by DAVID B. COE
“You are welcome to join us,” Robin told Little John. “You'll have to put up with these two though.”
“Thanks,” John said with a smile. “No problem. The wee orange one is quite amusing.”
“Where are we going?” Jimoen asked.
Robin shouldered his pack. “To the coast. To a boat. Before five thousand desperate soldiers descend and the price for passage across the channel multiplies a hundredfold.”
The others began to gather their things, but Will hesitated, glancing back toward the castle and the rest of the English army.
“What about our wages?” he asked. “They haven't paid us in a month.”
Robin laughed bitterly. “You think it was tough getting wages when he was alive, try getting paid by a dead king. Collect your gear as quick as you can.”
They made for the forest, and had no trouble leaving. The pickets had moved forward to join the fighting, leaving no one to guard the stocks or the edge of the camp. Soon they had stepped into the shadows of Broceliande and were heading toward the coast. Robin took the lead, and Little John walked at the rear, glancing back occasionally to make sure they weren't followed.
For the first hour or more, Robin pushed them hard, eschewing rests and setting a brisk pace. He didn't think anyone would come after them, but he wasn't taking any chances. At last though, as the sun reached its zenith over the trees, and the still air in the wood grew warm, Robin called for a stop by a small, sparkling stream.
Will, Allan, and Jimoen immediately removed their packs and began to rearrange their belongings. John walked down to the stream and splashed some water on his face. Robin took off his armor and fit it into his pack among his other things. When the others were ready, Robin shouldered his pack once more.
“Right,” he said. “Let's get moving.”
CHAPTER
SIX
Marion rode slowly through Sherwood Forest, steering her bay among the trees. She wore a brown bodice over her riding dress, but still the air was starting to grow cool, and she was eager to return to Peper Harrow and a warm fire. She'd had a successful hunt; the brace of pheasants hanging from her saddle would easily feed Walter and her, and Old Tom besides.
If she made it home. Suddenly she had the feeling that she was being watched, hunted. She slowed the bay and began to reach for her bow, which hung beside the pheasants.
Before she could nock an arrow, though, a figure dropped down from a tree, landing just in front of her. She started and gasped. But her fear was short-lived. The creature before her appeared at first glance to be a wild animal of some sort. It wore fur, and landed deftly on the path. But while it held a sharpened wooden lance that it pointed at her heart, it didn't look to be very threatening. Or very big, for that matter.
Marion heard a footfall behind her. Glancing over her shoulder she saw that a second … animal-thing had stepped onto the road behind her.
“Forfeit what ye have!” the first animal demanded. “Victuals, coin, clothing, or your life!”
She would have laughed had she not been so annoyed. Rather than give the creature anything, she reached out, grabbed the lance, and yanked it out of the creature's hands. The animal, who clearly hadn't expected this, scampered back away from her. And as it did, its animal mask slipped down, revealing a young boy. After a moment, Marion realized that she recognized him.
“Thomas Cooper! Is that you?”
Chagrined, the boy swallowed and gave a reluctant nod. She remembered that the boy's father had marched to war years ago, and his mother died soon after. There had been others like him, war orphans all. They hadn't been seen in ages.
“For two years you've been gone,” she said.
He nodded again, and as he did, he broke into a hacking cough.
Looking at him more closely, Marion saw that his skin had a grayish cast to it. He had rings under his eyes and his face had a pinched look. She wondered when he'd last had a proper meal.
Eyeing the second boy, Marion realized that she recognized him, too. A moment later he fell into a coughing fit of his own. Was this where all the town's boys had gone? Were they creatures of the wood now, barely alive and scrounging for food? If so, they were fortunate to have survived this long. From the looks of them, they wouldn't make it through another season.
ROBERT LOXLEY RODE northward through the wood, with King Richard's riderless white charger galloping beside him. He had twelve knights with him, flanking him in twin columns, the hooves of their mounts rumbling like thunder on the forest floor. The king's horse carried a pannier that contained Richard's crown. The Lionheart would not be making the journey home to England, but his helm would. It had fallen to Loxley to inform the queen consort that her son was dead.
As they rounded a bend in the road, Loxley heard a sharp sound. Several. Axe blows. Before he could rein his mount to a halt or shout a warning to his men, two enormous tree trunks, as wide around as the battering ram that shattered the castle gates, fell onto the road in front of them.
One of his lead riders was crushed. The two men riding at the rear of the columns were knocked flying off their horses and sprawled onto the forest floor, their chests smashed in. Loxley managed to rein his mount to a halt, as did the other knights. He looked about frantically, taking in what had happened, looking for the likeliest escape route. But before he could so much as bark an order to his men, a dozen archers emerged from behind trees and began to loose their arrows.
As if from nowhere, riders bore down on them, lances leveled.
Loxley reached for his sword, even as he ducked under another volley of arrows. He barely managed to get his weapon free before a lance took him in the gut, knocking him off his horse and to the ground. His sword landed beside him, its point sticking in the earth.
All around him his knights fell, pierced by arrows or run through with lances. Several more attackers rushed forward with pikes to finish the fallen. A few of Loxley's men raised hands weakly to ward off the killing blows. Others didn't move at all. Six more horsemen appeared on the road, galloping in from the far end, opposite the direction from which Loxley had come. Most of them wore what appeared to be French cavalry uniforms. But it was the man in front who drew Loxley's eye. He wore chain mail and over it a black tabard that bore a brightly colored insignia Loxley had never seen before. He might well have been a French nobleman.
His head was shaved, his eyes deep set, so that they appeared shadowed and dark. He was lean and lithe, and he rode with skill. When he halted and dismounted a few feet short of the first tree trunk, he did so with a swordman's grace. He regarded the scene coolly. The man who had ridden in beside him didn't appear to be a common soldier, either. He looked over the dead and dying while wearing a faint smile.
“Trouvez-le!” the leader called to the other men. Find him!
The attackers began to examine each of the dead, flipping over those who had fallen face down and pulling off helmets to get better looks at their faces. The leader stepped over the dead, pausing occasionally to use the flat of his sword to turn a dead face so that he might see its features more clearly.
“Richard? Richard, où êtes-vous?” Richard, where are you?
Loxley groaned, drawing the man's gaze. The stranger sauntered over to where the knight lay. The lance was still in Loxley's gut, and now the leader leaned on it. Agony. Loxley felt as though his body was being ripped in half.
“Où est Richard Coeur-de-Lion?” the man asked in a silky voice. Where is Richard the Lionheart?
Still holding the end of the lance, the man walked a slow circle around Loxley, twisting the weapon in the knight's stomach. Loxley howled in pain, writhing against the wood.
“Tell me, sir,” the man said, his English perfect, devoid of any accent. “Where is the king?”
“Dead,” Loxley rasped. “This morning. A crossbow bolt.”
The leader looked over at the man who had ridden in with him, his surprise obvious. The leader of the attackers gave the lance one last vici
ous turn, ripping another scream of torment from Loxley.
“I don't believe you,” the man said.
Loxley could barely raise his hand to point. “There is Richard's crown—on his horse. We bring it to London, with the news.”
The man looked at the white charger. Releasing the lance, he stepped to one of the dead knights and looked down at him. With his sword, he moved the man's arm, which bore a black band for the fallen king.
He looked up at his companion and laughed.
“We are on a fool's errand. To assassinate a king who is already dead.” He turned to his pikemen. “Bring me the crown.”
Two of the French soldiers started toward Richard's white horse. But as they drew near, the creature stamped, reared, wheeled and bolted, leaping over the downed log.
“Get the crown!” the man shouted to his men. “Kill the horse if you have to!”
Several of his men remounted their horses and gave chase.
AT FIRST, AFTER stealing away from the English army, Robin insisted that their small company keep off any established roads or paths. With Richard dead and the siege probably over by now, it wouldn't be long before others from the king's army were crossing through Broceliande Forest to the coast. Robin hoped to avoid all of them. Staying away from the lanes lengthened their journey a little, and slowed them down, but he had been away from England for too long. He wasn't going to risk the stocks again.
Having put a day's walk between themselves and the rest of their countrymen, Robin gave in and allowed them to follow a lane through the forest. Still, he remained watchful, and he set a brisk pace. The others complained. Robin merely walked, and despite their grousing, they kept up with him. Robin and Jimoen walked in front, followed by Will and Allan. Little John, lumbering and huffing like a bear, brought up the rear.
Near midday, as they followed the road through a lonely stretch of wood, a large white horse came dashing around a bend ahead of them. Jimoen jumped back out of the way, but Robin planted himself in the horse's path and raised his arms to stop the beast. It halted just in front of him, although it still looked spooked, its eyes rolling wildly in their sockets, foam at the corners of its mouth.
Slowly, Robin reached for the horse's bridle and took hold of it.
At the same time, two riders came barreling around the bend. One of them swung a rope bolas, clearly intended for the horse. But upon seeing Robin and Jimoen, they didn't hesitate. They bore down on Robin and the lad. The man with the bolas grinned.
Robin pulled his bow free and nocked an arrow. But he didn't have time to loose it before the lead rider threw his bolas hard, directly at Jimoen. The two balled weights wrapped themselves around the lad's throat and jerked him off his feet.
The other rider was almost on Robin now, but Robin managed to fire his arrow before the man reached him. He hit the man just below the chin, just above his chest armor. The rider fell, the point of Robin's arrow jutting from the back of his helmet, the point stained red.
The first rider had wheeled and, having tied the end of the bolas rope to his saddle, was dragging Jimoen roughly over the road back the way he had come.
By now, Will and Allan had their bows ready, and Robin had nocked another arrow. They all fired at the same time, and all three arrows struck true. The rider fell, but the horse kept running, still dragging Jimoen. An instant later, both the horse and the lad disappeared around the bend.
CHAPTER
SEVEN
Robert could feel his life bleeding away. More than anything he wanted to kill these men who had slaughtered his soldiers and left him here with this bloody lance in his belly, pinned to the earth like a bug. But he was helpless, weak, dying. The men around him were ignoring him, as if he were already dead.
The leader was staring down the road, clearly waiting for some sign that his riders had captured Richard's charger. His associate called orders to the other soldiers.
“Prenez de que vous voulez.” Take what you will. Like vultures, the men descended on the bodies of the knights lying around Loxley. They rifled through packs and saddlebags, stripped armor and clothing off the bodies, cut purses from around the knights' necks, pulled rings from stiffening fingers. All the while they shouted to one another in French and laughed raucously. If Loxley could have called down the wrath of God on every one of them he would have done so gladly.
Instead, he looked up at the leader, who was ignoring the scavengers.
“Are you English?” Loxley asked, struggling to make himself heard.
The bald man grinned cruelly and squatted down beside Loxley. “When it serves me,” he said. Loxley said nothing, but spat in his tormentor's face. The man's face contorted with rage, and Loxley thought for certain that he'd deal him a killing blow then and there. But at that moment, the horse of one of the man's riders came charging around the bend, hooves thundering, riderless. A man was being dragged behind the beast, bloodied almost beyond recognition, clearly dead.
The noble and his associate looked at each other, both showing fear for the first time.
Four more men came around the bend on foot. English soldiers! If Loxley had the strength he would have cheered. Three of the men had their bows drawn and they loosed their arrows, nocked new ones, and fired again, all without breaking stride. Several of the French cavalry fell.
One of the men—Loxley recognized him from the camp—fired two arrows in quick succession at the soldiers now standing with the leader. Both men went down, arrows in their throats between the top of the armor and their chins. Either shot would have been remarkable; together they defied logic.
The French soldiers who remained alive ran off the road into the trees. Several fell with arrows in their head and neck. Those who didn't ran into another man Loxley recognized: the giant who had been fighting the archer just the night before. He carried a stave, which he used to deadly effect, blocking sword strokes, cracking skulls and ribs, the wood a bright blur in the forest shadows.
Within moments, the leader and his associate were the only attackers left standing.
“Suivez-moi!” the leader called. Follow me!
Both men leaped onto their horses and sped away down the road.
The archer stopped in the middle of the lane, drew an arrow from his quiver, nocked it and, taking careful aim, let it fly. Loxley knew immediately that the man had found his mark. At the last moment, though, the leader turned to look back over his shoulder. Rather than taking him in the back of the neck, the arrow hit him in the face. He screamed, nearly toppled off his horse. Then he righted himself, grasping his mount around the neck and riding on. A moment later, he and his companion were gone.
ROBIN WATCHED THE two riders vanish around a far bend in the road. Then he turned to survey the carnage they'd left behind.
Allan and Little John walked among the dead soldiers. Coins, bottles, jewelry, and other trinkets were scattered all around. At least they had kept the French from their ghoulish harvest.
“They're all dead,” Little John said.
Robin wasn't surprised. “Keep an eye out for the living. They may return.”
Will Scarlet walked up slowly, leading King Richard's charger.
“Robin look.”
Will opened the pannier hanging from the saddle and pulled out the king's war helmet. Gold gleamed in the sunlight that trickled through the branches overhead. In all likelihood that helm was worth more than all the coin any of them would see in their lifetimes.
“Imagine the price we could get!” Scarlet said, his eyes widening. Robin could see that in his mind Will had already started spending his treasure. “It would buy land and a manor. For each of us!”
Robin shared a look with Little John, and wondered how best to rein in Will's ambitions.
At that moment, though, Robin heard a weak call of “Help,” from a man he had assumed was dead.
He strode over to the man, Little John just behind him. He recognized the fallen knight immediately: Robert Loxley, the king's man. A l
ance protruded from his stomach, and the ground around him was soaked with blood. Robin exchanged another look with John, who gave a small shake of his head. Robin knelt and, while John held the lance steady, he gingerly examined the wound. He then checked the man for other wounds. He had just the one, but that would be enough to kill him.
Blood now flowed slowly from around the lance, but most of the man's life had already bled away.
Loxley seemed to realize this. He grabbed Robin's arm and squeezed. Robin had the sense that the man was gripping him as hard as he could, but there was barely any pressure at all.
“My name is Robert Loxley,” the man said.
