"He took her in his arms and knew looking into her eyes that he never wanted to let go, after years of being away, after months of her denying what she felt he knew in that moment that the years hadn't changed a thing, they were just as they were when they were young and in love, before the war, before he left. He knew she would no longer fight her feelings towards him when it was only the two of them, he knew that he would want to spend the rest of his life with her and she with him.

Now unlike many of the stories you have heard they weren't perfect, they fought, they yelled, they didn't always get along. She always spoke her mind to him, and he always joked with her pretending to never take her seriously. She was strong willed and so was he, so much the same person they were far from right together, but yet the perfect match. While he was a hot head, she thought things through, when his temper got the best of him she was the only one that could keep it under control.

Yet they were in love, when they looked into each others eyes they knew they had found the person god had laid on the earth for them to find."

"So does that mean they lived happy?" asked a little girl with brown eyes and brown hair from her bed. She looked at her father loving the stories he shared with her for as long as she could remember. He made up a story for her at the start of every week and finished it by the end of the week. The story was always about the same people, just different adventures. The man looked at his daughter and smiled,

"Yes, they lived Happy, for what could be happier then true love, that god himself planned?"

"Well I don't know daddy." The little girl giggled looking at him

"They were the stuff of legend." He said softly as he kissed the little girls for head, "now its late and way past the time you should already be asleep so that's enough with the story for tonight and it is time for you to sleep my love" he said to her.

His wife and the mother of the child watched from the door way of their daughters room, just like her daughter she loved to hear the stories, not only because they were romantic, but because it allowed her to see the side of her husband she never knew was there. The way he spoke in his stories made it seem like he believed in that kind of love. The kind that only God himself could make, but the husband she knew didn't seem to believe in love. While the two were married they were far from in love, they only married because she became pregnant with their daughter and he did the right thing and made an honest women of her.

As she watched her husband she watched his face, watched the kind soft look that happened only when he was with his daughter, or when he spoke the stories that both girls loved so much. She didn't know how a man like her husband, a hardened farmer could get so much emotion from his mind, how he could make up stories that seemed to real, that made you really fall in love with the characters. Yet who wouldn't love a dashing hero that gives up a life of leisure to be an outlaw to enforce the law himself along with his men that would do anything to protect him? And of course the beautiful maiden that loved him and he her.

The man got up from the side of his daughter's bed and turned to see his wife, his face left the kind soft expression it had from talking to his daughter and telling the story.

"Kahlan, I'm heading out" he mumbled to his wife as he walked by her, she didn't say anything to him only nodded her head. She never tried to stop him from going to drink every night, he kept a roof over their head from his hard days of working and if he wanted to get a few drinks then she wouldn't stop him. She trusted he wouldn't stray from their marriage and she knew he didn't. Most nights when he came back from getting his drinks he came back to her in their bed, she would make him as happy as she could and he would sleep. She wondered half the time if he could even remember the nights he spent with her due to how much he drank, but she didn't mind, she knew he didn't love her and she knew deep down she didn't love him. After all she went for the hero type, the ones like in her husbands story, but she ended up with a man that never wanted to give any of his money to those less off, he told her so many times that it wasn't their job to feed the hungry. That also made it hard for her to believe in his stories he made this Robin Hood character seem so right even when he himself didn't believe in what Robin Hood did.

As he grabbed his coat and walked out she followed him to the doorway and watched him walk off of their property and in the direction of the tavern. She knew many girls went after her husband there, perhaps if she loved her husband she would be worried, but she didn't mind the other girls around her husband, just as long as he came home to her.

OoOoOoOoOo

As he walked into the pub he sat without glancing at any of the women, his mug was filled for him as he sat alone and drank, he never came here with friends or a women to keep him company while he drank, he never wanted to talk rather be left alone in his own thoughts. After he had a few cups of ale he would just look down at his hands on the table or at his mug obviously lost in thought of what was ever in his mind. Many of the women wanted him there, he was a well off farmer who wasn't rich, but could put a roof over his family's head and food on the table. Yet he wanted nothing to do with the women that would eventfully by the end of the night be all over him.

When it was time for the pub to close he would look up at the women in the pub hoping that his eyes would meet the only eyes that could stop his heart, the only eyes that he would wander to. Yet like every night he never found those eyes, as close as he could get was his wife, he knew he could go home to her every night and while he was drunk he could pretend he loved his wife, he could pretend she was the women he would have married, if only fate would have let him.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

1 Week Later

Kahlan traveled from time selling blankets and things she made. Perhaps that is how her marriage stayed together. She would leave for short amounts of time when she needed a brake from her husband she he needed a brake from her. This was the first trip however she had left her daughter with her husband to care for while she was gone. Most of the times the little girl traveled with her. She knew her husband was a good father, but she did worry about him caring for her when she wasn't around, would he head out every night for drinks still and leave the little girl alone?

She shook the feelings of the unknown off as she entered a village she had never gone to before, the village of Locksley. As she looked around she could tell she wouldn't sell much here, many people looked hungry and dirty. Looking around she couldn't help but feel like she knew this place, or at least the name, Locksley, where had she heard that before? It was strange how she seemed to know where everything was here as well as feeling like she knew the name, but yet she had never been here before. She drove her cart up to a hitching post where she could tie her horse. As she unpacked her cart and prepared to find a place to say a man walked up to her. A pleasant homely looking man, who had a sad smile on his face.

"Is there anything I could do for you Ma'am?" he asked her

"Only if you know of a place I could stay." Kahlan said to him with a kind smile, this man seemed kind, she was surprised in a place like this that someone would come up to her and ask her if she needed the help.

"You could stay with me and my wife" he told her, "Let me carry your things, she loves company." He told her without really waiting for an answer. He picked up her things and began walking towards a little hut, maybe only one third of a size that her home was. She followed as the man asked her many questions but hardly gave her time to answer them. She smiled when she realized that he was the type that loved to talk and her himself talking.

"And here we are" he said as they walked inside. "Kate, we have a guest, a traveler." He said cheerfully.

"Do we now?" said a women's voice as she walked over to them "Much you are much like your old master, you bring home far to many strays."

"If I am of trouble" Kahlan said "I could stay in my wagon or head to Nottingham"

"No" Kate said "The forest is much to dangerous with the outlaws at this time of day now that it is turning night, you will stay with us, at least until morning when it is safe to travel once more, or as safe as it will get."

"Alright" Kahlan agreed even though she wasn't really afraid of outlaws, she had dealt with worse she knew those days were behind her. Now she wasn't powerful or strong, she was a normal women who was nothing more then a wife and a mother.

"I'm Kate" the blonde women said "and you have met my Husband Much, I hope he wasn't rude and didn't forget to introduce himself again." The women said with a smile.

"Oops" said Much as he rubbed the back of his head, his attention then turned to his stomach "So then dear, what's for dinner?" he asked

"Stew, like always" she said

"Stew, why is it always stew, even in the old days that's all we had, we were lucky if we got bread, and unlucky when Jack made us eat leaves" Much mumbled as he sat down in a chair.

"I'm sorry" Kate said with a small smile, "He gets grumpy around dinner, in truth he would rather beef or chicken, but we could afford neither. I hope you don't mind stew."

"No" Kahlan said with a smile "Stew is just fine." It had been a long time since she had to ration food and only make stew, often on the farm she had chicken and beef to eat and made meals her husband and daughter loved. "My husband would be much the same if I made stew, he loves his chicken and beef." She told Kate with a smile.

OoOoOoOoOo

Later that night Kahlan and Kate sat by the fire that was warming the house while much was out gathering more wood. Kate was knitting while Kahlan looked at the flames dance over the logs.

"I'm afraid to say you won't sell much here." Kate said while she knitted

"Huh?" Kahlan said as she was taken from her thoughts and her daze of the fire

"Your things you brought here to sell, not many can afford things like that, perhaps the Lord, but he only buys things from London."

"Why is this place the way it is?" Kahlan asked, she hadn't seen a place so run down and broken since she had traveled many years a go in a broken land.

"It wasn't always like this" Kate said to her with a smile as she set her knitting down, a long time ago this place was run by a kind sheriff and Locksley was run by a man who thought only of his people.

You see the Lord of his land Master Henry has only been granted these lands for seven years, and before that was Guy of Gisbon, but before that there was a man, well he seemed more then a man. Robin of Locksley, he took care of his people and this land like no other. That is until he followed the king to war; while he was away a new Sheriff took power and allowed Guy to run Locksley in Robin's absence. During the time Robin was away a lot changed many of the other Lords grew afraid of the new sheriffs power and allowed him to push them around, allowed him to force them to tax their people higher then the people could actually make. Then Locksley looked much like it does now, we thought the darkness would hold over Locksley forever, that is until he came home, our Hero. Robin returned to Locksley and stood up to Guy, took back his lands and then stood up to the sheriff. No one had ever done that. The Sheriff hated how Robin threatened the power he held and did what he could to ruin Robin. And then when he had to Robin took to the woods as an outlaw to protect his people. He became our hero, our savior, he became Robin Hood."

At the words Robin Hood Kahlan realized why she seemed to know this place, because Locksley was the place that many of her husband's stories took place, robin Hood was the character that he had made up. As she listened to Kate she realized her husband must have lived here before or heard the stories of Robin Hood from another. She had known everything in the stories seemed to great for her husband to just make up. "I've heard of him" Kahlan said to Kate

"Have you?" Kate asked as she glanced down on what she was making, slowly beginning again, "Many have, his story goes all around England, the man who stood up when no one else would, a man that would inspire hope with just his name, a name that was whispered among many camp fires, into many ears, but now only a legend."

"Why?" Kahlan asked "What happened to him?"

Kate looked up, "He died, there was a long fight and he just didn't make it through."

"That's terrible." Kahlan said to her, "He never got to finish the fight he started."

"Yes, we all live like this today because he couldn't finish, but he sacrificed so much, it was finally his turn to be happy. He died and in return he was finally reunited with the women he loved."

"He was in love?" Kahlan asked as she thought of her husband's stories, wondering how true they really were.

"Oh yes" Kate said with a bitter sweat smile "You see after she died I had hoped he would see me, but even after her death his eyes were only for her he knew that you only get that one special someone that God lays down on the earth for you to find, but only if you are lucky enough you find them." Kate looked at Kahlan "And Marian was that for Robin, and he was that for her, while they fought all the time and they hardly got along, they were in love, they had something special that not many people have."

Kahlan looked back at the fire as she thought about that kind of love, she knew she had once found it as well, the man God had put on the earth for her to find. Yet now he was gone to her, just as Marian was for Robin. It saddened her to think of Richard and to hear how the story didn't end the way her husband made it sound like it did, it saddened her to know that the real Robin Hood a man that sacrificed so much knew the same pain she did, the same pain of losing the only person you could and ever would love.