Everything is a Choice

Chapter 16

Previously...

“There’s so much I don’t know about you, isn’t there, Locksley.”

“Gisborne?”

“It’s Guy.”

“And I’m Robin, or Brat Face, or Lick Bottom, or whatever you want to call me.”

“Ha! I’d forgotten about that.”

“Go to sleep,” I say.

“You too, Brat Bottom Lick Face.”

I take a swipe at his outstretched arm, miss. I push up on my elbows. There’s a sliver of moonlight coming through a broken board in the barn wall. It traces a pale line on his face. Amazingly, he's already asleep.

“Goodnight, Guy,” I whisper.

I awake the following morning with a pounding head, but, strangely, a lighter heart. 

However, it’s not until we are saddling the horses that I realise Gisborne’s dark brown mare is not among them.

He has gone.

Chapter 16 

“Much, if you’re going to sing that song, at least get the words right.  It’s bonny blue eyes, not mouth.”

“Who asked you?”

“If it was blue mouth, she’d be dead.”

Allan and Much are bickering, as usual. They certainly don’t miss Gisborne.  

Much can sing – if you can call his tuneless ditties singing – without fear of Guy shouting at him, threatening to stuff a gag in his mouth, or worse. Allan can tell his daft jokes without Guy giving him withering looks, and John is at liberty to complain about riding a horse mile upon mile without Guy’s hand twitching towards his sword hilt every time John opens his mouth.

As for me, I am free of the constant reminder that Marian is dead and of the man who killed her. Not that I am ever likely to forget, but without Gisborne’s dark shadow, there are times when I can push the sad thought to the back of my mind; when I can smile because Allan has said something funny, or laugh when Much has one of his ridiculous rants about the lack of killable wildlife for our evening meal. Yet, unbelievably, I find myself actively missing him.  

It’s ridiculous. I should have killed him ten times over for what he did. But the nagging hollow in my chest won’t go away and, on a particularly long day’s ride along the edge of a forest that could easily have passed for Sherwood, it occurs to me why this is so.

By killing my darling Marian, he’d taken away my reason for living.  Paradoxically, his appearance on the boat had also given it back.  Granted, my days are calmer now he’s not around, but, without him, I have started to feel her less and less.  While Gisborne rode, ate and slept nearby, Marian’s spirit seemed to ebb and flow between the two of us, as if Guy’s presence kept the essence of her alive.  Now, I can feel that ethereal thread starting to fray.  It is inevitable, I suppose, with the passage of time, and they do say that time is a great healer.  But I don’t want to heal.  It feels like a betrayal.

~

We arrive at Le Havre at evenfall. It is too late in the day to make enquiries about a boat to England.  We stable our horses and eat a hurried meal at an inn, after which I order Much, John and Allan to visit every other hostelry and lodging house in Le Havre to check whether Guy is here. I get a few dirty looks for that, but I have to know. When we left the Holy Land, we found ourselves on the same boat as Gisborne and, although meeting him again in similar circumstances would feel like taking a step back in time, I can’t help but hope that history might repeat itself. This time, however, I will offer him a handshake rather than trying to tip him over the side of the boat.