Robin knew she’d been right earlier to call them smart. Nottingham was large enough for them to all blend into new crowds, and if they kept their wits about them, no one would ever have to know the last survivors of Lockesly Manor were harboring two outlaws.
“All right,” she said. “We stay together and head for Nottingham tomorrow at dark. We don’t want to be seen,” she added. “Not if any of Gisborne’s men are still in the village.” And looking for revenge if he was dead.
Kitty brightened. “I’ve always wanted sisters.”
Robin couldn’t help but smile back. “So, if it’s not too much trouble, Much—”
“I’m coming with you.”
Robin was thankful it was someone else’s turn to be stared at in such an uncomfortable way, though the only thing she could think to say was a rather inelegant, “What?”
“I’m coming with you,” Much repeated, crossing her arms over her chest.
“You’ve family here, though,” Jemma said. “A home. A livelihood.”
Much shook her head. “My father’s gone to see about moving our mill closer to London. That’s why he’s gone and ain’t been back. He said he’d send for us when it was settled.” She looked pointedly at Maggie, who had been one of the kitchen girls responsible for going to the market each week. “We ain’t had anything to offer at market for a while now.”
“We thought maybe you’d gone to sell at Nottingham, like some of the others,” Maggie said.
“Much,” Robin said softly, waiting to look the other girl in the eye. “Are you sure?”
“It’s my choice, ain’t it?” Much stared right back at her. “Besides, can anyone else make flour? Know what’s good to use?”
As much as Robin wanted to argue that Much had opportunities here none of the rest of them had, it was, ultimately, her choice. The girl was old enough to be made a wife and mother, and she was certainly sound enough in mind to make her own decisions about what she wanted from her life. If she wanted to throw her lot in with the rest of them, well, Robin supposed she could always change her mind later.
“It is,” she agreed, remembering her own set of choices not long ago that had started her along this particular path. “We make for Nottingham, then. Tomorrow at nightfall.”
“We should sleep.” Jemma urged the others to make themselves comfortable among the straw while Much blew out the flickering candles.
Robin curled instinctively toward Jemma. She stiffened only slightly when someone laid close enough to touch on her other side. The gentle sounds of calm breathing lulled her closer to sleep, and right before she drifted off, she swore she heard Kitty mutter, “I really have always wanted sisters.”
“The sheriff’s household is the only one in Nottingham big enough to need servants,” Jemma said matter-of-factly, the worn wicker basket hanging off her arm bumping gently against her leg as she walked.
“Would you go back to that life?” Robin’s shoulders twitched, her bow a welcome weight against her back even as it was bundled up in disguise. She received a number of odd stares—mostly from older women—for her mannish clothing, and she knew without a doubt she’d stick further out in the crowd if she wandered about openly armed. They’d left Jemma’s quarterstaff in the small room they shared with the rest of the girls for that very reason, no matter how much Maggie had tried to convince Jemma that she could pass it off as a walking stick.
Jemma adjusted her basket with a sigh. “No. No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t make them have to go back to that, either.”
“Unless they wanted to.” Robin wrapped her fingers around the strap across her chest, the leather smooth to the touch. “I’ve told them they can have the world, and I haven’t given them much of anything for it.”
“You gave us the chance to have it,” Jemma said quietly. She paused at a stall to look at different lengths of brightly colored ribbon. “What we do with it is up to us. This one,” she added, pointing to one the color of fresh butter. “I think that would look very lovely in Maggie’s hair, don’t you?”
Maggie had hair dark as a raven, and the yellow would indeed stand out against it.
“Yes.” Robin ran her fingers over one the color of Lincoln green. “This one for Kitty?” Kitty had a head full of loose, blonde curls.
“She’ll like that. It’ll remind her of the forest. That one,” she pointed to one of pale lavender, “for Ginny?”
Robin wasn’t sure what color Ginny’s hair was—brown or black—but the color would brighten the end of her simple braid for sure. “Yes. Red, for Much. She’ll like the boldness,” she added after Jemma cocked her head in question. It would be a sharp shock in Much’s wild bird’s nest of dirty-blonde hair, too.
“Blue for you,” Jemma said with a bittersweet smile. “The color of the summer sky.”
“White for you.” She fished the appropriate coins from an inner pocket, and then handed them to the woman on the other side of the stall.
“You can’t braid this.” Jemma tugged on one of her curls, held back from her face by a band of cloth tied at the nape of her neck.
Robin pulled Jemma’s free hand from her hair and tied the ribbon around her wrist. “You’re no different from the rest of us.”
Jemma swallowed heavily, busying herself with putting the ribbons in the basket with more care than they needed.
While money was tight—and getting tighter—and they’d just bought things they didn’t necessarily need, Robin understood how important it was to have the smallest bit of happiness in their lives. The girls needed something to brighten their smiles again, and even a new hair ribbon, as small as it may be, might do it.
The manor had burnt to the ground and taken each and every one of their former lives with it two weeks ago. What money they’d had on them, pooled collectively, hadn’t been much. Barely enough for a room at an inn well beneath what any of them were used to, but sleeping in the streets and alleys wasn’t an option with so many of them, and one so young.
Much had found work in the early mornings with a short-handed baker, and it helped a little. Enough to let them keep the room and buy some food. Maggie still tried to get in with some of the seamstresses and dressmakers, but so far, she hadn’t had any real luck.
They continued to meander through the Nottingham market square. Robin shuffled half a step closer even as she kept an eye on the people around her. When she looked critically at the crowd, her stomach flipped.
“Jemma,” she whispered, a soft smile playing at the edge of her mouth as they caught the momentary attention of a group of boys. She and Jemma could play it off as though they were being coy, and they wouldn’t be bothered. “We’ve no weapons.”
“No weapons? You forget what’s across your back?” She tugged Robin’s sleeve, and they paused at a stall selling earthenware.
“Little weapons,” Robin clarified. “You’ve your staff, I’ve my bow, but not one of us—me, you, Kitty, or Maggie—have any sort of knife.” She tilted her head toward the group of boys who had moved on to stare at a few of the better-dressed, higher-born ladies with maids in tow. “They’re all armed.”
Jemma winced.
“I know.” They carried on. “Remember the blacksmith? Those prices? We can’t afford that.” She tilted her head to the side, reaching up to free her necklace with Marcus’s locket from the short hairs at the nape of her neck. “Well, we could…”
“No.”
She looked sharply at Jemma, having never heard such a tone from her before.
“Not like this,” Jemma said, far more gently. “Not for this.”
Robin looked down and away, cheeks burning.
“What we need,” Jemma continued conversationally, “is a tinker.”
“A tinker?” Robin’s eyebrows rose.
“A tinker. Small blades, smaller price. They’re very good at what they do.” She handed Robin the basket as they approached another stall. “They make knives for hands of all sizes.”
As much as th
e idea of not only giving Ginny a knife, but also teaching her to use it, was terrifying, Robin knew Jemma was right. The world preyed on the elderly, the very young, and girls, and Ginny fit at least two of those. And as much as any of them would want to argue the contrary, there would be moments when none of them would be around to protect her.
“A wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Robin murmured, running her fingers along the sturdy wooden handles of the knives in front of her.
“How much?” Jemma asked, looking into the well of midday shadows at the back of the booth.
A voice spat a price. Robin grimaced. The amount requested would take a large majority of their remaining money, and it would make feeding them more difficult than it already was.
“We can go another day, can’t we?” Robin asked, her free hand resting lightly on her belly.
“Wait.” The tinker eased from the shadows, face tanned from long days in the sun. “Too high a price?” she asked.
“Not for the quality, no,” Jemma answered.
The other women eyed the pair of them shrewdly, most notably lingering on the bow at Robin’s back. Her face, however, was damn near unreadable.
“Why you want ‘em?” she finally asked.
“Protection.”
“The Sheriff protects us.”
Robin’s eyes narrowed slightly. “The Sheriff protects those he deems worthy of protecting.” Gesturing to Jemma, she added, “We aren’t it.”
The tinker pointed to the disguised bow on Robin’s back. “I know what that is.”
“And I know what these are.” Robin picked up the smallest of the knives, the one she knew Ginny would be able to hold without issue. “It’s the using it that might be difficult.”
The tinker laughed. It was an odd, rusty sound. “You must be new to Nottingham.” She placed her hands on her hips and tilted her head to the side, once again studying them. “New, indeed. I’ll make you a trade.” She leaned forward, and then rested her elbows on the wood plank of her stall. “You can have as many of the knives as you need for half the price… if you teach me to use that bow you can’t hide for shite. Bring the others, and I’ll show them how to hide their weapons and fight with ‘em.”
Robin rested her weight on her palms, her cheek next to the tinker’s. “If I refuse?” To any onlooker, it seemed as though they were merely passing town gossip.
She shrugged and said, “No skin off my back.”
“Where and when?”
“Meet me here tomorrow at dawn—just the two of you—and I’ll show you where we’ll meet from then on. Make sure you’re not seen.” The tinker drew back enough to give Robin a sharp smile.
“Well met, Tinker,” Robin said.
Jemma placed money on the counter, starting to delicately—and discreetly—bundle knives into her basket.
“Lia,” she corrected. “And well met to you, too, Robin of Lockesly.”
Robin inhaled harshly and straightened.
Lia, still with that same predatory smile, melted back toward the shadows. “Don’t be seen.”
Robin tamped down hard on the panic in her chest, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other at a steady pace. Jemma fell in next to her. Robin kept up her carefully blank façade until they were streets away from the market and nearly back to the inn they rented a room at. There, temporarily alone, Robin leaned against the nearest building and panted.
“Robin?”
“She knows me, Jemma,” Her chest hitched. “She knew me, Jemma. Called me by name. Robin of Lockesly.”
Jemma’s mouth fell open. “How…?”
“I don’t know.” Robin shook her head, eyes wide. “I don’t know. She called me by name. She knew me. On sight.” She rubbed her chest with one hand, trying to ease the ache out of it. Her breathing was a little ragged, though it didn’t carry the wheeze one of the village boy’s did during cold weather. “We’re not supposed to exist. That fire—we should have died in that fire, Jemma. To everyone else but the six of us, we are dead. And if Gisborne is dead, too, then there’s no one around to tell who murdered him.”
“Keep your voice down, love,” Jemma said, dropping her basket in order to smooth both her thumbs along Robin’s high cheekbones.
“What if it’s a trap? What if we go to meet her tomorrow, but the Sheriff’s men are there, instead?” She wrapped her hands around Jemma’s wrists, her calluses catching on the new ribbon she wore.
“We can take extra care,” Jemma said, tone gentle. “We’ll make a plan. You’ve your bow, and I’ve my staff. I can go alone, and you can hide and watch from a distance. There are ways to make this safer.”
Robin took a deep, cleansing breath, and finally settled. “Do we tell them? The others?”
“Tell us what?”
They turned to find Maggie and Ginny only a few feet from them. Ginny held tight to Maggie’s hand, small, white flowers braided into her hair.
***
“What are you doing back there?” Robin asked with a smile, turning her head as far as Jemma would allow before the other girl positioned it once more the way she wanted it.
“Making you look pretty. Now hush, and don’t move.” Her deft fingers moved quickly. After a few more minutes, she gently laid Robin’s braid over her shoulder. “There. Like a proper lady, now.”
Robin ran her fingers over the plait with a giggle, her bowman’s calluses gentle against the fragile flowers Jemma had woven in for the summer festival. She startled at a different texture, craning her neck around to see what it was.
A tiny, delicate wooden daisy sat intermixed with the others. She knew of only one person in all of Lockesly who had such skill, and warmth bloomed in her chest.
“Marcus,” she breathed, lifting her head and scanning the gathering people for one particular face.
He leaned against a fencepost, ever-present whittling knife in one hand and block of wood in the other, though his eyes were undoubtedly on her. This time, Robin felt a heat in her belly to match the feeling in her heart.***
“Robin? Robin?”
“I’m fine,” she said, squeezing Jemma’s wrists where she still held them. “I—the flowers,” she finished weakly. The flower Marcus had made her had been on her dressing table.
“Tell us what?” Maggie repeated.
“We’ve surprises for you,” Jemma said, disentangling Robin from her in order to pick up her basket.
Ginny frowned. “Surprises?”
“Yes. For all of you.” She looped the basket over one arm, and then hooked her other through Maggie’s.
“We’ll explain everything,” Robin said as Maggie continued to give her a look. There was no use lying to them, not when she’d told them they were entitled to make their own choices.
She was content to let the three of them go ahead of her until Ginny pulled them to a stop, reaching toward Robin. She couldn’t say no to such a carefully hopeful expression, and she linked her fingers with Ginny’s smaller ones.
If Sabine had had a proper Christian burial, she’d be rolling in her grave at the thought of her daughter staying in such a place as The Gilded Crown. It was not as wealthy as the name suggested, though it was cleaner than Robin had expected. While they paid a high price for what they had, the next step down was sleeping in the street.
Beggars couldn’t be choosers, and Robin would prefer they didn’t have to resort to the former.
Robin ushered them through the taproom, keeping an eye out for anyone whose gaze lingered a little too long on Maggie or Ginny. Up the stairs they went, where they knocked a pattern on the door.
Kitty opened it a crack. “There’s a girl in a tree.”
“She can’t fall; she’s asleep,” Maggie murmured the second half of the pass phrase, and they all slipped into the room.
Inside, Much blinked owlishly from a pallet, clearly having been woken from a nap only moments before.
“We’ve something for you lot,” Robin said, unwrapping her bow and looping the string i
nto one of the notches at the end. From there, she could string it in a hurry, if need be.
“Gifts?” Kitty prodded Much into moving closer, and the girls formed a loose circle on the floor. “Why?”
“Why?” Robin settled on her rear as Jemma moved things in her basket.
“It’s not name day.” Ginny fidgeted.
“Because we can,” she said gently. “We want to. Because we might be outlaws and poor, but we can be happy. And we can be pretty.”
Jemma brought out the ribbons. “We picked out colors for you. Hope you like ‘em. Here, Maggie.”
Each girl took her ribbon. Robin could see the moment it dawned that they didn’t need a reason to be special or to be given a gift.
Ginny took hers and immediately turned to Maggie. She beamed as the older girl wrapped it around the end of her braid.
“What about the other thing?” Maggie asked.
“I’ve my bow and Jemma has her staff,” Robin said. “But we want you—all of you—to be able to defend yourselves if we’re not here.”
“Knives,” Jemma added. “Sized for our hands.” She held them up one by one.
“You’re worried,” Much said quietly, trailing her ribbon between each of her fingers. “What are you worried about?”
They’ve brains in their head, and good hearts in their chest. “There was a woman,” Robin started, thumb rubbing over the top of her boot. “A tinker. She—she knew me. She called me by name. Robin of Lockesly.”
“Will you see her again?” Maggie asked.
“She is the one who will teach us to use these.” Jemma reached out and gently tweaked Ginny’s nose. “Don’t look so glum—we’re clever girls. They’ll not take our Robin from us.”
Kitty crossed her arms over her chest, and then leaned against Much’s much sturdier shoulder. “You think she means to betray us.”
“I’m not quite sure what to think,” she said. Robin looked at each girl until they met her eyes. “I believe she can help us, but she can also hurt us. Jemma and I are to meet her tomorrow, and there is the chance that the Sheriff will be waiting. Outlaws that we are.”
“There must be ways to make this safer,” Kitty said, her ribbon draped across her bent knee.
Lady of Sherwood Page 5
