DISCLAIMER: The Robin Hood characters aren't mine and I'm not making any money from this story.

SUMMARY: Robin meets Much in the afterlife. Spoilers for ALL of Robin Hood: The Series.

A/N: Robin Hood board "gift" ficathon entry. I correctly guessed that Insomniac Bard made the request, and she correctly guessed that I wrote this story.

Just Because I Love You

"Just because I love you," Much said, voice surreal in the pre-dawn, "doesn't mean I can't hate you too." He was not admitting this. He could not be admitting this. He could not be feeling this. He loved his master. He was Robin's friend. And yet all the years of silence, and the ever-present surreal sense of pain and loss, the person he loved most in the world being the person whose company he most dreaded, finally seemed to take shape and form. It was no worse than John admitting he wanted to die. It was no more embarrassing than Djaq, eyes shining as she described the impetus of a carrier pigeon, confessing her secret love as the room evaporated into mush. Much would survive. Robin would forgive him. Whether he would forgive himself for giving shape and form to that unthinkable hatred, well, that was the question, wasn't it? But they were all going to die and Much didn't want Robin to remember the man who hated him.

It wasn't fair. Why did that moment have to keep cropping up in Much's nightmares? Robin had not reacted to Much's confession of hatred with anger. He had reacted by saying eventually "I have betrayed your friendship, Much," and said that it was because Much was a better man than he was, that Much could bear to remember the Holy Land and Robin could not. And they had hugged, and Robin had hugged him back. Why couldn't the scene play itself out in its entirety? Why did Much have to endure hours on end of "I hate you," then Robin's stricken face as Robin turned away?

Much sighed, then eased himself out of his bedroll. Tuck slept all the way on the farthest end … tent? Compartment? Wooden boxes were what they had, if Much was honest, wooden frames covered with cloth tightly enough to keep out the chill wind. The new guy, Tuck, had the farthest left compartment because the consensus of the gang was that he snored more loudly than any fifteen soldiers. Much was next to him because … well, good natured compliant Much always volunteered for such tasks. In exchange, Robin had given Much the latest morning watch so that his sleep would not be interrupted. It was hours before Much's watch. This time of night it would be … it took Much a moment to remember, considering that Will Scarlet was no longer part of the rotation … it would be the heavy snorer himself. So Much didn't even have Tuck as an excuse for being awake.

Tuck didn't miss much, but he tended to keep his mouth shut about the things he did see. Electing for the straightforward approach, Much tiptoed away from the others, waved to Tuck with a finger over his lips, and walked quietly into the forest. Tuck didn't so much as lift an eyebrow.

Much wandered well away from camp, lost in his thoughts. Perhaps the others made fun of him for not thinking about anything beyond his next meal, but wasn't that preferable to nightmares? Whether the nightmares took the form of blood and destruction, or whether they took the form of loss and loneliness and abandonment and humiliation, the answer was the same: to forget.

The moon was full, and the air seemed soft. It was not unduly cold. The air rang with crickets, and there was the distant trickle of a stream. The trees were alive in their own quiet way, and wind whispered through the leaves.

Much looked left, right, up, and back automatically. He had learned this habit as a child when odd animal attackers could appear out of nowhere in the forest, and honed it to a fine edge in the holy land when the threat was more subtle and bloodthirsty. Thus, he had more than two seconds' warning before he registered the grinning face upside down in front of his own.

"Master!" Much yelped, taking a step backwards.

Robin somersaulted over a low branch and landed smoothly on his feet in Much's path. "You weren't paying attention, Much," he said. His tone was chiding and frightening for an instant, but there was a huge grin on his face.

It was probably one of those things that Much had to just take, considering he was 'too easily wounded.' "If that were true I would have attacked you, master," Much said, gesturing to the knife in his belt.

Much had been braced for a clever sparring retort, but Robin only said, "too true," and fell into step beside Much.

"Master?"

"Can you call me 'Robin'?" There was an edge to Robin's voice. He was a harp string tuned too tightly. It was strange.

"Robin," Much said, hearing the syllables unfamiliar to his own voice and registering the true status they implied.

"Never mind," Robin said with a soft sigh. "My name sounds strange when you say it."

"It does, doesn't it, master?" Much said, laughing half in fear and half in relief. He had absolutely no idea what Robin was thinking.

"Much, did you ever climb trees? You know, before …"

Before the Holy Land. Before the brotherhood. Before the betrayal of that brotherhood. Before Much confessed that he hated Robin even as he loved him. Before Marian died. "I can climb higher," Much said. It sounded inane, but he'd been desperate to say something normal. His chest was starting to hurt. Without waiting for Robin, Much swung up the nearest low-hanging branch and climbed deftly to the highest safe spot. It was a thick, straight branch. Much wedged himself next to the trunk, and found there was a low branch already in the best spot to brace his feet. He could sit here as easily as in a hammock.

It only took Robin a moment to climb to the branch beside Much. He sat. Just … sat … edging a bit closer to Much than he would have had they been simply sitting beside their own campfire.

"Ro – Master? Is something wrong?"

"No," Robin said with his usual flippant tone. "Yes." He didn't elaborate.

Normally this would be the time when Much would start talking, and talk until something stuck, until someone told him to shut up and he went away to sulk. But with Robin, that was the wrong approach. Much had learned something in all the years they'd been together. "Do you want me to guess?" he finally said.

Robin sighed. "I want to keep my thoughts to myself," he said. "But that is a betrayal of our friendship."

"I didn't mean it when I said you'd betrayed me. I didn't mean that I hated you." The dream images rushed through Much's mind and he babbled on. "I didn't mean it, I didn't …"

He only came out of the trance as Robin's hands shook his shoulders – not enough to upset their balance in the tree, just enough to bring Much out of his head. "Much, no. What you said wasn't your fault. It was true. I did betray you. I'm trying not to do it again."

"I didn't mean it. I didn't … what?"

Robin laughed, and there was a raw, jagged edge of relief under the sound. "I'm trying to fix my own failure, idiot. I don't need you falling apart on me too." He paused, then said in a new tone. "You are … all right?" He buried his face in his hands. "I have been blind to all of you. All I have seen was…"

"Marian," Much finished for Robin. He had understood, in a way the others hadn't, what it had meant when Robin had pushed them all so violently away. If you go on a suicide mission in battle, you just hope your friends don't see you, because if they do then you have to push them away or they'll follow you to your fate. He understood what was happening now. This was a flash to years before, to all the middles of the night in the Holy Land when Robin and Much had been brothers in arms who needed each other desperately. And the feeling was just as surreal as that of Kalila and Dimna night, and Much had a hard time believing he wasn't still caught in the dream. "But, master, she was your wife."

"She was. But," Robin's words took on the same intonation as Tuck's, "I am Robin Hood. We are Robin Hood. Robin Hood is more important than Lady Marian."

"Only to some."

"Only to some," Robin acknowledged with a sad smile. "Still, I find myself at a fork in the road. Her journey diverged and mine stretches along its original path. Tuck would have me believe that the price we have all paid will be necessary."

"It seems to me," Much said, more slowly than he usually spoke, "That people are not prices. Tom was not, and neither was Marian. Nor Eve." It was the first time he had spoken Eve's name since they had kissed in the now-desolate Bonchurch.

"True," Robin said. "Soldiers are prices. Marian was not a soldier. Nor," he added with a look toward Much, "was Eve."

"They were as much soldiers as we are, Master." Much couldn't decide whether to continue to watch his speech for fear of offending Robin, to marvel that this conversation was actually happening and everything was like it had been before only better, or to let his own grief over Marian and his forever lost freedom and future rise to the surface. Much's old speech patterns began to creep back as Much surrendered. "We left because it was the right thing to do. We were soldiers for God and for England. And then just like you said we came home to find the true evil right here in our homes. I think it had already destroyed our homes," Much said, rustling a few leaves as he waved one hand in a flash of helpless anger. "For the longest time I thought we could get everything back. Now I wonder if we ever could. I don't know if things will ever be right. We're going to die out here too, aren't we? In the forest?"

"Perhaps," Robin said. His voice was somehow deeper than it had been before. "That is the answer, though."

"I don't understand."

"You will," Robin said softly.

Much wasn't sure how to feel about that, but Robin didn't give him a chance to reply.

"There's something else that's been bothering me," Robin said. More softly, haltingly, as if he didn't really want to speak any more.

"What is it, Master?"

"Do you remember Carter? And do you remember that you asked me afterwards why I had never held you the way I held him, and I thought you knew that was because you were strong?"

Much did not need to answer. Robin already knew. Damn it, though, the man was calling to mind all Much's repetitions of his own worst failures in his dreams. Why?

Robin's conclusion was almost inaudible. "I…am not so strong."

Sometimes, Much realized in that quiet moment, the best way to understand someone was to stop talking and wait for what else he might say. "She was your wife," Much said. "And I am your brother." Then, when he realized that Robin was not looking for words, he let go of the tree trunk and wrapped his arms around his best friend. Robin had … needed … to laugh out of the wrong side of his face. For quite some time.

Much would decide later that he preferred Robin's analogy of their lives as a journey to his own analogy of their lives as a battle against Vaisey. Vaisey and Robin died on the same day. That day Much's battle came to an end. The soldiers were sacrificed, and the victory was achieved. That day Much's journey truly began.

Vaisey was dead. Isabella was dead. King Richard was still gone in the Holy Land. Taxes were still too high. People still starved. Despite Little John's best efforts, certain peasant families were still composed of imbeciles who would not learn to feed themselves no matter how assisted. The various leaders who passed through the rubble of Nottingham Castle never cared for the people the way Robin had nor oppressed and tortured them the way Vaisey had. Things were less dangerous, but no less difficult.

The idea that he was on a journey sustained Much through the long years of hiding in the forest, working undercover for Richard, until King Richard at last returned from the Holy Land, not in a blaze of glory the way he had been expected but quietly. It sustained Much when he discovered Eve hidden in the rubble of Bonchurch clutching a child born out of the soldiers' torture. Her pain seemed worse than his own as he held her and protected her and healed her, and eventually married her in a quiet forest ceremony with Tuck to officiate and John, Kate and Archer to witness. It sustained all of them as they gradually grew together. Apart more and more physically as they each built lives, but bound together by a bond stronger than any that Much had shared with another soldier in the Holy Land (except perhaps Robin, but maybe not even that). They had seen Nottingham blown to the sky by the cursed Black Powder. They had buried one of their own who had died thinking he was outcast and hated, and that failure to say goodbye would forever haunt each one of them. They had slept countless nights near enough to one another to touch with the ordinary perils of the forest and the perils common to outlaws all also near enough to touch. They understood one another.

Eve had not been part of most of those specific experiences, but she also understood Much in a way that the others in Bonchurch, no matter how gracious, could not approach.

Paradoxically, their children also understood Much. Eve's first daughter – their first daughter, she still insisted once Much had married her – grew to imitate the Nightwatchman far before she had persuaded Much to tell her any stories of Marian. She was Marian, Much often thought, watching her in the firelight filled with a sadness he could not explain. He still did not understand why his description of Marian as a soldier had provided the answer Robin had needed on that long-ago day.

For most of his life, Much was happy. There were shadows over his life that most people didn't have. Dreams, memories, losses, needs. But those shadows made the light seem all the brighter. The fact that Much had seen indescribable visions of death somehow made the firelight flickering over his daughters' faces reflect so much more brilliantly into his soul.

It was a quiet night. Much lay with his arms wrapped around Eve, contentedly listening to her heartbeat. He had been tired lately, tired for no reason, plagued by visions of different branches to his journey. He didn't want to leave Eve. He loved her. She was … the better half of himself, all the memories and footsteps and accomplishments and shared dreams that he was desolate without. She loved him. Leaving her behind … no … Much couldn't. He wouldn't. And yet he was. He was getting up, withdrawing his arms from his wife, turning toward a wide open path that had somehow appeared where his fireplace ought to be. The loss was almost as staggering as the sudden loneliness. Much willed himself to return, but he could not.

"She'll be coming too," said a familiar voice.

Much didn't have to think, he ran forward, leapt into the air, and met the owner of that voice in a hug that was sure to knock them both off their feet. "Master!"

Robin's grin was every bit as cheeky as Much had remembered. "You took your sweet time," he said. "I was about ready to tell Marian that she had to start cooking squirrels."

"Do we eat? Never mind, I don't care about that right now. Eve. I want to see you, but …"

Robin's face sobered. He was the same, yet he was so completely different. "It hurts. Leaving people behind. And dying is something you have to do alone," he said. "I know that."

Flashes. Robin alone in that forest glade. Hugging Much so tightly and saying he was Robin's best friend, then letting him go. We are Robin Hood.

"She'll join us before too long," Robin said. "You are almost ninety, you dope."

Much wasn't any age now. "I'll watch over her, right?"

"We'll all watch over her." Robin pouted. "Aren't you at all glad to see me?"

"Master," Much said again, feeling the grin across his face. He hugged Robin again, finally secure that Robin wouldn't mind. Was this what things had been like between them? Only the fear was gone, that ever-present fear that Much would do something to make Robin tire of him at last and create the hatred that went both ways. There was no such thing as hatred here.

"I'm glad to see you," Robin said simply. "You were a fantastic Robin Hood. Better than I was, I think."

"No one was better than you were," Much said honestly. "Master. When I told you that Marian and Eve were soldiers, and that we couldn't get everything back, and you said you understood. What do you understand? What should I understand now?"

"Look," Robin said, pointing … out. Somewhere.

The adventure was just beginning.

The things that hatred destroys are gone. Forever. Nottingham Castle was never rebuilt. The peasants' lives, the people Robin had been most concerned about after returning from the Holy Land, never greatly improved. Injustice died hard, and just like soldiers in battle, it died leaving behind the traces of death, not new life. But it could be left behind, like the vestiges of old campfires left by the side of the road. The road stretched ahead, not behind, and there were new vistas. What awaited at the end of the journey … well, there was no end. But there was also no more sacrifice.

"Catch me!" Much called, and bounded … out. Into the fields, with Robin on his heels. They were children.