The Last Arrow RH3 (50 page)

As welcome a sight as it was—food and ale after so many hours trekking over uncertain footing in the darkness—it was not the sylvan, cathedrallike setting of their surroundings, or the steaming cauldrons of aromatic food, or even the thought of finally lying down and resting his weary bones that made Robin stop dead in the middle of the broad common.

Brenna, nearly asleep on her feet, stumbled to a halt beside him and followed his frozen stare. Richard and Dag, close again behind, stopped on the other side and looked instantly for some treachery arranged for their welcome.

There was no treachery, however. What brought Robin to a dead, breathless stop was the sight of a slender, plainly dressed woman standing as still as a statue at the wide base of the Major Oak. His eyes, as sleep-deprived eyes will do, had passed over her in the first sweeping appraisal of the ravine, but something had drawn his gaze back.

Something had made him hold his breath and brace himself through the thunderous, pounding beats of his heart.

The girl was as pale as candlewax, her face surrounded by a glossy chestnut mane of curls that fell in soft profusion around her shoulders and halfway down her back. Her eyes were impossibly large and dark and round in a face blessed by the angels with such sweet beauty, even Richard and Dag found themselves holding their breaths and growing warm.

"Saints preserve us," murmured Littlejohn. " 'Tis the little maid. 'Tis the maid Marienne."

Robin drew more than one startled look from brothers and ;a sister who had never seen him look so utterly, helplessly defenseless against the rush of emotions that flooded him. His hands hung limply by his sides. His chest labored to catch and hold a breath. His cheeks flushed every shade of red from pink to crimson, the color ebbing and flowing like tides gone mad.

"Marienne," he whispered.

She was obviously unable to respond or to move other than to sway slightly, side to side, in disbelief, and it was left to Robin, on legs hardly more steady, to walk across the remaining thirty feet and stop a body length away from touching her.

"Marienne? Is it really you?"

Though she still had not moved so much as a fingertip, her soft doe's eyes had become flooded with tears, making her lashes so heavy, they drifted shut at the sound of his voice. So absolutely still and pale had she become, and so piously plain the linen of her tunic, that for one terrible instant, Robin feared he was too late. He feared she had grown tired of waiting and resigned herself to taking her vows.

But then the smallest tremor of a smile spread across her mouth and when she opened her eyes again, they were brimming with such joy, he felt the effects of it wash over him like a warm wave of nectar.

"You are ... well, my lady?"

She lowered her eyes again and managed a timid nod. "And you ... my lord?"

"Better now that I have seen you. And ... your mistress?"

"She is well also. Perfectly well," she emphasized, raising her downcast eyes again. "It was almost as if ... she felt your presence for she bade me come here just yesterday."

Robin swallowed hard but could not dislodge the lump in his throat. "The child?"

"He is here, with me. He is ... off hunting for berries ... or acorns ... or ..." Her voice faltered to a whisper and a shimmer of fresh tears welled along her lashes. "Robin. Robin ... you came ..."

"We made a promise, you and I," he said, drawing closer, his voice shaking with emotion. "Did you doubt I would keep my part?"

"It was so long ago ... I thought you might have changed your mind. I thought you might have found someone else, someone beautiful and wealthy and ..."

He raised shaking hands and cupped her face, forcing her to look up and see the emotion burning in his eyes. "You are the most beautiful creature on this earth, Marienne FitzWilliam. As for wealth, if there was but you and I in this world and naught but a wooden cup between us, I would not dare ask God for more happiness."

With the strength of his love shattering every accepted social convention that separated the nobility from the base-born, the most honored and celebrated champion in all Europe stunned the gathered assembly by dropping humbly down on one knee before her. He took her ice-cold hands into his, pressing them first to his forehead, then to his lips, holding them there long enough for her fingers to warm under his breath as he repeated the pledge, word for whispered word, that they had made to each other in the midnight shadows of Kirklees so many long years ago.

When he had finished, he pressed a kiss into the palm of each small hand then held his breath and waited—not long, for she sank down onto her knees before him, crumpling in a pool of spread linen and tremulous sobs that could not be stopped, not even when he gathered her into his arms and held her tight against him.

"That was the promise we made, was it not?"

She nodded, her face buried in his neck.

"Then you hold the fate of my heart and my life in your hands, my lady, for I would have your answer now, before I draw another breath."

"Yes," she whispered. "Oh, yes ..."

Smiling, almost giddy with emotion, he bent his head and, uncaring of the dozens of eyes gawping at them, he kissed her.

The kiss was long enough and passionate enough to stir the outlaws into clapping and hooting. Even the brothers Wardieu, who had never seen their older sibling bestow more than a chaste kiss of peace on the cheek of a woman, put their hands together and grinned ear to ear. Brenna, watching from the common, felt someone beside her and looked up to find Griffyn observing the reunited lovers with something akin to amusement playing about his lips.

"So," he murmured. "He does have his human failings after all."

"Do not even think to mock him," she warned tautly.

"Mock him?" He glanced down at her in surprise. "My lady, I do not mock him. I am merely glad to welcome him to the fold. Indeed, I am even tempted to join him in giving these louts something to buzz about the rest of the day."

He said this while staring at the ripe fullness of her lips, and Brenna, acutely aware of his penchant for accepting challenges, refrained from having them say "You would not dare." But only just.

He laughed anyway, for the words were in her eyes, plain as ink on parchment, and despite the precautionary step she took away from him, his arm came out and his hand slipped around her waist. He drew her to his side and held her there long enough and with enough familiarity for Will, who was closest, to notice and send a bristling frown in their direction.

She managed to extricate herself just as Robin brought Marienne across the common to make formal introductions.

"These are the upstarts I have told you about in my letters," he said as he presented Richard—who bowed gallantly over Marienne's small hand—and Dagobert, who was still grinning like a mad fool in Bedlam.

"Allow me to be the first to truly congratulate you," the latter said, "for we have never seen Robin brought to his knees before, nor blush half so bright a shade of red as to rival Will'um's scarlet hair."

Robin smote him good-naturedly on the shoulder and did indeed turn a most glorious shade of vermilion as he turned to Brenna.

"Our sister Brenna. Bren ... my Marienne."

Up close, Marienne's sweet oval face fairly radiated her happiness, and it was contagious. She started to offer a curtsy, as was expected from someone of lesser birth, but Brenna stopped her and put her arms around the young woman's shoulders, bestowing a warm, sisterly hug.

"We have heard so much about you, I already feel as if you are a part of the family."

"Which she has just agreed to become," Robin announced proudly. "As soon as we can find a priest to marry us."

Brenna laughed and hugged her again, then hugged Robin until he begged for mercy. Geoffrey, Will, and Griffyn added their congratulations in a moderately less boisterous fashion, and then there was only Jean de Brevant, standing apart from the others, a pillar of muscle and brawn that wilted down on his knees when the dark-eyed Marienne smiled in his direction.

"Petit Jean," she whispered. "How truly good it is to see you again."

"You look well, Little One. The last time I saw you, you were but a child, so thin and gaunt and worried, I felt sure your face would never catch up to the size of your eyes. But now ... look at you. A beautiful young woman. I could not be more proud if you were my own daughter."

Marienne stifled another sob behind trembling fingers and, following Brenna's example, cast propriety to the wind and hugged the huge captain of the guard so hard he turned nearly as dark a mottlement of red as Robin. He stood to cover his embarrassment and yielded his place to Alan a' Dale, who had been watching the proceedings with frank astonishment.

"My lady ... you are acquainted with these knights?"

"Happily so," she said, slipping her hand into Robin's as he came up beside her.

"Does this mean you will accept my future wife's word as a bond against our character and our intentions?" Robin asked.

The forester read the happiness on Marienne's face and allowed a rueful smile to soften his features. "If I doubted Lady Marienne's word, I would have to doubt my own."

He extended his hand in a tentative gesture of apology and Robin took it immediately, clasping it with a firmness that roused another cheer among the men and women gathered around the base of the Major Oak.

"I would say this calls for a toast," Alan declared. He indicated the tables, laden with food and drink, where impatient foresters were already beginning to pick and pilfer. He took his seat near the middle, inviting Robin and Marienne to sit close by, then called for one of the men to fetch a large cask from the stores.

"Wine from the Aquitaine, my lord," he explained, laughing as the bung was unstoppered and the contents spouted forth in a rich red stream. "The very best intended for Nottingham's cellars."

"Only the best should be used," Robin agreed, "to toast newfound friendships and future alliances, but I would ask one favor first."

Alan sobered slightly and called for a hush amongst his men. "A favor, my lord?"

"Aye." Robin nodded grimly. "That we be treated with equal measure while we are guests in your greenwood. That there be no lords or knaves or lackeys or villeins to distinguish us one from the other." He paused and grinned at the startled looks on his brother's faces. "That I am called Robin and my brothers are Richard and Dag and Geoffrey.

That Littlejohn is ... well, Littlejohn and Will... may be Will Scarlett by the fire of his hair." The outlaws laughed and thumped Will genially on the shoulders, bringing a smile and flush to his cheeks. "As for that black-haired devil at the end, you will have to check beneath his hood upon waking each morning to see what name he prefers to go by that day, but for the time being, we shall keep it Griffyn for ease."

Another laugh dispelled some of the tension that seemed to be an instinctive response to the pale, other-worldly gaze as Griffyn raised his cup and saluted Robin's humor.

Even Brenna found herself smiling, completely at ease with his outrageously handsome features for the first time since stumbling across the half-naked satyr she had found in the woods outside Amboise.

Brenna ate until her belly ached, and drank a tasty forest brew until her head spun and the treetops threatened to change places with the forest floor. She had no memory of leaving the table, but when she wakened several hours later, she knew she would not soon forget the bludgeoning boots that were dancing around on the inside of her skull.

"Here," Griffyn said, handing her a cup of diluted wine and water. "Drink this. It will help."

"God love me," she gasped. "What was I drinking before?"

"A rather potent concoction they ferment from juniper berries. According to Alan a' Dale, you should have another healthy dollop of it to clear your head, but, judging by the color of your skin—or lack of it—I warrant another dollop might do you permanent damage."

"Are you saying ... I was intoxicated?"

"Quite splendidly so. You even insisted, as my wife, that we should be given our own hut with our own bed instead of having to share lodgings with 'forty farting foresters.' "

Brenna cast about her in horror. The hut she was in was made of bound staves and thatch, no bigger than the width of the rush-filled mattress, but obviously designed for privacy.

"I did not really say that, did I?" she squenked.

He smiled. And watched a spray of freckles rise dark against the paleness of her skin before he said, "No. You were quite beyond saying anything when we were shown to our accommodations. It was just assumed we might not enjoy an abundance of company."

Brenna groaned and squeezed her temples. He laughed softly and moved around behind her, sitting so that she was positioned between his knees. He loosened her braid enough to enable his fingers to stroke the back of her scalp, to knead away the tension and knots across her shoulders and down her neck.

"Relax," he commanded. "As soon as the blood is flowing properly again, you will feel better. You will have to look a lot better too, since your brother and I have arranged for you to give these wolfheads a demonstration on the longbow."