The Forgotten Keepsake

Chapter 1

(Runs parallel to events of Series 2 up until Episode 11 - Treasure of the Nation.)

(Disclaimer: all BBC Robin Hood characters and the show are the property of the BBC and Tiger Aspect Productions)

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Helps me keep going with my writing.
Cheers

I

Sir Guy of Gisborne had to admit that this was a low point even for him.

He was no stranger to feeling low; in fact working for the Sheriff provided him with no shortage of things to be brought low about but this, well, this misery was acute - affecting him as it did on so many levels.

Jilted at the Altar.

Punched in the face.

Left standing there in front of the congregation, wincing in pain, smarting at the humiliation, as she rode off into the sunset with Robin Hood.

Christ, it was enough to drive a man to drink. Except that, he had been there, done that and wrecked his room in the process. Now he was in the 'sit amongst the ruins of it all whilst picking at the scabs of your wounded pride' phase.

He was not a good man and he knew it. No, he was not the man Marian wanted him to be.

At some point in his life, he had overstepped a line. Then another. And another. But at the mercy of men who didn't give a second thought to lines there had been no other way. And what of King Richard and Robin Hood? Did they care about the lines they had crossed whilst slaughtering Saracens in the Holy Land?

And now Marian was in the forest. With Hood. Repaying him in kind for 'rescuing her'.

He could hardly bear it.

But what to do?

He sat on the floor of his destroyed room brooding and had been doing this for quite some time when he heard Vaisey yelling at someone in the corridor. He was about to rouse himself to see what was going on when he noticed something glittering under his bed. He glanced nervously towards the door, wondering if the Sheriff was about to barge in on him at any moment but upon hearing no further commotion, gave a sigh of relief and craned his neck to discern what the object could be. He scrambled over towards the bed, hastily shifting the debris of various broken possessions to one side, and after grasping wildly for a brief spell pulled it up to the light to get a better look at it.

He recognised instantly what it was - his mother's old hairclip. His lips creased into a wan smile as he turned it over in his fingers.

Ah Gisborne, what would she had made of all this?

It was a bad state of affairs and no mistake. Certainly not a wedding to make a mother proud - it was better she had not lived to see it. Indeed, there was not much in his life these days that would have made either of his parents proud, he thought bitterly.

He gently placed the clip upon the nightstand along with other items sacred to him; not even his keepsake box had been spared from his destructive temper this time, he realised sighing dejectedly. Perhaps he could somehow reattach the lid to it... He fiddled with it briefly to see if it was fixable but quickly gave up and sank back down upon the floor in a frustrated huff. It was then he felt something dig hard into his buttock. He leapt up with a yelp and cursing in a very un-knightly fashion looked to see what he had sat on.

It was a stone.

A pebble.

Bloody hell it hadn't felt like a pebble though! He looked at it for a split second before throwing it across the room in a fit of temper.

Wait a minute...

A stone? What...? What are stones doing on his floor? Those bloody servants... Can't a man get decent help to do the cleaning these days...?

He frowned and looked at the chaos around him and then remembered that he hadn't let anyone in to clean these last few days. In fact, he hadn't let anyone in at all - preferring to stew in his misery and self-destructive carnage. So who had traipsed stones in? He looked to see if there were more lying around but no, just the one it seemed.

Wait...

Could it be...?

He rushed over in the direction he had thrown it and after a brief search found it lying near the chest of drawers. He picked it up and turned it over in his fingers.

Yes.

Yes, little stone - I remember you.