Jennifer Roberson - [Robin Hood 01] (50 page)

He knew why she had come and what she meant to do. His eyes were black in the shadows. “I have no chivalry. Let it be the truth, then: what I would do to you should be done to no maid. It has been—too long.”

She did not know enough of men to fully understand, but her experience with Will Scarlet—and snatches of stories she had heard—persuaded her the communion between men and women could be violent. Obviously Robin knew, if he feared to harm her.

But she had gone too far. Fear was secondary. Now she meant to provoke, to lift the pain from him. “Will Scarlet took me.”

His face spasmed. “Don’t lie.”

She could think of nothing but him. “Then let it be
you.
Let it be Robin of Locksley.”

His expression was a travesty as he shook his head. “Too much of him is dead. Too much blood was spilled—too much flesh was
stilled
—”

No longer content to soothe, Marian cut him off. “You are alive,” she said.
“My father
is the dead man.”

He recoiled, as she intended, for she wanted to shatter the wall for good. “Is this my penance?” he cried. “Will you grant me absolution?”

Now she stood before him. She put out a hand and touched him: fingertips that trembled on the rigid line of his mouth.
I am not afraid of him.

He came up from the chair, leaving Arthur’s throne behind. He was Paris to her Helen, stripping away the useless courtesies of gentleness and compassion, cracking the veneers, shattering the facades. He was Acre to her Richard: the mask of his own construction, the wall he had labored to build, was undone by the human trebuchet who hurled the stone at his soul.

He wound his hands in her hair, drawing her hard against his body. “I want—” But he couldn’t finish.

“I know,” Marian whispered.

Marian awoke with a start and realized the wind had died, driving away the wolf and silencing the
bean sidhe.
All was perfectly still, save for the sound of Robin’s breathing.

A simple yet complex noise: in- and exhalation, a steady continuation that stirred in her a response of which she had believed herself incapable, not knowing what it was to desire a man, not knowing what it was to give of her deepest self, receiving his in return.

Her own breath ran ragged a moment, then renewed itself. She lay on her side on the woven mat with two cloaks thrown over her, one corner tangled amidst their legs. He lay heavily against her spine, soundly asleep; she had given him that, at least.

The absence of wind was eerie, the air thick and sodden. It was cool in the oratory, hoary with traceries of morning mist that crept through the window notches. The oil lamp burned low, fretting at its shutters; it washed the fieldstone chamber in oyster and ivory and gold.

She was sore, stiff, and weary from a night on the floor. She lay quietly on the mat so as not to disturb Robin, and considered the look of the world that according to the coy rumors she had heard all her life, was supposed to look very different the morning after a night like the one she’d just experienced.

He had said it plainly:
What I would do to you should be done to no maid.
And she supposed it should not be, but it had been; it was finished. Maidenhood was fleeting, surrendered easily in the brief painful instant between virginity and carnal knowledge; she was now a woman, and if he was too rough and overhasty she could blame it, if she chose, on the brutalities of war, on the horrors of captivity, not on the man himself.

She knew him better than that. Marian did choose. And later, a little later, he had shown her a different side; he had shown her a different man, this one able to rouse her as she had roused him, proving haste was not required, nor roughness, nor possession, but the avid tenderness and slow consummation of bodies but newly awakened: hers for the first time, his after nearly two years.

His nearness was comforting. She found it also daunting, fraught with new adversities she had not fully considered in the peril of the storm and the clamor of her body. Reality intruded: she had bedded a man in the oratory and still lay with him there, absent from her chamber where Joan would go to rouse her; too obviously used by the look of hair and kirtle.

He stirred briefly, murmuring into her hair, then fell once again into silence. Emotion overwhelmed her, flushing her with a hunger not at all of belly or spirit. She wanted—
needed
—to turn over, to look into his face, to reach out and touch him so he would awaken and touch her. She wanted badly to linger and dismiss the dawn entirely, and the day to follow; to invite yet again—or initiate herself—the incredibly complex intimacy that made two people one.

But there were chores to be tended, servants to be faced, a front gate to have mended, and God only knew how many animals to be nursed, found, or butchered.

Life doesn’t stop,
she thought.
Not for pain
—
or for pleasure.

The perils of yesterday were as present today: the sheriff of Nottingham had asked her to marry him. No—he had
told
her.

Marian frowned, listening. The cock had not yet crowed, which meant it wasn’t quite dawn—or the rooster was dead.

It
felt
like dawn.

Her mother had had a saying:
Linger, and you may lose; hasten, and you may win all.

It was time to make sure she won.

Marian sat up carefully, edging away from the mat so as not to disturb Robin. She cocooned him in swathing wool, leaving only face and boots uncovered, and a single curled hand.

She hoped the rooster was dead, so Robin could sleep a while.

 

The pounding on his door awakened William deLacey, with no word of explanation called out by a nervous servant. The sheriff hovered a moment between fury and astonishment; Prince John had departed, which meant there was no further need for such thoughtlessness.

He yanked back the linens and coverlet, thrust himself out of bed—his own once again, while Eleanor had hers—threw a robe haphazardly over his bliaut, and strode stiff-legged across the cool stone floor to the door, which he unlatched and jerked open. “What
is
—” He stopped in midspate. “Brother Tuck?”

The monks’ eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot. “My lord, forgive me. I must speak with you.”

It was a declaration no less preposterous than unexpected. DeLacey was in no mood for discussion aired by a gluttonous monk who had yet to prove himself capable of a single independent thought. It was a trait deLacey found useful often enough, but his preferences for willing, dullard servants did not in any way convince him to welcome Tuck at such an hour. He opened his mouth to say so, but the monk cut him off.

“My lord. I can’t do it.” Tuck’s color was bad, as was his breathing. He filled up the doorway with voluminous cassock and heavy shoulders. His face was filmed with perspiration, and he smelled of a nervous, powerful sanctity.

“Can’t do what?” the sheriff inquired, hard-pressed not to slam the heavy door shut just to make a point. “Brother Tuck, I believe there may be a more opportune time for this—”

But Tuck was not dissuaded; in fact, he seemed quite determined to block the only escape route so that deLacey
had
to listen—that, or go back to bed and pull the covers over his head, which he had learned as a child solved absolutely nothing. “My lord, I did not sleep last night. I prayed all night long. My spirit is in turmoil ...” He took a deep breath. “My lord, I
can’t
pretend to be a priest.”

DeLacey reached out and settled a rigid hand on Tuck’s shoulder, dug into black wool, then dragged the monk inside. It would not do to raise the topic where servants might hear. He shut the door decisively. “We discussed this yesterday—”

“Yes, my lord—and I agreed.” Tuck showed no signs of surrendering the battle despite his nervousness. “That young woman is indeed in need of comfort, but to imperil my soul—
and
hers!—by commiting a sin such as this is unthinkable.” The double chin was amazingly firm. “My lord, I beg you, there must be another way.”

DeLacey wondered what it would feel like to sink a fist into the mound of Tuck’s belly. “We discussed this
in detail
yesterday. For the Lady Marian’s sake—”

“For her
soul’s
sake, I dare not do it.” Tuck squared his shoulders. “I understand you may well dismiss me, my lord, but I am convinced there is another way. You see—”

“What I
see,”
deLacey began dangerously, “is a man in danger of being dismissed not only from my service, but from his abbey as well.” The time for prevarication was done. Tuck obviously needed to be reminded of whom he served, in what capacity, and just how exacting the duties were. DeLacey therefore resorted to blunt brevity. “You misled that old woman into believing you were a priest, did you not? And you prepared an execution order for the wrong man.
Knowingly
prepared it.”

Tuck’s wheezing increased. “My lord, I beg you—”

“What do you think Abbot Martin would say?” The sheriff leaned closer, lowering his voice. “What do you think Abbot Martin would
do?”

Tuck’s folded hands trembled. The determination slipped, as deLacey intended. The aberration was minor, then; Tuck was salvageable. “My lord ... there would be punishment, of course—”

“Punishment!” DeLacey allowed the word to crack through the chamber. “My God, man—forgive me, Brother—but I know perfectly well what Abbot Martin will do. There is no secret of his vice—”

Tuck’s wide jaw dropped. “Vice!”

“Indeed.” DeLacey now was coolly urbane, intimidating easily with a casual negligence. “The Church harbors many men whose appetites are—
unique
—Brother Tuck ... often such appetites may be used for training other men to celebrate the glory of God in many alternative ways. You are young, I know, and innocent”—his tone hardened—“but there is no substitute for truth. Abbot Martin will see to it the skin is removed from your back ... the question remains whether he will do it himself, or bid
you
to do it.”

It shocked him utterly. “Oh—my lord—”

DeLacey offered compassion. “Brother, I do know this without question ... one of your brethren served here for years. He died but months ago. He told me all about it just before he expired.”

Tuck was agonized. “He is the
abbot
—”

Silkily, he explained, “Appetite is not governed by closeness to God, Brother Tuck—if anything, wielding authority is a fillip to the taste.” DeLacey smiled kindly. “Now, Brother Tuck, what say you to the wedding?”

 

Sunrise gilded mist, so that shafts of mote-filled saffron light penetrated the window notches and illuminated the little chamber. Fieldstone glistened damply. Robin, newly awakened in an unfamiliar place, wondered for an instant if he had died during the night and no longer walked the earth.

Then he recognized the oratory, and remembered the night before.

He sat upright instantly, jerking cloaks aside;
two
cloaks, not one, and none of them housing Marian. She had left him entirely alone without waking him, which was odd of itself; he had not slept well since Acre and small noises and movement usually disturbed him.

England...
Slack-limbed in relief, Robin slumped back to the matting and gazed fixedly at the low timber roof looming overhead. He lay on his back with his legs propped up, his hands splayed limply across his abdomen, trying to sort out the welter of emotions surging up in place of aching emptiness, and the newly recalled responses of a body too long locked up in mind as well as in truth.

The acknowledgment was tentative and explorative, so as not to chase away the fragile, much-needed belief: that he was a man after all, despite the attempts of others to strip him, in the most elemental way, of the ability to prove it; despite also his own more successful attempts to mute his natural desires out of a sense of degradation in captivity, and also a personal shame that a man, even a king, might desire him in place of a woman.

Such desires, though named perversion in the sight of God, were not unheard of in an army, where men trusted other men implicitly, or died. In need of women but with none in attendance save those they caught and raped, some men sought release by private means, while others looked to companions. There were those, he supposed, who preferred it anyway; he had begun to think it might be so with Richard, for who but the king would have first claim on any woman, willing or no, and yet took none to his bed?

But as to
his
bed, and the woman in it ...

He laughed joyously, in an uprush of jubilant well-being. He was whole again, or nearly so; a man again without question. It only remained for him to make certain his father realized it, so the Earl of Huntington’s heir need not ever fear him again.

“Ya Allah. ”
He grinned up at the roof. In Arabic or English, God was merciful.

William deLacey supposed Nottingham citizens might speak well of his touring of the city in the aftermath of the storm. What they did not know—and did not
need
to know—was that he didn’t really care what damage had been done to the city or her people. His attention was wholly consumed by his current task, which had less to do with storm damage than with the devastation Prince John might wreak if his wishes were not obeyed.

He negotiated the twisty, narrow streets with distaste, disliking the mud that splattered his cloak and the stink of refuse and waste carried throughout the city, distributed in a most haphazard manner by the wind and rain. He noted with mild surprise, as he crossed the invisible border between the Jewish Quarter and the rest of Nottingham, that the odor was somewhat improved. Here people labored most assiduously to clean up waste and refuse, carting it away.

Two things, then, Jews were good for: lending money, and cleaning the streets.

He dismounted in front of the low-roofed, square building that was home and business to Abraham the Jew. He summoned one of the boys helping to sweep the cobbles in front of the door and bade him announce the sheriffs presence to Abraham, then come out and hold the horse. The boy was thin, dark-eyed and dark-haired, with eloquent, mobile features less offensive than those boasted by many of the Jews, deLacey decided.

Accordingly the boy went in, returned after a moment, and took the horse’s reins. In accented English he told the sheriff his grandfather would receive him.

“As well he should,” deLacey agreed, and unlatched the door.

The old man sat, as he usually did, for his wracked joints allowed him little latitude for movement. He inclined his head in greeting, then gestured stiffly for the sheriff to seat himself.

“No, I think not. My business will not require much time.” DeLacey swept a glance around the tiny room, very plain and unadorned, as if Abraham had no desire to show off the wealth he had acquired through usury. The Jews cheated everyone. Abraham merely seemed to be cleverer than others. “You will recall our conversation with regard to the additional tax.”

Abraham’s mouth tightened minutely. “Indeed, my lord—”

“I have come to reiterate that no tardiness will be tolerated.” The place stank of Jewishness; deLacey saw that the cloth covering the table was stitched with the cabalistic signs the Jews claimed as their written language. “It is vital that the sum be raised to ransom the king.”

“Indeed, my lord, we would like to think—”

But the sheriff did not permit him to finish. “You will recall that I asked you to speak to the other Jews.”

Abraham inclined his head.

“And that you were to tell them I would expect delivery of the taxes by the end of the month.”

“Yes, my lord, but now—”

“Now
what?”
deLacey snapped. “Is this the beginning of a ceaseless refrain encompassing refusal?”

Abraham sighed very faintly. “The storm has done much damage, my lord. Please to allow us a little more time to discuss the matter—”

“He is your
king,
Jew! Your liege lord. There can be no excuses to take precedence over the release of our sovereign.”

“My lord Sheriff.” Abraham’s twisted hands did not twitch upon the table. “It is as important to us that the king be released as it is to you. We have given generously—”

“And are more generous in taking,” deLacey retorted. “If anything, this storm will prompt others to come to you for money to hire repairs. Will you say to them you cannot lend it to them? No, of course not, because to do so would be bad business—a Jew who smells a profit never refuses custom.” He permitted himself a cold smile. “But when it comes to ransoming the king, which would not return a profit on money freely given, you refuse to consider it.”

Abraham was patient. “My lord, we have refused the king nothing. We have given more than most. All I ask—”

“It is refused,” deLacey stated. “You will speak to the others at once, gather the money, then bring it personally to me. I shall expect it within three days.”

“My lord!” Abraham’s expression was anguished. “My lord, I beg you—grant us time. This storm—”

DeLacey’s hand was on the latch. “The storm was indeed a bad one, and much damage was done. So much, in fact, it will be difficult to keep whole those possessions that escaped damage—surely you know how it is with poor people who lose what little they have. Too often they riot, and steal from those whom they consider less deserving than they themselves.” He opened the door. “Jews are always such easy targets.”

Outside, deLacey briefly considered flipping a penny to the boy who brought his horse, then thought better of it. If he were to expect the Jews to bring him the money, it had best be
Jewish
money and not coin of his own coffers. That would defeat the purpose.

 

Marian stood in the hall and tried to make sense of a world half destroyed by wind and rain. While she and Robin had remained oblivious to the storm save the one of their own making, Ravenskeep had suffered. Shutters had been torn off walls, so that blowing rain soaked bedding and rushes, which meant the wet bedding had to be dried on a day none too promising for steady sunlight, while old rushes needed to be hauled out by hand and replaced with fresh. The beaten earth beneath was too hard to be called mud, but was slick and treacherous.

The kitchen and pantry also had suffered losses, for water had come in beneath the doors and ruined sacks of flour, as well as other necessities; the cookfires had all been extinguished and the coals turned into black soup, which had to be disposed of before a new fire was laid. The roof had leaked badly in three places, less seriously in four others.

The hall was bad enough, but the exterior worse. Sim had come in and explained in detail how the chicken house had collapsed, scattering dead and living fowl throughout the walled courtyard. Somehow the stable door had unlocked itself, freeing the bay gelding—Marian did not explain how the lock had been opened on purpose, or the reasons for it—and letting in so much wind and rain that grain sacks were sodden and spoiled, and the bedding straw blown all over until hardly a wisp remained inside the stable, while the rest, he said, was likely halfway to Nottingham. The main gate had blown down and needed replacing, which Marian already knew, and most of the loose cobbles had been washed free of their beds, leaving muddy holes pocking the courtyard like an old woman shedding teeth.

That was the beginning. Marian listened to most of it and delegated duties by importance: she gave Sim silver pennies and sent him with the cart to the mill for more flour, because they needed bread; Hal she set to collecting and stacking cobbles to one side in the courtyard until the mud dried out and they could replace and reseat them; Joan she dispatched to supervising the airing out of soaked bedding and the cleaning of the kitchen.

Stephen and Tam reported the sheep were scattered all over the meadow and it would take some doing to gather them again; there were ewes dead, they said, and drowned lambs, and the bellwether was half-mad, which risked the rest of the flock, but they could tend them well enough. Marian set them to that task, knowing both men cared so much about the sheep they would be useless seeing to anything else until the flock was safe. So she called in Roger, who was her least favorite of all because he was lazy and sullen—he had run away twice from her father, but was brought back both times by Sim, who counseled a third chance—and asked him to see how many shingles they had stored away; if there were none, he would have to make them, as well as new shutters.

She then set three of the kitchen-girls to raking soaked rushes out of the hall, which would likely take all day, but told them not to replace the rushes because if it rained again before Roger finished the shutters and shingles, there would be all of it to do yet again.

In all the mess Marian was comforted by one thought: Robin was in the oratory. She wondered what he would say when he came in, or what
she
would say, and when he did at last come in the open door to blot out the tentative morning sun she found no words at all for a greeting, just an imbecilic smile. His own mirrored hers.

“Lady,” he said then, “will you walk out with me?”

And she went, because she had to, because they could say nothing to one another where others could hear them save mouth the courtesies of rank.

Her heart was full of an unforeseen shy hesitance and an equally surprising anticipation. Was this what love was? To want and not want, to need and not need, to relish the physical power while frightened by it as well?

She drew in a breath as they stepped outside the hall. “The oratory?” He was circumspect, taking care not to compromise her outside her very door. But his smile slid crooked as he cast her a sidelong glance. The timbre in his voice was altered, lacking its cool self-possession. He sounded wholly natural and somehow very young, unguarded by wariness. “I would forget what I have to say.”

She grinned. “What
have
you to say?”

“That I must go.”

She had not expected that. Not so soon.

He was quietly insistent. “I must, Marian—if I am to settle things with my father, I cannot put them off.”

She believed it worth the attempt. “I offered to send him a message. You refused. And then there was the storm.” It was most of it inconsequential. Marian wanted to tell him how much she desired him to stay, but words failed her. All she could do was what she had done, and hope it was enough. “I could send Sim with a message
now.”

His expression was bleak. “You don’t know my father—he is not a man of much patience when he has made up his mind about something ... the last word I had from him was Prince John had dangled his daughter as bait to catch Huntington’s heir. If I wait, it may be settled before I can speak against it.”

Her joy was abruptly extinguished. “John’s daughter,” she said hollowly.

“Yes.” He was serious now. “I had no interest in the match when it was first mentioned, and even less interest now. I promise you that.”

She could think of no single phrase that would express what she was feeling. Too many words tumbled about in her head, like a fortune-teller’s knucklebones. And she had no right to chide him—they had no claims on each other past what they wanted to make.

She drew in a constricted breath. “You will go to Huntington, then—”

“And come back.” Most definitive; the smile in his eyes was warm. “It may take a day or two—or
three,
knowing my father!—but I will come back to you. I promise, Marian.” He glanced briefly at the courtyard, where Hal gathered cobbles. His mouth tightened minutely. “I can do nothing now—”

“Here.” She gestured. “The gate is open, my lord—shall I walk you out of it?”

The glint in his eyes was pronounced. “Do, Lady Marian.”

She turned. “Hal—will you bring a horse for Sir Robert? He leaves for Huntington.”

“Aye, Lady Marian.”

“We’ll wait,” she said. Then, feeling jubilant again, because he was not deserting her utterly, “It would not do for him to bring the horse when we least expected it.”

“No,” he agreed gravely. “Marian—I will come back. He is not an easy man to deal with, but I will insist he understand.”

She felt the first touch of alarm. “Would he forbid you to see me?”

His face was very still. “He may forbid all manner of things—it was always his way. But I am no longer a boy. It is for me to shape my life.”

“You are his heir. What if he chose to disinherit you?”

“I am his only son—his only
child.”
Dryly, he added, “And there is no one else to inherit that monstrosity he has caused to be built.”

Marian laughed. “It is a most impressive castle.”

His tone was scornful. “A tribute to vanity ... worse than that, it is as much a beacon as the Beltane fire—he will use it to his own ends, because it gives him power. Power attracts others.” Robin shook his head. “His fine Norman castle speaks well of his wealth, but says nothing of his intentions save he can withstand any siege. It is a promise, Marian—‘do as I say,’ it says, ‘or beware how I can be used to withstand that which I do not approve.’ ”

“A message,” she declared. “He sends a message to John!”

“And to anyone else who dares to disagree with him.” Robin sighed, scraping a hand through shining hair. “Pray God they ransom Richard, or this realm could fall to John. And if John rules England, it will be because France permits it; he is in league with Philip. The king told me before he sailed for home.”

It was astonishing. “If the king
knows—”

Robin shook his head. “What can he do from Germany?”

She understood that well enough. “But surely the ransom will be raised. England adores the Lionheart.”

“England can only contribute what money she has left. Richard drained her coffers to fuel the Crusade—I doubt there is enough to pay German Henry’s ransom.” His expression was grim. “Had my father looked to the king’s release rather than his own vanity ...” But he let it go as Hal approached with the horse. “I thank you.” He took the reins. Somberly, he said, “I will promise the horse better treatment this time.”

Marian had not asked what had driven him out into the storm, and did not now. She did not see that spending a night in a man’s bed—and in his arms—gave her the right to know all his secrets, or his private thoughts. “Come out,” she said quietly, and led the way through the gate.

 

It was a mistake, Sir Guy of Gisbourne decided as the cart journey jarred his wound. He should have stayed at Huntington another day at least, allowing his leg time to heal before banging it about in a rude cart driven by a carter who searched out every rut and pothole just to keep his passenger alert. But a part of his mind reminded him most distinctly he dared not let another day go by without supervising Nottingham Castle, or all his diligent work would be undone in a few days by the ineptitude of Walter and his ilk; nor could he allow the sheriff too much freedom from observation. It was necessary that he return to Nottingham, but he was not enjoying the painful journey.