Robin Hood (11 page)

The young girl standing with John took his hand, her gaze drawn again and again to the golden crown he now wore.

The queen consort seemed to have reached the limits of her endurance. She leaned on the knight beside her for support, and looked deathly pale.

“You!” the king said. “Come closer.”

It took Robin a moment to realize that John was speaking to him.

Robin stood and approached the king. John was eyeing him closely.

“I don't know you,” John said.

“Robert Loxley, Sire, of Nottingham.” The lie came easily to Robin's lips. Speaking to Eleanor of Aquitaine had nearly been more than he could manage, but John was another matter.

The king nodded. “Welcome, then. Forgive me. I don't know any of you; you've been at war so long.”

“We have, sir.”

“And how did my brother die?”

“By exposing himself to danger, sir,” Robin said. “As was his way.”

“As was his way,” John mimicked, his tone mocking, his expression turning sour.

Eleanor, standing nearby, glowered at him, her right hand opened and rigid and trembling. For a second, Robin thought that she would slap him, heedless of the crown he now wore. But after regarding him briefly with manifest contempt, she turned sharply and strode back toward the tower. Through it all, John appeared oblivious.

“You shall be rewarded,” John said, still facing
Robin. He thought for a moment, then regarded the many rings on his hand. Choosing one, he tried to remove it. At first he couldn't pull it past the knuckle, but after a bit more effort, he managed to twist it free. He reached out to drop it in Robin's hand, but then hesitated.

“Nottingham, you say?” John asked.

“Yes, my lord,” Robin answered.

John smiled thinly. “Your father, Sir Walter, owes the Crown tax.” He tapped the ring on his crown. “My Crown. We'll start with this.”

He returned the ring to his finger, glanced at Robin once more, that same acid smile on his lips, and swept away. The crowd parted for him as if he were a ship carving through still waters. Men bowed, women curtsied. John seemed to enjoy it all. Eleanor's youngest might have been shocked to find himself elevated to the throne on this day, but he had recovered all too quickly. If this was the man who was to lead England, Robin grieved for the realm.

S
TANDING
WITH
B
ELVEDERE
, watching as John claimed Richard the Lionheart's crown, Godfrey found his gaze straying repeatedly to the knight who had stepped off the king's ship carrying the pannier. He knew the man. He was sure of it. But from where?

He saw the man speak to Eleanor, and then to the new king, and he burned to know what they said. Regardless of his identity, he had somehow come to possess Richard's crown, which Godfrey very nearly had in his grasp.

This stranger was his enemy.

He absently reached a hand up to the throbbing
wound on his cheek, his eyes still fixed on the man. How familiar he looked …

Prince John—
King
John—spoke to the man a moment longer before turning away from him and starting back toward White Tower. He parted the crowd of onlookers with a small gesture and strode past them. Even from a distance, Godfrey could tell that John was enjoying himself. Others followed him back to the Tower—the exchequer and justiciar, William Marshal and the cardinal.

As John neared the Tower gate, he spotted Godfrey. A huge smile lit his face, and he opened his arms in greeting, walking to where Godfrey and Belvedere waited.

“Godfrey, my friend!” the king said, his voice carrying.

Godfrey and Belvedere stepped forward to receive the king's greeting. Belvedere kneeled, but Godfrey remained standing.

As he drew near, John noticed the scar on Godfrey's cheek. His smile faded. “Your face?”

Godfrey grinned as if the wound was nothing. “A hunting accident.”

John studied the scar critically for a second. “Call it dueling. The ladies will love you even more.”

Godfrey's laugh was genuine. “I bow to your knowledge of ladies, Sire!”

John laughed in turn, and Belvedere joined in.

The king walked on toward the castle, though not before glancing back at Belvedere and saying “You may get up now,” his voice tinged with amusement.

Belvedere stood. Godfrey, meanwhile, had turned his attention back to the stranger on the dock. He
knew him now. The archer from the forest in France. The scar on Godfrey's cheek burned. The man had known enough to recover Richard's crown and bring it to London. He might well recognize Godfrey as Robert Loxley's killer. He was a threat to everything Godfrey hoped to accomplish.

“He knows too much,” Godfrey said to Belvedere, still watching the man. “Get rid of him.”

Belvedere nodded, a small smile on his lips.

R
OBIN HELPED LEAD
King Richard's charger off the ship and then waited as Will, Allan, and Little John brought their mounts ashore as well. The time had come for them to leave London and make their way to Nottingham, and none too soon, as far as Robin was concerned. Their ruse had worked, and it seemed that no one would be putting them in the stocks or fitting nooses to their necks. Still, he'd had quite enough of pretending to be someone he wasn't.

As he and others started off the dock, though, he heard someone call to him. “Sir Robert.”

Robin halted, and cast a wary eye at the man approaching him. After a moment he recognized him as the knight who had stood with Eleanor when first Robin came off the ship. He was an older man, though he didn't appear to have conceded much to age. He was lean and tall, and he moved with the easy grace of a swordsman. His eyes were pale, and his mane of reddish gold hair was shot through with white.

“I am William Marshal,” the man said stopping in front of Robin. “The husband of Lady Isabel de Clare. You will know of me perhaps. Your father and I were young men together. He will remember.”

Robin knew of William Marshal. Who in England
hadn't heard tales of the famed knight's valor in battle and his exploits in the tournament ring? Of course, Robin knew nothing of the man's friendship with Loxley's father, and so he kept his mouth shut, and simply nodded, acknowledging what Marshal had told him.

“Tell him I will come to see him soon,” Marshal went on. “On Spring's first black night. I may have need of him …”

The knight stopped himself, smiling reflexively. Robin had the sense that he had been about to say more than he intended.

“I'll tell him,” Robin said.

He bowed his head to the man and moved on. He could feel Marshal watching him as he walked, and he wondered if the knight suspected that Robin wasn't who he claimed to be. Robin didn't look back.

I
t was late afternoon, and Marion sat with Sir Walter by the ruined arch at the entrance to Peper Harrow. Sir Walter enjoyed getting out, particularly at this time of day. He could no longer see the golden sunlight shining on the walls of his ancestral home and warming the surrounding fields, but he often told her that it remained his favorite time of day. It was Marion's as well, and she was glad to indulge his desire to sit outside as dusk approached. The air was growing chill with the sun's descent, and Marion retrieved the old man's brown woolen cloak from the cart. While there, she put on her own as well. Returning to Walter, she wrapped the cloak around his shoulders. The old man caught her hand in his own and gave it a small squeeze, favoring her with a grateful smile. She sat beside him, her face tipped toward the setting sun, savoring its warm caress. Walter inhaled deeply.

“My nose has learned something since my eyes
failed me,” he said. “So—mark this, Marion—here between the myrtle and the wild strawberry patch, make my funeral pyre. Strip the turf east-west a foot deep—”

“This is mere mischief,” Marion broke in, trying to make light of what the old man had said. “Frightening me with your funeral talk. I'll laugh at you when you're a hundred.” Despite her brave words, though, Marion felt an odd chill. Shivering, she pulled her wrap tighter around her shoulders.

Walter gave a small laugh, but when he spoke again, it was in the same dark vein. “Lay a platform of slow-burning hardwood, spaces between to make a good draft. Then, pine laid crosswise—the sap will heat body and bones to vapor and to ash, which I will have scattered—”

“Stop!” Marion said. She stood and turned away from him, huddling ever deeper within her cloak. “Is this a funeral for a good Christian gentleman?” She tried once more to turn this into a jest. “I'll tell on you as a pagan to Robert when he returns from his campaigns.”

“Robert is dead, Marion.”

She spun toward him, feeling the blood drain from her face. “Who says so?”

“Robert,” the old man said levelly. “He told me himself.”

“In a dream?” Marion demanded, her voice spiraling upward. She rarely allowed herself to grow angry with Walter. He had been so kind to her; he had cared for her as if she was his own daughter for all the years Robert had been away. But this was too much! Frightening her so with his superstitions and foolish pronouncements.

Sir Walter shook his head slowly. “No. A visitation in my sleep. I've lived long enough to know the difference.”

“Well, he didn't tell me!” Marion could hear the petulance in her own voice, but she couldn't help herself. Her entire body trembled and her stomach felt hollow and tight.

Walter reached out a hand, searching for hers. Reluctantly, she grasped it.

“I'm so sorry, Marion. I brought you here to know what I know. Your husband is not coming home.”

He pulled her close to him and embraced her. Marion resisted, not yet ready to credit what he was telling her; not yet ready to give in to the grief that threatened to overwhelm her.

“And this is why you thought to instruct me about your last resting place?” she asked in a softer voice. “Because your son will not be here to be instructed?”

Walter swallowed, then nodded. His dead eyes brimmed with tears.

Marion bent and kissed his forehead. “Then I grieve for you. But do not grieve for me yet. I also know what I know. Sir Robert Loxley will ride out of Peper Harrow once again and through the streets of Nottingham with me at his side. May the forest gods grant me that, or I swear, I'll go and live in the greenwood if they will have me.”

Sir Walter pulled her close again, and this time she returned the old man's embrace.

Come home to me, Robert,
she pleaded silently.
Come home to this man who loves you so.

* * *

R
OBIN AND HIS
companions rode at a leisurely pace through the rolling hills of the English countryside, the fields and farmlands bathed in the deepening glow of the late day sun. The road they followed skirted the edge of a grand and ancient forest, its shadows darkening by the moment. The air was still, and a thrush sang from within the wood.