Gripping a goblet in trembling fingers, the earl mused thoughtfully, “But a man may make a principle
of
political reality and thereby control another, should he be clever.” And very, very careful.
He considered it thoroughly, swathed in bed linens and coverlets against the pernicious chill that had invaded aging bones. And when Ralph came to him and announced his son had arrived, Huntington, with an uncommon thrill of anticipation, acknowledged the unsuitable woman had provided precisely the opportunity she had promised.
Now was the time to seize it.
But what had she said?
“. . . make no assumptions concerning what shapes his actions, lest you shape in him an answer you cannot bear.”
Huntington was not a fool. He accepted advice from even the crudest of sources, if in his judgment that source provided the answer.
‘I have given you the key,’
the woman had said.
‘Use it wisely.’
And so he would.
“Have him in,” he told Ralph. “Send my son to me.”
In the gloom of a dying day, Brother Tuck was plainly startled as he pushed from knees to feet. “But I cannot,” he blurted. “I am not a priest.”
Marian drew breath, measured it out again as if she fed forty hens with but a handful of grain. “I do not mean it as confession.”
“Then—what?”
Now that he asked her, now that she was required to explain it, to put words to the emotions that had brought her to the oratory, Marian was mute.
“Lady.”
She had told him a thousand times to call her by her name. But Tuck was devotedly circumspect in all matters.
Marian sat down upon one of the small benches Will Scarlet had made. The oratory had been used only rarely prior to the arrival of Robin and the others, but Tuck had made of it a place reflecting the purpose for which it had been built.
She shook her head. Then bowed it. She intended neither prayer nor supplication, merely expressed the inability to choose the proper words. And Tuck, at last, understood.
He sat down on the bench beside her, and listened.
She told him everything. And then spoke of her fear.
“I did it,” she said, “because it needed doing. I cannot claim him; Robin isn’t mine. He is himself, belonging to no one. It is
his
will,
his
choice,
his
future at stake.” She drew in a trembling breath. “But he has gone to Huntington, and I have had time to think again, to consider what I have done. To know now I was a fool.”
“Lady—”
“I am
afraid,
Tuck. For myself.” She felt the prickle of shame. “I am not a good woman.”
“ ‘Good’ is defined by many things,” he declared with such certainty that she nearly gaped at him. “It is,” he insisted. “And only God can judge whether our ‘goodness’ is”—he smiled—“good enough.”
“But how can I be considered ‘good’ when I want nothing more than for Robin to reject his father outright and come back to me?”
“Regret is natural,” Tuck said. “But your intent was to give Robin the opportunity to choose. Were you a ‘bad’ woman—however you wish to define it—you would never have gone to the earl in the first place.”
Marian scowled. “I was a fool to do it.”
“We test ourselves,” he said gently, “with everything we do. All those choices we devise for ourselves, and the choices we make.”
“This is
my
test, then?”
“One of them,” he agreed.
“And if I am afraid of this test?”
Tuck’s expression was solemn. “You should be.”
She had not expected that of him, but rather comfort and sympathy. Startled, she stared into the sincere brown eyes.
“There is always fear in any undertaking that includes risk.” Tuck explained. “And surely this does. Have you not given his father the means to win him back?”
Marian thought about it. “I told him I would not interfere. It is Robin’s decision. But his father
may
win him back.”
“But that will not be your doing.”
The tone was bitter. “No?”
“There is some difference,” Tuck said, “between a woman who leaves the door unlatched, and the woman who orders her husband out that door.”
Marian frowned.
“I am not
blind,”
he said. “Nor deaf. Nor am I dead.”
She gazed at him in some perplexion; none of the men she counted as friends was making sense this morning.
Tuck’s face reddened. “A religous vocation does not necessarily make a man ignorant of . . .” He struggled with it a moment. “Of
compassion.”
His expression suggested that was not the word he intended to use, but nothing else was forthcoming.
Ah. “No,” she said, smiling.
“It is risk,” he agreed, seemingly relieved he need not explain himself more fully with regard to what he did and did not understand of men and women. “But even pledging oneself to God invites a measure of risk.” Tuck leaned toward her, speaking in a confiding whisper. “The devil, you know.”
“The devil?”
“But give him the opportunity, and he shall mislead.” Tuck nodded once. “That is risk.”
“The devil,” she said dryly, “may be but a babe compared to the earl.”
Tuck recoiled. “Never say so!”
Marian sighed. She should have known better than to say such to a monk, trained from the day he took his vows to be a literalist. She thanked him briefly and rose, feeling no more content than when she had entered, but before she could leave the oratory, he called her name.
Her name. Not her title.
Marian turned back, hand on the latch of the narrow wooden door.
“The choice he makes,” Tuck said, “will be his own. He has had two decades with his father, and five years with you. But he is not his father’s son, and he is not his woman’s puppet. You have said it: he is himself. Whatever decision he makes will be born of his own heart.”
“Duty,” she said faintly, thinking of the earl.
“Duty,” Tuck agreed. “To his father. To you. And to himself.”
Marian said, “And to his king. His country.”
Tuck’s eyes were bleak. “His king is dead.”
Nine
The Earl of Huntington looked upon his son and was disgusted, though he let none of it show. Robert’s fair hair was untidy from the ride, tangled against his shoulders, and he wore clothing best left to peasants. There was nothing of elegance, of his station, about the sherte or crude hosen. The boots were terribly worn, and the tunic of plain brown wool displayed woody slubs in the weave that bespoke poor wool and a poorer hand at the loom.
His son had come home from Crusade in 1194 vastly changed by war, and by captivity. The fey, feckless boy had been transformed into a man who was wholly a stranger, and while the earl applauded self-control—he disliked frivolity and effusiveness—he felt there was a distinct difference between keeping one’s own counsel and turning oneself to stone. There had been times he feared for his son’s sanity; and, in fact, was convinced the Saracens had ruined him utterly. Robert had always been difficult to manage, but after Crusade he was impossible.
Now, still abed, the earl stirred in vague discontent as his son gazed upon him. Robert was yet a stranger. Five additional years, albeit spent in England, in peace, had wrought additional changes. Some measure of healing had occurred; Robert seemed less brittle than before, less unpredictable. His eyes were not so haunted, his face not so gaunt, his movements not so constricted by concern for what his captors might require of him, or punish. He was markedly self-contained and plainly no more enamored of being under the castle roof he detested than he had ever been, but clearly he had come with no thought for anything beyond his father’s health.
And that was a weapon the earl intended to use.
There was, Huntington noted in mild surprise—he had forgotten—the faint pale tracery of a scar curving along the underside of his son’s jaw. He had seen other scars once, the permanent whip-weals in his back, but had noted no others. Now, as he lay in bed and Robert stood beside it, the earl could mark such inconsequential details as white-blond lashes, the clean arch of eyebrows, the molding of nose and cheekbones that echoed his mother’s features; and also such things as the grimness of his mouth and tension in the jaw—and unfeigned startlement in hazel eyes as he realized that indeed his father was ill.
“Did you think it was a lie?” the earl rasped.
Robert’s face blanked itself. The honest reaction was gone, banished by a mask his father recognized. His tone was perfectly courteous, but utterly lacking in emotion. “My lord?”
“Do not prevaricate,” Huntington said testily. “I see it in your face. You believed it a ruse?”
He was so fair that even the faintest tinge of color gave away his emotions. But the mask remained intact.
The earl grunted. “We have not been comfortable together for many years, Robert. I will feign no confusion, beg no explanation. We are very different men.”
He considered that. Then relaxed the mask enough to reveal an ironic wariness. “So we are, my lord.”
“Oh, do sit down!” the earl snapped, and gestured peremptory direction.
Robert glanced around, found the indicated chair at a table, and dragged it over. After a momentary hesitation, he seated himself, though somewhat gingerly and without any of his habitual grace, as if he hurt. He was quite stiff, the earl noted, poised to depart the chair—and possibly the chamber—the instant he decided it was necessary.
“You will recall,” Huntington said, “that it was not I who asked you to come.”
Robert opened his mouth immediately. Reconsidered. Shut it, and held his silence.
“You have been most plain with regard to your feelings for me,” the earl said. “You have rejected my roof, my hopes, my heritage. You have made a life apart from the one I intended for you. In five years you have not come here once.” He looked steadily at his son. “And yet you come now because you fear I am dying.”
“No,” Robert said.
“Then why?”
It was apparently too much to ask: his son stood up abruptly. “Perhaps I should not have come.”
“That is not an answer,” Huntington pointed out. “Make a
proper
one, Robert. Tell me the truth.” He twitched a hand briefly in a suggestion of supplication. “Let it be your truth, if you will, and I shall listen; I have already said we are two different men. That should suggest I give you the latitude to be yourself, rather than what I would have you be.” He grimaced. “You have won that much of me.”
Color seeped into the face again. “She said you were ill.”
“And so I am.”
“She said I should come.”
“And so you have.”
“She said . . .” But he closed his mouth on it.
“She said a great deal,” the earl observed at last.
His son held his silence, though his eyes narrowed slightly.
He waits for me to attack the woman, so he may defend her.
“Would you have come,” the father asked with devastating simplicity, “had she not suggested it?”
It was not a question the son had expected. He frowned slightly, briefly, turning over the words in his mind as if he sought a weapon within them. He found none. Now the pale brows knitted beneath tangled locks of windblown hair.
“Would you have come,” the earl repeated, “had she not suggested it?”
There was no bitterness in the eyes, no resentment in the expression, only fresh consideration as he revisited the inquiry. Robert was beginning to measure
himself
now instead of his father.
The earl followed up the advantage. “I have never sent for you. Not once. Not in five years. Nor did I send for you now.”
Color moved again in the face, staining flesh anew. The high cheekbones burned.
“I have asked nothing of you. Commanded nothing of you. Demanded nothing of you—” He raised a silencing hand before his son could interrupt to dispute the matter. “In five years.”
Now the answer was different. There were no grounds for dispute. “You have not,” Robert confirmed with obvious reluctance.
“Nor do I do so now. Save for one thing.”
The faint smile was bitter.
Huntington stirred beneath the bed linens. With one aching hand he groomed the coverlet. In a muted voice, he said, “Tell me what you would have me be.”
This was unexpected. His son stared at him, plainly taken aback.
And again: “If you could make me into the father you would have preferred, what man would I be?”
His son remained mute, and rigid as the chair.
“Tell me, Robin. The truth. How could I have done better?”
At the name his mother had bestowed and others used freely, lids flickered briefly. Something moved in the hazel eyes, something kindled, blazed, then was abruptly extinguished. He was not yet weaned. Not yet won.
“I have been true to myself,” Huntington explained. “I have done what I believed necessary for the good of the family. Means and methods do not always agree with the designs and desires of others; they did not agree with you.”
“They did not.”
Huntington drew in an uneven breath. “If I have wronged you, Robin, I do apologize.”
So profoundly shocked was his son by the statement that he was entirely incapable of speech. He blanched white as the finest bed linen. Eyes transformed themselves to opacity. Even his lips, as they slackened, were pale.
“It is my deepest regret,” Huntington said, “that we have lost so many years.”
After a moment Robert managed speech. “
All
of them.”
Protest rose to the earl’s lips—surely not all of them; had there not been a time when he and the boy were in accord?—but he swallowed it and deferred. “All of them?”
His son rose. Somewhat unsteadily he wandered to the deep-cut window embrasure and stood there, his back to the room, to his father. His arms were folded against his chest as if he hugged himself. And perhaps he did. He seemed oddly reduced, undone by the admission. He set his brow against the stone.
Even his words were sluggish. “I wish . . .”
The earl waited.
“I wish you might have said this to my mother.”
Huntington asked, “How do you know I did not?”
Robert turned. His body trembled with avid tension. “Did you?” The earl said nothing.
“
Did
you?”
“I did not,” Huntington said. “That, too, I regret. And so I make amends to you. For you . . . and for her.”
His son yet hugged himself. He collapsed against the wall beside the embrasure, wincing slightly, and stared into the pallor of candlelight. There was, the earl saw, a sheen of tears in his eyes.
The time is now.
“Forgive me,” Huntington said, “but I tire easily. Perhaps you will come back later?”
Robert, yet lost, stared at him blankly.
“Later,” the earl said, and reached for wine with trembling hands.
Robert, stirring laggardly from his reverie, hastily took up the cup from the bedside table and set it into his father’s hands. Fingers briefly brushed. The earl reflected it was the first time they had touched one another in more than two decades.
“Send Ralph to me,” Huntington said hoarsely.
“You should rest.”
The earl sipped wine; indeed, that much was true. The weakness was unfeigned. “And so I shall . . . but there is a matter Ralph must tend first.”
“Let me.”
Huntington considered it, let the consideration show; then smiled faintly and shook his head. “Ralph is more familiar with the household and with my business.”
Then came the words he had sacrificed dignity for: “Ralph has been more of a son than I.”
The earl gazed into the cup and forbore to offer answer, which was answer of itself.
The door thumped closed. Huntington bared his teeth in a brief, feral grin, and drank to his victory.
William deLacey, deep in his dungeon, left off his labors over the Exchequer cloth and cast a murderous glare at Sir Guy of Gisbourne, who stood in the door he had just unlocked and opened to announce a visitor. Belatedly. “Where is he?”
Gisbourne raised his brows. “In the kitchens, of course. He has ridden hard on his errand; I sent him there for food and drink.”
“It might have waited,” deLacey said between his teeth. “It
should
have waited until after he had given his message to me.”
“You said you were not to be disturbed.” Gisbourne paused. “You said it twice.”
The sheriff lost the remains of his patience. “I am
always
to be disturbed for the king’s messenger, you fool!” Particularly as it was very likely the word the man carried was of the king’s death. But then, Gisbourne was not aware of that. So far as deLacey knew, only he, the Earl of Huntington, and the miscreants at Ravenskeep were privy to the news of Richard’s impending death.
“Fetch him to the hall,” the sheriff said in irritation, folding up the painted cloth. “I shall meet him there.” He stowed the Exchequer behind one of the coin chests, then stomped out of the cell with Gisbourne in tow, taking care to lock the door before he put the key into the pouch at his belt. As steward, Gisbourne had a complete set of keys that fit every lock within and without the castle, but deLacey preferred to carry a few of the most vital on his person. “Did he indicate any manner of haste?”
Gisbourne’s breathing was loud as he followed deLacey up the stairs. “He had ridden hard, my lord, and had little breath left to speak. Beyond asking for you, he said nothing—although . . .”
“Although?”
Gisbourne’s tone sounded abashed. “He did insist it wasn’t necessary that he should be fed immediately.”
“But you saw to it he was ushered into the kitchens regardless.”
“Your orders had made it clear—”
“My orders are that I should be apprised of any royal messenger at any hour of the day or night!”
“And I know that,” Gisbourne observed with stolid persistence. Then added, “Now.”
DeLacey stopped so short upon the stair that Gisbourne nearly slipped. The sheriff looked over his shoulder, considering the entertaining possibility of shoving his steward down the stairs so he might never have to deal with his exasperating truculence again. But Gisbourne was by nature uniquely suited to his stewardship, and deLacey needed him until he could find another.
There was also the small matter of Gisbourne being his son-in-law, and the father—well, save for one, possibly—of the sheriff’s grandchildren, though he doubted Eleanor would care if her husband lived or died. He had insisted upon the marriage as much to annoy his daughter as to deflect the shame of her out-of-wedlock pregnancy.
DeLacey, still stopped upon the stairs, reconsidered the setting for the meeting. “Bring the messenger to my solar instead.”
“My lord?”
“This may be better done in private.” He began climbing again.
Better done in private so I might consider how best to react with only a single man as witness.
Because no one knew, nor could one surmise, how the politics would play themselves out over the next few months.
DeLacey grimaced. The king was dead. Long live the king.
John, surely.
Or possibly Arthur.
“Money,” deLacey muttered. “Money bought Richard out of imprisonment. And money shall make us a new king.”
“My lord?”
“Never mind, Gisbourne. Just send the messenger to me at once.”
The truculence and slyness had vanished. Gisbourne, too, was working out the potential ramifications of the royal messenger’s unexpected visit. “Yes, my lord.”
John. Surely.
But possibly not.
DeLacey wondered what sort of reception the erstwhile Count of Mortain would give his letter offering support.
“Money,” he muttered again.
This time Gisbourne was mute.
When Much arrived beside her, Marian was engaged in trimming back rose canes weighted with voluminous blossoms. The postern gate was nearly obscured by a tangle of canes and stems, and Will Scarlet had already complained of thorns snagging and shredding his tunic whenever he used the gate; his fear now, he said lugubriously, was that an eye might be next. Marian took the hint.