Scarlet

“I’m not,” I said.

His hand pushed me away, and he sounded angry but his eyes just looked like I’d stabbed him. “Well, then that makes you a whore.”

My eyes set to burning at that awful word. “You would say that!” I snapped. “Gisbourne is a monster, so I can’t belong to him, but John’s a nice sort, so he’s all right to own me, ain’t he? He says he loves me so it don’t matter how I feel, do it? He didn’t care none and neither do you.”

He grabbed my arms. “Scar, you kiss him, you sleep with him, you’re alone with him—what the hell do you want me to think?”

“Why are you thinking ’bout me at all?”

“I’m not.” He looked at me, straight in the eye, and pushed me off. “I won’t.”

I stepped back. God in Heaven, how could he do that—make me feel hurt and small and alone with one stupid word? “By the Holy Rood, Robin of Locksley, I hate you,” I spat at him. I pushed him aside, snatched my cloak, and opened the door. He grabbed my wrist, and I jerked away.

John were in the hall and he caught me round the waist. “Hey, love,” he said.

Pain shot through my back and I pushed him. “I’m not your love, John!” He looked so slack-jawed, and I felt hot tears rush to my eyes. I stopped and put my hand on his cheek. I could feel Robin standing right behind me. “I love you, John, but I don’t want to be kissed by you none. And you only want to kiss me because you saw my bits in a dress.”

He rubbed his rough cheek into my hand like a cat. “That’s not true. And you do want to be kissed by me. Don’t lie.”

My hand fell and my face ran hot. “I don’t, John!”

His eyes narrowed on me, fair worried. I shook my head but Rob scoffed. Then John’s eyes went to Robin and John laughed, but it weren’t a happy sort of laugh. “Oh. I see what this is about.”

Shame rushed over me again, feeling Rob’s awful stare on my back, and my face crumpled. John tensed.

“Something you and I should be discussing, Rob?” John asked.

“No,” he said. I pushed past John with water on my cheeks and Rob said sharp, “Where are you going, Scar?”

“You know where,” I said.

“Where?” John asked.

I kept going, but Rob kept after, saying, “If nothing else, you need to undo what you’ve done. The sheriff got twenty-seven people for not paying tax. Thirteen of the twenty-seven are children, Scar. You don’t get to just walk away from this.”

“I’m not!”

“And you’d have them see you die? You’d have all those children watch you be killed and know it was their fault?” he roared. “You’d put that on their shoulders, on their souls?”

I went boneless against the wall. I didn’t turn to look at him; I didn’t much dare. He were furious, but I wondered—wished—if he were saying he didn’t want to watch me die. Rob had that way, sometimes, of talking ’bout something other than what he meant.

“It’s not her fault,” Much said, coming up the stairs.

“The hell it isn’t,” Rob said, and I winced like he’d hit me with the words, dashing my wishes on rocks. “I’m not going to let her turn herself in, but yes, right at this moment, I think it’s her fault.”

“Rob!” Much said. “We’re all angry. Some for different reasons, but this isn’t the time to blame others for it.”

My eyes burned. “It’s right fair to blame me, Much.”

“You didn’t do this,” he insisted. “Besides, what can you do without us?”

“It’s easy,” I said soft. “Gisbourne will do just about anything to get me. I can trade for the townspeople.”

“What are you talking about?” John asked, stepping closer.

Much sighed. “Are you Marian, then?”

I nodded.

“Scar, you can’t go. He barely knew Thom. What’s he going to do to you?”

“It doesn’t matter. My life can purchase twenty-seven others, Much. What would you have me do?”

Much stepped up a stair, closer to me. “Fight.”

I looked at him.

“Fight, Scar, because God knows I can’t fight the way I want to.”

I never thought ’bout Much’s arm if I could help it, the scarred, black stump where his hand were cut off by the sheriff’s men. He kept it away, in a pocket or under a cloak. He put it between us now. I put my hand on it. If I could ever heal anything, I wished it could be that.

“I’ll help, then I’m leaving,” I told him. “For good.” Much looked to Rob, but I pushed past him. The front door of the tavern looked awful tempting, but I went instead to the kitchen, taking some broth. Relief were washing through me in pulses with the pain, and so were a toppling, crushing, mind-cracking amount of fear.

Tuck let me stay in the room for the next few days. I needed to heal up a bit, and it were better done warm and fed. I think the lads agreed to it because Tuck and his wife kept a closer eye on me than they did. It felt strange to be so far from the lads. Felt strange to be far from Rob, but I didn’t want to think about that none.

I didn’t want to go into the town. I were sure they’d stone me or something fair awful. I needed to come up with a plan, but nothing were coming. Any minute Rob were going to walk through and tell me the townspeople were set to die the next day, and I wouldn’t have a plan.

The lads came together while I were mopping the floor. Ethel, Tuck’s wife, thought that there were no reason I shouldn’t be put to some light work since I weren’t paying none. I stopped, straightening up. “When is it?” I asked.

“Five days,” John said.

“Five?” I asked. “But isn’t that Ravenna’s wedding?”

“The sheriff’s, you mean?” Rob said. “Four days. They’re hanging everyone the day after the wedding. Because the sheriff is disappointed that the locals don’t love him as they should.”

I looked at him. He looked worn, like an old doll.

“There’s more,” John said. His voice sounded heavier than a ship anchor. “They’ve moved the prison. All our townspeople are being held in a place where we’ve never been and don’t know how to break out of.”

The mop fell from my hands. “How do you know?” I asked. This were all kinds of bad.