(If I ever meet Robin Hood in person, the only thing he gets is a broken nose.)
They dragged him to the tavern, insisting on a rare night of celebration in light of the job they had just completed, a job that had required weeks of planning and a not inconsiderable amount of risk and luck for everyone involved.
Amazingly, it had all gone off without a hitch, and Robin, defenseless against their joy, chuckled and agreed that they had earned a few hours of revelry.
His men appropriated three tables and pushed them together, casting aside their bows and cloaks and responsibilities and talking over each other, each man determined to buy a round for the company on some unfortunate lord's dime.
This was how Robin had accumulated half a dozen pints in less than an hour.
He tried to wave them off, arguing that one of them had to remain reasonably sober, that he just wasn't in the mood, that he was their leader and you'll do as I say, John, but the more he protested, the more they laughed, and the hoard at his elbow continued to grow until it near crowded him off of the table.
He sipped slowly through one pint, then another, and smiled as his men told stories he had heard a hundred times before, each wilder and more embellished than the last. He loved them all, these men who had become better than brothers to him, but, gods, his body ached for quiet after the day they'd had, and quiet seemed to be the one thing they had no intention of giving him.
Their voices rose into a collective roar as the evening progressed, tempers flaring and extinguishing quicker than he could track, ribald jokes flung back and forth, songs started and forgotten partway through. At least one broken glass crunched underfoot, and he considered it a small mercy that no punches had been thrown. Yet.
He caught the eye of the proprietor, a stern grey-haired woman called 'Granny,' and shot her an apologetic look, only to be met with a dismissive shrug. They were good business, it seemed to say, and they would be welcomed as long as they drank more pints than they dropped.
No sympathy for him there, and so Robin resigned himself to a long, lonely night of watching his men's high spirits dwindle into snores, their heads dipping to the table in turns until it came time to settle the bill and herd them, staggering, back to the camp.
The drink was just beginning to loosen him up, canting in the sides of his vision, when a relative hush fell over the table. All of the men in the tavern seemed to crane in the same direction, focusing on the back of a woman who had just entered, who slipped through the mess of tables as if she couldn't hear the whispers, the drunken buzz, that followed at her heels.
She was dressed plainly enough, and Robin thought little of her – aside from Granny, women were uncommon creatures in these parts, and any man in his cups would fixate on anything that moved – until she turned around, shaking her hair away from her face.
It wasn't the eyes that caught him, though they were lovely, or the mouth, or the other countless details his mind tripped over as he took her in, but the unexpected familiarity of the woman that left him half-stunned.
He had never met her before, but he knew her, of that he was sure.
Some of the younger men, Will at their center, were gesturing towards her, egging each other on, until Robin placed his hands on the table, drew himself up, cleared his throat.
"Sorry, lads, I believe this round is mine."
Will looked devastated at this announcement, and John choked on his ale, fighting to swallow for a moment before he reached over to cuff Robin on the shoulder with a broad wink. He almost missed Robin entirely, swatting at the air beside him, and would have pinwheeled off the bench if Much hadn't grabbed him by the collar and hauled him back.
Robin's head swam a bit more than expected when he stood upright, and there was a definite swagger to his step as he approached the bar, angling up to the woman and resting an arm beside hers on the wood.
"It's Regina, isn't it?"
Despite the phrasing, it was a statement that he made, confident in his naming of her, and he read his answer in the way her shoulders tensed, her body taut as a snare as she studied him in turn. She looked at his hands first, and he uncurled his fingers slightly, showing himself unarmed, and her eyes traveled up his chest, over his chin, to settle most disconcertingly on his own.
"Who wants to know?"
She wore the same fierce scowl as the girl on the posters – Regina Mills, wanted for crimes against the crown: murder, treason, and treachery – but it was the flat coarseness in her voice, deeper and richer than he had expected, that reminded him he was dealing with one of his own kind, an outlaw.
"You have nothing to fear, m'lady," he hedged, wondering if she had guessed at his identity too. They had certainly graced enough posters together, papering trees and tavern doors throughout the kingdom, though the sketches did neither of them any favors – she, especially, was underserved by the severe lines of her portrait, he thought. "You're among friends here."
She huffed and turned away, bending further over the bar to flash two fingers at the barman. The gesture was efficient and oddly attractive in its sureness. She was at-home here, so much so that he found it strange she had managed to elude him thus far, sitting under his nose for gods knew how long.
He was running his tongue over his lip, thinking, when she shifted against the bar. She didn't look at him, spoke down to the wood and her fingers tapping out a frustrated rhythm there, and there was a kick of anger in every word.
"Friends? You almost got me killed."
Her other hand tugged at the fur along her collar, revealing a pale curve of shoulder and a raised not-quite-scar, the width of his finger, that cut across the side of her neck. Before he could challenge her, she turned from him again and flicked another sign to the barman, asking him to hurry.
Robin was at a loss. He certainly hadn't put that mark on her himself (and he would remember shooting at a creature like her, he sincerely hoped) and could think of no other occasion when his actions would have endangered her.
He stood awkwardly behind her, unsure if he should try to make amends for whatever she blamed him for or if he should retreat and let her alone with her grudge. Let them be rivals, if that was what she wanted.
He searched the room, ducking a glance behind him, and wondered who Regina's second drink was meant for. Some other person of questionable repute. Some other man. It had to be, and yet he could see no one waiting for her return. Perhaps she is planning to throw it in my face, he thought, and had to clamp his teeth down on the amused smile that was threatening to overtake him.
He leaned down to match her height, deciding to treat her as he would any other thief whom he had wronged, and clapped a light touch to her back.
"Come. Let me buy you a drink."
Her head whipped up before he could react and drove, powerfully, into his nose with the kind of sickening schunk! that had people two tables over shuddering. Vision knocked black, Robin almost lost his footing as he reached up to stem the flow of blood that was already drenching the neck of his shirt.
He could see Regina through his hands, rigid and wide-eyed and caught in the middle of a gasp, one hand creeping up to cover her mouth in the kind of exaggerated horror that would be funny, he was sure, in any other situation.
"Oh, no, I didn't mean…it was an accident, I swear I…I –"
Her words were barely audible over the rush of blood in his head, the throb that he could see at the edges of his vision, and, with a sudden drop in gravity that made his stomach whirl, Robin realized that he very much needed to be sitting down now.
She reached for him, trying to help, and he reflexively flinched away from her touch, stumbling against the bar before he found his legs again. She shrank back as well, all but wringing her hands, and he wanted to reassure her that, despite all appearances, he was fine, but the words came out thickly, mouthed through blood, and he had to spit the mess to the ground before he could continue, coughing out all he could think of to stop her from looking at him like that.
Like all fights that ended in bloodshed, this one caught the attention of the room, and his men came crowding with shouts of Robin! (and her eyes settled on his then, quicker than a shot, and she looked a young and wild thing) and hustled him through the kitchen to be seen to by Granny.
She pushed and prodded at his face without the least thought of being gentle, cleaning away the blood and remarking on his fast-blooming bruises, and he wasn't sure he would ever forget the grating sound that happened inside his head when she re-straightened (more or less) his nose.
He emerged from the back rooms feeling drained and intent on putting an end to this day as quickly as possible. He would just slip a word to Will, charging him with seeing everyone home safely, then –
Oh, he would have, if Regina hadn't been sitting there, in the midst of his men, apparently being regaled with tales of every scrape Robin had gotten himself into, every scar that marked his skin.
He loved his men like brothers, but sometimes he wanted to kill them.
Regina had clearly been installed at their table against her will, staring a bit uncertainly at the glass in her hand while each man tried to drown the others out. He longed for bed, but there were other things he longed for too, and he was not so heartless as to leave her in the company of men this inebriated.
"Determined to think the worst of me, aren't you, m'lady?" he asked quietly as he took his place on the bench beside her.
"You're becoming quite the legend," she whispered back, smirking a little, though her brow furrowed as she studied his face, lingering over the painful swell of his nose and the shadowy bruises that underscored his eyes.
Her fingers twitched against her glass, and he thought she might reach for him again (wondered what that gentler touch would do to him), but she gestured to the bottle of whiskey in front of her instead.
"I thought you could use something a little stronger tonight."
"Aye," he agreed, taking the second glass, needing strength for something that had nothing to do with the visible injuries she had inflicted, knowing-but-not-knowing that she had hit him deeper than that, broken him in other ways – a rabbit caught in the snare of her body from that first, fraught meeting of the eyes.
There was a tilt to her head that told him she knew what strength he needed.
(That she needed it too.)
"I am sorry."
"Don't be," he said, and he couldn't resist digging at her. "I had it coming, apparently."
She traced the raised line on her neck, and there was no bite in her this time. "I may have overreacted about that."
"I'd like to hear the story someday."
She smiled up at him, secretive and delicate and utterly charming. "You will."
They sipped at their whiskey, and he listened to her laugh at John's telling of the time they had emptied the Queen's stables and nearly been stampeded flat in the process, each mishap leading into another until even he couldn't understand what story John was trying to tell anymore.
He could feel Regina gradually growing restless beside him. She had not bargained for such an eventful night, after all, and, there was no reason for her to stay if she was wanted elsewhere. When a few of his men began stripping off their shirts to show off particularly impressive or gruesome scars, he reluctantly leaned in to tell her so.
"No one will notice if you slip out now, m'lady."
"Ah, Robin, ye can't be letting this one go so easily!" John boomed from across the table, and Robin cursed his timing, wondering how it could be possible that ten pints of ale had improved the man's hearing. "She's better in a fight and prettier than ye – right, lads?"
No one else paid him any attention, but Robin swore his saw Regina's cheeks color as she raised an amused eyebrow at him. His own face felt hot, and he hoped that his bruises had darkened enough to hide the flush that was spreading there.
"Thank you, John," he said wryly, feeling Regina shift off of the bench and make for the door and trying not to watch her, not wanting to know if she would look back at him or not. "You know just how to make a man feel special."
A slight draft was all Regina left behind, and his men carried on, undisturbed, with their boasts and slurred stories. Try as he might, Robin could not call his focus back to what John was saying or what Will was drawing in the air.
He fiddled with the bottle of whiskey, ran a finger around the rim of her glass, imagining a hint of warmth where her lips had settled. The pain of his nose was dulling now, like a fire burning low – a distraction, nothing more, from another pain he could not place. It was a wounding or a healing or something in between, something woken in him, roaring into being under her touch.
(The path of an arrow shaft along her neck, the crook in his nose, and, no, they would never be friends.)
In the beginning, if she was to be believed, he had nearly killed her.
In the beginning, she had half-killed him, too, and he would spend the rest of his nights begging her to return and do a thorough job of it.