Lady Thief: A Scarlet Novel (21 page)

One of us were shaking, and I didn’t know who, but it didn’t matter. If one person shook, the other’s body took it in.

“And then the wind rose, and the sand rose with it. They continued to come at us. We were blind, and more than that, the ease was gone. I couldn’t see who was right in front of my face, much less what they wore.”

His body leaned tighter against mine, careful not to lean on my arm.

“I can’t take this back, Scarlet, once I’ve told you,” he breathed.

“You won’t have to, Rob.” I stroked his head, his neck, his rough cheek.

“The sand cleared,” he said, “as quick as it had come. And at my feet were three men I’d fought beside for months. Three men I knew. One was even younger than I was. And I had killed them. You all think I’m so noble and goddamn righteous, but I don’t even know who the enemy is. I don’t know who the enemy is if not the demon that’s within me.
Those men, the hostage children I was made to kill—Scar, they haunt me. They haunt my nights and they remind me daily that even if by some miracle I can win this, I should never be sheriff. I know the weak and evil parts of myself too well.”

It were him what were trembling, and I tugged on his shoulder until he drew up, guiding him to the bed and making him lie in it. He were sweating hard, and I feared for a fever. I stroked his hair back as it slicked over with sweat. He were staring at me, waiting for what I would say.

Slow, I shook my head. “That isn’t evil, Rob. That isn’t weak. It’s horrible and unfair. But it’s not your fault.” He tried to pull away from me but I stroked his cheek. “There is so much more in your heart than your ghosts,” I told him. “And in mine too. I don’t care how many sleepless nights it takes. I don’t care for bruises or fire. I won’t let them take your soul.”

He gave me a tiny hint of a smile and it felt like sunlight breaking on me. “I don’t know if you have much of a say over it.”

“You gave your heart into my keeping, Rob, and I protect what’s mine. Because I know what is in there true, and it has naught to do with demons.” I bent down, coming closer to his face and letting our lips bare touch. His hand ran into my hair and he pulled me closer for a proper kiss. I felt him breathe deeper, slower, into me, calming, our souls rushing out to meet.

I broke off, then ducked again for one more touch. “They can’t have you,” I whispered to him. “You’re mine.” I kissed the corner of his mouth. “And I look at Gisbourne and he don’t know he’s weak. The prince don’t know he’s cruel. But you know your most dangerous parts and you act like a hero anyway. That’s what will make you a wonderful sheriff, Rob.” I stroked his face. “But if you ever wanted to run, I would run with you. This will be brutal and punishing, Rob, and if you ever think you can’t fight in true, I will run with you in a breath.”

“I can’t run,” he said. “But I fear I can’t win, either.”

The guards outside spoke to someone, and I sat up straight as the healer came in. He came with a tray of jars and knives, and my lip curled. The monks disliked the practice because of its weakening effects, but I forgot how common it were for these noble healers.

“No,” I said as he crossed the threshold. “No bloodletting.”

The man’s mouth dropped. “My—my lady, his humours must be brought into balance.”

“Poultices, tinctures are fine. No bloodletting.”

Rob squeezed my hand tight.

The healer’s chest puffed. “With respect, my lady, his Grace instructed me to bring the young man to full health.”

“You bring a knife near his skin and I will have it at your throat,” I snapped.

He went red and started sputtering, but Rob managed a weak chuckle. “Please, my lord, denying her wishes would be much more hazardous to my health.”

“If the lady would remove herself,” the healer said, “I must examine his lordship.”

“I’m no lord,” Rob said. “And I would like you to look at her hand first.”

The man’s eyebrows what were thicker than the feathers of a ruffled chicken rose up, but he didn’t say anything as I drew the hand slow out of the sling. He unwrapped the wet bandages careful, and when he were done he looked at my face in a way full different than he had before.

He handed me the pain tincture. “Several drops of this should help, my lady,” he said grave.

I shook my head, but Rob sat up, sliding one arm around my waist and taking a dropper full with the other hand. He held it up and I opened my mouth as he tapped it in. I shut my eyes against the taste and turned full against him as the healer put a salve to the wounds that looked sick already.

It were so raw and sore that his touches hurt more than the cut what did it. To my horror I started to sob, but Rob held me tight, squeezed against him.

When it were done, I were shaking violently and Rob held me, kissing my cheek and temple and hair. “Go on,” he said after a moment. “Rest. You need it.”

“I’ll come back,” I promised him.

He nodded, kissing my cheek once more.

Careful to walk proper out of the room so Rob wouldn’t worry, I near collapsed outside the door, and one of the guards caught me in his arms. “My lady,” he said. “His Grace asked me to see you back to your chambers.”

I nodded, fair grateful. It seemed miles back to my room. We started walking and I were more grateful for the earl’s care when I fainted dead in the hall.

When I woke, it were to a soft, metal noise and the cracking of fire. I were in the bed I didn’t like, and my whole body felt like a sack of flour. I struggled to sit up in the bed; the day-old dress had been taken off me and I was just in the long, loose gown, deep under blankets and warm.

Gisbourne were near the fire, and I could see the glint of steel as his whetstone passed over the sword, sharpening the blade careful and slow.

“Do you care to tell me where you were this afternoon?” he asked, not turning to me.

“A healer checked my hand.” Which did feel much duller, now.

“The earl’s healer.”

“Yes.”

“And how did you come by that?”

I sighed. “I reckon you know just where I were, Gisbourne.”

The whetstone stopped. “Yes.”

Pushing from the bed were awkward with one hand, but I struggled free of it and went for the other chair by the fire. “Did you win the melee?”

He tossed his sword down so it clattered loud. It were
meant to intimidate me, I think, but I were far beyond such. “Does this marriage mean nothing to you, Marian?”

I frowned at him. “Of course it doesn’t. You knew that from the first.”

“Then why come here at all?” he growled.

“Did you hit your head?” I demanded. “The annulment. All I’ve ever wanted were the annulment.”

“And to make a
fool
of me!” he roared, throwing himself back in the chair.

“I never lied about what and who I am. You knew that. You brought me here. If I make you a fool, it ain’t my fault.” I tucked my legs up, cold and simmering with anger. “Fool indeed. But what the hell is wrong with you, that you defy the prince to protect me in one moment—what, so your
honor
remains intact?—and then help him cut off my damn fingers the next?”

He stood, scooping up the sword and slamming it into its scabbard and throwing it on the bed. “Because there is one line I won’t cross—and that’s the whole reason I agreed to this exercise in idiocy to start with. You think you were my first choice, Marian? You think I was desperate to marry Leaford’s younger, uppity daughter? With an unmarried, beautiful older sister hanging about?”

This stole my breath. “You wanted Joanna?”

“
Wanted?
No. Hell no. But why would I take you over her, hmm? She was stunning, graceful, sweet—she would have bent very well to my hand. So why you?”

My lip curled at the thought of him raising a hand to Joanna. “You never wanted either of us from the start. You wanted Isabel. It’s obvious every time you look at her, Gisbourne—”

“Use my given name!” he screamed. He stepped over to me, catching my throat, but not squeezing, not hurting me. “Say it,” he said. “Say my given name. You are my wife, Marian. Use my given name.”

With unblinking eyes, I stared at him. I had lost fingers to his master; his threats seemed hollow and idle now.

He shook his head with a sad, helpless laugh. His hand left my throat to catch my cheek, looking at the fading bruises there. His rough, calloused thumb ran over the cut by my lip. “You won’t, will you? I can beg you and break you and you won’t do a damn thing I ask.”

It seemed wise not to answer that.

His thumb went to the scar, testing it, feeling its depth and the odd jumble of skin and scar under the surface. “You are the most unnatural, vexing woman, Marian.” He tilted my chin farther up. “You didn’t scream once last night.”

“I told you,” I said quiet. “I’m not afraid of your pain. Or his.”

His thumb ran over my mouth, and I went tense. “I am,” he admitted. “But it’s his bribes that are so much darker and alluring.”

“Is that why you married me, Gisbourne?” I asked. “He bribed you?”

He nodded, and my breath left me.

“Why?” I asked. “Why would he ever? How would he know of me at all?”

His hand left my face. “You’re like a wild horse, Marian. Utterly untamable, unassailably noble. No—not a horse.” He chuckled and looked at me. “A
lion
,” he said. “And you are the fool in truth if you don’t know what that means. Why it is the one thing that means the prince can’t kill you and the one reason he will always want to. Why you are dangerous to him.”

“Eleanor said he can’t kill me because he has royal blood. Godly blood.”

His grin was wicked and dark. “I can’t kill you, Marian, and I have no royal blood. Hell, I barely count as noble. But to kill you would be to defy God himself—not to mention Eleanor.”

“I don’t understand.”

He laughed, and I stood.

“Tell me! I don’t know what you’re talking about!” My voice raised dangerous close to a shriek.

He began stripping off his clothing, not answering me.

“Gisbourne!” I yelled again.

“Your parents have come to the castle,” he said after a moment, stripping off his tunic. “They expect an audience with you tomorrow morning.”

“My …” I dropped into the chair. My parents. I had been so long gone from them it seemed easy not to think of them at
all. A thousand thoughts twisted through my mind. Did they hate me? Were it all forgotten and forgiven now I had done what they first asked? How would I explain leaving them at the first?

Christ, how would I explain Joanna?

He chuckled. “I thought that might shut you up.”

When I woke up, Gisbourne were sleeping and there were early, gray sun in the room. I called for Mary and when she set about pulling fabric round the bandaged hand, she stopped but didn’t say nothing. Gisbourne grunted and sat up in bed, watching me and yelling for Eadric.

My head were running fast, thinking on my parents. What would I say? How could I possibly say anything? What if my parents wanted to know—anything. Everything.

“You’re quiet,” Gisbourne said.

How much time had passed? I weren’t sure. He were dressed. I realized Mary weren’t flitting about, and I were dressed too. “Thinking,” I said.

He went to his coffers, shuffling through until he found something. It were a long, black-sheathed boot knife. He drew it half out and showed me a wicked-looking blade. He pushed
it back in the sheath and tossed it to me. I caught it and looked at it; I couldn’t even draw it out of the sheath the way my hand were bandaged, so I just stared at him.

“Does that help?” he said.

Silent, I nodded slow.

He nodded once, sharp. “Good.”

And then he left.

I wedged it into the edge of my kirtle in the back, hoping it would hold snug enough that I could pull just the blade with one hand. Not that I expected to draw a knife on my parents; having it near me, a reminder of who I really were, helped in true.

It were strange both that Gisbourne knew it and allowed it.

I went out behind him, starting for my parents’ chamber. Sucking in a breath, I changed my mind.

I went to Rob’s room, and the guards let me in without a word or a harsh look. He were awake, lying in bed, and he half sat up, looking at me.

“Scarlet,” he murmured.

I came forward without a word, tucking myself into the bed beside him. I laid on his chest and shut my eyes, trying to wish the world away. His heartbeat were leaping out at me, beating into my skin till my heart beat back, matching the tune.

“I slept,” he marveled to me. His lips touched my forehead. “All night, as far as I know.”

I pressed my face to his chest and let my eyes close. “The sword fights are today,” I said. “Individual matches.”

His neck bobbed a bit as I felt him nod. “And I’ll fight,” he told me soft. “There’s no running.” His hand dragged along my back. “Or, rather, I could always run—but I want to fight for you more than I want to run.”

Inching up, I raised my face to kiss him. I shut my eyes into it, trying to forget what would happen today, for him and me both. “Just lose in the sword, Rob,” I told him. “You don’t need the prizes or the money. You only need to win the archery for sheriff. Anything more ain’t worth the bruises, the punishment.”