Scarlet (19 page)

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I tipped my hat to her. “Hullo, Mistress Morgan. ”

She looked behind her, and I saw the three curly headed ninnies she liked to call daughters. “Keep to yourself, Will, ” she told me.

I ducked my head, but I felt anger twist in me. John were the swiver, not me. Just because her daughters liked who they thought I were didn’t make it my fault. And I knew for a fact that John ain’t always been a gentleman with Aggie Morgan, her red-haired oldest. He smiled at her, and she giggled.

I tugged my hat down and went to the hearth, where I saw Lena. I thought she were sitting with Mr. Morgan, but it were Mark Tanner.

“Will Scarlet, ” Lena greeted, jumping up. She hugged me and pulled me down next to her.

Mark shook my hand. “Will, ” he said.

“Mark, ” I said. “Didn’t know you were staying here too. ”

“Oh, I just came to call on Lena. ”

My mouth opened, but just then John came over, trailing the girls behind him. I pulled a little closer to Lena, but they crowded around us.

“Did you give it to them yet?” John asked.

I fl ushed, but I reached round behind me to pull out the food. I passed the meat to Lena and started to hand out the rolls, but Matilda pushed past her daughter. She grabbed the meat and threw it back in my lap. “No, ” she snapped.

“Mother!” one of the girls cried.

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I blinked. “What?”

“I know what you are, Will Scarlet, and how you come by your ‘gifts. ’ We are a good, Christian family. God, and not a thief, will provide for us. ”

I knew my cheeks were red as my name, and I couldn’t think of a word to say. “But—” I tried.

She cuff ed me on my ear. “You heard me. Shame on you, and shame on Robin for letting you do it. ”

I shrank back, holding my head in shock.

“Steady on!” John said, jumping in front and pushing between me and her. Lena’s arm came around me. “Will’s only trying to help. ”

“We don’t need help, ” she said. “Certainly not from the likes of him. ”

“Will isn’t
like
nobody, ” John said. “And he works harder to save our people than anyone else. ”

“It’s noble of you, John, but I think he should go. Now. ”

I weren’t waiting around for her to kick me out. I were already on my feet and past Mark Tanner, running out the back door and not waiting for John.

I bundled up the food and left it for George and Mary and little baby Robin, and I went back to the cave. Rob and Much were there, so I climbed the trees, going up over the cave without talking. I don’t think they even saw me.

“Rob!” John called, crashing through the forest. “Much, have you seen Scar?”

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“Mistress Morgan tossed her out for stealing. ”

Rob’s face went fl at and hard, and I felt sick. “She stole from the Morgans?”

John scowled. “Of course not. She brought them food for caring for Lena, and they practically tossed it in her face. ”

Rob sighed. “Because she stole it. ”

I pushed my cheek against the tree.

“She’s probably just run off for a while, ” Much said. “She does that. ”

“I know, Much. But she can’t run off every time someone says or does something. ” Rob shook his head. “Or she can, but if she wants to do that, we can’t count on her as part of this band. ”

I opened my mouth to tell them I were there and hadn’t run nowhere, but it didn’t come out.

“We can always count on Scar, ” Much defended.

“I’ll admit, I’ve called her a coward in the past, ” John said. I hugged my knees.

“But we can count on her, ” he continued. “She’s allowed to be hurt. ”

“She’s not a coward, ” Rob said. “I have never and will never accuse her of that. She’s as brave as they come— but her fi rst instinct is to hide from us. To hide from me. ”

“Why shouldn’t I hide?” I called. “When with every odd breath you tell me how fast you want me out of this band. ”

I hopped lower in the trees, standing, staring defi ant at him. Water were in my eyes but I didn’t much care.

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My face went wobbly. I had to ask it, and I couldn’t shake or shiver none. “Do you want me to go, Robin Hood?”

His jaw moved like he were chewing it over. He heaved a sigh and threw his bow across his back, climbing up the tree. He came up beside me and I didn’t dare blink. Tears would have gone every which way, and I weren’t never going to cry in front of Rob. “Go up, ” he told me.

I climbed, blinking and wiping my mug on my sleeve. I climbed faster than Rob, even though my shoulder set to an awful aching. I waited for him on the branch that were highest I could sit on.

He came and sat beside me.

Yes, I want you to go, ” he said, and I thought I heard wrong. I looked at him, and more tears jumped out. “I want you to go, Scar, if you can’t trust me. If you can’t let me in, then you have to go. ”

“I trust you, Rob. I always have. I don’t even want to, but you’re just . . . you. It’s terrible. Do you have to know the whole awful story for you to trust me?”

“No. Sometimes I worry that I don’t know you at all, though. ”

“You don’t trust
me.
”

He sighed. “I want to. But we both know you lie to me. ”

I hung my head. “I can’t lie to you, I don’t think. I try not to talk ’bout things, though. ”

“I know. Why is that?”

“Telling secrets ain’t done me no favors in the past. ”

“Who was she?”

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“Who?”

“The girl in London. The one you don’t want to tell me about. ”

I swallowed, but her name bubbled up in my throat. “Joanna, ”

I said. “My sister. ”

He closed his eyes. “She protected you. ”

I nodded, tears tripping down my nose.

“And you stole food for her. ” He sighed. “What happened to her?”

“She caught sick. She kept coughing,

” I said. I hugged

my arms over my stomach. “I stole food, and medicine, milk and water, and some Scottish whisky— and nothing worked. She coughed blood everywhere. ”

“Consumption?” he asked soft.

I curled up a shoulder. “Don’t know. Never had a name for it. ”

“She died. ”

I nodded. “The day after, I met you, and I let you catch me. ”

He pulled back. “Let me catch you? You didn’t let me. ”

I pushed water off my face, not looking.

“But that’s foolish. Why would you ever let me catch you?”

He stopped moving, and I didn’t look, but I could feel his sorry stare. “Because the punishment for stealing is death, and you thought I was a high lord. You thought if you just stole from me, you would die. And you’d be with her. And you’re so pious, you’d never take your own life. ”

I sniff ed back tears. “Don’t think I count as pious, quite. ”

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“But that’s it, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “You didn’t do what you ought, ” I told him.

“Prison were a bit of a diff erent matter than dying. I never want to die the way she did, diseased and slow, even if it would get me back to her. ”

“Christ, ” he murmured.

“I just left her in the room we rented, ” I told him. It were like the dam had cracked and a geyser were shooting out, and for once all I wanted were to talk about Joanna. “She were like stone in the bed, and with blood all around. Her hair didn’t even look like hers, where it were still on her head. I didn’t— I didn’t know what to do. ” Tears kept falling. “I left her there. There weren’t nowhere for her to be buried. I wrote her name in a book and left it on her bed so they might fi nd our kin, but I never checked. I just left. ”

“You lost everything you had, Scarlet. No one could judge you no matter how you reacted. ”

“It were worse than letting her die. I left her alone. ”

“Where did you go?”

I wiped my eyes. “Church. I sat there and cried and all the saints were fair glaring at me and it were raining something awful. A candle knocked over and a bit of the wall caught fi re. I put it out, but I ran. I couldn’t do nothing but run. I fi gured it were a sign from God that I weren’t welcome nowhere on earth. So when I saw you, it seemed like another sign. ” I shook my head, and more water ran out. “But then you didn’t let me die. You made me come with you, and you made me watch how 212-47765_ch01_1P.indd 188

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many other people were hurting, and you make me fail every day when I can’t fi x it. ”

He were quiet for a long stretch. “Do you still want to die, Scar?”

I shut my eyes. “Don’t know, ” I whispered. “Sometimes I don’t see much worth living for. Sometimes I think I’m a curse on everyone because I live so contrary, and give the Church stolen money, and break most of the Lord’s laws. But as long as the Lord’s giving me a chance to ’tone for what I done, I’ll take it. ” I sniff ed, rubbing my face on my sleeve. “You know ’bout me going to church?”

He nodded. “I saw you there. ”

I looked at him. “Thought you didn’t go to Mass. ”

“I don’t. ” He shifted round, and his voice got quiet. “I wish I could. I followed you there once, hoping maybe if you were there I could go in. As much as I desperately want forgiveness, God’s not off ering it at the moment. ” He swallowed, and it pushed the bulge in his throat out. “Why do you wear a dress?”

“Can’t lie to God. ”

“You’re not lying, Scar. You are who you are. God knows you in skirts or breeks. ” He shook his head. “The good and the bad, unfortunately. ”

I shrugged. “Always feels wrong. ”

He leaned forward a little, shifting on the branch, to rub his thumb under my eyes and pull off the tears. “When did Gisbourne give you the scar?”

“Years ago. He caught me and Joanna running from our 212-47765_ch01_1P.indd 189

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home and he pushed a knife in my face. I said he’d never use it on me, so he did. ”

“Bastard. To cut a girl, and you must have been just a little one at that. ”

“Thirteen, ” I countered. “Two days before fourteen. I weren’t so little. ”

“It’s strange. It sounds so young, but most noblewomen are betrothed at fourteen. Some even wed, though traditionally they wait till fi fteen. ”

I swallowed a hard lump. “Heard that. ” I raised my eyes to him, my strange eyes, and for the fi rst time, I wished that I would blaze in his mind. Truth were, I’d met Rob. Before Gisbourne cut me and before Joanna and I ran to London, I’d met Rob—

just once, not for long. When I saw him in the marketplace that awful day after Joanna died, knowing he were a lord, it felt like a gift. I’d known him straight off — but in all the time then and since, he’d never remembered my long-ago self.

“So you know, Scar, I don’t want you going anywhere. And I’m sorry about the Morgans. That was cruel. ”

“I don’t mean to run, ” I said, ducking my head down. “Just sometimes I feel like everything will come out, like a bleeding slice, and . . . ” I shrugged.

“I know. But no matter how you bleed, we’ll patch you up. Just trust us. ”

I nodded.

“Will you come down with me?”

“I’ll just stay up here. Hurt my shoulder enough to get up; I’ll let it rest a bit. ”

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He took my arm. “Christ, I forgot about that. Come on, get on my back. I’ll carry you down. ”

It did hurt a fair bit, and with all the waterworks I felt tired and weak. Still, I shook my head. I think I’d rather tumble my way to the ground than scrabble on his back like a monkey—

or worse, like some tot of a child.

He frowned but didn’t force it, and he climbed ’longside me down the tree. When we touched ground, John called me to sit by him. I gave Rob a bare glance and went, sitting near John. He passed me some soup and moved closer to do it, putting his arm round me. Part of me squirmed a bit, like it weren’t quite right, but most of me were just glad for a warm arm and warm side and warm soup.

“The soup should go down pretty easy, ” John told me soft. I nodded, and he squeezed my hand a bit. “Sorry about the Morgans. ”

Taking a sip of the soup, I felt like pushing his arm off , felt like climbing back into the tree and pulling Rob up there with me, staying there and graining into the wood. I caught Rob looking at us, but soon as I looked up, he went to Much without looking at me again.

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C H A P T E R

T
he days started drawing on faster. We spent them training and working the road, collecting as much as we could in coin. It were coming in quick enough. During the nights, we hunted the king’s forest and we gave out the meat, but in almost two weeks, six people got nabbed, and we knew it would be worse come tax day.

Gisbourne weren’t killing them, which were good and bad at the same time. Good that they weren’t dead, but bad that they were all in the prison still. I knew he had the castle trussed up like a fortress; even during the day, people couldn’t come and go anymore. If we were going to break them out, it would have to be all at once, and we wanted to wait till hanging day. Or hanging night, I suppose, because hanging morning wouldn’t do anyone much good.

My shoulder healed up; it only hurt if I hit it. Which were 212-47765_ch01_1P.indd 192

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