The Last Arrow RH3 (54 page)

In the outlaw's camp, less than five miles away, the foresters were also making last-minute preparations to leave.

Runners had already been dispatched to watch the road, but because of the size of the escort and the distance they had to travel before they cleared Sherwood, it was not supposed Gisbourne's troop would reach the Witch's Teats before noon. It would give Alan a' Dale's archers plenty of time to shake out their nerves, although they had delayed their own departure long enough to avoid giving them too much time to ponder the risks.

Brenna and Will had worked all the previous day with the archers who showed the most skill with the longbows.

They would be positioned atop the crests of either hill, while the vast majority of bowmen would be situated halfway down, at a distance that promised devastating results even with their less powerful weapons. Fletchers had worked day and night to make arrows, and there were

impressive bundles of steel-tipped shafts waiting to fill the quivers. The knights from Amboise were fully armored for battle and moved with quiet intensity among the horses, checking girths and straps for any sign of weakness.

They were not overly worried about the foot soldiers; it was the company of knights—forty against seven—that was cause for concern, and they were counting heavily on Will and Brenna and their small team of elite archers to cut the odds to more comfortable numbers.

"Have you seen Griffyn?" Brenna asked, coming up behind Robin.

"Not since last night." He paused and straightened from tightening the buckles on Sir Tristan's croupiere. "Was he not with you?"

She supposed she should have had the humility to blush, but there was simply no time for it now and her breath puffed white in the mist as she turned and glanced at the activity taking place around them. "No. And his horse is gone."

"What do you mean gone?" He twisted around, frowning, and took a quick head and beast count. The outlaws had a dozen or so animals of their own, palfreys mainly, that they had dressed with bits of confiscated barding and accou-trement. The men themselves were wearing pilfered coats of mail, tunics, and carrying knightly arms to make it seem as if their force of mounted fighters were more formidable than it was. Littlejohn and Geoffrey LaFer had worked as hard with them as Brenna and Will had worked with the archers, and Robin saw them moving among their proteges now patting backs and giving words of encouragement for a sword well buckled and a shield impressively painted to resemble real coats of arms. But there was no sign of the big gray destrier caparisoned in hunting green and gold. No sign of his master either.

"I mean ... gone," she said quietly.

The violet eyes were waiting for him when he finished his count and he could see that she was angry. Very angry.

On a day when any emotion that might distract her or put a tremor in her hand could jeopardize the entire venture.

"Perhaps ... perhaps he rode on ahead with some of the others to check the road."

"I have asked everyone. No one has seen him since late last night."

Robin abandoned the girth and turned to face her. "Perhaps," she said with quiet intensity, "he realized there was no profit in risking his life for such an ignoble

cause. Perhaps he has had all the adventure and recklessness he cared to enjoy."

"You do not really believe that, do you?"

She looked off into the trees, obviously too hurt to put her emotions into words. "His horse is gone. His squire is gone. The two bulging sacks of coin he so generously donated to the outlaws' coffers ... they are gone as well. What would you have me believe?"

"Bren..."

She shook her head. "No. I should have known better. We all should have known better."

She turned and went back to where her archers were waiting. They were leaving in groups as soon as their quivers were filled, setting off through the mouth of the ravine at an easy loping gait. Will was there. He saw the mutinous set to her mouth and the flush that sat high on the crest of her cheeks, as if she had already run the distance and back again. Her throat was working frantically to swallow some tightness gathered there and her actions were brusque, all but vicious, as she slung her bow over her shoulder and grabbed up a bundle of arrows.

He looked, as Robin had, to where the horses were being led toward the forest path. "Where is Griffyn?" "Gone."

"Gone? What do you mean gone?" "How I do grow tired of repeating myself," she hissed rough the grate of her teeth. "I mean gone. Fled. Tucked tail and run. He is probably halfway back to Burgundy by now where the profits are larger and the women"—she had to stop for a catch in her throat—"the women ask nothing of him but the charity of his smile." "Bren—"

She glared at him across the top of her saddle. "I do not ant your sympathy or your understanding. I was a fool and I paid the price."

"But are you in the proper frame of mind to do what must needs be done today?" he asked softly.

"I will do what has to be done," she insisted. "And likely take pleasure in doing it."

Will watched her snatch up the reins and lead her horse to the mouth of the ravine, and the only sympathy he felt was for the men who would come within range of her arrows this day.

The fog had thickened to rain by the time they arrived at the Witch's Teats, a cold, cutting drizzle that turned the road to mud and the grass on the meadow into slick, gray-green waves. Robin rode back and forth across the stretch of meadow checking the position of the archers concealed in the long grass that grew down the slopes of both hills.

It was an ideal place for an ambush. The mist-shrouded tree-tops of Sherwood were just barely visible low on the southern horizon and the ground was relatively flat from there to the Teats, where the two gently rising mounds of earth forced the road to zig and zag between their bases. There were no trees and few bushes on either slope, and an unobservant eye would skim right across them without contemplating what mischief might lurk in the natural pocks formed by earth and overgrown nibble. There were more woods to the north, in the direction of Lincoln, and to the east, but they were neither as dense nor foreboding as Sherwood. The easterly wood was closest—no more than five hundred yards beyond the hills—and, if things turned sour, offered a handy escape route to take the men back to the safety of Sherwood, while hampering any horses or foot soldiers who tried to follow.

The heavy mist was an annoyance, but better than the strong sun in a midday sky that might reflect off bits of metal to betray their presence. Even so, as a precaution, the men on horseback were positioned behind the hills well out of sight of the road. Lookouts were posted as much as two miles away to give plenty of warning, and it was one of these men who came galloping along the road now, his horse's hooves kicking up clods of muddy earth.

"Robin! They are nearing the edge of the forest." He panted. "They are coming."

"How do they look?"

"Fearsome." He was bluntly honest. "Too many to count."

"Knights? In the van or at the rear?" "Rear, with the wagon."

Alan a' Dale came loping toward Robin and the lookout, a bow slung easily over his shoulder. He was dressed, like the others, in the simple brown leather jerkin and green woolen hose that had become their uniform of sorts. A wide, hooded collar sat on his shoulders, the hood raised to keep the dampness from sliding down his neck.

"They are come?"

"We should be able to see their steam in a few minutes," Robin said casually. "Are the men ready?"

"As ready as ever they will be, with God's luck."

Luck, Robin thought grimly, had nothing to do with it. And everything. He glanced at the top of the westerly hill where Brenna was positioned with half the longbow archers, and to the east, where Will waited patiently with the others. Two of their proteges had deserted the camp during the night and taken the longbows with them as mementoes, but there were ten stout weapons with eager hands to draw them, and they would open the first stage of the attack.

"Lady Brenna near took my head off," Alan said ruefully, "when I reminded her there were no vows, no chains binding these men to our cause. We had hoped for four score, we have nearer a hundred counting those who came in yesterday from the nearby vills and villages. Yet we lost some we had counted on." He shrugged and spread his hands. "Some have families. Others want them."

It was the same on any battlefield and most leaders held their breaths on the day of the actual fight hoping to see the same faces behind him that were there the day before.

Knights were different, of course, for they carried their honor onto the field. But these were not knights and, as Alan said, not bound by any oath of service. They were farmers and cotters and turnip-growers (the old man was even here, crouched behind a boulder with his scythe in hand) who had never fought an open, pitched battle before. Their hopes lay in speed and surprise, and a goodly part in the slender arms of a woman who had had her heart crushed by a callous, cowardly rogue. Robin did not want to think about that now. There would be time afterward to debate the ways and means of avenging his sister's honor, and he would do it gladly if it meant following the black-hearted bastard to the ends of the earth. For now, he had to concentrate, to focus on the impending attack, and to hope the men—his brothers most of all—would set aside the rules of battle etiquette and follow his orders precisely. Chivalry dictated the knights should show themselves first and allow their enemy ample time to prepare a defense, but this they could not do without forfeiting their biggest advantage. Chivalry would have also blanched at the thought of women arranged beside the men in the front line of battle, but Alan had brought forth a score of them the previous night who insisted they were just as capable (and some more so) of drawing a bow as any of their menfolk.

Nor was it considered an honorable ploy to attempt to cut down as many mounted champions as possible with bow and arrow before the actual fighting began. His brothers had grumbled loudest at this, at being set back behind the hill until they were called forth, claiming it was unmanly. Conversely, the foresters trusted him so completely, he was afraid their enthusiasm would cause them to break cover before he had given the signal.

Not by his choice had they started to look upon him as their leader, for he had been careful not to intrude on Alan a'

Dale's authority, but even the lanky archer had seemed glad to relinquish the responsibility, far happier in the role of second-in-command. Richard and Dag had contributed

to the subtle shift the first night in camp when they had been asked about the way of things in Normandy. The stories they told of their recent victory against the king's army in Maine had every man on the edge of their seat.

Further tales of Robin's successes in the tournaments had brought their eyes nearly popping out of their heads, no more so than when they recounted his most recent triumph at Chateau Gaillard against the ferocious, flesh-eating Prince of Darkness.

The camp bard was kept busy composing his ballads, which were turning out to be such thrilling and exaggerated testaments of Herculean feats, Robin had found himself listening in awe. Now that the time had come to live up to their expectations, however, he found himself breathing a little harder, fighting to control the tightness in his chest.

It was not the dying that mattered, he had always believed, but the manner of it, and to die on any battlefield was to die courageously and honorably. He had never given death much more than a passing thought before. But now he had Marienne, and the thought of losing her so soon after he had finally found her again ...

"My lord?"

His mind had wandered and he brought it back out of Sherwood with an effort. It was Timkin holding out his shield and helm, regarding him with grave and trusting eyes.

Robin had almost forgotten the boy was there, as faithful and dutiful as he had been at Roche-au-Moine. He wore a suit of mail and tunic emblazoned with the Amboise device, for it was expected a squire should remain by his master's side to guard his back against attack and defend with his life, if necessary, that of his liege lord.

How old was he? Fourteen? Fifteen? A man already seasoned to war, yet a boy still who had never felt the scrape of a blade on his hairless chin.

Robin took his helm. "When this thing starts," he said, pointing up to the crest of the westerly hill, "I want you up there."

"My lord?"

Wary of pricking the boy's pride, Robin nodded grimly. "It is most important—vital, in fact—to the efforts of us all that you see no harm comes to Lady Brenna. If she and her archers have any measure of success, you can be sure the sheriffs men will try to cut her down or stop her. If I thought I could trust either Richard or Dag not to be distracted in the heat of battle, I would put one of them there, but since I have more faith in you, I will take your vow instead, that you will defend Lady Brenna as you would me, to your last breath, if need be."

The boy flushed and nodded. "You have my most solemn vow, sire. Nothing will get past me!"