The Archer (The Blood Realm Series Book 3)

by Jennifer Blackstream

  “Then quit giving me such bounty to smile about.” His voice was teasing, but he acquiesced to her request. Bit by bit he reined in the smile, until the only remnant was a slight crinkling around his eyes. “The night isn’t over yet. We have the gold, but that’s only the first step. I dare say the second may not be as exhilarating, but I hope you’ll find it as rewarding as I do.”

  His eyes grew fuzzy, as if he were looking at something far away. The bow sagged in her hands, anger fizzling out as she found herself chasing that look, wanting to know where it had come from, what it was about. His entire body changed, softened somehow.

  “You seem different.”

  The words were out before she could stop them, before she was even aware she’d intended to speak. Robin blinked, looked at her as if only just noticing she was there.

  “Oh?”

  In for a penny… “You’ve seemed a little different since…” She looked down at her bow, ran a finger over the string. “Since I agreed to stay.”

  “Do I?”

  She lifted her head, ready to glare at him, but there was no teasing in his face now, no sign of mockery. Rather, he looked almost as disconcerted as she felt.

  Strange. “Yes. I can’t quite put my finger on what’s different. But you seem…more at ease?”

  “Well, you haven’t caused me egregious bodily harm for a bit,” he mused. “Perhaps physical health agrees with me?”

  His tone was joking, but the humor didn’t quite reach his eyes. There was a haze there that said he was thinking hard about something, something he wasn’t quite ready to share. And he was studying her with an unnerving level of scrutiny. She tightened her grip on her bow, determined not to fidget under that look.

  “And you, Marian? Do you feel any different?”

  Yes. “No. No, not really.”

  His brow fell, eyes narrowing with suspicion, but she turned before he could pursue the matter and walked around to the other side of the carriage. The air was easier to breathe over here, not so full of that scent that was wholly Robin Hood, rich earth and crushed clover. Her hand trembled as she replaced the arrow in her quiver and she balled her fingers into a fist. Forget it, Marian. Forget him. Three days. Only three days.

  Fortunately for her resolve, Little John returned to the carriage with Percy’s bag of gold in his hand. The fat noble was still kneeling on the ground back where he’d fallen, but now he was staring after Little John with hatred in his eyes.

  It would be smarter to kill him. He’ll never forget this. He’s a gluttonous coward, but he has the money to buy friends, pay people to care about his whining. Mercenaries.

  “We don’t kill.”

  Marian jumped, nerve endings in her arms all spasming at once. Will was right beside her and she hadn’t heard him approach, hadn’t noticed him at all until he’d spoken. His voice had a wet, hissing quality that would have told her he had a mouthful of sharp teeth even if she hadn’t been looking right at him. He grinned at her and she blinked, realizing that she’d drawn her bow and had an arrow nocked, aimed at his throat.

  Quickly, she dropped the bow, the tension of the string sinking into her muscles, making them vibrate with the rush of adrenaline that had nowhere to go.

  Will looked over her shoulder at Percy. “It’s hard sometimes. Not killing them when you know it’s dangerous to let them live. It’s unwise to make such powerful enemies and then leave them free to plot, to…accumulate.”

  Marian followed his gaze. “Robin was very clear about his rule against killing.”

  The spriggan hefted one shoulder, settling something more firmly over his back. Tilly, Marian realized. Will must have retrieved her unconscious body from the road.

  Will opened the door to the carriage and plopped Tilly down onto the seat, not bothering to secure her or see that she was steady. Her body slumped, half-falling to the floor and lying there like a depleted sack of potatoes. He thrust the door shut and returned his eerie gaze to Marian.

  “You are wondering if he thinks less of you because you are a killer.”

  “I am not a killer.” The sentence flew from her lips as fast and sharp as one of her arrows. An image of Guy of Gisborne, bloody and broken with one such arrow sticking out of his chest like a macabre exclamation point laid itself over her consciousness like a pall and she bit the inside of her lip to keep from qualifying her statement, or trying to take it back. I am not a killer.

  “I am,” Will said calmly.

  The well-worn grip of her bow caressed her fingers as she tightened her grip, but she didn’t raise it. Despite the implications of the spriggan’s statement, there was no threat here. She knew it as surely as she knew her own arrows. And the fact that she could put that sort of faith in a half-goblin she’d known less than a week sent a shiver down her spine.

  “Don’t let his aversion to killing fool you. More than one villain has experienced death at Robin’s hands and lived to tell the tale. His glamour is not just for hiding, and you have experienced its strength firsthand.”

  Marian’s stomach rolled. The thought of having that glamour turned on her as it had been on the sheriff, to have it take her mind through her own death. Another shiver ran down her spine.

  “So you see, our grand leader has his own darkness. And Robin does not judge others for killing. He understands that sometimes it is necessary. But he says…” The spriggan twisted up his face in concentration, reaching for a memory. “Something about the energy of killing. He says killing marks you, and if you do it too often, then others will…sense it, somehow. Too much killing will frighten away those who would do you good and attract those who will do you ill. In our line of work, it would be too easy to kill too many, too often and then…and then we wouldn’t be a force for good anymore.” He frowned, then shook his head. “Or something like that. It all boils down to no killing.”

  “Is it hard for you?” Marian kept her voice low, not wanting Robin or Little John to hear her. The two men were on the other side of the carriage, holding their own conversation in quiet tones.

  “Not as much now as it was.” Will shrugged. “I’m only half spriggan. My father was a goblin.”

  His gaze intensified, watching Marian. Probably for some sign of disgust or fear.

  Goblins don’t scare me, little one. And your goblin heritage is apparently more obvious than you realize.

  “Then you have a bit of the bloodlust. A little more of a carnivorous appetite.”

  Will grinned at that, the too-wide smile splitting his face and showing off a seemingly unending line of razor-sharp teeth. “Yes.” He looked at Robin then. “Never bothered Robin. He told me he didn’t care what I was, only what I did. Invited me to join him. Said it might help…take the edge off.”

  “Does it?” She held her breath, even her heart trying to still as she waited for the answer. If her old life was truly gone, if the spell—if worst came to worst, perhaps there could be a place for her…

  Stop it. Stop it!

  “A little. A chase helps get the blood going, keeps the muscles and bones from getting too antsy. And if it gets too bad, there’s always the more dangerous game.” His yellow eyes darkened to a burnished orange. “It’s not just the thieves and fat cats we deal with, you know. There are larger threats. Monsters, both human and not, that give up their right to be left alone by taking the lives of others. If the hunger ever gets too great…”

  Marian leaned forward, lured closer by the promise in the spriggan’s voice. Yes, she could imagine that. Could imagine all the evil out there, evil that had no solution but to be killed, permanently removed as a threat. If Robin didn’t like to kill, he would need…help, in that area. And Will was only one creature, one man. He couldn’t do it alone.

  A knowing glint lit Will’s fiery eyes and Marian realized she’d been hanging on his every word, her own hunger rising. She jerked back, stumbled a step. Her shoulder slammed into the carriage.

  “Everything all right over there?”
/>   Robin’s voice seemed to come from far away. Marian’s attention was locked on Will, on that look that seemed to see far more than she ever wanted anyone to see. He let her go, didn’t say another word. Still, there was too much understanding in his eyes, too much…kinship.

  Marian mumbled something even she didn’t understand and quickly skirted around the carriage to stand next to Robin and Little John. The sidhe stared hard at her, green gaze flicking over her face. Whatever he saw there made his brows knit in concern and he slid his glance over to Will then back at Marian. He arched an eyebrow in question.

  “All’s good,” Marian said with forced cheerfulness. “Are we done here?”

  “Almost.” Robin gave her one last scrutinizing look and then turned to Little John.

  The shifter wrapped several gold coins into a brown handkerchief, folding it tightly so the money didn’t make any noise. He handed it to the driver and whispered something to him. The man nodded, bent his head to kiss Little John’s hands, and quickly tucked the handkerchief into his pocket. Little John shuffled as if embarrassed by the show of gratitude, then mumbled something under his breath. The driver nodded again and Little John put a hand on his shoulder. At the count of three, he flung the driver out of the carriage and into the road.

  Marian arched an eyebrow as the man cowered in the dirt, arms covering his head as if to ward off a blow. Little John turned his back to him, winked at her, and walked into the forest without another word. Will followed after him, his gait heavy and clumsier than it was in his smaller form. Robin took Marian’s arm and they followed.

  The scent of moist earth and rich green leaves welcomed her into its embrace as they ventured farther from the road, deeper into the woods. The tension knotting her muscles slowly relinquished its hold, the atmosphere of the forest kneading her shoulders with gentle fingers. She let her head fall back, her eyes close for just a moment. Oh, how she loved it here. Tucked away in the shade, the canopy creating a separate world far from the tedium of landscaping and harvesting. Far from the bustle of people milling about like cattle.

  Whatever else happened, she could be grateful for this. For being strong-armed into spending more time in the wilderness that was so dear to her heart. She would carry this time with her always. Perhaps it would ease the pain of leaving, of walking away when it was getting harder and harder to remember why she had to.

  But you have to go. You know you have to go.

  “I like Kevin.”

  Will’s voice broke into her reverie, blessedly distracting her from the dangerous path her mind had been about to meander down.

  “Kevin?” Marian asked.

  “The driver,” Little John supplied. “Good man, four children. The Heaths pay him a pittance, and more often than not order him to remain on call the entire day. ”

  Marian snorted. “That sounds like Percy all right. He lives in horror of having to walk from one room to the other.” She looked back over her shoulder. “We should have disabled the carriage. Made him walk back home.”

  “Carrying his wife,” Will added.

  “He wouldn’t have carried his wife,” Little John corrected him. “He would have made poor Kevin do it.”

  “Don’t be absurd, lads,” Robin cut in. “How could Kevin possibly carry Lady Heath when his arms would be full of her husband?”

  They all had a good laugh at that, both for the image it produced and the probable truth of it. The laughter and camaraderie felt almost as good as the embrace of the forest and when Robin smiled at her, she smiled back after only a second’s hesitation.

  Three days.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “So who is she really?”

  Mrs. Thornton’s voice danced around Robin’s ears, barely registering over the caterwauling of her seven children. The small cottage did its best to absorb the sound. The white stucco walls were covered with shelves and shelves of bits of clay shaped by tiny hands, framed drawings and paintings that may or may not have been the result of accidental paint spills, and a host of delicate knickknacks the homeowners were optimistically hoping to keep out of reach. Unfortunately, seven children produced a level of sound that would no doubt be heard through the bedrock of Scythia itself.

  Robin opened his mouth to answer her only to be distracted by a pinch at the top of his thigh. He glanced down to where the youngest, Matthew, was climbing up his leg, little face screwed up in concentration. Red curls of downy baby hair stuck out at wild angles from his head, and one chubby hand groped higher, searching for a handhold. He brushed the bottom of Robin’s bow and Mrs. Thornton scooped him up before he could close his fist around it.

  “Robin,” she prompted, holding the frantically squirming two year old in one arm braced on her hip. “Who is she?”

  Against his will, Robin’s gaze was dragged back to the woman who had held it for the majority of the evening. The glamour he’d conjured for her hid her red hair under a black cascade of straight, silken locks and masked her green eyes with a deep chocolate brown. Her high cheekbones were sharper, her muscled arms more slender and delicate. The soft curves of her hips, visible only when she turned suddenly and the green cloak flared behind her, swelled out an inch or so more. And she was more than half a foot shorter.

  But his glamour didn’t hide her joy. It didn’t hide the huge smile that hadn’t left her lips since Mrs. Thornton’s oldest, a girl of twenty, had attached herself to Marian’s side, fascinated with her recurve bow and the feathered arrows in the quiver at her back. Since the six-year-old twins had engaged in a battle for her attention by seeing who could sing the loudest—a rather bawdy drinking song they’d learned from their uncle no less.

  “She is only a friend, love,” he murmured. “Just a friend.” Just a friend. Just. A. Friend.

  “Aye, and you’ll want to be keeping it that way.”

  A solid hand on his arm broke the huntress’ spell. Robin blinked the rose-colored haze from his eyes and turned to look at the speaker, finding Mr. Thornton himself standing at his side with a serious look etched into his weathered face. His severe black shirt was open at the collar, revealing a nest of grey chest hair, and the small eyeglasses on the end of his nose were smudged with tiny fingerprints.

  “Shut up, Alan,” Mrs. Thornton warned. She put down the child she’d pulled from Robin so she could cross her arms over her thin chest. Her pale blue eyes narrowed at her husband, pinching the soft white skin of her face like the petals of a daisy. “You’ve no business poking your nose into Robin’s affairs.”

  Her husband waved her off, shaking his foot absent-mindedly as the two year old she’d just released attempted to latch on to his leg for a climb. “It’s true, I tell you. That woman would bring you nothing but grey hair.” He jabbed Robin in the chest, gesturing at his own grey hair with the other hand. “I see that quiver of hers. She’s an archer, yes? Like you?”

  “She is.”

  “And I’ll bet she tries to show you up with it, doesn’t she?”

  Robin opened his mouth, then closed it. “Actually, she tends to threaten me with it.”

  “And well I— Wait a minute.” The old man grasped the edge of his glasses, pushed them up his nose as he narrowed his eyes. “Why is she threatening you with it? You’ve not been making unwanted advances on the lass, have you? That won’t stand, young man, it won’t—”

  “Her honor is safe with me,” Robin broke in. He shrugged off the flicker of annoyance that the thought to the contrary would even cross the man’s mind. “I’m not a man to go where I’m not wanted.”

  Mr. Thornton dropped his glasses, letting them slide down his nose again as he wagged his finger with undue enthusiasm. “Exactly! Haven’t done a thing wrong and already she’s giving you the pointy end of her arrow.” The two year old reached his hip and Mr. Thornton groped for the child, trying to get a good enough grip to pry him off. “And I’ll bet she argues with you all the time?”

  Now it was Robin’s turn to raise his eyebrows. �
�She does at that. You speak as though you know her.”

  “I do,” Mr. Thornton muttered, eyeing his wife out of his peripheral vision.

  Mrs. Thornton, who had abandoned the men in favor of her kitchen, held up a battered, flour-coated rolling pin and waved it at her husband, the sparkle in her eye belying the threat of the gesture. The corner of Mr. Thornton’s mouth quirked up, the laugh lines around his eyes deepening. Then he shook himself like a wet dog drying its fur and faced Robin with a renewed expression of determination.

  “I’m warning you, a woman like that will give you no peace at all. A constant battle, that’s what waits for you in those pretty arms of hers, and make no mistake.”

  Across the room, a sob broke out, followed by a wail befitting a banshee. Mr. Thornton was off like a shot, two year old bobbing in the crook of his arm as he leapt over a pile of bedraggled dolls and used his free arm to scoop up the five year old who’d just tumbled off the arm of the couch, thumping a head full of red curls on the hard wood floor. Robin’s heart warmed as he watched the stern old man cuddle his injured child, cooing and pressing kisses to the sniffling girl’s head.

  The oldest girl glanced over at her crying sibling, then back at Marian. With obvious reluctance, she handed Marian’s battered leather quiver back to her, one finger giving the grey and black striped feathers a final caress. She settled her grey shawl more firmly over her shoulders, covering the cream and red plaid shirt she wore, and went to her father’s side to take the two year old. The child immediately snuggled against the soft wool of her shawl, little face tucked into the crook of her neck.

  Marian’s gaze lingered on them for a long moment, the ghost of a smile still holding her lips. The twins, distracted by the commotion with their sibling, had forgotten their song and abandoned Marian in favor of fighting for their father’s attention. She waved at them, a faint fanning of her fingers, then drifted across the room to stand at Robin’s side.