Marian awoke confused and hurting, alone in bed in a dark, filthy cottage. She had no idea where she was, what day it was, nor why her head throbbed with pain.

The last thing she could clearly remember was being in Acre and Guy stabbing her after she got between him and the king and admitted her love for Robin, then Robin holding her hand and leaning over her as they repeated their wedding vows a second time that day. She remembered pulling Guy's sword out of her abdomen, and then nothing more.

This dirty hovel wasn't in Acre, and it couldn't be Heaven!

Of course it wasn't. Her head wouldn't hurt so horribly if she were dead, she realized. But how had she survived, and where was she? Carefully, she touched her side where Guy's sword had plunged into her.

Her clothing, not the white Saracen dress she had been wearing but an English gown she didn't recognize, was dry and unbloodied. The wound did not hurt, and there was another surprise. Her body was slightly fuller.

Robin's child she secretly carried within her had grown. So, time had passed since her final memory. How long, and what had happened since?

The door opened and Guy himself stepped into the room, carrying a bowl of something steaming. "Here," he barked at her, wanting nothing so much as to care for her but expecting her to despise him. "You should eat."

"I'm not hungry. Guy, where are we?" Marian asked.

Guy didn't want to admit he had taken her to his mother's French village where he and Isabella had grown up, after their father's village in York had been stolen by the Crown and given to the Church. Instead, he ordered, "Eat. It isn't poisoned. I'm not Isabella."

"Who is Isabella?"

Guy looked at Marian in amazement. "Isabella...my sister. You remember her."

Marian began to shake her head "no," then stopped and grimaced. "I didn't know you had a sister. I'm afraid I don't remember much," she admitted.

Gisbourne realized the blow he'd delivered to knock her out must have taken away her memory. At least it had erased parts of her memory. She had called him by name, after all, so she knew him. What else had she forgotten?

"What do you remember, Marian?" he asked, placing the bowl of soup on a small bedside table.

Marian didn't hesitate. "I remember you killing me in Acre," she accused him.

"I didn't!" he cried. "You forc-"

She interrupted before he could finish. "You never stabbed me?"

Guy felt it to his advantage to lie to her, and he did so, desperately. "Never."

"What about the time you stabbed me with your dagger? I suppose you deny that, as well?"

"I stabbed the Night Watchman. I didn't know it was you! Marian, would I hurt you? Haven't I told you, you mean everything to me?"

She lay back, thinking, uncomfortable by his passion. She was alive, so she believed what he told her. "It seems so real," she said, "but it must have been a dream."

"A dream," Guy repeated.

Marian caught her breath and tried not to cry. "It was all a dream then," she said tragically. "Robin Hood is...?"

"Dead," Guy told her, with the hope to truly possess her beginning to dawn in him. "Killed by the sheriff's mercenaries." Had she really lost the most recent years of her life, Guy wondered? He could only hope it was so.

Marian placed both hands over her belly, wishing with all her heart she had not waited for his birthday to tell Robin the news about their child, at the party in Nettlestone Much had arranged. That party had ended in his death and the deaths of his men, and Marian wept now, believing Robin had died never knowing she was to bear his child.

Did Guy know, Marian wondered? Surely she would be dead if he did! She forced back her tears and asked him, "I was in Acre, though, wasn't I?"

"The sheriff took you with us," Guy sneeringly explained, angry again at the thought of her betrayals, "after learning you were the Night Watchman."

"I remember," she said faintly. "And Allan a Dale?" She definitely remembered begging Allan to leave The Road to Portsmouth Inn and go save Robin.

"Who knows?" Guy lied. "He lost his nerve and disappeared, before we reached the coast. I never saw him again."

So, Allan had failed, possibly having been killed himself. Happy-go-lucky Allan, who had saved her from the hangman's noose! All of them...dead! Marian wanted to cry, but forced herself to be brave. Her life and the life of her child depended on her watching what she said.

She remembered something else...her plan to save Robin's child. She had promised Guy in the Holy Land, if he would kill the sheriff and thereby save King Richard, then she would willingly give him her hand. She had promised so that her child could live...not only live, but inherit what rightfully belonged to him, or to her, the village of Locksley.

Glancing quickly down at her left hand, she saw she was wearing the emerald engagement ring Robin had given her, high in the tree when searching for Lardner, as well as a small gold band she didn't recognize. She was married then...to Gisbourne? And how had she retrieved Robin's ring? She had left it hidden under her mattress in her room in Nottingham Castle, before she had been forced to go to the Holy Land.

But with everything else disturbing her thoughts, the presence of the ring didn't matter much, though looking at it broke her heart.

"Did you...?" Marian took a deep breath before being able to continue. "Guy, did you kill the sheriff?"

"Sheriff Vasey is dead," Guy answered. Guessing what she must be remembering and hoping she would believe they were married, he added a lie to the truth. "By my hand," he finished.

"And the king?"

"Safe, and once again on the throne of England. You are now my wife," he said, proclaiming it proudly. "You are Lady Gisbourne."

Hearing himself speak the words and seeing Marian accept them, exhilarated Guy. Throwing himself on top of Marian, he began kissing her and molesting her with his hands.

"Guy, stop!" she ordered angrily, pushing him away.

"You are my wife," he repeated.

"I am your injured wife," she reminded him. She had no idea why her head hurt so badly, but she was now glad that it did.

She had no recollection of being with Guy in the marriage bed, only that she was repelled by the idea. Her heart belonged to Robin, and always would. Yet she knew she must have honored her "duty" as Gisbourne's wife, to deceive him about the child in her womb. There was something she vaguely recalled, something ugly and violent that involved Guy, that lay hidden in her mind.

More lies! She hated living a life built on deception. Yet Guy had killed the sheriff because of her, and saved England. Perhaps he would become a good man, in time.

"Later," she told him gently. "I am sorry, but I have a terrible headache."

"Later then," Guy reluctantly agreed, longing for her to love him...truly love him, not only with her body.

He could wait, now that he was sure she would be his.

But Marian had a few more questions to ask him. "Why are we here, Guy? Why aren't we home, in Locksley?"

Gisbourne thought hard, trying to come up with a believable explanation that might cause Marian to admire him. "The king," he said at last, borrowing the reason he believed had brought Hood to France. "King Richard is at war with the French king. I fought with him, for England, though I'm half French. I was wounded," he added, to excuse himself from continuing in battle.

"Your thigh!" Marian said, sitting up in bed. "You took an arrow in your thigh, and I stitched it for you."

"Yes," Gisbourne agreed, alarmed lest her memory return, but comforted by the new note of kindness in her voice.

He would finally win her, with Robin Hood out of the way, he told himself. Now, if only Hood were out of the way, truly! Dead at last, by his hand! Fear at facing Hood again gripped him, but he knew what he must do.