"Are you sure it's come this way?" Guy said.

Robin gave a soft, resigned chuckle and stepped back, gesturing to the ground beneath his feet. "Have a look for yourself. The dirt's only just settled – something big's passed this way no more than a day ago."

It wasn't that Guy didn't trust Robin's expertise in the matter…he just trusted his own far more.

Crouching down in the spot Robin had only just vacated, Guy examined the tracks. He traced the indentions in the dirt with his fingers, rubbing it between his calloused digits. After a moment's careful scrutiny, he dusted off his hands and rose. Robin stood behind him, watching, and just a few paces away, Much, Tuck, Allan, and John were waiting.

"A cart," he said. "One bearing more weight than the standard traveler."

That piqued Allan's interest. "A supply cart?"

"Could be," said Robin. "Or it could be something else."

"Like what?"

"I dunno, Much."

"But you said you heard about it."

Guy watched with a mix of annoyance and amusement as Robin turned to Much, a look of tenuous patience on his face. "I heard there would be a shipment passing this way. They never said what the shipment was of," he said.

Folding his arms across his chest, Much frowned. He looked like a child, Guy thought. "For all you know, couldn't it just be a shipment of trousers or something?"

"Or it could be a shipment of gold," Tuck said. "Either way, it is a shipment from the Sheriff, and we can assume it will not benefit the people. Cloth or coin, it is our job to see that it will."

"Well, when you put it like that…" Allan shrugged. "Let's move on, then. North, yeah, towards the castle?"

Guy was already walking that direction when Robin and the others fell in.

Much dragged his feet as he went, and finally, he just stopped. "Robin…we've been moving for hours…."

Guy paused, his amusement from before long gone; it was replaced only with frustration. Much had been whining for miles, now, he was getting tired of it.

Just a little down the road, Robin looked back at Much from his place at the edge of an embankment. "Much."

But Much went on as if he hadn't heard. "We're never going to catch up to the cart at this pace."

"Much…"

"We'd be better off just nicking it in town. Why don't we just go back to the hideout and I'll cook us a nice—"

"Much!"

Much started, and finally, he pursed his lips and went quiet.

Robin looked satisfied with the silence, but Guy noticed he didn't look altogether pleased. His discontent seemed to come from something else, though. "We found it," he said. That was the only warning he gave before he stepped off the side of the embankment, sliding down the mud and the leaves until he reached the road just below.

Just ahead on the road, a cart was overturned. The horses had gone – probably four of them, going on the size – but other creatures lingered.

People. There were people around the cart, in rags and chains.

"Slaves," Guy said as Robin, John, and Tuck hurried to the people. "A shipment of slaves." He frowned. This did not bode well. "Be on your guard."

Allan paused in the middle of helping a young man out of his chains to look at Guy. "What for, mate? They're hardly gonna hurt us."

"And do you think they were escorting themselves?" No, Guy imagined there would be about a dozen of them with a convoy that size.

That seemed to throw a stick in Allan's nonchalance. He waited until he'd finished getting the manacles off the would-be slave to sit back on his heels. It seemed like a key had already been making its way around before they arrived, because most of the people were already free.

"I'm not being funny, but he's got a point. Where have the guards gone?"

"I think I've found one."

Everyone looked over to where Tuck knelt on the ground. Lying in front of him was a corpse in mail and Nottingham colors. Robin was the first over, and Guy was in tail as Allan and Much continued getting the last of the slaves free.

"There's hoof prints," Robin said. "A good five or six sets." He stood and walked back over to the slaves. There was one on his feet, a man around middle age, looked to be heading the group, and Robin made his way over to him.

Guy followed him, though he was content to let Robin do the talking; he was not the sort to comfort the victims. That was not his role in this merry band of thieves.

"What's your name?" Robin said.

The man look startled – surprised – but he told him. "Lyle."

"Can you tell me what happened here, Lyle?"

"They were bringing us for the castle. Some of us were meant for the mines, though – the Turks, mostly. Not many of them, there were, but enough to make the guards antsy. Shouldn't have been looking at the Turks, though; was an Englishman what gave 'em the slip."

That caught Guy's attention. "Someone broke you out? One man?" That was practically unheard of. Even Robin's outlaws had trouble, and there had been five of them.

But Lyle nodded. "Sure enough. A bloke not much older than my boy back home, now's I'm thinking about it. Managed to nick himself a key from the guards and passed it on."

"And where is he now?"

"He took one of the horses. Got his hands on a blade and cut it right off the carriage; nearly upended the thing. He rode off shouting about something that got the guards on him. Every last one of them, save the one what got trampled by a horse."

That would be the one Tuck had found.

Guy could see the conflict play out on Robin's face. He needed to take care of these people, but from the sounds of things, there was another person in need of his help.

Then, his jaw set; his decision had been made. "Much, Tuck, see these people to Locksley. See that they're given food from our stores and a bed to rest in until we can get them sorted out. Allan, Guy, John, I'll need the two of you with me."

Guy raised an eyebrow. "What's in your head, Robin?"

If Robin noticed Guy's skepticism, he didn't show it. Instead, he smiled, shouldering his bow.

"We've got a hero to save."

As it turned out, though, it wasn't the hero they ran into first. No, they made it only a few miles before they found themselves staring at a small horde of the Sheriff's men. Three were on horseback, nine more on foot.

"Maybe the bloke got away," Allan said. When the others looked at him, he shrugged defensively. "What? They're not exactly in hot pursuit then, are they/"

He wasn't wrong. The men were moving along slowly, looking around like they were trying to find something.

"Well, whoever this bloke is, he's a crafty one," John said. There was appreciation in his voice; all of the outlaws could admire a good getaway. Even Guy wasn't scowling quite so deeply as he usually was. "Those blokes don't look to know up from down."

He'd no sooner said that than a twig snapped. There was no way of telling whose foot it had snapped under – Guy knew it wasn't his, at the very least – but the effect was the same. In the relative silence of the forest, the sound was nearly cacophonous; at least, it felt that way.

Every single head in the horde turned towards them, and there was no way they could've missed them.

"Maybe they don't know up from down.," Robin said, "but looks like they know us well enough."

Allan swallowed deeply. "Do we run, or do we fight?"

As he spoke, though, the guards all drew their weapons and ran at them.

With just the barest hint of a smirk on his face, Guy drew his own sword. This was his role. "Doesn't look like we've got much choice."

"Well, then," Robin smiled and leveled his bow. "If it's a fight they want, it's a fight they'll get."

And a fight they did get. All of them; not just the guards. They'd managed to get the men off their horses, but with twelve to their four, it wasn't so easy a fight as they might've liked.

There were seven left standing, but they were wearing out. Guy himself was trying to fight two of them, but they'd managed to back him into a corner. It was a matter of unforced error that he lost his blade; one of the guards managed to knock it away from him. He managed to duck the next swing, but it meant moving away from the blade. His back hit something solid, and he knew he'd met a tree.

The others were too busy; Robin was taking on two of the guards, same as Allan, and John was fighting to get one of the men off the horse he'd managed to scramble back onto. There was no one he could look to for help, and the man was readying another swing.

It seemed to Guy as though it was time to make his peace. He had two men to fight and nothing to fight them with. The circumstance wasn't favorable, to say the least.

But then…circumstances changed in the form of a sword that intercepted the guard's just before it had an unfortunate meeting with Guy's neck. Guy immediately dove for his sword, tucking into a roll and rising to his feet at the last second.

With a quick parry and thrust, he freed himself up to get a look at his impromptu savior. He had been right in thinking it wasn't one of his own men. No, it seemed to him like they'd found the stranger. He was a tall thing, though not quite so tall as Guy and far lankier…almost coltish. His movements were trained enough, though; quick and sharp and precise like nothing Guy had ever seen before.

Only…that wasn't quite right. He knew that form…he'd seen it before, maybe once or twice. Not enough to know anything of consequence, but enough to have a notion. The chaos didn't give him much time to think of it; the very next instant, the stranger was off to help Allan, and he set about divesting Robin of his second man.

After that, the tides were turned. With an extra man, and them a man down, the fight went far easier, until at long last, all the men were down. As John set about tying them up, Guy watched Robin turn to the stranger. He was standing over at the edge of the road, liberating one of the soldiers of his sword belt. Guy almost laughed at the idea – a guard that big, the belt would be more likely to pull the stranger's trousers down than to hold them up.

Robin's voice drew him out of his thoughts.

"Hey, mate," Robin said as he clapped a hand to the stranger's shoulder, "thank you for the—Will?"

Guy recognized that name, and as the stranger turned around, he found he recognized the face, too. He'd seen it before, more than the odd occasion. Sharp features, almost elvish…young…he was one of Robin's band, only he hadn't seen him around since the Holy Land. Will…Will Scarlett, he thought it was. The young one. The quiet one.

"We've got to stop meeting like this," Will said in that perfectly deadpan way of his. There was a spark to his eyes, though, a glimmer of amusement.

The clever one, too, apparently.

Robin grinned in turn. "Come here, you," he said, pulling the smaller man into a firm hug. It amazed him how, even next to an average-sized man like Robin, this Will could look so small. Just looking at him, Guy might've thought him fragile, only he knew now he had seen him fight. He recalled him being quite handy with a couple of axes, taking down more than a few of his supposedly-trained men back when he was working for the Sheriff.

Robin let him go, only insofar as to hold him out at arm's length to get a look at him. "It's good to see you again."

"It's good to be seen again," said Will. Guy wasn't sure he'd heard him speak before; mostly it was all the others doing the talking. It was a shame; it wasn't nearly as grating as he'd thought the others' to be.

Still, though, casual as it sounded, he heard something underneath the voice. He was no expert, and he didn't particularly care either way, but there was an edge…something deeper to the words that Guy couldn't quite peg.

There were other things that were far more simple to understand, however. The haggard look about him, the dark circles under his bright eyes…the smudge of color on his cheek just a little too blue to be dirt.

He didn't get long to make his observations, though. Just as those things began to appear to him, Will disappeared behind a wall of black.

"Great God, lad, you're back!" John said, hugging Will so fiercely that he nearly took him off his feet. If Will had looked small before, he hardly looked like more than a child, now.

"Well, don't crush him, John," said Allen as he came up behind, but when John let him down, he hugged him just as tight.

Robin watched the whole affair with a grin on his face, his arms folded across his chest. "Now who's crushing him?"

"Perhaps if he was thicker than a branch, it wouldn't be a problem," Guy said dryly.

It was as if everyone had forgotten he was there – he didn't doubt it, and he didn't blame them, really – and had suddenly remembered. They all turned, but it seemed they had gotten used to him being around.

Will wasn't quite so well-adjusted. The young man immediately went on guard, his blade drawn and leveled at Guy. Handy as he was with an ax, it looked to Guy like he knew his way around a sword as well. That look on his face, too…it was a dark look. One that didn't look like it belonged on such a young face.

It reminded him too much of the face he saw in the mirror.

"What's he doing here?" The smooth English tenor of the young man's voice had lowered a level, grown harsher.

Robin caught his sword arm. "Easy, Will," he said. "He's with us, now."

Will didn't make any move to lower his blade beyond what Robin had forced, and his eyes stayed just as fixed.

"Will." Robin's words were neither forceful nor harsh, just…firm. Guy watched Will's eyes flick over to him, questioningly. He wasn't sure; he wasn't certain. But Robin nodded, and after a long, tense moment, he lowered his sword. Satisfied, Robin looked to Guy. He gestured for Guy to come over, and Guy saw no reason not to.

He left a good two arm's length between them; Will was still holding a sword, and heartless as people seemed to think, he had no desire to alarm this man further. He'd saved his life; the least he could do was respect his personal space.

All the same, he held out a hand. A show of good faith, since explaining his change to the light side would take far longer than he cared to spend in the woods.

Will hesitated. Normally, shaking Guy's hand would mean dropping his sword, but he looked to be a southpaw, from the way he was holding that sword. He could still hold his sword, and he still did as finally, he reached out and took Guy's hand.

He had a firm grip, Guy noticed, however uncertain he was.

But that wasn't the only thing he noticed. In shaking Guy's hand, his sleeve had ridden up. Not much, but around the cuff, he could see just a sliver of something. The skin looked…raw. Welted.

He'd no sooner caught sight of it, though, than Will was pulling his hand back. Guy let him – generally, a wise man didn't do things that might make an armed man uneasy – and with Robin's peacekeeping needs apparently appeased, he watched the leader of the group clap Will on the shoulder.

"He wasn't wrong, though, mate. You're skin and bones. What say you we get some food in you, aye?"

And just like that, that grin came creeping back up on Will's face. "Sounds brilliant."