Hawksmaid (16 page)

T
IME CAN DO STRANGE
things. The days of the journey to Barfleur and then on to the emperor were a blur in the mind that Matty and Moss now shared. The ransom had been delivered. Richard was released, but it all seemed like a dream. Matty felt herself and Moss both weakening on their flight back to England. Was it a fever? A hawk fever? Would the treatments she had used to cure the birds work for her and Moss? And even so who would know how to treat them?

She knew that some unseen power had allowed
her this time out of time, this life that had straddled both living and dying, both human and bird, splicing feather and flesh. But the effort had been great, and she now felt that the end was near. She could hear the others speaking as they flew those last miles back to the Fitzwalter castle.

“Come, Moss, you can make it.” Lyra and Ulysses were both flying under the peregrine, creating an updraft so that the bird would not have to pump her wings so vigorously, for each wingbeat seemed to deplete her strength. Matty, too, felt their shared strength ebbing, her heart slowing.

Marigold flew and spoke to them both. “We're almost there. I see the castle. Hang on! Oh, Matty, live!”

“Trying. Trying.” The whispered words were not quite bird nor were they human.

They flew in through the window on the east wall of the mews. Moss, too weak to perch, settled on the floor. The other birds brought talons full of straw to pile around her. Matty felt a tearing inside.
We are separating, but I am as withered as this old peregrine.

“Matty, say something. Say something,” Marigold begged. But Matty could say nothing. She watched
from somewhere just above Moss. Watched the bird's chest heaving, the breaths growing shallower, the peregrine's eyes no longer seeing. The space between each breath grew longer until…until…

 

In the shadows of the cell of the abbey, the lepers gathered around.

“Is she still breathing?” Helena asked.

“Hardly,” said a legless old man. “She can't last till morning.”

And Marian felt herself dissolving like night dew in the rising sun. She felt no pain. Nothing.
Death is not that bad,
she thought with mild surprise. It seemed almost like an old friend who had waited patiently for her at the end of a very long road. Had she the strength, she would have run to it.
Yes, I am falling in love with dying,
she thought.
In love…

 

“She's gone, isn't she?” Morgana said as she looked at the unmoving feathers on the floor of the mews.

“Yes,” Marigold replied. They had all felt it, known it the instant Moss died. It was like a breeze passing through the mews and then only stillness, a whisper, and finally silence. No more. “But Matty—is she gone,
too?” The birds began to cock their heads, swiveling them this way and that. There was an emptiness in the mews that none of them had ever experienced. They dared not speak what each one sensed. “Matty?” whispered Marigold. But there was nothing.

“She's not here,” Lyra said softly.

Suddenly Marigold felt a great anger suffuse every one of her hollow bones.

“We're going!” she announced.

“Where? What's to be done?” Lyra asked.

“She has to be somewhere,” Marigold said staunchly. “This…” she said, looking down at the body that had held Moss, “this is not Matty.”

Then Ulysses said, “Marigold, you loved her like no other. Because of you she was almost hawk, and because of her you were almost human; but she is gone. She has died.”

“But, Ulysses, even in death, she must be
somewhere
. Moss's body is here.” Marigold's voice cracked. She could not bear to think of Matty as a body. “Terrible things have been done to her. We cannot right all wrongs. But I swear on the memory of Matty, I will take my vengeance on her enemies.”

The three other hawks were suddenly jolted from
their grief. “We fly at daybreak!” Marigold said.

A cacophony of raucous caws filled in the mews.

Below, old Meg turned in her sleep and thought,
Ah yes, Matty must be back stirring up the hawks. Imping their feathers, filing their talons…
but then she blinked her eyes, opened them wide, and she realized how silly that was. Matty had been gone for weeks and she knew not where. She was completely alone now in the castle. Hodge had died the day after Matty had disappeared. The loneliness she felt was as sharp and painful as any ache in her stiff old bones.

 

It had not been more than a few days since Robin had received the message that Marian was being kept at the Nottingham abbey. He did not know all that had transpired since and that her hawks were mourning what they sensed might be her death. Instead, he was merry with an ingenious scheme to free her.

“You see, fellows, it has taken me a while to plan this. But I have gone out and watched that abbey and come to see they do a thriving business in funerals for lepers. So here is my idea.” He looked around, his eyes lively. “I propose that we have a leper's funeral…but for an uncommon leper.”

“Yes,” said Rich slowly, a sly twinkle in his eyes. “Do go on? Who is this leper?”

“Me, of course!”

“Oh, this beats all!” Little John whooped. “Can I be the priest?”

“And of course I'll be the friar,” said Friar Tuck.

“Yes, and the rest of you the mourners. And call in all the boys—we need lots of mourners. Spread the word that this is a rather well-off leper. They'll swing open the gates for us. Get ready, boys. Time to mourn! And time at last to rescue Marian.”

“
L
OOK DOWN THERE.” MARIGOLD
tipped her head as they approached the abbey.

“What is it?” Lyra asked.

“Matty's friend, the friar.” Her voice broke. “I—I think it's what humans call a death walk, one they do for their final ceremonies.”

“Final ceremonies?” Ulysses asked.

“Yes, when someone dies. I learned about it those
times I visited Matty at the abbey. They call them funerals. But they also have them for lepers even before they die. And I think this one is for a leper.”

“Not Matty?” Morgana said with excitement.

“No. See that limping figure, the one with a crutch. They are bringing him to the abbey. But—but…”

“But what?” Ulysses asked.

“There's something about him. I'm not sure. Let me go explore.”

Marigold plunged down, then peeled off as she approached the procession so she was hovering just above the straggly line of marchers. She managed to flit through the line and peer deeply into the hooded face of the limping man. “Marigold!” Robin exclaimed. Next to him in the garb of a priest was the towering figure of Little John and then Rich. Behind them, dressed as monks and mourners, were many more of Robin's men.

Marigold flew back to the other hawks. “It is Robin Hood!” She swiveled her head toward the goshawk. “Ulysses, now that Moss is gone, you fly point the best. We need to support the death walkers. There will be an attack, I am sure.”

“All right!” Ulysses cawed, like the voice of
a commander, experienced in battle. “Form up. Marigold, fly port flank. Lyra, fly starboard. Morgana, follow them.”

 

The abbess stood erect at the gates of the abbey. She wondered briefly why it was not the usual priest heading the procession. Well, no matter. She had been told that one of these lepers was quite well off and with no heirs. It would be easy to confiscate his money and possessions.

As the procession filed into the courtyard and finally into the chantry, the abbess did not notice the four birds hovering in the sky.

The trestles in the chantry were draped with the black cloth. The leper began to kneel for his last confession. The service had just begun when Will, shrouded in his monk's habit, slipped in beside Robin. “A contingent of sheriff's men on the way. News of your wealth, I think, has spread a bit wider than we might like. Seems that the sheriff wants to get the same share as his sister.”

“Sibling squabbles. How tiresome. Are we outnumbered?”

“About even.”

“Fear not, we've got the birds on our side. That puts us ahead.”

 

The service was brief. It was time for the symbolic burial. The abbess stood by the priest as he prepared to sprinkle the dirt on the leper's feet. “Thou art dead to the living, but alive again to God.”

Suddenly the leper's black shroud swirled into the air. “By the bishop's buttocks, I'm dead!” roared Robin Hood, flashing his sword. The abbess swayed. Her mouth pulled into a grimace of disbelief. The other mourners were instantly transformed. Rich and Scarlet tore off their dark clothes and stood in the green of the men of Sherwood Forest. Through the chantry doors burst Little John.

Then, seemingly from nowhere, a forward guard of the sheriff's men began swarming into the outer courtyard of the abbey.

“We have a fight on our hands, lads,” Robin shouted. More men in green rushed over the courtyard walls. Robin turned to his followers “Listen to me, men of Sherwood. Head for the rooftop. Fit shafts to your bows and aim for their hearts. And now, milady”—he addressed the abbess, who was stunned beyond
speech—“kindly direct us to your prisoner.”

The abbess remained silent. “You are a common thief.”

“And so are you! God's kneecaps, woman, do you hear me! Take me to Marian,” Robin roared. He glimpsed the flash of metal just as she dragged a dagger from within her robes and raised it to slash his throat.

The four hawks caught the glint of the dagger and, as if one, they hurled toward the figure. Marigold had never flown with such fury. She thrust her legs forward and extended her murderous talons. A bloodcurdling scream ripped from the abbess's throat. Her hands were useless to protect her from the bird's brutal attack. Fingers were broken, and then the abbess's translucent eyes were gouged out. In one quick slash of the talons her throat was cut. The abbess collapsed to the ground.

“Marigold,” Ulysses commanded, “you and Morgana stay here. Lyra and I will meet the sheriff's force on the road.” Instantly, Ulysses and Lyra were flying in low passes over the sheriff's men. They aimed for throats and heads, knocking the men off their horses more by surprise than force.

Inside the courtyard Marigold and Morgana
continued to wreak havoc while Robin hurried toward the leper hospital with Little John at his side.

Robin plunged into the room with its wreckage of humanity, and his blood ran cold. There on a pallet lay Marian, barely breathing, her face the color of stone. Nearby was a heap of bones with a few fragments of flesh remaining wrapped in a shroud. From that heap came a voice.

“She is not living, but she is not dead. She is elsewhere, Robin. She has shed this body for now, as one might leave their clothes. Do not fear. Gather her close, and take her to the greenwood, once more to the blasted oak of Sherwood.”

M
ARIAN HAD BEEN SO
close, so far down the road, and her old friend Death had been waiting, when suddenly it was as if that friend turned away. “But Moss…you took Moss…. Why not me? I'm tired…so tired I don't want to go on!” Death paused, and Marian felt hope. But then Death said, almost casually, looking over her shoulder, “It's not your time!” and walked on without a backward glance.

Still Marian tried to argue. “It is my time!”

“Live, Marian! Live! Please live! I love you. You can't die.”

 

Someone was kneeling by her. He had been there for days, possibly weeks, crying, begging her not to die. Now for the first time since she had been rescued, Marian's eyelids fluttered open.

“Robin? Robin, it's you?”

“Yes. Me.”

“How long have I been this way?”

“More than a fortnight. Marian, there is much to live for. Richard has been freed. He makes his way back to England.”

“Then it worked. The ransom worked.”

“You made it work. You and your hawks. You see, you must live. I love you.”

Marian felt a glad thrill in her weakened heart. In a voice that was barely a whisper she said, “Then you must imp me back to health.”

“What do I do?”

“You must hunt me a hare and make a rich broth from its flesh and at first feed it to me slowly. And my ankles that are sore and bloody from the jesses, you
must bathe them in a tincture of henbane and water of lettuce and just a touch of nightshade. Then dry them and rub them with balm of aloe.”

“And this will make you well, Marian?”

“Oh yes, Robin. And I shall love you forever and ever.” They were now beyond words and could only peer so deeply into each other's eyes that, for them, all the world disappeared.

At that moment Little John came into the blasted oak. His eyes brimmed with joy.

“Robin, at last!”

Robin looked up at his old friend. “He's back, truly?”

Little John nodded. “Truly, and he wants to see Marian.”

“She is too weak.”

“He insists.”

“Insists?”

“I would not argue. I think he has the right.”

“Then bring him in, but tell him he cannot stay for long.”

The shadow of a tall man sliced across the hollow, and there was the clank of metal. The man knelt by the animal furs on which Marian rested. “Your
majesty!” Marian gasped.

“Milady, I understand you are the reason I am here today. And although precious jewels were the ransom for my own life,
you
are England's most precious jewel.”

Marian closed her eyes. She remembered that terrible day when her father had told her mother to hide her. His words came back so clearly it was as if he were right here with her. “Hide. Suzanne! Hide Matty!…Forget the jewels. Matty is our only jewel.”

She felt the king lean closer to her. “Can she hear me?” he asked.

A trace of a smile crossed her face. She began to speak in a low whisper. Everyone leaned toward her, for she could barely be heard, but it sounded as if she was laughing. “I wouldn't fit in the potato hole.” She chuckled.

“Potato hole?” whispered the king.

“She must be talking about the raid on her father's castle. Her parents tried to hide her in a potato hole,” Robin said. “But I'm not sure why she is talking about this now. It was so long ago.”

“Because I was my father's only jewel,” Marian replied in a much stronger voice.

A wonderful sense of relief swept through the blasted oak. The king now rose. He turned to Robin. “Can you perhaps lift her up a bit?”

Robin put his arm around Marian and, supporting her back, held her so that she was almost sitting. The king drew his sword. He raised it and then tapped her on each shoulder.

“Right mindful of your prowess on the field, I, Richard, king of England, dub thee Lady Marian of the forests of Sherwood and Barnsdale, a knight of the realm.”

A knight am I! Oh!
thought Marian.
How much nicer to be a knight than a jewel.

She looked at Robin. She felt a surge deep within her, a new keenness.
Yarak. I am yarak once more!