Author's note: All, thank you so much for sticking with me on this story. I know it's been slow in coming, but hope you've been enjoying despite the infrequent upudates. I'm planning on making the next few chapters a bit shorter to post a bit more frequently.

Just as we had a confrontation chapter between Robin and Edward, I wanted to have a chapter where Marian goes to an old friend/mentor (and Robin's aunt) to find out what really happened five years prior when Robin went to the Crusades. The chapter below picks up, I believe from chapter 8.

Would love to hear what you think! R&R if you have a moment.

Thanks!

Chapter 10

"Now, Marian…" Margot of Huntingdon's inquiring gaze met Marian's. "…shall you begin the conversation you ended five years ago? Or shall I?"

Marian did not hesitate. "Why did you end your courtship with my father?"

An eyebrow of surprise hitched. "You really are here for the truth." Margot pronounced as her usually sparking eyes flashed a steely, penetrating blue before answering Marian's question with one of her own. "Why do you think I ended it?"

"Father said it was because of another man."

A wry smile touched Margot's lips. "Yes, I can imagine he would put it that way."

"So, there wasn't." Marian concluded, though it was evident she was not surprised.

"No."

"Then why?"

Margot's gaze lowered to the clasped hands in her lap, surprised that even after all this time, the truth still hurt. "Because I realized Edward and I were not truly compatible the night my nephew came to me with the weight of the world on his shoulders and a sudden belief that he was not worthy of your hand."

"Robin." His name was a whisper on Marian's lips. "But…" The warmth of the room seemed to evaporate. Chills ran through Marian's blood. Her own question trembled with uncertainty. "But…why?"

Margot hesitated, assessing her guest.

When last she had seen Marian five years before, she was still, in many ways, just a child. Stubborn and headstrong. A dreamer who refused to realize that not all dreams come true and that not everyone conforms so easily into the ideal of who you want them to be.

It was that stubbornness, that unwillingness to hear the truth, to face reality, that had abruptly ended a relationship that had meant so much to both of them.

But now…now, Marian was no longer the sweet, little toddler that had climbed on her lap for a bedtime story or even the young girl tentatively beginning to discover her own beauty and intelligence. Instead, Margot saw the woman that Marian had become. Was still becoming. The woman that had experienced the harsh realities of a life lived in fear and restraint. One that had faced more disappointments and heartbreak in her young life than most nobles of Margot's age.

It gave her no pleasure to give Marian more pain.

"I think you know."

Marian swallowed hard. "I need to hear it. Please, Margot, I need to hear the whole of it."

Scrutinizing Marian's tortured expression, Margot relaxed back into her chair, her lips pursed in thought before asking a perceptive question. "Why now? What has changed?"

"Robin has returned." Marian stated simply, the unreadable mask of her expression unable to hide the mixture of emotions in her eyes.

"He has been returned five months now." Margot probed further. "Why this sudden interest in the truth of what happened five years ago?"

Clearly agitated, Marian rose from her chair and approached the fireplace. Her back was straight. Her head held high. Her steps unwavering. Margot had never been more proud of her. For her strength, her dignity, her grace. She was all that Margot had hoped she would become. All that her mother had been.

"I am recently betrothed, and not to the man I love." Marian turned to face Margot, her large blue eyes betraying the turmoil of her heart. "It is tearing Robin apart."

"And what is it doing to you?" Margot gently asked, already knowing the answer, but needing the certainty of it before flinging open the doors and ushering Marian into a past that would surely upend her present.

"I do not have the luxury of expressing myself." Marian stated, a delicate chin jutting out stubbornly even as her hands clenched and unclenched by her side as if that action alone would choke off the words she so desperately wanted to say.

"But if you did..." Margot prompted.

"If I did…"

One more, gentle nudge. "It is alright, Marian. You are safe here, now, as you always have been."

Safe.

That word. Once so much a part of her, now so very foreign, seemed to wrap itself around Marian and burrow its way into her heart, reminding her of all the secret dreams and hopes that had been whispered in this very room to the woman standing before her.

A woman who had been her mother's dearest friend and confidant. A woman who had been the same to her, when at the tender age of four, Marian mourned her own mother's loss. A woman who had ushered into her life a young boy with sparkling blue-green eyes and a dimpled smile that had brightened every day of Marian's youth.

A woman who was now asking her to go back in time and pretend that certain death didn't wait for her should she openly claim the love that had always lived in her heart.

For a moment, Marian could hear past laughter echoing in the walls around her. She could see subtle smiles and casual winks. She could smell the fir branches burning in the fire, its glow casting shadows that hid the act of fingers entwining as two hands joined. But most of all, she remembered the secret place in the small turret on the third floor, too small for a full-fledged tea party, just large enough for two young lovers to explore their newly-discovered feelings with kisses so passionate Marian could still feel them on her lips today.

Safe.

Now, as she always had been.

It was then that the facade she'd been hiding behind for the past five years began to crumble and give way to the heartache that she'd been so stoically keeping at bay. Her eyes filled with unexpected tears. Her lips trembled with words she dared not say.

"Oh, Marian, my child."

Catapulted from her seat, Margot's open arms were filled with a broken Marian.

Through her tears, Marian poured out her heart through stunted phrases and broken words, catching her mentor up on the tumultuous events of the past five months.

"Margot, I do not know what to do. I was forced into the engagement with Robin as a witness. I was given his ring in Robin's home, a home I am expected to claim…as someone else's wife. Every day I am required to pretend the man who holds my future is good and true and that the man that holds my heart is unworthy."

Pulling back abruptly, Marian angrily brushed away her tears and began to pace. "And now…now, there are hints that Robin has faced this criticism before. That decisions were made for reasons of which I was made unaware. That he has spent the last five years proving something I have always known."

She spun to face Margot, determination wrapping itself around her like a cloak. "I need to know the truth, Margot."

"Alright then." Margot nodded her consent. "Ask."

Marian paused as if knowing her very life was about to change.

And then the questions tumbled forth.

"Did my father tell Robin directly that he was unworthy of my hand?"

"Yes."

"Did my father send Robin to the Holy Land to win his acceptance for our marriage?"

"Yes."

"Did he ever intend to give it?"

For the first time since Marian's inquisition had begun, Margot hesitated, knowing her answer would change at least one relationship forever.

"Well?" Marian prompted. "Did he?"

"No."

Shaken, Marian sank down on the nearest chair.

"Tell me."

Margot returned to her favored chair and leaned forward, gathering Marian's chilled hands in hers and delivering the tale in a voice so gentle, it was in stark contrast to the harsh truth of her words. "The Duke of Lancaster had a son that Edward had arranged for you to marry."

"What?" Shocked by the length to which her father's plans had gone, Marian turned pale.

Margot continued. "His land holdings and wealth far exceeded those of Huntingdon's. Not to mention, he was of royal blood. A union between the two houses would have secured your family's place in this land for generations to come."

"Go on."

"Negotiations had already taken place when the premature news of your betrothal to Robin reached your father. He was caught off guard and, with witnesses surrounding him, had no choice but to accept the match. Later, in a private conversation with Robin, he made his hesitations known. He told Robin that, although he approve of the match on principle, he felt you were both too young to wed. He…suggested that Robin join the King's retinue to the Holy Land."

"Suggested." Marian repeated, questioning.

Margot amended her statement. "Made it a condition of his formal approval of your marriage. His intent was to remove Robin from the picture…"

"…and my heart…" Marian accurately surmised.

Margot concurred. "Yes. The Duke's son was to be a distraction that would turn to a serious attachment that would then lead to an acceptable marriage."

"It would have never worked." Marian declared without hesitation.

"I know." Sighing deeply, Margot's gaze shifted to those long lost days of the past. A time when painful truths were faced and destinies changed. "I tried to make Edward see reason, but…"

Lips trembling, Marian came to her own conclusion. "So it was not that Robin was unworthy of me. He was unworthy of my father's ambitions." Pulling in a shaky breath, a shell-shocked Marian continued, the thoughts bombarding her mind tumbling forth, each more agitated than the last. "How could father do this? Robin could have been maimed in the Crusades. Or worse. He could have been killed…"

Just that thought alone created a physical reaction in Marian. Her eyes drifted painfully closed. An imperceptible shudder ran through her. An errant tear slipped down her face. When she spoke, her voice was a strained whisper. "How could he have no regard for Robin's life? Or mine, should I lose him?"

Walking a fine line of honesty and compassion, Margot attempted to plead Edward's case, if not for the man himself, at least for the sake of his daughter. "What your father did, Marian, I do believe he did because he thought, in the long run, it would be best for you."

"And for him."

"Yes. And for him. But..." Trying to sooth a tattered heart, Margot tried to offer one ray of solace. "...no matter what he has done, Marian, your father does love you..."

"Do not speak to me of a father's love." Marian commanded, all warmth gone from her voice, her eyes. "The one man in this world charged with guiding my way through the treacheries of life spat in the face of love. And for what? Greed? Power? Safety?"

Vehemently shaking her head, Marian rose from her seat and placed as much distance between herself and the one defending the very man that had betrayed her trust. "I will never forgive him for this, Margot. Never."

"Marian, please try and understand." Trying to mollify a quaking Marian, Margot approached gently, as if trying to coax a wild tiger from its cage without being its next meal. "Your father…he has never understood the strength of the feelings between you and Robin. The way the two of you can drive each other mad one moment then be the solace no one else can give the very next. Or how, without benefit of promise, you have remained unmarried all these years when there were perfectly suitable suitors at hand."

"They were not perfect because they were not Robin!" Marian shot back as if answering her father's repeated accusations once and for all.

"I know that, Marian." Margot sighed deeply. "But Edward...he's never understood because he has never once in his life felt that kind of passion and irrational devotion that is so blindingly obvious when you and Robin are together. And even more so when you are apart."

"But…my mother…" Questions clouded Marian's eyes. "Are you saying that my father did not love my mother?"

Margot pulled up short realizing the damage she may have caused in her rush to justify Edward's actions. "No, no, of course not. How could he not love her? Marian, your mother was beautiful and kind and every good thing that life is." She paused, gauging whether her words were truly sinking in. Gauging how much she should reveal. "But your parents, Marian, they did not marry for love. Surely you knew that."

Gaze fixed on the fire, and arms wrapped around herself as if she were trying to hold herself together, Marian shook her head slowly. "Father never speaks of her, and I…I have been loathed to ask. I thought…I thought it was too painful for him because he loved her so, but perhaps…perhaps he does not because she was nothing to him."

"No. Marian, that is absolutely not true." Turning Marian toward her, she caught her gaze with a dip of her head. "By the time your mother passed, your father and mother loved each other deeply. But it had not always been so." She paused. "Do you want to hear?"

Marian nodded mutely as she wiped away an errant tear that had fallen down her pale cheek.

Seated once more, Margot began her brief tale. "Marian, dear, when your parents met, they were dutiful children to parents who wanted their union. It was, no doubt, a political and financial match between two houses, and neither opposed on those grounds. Prior to their wedding, they had become acquainted enough to be sure of their contentment with each other, but their love, it came after all of that. Little by little, day after day, their feelings grew until they realized just how dear they were to one another. It was a slow, gentle love that was cultivated through care and time." Margot smiled with remembrance. "Unlike yours and Robin's, which was instant and intense."

Margot gathered Marian's hands in hers once more. "Can you not see, Marian? Your father was choosing for you the path that had given him the most joy in life. A marriage to a good nobleman who would grow to be a great love."

"But I already had a great love." Marian's broken whisper nearly broke Margot's heart.

"I know."

Marian blinked away further tears as she asked one pervasive question. "Why could he not see that?"

"He did." Margot answered softly. "And perhaps…for a father who loves his daughter with all his heart, it was that love he feared the most. For if you were to fully embrace it then lose it, it would have destroyed you. And for that reason, that was a love too great for your own good."

Marian's voice trembled. "And you? Do you think the same?"

"No." Margot's bittersweet smile belied a love long lost and a lifetime of sweet memories and enduring loneliness. "Then again, I, too, have never married for a reason."

Margot's words struck a chord in Marian and with that enigmatic revelation, Marian instantly recognized herself in the woman before her and wonder how she had never seen it before. How she had never questioned Margot's maidenhood or the cause of it. Her heart, already breaking in two, broke again for such a dear friend. "What was his name?"

"Roderick." Margot answered softly, knowingly, then patted Marian's hand. "And he is a story for another day."

Nodding, Marian swallowed hard and sniffed back remaining tears before mentally gathering her tattered emotions and pulling herself back together. In a heartbeat, she had once more transformed herself into the very essence of reserved calm. "I must go. I have been gone too long…"

She rose to leave.

Margot followed suit, worry etching itself on her face and knitting her elegant brows together. "What will you do now?"

Margot's question ricocheted through Marian's heart, only one answer echoing back with ringing certainty.

"I will find Robin and tell him the truth."

"Knowing Robin's impulsive nature, do you think that is wise…" Margo inquired gently. "…now that he is an outlaw?"

"Wise or not, Margot, words need to be spoken." Marian paused, her voice betraying the depth of her conviction. "Robin cannot go on believing a lie, and I…I refuse to go on living one."

Tbc…