Marion stared at herself in the mirror. She'd been granted a servant to help her prepare for the ceremony, a deaf old woman from Gisburne's family estate who couldn't care less who her lord was marrying as long as she was paid well for her assistance in preparing the bride.

The dress was a rich brocade that fell in heavy pleats from bustline to ankle, gold and scarlet and even a hint of black here and there among the stiff embroidery. It was also about thirty years out of style and no doubt had once belonged to Gisburne's mother.

Marion suppressed a shudder at the thought of that poor woman and her recent death. If her husband had truly been dead all those years ago, how might Guy have turned out if raised along with Robin, brothers in more than mere blood?

She dismissed the thought from her mind. What was, was, and no amount of wishful thinking could change the past, else her husband would still be alive and the Sheriff and Gisburne rotting in their own, lonely graves, unwept, unmourned and unsung.

"Such a grim visage for so happy an occasion."

Marion jumped, just a little, then squared her shoulders and turned to face Gisburne. He leaned against the doorframe, clad in his finest tunic, mail polished to a shine rarely seen in a working soldier's armor no matter how high or low his station. He'd been to the barber; his chin was smooth and his hair had been trimmed in a formal Norman bowl-cut. She supposed to other eyes he might cut a dashing figure. "You do my mother's wedding gown justice," he continued, confirming her suspicions as to the origins of her dress. "I had to guess on the measurements for alteration, but Elena did a fine enough job.

"Will I go veiled and hidden to this farce of a ceremony?" was all Marion asked as she stepped away from the mirror.

Gisburne laughed. "No, I've neither the need nor the desire to hide your identity any longer. Surely you realize I've won no matter what the outcome today?"

Marion went still at his mocking words, considering his meaning, discovering it, and flushing with dismay. "This is all a trap for Robin," she gasped, taking an involuntary step forward, hand clenching for the hilt of non-existent dagger, arms aching for the feel of bow and arrow to cut down the arrogant bastard sneering at her from across the room. "You don't really intend to marry me."

"Ah, but that's where you're wrong," Gisburne taunted her. "I do. Everything I told you was true; the only part I left out was that if Huntington tried to come to your rescue he would find himself trapped, captured and imprisoned, forced to watch as I claimed you for my own. Perhaps," he mused, "I might even arrange for him to witness our wedding night." He shrugged; before Marion could even come to grips with that appalling possibility, he added: "If he doesn't show, then I have the satisfaction of having you for myself, of raising his bastard as my own and knowing his own son will grow up loathing the very mention of the Hooded Man. Either way, I win."

Marion's stomach clenched with nausea at the Gisburne's words, then found herself wondering how he'd managed to hide such cunning behind a façade of buffoonery and incompetence for so long… "Who put you up to this?" she demanded, heart and mind rebelling at the thought of Gisburne as the author of such meticulous planning. He couldn't have put this together on his own, or even with de Rainault helping him as he so clearly wasn't in this case. "Who's pulling your strings, Gisburne?"

His face hardened at her accusation, and he lost his casual pose, stiffening in fury as he strode into the room and grasped her wrist, yanking her toward him and lowering his face to speak directly into hers. "No one," he ground out. "This is my own doing. You have mocked me and made a fool of me for so long, you and the rest of that band of thugs and thieves, that I have had a great deal of time to perfect my own plans against you. All that I needed was the correct timing, and you and the Sheriff cooperated beautifully in that. The last piece fell into place when the Abbess informed me of your condition, and so here we are, Lady Wolf's Head, the day of our wedding, and I tell you that I will not be denied this time. I will have the last laugh."

Then he grasped her by the back of the head, yanking her forward and forcing a kiss on her unwilling lips, pressing his tongue into her mouth and ignoring her furious struggles to free herself. He legs were hampered by the heavy skirts of her wedding gown, and he ignored the blows she rained on his arm and shoulder with her free hand, crowding her against the wall and slamming his body against hers with enough force to steal the breath from her lungs.

For the first time ever Marion truly feared Gisburne. It was true; they'd come to view him more as a nuisance than a real threat, certainly when not backed by the Sheriff and a full cohort of soldiers to do his bidding. Further complicating things now was the secret shared only among Robin's outlaw band and Marion regarding Gisburne's true paternity. Robin was still conflicted about his complicated relationship with his half-brother, but Marion doubted Gisburne would harbor any such conflicts were the truth to come to light.

We'd have done better to kill him before we found out who his father is, she thought bitterly, as the brutal kiss came to an end. She'd tried to bite him, but he evaded her snapping teeth as he pulled away, releasing his painful grip on her hair and wrist and sneering down at her as she glared back at him defiantly, trying not to show how shaken she was by the force of his embrace. "You've never been able to stop us, not even when you killed my husband," she said, keeping her voice as steady as she could manage when all she wanted to do was scream at him. "You've never had a better chance, and you failed even then. And you'll fail this time, just as you always have."

For a moment she wondered if she'd gone too far; he seemed on the verge of striking her, possibly even killing her, then visibly regained control of himself and stepped back. "I shall see you at the altar," he ground out, then turned on his heel and left, slamming the door behind him.

"Ah, so there's to be a babe, that explains things," came the voice of Marion's temporary servant from the far corner of the room to which she'd retreated at some point. So much for the woman's supposed deafness. "Such haste in a wedding usually means the loving couple's already tasted the wedding night, makes sense now." Nodding to herself, the old woman meandered her way to the bathing chamber, no doubt to make use of the piss pot as she frequently did. Marion had completely forgotten her presence during the confrontation with Gisburne, but did nothing to try and alter the old woman's misperceptions. What would be the point?

Fighting back the urge to succumb to tears, Marion chose instead to pace and plot, desperate to keep Gisburne from capturing Robin or any of the others in the trap he'd so skillfully set. But no matter how feverishly her brain worked, she could come up with nothing short of shouting out a general warning once she'd reached the altar.

And if nothing else came to mind, if no other opportunity presented itself, she would indeed scream out a warning and pray that Robin and his men had the good sense to act on it.

oOo

In the end they managed it quite cleverly, showing up to the ceremony disguised as clergy. Nuns, not priests or monks, who would be immediately suspect. Whoever had shaved them had done a wonderfully close job, leaving not the faintest hint of stubble to give them away. All except John, of course, but at his height he never would have passed for any kind of a woman. His disguise was a hayrack with a false bottom to keep any poking pitchforks from finding him; the hay had tangled itself in his hair and beard and for a moment Marion could almost find it in her to laugh with delight and disbelief at the picture they presented as the others threw off their enveloping habits and wimples and drew their weapons.

The moment passed when Gisburne shouted for his men to surround her would-be rescuers. The battle was brief, vicious, and, in the end, futile; Robin lay bleeding on the ground at Marion's feet while the others barely escaped with their lives. It was only now, in the aftermath of that battle, that Marion realized Gisburne's soldiers weren't the usual conscripts and hangers-on of Nottingham, that he'd apparently imported mercenaries from somewhere to handle this particular event, and her fury at him grew until she could stand it no longer and shoved him away from where he stood, gloating over Robin's unconscious form. "This wasn't part of our bargain," she spat as she knelt on the ground, never mind the mud beneath her wedding finery. Or the blood as she tenderly raised Robin's head and laid it on her knee.

Gisburne shrugged, his gloating smile only growing larger as he watched his erstwhile bride cradling the wounded form of another man. "Does this mean you've chosen to go back on your word, Marion? That you'd rather die with your lover than live with me?"

Put that way, it was no choice at all. She'd thought herself trapped, but realized now it was her own fears that held her back, that kept her from seeing the truth that was in her heart.

"Your choice, Marion," Gisburne pressed in a low voice meant only for her ears. "Marry me and spare your child, or," he nudged Robin's unconscious form with one contemptuous foot, "throw your lot in with this scum and take your chances with the Sheriff when he returns."

Her choice. She'd had nothing but difficult choices to face lately; what was one more? As she shifted her glance between her unconscious lover and Gisburne's gloating face, she realized that, for once, it was no choice at all. She deliberately turned away from Gisburne, stroking Robin's cheek with one finger. "I choose him," she whispered, all doubts fading away. Perhaps God would punish her for not putting her child's life ahead of the man she held in her arms, but that was for Judgement Day, whether it be soon or late, and she was at peace with her decision. She would face the consequences of her actions with head high and pride intact.

Gisburne shouted for his soldiers to take them away, and Marion allowed herself to be yanked to her feet. She managed to keep one hand possessively on Robin's chest as he was hauled up between two of the castle guards and dragged to the grating in the floor that was the only entry to Nottingham's dungeon. He was dropped unceremoniously to the bottom of that noisome pit, but Marion was afforded the courtesy of a rude wooden ladder with which to make her descent.

Once she reached the floor she rushed to Robin's side, taking him tenderly in her arms and doing her best to staunch the fresh flow of blood from the reopened injury on his head, binding up the numerous cuts he'd suffered from Gisburne's slashing blade during their short but furious duel.

She tore up her linen under gown without hesitation, not bothering with the stiff brocade of her wedding dress, useless for anything so utilitarian. She half-expected Gisburne to demand its return, but apparently he had as much use for it as he now had for her.

Strangely, her strongest emotion was one of relief. Yes, she and Robin and their unborn child were in an untenable position, but the rest of their friends had escaped and were no doubt plotting even now to free them. It was only a matter of time, a race between the outlaws and de Rainault, for his return would surely mark the end of their lives.

In other words, a situation she was familiar with, and that only once had resulted in the wrong outcome. The odds were well in her favor, and she deliberately kept her thoughts focused on the inevitable rescue.

Far sooner than she'd dared to hope, Robin groaned and stirred in her embrace. She leaned down and shushed him with a gentle kiss on his forehead. "Quietly, you've been hurt. Lie still and let your body recover as best it can."

"Where're we?" he mumbled, his voice slurring slightly. He winced and put a hand to the back of his head. "Wha' happened?"

"What do you remember?" she asked, fighting down a thrill of fear at his words. If his injury were severe enough, it might have done damage to his mind as well as his skull.

"Gisburne," he said, this time speaking clearly and with a great deal of hatred. His eyes snapped open and he gazed up at her. "Why was he trying to force you to marry him?"

"What, am I not worth marrying?" Marion demanded in return, giddy with relief that he was sounding more and more like himself with every passing moment. She smiled to show she was jesting, but he frowned and pushed against the floor, levering himself to a sitting position.

She surrendered her hold on him, giving him time to adjust to their current circumstances. He knew where they were, now, she could see it on his face even in the gloom of their cell. "He's imprisoned us both; I assume that means the wedding's off?"

He was matching her gibe for gibe, another good sign. "What can I say." She sighed theatrically. "My heart was already taken by another."

There was no humor in her voice now, just the truth, plain and simple. He reached up and stroked her cheek tenderly. "I was hoping that might be the case," Robin whispered, and leaned in to kiss her.

She returned the kiss, wanting desperately to throw herself into his arms but knowing now wasn't a good time, not with him still bleeding through her attempts at bandages from various places on his arms and torso, legs and even the back of both hands. When she pulled away, however, it was only by a few inches. "Robin, this is all my fault. If I hadn't been such a wretched coward, if I'd gone back with you to Sherwood when you asked…"

He shushed her with a gentle finger to her lips. "What's done is done. We've been in this situation before, all of us, together and alone, and we'll get out of it again, as we've always done."

She smiled at the confidence in his voice, allowing herself to believe. The smile faltered as she realized that she would have to tell him the rest of the truth, before Gisburne could show up and expose her secret. She wanted more than anything to be the one to tell him, but before she could speak he groaned and leaned forward, clutching his head in his hands.

His blonde hair was matted with blood from crown to neck. "You need to rest," she urged him, offering her lap as a pillow for his head. "Sleep. You'll feel better after you've rested." The truth would have to wait a little while longer.

It was a sign of how much pain he must be suffering that he gave her no argument, merely arranged his cheek on her thigh and curled into a ball, holding her hand in his. With her free hand she carefully stroked the back of his neck and shoulders, not stopping the soothing motions until she felt him relax into sleep against her lap.

His last, sleepy words were not for her, however. "I'm just glad I thought to leave Albion behind. I shudder to think of it falling into Gisburne's hands." Then he was asleep, unaware of the extra layer of guilt he'd added to her already overloaded burden.

A/N: Gosh, I hope everyone who is following this story is enjoying it. But I can't tell because of lack of reviews. Please let me know if it's working for you, I'd really appreciate the feedback so I know if I'm doing a good job or not. Thanks!