I am actually exceedingly excited because I have actually hit 100 reviews on a story! This is the first time that's ever happened. I am giddy and everything, super excited and whatnot.
"Will!" a girl's voice came from inside the cart. "There you are!"
Will took a step back from the carriage, and the occupant emerged from the shadows. The occupant was a girl with blonde hair that fell in elegant rings around her face and down her shoulders. Her skin was smooth and had a sort of glow to it, and her eyes were a deep shade of calm grey. A smile lit up her face and she jumped from the carriage, wrapping her arms around Will. Robin got the impression that this was surprisingly undignified for her.
Robin, of course, had no idea who Alyss was or why she was here, but it was evident enough that she and Will had a "more than friends" relationship. Robin glanced at her hand an took note that she had no rings on her fingers, so she wasn't entirely sure what their relationship was supposed to be.
"How?" Will asked, separating himself from Alyss' embrace after several long moments (long, awkward moments from Robin's perspective). Alyss didn't answer him, but she did pull him back to her in a kiss.
"I'll explain that later," Alyss said. "I'm here on important business, from the King."
"From Duncan?" Halt interjected, stepping around the cart to make eye contact with Alyss.
"Hullo, Halt!" Alyss replied, smiling openly. "It's been a long time. And yes, from Duncan."
"What would he have to say that isn't in this letter?" Halt held up the letter that he still had grasped in his hand. Halt raised an eyebrow, glancing down at the letter once more.
"The things he had written in the letter are no longer valid." Alyss released Will from her grasp and assumed a more diplomatic posture. She folded her hands in front of her, and squared her shoulders.
"Well, what's the difference, then?" Robin interjected. While the others might know Alyss, Robin certainly didn't and had no reason to trust her. Additionally, one of the things Robin had learned in her early years was that magic existed in this land. She didn't know what the limits of magic were, but she was willing to bet that a good sorcerer could copy someone else's face.
"The King was attacked shortly after sending the letter," Alyss replied. "He was shot."
A silent murmur raced in between Will and Halt. Mauch glanced over at Robin and she looked back, her eyebrows knit with uncertainty.
"Alright, and why not just send another letter?" Mauch asked.
"He realized that it might take an extra week or two for the first letter to reach Halt because the messenger wouldn't know precisely where Halt was, and so it wouldn't be reliable to send the second letter to Halt or else it might not have gotten here until to late," Alyss replied. "So he sent the second letter to me, because he knew that I would be able to find you."
"What are you doing in the tax cart?" Robin asked, not entirely fitting two and two together.
"I'm under cover," she replied. "I'm supposed to be the noble representative from the Northern county, bringing the tax in."
"Well... why?" Mauch asked, frowning in concentration.
"Two reasons. Firstly, the king had me in this position for several months now." She shot a glance at Will, her face apologetic. "Secondly, it was the only way I could be sure to run into you lot."
"True," Halt said, nodding.
"This way, you would see me immediately. The other way, I might have wandered for days before I saw you... or, rather, you saw me."
"What does the king have to say?" Halt asked.
Alyss reached within her robes and brandished a letter with the seal broken. She handed it back to Halt, her face somewhat grim. He opened the letter and skimmed it, his eyes flickering across the page like a snake's tongue. His already grumpy resting-face sank into a deep scowl, and then he closed the letter and tucked it within his cloak.
"What did it say?" Will asked, his own brow knit.
"Later," Halt said, shooting Robin a fleeting glance that made her stomach turn. "In quiet."
Robin felt slightly insulted and nettled, but she didn't say anything. She pretended she didn't notice and glanced over her shoulder, scrambling for something to say that would ease the tension in the air.
"I wonder where Alan and Little John went? They should have been back with Gilan by now," she said, awkward.
"Alan? Little John? I'm sorry," Alyss said, suddenly realizing she knew practically no one there. "I don't believe we've been properly introduced. I'm Alyss." She reached her hand out to Robin, smiling evenly.
"Robin Hood," Robin said. "Or... Alis, Alisandra, Sandy, you get your pick."
"Alis? Our names are practically the same!" Alyss said, smiling. "Do you go by Robin Hood, though?"
"Now," Robin replied, nodding. "They call me Robin." She indicated to all the others standing around.
"Well, it's nice to meet you, Robin. I didn't know you knew Halt or Will?" Alyss said, glancing up.
"She's my apprentice," Will said.
"She?" Alyss asked, squinting down at Robin again. "Oh! Well, that would make a lot more sense than a boy named Alisandra, wouldn't it?"
"Oh, right." Robin glanced down at her masculine disguise. "I forgot I was dressed as a lad."
"It was a good question, about Gilan and Little John and Alan, though," Will said, looking back at the woods thoughtfully.
"I can go," Mauch volunteered.
"Don't be silly," Halt cut in. "We're all heading back that way anyway, right?"
"I'm not," Alyss said, looking at Will wistfully. "I have to finish this mission. I'm under cover as a tax-deliverer, remember? I'm supposedly escorting my younger 'brother' here to learn the ways of running a barony, and we brought the taxes with us on the way."
"Brother?" Robin asked, peeking into the cart. She saw no one.
"Indeed," she said, turning to look over her shoulder. "Marius, you can come out if you'd like. They aren't actually robbing the cart."
"I wasn't hiding," a boy's voice declared from within the depths of the cart. "I simply had to count the tax money to make sure everything was in order!"
"Of course you weren't," she placated him.
A boy poked his head around the edge of the door, a small chest filled with coins tucked in his grip. He was older than Robin had first thought, judging from his voice. He was probably her age, maybe a year or two older, and he was easily taller than she was (although that wasn't much of a challenge). He had a strong jaw, and a mop of auburn hair that kept flopping into his eyes even though it looked like it had been geled into place.
He definitely didn't fit the voice she had heard moments before.
"Rangers can be scary, I get it," Will laughed, and the boy flushed. "I'm Will, this is Robin Hood, Mauch, and Halt."
"I'm Marius, so they call me," the boy said, stepping out of the cart. "And you've apparently met my elder sister, Alyss as you call her." He had a pronounced accent, but it wasn't one that Robin was familiar with.
"And I'm under cover as the Maid Marian," Alyss filled in. "We're supposedly the children of the Baron's brother, whom he never bothered to actually meet."
"I see," Will said, rubbing his hand across his face.
"We really must be going, or else something will be amiss. If you need to call upon me at the castle, do not come dressed as such... and, if you wouldn't mind, call upon the Maid Marian rather than Alyss," Alyss replied, giving Will one final hug. Robin was intrigued by the girl, especially because it seemed she had gone over a transition from informal to a proper diplomat in a single short conversation.
"I'm glad you're safe," Will whispered into Alyss's ear, just loud enough for Robin to hear it. Alyss smiled.
"Wait," Robin interjected. "What about the money that we robbed this carriage for?"
"If I take it to the Baron, we'll be seen in a better light and be able to get closer to him," Alyss said. "Which would be very valuable..."
"I agree, do it," Halt said, cutting through the sentimental looks that Alyss and Will kept exchanging. "Get going, too. I'll wake up your guards, and then we're going to go figure out what precisely happened to Gilan, Alan and Little John."
As they got closer to the camp site, an eerie air fell over the party. The forest seemed to get grayer, and Robin's stomach filled with butterflies. No, perhaps butterflies weren't right, she decided – perhaps dark, shadowed moths were better. She knew something was wrong on an instinctive level. She wasn't quite sure what level this was, or where it came from, but she knew what it meant. The feeling was familiar, but she wasn't sure where it came from...
She had had this feeling only twice before. The first time was the day her father died, and a couple weeks letter she got confirmation of his death at the hands of Morgarath. The second time was after she had the dream of Will getting shot through the chest with an arrow. While the second hadn't come true, she knew that the first one had, so she gave this feeling a certain level of respect.
The silence of the woods only made the feeling worse. She noticed as they grew closer, the bird songs grew quieter and then stopped altogether... almost as though the animals had fled from the area, just as animals flee from forest fires or earthquakes. Despite her sense of danger, they kept walking.
The camp came into view, and it was completely empty. Robin stopped walking, staring out at the camp site. Halt and Will didn't; Halt and Will saw something that Robin didn't see. Halt walked towards the centre and crouched down, looking at the scuffed leaves. Now that Robin knew where to look, she saw that some of the leaves had their damp undersides turned up towards the sky.
Halt and Will were whispering to each other, and Robin approached slowly. She walked around the scuffed clearing that they were observing. What she wanted to see was the cabin-like structure that they had hidden under the leaves. She walked towards the door and saw a long, cruel dagger standing hilt-up in the door.
They all knew what had happened now, but no one wanted to say it. Will was the one that broke the silence.
"Well, I suppose we've got to go break them out of prison, haven't we?"
