DISCLAIMER: I don't own Robin Hood or any of the characters, and I'm not making any money from this story.
A/N: I do know that it's impossible to have seaweed anywhere in the forests of Nottingham. It's just an ordinary river plant. Robin and the gang compare it to the seaweed they saw on the way to the Holy Land and the name sticks.
A/N: Written for the Robin Hood board "gift" ficathon, prompt:
#7. Season 3. AU
Robin decides to not return Kate's romantic feelings. The fic may refer to Much or not.
(This isn't AU, though. I believe something like this could have happened in canon.)
I incorrectly guessed that Fairycutie made the request; it was actually UrbanGirl. No one guessed me as the author either, though. Final author's note: I couldn't have written this fic if I was an only child.
TIMELINE: Directly after "The Enemy of My Enemy."
A Lady Doesn't Play Seaweed
"Kate! Kate! Look what we found," Allan said, bursting into the camp waving something green above his head.
Wild lettuce? Secret maps written on forest leaves? Considering it was Allan, who burst in announcing something or other every day, Kate didn't think that it was yet at the level of emergency to warrant putting down her embroidery. She'd begged the thread from her mother during their last visit, and she was attempting one of the most difficult stitches she'd managed to learn during her time as simple ordinary Kate, and if she put it down now she'd have to start the section all over.
"Kate! Look at this!" Little John said.
Okay, maybe that warranted having to redo the section. Kate carefully put her needles down inside her private trunk, closed the lid, then came up to Little John. "What is it?"
"Reeds growing in the water," Little John said.
"I found them," Allan said. "Watch what happens when you blow on them!" He proceeded to give Kate a loud demonstration.
Kate wasn't sure what she was supposed to be hearing. "Yes," she said, hoping she didn't look as puzzled as she felt.
"It sounds like gas, see," Allan said. "Come on, you try it."
Gas. She'd abandoned at least an hour's work for plants that sound like gas.
Little John, who'd always been slightly wiser than Allan 'a' Dale in Kate's opinion, said, "She's a lady, Allan. We should show Much."
"He's a girl too," Allan said around a fit of laughter.
With his usual impeccable timing, Much sauntered up, punched Allan in the arm, grabbed Allan's plant, and blew on it to produce the loudest and rudest sound yet.
Little John doubled over. "He wins, Allan. Much isn't a girl."
Allan snatched his seaweed back from Much, leaned somewhere in the vicinity of Little John's rear end, and blew.
Even Guy, who'd been hanging back close to the forest behind Allan and John, had something green in his hand.
Kate backed away from the boys as gracefully as she could. Maybe she could just sit by the fire as if nothing had happened and use the last hour of daylight, she could repair the damage to her embroidery project.
Robin would defend Kate. Robin was the leader. Robin Hood was much, much too mature to go around blowing gas noises with a river plant.
PFFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTTTT!
Apparently not.
"Kate? Kate, are you there?"
"Considering it's my watch, yes, I'm here," Kate snapped. "Right where I am supposed to be without any such distractions as rude plants."
"Aw, Kate, that was the most fun I've had since …" Robin trailed off, sliding easily on the log beside Kate and draping his arm around her. "Well, I can't remember. "
Kate felt herself stiffen. "I am glad you enjoyed yourself," she said, not meeting Robin's eyes.
"Kate? What's bothering you?"
"I'm fine." Boys, she thought. Surrounded by boys.
"Are you really mad at us about the river plants?"
Kate sighed. She poked the fire. "I'm not mad at you about the plants. Even if that was a really stupid distraction. We left behind goodness knows what chaos in York and Isabella is after all of us, and you are all pretending to have indigestion."
"Wow. And I thought Guy could be pompous," Robin said, with what Kate assumed was supposed to be a charming smile.
Kate pulled away from Robin's embrace, sitting on the other end of the log and still poking the fire.
Robin slid over next to her. "Kate. Why are you mad at me?"
"I'm not mad at you."
"You're mad at me."
"I'm not mad at you."
Robin said, very softly, "I call you a fool when I mean you are a hero."
"What?"
"Nothing. Something someone dear to me once said."
"Marian." Kate met Robin's eyes, and he looked so lost – how could a man be such a pain and such a noble hero all at the same time? – and brushed his face with her hand.
He nodded.
Kate decided that she could forgive the seaweed pranks and she wanted to kiss Robin.
He responded, but … lightly. Gently. The same way Kate's mother used to kiss her forehead before bed. This wasn't a way a boyfriend was supposed to act, was it?
She loved him so much, and yet she didn't like the way he made such easy assumptions that made fun of her by being what they were. Attempting to forget about that, Kate kissed Robin again.
He broke it off, as quickly as possible without actually rejecting her outright.
"Robin?"
"Hmmm?"
"Is there something you're trying to tell me?"
He looked away. "Vengeance will destroy your soul, sure, and we've all lost people we loved. But I feel as if I am still married."
Okay, that was insulting. "You're thinking about Marian every time you kiss me?"
"No!" Robin slid to the other end of the log, grabbing his own stick and giving the fire a vicious poke. Seaweed exploded from underneath one of the logs. Robin ducked out of the way. "No. Kate, you deserve someone who wants a life with you. Someone who doesn't…"
"Mentally cheat every time we kiss?"
"Someone who can imagine a life with a second wife," Robin said.
The harshness reached through to penetrate Kate's feelings. She was being selfish. She wanted him eventually to marry her, to make him hers and make this entire life in the forest worth it. But … this life was already worth it. Kate was doing more good than she'd dreamed. She'd meant all the things she'd told her mother about the job they were doing. She was even willing to accept sleeping within a stone's throw of Guy of Gisborne to get the weapons they needed. Kate didn't need Robin to justify her choices. Still, though, the tone of her voice was more indignified than she would have ever liked as she said, "are you breaking up with me?"
"Were we ever together?"
No … Kate supposed not. The other members of the gang had proclaimed loudly that Robin's heart was hers and not Isabella's. But Robin had never kissed her in more than a brotherly fashion – never enough to make her think that he wanted her as a woman, to marry and bear children and build a life once this war was over. "You liked me better than Isabella." Wow. And she'd been indulging in mental tirades about the immaturity of the boys in the group?
Robin slid closer again and brushed her face. "Always. If I wasn't already married, Kate, I would like to have met you."
"Okay." Kate surprised herself. She actually was okay.
"The camp is full of boys, you know," Robin said. He cast a not-so-subtle look toward Much's sleeping spot, which Kate had no trouble interpreting.
"Yes," Kate said, picking up a piece of seaweed and blowing her first fake gas sound. "It most certainly is." She threw the river reed at Robin.