Ever After (12 page)

“T
his is bollocks.”

I grinned, adjusting my sword belt, surprised how comfortable the weight of it felt around my waist after all these years. “Just try to blend in, lass.”

Arabella fidgeted irritably with her tunic. “Easy for you to say. You're all . . .
knightly
and sexy as hell. Is this how you looked when you were a warrior for your people?”

The similarities would've been much greater had I still been covered with the blood and grime from the night before. But the quick shower I'd taken—cursedly
alone
—before we left had somewhat diminished the authenticity.

I shrugged. “More or less.”

Her gaze traveled up and down my body. “Not bad, love. Not bad at all.” She nodded, agreeing with her own pronouncement. “The armor suits you. You're the very picture of a gallant knight, I must say. I've no doubt you stole the heart of many an unsuspecting maiden in Make Believe.” She gave me a dimpled sidelong glance, the heat in her gaze warming the center of my chest. “I wish I'd known you then.”

I was glad she hadn't.

I repressed a shiver as I thought of the person I'd been back then and of the images of war and loss that haunted me every day even still.

“I can't believe you had this already on hand,” she further mused. She felt the chain mail of my hauberk with her fingers. “It feels authentic.”

“It is,” I told her. “My armor from when I was a warrior for my people was lost to me long before you and I met, of course. This is my king's livery. It was what I was wearing when we came over so it traveled with me. Unfortunately, it was a bit outdated for the early nineteenth century, so I've had it in storage. I've only had occasion to wear it when the king holds his annual tournament to celebrate Mab's birthday.”

“I imagine you're a force to be reckoned with,” she mused, her voice carrying a ferocity that made me glance her way.

I hadn't been wrong. There was a fierceness in her eyes as she met my gaze, her head held high. She was
proud
of me, I realized. Intensely
proud
of me. I squared my shoulders, her belief in me affecting me more than I could've imagined. I knew I'd served my commander well as a warrior, had served my king well as a bodyguard, had served my friends and family as well as I could as one who was devoted to them. But to know Arabella believed in me and thought there was something remarkable about me . . . That filled me with a joy that was indescribable.

“I, on the other hand,” Arabella continued on a dramatic sigh, sweeping an arm down the length of her body, “look like a reject from a Disney theme-park casting call.”

I laughed, unable to suppress it. She had a point. In the green tunic, brown leggings, and green suede knee boots she'd procured from her collection of costumes at the theater, Arabella was a caricature of her own story. At least the bow and arrow she carried were her own, a precaution we'd agreed upon before leaving for the Texas Renaissance Festival.

“Remind me again why we couldn't have just come in as attendees,” she demanded, her eyes narrowing at me. “Why did we have to come in costume?”

I offered a courteous nod to a passing performer dressed as a pirate and his shockingly buxom barmaid companion. “Fabrizio said the shield is being used by the jousting troupe as part of their heavy arms demonstration and is kept in their tent during the joust. While they're preoccupied with the performance, we'll just slip into the tent and get the shield.”

“We could do that in normal clothes,” she grumbled.

“Yes,” I conceded, “but if anyone witnesses us entering, they're less likely to think anything of it if we look like we belong there.”

She gave me a doubtful look. “Because I look so knightly, dressed like a prepubescent boy?” she shot back, adjusting her feathered cap. “Why the hell do people think I wore so much freaking
green,
anyway?”

I chuckled. “You're the one who chose the costume. You could've dressed as a barmaid. Or a noblewoman.”

She grunted. “I did the whole noblewoman thing once before, and—”

“You did?” I interrupted, the news halting me in my steps. “When was this?”

She turned back to face me, her mouth opening and closing as if she wasn't quite sure what to say in response to what seemed to me a completely innocuous question. The smile she donned was forced in its guilelessness. “It doesn't matter, does it, love?”

It shouldn't have, but it did. And I couldn't really understand why. There was something about the unexpected news that made me bristle, something in the way she'd immediately shuttered her emotions, trying to hide the truth from me. “Was it before we met?”

She heaved a sigh and pressed her lips together, clearly irritated. “Aye, it was.”

“Why didn't you ever say anything about it?” I asked, following behind her as she turned and strode toward the arena where spectators were gathering for the jousting tournament. “The entire time we were together, I thought you'd been living in poverty, forced to steal in order to survive and help others in need.”

“Do we really need to do this now, Gideon?” she huffed. “Besides, it's not like you weren't keeping any secrets of your own. I didn't realize you were a fairy until the day I fell.”

With that she increased her pace as if trying to outrun the truth.

“Don't run away from me, lass,” I said, closing the gap between us in a single stride and taking hold of her arm, gently pulling her to a stop. “Not from
me
.” She glanced away, averting her eyes as she wrestled with indecision. I gently took hold of her chin and turned her face toward me. “You never need hide anything from
me
.”

She raised her gaze to mine, her long dark lashes wet with tears. “I'm not hiding it, love. It just . . .”

I smoothed her chin with my thumb, realizing the memory that haunted her was a painful one. I, of all people, could understand that. “Then we won't speak of it, lass. There's no need.”

I released her and started walking again. A moment later, I felt her at my side. Her emotions were twisting at her painfully, so I was surprised when she said, “After my mother died, I fled to the woods, hungry, afraid. A nobleman by the name of Locksley found me wandering and took me in. He and his lady wife loved me as another daughter. They became my new family and I loved them with all my heart. When I was sixteen years old, a Tale came to visit. A recent acquaintance of Lord Locksley, Sir Guy of Gisbourne was handsome, charming. Everyone believed him to be honorable and noble, but he took advantage of a young woman's naïveté then left her heartbroken—and with child.”

I shook my head, confused. “But you were still a maiden when we met. I remember well our first night together.”

Her expression softened and she placed a hand upon my cheek. “As do I,” she said with a smile. “It wasn't I who was harmed. It was the one who'd been like a sister to me—Lady Marian.”

“Maid Marian,” I murmured as pieces of the Robin Hood story fell into place. I knew Arabella hadn't had another lover—man or woman—prior to me. But I'd never thought to ask who the source of the fabled Maid Marian was. “What happened to her?”

Arabella's eyes clouded with sadness. “Lord Locksley was determined to defend the honor of his daughter and wanted Gisbourne to care for her and the child. But Gisbourne refused. And, like the coward he was, he sent his men to answer Locksley's challenge. My adopted father fought valiantly, but he was outnumbered. And my lady mother . . .” She blinked away the tears and turned to resume our trek to the arena. When she felt my presence beside her, she continued, “Lady Locksley sent Marian and me into the woods to hide while she stayed behind to draw the men away and give us a chance to save ourselves.”

I could well imagine the brutality that Lady Locksley must've suffered at the hands of Gisbourne's men. I'd seen far too many acts of such violence committed against my own people by thieves and raiders to have any illusions about her treatment. “I'm very sorry.”

Arabella took a deep breath and let it out slowly before she said, “Marian and I were left with nothing and no one but ourselves. As she was with child, I took to stealing to keep us alive. I learned to fight out of necessity to keep the other thieves in the woods from harming us. Fortunately for us, there was still honor among thieves and some of the men came to our aid and we banded together. They looked on us as their little sisters and offered their protection—for a price, of course. It turned out I was rather adept at thievery and damned good with a bow, so I planned the jobs, kept us off the gallows, and let them keep a share of the haul. But because I'd been left with nothing twice in my life before I'd even seen eighteen years, I insisted that part of what we stole had to be given to the needy. Eventually, I became the leader of my ragtag band, my so-called
merry men.
”

“And Marian?” I prompted.

Arabella lifted her chin a little as if attempting to defy the sadness threatening to overcome her. “Marian was not meant for such a life,” she said after a moment. “She was fragile. She didn't survive the birth of her daughter. I took the baby to a couple in the nearby village who I knew had been unable to have a child of their own.”

Arabella's sorrow was so intense in spite of her efforts to rein it in that it struck me in the chest, making my own heart ache. I wanted nothing more than to take her in my arms, hold her until the pain eased. But I knew that kind of pain would never go away—I'd lost enough of those I'd loved to know that for fact. Even so, I wanted to give her my love, lend her my strength, soothe her wounded heart. But when I reached for her hand, she increased her pace, her fingers slipping from my grasp.

“The tournament is about to start,” she said, nodding toward the arena where the performers were preparing for their demonstrations. “Now's our chance.”

“Arabella,” I called after her, the rebuff stinging more than I cared to admit.

She turned and spread her arms as she continued to walk backward, forcing a smile that was laced with mischief as only hers could be, bringing that adorable dimple to the corner of her mouth. But her smile lacked its usual carelessness. “Coming?”

I caught up to her just as she reached the tent opening and pulled back the flap to enter. It was at that moment that I felt the prickling of danger at the back of my neck. My hand shot out to grasp her wrist and roll her out of the way, blocking her with my body.

Pain exploded in my side as the assailant's dagger struck my surcoat and hauberk but the ache in my kidney was immediately dulled by the adrenaline that blazed in my veins. I dove into the tent in time to see a hooded figure dressed as an Old World executioner ripping through the canvas on the other side, a heavy shield under his arm.

As I charged after him, I heard Arabella calling my name, her voice heavy with fear, but I wasn't about to let the bastard get away with the shield. My legs pumped, the chausses I wore adding extra weight and slowing me down, but I gained quickly, pouring on a burst of speed to close the last couple of yards between us, diving forward to take him down to the ground.

Quick to recover, the bastard brought up his elbow, cracking me in the cheek hard enough to make me loosen my hold on his jacket, giving him just enough room to swing the heavy shield around as we rolled and smash it into my head. Thank God the mail coif I wore kept the edge of the shield from cracking open my skull.

The Executioner quickly scrambled to his feet and made for the tree line, but I was on him again in an instant, drawing my sword as I gave chase. Realizing the futility of trying to outrun me, the Executioner suddenly halted and whirled around to face me, swinging a heavy axe as he turned.

I saw the blow coming just in time to leap back. With a roar of rage, I attacked. He managed to bring up the axe and block the downswing of my sword, but it sent him staggering backward. I offered no quarter. I brought my sword down in a savage arc, only to be blocked by the shield the Executioner carried. Undaunted, I delivered another blow and another, each time knocking him further off-balance and weakening his defense.

But the man in the mask was no amateur and was certainly no Renaissance festival performer who'd only met an enemy in the carefully choreographed arena of a mock battle. He was a seasoned warrior, his defense against my attack skilled and patient. I could see in every movement that he was biding his time, waiting for me to reveal a weakness, to leave a vulnerable area unprotected.

And just when I began to think his strength was failing, the powerful blows of my sword nearly forcing him to his knees, he surged upward with his shield, deflecting my attack at the last second and swinging his axe with the other arm. With no shield to defend myself, the blade of his axe landed in my side; the chain mail held against the axe's sharp edge, but the force of the blow sent a wave of agony through my entire body and brought me down to one knee with a guttural cry.

Before I could rise or return the attack, the Executioner tossed his shield aside and snatched the coif from my head to grab a fistful of my hair. But the smirk I could feel lurking behind his mask died when he jerked my head back and got a good look at me.

“Fuck me,” he cried out.

I snatched the dagger from my boot and drove it up into his abdomen in one quick motion. He immediately released me and staggered back, clutching at his belly, blood dripping through his fingers. The axe he'd carried slipped from his other hand to fall, unheeded, onto the grass.

My grip on the hilt of my sword tightened as I got to my feet and rushed forward to finish him off, but sudden applause brought me to a halt. I'd been so intent on reclaiming the shield and taking out the Executioner, I hadn't even noticed that a crowd had gathered around us as we'd fought, no doubt thinking our engagement was another mock battle for their entertainment.