LX

 

 

MICEL LOOKED DOWN in numb silence at the knife in his hand, and the dead, bloody body of the boy – the same age as him, more or less. His first kill.

“You bunch of rogues took your damned time!” laughed Hood, and clapped his arms around them in hearty greeting. He stood now, unbound and beaming, surrounded by the principal members of his loyal band, Took and John Lyttel – dressed as Tower guards – and in her finest gown, Marian. Beyond the door, the crackling fire ship – whose arrival moments before had been their signal to move – bathed the stable’s interior in orange light.

Micel supposed it the greatest of honours to be included among this select company, and to be witness to this momentous deed. He had long anticipated this moment – had looked forward to it, and worked towards it with every ounce of his being. Yet he found that he felt nothing at all. Perhaps it was necessary. Perhaps this was the price you paid for becoming inured to death.

Hood was exactly where they said he would be – where Marian had made sure he would be. He had been tied like a hog, but the guard had been minimal, enacting their plan was absurdly easy.

Three guards and a stable lad now lay dead upon the straw. The stable lad had been his; they had saved that kill for him. Micel stared at the still-warm corpses – slabs of meat that only moments before had been living, breathing beings, with dread and sorrow and regret in their eyes. Time and again he went over the violence of the past few minutes, but he could make nothing of them. What lay at his feet now was utterly without meaning.

He glanced up and saw Marian staring, hollow-eyed, at the same butchery. Yet what went on behind those eyes seemed just as distant, just as unfathomable.

Hood rubbed his wrists, and – laughing heartily – stepped forward and caught hold her arm. She snapped out of her weird reverie and smiled weakly.

“It’s all right,” she said. “I’m all right.” Her voice cracked slightly even as she tried to reassure him.

“But of course you are!” laughed Hood. “We’re all together again!”

Micel saw her fists clench and her back straighten, as if she were steeling herself.

“I know this was necessary,” she said. “For the greater good.”

Hood regarded her as one regards a child speaking charming but meaningless babble, then threw his great arms about her. “My sweet Rose!” he chuckled.

“We must hurry,” said Took. “They won’t be distracted forever. If the gatehouse guards get wind of what’s afoot...”

“They’ll let us pass,” said Lyttel. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Then Micel saw Hood’s eyes upon him. It was the first time his idol had stood before him as a free man. The moment had fuelled a thousand fantasies, but now it was real. Somehow the man appeared not as indestructible, the scene not as composed, the colours not as bright as in all his imaginings. And yet, there was that spark lighting up the man’s face – something he could not have imagined before meeting him – that rooted him to the spot. The outlaw king stepped past Marian, and nudged Micel upon the arm. “And this is the fine fellow who made it all possible! Where’d you find him?”

“Starving and half-dead in the forest,” said Lyttel. “He’d killed one of the king’s deer, but didn’t look like he had much idea what to do with it next. He’d come looking to join us. I took him under my wing.”

Hood placed his hands upon his knees and bent towards the boy. “Every day you brought me food,” he said, his beaming face and white teeth looming down at him. “Yet still I do not even know your name.”

“Micel.” He had meant it to sound strong and fearless, but what he heard coming from his mouth was the voice of a nervous child.

Hood roared with laughter at that. He gestured to the big man – “So, you are Little” – and then to the boy – “and he is Much! Well, there is no better, or bigger, wing to be under than that of John the Miller.”

An anxious Took looked out into the castle ward, then dodged back in. “We must go.”

But Hood, refusing to be hurried, bent down, dipped his finger in the blood of the dead stable boy, and smeared a red mark upon Micel’s forehead. “Now you are truly one of us.”

“Please,” said Took, “God is with us, but even His patience is not infinite.”

Hood ruffled Micel’s hair and turned. “So, how do we make our escape from this wretched place? Plunging into the river? Leaping from the battlements?”

“We walk out,” said Took. “In plain sight, through the main gate, with you as our prisoner. Lady Marian is known; she carries the seal of the Sheriff. And we have a familiar face...” He gestured to John Lyttel. Micel had learned the big man was once a guard within these very walls. It was his knowledge that had furnished the Red Hand, and provided the means for the plan, but it was Took had given it shape.

The rebel monk shoved a page’s hat upon Micel’s head, then wrapped rope around Hood’s wrists so they once again appeared bound. “God will make them blind,” he said. And, taking up positions either side of him, with Micel walking alongside Marian, Took and Lyttel closed the stable door behind them and led Robin Hood to freedom.