The guard led him under a second gatehouse, up the high steps of the motte, and all too soon he dragged Cal into the great hall.
Cal blinked in the high chamber, as alive with activity as the town. Some folk were taking an early meal at long trestles, and to his left, a girl in a white smock hummed tunelessly as she spread fresh straw. His focus remained ahead.
On the raised dais, an elderly man with a hooked nose sliced meat from the carcass of a goose. His throne-like seat and his position at the centre of the high table signified this was Baron Brock. Beside him sat Odo, a bandage peeping from beneath his rubicund cap.
Cal attempted to return Odo's even gaze. So much for a chance to forge alliances before being seen, yet matters could be worse. Odo hadn't shouted spy, and if he'd identified Cal during yesterday's skirmish, then Cal would no doubt already be done for.
The guard knelt, bringing Cal down with him. "Sire, this man brings a message."
"How interesting," said Odo, reclining so his heavy chair tipped. "Our missing forester."
Brock beckoned that Cal should approach. Head bowed, Cal passed the scroll across the table and then scuttled backward. Odo regarded him with mild amusement, and Cal couldn't decide whether he'd give a pocketful of jewels to fathom what Odo was scheming or if he'd rather not know.
"Who is this from?" asked Brock, clasping the scroll unread.
"Herne the Hunter, my lord."
Cal hadn't spoken loudly, but every set of ears in the hall pricked. A hush descended. The singing girl dropped her reeds to perform the sign of the cross, muttering, "Satan is come among us."
All remnants of colour were siphoned from Brock's hollow cheeks. "H-Herne the Hunter? How can we know there's truth in what you say?"
"My lord, I can prove nothing," said Cal, "but the beast held me his prisoner. He had a companion who claimed to be…Robin Hood."
A myriad of shocked mutterings swelled, then died. Odo stuffed a hunk of bread into his mouth and spoke as he chewed. "Robin Hood. So that bracket-faced whoreson instructs his betters now?"
"No, my lord," answered Cal, "but he tries. The rogue forced me to bring this to you, though I would've warned you of his evil intentions freely. It's best for great men to know their enemies."
"I see." Odo took a sip from a pewter goblet and turned to where Brock unrolled the charter.
As the barons read, the only sounds were the distant clatter of pots from the kitchen and the scuffle of the rats. Brock jumped up and stabbed a finger at Cal.
"You knew the contents of this document, boy?"
"My lord, I don't understand letters," lied Cal. "Besides, they wouldn't tell me, their lowly captive and a forester to boot. They kept me in chains, and they punched and kicked me. I…I've hardly eaten since I was taken."
Odo dabbed his tongue to his lips, seemingly beating back a smirk. "Do not upset yourself, my dear Brock. This worthless scrap of skin can be of no real threat to us. Robin Hood is an unruly serf, and we will treat him as such when we bring him down. As for the Wild Hunt—'tis a spectre conjured by mothers to frighten their puking brats when their brooms haven't the bristles left to lash them."
Brock didn't look convinced, but a nod indicated that his underlings in the hall should get on with their duties. To a buzz of disapprobation, most did.
Odo leaned toward Brock. "Leave this with me. I've dealt with the outlaw before. And I'd like to talk in private with the messenger and apply the usual methods to test how honest he is."
Torture.
Cal kept his features blank but couldn't prevent his legs from shaking.
"Yes, yes," murmured Brock, as disinterested as if Odo had asked him to pass the salt. He fixed on the charter. "This is most distressing. Most unseemly."
To the slow grind of heavy wood against the dais, Odo rose, then sauntered to the end of the high table and around to Cal. He dismissed the guard, pressed the tips of his leather-clad fingers against Cal's cheek, captured his gaze, and winked. Cal followed at Odo's heel, under a low archway at the end of the hall and into a small vaulted room, a wine store. Odo closed the door behind him and leaned back against it.
His snort of laughter wasn't a surprise. "You belong to Marshal, do you not?"
Composed as a picture, Cal bowed. Odo was toying with him, but Odo manipulated Brock too, or this conversation would have taken place in front of the fellow noble. "I came here in the service of the regent," he answered. "But…my loyalties may have changed."
"A good answer from a little snake. By now you must have worked out Marshal isn't the only lord to have eyes and ears where he oughtn't and fingers up the arses of all who count." Odo tapped his nose, chuckling. "Who do you belong to now, boy?"
"I…I…"
I belong to Robin Hood!
Cal's inner cry shattered his fragile serenity. All he needed were simple words, yet saying them was nigh impossible. To be back in the godforsaken Greenwood would be better than this. But no, he had to be strong… or weak… or, oh Lord, who knew? He wished he could return to the days when Robin Hood had been a faceless myth and untruths had tripped freely from his tongue. He forced the vow.
"I belong to you, my lord."
Odo nodded. "Good lad. You'll forsake all other loyalties and be my servant, doing my will and mine alone. The punishment for disloyalty will be death."
"I'll do anything for you, my lord, if you ask me." Cal mustered a lopsided smile as the silky lines started to flow. "Anything to please you."
"Indeed? So what will you do for me now?"
Odo's expression was inscrutable, but they were alone in this tiny chamber. What else could he want beyond a bout of pleasuring? Cal dropped to his knees, the tart scent of fermented grapes and apples congealing in his lungs. Tight leather boots delineated the sweep of Odo's thighs, his elegant calf muscles. This task would once have been easy. Today just touching any man proved a struggle.
Odo held very still. Cal slid his fingers under a splendid blue tunic and found Odo's thick member hanging limp. Taking the heavy cock in his hands, he caressed the foreskin and the glans beneath, rewarded with a slight lengthening of the shaft. He moistened his lips, readied to give his best. Then Odo cracked knuckles across his face, splitting his inner cheek. He sprawled backward, his head clonking a liquor barrel and blood filling his mouth.
"I know Marshal is more aged than a deaf and blind donkey, but I thought he'd do better than to send a lily-livered whore to do a man's work." No laughter now. Odo brushed off his garb as if Cal were a leper. "However, you're going to do a man's work for me whether you like it or not. You've made your first mistake in thinking I'm interested in your mealy little mouth, let alone your scrawny arse. Your next error may reap your death, which won't be a quick one, I promise you."
Cal wiped his lips and battled tears of humiliation. "I understand, my lord."
"Now get up."
He obeyed, rising unsteadily.
"You will return to the verges of the Greenwood as this charter demands, and you will offer Herne the Hunter an alliance on my behalf."
Are you mad?
If he hadn't believed Odo would strike him again for it, he'd have asked the question out loud.
"Don't look so shocked, slut. Despite what I said to Brock, I know what Herne is capable of. In my grandfather's time, men still lived who recalled the last occasion the Wild Hunt rode. The huntsman scoured the lands with an army of eviscerated corpses, paving the way for our good master William, who reduced sturdy Saxon warriors to shit-shovelling swineherds. Those once-proud fighters whimpered like dogs at the mention of Herne's name."
The thought that he, Cal, might be party to unleashing the Wild Hunt soured even the taste of blood. Coward and slattern he might be, but could he stand by and allow that to happen?
"Now," said Odo, "you will inform Herne that Baron Brock refuses the charter. Herne must raze the southern shires till the streams swirl with blood and dust chokes the air. When I march to London to seize the crown of the
weakened kingdom, the huntsman will be rewarded.u"
Nodding slowly, Cal grabbed the strand of opportunity. "My Lord, Herne would only believe such a promise if it were written down."
"So you can scuttle straight back to Marshal with the evidence of treason you sought in the first place?"
Oh. So much for that faint hope.
"You'll tell Herne and be grateful for the chance. It's the main reason you still possess a tongue. Now there is one other matter to discuss. You're not to my taste, boy, but there is one who is."
Robin. He meant Robin.
Cal blinked, affecting confusion.
"You weren't his hostage. You stood by him."
"But—" Denying it would be hopeless. Odo knew, and barons needed no proof anyway. In the great hall, somebody started singing a cheerful hunting song, though the noise sounded foreign and distant. The stone walls seemed to close in on Cal like the sides of a tomb.
Odo's sharp chuckle returned. "That's right. Sir Vernon recognized you when you hurled my dagger, injuring him and his horse. Your death sentence would be assured if you weren't a cheap little turncoat who has his uses. I have to admit, your pluck impressed me when you walked in here today, face straight, after trying to kill me."
Plucky? No. Cal was lower than shit and as good as dead, though he allowed a faint thread of pride to fortify him.
He wanted to kill Robin, and I denied him. I defended my friend.
"You didn't save the outlaw, of course," said Odo, his words like an elbow in the ribs. "I had no intention of slaughter. I don't want Robin Hood dead—at least not yet. I want him in my bedchamber."
That whispering jealousy returned, though Cal knew it was petty and futile.
"Ah, I thought as much." Odo brushed Cal's hair from his brow and touched his chin, revealing the twist of resentment Cal couldn't disguise. "Robin has conquered yet another worthless heart."
"It isn't true. After all, he sent me here as a hostage, and I…I'd kill him as quick as I'd crush the throat of a songbird. He's n-nothing to me."
Odo rewarded the lie by clouting him about the back of his head. "Does the outlaw feel the same way?" He muttered more to himself than to Cal. "When this wretch does not return, will Robin Hood come after the boy, as his men once came for him?"
Cal's ears rang from the blow. "He won't. He knows I'm a spy, and he hates me."
"Lovers' rifts heal fast." Odo smiled. "Don't worry. If he does follow, I'll be ready. But first I must help you focus your mind and make certain of your loyalties."
Every muscle in Cal's body tightened, and he mindlessly bit the torn flesh in his mouth. He'd be thrown to the whips, the brands, the screws, and a dungeon crawling with rats. Not again.
But there was no point in fighting. He couldn't do a damned thing. And Robin wouldn't come.
Chapter Twelve
If Robin had arrived at Castle Brock by night, he'd have found a way to scale the town walls. Arriving on a busy market morning, he'd be seen climbing for sure. He piled some windfall fruit at the top of his pack to resemble a trader's stock, bunched his cloak to conceal his bow, and sought entry the only way possible—through the gatehouse.
He lingered among the mean dwellings outside till a shepherdess approached, driving a flock of sheep splashing and bleating through the clay and mud. As predicted, the guards threw their attention to the girl—or rather, the pretty breasts that her shabby russet smock failed to subdue. Robin negotiated the sea of woolly animals and slipped under the portcullis without notice.
Or perhaps not.
As he sloped into a heaving marketplace, a tall figure stepped from a shadowed archway, back by the gate he'd come in. The man pulled his hood over his face, his mantle billowing in a bright shade of burnt umber.
Robin couldn't take any chances. He'd lose all potential followers among the throng. He hastened toward the sign of a tavern and then squeezed among the folk inside, who crowded the trestles, downing jugs of watery ale. He didn't object when a skinny wench snatched an apple from his pack. He made for a side exit into a steeply pitched alley. A black cat dashed past, the tail of a rat dangling from the corner of its mouth, and shot up the narrow thoroughfare, which led straight to the bailey wall.
"I'll follow you, puss," he murmured, "and hope the day brings me as great a fort—"
Someone screamed.
The cry, addled with fear, hailed from a house back down the alley in the direction of the market. Robin's response was visceral. He ran, then busted down the door of the tottering three-story residence with the sole of his shoe.
Sir Randolf sprawled on the straw within, grasping his hands about the throat of a blond lad, who lay squashed beneath the knight's bulky form. Not Cal. The pale, freckled boy who stared at Robin was a good few years younger than Cal.
"Fuck off," said Randolf, not bothering to look Robin's way. "Or I'll feed your testicles to the swine and make you watch."
The lad under him laughed shakily. "I'm alright. It's just a game."
"That it is." Randolf twisted his red neck and glared. "You still here?"
Stepping inside, Robin pulled back his cloak and retrieved his bow, groaning internally. He risked his mission here, gambling Cal's life and who knew how many others. He nocked an arrow. "Between knights and peasants, there can be no games. Let him go, or I'll lodge this flinthead between your eyes."
Randolf's jaw fell lax, and he squinted at Robin. The lad took the opportunity to wriggle from under him, then flew up a ladder to take refuge above.
"Well, bugger me!" Randolf finally seemed to recognize him from yesterday. "You're…that…that outlaw. Call the guard—'tis Robin Hood!"
A footfall sounded on the mud and cobble outside, and Robin wondered at how anyone could respond so fast. Gambling the newcomer would be on him faster than the drunken knight could retrieve and wield a weapon, he cast his bow aside, drew his dagger, spun about…then staggered back, nearly tumbling.
A man blessed with warm russet hair smiled back at him, his dimpled chin covered with a rust of stubble.
A ghost. It had to be.
"Daniel?"
No phantom, a real and solid Daniel shoved Robin aside, then crunched his fist against Randolf's jaw. The knight fell back senseless, and his glaive clattered to the flagstones.
Robin's world turned somersaults when Daniel grasped his hand. Daniel's clammy palm confirmed as strongly as the strike against Randolf that he lived.
Robin sheathed his dagger. "Daniel. I…I thought you died." For me.
"You thought wrong." Daniel's mischievous grin felt deliciously familiar. "How good it is to see my old friend."
Memories flooded back—the guilt from which Robin had believed relief impossible, and that blossom-filled spring when they'd taken their pleasures as one. In the months after Daniel's loss, Robin would have given a pound of flesh for this moment. He flung an arm about his former lover's neck. "Goddess, Daniel, I missed you."
He buried his face in his friend's shoulder and breathed—the stench of liquor, stew pot, and human dirt that saturated towns and keeps up and down the land. He bunched his fists in a cloak of finely woven linen dyed the shade of burnt umber.
That was Daniel he'd seen near the gate.
The moment of joyous bewilderment passed. How the hell had his friend survived Odo's wrath?
He pulled away. Daniel's green eyes shone as honest and true as when they'd swived beneath a crone's moon long ago.
"Why are you here? How?"
"John was wrong about me," said Daniel.
"I'm so sorry." Robin sighed, and a little of his old resentment for John flowed back. "I begged him to go back for you, but he did what he believed best."
Daniel's smile was slow to spread, and then he laughed. "Ah well, our friend had little choice, and I hold no grudge. Mine's a saga so lengthy our Norse brothers would be proud of it, but suffice to say I survived, which is more than you shall, if you linger here much longer." He picked up Robin's bow and passed it
to him, then closed the door on the slumped knight and glanced up and down the alley. "Clear for now. So what possessed you to walk into this pit of bears?"
"Same reason you once came for me—to fetch a friend." Robin's words were tight, and he edged away. As much as he wanted to spill all, caution held him back. Daniel shouldn't have survived Odo. "I need the truth."
"I don't blame you." Daniel's grin made Robin feel churlish. "The truth is I rotted many a moon in Odo's dungeon, and it broke me. His jailer let me go, believing me a delirious wreck, and I was. It just happened Baron Brock was visiting and needed a gibbering fool to entertain him. He took me into his household, and my fortunes looked up from there." He clasped Robin's shoulders in entreaty. "I've been biding my time ever since, gathering information, studying their weaknesses, and hoping I'd get my chance to bring down the enemy from within."
Though Daniel's touch had once afforded Robin copious pleasures, his nearness now left him cold. His imploring countenance proved harder to resist.
"My loyalty has always been to you," he said as Robin stepped away and double-checked they were still alone. Only the black cat stood and stared, his green eyes wide and his tail twitching. Robin let his friend's words fortify him. "It's what I clung to in my darkest hours, why I waited for you at the gate today. The moment I heard the guards were on the lookout for Robin Hood, I swore my old friend would not be taken."
Robin puffed out his cheeks. He'd forgiven Cal his trespasses. It seemed unfair to deny Daniel, who'd also suffered much. Even if Daniel hadn't died for him, he'd still fallen between Robin and that blade.
"Alright," said Robin, opting to tread carefully. "A boy came here today with a message for your master. Can you get me to him?"
Daniel nodded. "I can get you in and out of the keep through a way so secret only the mice will notice, and I'll mind them not to squeak. But when we're done, I'd like to discuss some plans with you. I have ideas on how to rob Brock blind and leave him in ruins, but I can't do it alone."
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