THE CAVE
Weeks had passed.
Weeks.
Six weeks.
Things had returned to normal.
They had had to.
Robin and Marian did not want to grieve forever.
Marian wanted to move on completely, and while this had resulted in arguments about how much she should do within the gang, slowly she had returned to the member and fighter she had been before she had fallen with child.
She was Lady Hood, former night watchmen and champion of the poor like the people around her.
Robin had no reason the side-line her anymore.
So time had passed, and the gang were all they ever had been.
But some things were starting to change once more.
Time and over a month had passed, and it had awoken an emotion in Marian she had never felt before.
It had not gone unnoticed by Robin.
Robin and Marian were lying on their backs on their bunk. Her nightdress was pooled around her hips, him shirtless, the blanket covering up to his hips.
Her hands were by her head, face flushed with rousing desire.
They both flickered in the yellow candle light, and the darkness of the cave around them made it seem as though there was only them in the world.
It felt hot, far warmer than it could have been in their bunk.
She rolled towards him, sliding one leg between both of his and running one hand over his chest, over his heart.
He caught it beneath his as it began to massage his torso, her lips moving to his shoulder.
She was half on top of him.
Both of them were still gasping for breath as she started to run her foot all along his leg, her body rocking against his hip.
"I want to conceive again…" She whispered in his ear.
His hands fell to her hips, fisting the sheer white nightdress she had taken to sleeping in.
They lived modestly, but this small amount of expense on Robin's part was a luxury they deserved.
"I want to conceive a son…" She all but ground herself against him.
He gasped in pleasure.
"A son to be the living image of his father…"
Her lips were on his collarbone, hands exploring his body, her hips rubbing against him.
"Marian…" Robin moaned.
This was not the first time, nor did he think it would be the last, that she would become so amorous so quickly. Robin found that once was not enough anymore.
It was like they were newlyweds.
"Marian we can't." He pushed her away.
This was not the first rejection either.
There was a sad undercurrent to Marian's desperation, for that was what it was.
Both of them knew it.
She wanted another child, another baby… another time of feeling a life grow inside of her.
Robin wanted it to, to see her so happy again.
But there were more frequently those rare moments now when he was serious and she could not see why.
It would do not good for him to admit that she had fallen with child accidently the first time, and that the impracticalities of having a child had had to be overlooked.
They were in the forest…
But now…
Robin was unsure just how good an idea it was.
But he could not deny her anything, as much as he was trying, and he certainly could not lie to himself that he did not want a child.
A son.
He knew that neither of them had any preference.
But Marian had been so sure that the first child they lost had been a boy… she wanted another… to be his image as she said…
He could not deny her…
But he had too.
"We have one more week, one more week to wait… please Marian." He stressed, holding her slightly away from him.
Marian had been prepared for this rebuff, but like all the others, it hurt her deeply.
She felt rejected and small.
As with most nights, she flopped to lie flat on the bunk beside him and covered her face with her hands, not wanting to cry.
Emotion bubbled through her at the thought that they had to wait to be intimate, in the way that most people waited after a bearing a child… Marian had to wait after she had lost one.
She sniffed and swallowed as Robin wrapped his arms around her and held her to his side.
"I'm sorry." She mumbled.
He sighed and hushed her, holding her tighter.
"One more week Marian, that is all it is."
"And then we can try again?" She lifted her eyes to look at him with teary eyes.
His eyes were grim and anxious, but with slight regret he nodded his head.
She nodded back and he sighed, regretting it almost instantly.
He was unsure he could stand that much hurt twice.
LOCKSLEY VILLAGE
A young boy, no older than nineteen, with copper hair, bent relaxed backwards over the well to lean on it. A rose was held in his hand, devoid of thorns, he had though ahead to cut them off.
What token would it be if he handed it over with blood seeping through his fingers?
Footsteps sounded behind him and he glanced to see her walking towards him in black.
Always in black.
She reached to take his hand, it felt cold upon his, but he paid it no mind.
They snow had only just left after all.
She towed him along, giggling and laughing, teasing and taunting him.
Finally, as her back crashed down upon the door of Locksley barn, pulling his body upon hers, she grabbed his face, brushing her lips over his.
Her hair hung down over her shoulder in gentle waves, and looked far darker, far browner, than it was naturally.
"Would you enter bold sir?" She grinned against his mouth.
The bait sat there, just before the prey.
He took it without thought.
"Oh I would." He laughed and she grinned, biting her lip.
She pulled his face down for a kiss, and towed him inside the barn.
It was dark and damp, but he paid it no mind.
His back pressed into the now closed barn door.
He could barely see her in front of him, it was so dark.
The moon, high in the sky, signalling the fact it was drawing to midnight, illuminated a small pool of light on them from a hole in the roof of the barn.
He was tired, but stirred by her.
They always met at night, she insisted upon it.
Late, so she could come from Nottingham.
No one knew that they met, none of his family, he didn't want them to know...
She didn't want them to know.
Always in dark places, not that he minded, to him her beauty shone like a beacon.
But it was almost as though she knew it…
She grinned and crushed her mouth to his. The sound of their kissing was the only one in the darkness of the barn. He was so lost in exploring her body that he did not notice as she slipped her hand down her hip to produce a dagger from her skirts.
His eyes snapped open only when he saw it glint in the moonlight.
"What the..."
She grinned, but it seemed to darken her eyes.
"Eternal sleep is thine."
She test her arm and blade forwards.
His scream ripped through the darkness.
She watched as he fell it the floor, slumped, blood oozing from his chest.
She smiled sickeningly as it spilled, darkening the dusty ground in the moonlight.
Slowly, she crouched down and ran her hand over the back of the man's head.
Lilith smiled, before she raised the knife again, and plunged it downwards.