Lady of Sherwood

by Jennifer Roberson

  It wasn’t a lie, not insofar as the former Hathersage Giant knew. But that did not mean the others were innocent. “Where is Locksley?”

  “Huntington.”

  “Huntington,” he repeated, imbuing it with elaborate tones of doubt.

  “Aye, Huntington,” Little John repeated. “His father’s ill, aye?”

  Indeed, the sheriff had seen that for himself. And it was possible father and son might reconcile in the face of ill health. It occurred to deLacey that if they did so, things would likely become much harder for him. Best to find evidence of misbehavior as soon as possible, so he would have a weapon. Earl’s son or no, Robert of Locksley could end up out of royal favor if deLacey presented proof. “Did he and Will Scarlet—and that whoreson minstrel!—stop the messenger on the road?”

  “What road? What messenger?” Little John drew breath to shout. “And what are you doing in the lady’s bedchamber?”

  Immensely frustrated, the sheriff wanted to say, “Making a fool of myself.” But not before them. “I am seeking Robert of Locksley. Last I knew, he shared the lady’s bedchamber.” He raised one elegant brow. “Or have things changed? Is that why he’s gone back to his father?”

  The huge man pointed at the door. “Get out.”

  DeLacey cast a glance at the bed’s inhabitant. She was tousled, heavy-lidded, and still flushed from the outrage of his presence. For one moment he felt a stab of intense jealousy—she might have been his, once—then buried it beneath an icy self-control. “When Locksley comes back,” he said, “send him to me.”

  Little John was astonished. “D’ye think he’ll come because you ask for it?”

  “He may come of his own accord—or he may not, in which case I shall send soldiers. I am empowered to do so. I am empowered to do anything I believe necessary to maintain the peace of the shire, including ordering sons of earls to attend me in Nottingham.”He smiled with sweet implication. “I should think it would be easier, and far less embarrassing, if he rode in himself, rather than being brought in.” DeLacey stepped to the door as Little John moved aside, then turned back quickly to Marian to rap out a final question when she least expected it. “How did you know the king was dead?”

  She seemed puzzled that he should need to ask. “Messenger.”

  Indeed. Messenger. There it was: the truth. He blessed the poppy syrup even as fury thinned his tone. “I’ll have him,”he promised. “Huntington’s son or no, Crusader knight or no, the Lionheart’s boy or no, I’ll have Robin Hood. I’ll have you all.”

  Marian’s woman turned a furious face to him. “Get out.”

  He was unattended by soldiers in a room hosting the man who was likely the largest in all of England. This time deLacey got out.

  The earl had taken himself from bed for the first time in three days. He felt weak because of it, nearly enfeebled, and was angered to see how his limbs shook as he stood up. He wore an overrobe in addition to bedclothes, but pulled the pelt coverlet off the bed to add another layer against the chill. He got as far as the table with its wealth of parchment, inkpot, and quills, and sat down heavily in the chair. He could hear his breath moving noisily through aching lungs.

  He supposed they believed him dying. Ralph had been moving about quietly with a peculiarly bland expression for the last several days, and Robert himself had looked more than a little shocked to see his condition. But Huntington knew better. So long as there were duties to tend and a realm to have the ordering of in lieu of a proper king, he would not die. But he had no compunction regarding allowing Robert to believe he might die; that, too, was a weapon, and Huntington disdained few.

  The earls of Alnwick, Essex, and Hereford would be here in a matter of days. Until that time, he had opportunity to reconsider what he would propose. But he knew very well his mind was made up. There was no other course.

  Huntington took up a quill, inspected the nib to judge if it would take ink properly, then dipped it in the pot. He pulled a sheet of parchment to him and proceeded to write out two names: Mortain, and Brittany. Both princes; one the son of a king, the other a grandson of the same sovereign.

  One of them would be king. The other would likely be killed.

  Arthur of Brittany was a boy, an unknown entity. John, Count of Mortain, was a man grown and very much known. But nothing about him recommended him to most of England’s barons as fit to hold the throne.

  His hand shook so hard the ink spilled from the nib. His fine letters were spoiled by the resulting blots. He hissed displeasure between his teeth, until he heard the latch lifted and the door pushed open. His son stood in it.

  “Robert,” he said in surprise.

  “Meddling,” Robert eyed the parchment and trembling quill, “will be the death of you. You’ll die abed one night of a surfeit of frenzied plotting, or be executed for it.”

  He set the quill down sharply. “These things must be done, Robert!”

  “Let someone else do them.”

  “I have given my life to this realm—”

  He was overridden. “Let others do so.”

  It was preposterous that his son should speak so. “You went on Crusade, Robert. Surely you must know what it means to dedicate oneself to a cause one believes in.”

  “That,” Robert said, “was escape.”

  “Escape!”

  “From you.” He hitched a single shoulder briefly and leaned casually against the jamb, as if what they discussed was a matter of whether to hunt boar or deer. “Oh, I did hope there would be glory of it, and the chance to ride with King Richard was enough to feed a starving man’s soul, but mostly I went because I could not bear to be beneath your roof anymore.”

  The earl’s head jerked up stiffly. “Is this your idea of kindness to a sick man?”

  The smile was excessively dry, as was the tone. “You have never wanted kindness, my lord father, ill or well. All you ever demanded was obedience.”

  “So a son should obey!”

  “And a son shall obey, so long as his heart does not see a better way.”

  The earl sat crossways in his chair, gripping the back with one palsied hand. “What have you come to say? That I have been a poor father?”

  “I have not.”

  “Then why?”

  Robert yet leaned against the jamb. “To ask you to stop meddling in the affairs of kings.”

  “If wise men do not, as you say, meddle in the affairs of kings, England may suffer for the man who is king.”

  “You are old, and you are ill.”

  Unspoken were the words: “and dying.”

  The earl scowled. “Perhaps if I had a son I could trust to work in my place—”

  “Oh, do stop it,” Robert said wearily, straightening up at last to walk fully into the chamber. “John, or Arthur—what does it matter? The affairs of kings are above us.”

  “Kings depend on men such as myself. Without us, they are lost. They must have our support, our money, our influence. They may be born to the title, but keeping it depends on us.”

  Robert inspected the great tester bed, noting its dishevelment. “And so you and the others plot treason.”

  The earl said clearly, “England has no king.”

  “And therefore it is not treason?”

  “Nor will it become treason if we take steps to see that the wrong man never gains the throne.”

  “Surely that is up to Richard.”

  “Richard is dead. What matters is what living men want.”

  Robert turned and sat down upon the edge of the bed. “You, my lord father?”

  The earl did not miss the irony, but chose to overlook it. “I,” he agreed. “And you, if you joined me.”

  Robert sighed, then shook his head slightly, less in denial than in wry disbelief that this should once again be a subject of conversation. “I came to visit a sick man, not to join a rebellion.”

  “A rebellion, if you will, of men who have had the governing of the realm in Richard absence,” the earl said
sharply. “None of us wants the throne, Robert. We merely want to preserve the power of it for the man who will do best by England.”

  “Arthur of Brittany?”

  Huntington’s tone was acerbic. “You have met John. Would you wish him to be your king?”

  Robert ignored the question. “If you lose, you will die.”

  “We all die,” the earl said. “Some of us die for causes, not for complacency.”

  “Do you think God cares?”

  Huntington said, “No more than I care what God thinks of my actions.”

  “Heresy,” Robert said, “and treason. Surely you are damned.”

  “Oh, as to that—I believe you damned me for being your father the moment you were old enough to understand what damnation was.”

  “Yes,” his son said.

  The earl, neither surprised nor disturbed, merely smiled. “Then join me, Robert. Join me in hell. But we’ll go there knowing we did it for England’s sake.”

  One pale brow arched. “Together?”

  “Well,” Huntington said with a hint of irony, “it might be the first time we went anywhere together.”

  The topic was not amusing. But Robert laughed.

  Thirteen

  Within two days Marian was up and about, albeit with no pretensions to fitness. Her hand still hurt and she found it excessively taxing to be limited to one, particularly when it came to such things as participating in the daily tasks. Joan soon told her to leave the household to her care and merely heal; but Marian demurred until Joan said, in no little exasperation, that she was merely getting in the way.

  Rather meekly, Marian took herself out of the way by wandering outside to the meadow to gaze upon lush greenery and clustered puffs of white sheep shadowed by wobbly young.

  Little John was with them, but came striding up when he saw her. The sun burnished red hair brilliant and shaded his beard with gold. For all he was so huge, his movements were tamed; she wondered how much of that was a natural, if substantial grace, or gained because of wrestling.

  She thought of going to meet him, but now that she stood comfortably collapsed against a stacked stone wall beneath the golden warmth of the midday sun, it was far more attractive to stay where she was.

  John carried his crook. Seeing the smoothed, mellow wood in his hands reminded her of the tale Robin told of their first true meeting, when the Hathersage Giant, employing a quarterstaff, had tipped Sir Robert of Locksley, king’s knight and Crusader, off a log bridge into the water. Marian did not entirely understand what motivated men’s mock battles—she had asked her father once, and her brother, receiving no reliable answer—but had learned that men took great pride in such things. Robin was chagrined to have lost, but not undone by it; and it gave Little John a certain pleasure to know he had defeated a man so far above him in birth and rank.

  Marian thought privately Little John would defeat any man, Crusader knight or no. He was not trained in the arts of a knight, but when it came down to sheer physical power, no one in all England could defeat him.

  He grinned at her, blue eyes bright. “Too grand a day to spend indoors.”

  She returned the smile. “You would not say that on a winter’s day.”

  “But the ewes lamb in the spring,” he countered. “I know better than to come out in the midst of winter.”

  “You have,” she reminded him.

  “Aye, well, if the sheep need me.” He nodded his thick-maned head in stolid acceptance.

  Marian asked, “Who would you have me set to tending them, when you’ve gone to Locksley Village?”

  He hooked one massive leg across the low wall and perched there, straddling it easily. “I’d sooner stay here.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, undeterred and undismayed. “So would you all. But it will be safer there.”

  He did not dispute that. “Matthew,” he said. “He has a fair hand with the sheep.”

  “Very well.” Marian noted how slender the crook looked in his big hands, and how the freckles upon them were coppery as his hair. “Thank you for seeing to it the sheriff departed my bedchamber.”

  His face, above the beard, flamed briefly. “He had no right to be there.”

  “William deLacey does not trouble himself about such things as manners and rights,” she said dryly.

  He glanced at her briefly, then looked away. “I still say we should have fetched Robin home.”

  She kept her voice even. “Robin has family business with his father.”

  “He’s no family, the earl,” John said roughly. “Robin is best off here.”

  “We may all believe so,” she said simply, “but it is for Robin to choose.”

  The big man jerked his chin. “He’ll be back, so he will.”

  “I do hope so.”

  He looked squarely at her. “He isn’t daft, is he?”

  She took that for the flattery he intended and smiled her thanks. “Family does matter,” Marian said. “It must.”

  “I’ve none. You’ve none. We none of us has anyone except one another.” He excavated in grass and dirt with the heel of his crook. “We are our own family.”

  “He must have the choice,” she said firmly.

  Little John’s voice was curiously flat. “Because he has more than the rest of us?”

  She did not duck the question, or the answer. “I want him here with no regrets.”

  “I’ve none,” he declared.

  Marian grinned. “Forgive me, John—but I don’t share my bed with you.”

  “Oh, aye,” he said with elaborate and mock wisdom. “It does make a difference.”

  “As well it should!”

  “Aye, well . . . he could have both.” John glanced at her. “The earldom, and you.”

  Marian shook her head. “Not while his father lives.”

  The giant shrugged. “No man lives forever.”

  No man, not even the earl. But such men as earls did not grant errant sons the privileges of heritage if errant sons proved intractable, and Robin was nothing if not impossibly stubborn when it came to principles.

  Or to her.

  Marian sighed. Little John meant well, but she knew the earl would, unlike the Lionheart, make up his mind about such things as heirs before he died.

  “Are you ready?” she asked.

  “To go?” He bent and spat. “Aye, if you want us to.”

  “It is necessary. You know that.”

  “And if the sheriff doesn’t come?”

  “He will.”

  Little John sighed. “Aye.”

  “Much is watching the road.”

  “Aye.”

  “He’ll bring soldiers this time.”

  He looked at her from under gold-tipped lashes. “And this time you’ll be able to speak for yourself.”

  Marian smiled as a touch of wind lifted strands of hair from her face. “So I shall.”

  Sir Guy of Gisbourne escorted the man into the sheriff’s private chambers with solemn alacrity, despite the fact the sheriff was in the midst of a bath. DeLacey, furious, considered reprimanding Gisbourne for it—he had ordered everyone save the woman tending his back to leave him be—but he recognized Gisbourne’s revenge. With effort, he received steward and stranger with aplomb, despite the fact he was seated naked on a stool in the middle of a cask filled with steaming water. In fact, the woman had just poured a ladle of water over his head, and he stared at Gisbourne and the man through dripping, water-weighted curls.

  Gisbourne’s tone was uninflected. “A messenger, Lord Sheriff.”

  DeLacey considered crossing his legs, but forbore; the cask was his shield. “Tell it to me.”

  The messenger inclined his head. “I am to present it to you, my lord, not read it. So privacy is assured.”

  The water was refreshing and relaxing, and deLacey had no intention of deserting it. “I permit you to read it.”

  “Forgive me, my lord, but the Count of Mortain entrusted it only to you.”

  The she
riff sat upright on the stool. “The count—?” He flapped a hand at the woman; after a moment, he included Gisbourne in the dismissal as well. “Go. Go.” He put out his hand. “Give it here.”

  The messenger retrieved a sealed, folded parchment from his pouch, and presented it. Even as deLacey broke the wax, the man bowed himself out.

  The crisp parchment, introduced to the steam rising from the cask, wilted. DeLacey swore as the ink began to fuzz into damp lines. Lest it soon be indecipherable, he climbed hastily and awkwardly out of the cask and went to the slotted window, standing nude and dripping in the golden glow of late afternoon.

  He read the message. Read the signature. Read the message again.

  Then he shouted for Gisbourne. For a horse. For soldiers. For clothing, including mail. And such accoutrements as weaponry.

  “What is your price?” Robin asked.

  His father was stunned. “My price?”

  They had changed places since the last time they had met in this room. The earl was in bed once again, and Robin sat at the table. He took up a quill and ran the speckled feather through his fingers, testing against the web of thumb and forefinger the soft but tensile strength.

  “To buy a son. An heir.”

  Huntington was now beyond astonishment. Speechless, he stared as the color rose in his face.

  “Ralph has suggested,” Robin said, “that you might do well to have a son again. Someone who might . . .” He paused a moment, selecting his words with care. “Mitigate your aspirations.”

  “Ralph speaks out of turn,” the earl snapped.

  Robin hitched one shoulder in an elegant half-shrug, noting inwardly that some of the residual soreness left from being stripped out of the saddle and dumped on the ground was fading. “But surely you have one. A price.”

  “Surely you have a price!”

  “I do, yes. But I want to know yours.”

  Huntington glared out of the shadows of the huge bed. “I wish you to join me.”

  “To overthrow a king?”

  “He isn’t king yet.”

  “To keep him from becoming king—and to overthrow him should he become it anyway.”