'In which nobody really celebrates Valentines Day'
This story contains spoilers for the finale
Authors Note: So all of the Valentines day stuff coming out at the moment got me thinking about a Robin Hood oneshot, which then got me thinking about the couples, which then got me thinking about the finale, which resulted in this rather a-typical look into Valentines day. Not your typical, joyous, fluffy fic. I might write one of those too, I'm a sucker for fluff. But this was what the plot bunnies told me to write, and they cannot be ignored.
And yes, I know they didn't have Valentines Day or Hallmark back then. Just read and enjoy the fact that this is fanfiction and I can be as anachronistic as I like. If it makes you feel better imagine this is a nice medieval holiday, like May Day or something.
Also, and I only just realised this too, but over here Valentines Day is a nice, warm day in the middle of summer. Just bear in mind the Southern Hemisphere climate when you read this. Otherwise it won't work.
Robin
It was quiet when he awoke. This in itself was not unusual. Since arriving back from their exertions in the Holy Land the camp was often, always, quiet. Where before there had been laughter, singing, the soft breath of a knife on wood, the energetic hum of sword practice now there was simply four men trying not to tread on one another's toes. Much didn't mutter to himself as he cooked now, griping about this and that in his familiar way, he just made dinner, passed it around and moved away, so that no one could mention the fact that everything tasted different without Saracen spices and herbs.
Little John had always been fairly quiet, but he had made himself heard when he felt strongly about something, his noise then making up for any amount of silence surrounding it. But in this new environment, this foreign world that they had returned too there was no place for feeling strongly. Before they left the ever pressing need to fight the sheriff had given them reason for passion and emotion. But following his failure in the Holy Land he had taken his time to regroup, leaving the outlaws with little to do other than shuttle information back to the King, who was consolidating his position slowly and surely, secretly manoeuvring for a battle that would still be a long time coming.
Allan's silence had been missed over a year ago, in a different time and place, where the two people most hurt by it were still here, living in the camp. Now there was still silence where once there had been laughter and playfulness, but what could be done to fix it? Betrayal still hung faintly in the air, a quiet sense of distrust lingering in the forest. Djaq could have solved it, maybe, she was quick to forgive, to see the good and overlook the greed. To trust Allan enough that he could once again act as he once had, fall back into the position he had once held. Will too, perhaps, could work this magic, for it was his friendship, his handshake that had given Allan the faith that he could rejoin, that he could redeem himself. But the gang that slunk through the forest on its return from the Holy Land was not that same group Allan had longed to rejoin, it was a broken man and his three lost followers, wondering what to do in a world that seemed, for the moment, to no longer need them.
And so the camp remained quiet, edgy and sullen. What Robin found strange that morning was not the silence, but rather the fact that no one was in the camp. A plate of breakfast sat by a fire that still steamed slightly, as though it were only put out within in the hour, but John, Allan and Much were no where to be seen.
Robin wondered, briefly, what this gesture meant. His men were too good to simply get up and unanimously abandon him, especially Much, who knew him too well to believe that he was any less grief stricken now than he had been two months ago when they bordered a boat, leaving his heart and soul behind them in a sandy grave.
He thought of Marian as often as he breathed. They had erected a stone almost as soon as they arrived home, between her parents, the father who had only just out lived her, and the mother she had barely known. The Sheriff, though not actively pursuing the outlaws at the moment, had made the effort to place a guard near this stone, a spiteful mockery of Robin grief. Their few scouting missions to Nottingham revealed that he was increasingly furious at the fresh flowers that arrived at her grave every day.
It was only after he was dressed, preparing to go and collect today's blooms, that Robin realised why his men had all disappeared. For today was of course that holiday which lovers had enjoyed for so long, would continue celebrating for the rest of time.
He had only celebrated the holiday once, back when he was still just Robin, and she was Marian, and Lords and Ladies were friends of their parents and the edges of propriety could be tested gently, because they were little more than children.
He had picked her up just after dawn, laughingly throwing rocks through her window to surprise her. She had bested him though, climbing out her window fully dressed seconds after he arrived, as though daring him to think that he could ever have a thought that she did not share. He had picked her flowers from a grove perilously perched on the wrong side of the river that ran through the forest, nearly drowning in the process, and after she stopped shouting at him for his stupidity she had worn one in her hair for the rest of the day. He had kissed her goodnight at her bedroom windowsill, and there had been no doubt in his mind that he ever wanted to spend this day with anyone other than her.
The next year he spent the day covered in dust and sand and blood, sweating and stabbing in a furious battle while she sat alone on a riverside, staring at a grove of unreachable flowers.
This year the guards were surprised to note that the flowers adorning Lady Marian's grave were not only more spectacular than any that had previously been placed there, but that they were also slightly damp.
No one back at the camp questioned Robin when he returned that evening, eyes puffy and red, with a small pink flower tucked gently behind his ear.
Djaq
There was a holiday that Will had explained to her last year, on a day when Robin had seemed particularly antsy that he couldn't see Marian in the castle, and Little John had done rather a lot of muttering and grumping, and Allan had sent the two of them curious looks all day. He hadn't been totally clear, simply stating that it was a day when people who were very fond of one another spent time together, often giving each other flowers and the like. A day specially sequestered just for people to show their love for one another.
She had been quite touched by the idea, for there was no formal day for informal expression of feeling in her own country, just discussions among prospective in-laws that ultimately led to matches that were unbalanced and generally unhappy.
It didn't occur to her until the next morning that she had spent the entire day with Will without even noticing.
This year the holiday was once again passing without her having a chance to involve herself in it.
Djaq considered it somewhat ironic that she had spent two years in England spending a fair amount of her time wishing she could be home, missing her friends, her birds, the hot blast of air that sucked her breath away whenever she stepped outside in the middle of the day. She had missed being Safia, her soft bed, the scorching feel of sand against her bare feet, the way the wind rustled against the house during sand storms, the spicy intensity of her favourite foods.
Now though, now that she had all of those things that she had been pining for for so long she found herself missing other things, even more intensely than she had missed her childhood home. This place felt as foreign to her as if she had never been there before. She had forgotten customs that had once been second nature, and found herself flushing with embarrassment whenever she stepped beyond her cultures expectations.
She had longed for her soft bed, but found herself unable to sleep on it after growing used to her slab in the camp. The friends she had wished to see for so long were total strangers now, unable to understand the time she had spent as a slave, her choices in England, her assumption of Djaq's identity. She had imagined them sharing a grief that none of the outlaws could really understand, but she had been met with underlying enmity, an unspoken questioning of whether she was worth Djaq dying for. She found herself hating the sand-blasted heat and wishing for the misery of constant rain to which she had grown so used.
Moving back here was supposed to be a chance to spend more time with Will, to see him in a context where they weren't brothers in arms, but two people desperately in love, an engaged couple with eyes only for one another. But that too had not gone the way she planned. He lived basically under house arrest, unable to really leave the safety of Baslam's [Baltham? Basaam? The Pigeon Guy house because of the hostility of those outdoors, who hated the English without distinction. Rules of courtship interrupted their few moments together, and the wedding that they were trying to arrange kept being stalled by 'well meaning' 'old friends' who spent vast reserves of energy trying to convince Djaq of the infamy of her choice.
There would be no 'valentines' for her today, no chance of picnics and laughing, she caught a brief glimpse of a tired looking Will at breakfast, appreciating the effort he made to look happy while she was around, before being rushed off to visit relatives she had never heard of, or cared to hear of. Will had, as he often was, been shunned from the invitation.
She was angry and tired, and stung by the prejudice of people who shared her blood when she lay down on her bed that night, hoping to dream of all the English people who would be exchanging beautiful flowers with one another.
Instead she dreamed of the man who had left the carved wooden rose on her pillow.
Little John
They had evacuated from the camp almost as soon as the sun began to touch the sky, wanting to leave Robin to grieve in private. He left Allan and Much behind once they were out of sight of the camp. They were perceptive enough to know that he had reason so grieve as well.
He had proposed on this day, more than ten years ago now. Before any of the rest of the gang were old enough to consider the opposite sex, he had been down on one knee in a flower-brushed field asking for the hand of a beautiful woman.
She had laughed delightedly, and given him a grin that had an exasperated hint to it, as though she had been waiting patiently for a long time for the words that he had finally been brave enough to speak. He had always been the shy one around her. Liking her from afar for almost a year before finally asking to court her, courting her for months longer than anyone else in the village did before proposing.
His proposal had been garbled and rushed, after spending the whole day trying to make things perfect rain had been threatening by the time he got around to actually asking. She had to shout her acceptance over the boom of thunder, and by the time they got back to the town both had been soaked through. He dropped her at her door to inform her parents of the news, though he had already spoiled the surprise by asking their permission the day before.
Four years later he had spent their special day sprinting through the forest with the intention of disappearing forever, after a rather fortuitous cart crash gave him a chance to escape a hangman's noose. There had been no chance to say goodbye, no lengthy teary moments to spend together, just the sound of soldiers bashing on their door and his frantic last stand against them. She had been visiting her parents, had come back to the news that he had been taken away and hung for stealing food that they had been desperate for.
He wondered what she had done in the years following that day, whether being caught in a thunderstorm made her think of him, whether she locked herself in her home on their day and never came out, because the thought of him dead was too painful for her to bear. He wondered whether his son had been told the story of their engagement, of his father's nervousness and his mother's will power. Of the rain and the laughter, of the joy that had filled their home after they stood in the church and said 'I do'.
It wasn't raining today, the sun was shining brightly, and there were few clouds in the sky. It was a day that seemed to scream for people to be happy, to enjoy themselves, to not think about lost loves, and lost time.
To not think about confessions made in a barn to a group of people also lost to him now.
He wondered, as he stood up, trying to get feeling back into his feet after a day spent staring at Locksley Village, if she still considered this to be their day too, or whether she was now eating a special dinner with the man who she had decided to give all the rest of her days to as well.
Ok, so, there's my little Valentines Day story, it's a little early but there you go. I'd rather post it now than forget about it. Hope you liked it, I know it was a bit different, but I'm still, STILL, reeling from how miserable the finale made me, so I thought I would write a slightly sadder story.
Next chapter of Subterfuge should be up soon too, so keep a look out. Thanks guys!!!!