tall, slender figure, hooded and dressed all in black, approached Rosa among the crush of people. Matt tensed immediately, and prepared to draw his knife, but Rosa laid a hand on his arm.

“Wait,” she whispered. Then she turned to the hooded figure. “What do you want, Sir Hugh?” she addressed it.

The figure chuckled.

“You recognize me immediately, my lady,” he said. “It does me honor. What I want is to offer my condolences…”

“They are unwanted,” she answered sharply, trying to hold back the tears and desperation that threatened to overwhelm her. Will found her hand and held on to it. Sir Hugh DeHavenger drew in a sharp breath beside her.

“You do understand that I have important duties to perform on this day and instead I am here looking for you among the crowds, my lady?” he said, a bit impatiently.

“And yet you still haven’t told me to what I owe this unwelcome visit,” she retorted.

“Well,” he began, “for one thing I have pointed you out to my guards.” He lifted a finger to indicate the said guards, a mere few yards from where she was standing, their eyes glued in her direction. “You are, after all, a wanted outlaw, let us not forget. You, as well as your feeble bodyguards.”

Rosa could feel the panic, palpable, radiating from Will and Matt. She strove to remain calm.

“And what of it?” she asked.

“Nothing as yet,” he answered, bending close to her ear. His masculine scent filled her nostrils and it was all she could do not to flinch. She felt the blood draining from her face, but she willed herself to keep a firm footing and breathe. “Now cast your eye to the east gate, if you please, my lady.”

She did, and almost fainted. If Sir Hugh hadn’t caught her, she would have stumbled and fallen to the ground. Terrified, Will and Matt looked to her white face. “No,” she whispered.

“Yes,” Sir Hugh countered.

There, just to the side of the east gate, were Little John and Julian in their monks’ outfits, handcuffed and bloodied, with five guards around them.

“They will, of course, join your beloved criminal in the gallows,” Sir Hugh went on, undeterred. “What say you?”

Rosa took a frantic breath.

“Anything you want,” she replied immediately and he smiled.

“Ah, now that’s what I like to hear. Tell your friends to leave us.”

She signaled them to go, but they didn’t budge an inch.

“We are not afraid of you,” Will told him bravely. “The worst you can do is kill us along with our chief yonder. ‘Twould be an honor for us both, truly.”

Sir Hugh shook his head.

“I know you are not afraid of me, my stupid fellow,” he said to Will. “But you are afraid for her.” With these words he produced a small knife which he then proceeded to place against her throat, unnoticed by the crushing and yelling crowds. Will paled so much that Rosa was afraid he would swoon right there and then.

In a moment, however, he and Matt stepped aside, elbowing their way through the crowds, and left her alone with Sir Hugh.

“Satisfied?” Rosa asked him.

“Not quite,” Sir Hugh said.

“I am entirely in your power,” she replied. “What more can you possibly want?”

“It is a sad occasion this, your honored father’s funeral,” he said solemnly, “but unfortunately ‘tis now that the opportunity has presented itself.”

“What opportunity?” she asked, dread creeping up to clench her stomach.

“You look so beautiful in your grief,” Sir Hugh said, gazing into her eyes earnestly; his own were beginning to mist over. “Your skin so pearly white against your black mourning dress… How I long to pull back this veil and see your red lips…” she swayed on her feet, and he seemed to shake himself out of his trance. “But all this will have to wait,” he resumed. “For now, I humbly offer you the bridal price of your friends’ lives. And in return I must ask for your hand in marriage.”

He prepared to kneel down in the dirt and mud, as rain droplets were splashing on his hood, and offer her his hand. He didn’t need to, however. With only a second’s hesitation, Rosa drew herself up and looked him squarely in the eye.

“Robin’s life too?” she asked him. He sneered, but inclined his head in agreement. “I accept,” she said.

She stayed long enough to see the guards releasing the men, and to make sure that they were being left alone to leave through the gates unescorted, before she made her way to the platform, along with Sir Hugh DeHavenger. She well knew she was to sit next to him in the gilded, intricately-woven throne up on the dais, as his intended bride, for all the world to see. Before they went up, however, he took her hand and turned her to show her a lone figure alighting from a dog-cart near the gate.  She thought his gait resembled Robin’s, but she couldn’t be sure at this distance whether it was truly he.

“There will be no wedding unless I am convinced that Robin Hood is free and safe,” she hissed at him as they were taking their seats up on the dais. “And by this I mean that I am going to need actual
proof
of his safety, more than a glimpse of him at the gate, if it even is he.”

Sir Hugh was sweeping droplets of water from her veil tenderly. She flinched, but did not move away from his touch.

“I always keep my word, sweet. You will learn to love me,” he said, almost kindly, and then his voice became harsh again. “And you will learn not to speak that name in front of me again, unless you want your wedding night to be one of unbearable pain and humiliation.” Gently, he took her hand and brought it to his lips. Then, hiding it in the folds of her skirts, he twisted it painfully, until she saw black spots in front of her eyes.

She could barely recognize this harsh, cruel man, his behavior at the moment closely resembling her father’s. Where was the brooding poet, the quiet gentleman she had known in her childhood? This man, causing her to swoon with pain, was an altogether different creature, a grasping, ruthless despot.

His hand supported her drooping head, and, all concern, he called for some wine for his bride, who had been overcome by emotion at the sight of her father’s casket.

As she was revived, gasping and sweating from the pain, Rosa felt a chill run down her spine. She lifted her eyes to the crowds to try and distract herself from the pain.

And then there he was.

A sudden movement in the second row, just below her foot, the flash of a green hood dirtied with mud and soaked by rainwater -that was all that gave him away. But immediately she was alert, for her heart stirred within her at the mere suspicion, at the mad hope that she had seen him.

She lifted her gaze to look better and her eyes met the black ones of the outlaw who loved her.

There was pure anguish in those black eyes, a desperation and helplessness she had never seen before. He looked white and gaunt, but he kept his eyes firmly on her as though there was no one else present but her.

The new Sheriff, the jostling crowds, even the grim guards disappeared.

She looked back at him.

Water was dripping from his clothes, his hair, his chin. His lips were parted slightly, as though he was in the middle of calling her name but the noise all around him was drowning out the sound, and she saw him wince as he took in the despair in her expression. His eyes were wild with fear for her, and she hoped, for his sake, that he hadn’t seen the small show of cruelty her new bridegroom had displayed.