Robin: Lady of Legend (The Classic Adventures of the Girl Who Became Robin Hood) (6 page)

John looked at her askance. “You must have led a very sheltered life, if you do not know enough to avoid the Sheriff’s foresters when you can. They like to accuse people of poaching and then take their purses in exchange for not cutting off their ears or hauling them before the courts.”

Robin grimaced. She hated corruption more than anything. “Surely we can just avoid them?”

“They will have heard you ranting,” John said, resettling his grip on his staff. “Avoiding them now would make it seem as though we have something to hide. If they think we are outlaws, they might decide to shoot us first and check for warrants later.”

“What should we do, then?”

“What we would normally do—keep walking. If we are lucky, they will not bother us.”

Such a blessing was not destined to be theirs, however—the voices kept growing stronger. Within minutes of the pair’s casual ambling, the shrubbery ahead of them began to tremble and quake; with a loud snap its limbs parted, and five foresters stepped into view, looking unlike any woodwards Robin had ever seen.

Rather than wearing the brown-green garments most foresters preferred, these men were attired in deep purple livery. Each man flaunted a purple tunic and hose, along with black leather boots and a belt. A black leather quiver hung from their backs, and in addition to the bow they bore, each man wore a broadsword strapped to his waist.

Their leader moved to block the path, raking Robin and John as he did so with a contemptuous stare. He looked familiar, somehow, but Robin was certain she had never seen him before. His top lip curled up in a sneer. “Well, well, what have we here? A scion and a burly giant . . . who went and brought back David and Goliath from the Crusades?” he mocked.

“Good day to you, too,” John offered pleasantly, leaning against his staff.

“What is your business traveling through the Sherwood?” the man asked, ignoring John’s implied rebuke. He cast an eye at Robin’s quiver and the bow clenched in her hand. “Hunting?”

“Hardly,” Robin said. “We go to fair.”

“The Radford fair? A green lad like you with no more marrow to his bones than a starving child—planning to compete? That is rich,” the forester hooted. His companions, taking their cue from him, laughed as well. Robin felt her face grow hot.

“I
was
planning to compete, but if it is true that a town’s best archers are its foresters, then maybe I should not bother. I could beat any of you. But perhaps that is why the Sheriff made you foresters—he need not fear you killing any of the King’s deer except by accident.”

Anger flashed in the man’s eyes. “Mighty words for one so young. Can you prove them?”

“I can.”

“Then defend your boast. There is a herd of deer at the end of this glade. Twenty marks say you cannot hit a hart from 300 paces, let alone kill it.

“Done!” Robin cried, reaching confidently for an arrow. Her arm was arrested midair. It was the first time John had ever touched her, and she froze in surprise. His hand was large and coarse, and very strong—she could no more reach for an arrow now than she could fell an oak with a sneeze.

“Do not tease the youth,” John commanded. “If he shot a deer, you would pay him back with your steel blades, not with marks. If you want to challenge someone, challenge me.” He gripped his staff in warning. Robin got the impression that not many people cared to challenge John.

The forester stared at him, incredulous. “Do you know who I am?” he demanded. “I am the Sheriff of Nottingham’s nephew! One word from me and the two of you would be strung up from the nearest tree, whether you had shot a deer or not.”

“Oh, you are his
nephew!
” Robin gasped imprudently, as if struck by a sudden revelation. “Well, that explains your bad manners, then; I suppose you cannot help your bad looks.”

The yeoman gargled in fury, and his hand seized the hilt of his sword. A look of cunning stole over his face. “My uncle has charged me with protecting the King’s deer from poachers, and ensuring that the King’s people obey his law. You do not look like good law-abiding citizens to me,” he hissed. “Doubtless, you have forgotten to pay your taxes. We will have them from you now.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Robin saw John Little tighten his grip on his cudgel, his knuckles gleaming white. Surreptitiously, she wiped her free hand on her tunic. Her fingers itched for her quiver; the sword at her hip hung forgotten.

“You are welcome to collect, if you can,” John said with a grim smile.

The other foresters stepped up next to their leader. Altogether, there were five of them, to her two.
Good odds
, Robin thought recklessly.

The leader feinted with his sword, and John clouted him on the shoulder with his staff. Another came in from the side, and he pummeled him in the ribs. Robin saw a third man attempting to string his bow, and she struck him hard across the face with her own; John finished him off with a crack to the crown.

The fourth and fifth foresters attacked simultaneously, their swords biting deeply into John’s cudgel. As he attempted to shrug them off and free his weapon, Robin saw the Sheriff’s nephew rise up behind him, his sword held aloft to deliver the killing blow.

It was over in a second. With a drowning gurgle, the purple-liveried man sank to his knees, Robin’s arrow quivering through his heart.

When the others saw what had happened to their leader, those who were able to dropped their weapons and fled, leaving their fallen comrades behind. John Little stood up slowly from his defensive crouch, his gaze taking in the murdered man and Robin’s shocked expression.

“Robin?”

Without a word, she turned and fled, tripping over roots and rocks in her haste to get away.

“Robin!”

John Little’s voice faded into the distance as her feet pounded the dirt. Robin ran desperately, barely noticing the tree branches that whipped at her arms and face, leaving long red streaks where they struck. She was filled with a terrible anguish—the knowledge that she had killed a man who probably did not deserve to die, and whom she had provoked to his death through intransigent pride.

Panic and shame bore her deep into the forest, until her legs gave out beneath her and she tumbled to the base of a massive oak. Curling into a trembling ball, Robin allowed dark oblivion to claim her.

CHAPTER 5

A REFUGE

TIME PASSED SLOWLY for Robin. For several days she adhered to her refuge, leaving it only when hunger and thirst compelled her to. Though the overripe berries she found made her ill, she could not bear the thought of trying to hunt; her bow and sword lay where she had cast them after waking up a murderer.

She had killed in defense—logically, she knew that. But logic could not keep her from vividly recalling the sensation of her arrow slipping through her fingers, nor the forester’s soft gasp as her shaft pierced his lungs, nor the way his eyes rolled up in his head and the blood trickled from his mouth as he died.

The memory choked Robin, drowning her in merciless recollection. She felt as though a large claw had seized at her insides and was tearing her to pieces, rending her with agony until she could only retch.

She endured like this for several days, her body foraging mechanically for just enough food to keep her alive, while her mind remained locked in endless replay.

Eventually, Robin’s spirit began to rebel against her depression, and one morning she awoke to the realization that her stomach was hollow, her limbs had grown lean, and the dead were dead and if she did not get something substantial to eat soon, she would be too.

Slowly, Robin got to her feet. She had been lying against the trunk of a giant tree, her body cushioned by a bed of moss; thick and soft, the dark green rug gradually thinned away into stunted grasses the farther it grew from the tree.

Robin looked up. A resplendent English Oak towered above her, its trunk so broad that eight men would have failed to circle it with their arms. Massive branches, twisted and gnarled with age, shot out from low on the bole. These rugged boughs supported a broad crown that stretched across the sky like a chandelier.

There was little else in the clearing—for she was in a clearing, Robin saw—save for some hardy grasses; little else could survive in the halo of shade cast by the mighty oak.

The clearing itself was vast, with its nearest edge at least a hundred paces away from where Robin was standing. Birches and pines rimmed the glade on three sides; a low wall of rock bordered the fourth.

A small path of crushed grass traced its way from Robin’s feet towards that wall. She did not remember making such a trail, but there was much that Robin did not remember about the last few despondent days. Obviously, she must have traipsed that way several times in order to have created such an imprint. Unable to remember why and curious to find out, Robin followed it.

The rock wall where the trail ended proved to be the top of a granite cliff, whose mild decline led to the verge of a winding, azure stream. The sight of the watercourse below made Robin dizzy, and she realized just how thirsty she was. Instinctively, she began to clamber down the speckled boulders and thick slabs of rock, as indeed she must have done many times over the last few days, touching the stones for balance with fingers that trembled.

At last, her feet touched down on silty soil, and Robin sank to her knees, folding her hands into a leaky cup and drinking deeply from the stream. The thin water cooled the hot thickness of her tongue and helped assuage her empty stomach. Tossing back her head, Robin poured the clear, cool water over her face, letting it trickle across her cheeks and into her hair like tears.

“God, my God, have mercy on me. I am truly sorry, forgive me,” she whispered.

Several minutes passed, during which time Robin stared unseeing at the bank across the stream. Finally, she shook her head hard and forced her weary mind to consider her predicament.

By now, the foresters who had survived the fight would have borne their tale to the nearest village, and from there word would have spread to watch for the hooded lad who had killed Sheriff Darniel’s nephew. Disguised as she was, Robin would not get very far down the road toward London Town before the Sheriff’s soldiers would surely halt her for questioning. Their methods of inquiry were rarely gentle, and her true identity would be quickly discovered. Most likely she would simply be returned home to marry Darniel, but the soldiers might decide to ask the foresters if they could identify her; if they did, she would be hanged for murder.

Taking off her hood and resuming her normal appearance was hardly an option, either. Assuming that Robin could find a peasant willing to trade her tunic for a dress, Lord Locksley was sure by now to have men searching everywhere for his tall, blue-eyed, blonde daughter—he might even have posted a reward for her safe return! No one would think twice about returning an errant young lady to her father, especially if gold was involved. She would be dragged back home to marry the Sheriff or dragged off to the gallows as soon as she left the forest, depending on her attire. Neither option held much appeal.

I could just stay here
, Robin thought, gazing up at the rocks that hid the glade from view.
The soldiers will cease to hunt me after a while, and my father in time will give up his search; then I can continue on to London Town as I had originally planned. Until then, I can live here. There is water, and I am well able to hunt for food. As for shelter, there is plenty of wood, and time enough yet to construct one before the rains start in earnest. I can survive.

Filled with determination, Robin began the climb back up the cliff.

Her weapons lay where she had left them, a few cubits away from the base of the oak. For a moment, Robin just stared at them, a farrago of emotion warring within her. At last she picked up her bow stave, running her hands over it to warm it up.

She did not have the strength to hunt far, so Robin found a nearby tree to perch in and waited for something to wander by. She waited until the sun was beginning to set. Just as she was about to give up the hope of any dinner, a roe pricket poked its nose out of a bush. Robin’s trembling muscles caused her to miss her first shot, but she gritted her teeth and got in a swift, second shot just before the frightened deer could bound out of range.

The deer she had managed to take down was small—perhaps thirty pounds—but it was more than enough meat for one person. The delight of knowing she would soon have a full belly was tainted, however, by the memory of John’s warning against killing the King’s deer.

“As a noble and a cousin to the King, I have the right to hunt in this forest,” Robin reasoned defensively, startling herself with the sound of her own voice. She fell silent, but her thoughts continued:

But I am not just a noble anymore, am I? I am an outlaw, and as an outlaw, I have no rights. Not even the right to food, for though beggars may plead for a pittance or scrap, even that is barred to me now. It seems, then, that for me to survive, as a consequence of having committed one crime, I must now commit another!

This terrible irony weighed down on Robin, and it took nearly all of her strength to lift her sword and hew off a slab of the roe’s rump, and then carry it back to the clearing.

It took her longer than usual to start a fire, but soon the smell of roasting venison was permeating the air, lifting Robin’s spirits more than she would have thought possible. Later, as she tore the half-cooked meat from its skewer and consumed it ravenously, the warm flesh did much to soothe the ache in her chest.

If I am to stay here
, Robin decided that night as she lay upon her bed of moss, watching the stars glister through the branches of the oak,
I must be able to defend myself—and to do so assuredly, so I will not panic and kill someone again
.

Her aim with the bow was good; she would make it perfect. The sword that Will had given her glistened in the moonlight. She would teach herself to use it. Never again would she be helpless in the face of an attack. Never again would she kill someone when she could disarm or disable. Never again.