Disclaimer: Do I have to put one on every chapter? I get sick of them. The disclaimer is on the first chapter. I'm not putting any more on unless the status quo changes.
A/N: Guy and Marian aren't in this chapter. :( This focuses on Robin's thoughts. G & M will be back soon, promise!
Chapter Two
Grief
Marian stands in a garden full of flowers, vivid pinks and yellows sprouting like jewels from the dusty earth. She wears a dress of the purest and brightest white, so light and luminescent she is almost invisible. Robin moves towards her, he is nearly close enough to touch her when she speaks.
"I love you," she says, and from the warmth radiating from her smile and through her words he knows it is genuine. He should be happy, but there's something not right. She's not talking to him. She's talking to someone behind him. He tries to turn but he can't, he's rooted to the spot. She's laughing now, high and musical, not unkindly, but Robin doesn't find it funny…
Robin jerked awake. The same dreamed had plagued him for weeks now. It always played out the same and it always left him feeling uneasy.
"It's just a dream," came Much's voice. Robin sat up and saw his friend surveying him grimly. "How many times do I have to tell you?"
Robin shook his head.
"Something's not right."
"I suppose grief affects us all in different ways." Much sighed heavily. "The others have gone delivering. We let you sleep."
"What? Why?" Robin jumped up, fully awake and alert, groaning inwardly as he saw the sun high in the sky overhead.
"Master, it has to be said, and as always I am the one to have to say it. You haven't been the same since the Holy Land. The second time I mean. You haven't been sleeping or eating well, and frankly we're worried about you."
"And why do you think that is?" asked Robin shortly.
"Master, we understand your loss…"
"No, you don't," Robin snapped back. "You don't understand at all. None of you do."
Much looked at Robin in silence for a few very awkward moments.
"You aren't the only one to have loved and lost," he said finally. "We've all experienced that. Not everything is all about you."
Much made to leave the camp and Robin, struck by the words, made no move to stop him. Much turned back.
"We all miss her. We all want to kill Gisborne. But until we find him we can't, so I suggest you carry on doing what Marian did and what she loved you for. Helping the poor!"
Still Robin said nothing. He sat and listened to the crunching of Much's footsteps in the fallen autumn leaves getting further and further away.
What he had said made chilling sense. Robin replayed the conversation in his head.
"Grief affects us all in different ways." True: it made Robin forget his friends and equally his purpose. Since he'd returned from the Holy Land he'd been half-hearted in his efforts to help the villagers, a lacklustre champion of the poor. The Sheriff had resumed his usual reign of terror but Robin had found that he no longer cared. He was no longer frustrated and angered by the injustices of the world. Indeed, he was no longer frustrated and angered by anything much, except his recurring nightmare. He had tried to shake it off, explain it away as the product of a fevered mind, but it was over four months since that fateful day and it was still haunting him night after night.
"You aren't the only one to have loved and lost." John had lost Alice. Much had lost Eve. Allan had lost his brother, and to a certain extent, Djaq. And even though they weren't with him, Robin knew that both Will and Djaq had lost loved ones as well. Yet none of them had been so afflicted by it. Somehow they had managed to pick up the pieces and move on with their lives, continuing with the paths they had lain for themselves, remaining strong despite their grief. None of them had been haunted for so long. Whilst it could be argued that Alice and Eve were still alive, the chances of reconciliation were so slim as to be non-existent. Perhaps that made it worse, the knowledge that they were out there, somewhere, yet still lost… Robin realised that he was being selfish in suggesting that they didn't understand his feelings, and he knew he had to make it up to them, the question was how. He'd throw himself into their cause with renewed energy, continue Marian's good work in her memory. After all, she wouldn't want him to just give up, would she? She'd fought for so long and at great cost for what she believed in, what they both believed in, only to have him ignore it.
"We all want to kill Gisborne. But until we find him, we can't." There it was, the only other thing that perturbed Robin aside from his dream. Locksley Manor lay empty. It appeared that Gisborne had not returned from the Holy Land with the Sheriff. That was the impression he had received from the villagers' reports. Robin's ship had docked about a week after the one carrying the Sheriff, who had wasted no time in dispensing rough 'justice' in their seven days absence. John had been outraged, Allan and Much dumbfounded at the destruction one man could bring to a shire in such a short space of time. People had begun to lose faith in the outlaws and the Nightwatchman, and with reason. They had worked hard to remedy the situation, whilst quietly spreading the unfortunate news that the Nightwatchman had gone for good.
Yet there was no sign of Gisborne anywhere. No one had seen him, and no one was particularly missing him. It was all a little too strange for comfort.
Robin waited until the others arrived back at the camp, Much carrying a bag of what looked suspiciously like squirrels. He'd spent the day forming and refining his theories and a plan.
"I'm going to Nottingham," he said as they settled themselves down for the evening. "I want to ask the Sheriff where Gisborne is."
"Robin…" began Allan. "I'm not being funny or anything, and don't for a minute think I'm trying to defend him, but won't killing Gisborne make things worse? It'll be a gang thing then, us and the Sheriff picking each other off until there's only one left. Mark my words, if you kill Gisborne he'll come after one of us, I've seen it happen over in…"
"Allan," Robin interrupted before the younger man could get too carried away. "I didn't say I was going to kill him. I didn't even say I was going to go after him. I just want to find out where he is."
"Why?" asked John, and Robin could detect a note of weariness and disbelief in his voice.
"Because if Gisborne is still in the Holy Land then the Sheriff is obviously planning something. Why would he stay there without instruction from the Sheriff?"
"To hide from you," suggested John irritably. "Robin, this theory…"
"He'll be going after the King again," Much cut in.
"That's what I'm afraid of," said Robin gravely. He looked at John, who threw his hands up in defeat.
"Fine. We go to Nottingham. I don't know why I go along with your ideas half the time…"
XXX
"Robin?" whispered Much as they scaled the wall of Nottingham town. "What if the Sheriff doesn't know where Gisborne is?"
"The Sheriff always knows where Gisborne is," said Robin. "Usually because he sent him there."
"But what if he doesn't tell you?" asked Allan. "I'm not being funny or anything, but he's hardly likely to say 'oh yeah, I left him in the Holy Land to try and kill the King AGAIN' if you go waltzing in there yelling 'where's Gisborne?' is he?"
"Allan, don't make it complicated," moaned John. "Let's just get in there, let Robin have his little chat and get out."
They crept along the now well-worn passages to the Sheriff's chamber with ease. The lack of guards surprised them, and perhaps made them a little wary, but no one stopped to ask why.
"I won't be long," said Robin as he slipped into the room.
"Not you again," groaned the Sheriff. "You really should stop getting into bed with me. People will talk."
"Where's Gisborne?" asked Robin.
"I don't know, but when I find him, you'll be the first to know."
"Don't tell me that. You always know where he is."
"Not always, and I certainly don't now. What time is it in the Holy Land? Midnight-ish? I expect he's against a wall with a wench he paid an arm and a leg for, now will you please go away and leave me alone?"
"He's in the Holy Land then."
"I'm assuming he's in the Holy Land. He didn't get the boat back to England with me, and seeing as you're so anxious to find him I'm assuming that you didn't bump into him on your boat either. He's quite hard to miss actually. He's usually the one in black leaning over the side. Follow the retching. Poor man. Never got on with boats…"
"Why is he still in the Holy Land?" interrupted Robin.
"Search me. If I knew I'd have sent him a note telling him to get himself home. I need him over here. There's no use waving the sword around, I am actually telling the truth."
Robin looked at the Sheriff's smirking face. There was definitely truth in it, somewhere behind the eyes, although Robin couldn't tell to which part of the tale it alluded. One thing was for certain though – the Sheriff was definitely hiding something beneath the mangle of truth and lies, and he was in no hurry to reveal it.
XXX
"Gisborne's still in the Holy Land," said Robin as they walked back to the camp with the sunrise. "He didn't come back with the Sheriff. Though the Sheriff won't say why."
"Did you really expect him to?" asked Allan. "Honestly?"
"No," admitted Robin. He felt so frustrated. He was finally putting his mind to something that wasn't his grief over Marian, and he was getting nowhere. "But he knows more than he was telling. There's something not right. Shah Maht is still alive and well, even if Gisborne got lost at sea trying to dispense it."
"Robin…" began John in a tone that implied he wanted nothing more than to forget that the Holy Land ever happened. But John never got to finish his sentence, for Allan had opened their supposedly deserted hideout to reveal two people inside it already.
Will and Djaq had returned from the Holy Land.
I love writing the Sheriff, and I tried to stay true to character... I wasn't trying to be funny on purpose but I really can imagine that conversation.
Review please!
