THEY WERE up with the sun the next morning and rode for hours. Neale and Cleon were eager to put as much distance as possible between themselves and Nottingham, but eventually the horses could go no farther and they set up camp near a bend in the river where the grass was green and lush. Marian sat for a bit on the bank, soaking her legs in the cool water, and after dinner that night, when the sun was a low burst of light beyond the western forest, she and Robin waited until Cleon and Neale were asleep, then sneaked back to the river. They sat quietly on one of the flat rocks and hung their feet in the current. Between them, their hands curled near each other, and Marian wished for the boldness she’d felt the night before when she’d taken Robin’s hand in hers. It was an easier thing to do when Robin was asleep, when she wouldn’t laugh at her. Or pull away. Or look at her in the horrified, disgusted way Marian sometimes imagined she might.
Sometimes she thought Robin might smile and hold Marian’s hand in her own, and that was even more terrifying.
“It’s nice out here after dark.”
“I used to love Abyglen after dark,” Marian said. Their voices were low, almost whispers. Marian couldn’t think of anything worse than someone waking and finding them, even if it was just to join them. The quiet of this moment, and the stillness of it, felt like something made of magic.
“Did you sneak out a lot after dark?”
“Not a lot. There was no one I much wanted to sneak out with.”
Robin ducked her head and smiled. “Do you want to swim?”
Marian glanced over her shoulder. They were far away enough from the campfire that their voices wouldn’t wake anyone, but if they started splashing about in the water, Cleon or Neale would surely come to check on them. “Do you think we should?”
“Why not?”
“I haven’t brought anything to dry off with.”
“We’ll go without our clothes,” Robin said, waggling her eyebrows at Marian. “Then we can dry off with them and run back to the fire.”
“Robin!” Marian whispered, astonished at her friend’s boldness, but already she was standing to quietly strip off her boots. “You’re mad.”
“This full moon makes me feel mad.” Robin wound her socks around each other and stuffed them into her boot. Then she turned her back to Marian and tugged her shirt over her head. Marian looked quickly away, but not before she got a view of the narrow span of Robin’s waist and the curl of her shoulder blades.
Heart pounding so loud she was sure Robin and Cleon and every other person in the country must be able to hear it, Marian yanked her shirt over her head and shoved her leggings down over her hips. Then she flung herself face-first into the water, pinching her nose shut as it enveloped her.
One… two… three….
She held her breath and listened to the blood rushing in her ears. The water swirled around her as Robin came splashing in beside her, but still Marian stayed under, counting her heartbeats. Only when she felt as though her chest was going to burst did she put her feet down on the muddy river floor and push herself up.
Robin’s eyes were huge in the moonlight. “I thought you’d drowned,” she hissed, splashing a wave of cool water in Marian’s face.
It was hard to look at Robin but harder to look away. Her pale shoulders beneath the water, the curve of her. The water had darkened her hair and smoothed out all the curls so that it lay flatly across her forehead.
Marian’s feet carried her forward over the sandy riverbed. Her mind was ablaze with all the things that could go wrong, but she moved forward anyway. Robin’s eyes widened; she had hardly a chance to even open her mouth before Marian was in front of her. Marian closed her eyes and bent her neck.
Robin’s mouth parted beneath hers. It tasted like river water. Marian was almost numb, but even as a white buzzing filled her ears, she reminded herself to commit every speck to memory: the way Robin’s lips were slick and unbearably soft; the way her nose was cool and her breath warm; the quiet, surprised noise she made when Marian reached up and touched her cheek. She kept her eyes squeezed shut, though she dearly wished to open them and see if Robin was looking at her.
She didn’t dare. She pressed close for another second, then one more. It took every ounce of her willpower, but she finally found it within herself to break the kiss and move away. She did it slowly, moving first the hand that had come to rest in the curve of Robin’s neck, then stepping back and opening the space between them. Finally she lifted her head so their lips parted with a nearly inaudible sound that made Marian shiver, even though her blood was boiling.
Marian knotted her fingers together and forced her eyes open.
Robin still looked just the same. Her face wasn’t the face of a stranger, though Marian felt changed from the inside out. The moon was still heavy in the sky, the air still thick with the sounds of crickets and frogs and rustling leaves. Almost no time had passed. How was that possible, for something to change so profoundly from one moment to the next, and for everything else to remain exactly the same?
“Marian—”
“Don’t say anything.” Marian shook her head desperately. “If you’re only going to say I shouldn’t have done that, don’t say anything, I beg you. You can say it tomorrow. Just not right now. Don’t say it right now.”
Robin’s eyes crinkled up at the corners when she smiled. She ducked her head, then looked up at Marian through her eyelashes, which were spiky and stuck together with river water. “I wasn’t going to say that. But I’ll do as you ask.” She reached up and curved her hand around Marian’s jaw. “For now let’s not speak at all.”
This time she closed the distance between them.
THEY HAD scarcely risen the next morning when the messengers came. Their red capes were the color of blood in the bruised sky. There were two of them, and Marian couldn’t imagine why there were two.
It was like being plunged into cold water. It did not seep into her skin, the realization. It engulfed her, enveloped her entirely and all at once. She was standing in little more than her riding cloak and boots when it happened, holding a pail of river water to extinguish the last smoldering embers of their campfire. Marian could not look away from the two black horses drawing near, at the two familiar men astride them. How she knew, she could not say, but the knowledge was as clear to her as up from down, right from left.
The banner of the king flapped above their heads. How silly, Marian thought inanely, to carry such a thing for a job such as this.
Cleon was packing up their bedrolls, and Neale was brushing the horses. Where was Robin? Marian couldn’t remember where she’d gone off to. Marian wanted her fiercely, wanted her the way a hurt child wants her parent. But maybe it was better this way. Maybe this was the sort of news a person needed to hear alone.
The two knights brought their horses to a halt. Marian was shaking so hard she doubted she would be able to reach them, but her feet carried her forward. Her mind flashed to the first time she had seen Papa riding into Abyglen, proud and true, his strong jaw held firm.
Marian came to a stop just in front of the king’s men as they dismounted. She smoothed down her cloak and tucked her hair behind her ears. She straightened her shoulders and swallowed the lump caught in her chest.
“You are Lady Marian?” one of the knights asked. Marian forced herself to look at his face. She recognized him in a vague way, though she couldn’t have said what his name was.
“I am.”
The two men glanced at each other nervously. How odd it was, Marian thought, for two men as brave as they were to be frightened to tell a girl her father had been killed.
“We bring you condolences from King John, God save him, and regret to inform you that your father, Sir Erik Banner, was killed early this morning.”
Despair flared white-hot in Marian’s belly. Papa, big and strong and brave and good as he was, was gone. Dead in service to the king, who these men still wanted God to spare, when he had not had that same consideration for the only parent Marian had ever known. She shook her head and held up a shaking hand as tears slid from the corners of her eyes and down over her sunburned cheeks.
“Please.”
The knight who had been speaking clamped his mouth shut. He cleared his throat and straightened up, his chain mail creaking as he did. “Your father was a good man, Lady Marian. A brave man. He fought—”
“I beg you,” Marian said. “Just….” She took in a shuddering breath.
Footsteps thudded softly behind Marian. Robin put her hand to the small of Marian’s back. “Marian?”
“We’re to return to Nottingham at once, Lady Marian.”
“Of course.”
“We’re to….” The knight cleared his throat again. He glanced at the other man, who shook his head and stared straight ahead. “You’re meant to—”
“Marian?” Robin said softly. “Are you all right? Are you—Marian, are you crying?” Robin swung around and glared fiercely at the knights. “Who are you? What do you want with her?”
“Robin,” Marian whispered. She laid her hand on Robin’s arm. Her skin was familiar and sun-warmed, and Marian grounded herself in it. She wanted to bury her entire self in Robin, to burrow into her very heart. “It’s all right.”
“What did they do to you?” Robin dragged her thumbs over Marian’s cheeks. “Marian, what did—?”
A strong hand closed around Marian’s shoulder. “Robin,” Neale said softly. “Come away.”
“Marian’s upset,” Robin said furiously, rounding on her father. She shook off his hand, but Marian found she could not do the same. She leaned back against Neale, letting him take her weight. He did so easily, wrapping his arm around her shoulders.
“Robin, let go. Marian needs to sit down.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not!” Robin shouted. “You’re crying!”
“Robin, let’s just—”
“I’m not going anywhere until someone tells me—”
“Papa’s dead.”
Robin’s entire body went rigid. “What?” she whispered, looking from Marian to Neale, then to the two knights standing stoically in front of them. “What do you mean?”
Marian was exhausted all of a sudden. She closed her eyes and leaned more fully into Neale’s chest. His arm around her tightened, and Marian gave in to the darkness closing in around her.