Lady Marian

Chapter 27

Sarah bathed my hands in cold water, pressing a foul-smelling ointment to them.

"Never—never—did I dream I would see the day when Lady Marian of Huntingdon would go swinging swords through Nottingham Castle." She held a cloth to my knuckles so firmly they ached worse than they did before.

"Did you ever dream you would live in a cave first?" I asked.

Sarah thrust my hands back into the basin of water. She set about unbraiding my hair. "Do not use that tone with me, milady. I'm not your maid anymore. You said so yourself."

"Could have fooled me," I uttered beneath my breath. Sarah yanked on my braid a little harsher than was necessary.

"You are lucky you were not killed. And tell me, how many men were killed in this endeavour?"

The sight of Robin's dagger sticking out of a guard's belly swam in front of my eyes.

"You do not want to know that," I answered, taking leave of Sarah's hands as I sought out the black silence of my and Robin's antechamber.

Robin had already retired for the evening, wrapping his wounds with sonorous sleep between the animal skins we called blankets, rather than Sarah's bandages and ointments. I slipped off my wool dress, leaving on my heavy chemise, and into the bed beside him.

My husband turned toward me. "I did not mean for the day to turn out as it did."

"Locksley will not starve," I said.

"I did not mean to leave such wreckage in our wake."

"It is not the first time."

"But I always hope it will be the last." Robin wiped his eyes with the back of his swollen hands.

"You could have killed the sheriff." I sounded flat, like the pillow I tried to fluff out beneath my head.

"Prince John would retaliate, and that would be worse than leaving him alive. I should never had let him get to you."

"You forgot I was not one of your soldiers behind you. That is almost a compliment."

"Soldiers," Robin said the word as if he was not speaking to me, but connecting to distant memories.

"How do you forget what you have done?"

Robin wrapped a sinewy arm around me. "You never can forget. It is us or them. Today was my fault. I saw an opportunity and rushed into it without thinking out a plan. Their blood is on my hands."

Theatrics, I thought.

"They didn't have to attack. They don't have to serve the sheriff," I said.

Robin sighed. "Think that if it helps."

I ran my stiffening fingers through his wavy hair, pulling his head onto my chest.

"That does help," Robin whispered, drifting back to sleep.