Joan’s expression was serious. “I said, ‘Get. On. The. Bridge.’ ”
Her friend had officially gone mental. Joan aimed another whack at Robyn. Ready this time, Robyn parried it away.
Another whack. Another defensive block.
Whack, block, thrust, parry.
Robyn shuffled on to the tree trunk that Joan so creatively called a bridge.
“What’s got in to you?” Robyn had never seen her friend like this.
Thwack!
Robyn ducked, lost her balance, crashed spread-eagled on the trunk.
The stream trickled lazily below her, promising an icy bath should she fall in. And no fire as yet to warm herself up.
“We’re outlaws now,” Joan said.
She must have been talking with Marion.
Joan continued, “We need to look after ourselves and be strong and be ready in a fight.”
“We do?”
Thwack!
Robyn blocked it with her knuckles. “OW!” Shaking her hand did nothing to ease the pain. “Are you crazy? That really hurt!”
Joan held her staff up, ready for another blow. “Do you think Roger or Maudlin will care if you hurt your hand?”
“They’re not here!”
“Not yet maybe, but we need to be ready. On guard!”
“I’m not playing!” Robyn threw her long staff into the stream, where it caught on rocks. Water churned into foam around it.
“This isn’t a game.” Joan swung her staff like a sword.
Robyn flattened herself against the trunk. The continuing drizzle made it so slippery she lost her footing.
“Saints!” Gravity plummeted her into the icy water. Her screams were louder than the splash. The water, so cold it burned, soaked through everything in a second.
Iced to the core, Robyn struggled out of the river, her clothes miserably heavy. “Are you happy now?”
“You left your long staff behind.”
“You get it then.” Robyn stomped off. It was one thing to douse herself in a stream after scaling the walls of a burning tower, quite another to be frozen stiff for no good reason.
Please tell me Marion has the fire going?
Praise heaven! Marion had a fire burning in the incomplete roundhouse. Not a large one by any account, but enough of a small glow.
“You’re dripping all over it!” Marion shooed her away.
“C-c-c,” Robyn started a sentence that should have been, “Can’t get warm enough.” She would have hugged the fire to her chest if it would help. Her back teeth clattered together, making words impossible.
“You’re soaked!” Marion said.
So he noticed?
“J-J-Jo-” More shivering and rattling teeth. “Joan!” she managed with supreme effort. Rubbing her hands together didn’t warm her one bit, but sent droplets hissing onto the meagre fire.
“Careful!”
More splashes hissed onto the flames. She shoved her hands under her armpits to make them warm. It achieved nothing.
“You’re freezing. Come here,” Marion said.
Robyn couldn’t move. Instead, Marion stepped closer and embraced her in a tight hug. “You’re made of ice. I shouldn’t have let you sleep out last night. I’m so sorry.”
“N-n-no–” She couldn’t get anything out. She wanted to say, “It’s not your fault, Joan did this,” but the freezing tremors took hold. When he kissed her on the forehead, his lips were hotter than a branding iron.
“River!” The word flew out like a curse, but at least it was a whole word and maybe Marion could put the pieces together.
“Yes, I can see that you must have fallen in. You’ll never get warm if you stay in these.” Marion broke their embrace, pulled his tunic off over his head and offered it to her. “Get your wet gear off and put this on.”
He stood there in his threadbare undershirt, leaving very little to the imagination. Which made Robyn realise how dangerously cold she had to be, if she couldn’t feel any heat in her cheeks at all.
Too frozen to be embarrassed, Robyn dragged at her hooded tunic. So wet and heavy; her arms too weak. Marion stepped in and finished the job, shlucking the fabric away from her goose bump-covered skin.
She wrapped her arms around her torso as the air swirled around her bare skin. Not from shame or trying to cover herself, but in a desperate attempt to keep warm. Marion slotted his tunic over her, wrapping the sleeves forward to tie her in to the fabric.
Joan walked into the round house. Robyn heard Marion and Joan talking, but their words became a mash of sounds swirling around her. All she cared about was getting warm. Marion came back and held her tightly in his arms, rubbing her back fiercely to get some heat into her body.
At some point she passed out, because the next moment she woke in a messy pile of limbs on the ground, Marion holding her steady and rubbing heat into her arms and back. He kept kissing her on the forehead as well, his lips a welcome hot-spot.
Oh, wait a minute. It wasn’t Marion. He was cuddling her from behind. The lips on her forehead belonged to her mother.
“She’s getting warmer,” Eleanor said.
Marion barked more orders. “Joan, bring more wood for the fire.”
“But everything’s wet?” She complained.
“Then back the carriage in here and we’ll burn that!”
More shouting; then everything went woozy and Robyn passed out again. Then she woke again, tucked up in a tight ball, knees under her chin. Marion was still wrapped around her, rubbing her limbs to get warm.
A fresh bout of shivers rattled her bones.
“The fire’s bright and hot now,” Marion murmured into her ear.
Her legs were bare. Getting her bearings, she eyeballed her tunic and frock skirt hooked over the branches on the walls, dripping puddles onto the floor. Marion guided her feet towards the coals. A moment later, her toes felt like they were on fire.
At least her feet were finally warm. Ouch! Too warm all of a sudden.
“Careful! You want to thaw out slowly. Too much and you’ll blister,” Eleanor said.
Wiping her blurry eyes, Robyn noticed everyone gathered around her, the same worried expression on their faces.
“I’m so sorry for what happened,” Joan said. “I just wanted us to be fighting fit. You know? Ready for anything.”
“I know. It’s OK Joan.” It came out in a whisper. Robyn was grateful she could make sentences again.
“I should have at least let you wake up and have breakfast though,” Joan said.
In a whisper, Robyn said, “Roger and Maudlin wouldn’t.”
An uncomfortable silence descended. Marion kept rubbing Robyn’s back, but instead of the fierce intensity of before, it had slowed to something more like a caress.
“You’re right,” he said. “We need to be ready for anything.”
They all nodded. At which point Robyn noticed someone missing. “Where’s Ellen?”
“Here I am,” she said bringing a cloth sack with her. A cloth sack that moved and wriggled. “Hope you all like shellfish.” Confused faces abounded as Ellen put the sack on the ground to reveal her catch. “Snappy little biters they are, but if you grab them by the back here, see, they can’t get you.”
“What are they?” Marion said.
They had a strange, greenish gray colour about them, and they wore a suit of armour.
“Freshwater crayfish!” Ellen beamed as if she’d produced a bag of gold. “All the meat is in the tail, and the claws, but you cook the heads as well to make soup and it’s so lush.”
Mother Eleanor leaned forward to take a closer look, then leapt back as one of them snapped its enormous claw at her. “They look like something out of a nightmare!”
Ellen looked around. “Well? Who’s going to help me?”
Stunned silence.
Ellen put her hands on her hips. “If I have to do it all myself, I’ll eat it all too.”
“Those monsters came out of the river?” Ele
anor asked.
“Yep.”
“Proves my point. Rivers and humans shouldn’t mix. Robyn, let this be a lesson to you. Not only will they try and freeze you to death, but they’re full of demons that will flay you alive.”
“Mother Eleanor, thank you for volunteering.” Ellen said, roping her in to helping with food preparation. “Now, you hold the blade steady like this and bring it down hard here, in one go. That chops the tail off in one hit. The tail’s the bit we’re going to eat.”
Nobody interrupted as Ellen gave her cookery demonstration. The pointy heads with their bobble-eyes went into the pot, the claws and tails put aside for now.
Once the water in the pot began to bubble, the shells changed colour from their mottled grey to bright red.
“What witchcraft is this?” Eleanor asked.
“They look like devil spawn but they taste like heaven,” Ellen said.
Soon the aromas filling the little round house set everyone’s tummies to gurgling.
What with the bad night’s sleep, the fight with Joan and subsequent near death from freezing, Robyn could have eaten one of those monsters, snappy claws and all. Hot soupy smells of roasted nuts and butter teased her senses. All from one little armoured creature that looked like it had crawled from the bowels of hell.
Ellen strained the soup through the bag to get the shell and grit out, then it was time to add the chunks of tail and claw meat.
“Make sure you take the vein out,” Ellen said. “I won’t lie to you, this is the worst part. The vein is the . . . um . . . food tube.”
“Urgh,” everyone said as they sliced at the tail meat with their thumbnails and flicked out the dark vein of grit. It was fiddly and frustrating and took forever. Every meal takes forever when you’re starving.
Stomach folding in on itself with hunger, the moment it was ready, Robyn had her bowl out.
It was so delicious she couldn’t speak.
“It’s good, isn’t it?” Ellen said.
“Good is an insult,” Madge said as she slurped at hers. “This is a dream in a bowl.”
“Is there any more?” Georgia asked as she emptied her serve.
“Sorry, that’s all there is. But if I set the sack again, we can catch more tomorrow. Plenty more where they came from.”
Everyone agreed they would catch more of these devil-creatures, as often as they could.
“You did well to pick this spot,” Robyn murmured to Marion.
“Thanks.” He gave her a kiss on the cheek.
Everyone saw his kiss and a chorus of “woo” filled the air.
Hot blushes of embarrassment roared up Robyn’s neck and spread over her face. It was suddenly too warm in here.
“Your clothes will be dry soon, love,” Eleanor said. “Then you can give Marion his tunic back.”
Earlier, she’d nearly died of cold. Now she might die of red-hot embarrassment as every gaze fell upon her. Marion had seen her as good as naked and now everyone knew she was wearing his clothes.
But it had been an emergency, hadn’t it? It wasn’t as if she’d had a choice about taking her drenched clothes off.
Far too many eyes were looking at her, leaping to conclusions. Or maybe they simply knew where this was all leading and she was the one protesting too much?
Whatever the case, Marion deserved her thanks. She’d been half frozen to death and he’d known exactly what to do. Who cared if everyone was watching? Madge and Wilfred didn’t care who saw their affection.
“Thank you,” Robyn gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek. It didn’t feel like enough so she pulled back and added, “For everything.”
His voice low, Marion said, “I was so worried.”
Ellen said in a too-loud voice, “Best take these scraps out. We’ll use the shells and heads as bait for the next lot.”
Some shuffling nearby and movement in the side of her vision told Robyn they’d get some privacy.
Some much-needed privacy.
Ears flapping for the sound of everyone leaving them alone, she heard Georgia say, “The soup was amazing.”
To which Ellen then said, “I won’t lie to you, it’s even better with a dollop of cream in it.”
At which point Robyn cursed.
“What?” Marion was all confusion.
“That Ellen. She’s got them all eating out the palm of her hand.”
Marion shrugged. “Yesterday you were complaining that she was one more mouth to feed. Now she’s proved how useful she is you don’t like her again?”
Robyn folded her arms across her chest. “Come on, ‘cream’? That’s no accident. She knows mother wants to get Bella back.”
Silence for a short while, then Marion tilted her face back to him. “Why are we talking when we could be kissing?”
Wait, what? Kissing?
Marion leaned in and planted a kiss straight onto her mouth. Robyn’s eyebrows shot up so high they nearly flew off her face. The pressure of his lips on hers was simply divine. Firm but yielding, warm and wonderful and a little bit thrilling.
Make that a lot thrilling.
“I was so worried about you,” he said as he pulled back.
Her tightly held arms unfurled themselves. Strange new feelings took hold. She knew she needed to examine them a little more. Perhaps a lot more. “What was that?”
“One of these.” He kissed her again. The second kiss was just as bold as the first, their lips fitting together, the whispery whiskers of his top lip skating over her skin.
So shocked by this rapid change in developments, Robyn let Marion take charge. But only for a moment, only until she worked out the right kind of response. Which was to kiss him back just as firmly as he had kissed her. Except soon after starting what should have been an exploration . . . it felt more like capitulation.
In panic, she pulled back, her breath coming in short bursts of shock. Marion looked so . . . so different all of a sudden. An unchecked smile spread over his face. Half expecting to hear something self-congratulatory like, “That shut you up,” the shocks kept coming when Marion grinned and said, “That was awesome!”
Mesmerized, Robyn touched her fingers to her lips, wondering if this were really happening. The dark centres of Marion’s eyes grew large, even though it wasn’t anytime near dusk.
This kissing thing. Was it always so . . . magnificent? Curiosity got the better of her and she leaned in for another shot at it. Instinct guided her hand to anchor itself on his shoulder as their lips came together. She felt his strong muscles bunch under her hand, through his thin undershirt. How good would it feel to touch his bare skin? On its own volition her palm moved northwards to caress his neck and hold him to her. When her fingertips came across a pulse point, she found his heart beating almost as fast as her own.
In response, his arms closed around her waist, locking their bodies together, their chests pressing closer with each shaky intake of breath.
Something flipped in her tummy. Something tentative and unsure of itself. Something that would take a serious amount of kissing to fully investigate. Robyn applied herself to the investigation. She was nothing if not thorough.
Mother Eleanor’s voice rang through the air. “I’ll just go and check to see if Robyn’s clothes are dry.”
Reluctantly, Robyn pulled away just as her mother walked in. The woman was humming far too loudly, pretending she had no idea what had been going on in here. “Wasn’t that meal delicious Robyn?” Eleanor asked.
“Yes it was.”
Robyn and Marion’s foreheads were still touching.
“It might be nice to have it with a little cream. Oh good, this is nearly dry. Perhaps only a few more minutes and it will be done. I have Joan fetching more wood for the fire.”
The whole time she spoke, Eleanor didn’t make eye contact. Then she left the round house and called out to Joan to collect more wood.
Robyn couldn’t shut off the nagging voice of warning in her head. “I don’t trust Ellen. Even if we
managed to get cream, next time it will be something that needs a little butter. After that it will be milk. Before you know it we’ll be heading straight into Sheffield to liberate the cow.”
A heavy sigh from Marion. “Straight into a trap, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Her rubbed her back. “You’re so smart, that’s why–” he suddenly coughed, spluttered and pulled back, covering his face. “–Damn smoky fire.” More spluttering.
The fire belched smoke, so they shuffled away from the fire. The break in the kissing brought reality intruding back.
“Joan’s right, you know,” Robyn said.
“About?”
“About the fact we need to be ready, at all times. Roger could be back any time. People could be travelling the Kings Road north and south and see us. Other outlaws could raid our camp.”
“As long as getting ready doesn’t involve freezing to death,” he stroked her face. “I was so worried about you.”
“Thank you for unfreezing me,” She kissed him again and gave him the best hug she could manage in her exhausted state.
Marion held Robyn’s hand to steady her as they ventured out. The rain had slowed to swirling drizzle. Joan and Georgia were teaching Wilfred and Madge how to fight with long staffs. This time, they were doing it on muddy ground instead of balancing on a tree trunk over a freezing river.
Near that same river were Ellen and Eleanor, weaving thin branches into a basket shape. “Oh, hello Robyn. You’re mother’s an excellent weaver. We’re making crayfish pots for the next catch.”
Their fingers deftly wove the soft twigs around and around, creating a wide-bottomed basket.
“Won’t they get out?” Robyn asked.
Ellen grinned. “If we left them like this, they surely would. But look, this is the shape we’re going to make them into,” she said, pointing to some scratches in the mud. Ellen had drawn a bowl with high sides that tapered inwards at the neck, much like a flagon for storing wine. “Some farmers I used to know showed me how to do this. Because of their armour, crayfish can only bend forward, you see, they can’t bend their shells back the other way. So they can crawl or swim in, but they can’t crawl out again. All we do is set the trap and come back later to see how many we have.”
The whole time Marion said nothing, but Robyn had a fair idea of what he was thinking. Ellen was making herself useful. Very useful. And she was being so friendly about it. How could they think badly of her when she was being so nice to them?
Robyn and the Hoodettes Page 15
