Sherwood Shenanigans, Part III of III

[queenofmay]

It takes all her will power not to run. Every faintly quickened, but not running, step toward her room. Which she knows anyone she passes will take as her running away from the Sheriff's hands. When it is far more directed in running to.

To the door of her room, which she locked without slamming. To the pile of clothes hidden under her mattress, the candles not even lit. To her Night Watchman costume, which goes on, as the dress gets thrown on the bed. It could be dealt with later. Coiling her hair quickly, as her mask dangled from a strap between her pressed lips. Her hair might end up far more knotted, but that could be dealt with later, too.


Then Marian was back at her door, beginning to push the mask up past her chin, as she looked down the dark hallway to the left.

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[queenofmay]

"No." It's not a snipe. It's so flat as to almost be apologetic, staring at his hair in the darkness as he shook his head, listening to a quiet desperation she hoped never to hear from him. Not here, and not for her, and not as necessity to himself.

Marian took a breath in, pushing it right back out her nose and making her shoulders, in the span of his hands, sink slowly down from ram rod straight. The exhaustion of hours wearing through, the shock of him knowing bleeding off it's first staggering blow. "You cannot keep me out of my own life."

Because they are calling it two different things, that it is, with only one foundation to their word now.

And if Robin and her father never could stop her?

And if it did involve her father so far below, a week unknown?

[the_seafarer]

It isn't as though he doesn't know Marian can handle herself. He'd never willingly try a test of skill with her; he might be taller, stronger, but her abilities demand respect.

In a fight, she can deal as well as anyone who might come after her, but the thought of her being caught, clear proof of her involvement with Robin's men, turns his blood to ice.

But there's nothing for it: this is her world, her life, and he is absolutely dependent on her to return home. His hands loosen but do not lift from her shoulders, and he meets her eyes with his own rueful.

"All right. We'll make for the stables, find Kiseki." He pauses, and when he goes on, his voice is not unkind.

"Is there anything at all we can do for your father?"

[queenofmay]

Her jaw tightened briefly, but she didn't go still even if her eyes left his. To his arm, to somewhere between. Somewhere. Else. She can't look at him. Can't. And it is struggle to make words work there, when it is a struggle to stand near him and speak.

The only related words to her father in a week have been pleading to a man who gets the greatest satisfaction in having a reason to have her grovel at his feet. To have her standing in a corner like a song bird, knowing she won't fight back. For that solitary reason. The price is too high.

Even when it only strengthens her resolve. And desperation.


"I cannot tell you every single time The Sheriff threatens to do something to me, to any of us." She doesn't care if she's talking his arm near one of her shoulders. If she can't look at him, she can at least try to give him something.

"Half the time it is only that. Threats. Greater and greater threats. The earned fear is a great motivator to his aims where it comes to most people." She. She -- they aren't most people, she doesn't say.


Nor that 'the other half of the time,' is all cut tongues or hands, and poisoned people, and dead men swinging. That Nottingham has no other other half either. Except. Except the ribbon of hope being cut by Robin through the center slowly.

[the_seafarer]

If she will not look at him, at least she'll speak, though the question she answers is not the one he'd just asked. His hands are warm on her shoulders, his eyes are on her face, watching the play and flicker of emotions as they cross her features.

No. She cannot always tell him; he has no right to expect that she'd tell him anything but what she wished to. How could he, when he is so completely cut off from this world and all it's troubles? Wishing to help does not give him the ability to make it possible.

And yet -- and yet this is not a threat against people he may sympathize for but will never meet. It isn't an idle warning, intended to terrorize villagers.

"This is not an idle threat," he says, gentle. "You don't have to tell me, but, Marian, neither do you have to be alone in this."

[queenofmay]

"It is my fault he's there."


The amount of effort and emotion in those very small words, means her shoulders draw in and she steps away from him. At least from his touch. But she doesn't walk anywhere. There's nowhere to go. There's nowhere she can outrun that.

[the_seafarer]

"It is not."

When she turns, he lets her go, and he might not go after her, but neither does he move away.

"It's the Sheriff's fault. He is to blame for all of this. Not you. Never you."

It's the Sheriff who hurts the people he's meant to protect and says it's in the name of punishment for their wrongdoing, the Sheriff who imprisons unfairly and doles out vindictive rulings where he will. Marian can't be blamed for his actions. She may be the reason, but it is not her fault.

Not that he believes she will ever accept that.

[queenofmay]

No, she made a choice. She took a risk. A direct stand against The Sheriff. For Robin's life. Even if she'll claim aloud it might have been for both men. She made that choice. To defy him, so openly, before the whole of Locksley Village. Trusting, idiotically and arrogantly, she was safe.

And maybe she was. Still untouched a week later. But he'd done well to slam his point home into her heart for choosing to correct him, for calling his choice a mistake. Her eyes when she looked back at Caspian were a riot of all those emotions.



"It was only an hour after it happened the time-" She nodded, barely, trying to mean the day it happened. Filing in, with only thing she can think to shove there instead. "-the day you arrived in Milliways, again."

"It's only been a few days since." As though each hour doesn't have more weight. She keeps forcing the words, as though it's not a knife cutting through her. Hard straight lines in her face, as she looks to her bed or her window, not crossing her arms, hands curled.

Harder yet. To not let her voice flicker for the last words.

"I haven't seen him since that day. There are orders against it."

[the_seafarer]

She doesn't need to explain herself to him, will never need to explain herself to him, but he listens anyway, because she seems to need to tell him.

Even if the look in her eyes makes his heart contract and ache for her.

"He seemed well."

It's all he can offer her, a tiny thing to cling to, but, mayhaps, something. Anything.

"As well as could be. And Sir Guy has been bringing him food."

[queenofmay]

She'd argue if he'd said that. The sound of his voice after her question. The way he'd pulled away. Even if she has now, she isn't. Contradictory, but true. All of it.



And Guy. Clinging to his first words even as they went unanswered, she frowned with a bitter, sharp edge thinking about his last ones. "He said he would two days ago."

Right there at that door where they came in.

"I hadn't thought to ask him since." She shook her head.

"Maybe some part of him actually feels remorse-" And, oh, but these word are icy ironic and almost mean, with no faith to them. "-for standing there and doing absolutely nothing while my father was carted off as the price for keeping his own life."

Two. Two for one. They were both alive. And he had walked away. Not even saying a single thing to her after The Sheriff turned on her.

[the_seafarer]

He won't presume to know what Sir Guy might be thinking or what his motivations are, and he's not inclined to better his opinion of the man though he'd helped Caspian escape. The hearts of men and what good or evil they might accomplish are nothing he has ever been able to understand, though he'd swear that most are capable of great deeds of both.

The bitterness in Marian's words, therefore, he does not argue or attempt to cheer away, but there is nothing they can do to help her father tonight, and they must be quick if they hope to avoid capture.

"Marian," he says, gentle, "I am sorry for your father, for you, and everything you've lost. But I fear the guards will soon discover my escape, and will begin searching. If there is nothing we can do to aid your father, we must leave as soon as we can."

[queenofmay]

It's easier for her not to pay attention to, or at least not to let in far enough, all the words he chooses to say first. Apologies she can't let in. Because he's right about the rest of it. They only have so much time.

She's had her room search for prisoners before.

One she was even hiding in her bed. Once.



He says we and she feels the snap. The taut line between herself and some spot so many floors beneath her. She can only go so far. But that doesn't have to be said yet. He'll probably realize it.

"To the stables. Kiseki should be fine." Should. She hopes. She can't know. These are things she's rarely had to think about, when she's concerned with people's lives first and foremost. She doesn't pick her mask back up, but she the skill half cover back up from where it's lain around her throat this whole time.

Turning to blow out the candle near her, even as she nodded him toward the door.

[the_seafarer]

He nods, doesn't say anything else or try to distract or deter her. He needs her guidance to reach the stables, to reach a door that will bring him back home again, and she needs to stay safely unsuspected.

At least she's wearing her Nightwatchman guise: no one would think it to be her at a single glance.

Luck seems to be with them as they creep silently out the door: he waits for Marian to check the hall before walking quiet as a cat along the stone flags.

If this quiet will only last, they may have a chance.

[queenofmay]

No one ever does. Even when she's standing right in front of people who saw her during the day, when she's standing in front of men who think they know all that she is and can be. They have to be shown.

The second candle goes, and the room instantly inky black. A space she knows by its paces already, because she crosses it, and heads for the door. Letting dim light stream in, before she's nodding and leading him actually back the way he probably came form.

She's incredibly quiet. She's done this before. Knows where to stop, to look around. To hold up a hand, pausing for a passing person around the corner, walking down a hall. Seeming not even to breathe as she listens to foot steps slowly, boredly stomping away from them.

[the_seafarer]

She's silent as a shadow, a dim shade slipping easily over the stones, and he tries, but it's fortunate that here there are no twigs to break, no horses to spook, no men to startle and yell. Still, he can be reasonably quiet, though his boots are heavier than hers and his steps nowhere near as soundless.

They pause to listen as someone walks near, then away, and when Marian moves forward, he follows, as closely as he can.

[queenofmay]

It's not a short trip, really. They have to cross the castle, and they need to end up two floors down. At least the fact it is morning, means it's really easy to slide through the darkness. If she were alone she'd go faster. If he was any more certain than isn't, than he has no reason to be, she'd go faster.

If he were Robin. Who'd several times chased her, careless and young, through all of these halls. But he isn't. This is No Man's Land for him. And he isn't all that bad. Even though she could probably tell he was coming at her from a hallway away if they weren't together.

He was careful, though, and well meaning. He didn't bump her, and anything else in the hallways. He could really be a whole lot worse, in ways he wasn't. In some part, she's incredibly glad he isn't good at this. Shouldn't be. Never should need to be.

If she can get him home. She'll have to send him back to Robin. Take him? Direct him? Trust Much to speak for him, if she doesn't go herself? Sit up half the night, worrying about where he ended up in the wild of Sherwood, that he only knew by one late summer's day light.

She paused on the bottom of the steps, looking down one of the more used hallways. It was quiet. But she learned not to trust even the quiet in the last six years.

[the_seafarer]

Even in the midst of all this pressure pushing down on them, magnifying every sound and deepening every shadow, he can't help but be impressed by the way she moves, the confidence in every step. She really does know this place like the back of her hand; she knows how to move silently, quickly.

If he weren't here, he imagines she'd be at the stables already.

They hesitate at the bottom of a flight of stairs, pressed close against the wall, cold seeping through his clothing from the stone, and he waits, watching her, eyes flicking back and forth between her and the hall they're paused at.

[queenofmay]

Like a shadow with a tail. There are places she could duck if she were alone, she can't right now. But it's fine. She keeps telling herself that as though every nerve isn't heightened by the danger to Caspian. The fact she needs to make this right.

Before it can get any worse than what she's already gotten him into in less than a day.


She waited. Ten second. Thirty second. For something, that in the end, she doesn't end up hearing, so she edges out with a look back to him and nod to which way she's going. Which will be straight across the hallway, toward another corridor. She hates open spaces alone.

Marian actually feels a spike of fear hedging them with another.

But it panned out. No sound, no sudden footsteps. Of all the nights to actually end up getting lucky for there not to be people posted. Or who might have fallen asleep or wandered off. Lucky, regardless.

Then it's another corridor, and out on to walkways that are opened on the sides, headed toward the stables. The scent of warm summer air, mixed with hay reaching them before the last turn even. It's not a front entrance. It's for stableboys, coming to and fro, but she can guess it won't be watched given the hour.

[the_seafarer]

They wait for a long, long moment -- it may only be thirty seconds, but it feels like five dragging minutes when nerves are as sensitive as they are right now -- but finally, Marian nods, and he follows her, moving as quietly as he can, down the corridor and along another and then out once more, into open air.

He can smell hay and horses; it makes him think of the tour he'd taken with Kate, when all of this would have seemed impossible.

They move quickly across the square, uneven stones, and duck into the warmth of the stables, where horses move sleepily, making soft noises and lashing their tails in lazy half-circles.

He's looking for the bay with the white star on its forehead.

[queenofmay]

She knows, moves slowly through one side of the room. It's about as large as Milliways. Horses for work, horses for show, horses for riding. Horses enough for the entire guard retinue to ride out without inconveniencing any of the first three.

It's only when she spots a familiar enough colored nose, dark and irritable snort, as if to ask what took her so long, that Marian quickened her pace. Her feet siding faintly harder on the stones, as she hissed, a quiet, non-description noise for Caspian's attention.


Because the tack beside the stall with her unnamed brute, had a sword hanging with it.

[the_seafarer]

He's searching, looking along the stalls for a familiar brown nose and a wicker he knows well when a faint sound from Marian catches his attention.

Joining her, his eyes follow her nod, and he steps forward, a weight lifting from his heart as his fingers trace lightly over the lion's head of the pommel, the hard leather grip. He'd know the sword Gimli the Dwarf made him out of a thousand such blades.

Thank the Lion.

It's no use taking the tack before they find the horse meant to go with it, but he hears a heavy body shifting in the stall across the way, and when he goes to look, it's Kiseki's mild eyes that he meets, looking at him reproachfully.

"My apologies, old friend," he whispers, relieved and smiling.

How they'll get him back to the bar is another problem, but at least this first is solved.

[queenofmay]

Marian spun about suddenly, facing the direction of another line of stalls, shoulders instantly rigid even for the fast follow and slower flutter of her cloak after her. Eyes, blue-grey, wide right over the dark swath of silk covering half get her face, scanning the space. 


She thought. For a moment. That she heard. 

[the_seafarer]

He hears her turn, and looks over his shoulder to see her looking around. Frowning, he lifts his eyebrows in a silent question.

Next to him, Kiseki nudges at his arm; he turns back to lift the latch, carefully, quietly, testing it.

It's heavy, but quiet enough, and he leaves to step next to Marian, still near Kiseki's tack.

"What is it?"

[queenofmay]

She doesn't wave him off or shush him, but she doesn't answer. It's like the room suddenly has too many noises, even for how quiet it is. Even for how few voices but how many warm bodies, moving, swishing. Different registers though.

Nothing. Horses. Nothing. Caspian. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Marian stepped toward the center of the aisle, head up, if all of her still concealed, by the long cloak, by the mask. Steps nearly silent. Until she made a small clicking noise with her tongue, against the top of her mouth. Something that Caspian would quite recognize from the morning even. The unnamed horse behind her does, even, stirring and stamping irritably.


Her shoulder still frozen, head tilted for --


And then she was off. Across the small passage between rows of stalls, to another one. Where and It can't be colliding with equal force, neither enough to stop her steps from being very much just this side of a mad running dash, a shadow fleeing into further shadows.

[the_seafarer]

He can't shout, so he does the next best thing, gives chase through the neat labyrinth of stalls.

She'd clucked, like she was calling her horse, but the unnamed stallion and Kiseki were right there.

What did she hear that he did not recognize?

[queenofmay]

He isn't expecting it. He has a horse with an open gate. He doesn't know where the halls twist. He isn't anymore near her first thoughts in this second.




And what he'll find when he does, might be an image he should keep tucked in his book for all time, of things Marian does not do, does not show.



A woman, wrapped in the colors of a shadow, with almost every inch of herself plastered against a stall door, as though by her force of will she might go straight through, head driven against the cheek and jowl of a white mare, shoulder tucked under her great head.

Having still not made a single sound, even for how tight her face in pressed, and how one of her arms is thrown about as far as she can reach over the stall door, across the neck and white-beige hair. Not even her breath races in this silence, as she breathes one of the most known scents in her world.



Not once has Milliways seen her throw herself at any horse, even her own.






Or maybe, it is simply the other way around. Maybe it is Milliways, in five years, that has never once seen Marian with her horse.