Laura Strickland - The Guardians of Sherwood Trilogy

by Champion of Sherwood

  “We have always been that to one another,” Linnet said, “the three of us.” That had been especially true since the death of Fal’s mother and sister. With Linnet’s parents so often away and Martin Scarlet occupied with the fight against Nottingham, their bonds had steadily deepened.

  Falcon shook his head slightly. “I speak not of games with Lark. Linnet, you know what you mean to me. When are we going to make a declaration of it, what lies between us?”

  Without giving her a chance to answer he leaned forward and covered her mouth with his, quick and tender. Falcon had kissed her before, countless times, both brotherly kisses on the cheek and a young man’s attempts at seduction. But his lips carried a new message this time: Linnet felt passion and intent. She felt what lay in his heart.

  For an instant the sweetness of it held and realization crystallized in Linnet’s mind. He loves me. And I might have loved him after all, had another not already claimed my heart.

  She drew away and raised both hands to his chest. His eyes had grown dark and revealed the desire building inside him.

  “No, Fal.”

  “What? Why not? Linnet, the time is now for us to sort out our places in the triad and firm up our bonds. You and I were always meant to be together. Marry me now, and we will go into this thing doubly strong.”

  “What of Lark?”

  “What of her?” Falcon tossed his head. “She has always known she is the odd one out. The circle requires three; there is no help for it. Two bond with each other, and the third with Sherwood. She knows that as well as we.”

  “I hardly think Lark well-suited to disappear meekly into the forest. Surely I am closer to the land when I take from it my herbs and use them to heal.”

  “Are you in earnest? I have never seen anyone more in tune with Sherwood than Lark. She asks permission every time she cuts wood to make an arrow and whispers a prayer before every shot. She can vanish into the trees like one of the Old Ones. Sometimes I think she is more than half spirit.”

  “Yet she has not the nature to make a hermit.”

  “Does it have to be that way?”

  In the past, one of the three who made up the triad had gone to live in the forest, honing his or her knowledge and wisdom. That kept the magic of Sherwood bonded and available for the defense of its guardians. Linnet’s own parents, along with Martin Scarlet, had changed the face of things somewhat; Wren and Sparrow had dwelled at the forest refuge together, affirming the power there. Martin Scarlet had presented the face of their defense with Falcon’s mother, Sally, at his side.

  The power had shifted but not failed—until now. Linnet knew she must do her part no matter what her heart might demand.

  She closed her fingers on Falcon’s arm. “We cannot speak of this now. I came to tell you we must gather and move everyone out of the village. The Sheriff comes with a company of men.”

  Emotion kindled in Fal’s eyes. “That bastard Gareth de Vavasour leads them to us, no doubt. I should have known he had no honor and would act against us even though we spared his life. Pa was right. We should have slit his throat and sent him back to his accursed uncle dead and cold.”

  Linnet drew a hard breath. “We do not know who leads them. And it does not matter now. We have naught left to lose in the village, save lives. If we scatter into the trees, we may at least protect the villagers.”

  “Aye. Find Lark and anyone else who can spread the word. Get everyone up and moving. I will organize the men. We will await them in the trees surrounding the village and slay de Vavasour’s men when they come looking.”

  Linnet’s heart plummeted but she strove to conceal her dismay. “Aye.”

  “Go swiftly. But Lin—” Now Falcon caught her arm. “How did you know? What magic brought this word to you?”

  “No magic.” Linnet smiled stiffly. “Only a dream.” For as Gareth had said, that was all he could be to her now.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “This place looks deserted, not a soul here. Are you certain this is the right village?” Robert de Vavasour turned in his saddle to glare at Gareth. “Either they have abandoned the place or they were warned. Who has betrayed us?”

  Gareth was spared answering by the arrow that cut the air beside his left ear, so close he heard the whoosh of its fletchings in passing. The shot was followed by a storm of others, two of which plucked two soldiers from their boots where they stood.

  Gareth and his uncle—with the captain of the guard, Monteith, the only mounted men in the company—swiftly turned their horses and wheeled, only to be met by more arrows fired from their flank.

  “Fall in!” Robert de Vavasour cried.

  The village, a wasteland of burnt thatch and rubble, offered virtually no cover. But even the best longbows could only fling a shot so far. Gareth guessed the woodsmen would not expose themselves, and the center of the village must be safest.

  The company shifted as one, soldiers dragging the two downed men. Gareth found himself very near the place where he had once been staked out like a sacrificial goat.

  Enraged, Robert de Vavasour seethed, “How dare they! Peasants, to fire on their betters—I will have the skin off their backs, for starters.” As if to emphasize the words, he drew his riding crop. “And which of you has betrayed us?” He struck at the soldiers gathered about his horse, which danced nervously. “Has one of you been bedding some slut in this village? Speak, if you know what is good for you.”

  Gareth shuddered inwardly at the uncanny accuracy of his uncle’s surmise. He shifted his mount to cover the men. “It need not be any of our soldiers, my lord. Something could easily have been overheard at the castle.”

  “Out of my way.” De Vavasour lashed at Gareth’s shoulder. An arrow particularly well shot followed the movement and clove the air between them. It served to further whip Robert’s anger. He glared away towards the trees.

  At that moment he looked so like Gareth’s father—the expression of haughty disdain, the severity of the features, the unreasoning cruelty in his eyes—it turned Gareth sick with hate. Gareth had hoped he had put that emotion away with his father beneath the cold soil of Yorkshire. Yet it dogged him still.

  “They shall pay,” Robert seethed, “for raising weapons against their betters. One way or another, they shall.”

  “Aye, my lord.” Gareth bit the words hard. “But we have to get away out of here first.”

  The road that led from the fields, and on which their company had traveled, was surely blocked now. Any other route lay through the forest, which these folk knew far too well. Hampered with two wounded men, they might all be cut down.

  By warning Linnet, had he assured the deaths of all these men?

  “What is the name of this village?” De Vavasour demanded, virtually foaming at the mouth. At least he showed no fear. Gareth had to give him that.

  “Oakham, my lord,” said Monteith.

  “And is their headman one of those so lately released?”

  “I believe so, my lord.” Monteith’s features pinched in disdain. “They are much like each other, these peasants.”

  “From this day forth, there is a price on his head. He will be cut down on sight. Understand?”

  That still would not get them away out of here, Gareth thought sourly.

  But Robert was in a full rage. “I will teach him and all his kind to raise a hand against their Sheriff and their King. Why, the very land upon which they subsist belongs to Henry. What is the name of this headman?”

  “I do not know, my lord.”

  Robert glared at Gareth. “You were held here. Do you know?”

  Again, Gareth was saved answering—and lying—by an accurate shot. The arrow skimmed the Sheriff’s helmet, and he ducked indignantly. “Whatsoever his name may be,” de Vavasour began, “he will die. I will make an example of—”

  “Down!” Gareth shouted reflexively and shoved his uncle from his saddle. The arrow aimed at Robert’s head grazed his arm and they both tumbled from the
ir horses. Gareth fell heavily, and his mount shied. Robert, also winded, stopped shouting long enough that Gareth could hear the voice that sounded in his mind.

  My love—are you hit?

  Nay.

  He felt Linnet’s relief, like a shower of warmth breaking over him. Where are you? he asked desperately.

  No reply. Gareth struggled to gather his scattered thoughts. By all that was holy, why had he saved his uncle’s life? Why not let him take the arrow intended for him? Even as he leaped to his feet Gareth cursed himself for it. Had it been his father, Gareth would gladly have let the arrow take him.

  Robert got to his feet even more furious than before. “Attack them! Seize them!” he yelled, waving his crop. “Do not let the bastards think they can best us!”

  After one incredulous stare, Monteith rallied his men, all but the two fallen, and charged the nearest of the trees from whence issued the arrow fire.

  To give Robert de Vavasour his due, he was at Monteith’s side. An old campaigner, he seemed nothing loath to wet his blade.

  Gareth found himself moving also, his training far too ingrained to let him stand while other men entered the fray, even though it repulsed him to the bone to face peasants with a sword.

  He need not have worried; the villagers dispersed like smoke at the approach of the soldiers, leaving behind a hail of arrows. Another soldier went down, groaning, and the rest found themselves staring about with no opponents.

  “Find them,” Robert de Vavasour growled. “Spread out and search. Do your duty, curse you!”

  “My lord…” Monteith began cautiously.

  “It is suicide,” Gareth put in when the captain faltered. “They know the forest as we do not.”

  His uncle glared at him. “Are you a coward? What sort of man did my brother raise?”

  Gareth forced himself to expressionlessness, a tactic he had always employed with his father. “They will pick us off one by one. It is what they want.”

  As if to emphasize his words, an arrow took another man.

  “My lord,” Monteith ventured again, “we have not a large enough company. If you wish for justice, I say withdraw now and come back with at least two score men.”

  Robert de Vavasour swore bitterly. “Do you recommend falling back before peasants?” he asked scathingly. “Saxons, who fight with bows and axes? By God, of what are you made? This is why outlaws infest Sherwood, and this is why they dare stand against their king.”

  An arrow, arced with exquisite precision, appeared from nowhere and found the seam in Robert de Vavasour’s light armor, at his elbow. Gareth’s eyes caught a movement among the near trees, a form he surely knew—small, swift, and fierce. Linnet’s sister it was, though he could scarcely imagine a maid making such a shot.

  Robert de Vavasour hollered again in rage and pain. He whipped at the men closest to him with his sword. “Will you stand and do nothing whilst your sworn lord is attacked and injured? After them, I say!”

  Some of the men, more obedient than intelligent, moved off into the trees. Monteith appeared rooted to the spot, perhaps determined to defend his lord to the death.

  When Gareth started forward, it was in response to no order at all, but rather a call he heard only within. My love.

  She waited for him somewhere close by. To be sure, so did an arrow or a dagger—his death lay here. But far more urgently, so did his reason to live.

  He stepped into the trees, his sword raised, and darkness closed about him like an embrace. Curiously, he could still hear the others moving around him as if his sense of hearing heightened even as his sight flew from him. He heard the villagers moving furtively; they made no more sound than might their animal counterparts in hiding. By comparison, the soldiers crashed about, easy prey.

  He heard the twang of a bowstring near at hand and then the gurgling scream of a man going down. He heard—

  Gareth. Here. Hands closed upon his wrists and his whole body tensed in response. He knew her by touch and by the scent of her, even before his vision cleared enough to allow him to see.

  What magic is this? He asked not aloud but mind to mind.

  Powerful magic, indeed, Linnet told him. Come you with me.

  Aye, agreed Gareth, who would far sooner die than refuse her. Wherever you go, so do I follow.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “I needed to see you, to touch you,” Linnet said, and tightened her hands on those of the man before her. Not a vision—he truly stood here, and the agony that had been with her since their parting eased for the first time. She did not understand this powerful wanting inside her, so much more than desire.

  She gazed into his eyes and he into hers, and for an instant the rest of the world ceased to matter. The magic shield Linnet had called up hung among the trees and isolated them. The very essence of Sherwood conspired to give them these precious moments.

  “I heard your voice. I came,” he said simply, and raised both her hands to his lips. The gesture reflected the devotion Linnet saw in his eyes, and her spirit took wing and flew victoriously. The world might have gone mad around them, their situation might well be impossible, a future unimaginable. But he was hers still, and she his forever.

  She leaned up and he down—their lips met delicately, almost tentatively, and clung. Hunger came surging then, swift as the rush of flame. Linnet’s heart leaped within her, gladness tangled hopelessly with yearning.

  She poured her words and her emotions into his mind. I love you. You are the only one who will ever claim my heart.

  She felt his spirit leap in response. I love you. This vow I give you before all others ever I have made: my loyalty and heart are yours alone.

  Joy flooded through Linnet, even stronger than the wanting. This, she knew, made the true measure of the man, and she could ask no more than this gift.

  He kissed her again, and his thoughts tumbled through his mind in bright images: the two of them naked and twined together; his mouth hot at her breast; him entering her with searing pleasure; the fierce joy of their spirits merging as one.

  Beyond impossible, she thought—a battle raged all around them. The Sheriff himself lingered so near she could hear his harsh voice calling orders to his men. Close by, her allies loosed death from longbows. Only the shadows gathered in the arms of the trees kept her and Gareth hidden from sight.

  In truth, they stood on opposite sides of a wide chasm. Yet she knew to the root of her soul they stood as one.

  Come with me, she said into his mind—just a thread of thought and yet it drew him as inexorably as had the rope tether her father once kept on his neck. Hands joined, they flew into the trees, and the obscuring darkness moved with them. Linnet led the way at the insistence of her heart, until at last the commotion died away behind and the darkness seeped back into the trees from whence it had come. Soon there was only the wind high in the branches, the songs of the birds, and the sense of protection that always found her here.

  Though she had spent much of her life in the village, she was of the forest, both conceived and born here. It welcomed her now. And it welcomed the man at her side. Linnet could not understand it—born an enemy to this stronghold of magic, he should be treated like other men of the Sheriff’s company who strayed too far, riddled with confusion, chewed by terror and spat out again, either alive or dead. Yet Linnet could not mistake the sense of acceptance that now met them both. Sherwood wanted Gareth here.

  Not, by all that was holy, more than she did herself.

  She stopped at last, breathless, and turned to face him. Once again their eyes met and the joy came flooding.

  Love me, she begged. It is meant.

  He raised his gaze to the trees, a man weighing the safety of his surroundings. He seemed to measure the light streaming through green leaves and to test the silence. When he spoke, his words surprised her. She might have expected some protest—he had just left a battle for her sake. But he said, mind to mind, We are not alone here. Something watches.

&nb
sp; Linnet had never felt alone in Sherwood. Too many spirits dwelt here and too much magic. Aye, but we are not so much watched as guarded. She raised her hands and investigated the light armor he wore, all leather and iron. At her touch, all his resistance melted.

  In the end, he helped her remove his clothing, and removed hers after. By then they were both breathless with wanting. Their hands began to explore even before their bodies met and they sank down into the shed leaves and moss.

  Linnet came alive at his touch like the spring surging, and the intense pleasure of his mouth upon her chased away all other thought. There remained only this moment and the unbearable urge of their coupling, the consuming emotion of it, like a wild storm, when they claimed each other.

  His seed filled her like light, far more vital than breath. As they took flight together, body to body and mind to mind, she experienced the full magic of it. No ordinary joining, this, but something perhaps ordained from her birth, and his.

  Hold me.

  Spent and yet not spent, they cradled one another, cherishing. Linnet raised her eyes to the leaves overhead; their song seemed to shimmer through her with the last notes of passion. Bemused, she allowed her gaze to drop to Gareth’s face.

  He lay with his eyes closed, savoring what she savored; she could feel that he did. And oh, he was wonderful to look upon, with the golden brown hair tousled on his brow, the deeper brown lashes spread on his cheeks, and his lean face perfect in repose.

  Nearly perfect. With her finger she traced the remnants of the mark Martin Scarlet had left on him. It would lend a permanent scar, but that made him no less desirable in her sight.

  His eyes flew open at her touch and met hers; in them she saw all she ever wished, for this moment and every moment to come.

  “I already want you again,” she confessed. “But not yet. I need to make this time last. Talk to me, my love.”