Vengeance is sweet 2

Guy picked up Marian at her father's house; she had agreed to accompany him to the sheriff's feast. This was one of the first official outings as his fiancée. A servant opened the door and Guy entered. How beautiful she was! The dark hair was pinned up and on her dress she had fastened the brooch he had given to her – the only valuable heirloom he had possessed. She had blushed when he told her that this brooch had once been his mother's. Guy smiled at Marian and gently put the cloak around her shoulders. This woman would belong to him even though they had not set a date so far and despite her having asked him a few days ago for a little more patience until her father was better.

Edward of Knighton degenerated visibly but this was something that would never change. Guy did not understand her hesitation; why could she not be his wife immediately? He loved her with a passion he could not understand himself and that nobody would ever have thought possible of this gloomy man. When he had begun to court her, he had had ulterior motives that she was ignorant of – that anyone was ignorant of.

A hatred towards anything named Locksley burned in Guy's soul, and the reason for this hatred dated back more than ten years but to Guy it was like it had happened yesterday. During their time as knaves Julian of Gisborne and Walter of Locksley had met and become good friends. When Locksley asked his friend to lend him a large amount of money for several successive years of bad weather had ruined the crop and lightening had destroyed part of the castle, Julian did not hesitate, even though it was difficult for him to spare the money.

Guy was a happy lad of eleven years and always up for mischief. He was not very big for his age but pretty agile even though his father always reproached him of not taking the martial arts seriously enough. "Later", Guy had always laughed. Two years later Julian of Gisborne accompanied King Richard to the Holy Land and did not return. At age thirteen, Guy found himself the heir of his father's estate. On the verge of manhood, rather tall by now but not yet fully educated and lacking enough authority to hold off marauding hordes roaming the country. Jeanne of Gisborne decided that she would have to employ knights until Guy was old enough. She sent a messenger to Walter of Locksley and asked for payback of the loan, but the messenger returned without having achieved anything – Walter of Locksley could not remember Julian having lent him any money.

Julian thought it natural to lend money to his friend and he thought it just as natural to trust his word of honor. Nothing had been fixed in writing and Jeanne of Gisborne did not have the slightest bit of proof of the fraud. How would she get the money now to pay the knights? Guy saw his mother's despair and had to witness numerous mercenary knights leaving the castle.

The stables of Gisborne were full of noble steeds that roused the envy of many. These fine animals would be the Gisbornes undoing.

Guy had left to go hunting in the wee hours of the morning, accompanied only by the farm hand Arthur. His mother would be proud of him; he had shot an impressive stag. Filled with joy he turned his horse in the direction of the castle when suddenly he saw smoke building up on the horizon. Gisborne, Gisborne was ablaze! He left Arthur by the stag and spurred his horse towards home, racing like a madman.

Never would Guy forget the sight of smoldering debris, his cries of horror at the corpses of the servants and several knights in the castle yard, the tears as he saw his mother lying strangely twisted on the ground, even in death still crouched over the little girl the murderers and depredators had not spared either.

Guy's little sister Josiane had been but three years old, a slim creature with light green eyes and blond hair. The castle had been attacked at dawn, its inhabitants slain, the horses stolen, everything raided and finally set on fire.

Guy stood as though paralyzed and then dropped to his knees. He took his dead mother's head onto his lap, tears streaming down his cheeks. After he and Arthur had buried Jeanne and Josiane of Gisborne, Guy remained at the grave, still and numb. All this was Walter of Locksley's fault. Through his fraud the castle had been without defences, through his fraud Guy's mother and sister had been murdered. Guy would avenge them. He did not yet know how; he was but a destitute young nobleman who owned nothing more than his horse and a few weapons. Those and the brooch his mother had always worn on her dress, a wedding gift by Guy's father, were the only things he took with him. Jeanne of Gisborne had a brother Guy would turn to now even though he did not fool himself about the sort of welcome he would receive. His mother had always said that André had no heart. This very experience Guy had to make himself also for his uncle only grudgingly agreed to let him stay. Guy, however, was secretly glad his uncle had no love for him. This made it easier for him to put all his energy and emotions into planning his revenge on the Locksleys. No one ever saw Guy shed a tear, not even when he was wounded, but no one remembered ever having seen him laugh either.

Even if anyone had remembered the name of Gisborne, nobody would have recognized the tall, serious young knight joining the armed forces of the Sheriff and connected him with the boy he had once been. The revenge on Walter of Locksley had been taken from him for he had died and his son had joined the war with King Richard, but Guy had time. He would wait; the time for his vengeance would come. While Edward of Knighton was Sheriff, Guy kept a low profile, but after Sheriff Vaysey had come to power, things began to change for Guy as well, and soon he found ways to prove himself useful to the new Sheriff. For his revenge he would do everything. Guy had heard that Marian of Knighton had been betrothed to Robin of Locksley before the crusade and that the engagement had been broken off, but that Marian had remained Robin's one and only love. Would it not be poetic justice of he, Guy of Gisborne, married Locksley's former fiancée?

Though what had been but a strategic move and part of his plan to avenge his family, turned soon out to be something completely different: Guy had not expected love to strike him like lightening.