Post of the Month

~ April 2010 ~

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Timothy & Merries ~ Written by Rhys, Siiri, Annie, Gwyn & Angela. 

Posted on the HoS Yahoo group August 2008.

"Nearly there." Scarlet's voice broke the silence between them.

Timothy and Scarlet had been walking through the forest for what seemed to Timothy a few hours. He had quickly ascertained that Scarlet was not one for conversation, and so he had kept mostly quiet, keeping his thoughts and feelings to himself as they had negotiated tracks and stream paths and slopes up and slopes down; feet stepping over tree roots, sinking slightly down into moss, slipping on ages old leaf mulch. He had done whatever Scarlet had instructed and done it immediately, taking pleasure in the fact he was proving to this abrasive individual that he was not some hapless burden, that he could keep up.

He trusted Scarlet as his guide, he knew that much. Scarlet clearly knew how to guide a blind person, and warned Timothy of obstacles coming up - but rarely said enough to paint the far distance for Timothy - what was ahead, what was all around. Timothy instead cast his senses out and gathered all he could in the way of information.

He could feel evening wrapping its cooler fingers around the tall trees that they wended through, grass and patches of moss and bare earth underfoot. Here, a sense of expectation filled the forest. There was a stillness in the air, an almost unnatural calm, broken only by the occasional chirp of a bird. There was the sound of trickling water in the distance, and Timothy smelt the silt, the scent of a large body of freshwater. Beside him, through his light grasp on Scarlet's elbow, he felt the man's limbs move with fluid ease as they walked. Scarlet was obviously sure of himself in these surroundings; knew where he was, where he was headed.

Timothy had sometimes wondered how sighted folk found their way with eyes alone, and he wondered again now. It was a mystery to him; always had been. Did they not feel unsure when they did not use their hands or a stick to feel their way? Did they not feel unsettled heading into that vast blankness ahead of them, beyond what ears could hear, which he knew as the far distance?

The far distance; beyond hands and ears and nose - it was beyond his comprehension. He imagined it as a beautiful and complex tune that poised on the brink of being played to him - a tune that sighted people could hear from far further away than he could. It was difficult to explain to sighted folk how he imagined the far distance. How he imagined many things around him. He had learnt from a very early age that someone born blind could often not put into adequate words how they imagined or how they viewed the world. Feeling and listening were not constricted by language; hemmed in by words, but were also very difficult to define using words.

Timothy faced into a breeze now, coming through the trees, and the soft current rippled his hair. He scanned the air keenly, but there was no scent or taste of a storm like the one he and Jenet of Elsdon had been forced to take shelter from yesterday.

Scarlet swung left, and Timothy followed suit, only half a step behind, to find himself amid close-knit trees. He put out his free hand to his left, and his fingertips grazed lightly against rough bark of a trunk they passed. Here underfoot there was moss and grass; the ground was far drier.

Something scrabbled up another tree trunk close ahead at their approach, nails scratching on wood, and he thought it must be a squirrel. When he had been a boy at Thornton, one of his friends in the nearby village of Felden had found a young squirrel and tamed it enough for it to like being petted. Timothy remembered it being given into his eager hands so he could feel it and learn what it was like. It had sat perched on his knee as he had run his hands over it and found with delight the soft bushy tail, the way the creature's lithe body had wriggled past his fingers. Fluid and full of grace - a body designed to leap and climb like an acrobat. Designed for the forest - as Scarlet seemed designed.

The forest smelled like root vegetables and grass deep within this part of it, and he inhaled the sweet musky scent of bark and bracken, and the fresh scent of running water. Water rushing over stone and a small course of it falling from a height into more water, not too far away.

"There is a waterfall nearby," Timothy observed quietly out of the silence between them as they walked on.

"Oh, you're sharp, you are," Will replied sarcastically.

Timothy caught the tone in the man's voice. "You don't want to tell me where I am."

Will's answer was guarded, and Timothy knew he had hit upon the truth. "Plenty of waterfalls in Sherwood."

"Not one falling through rocks into a large body of water. A lake?" Timothy hazarded. "I get the scent of it...the stillness of it. I hear the water washing over stone....the waterfall."

Scarlet's body swung left suddenly, pulling Timothy with him, away from the sounds of the waterfall. Timothy was employing his guiding stick, and it knocked against tree roots and bushes and bracken. He gained the sense that this area was well shielded from any stray or curious traveller.

"Of course," Timothy said quietly, "you would camp near a water source."

Scarlet didn't answer, just walked on.

Breaking the silence of the early evening, a voice sounded softly and echoed from ahead. It was not a call to them, but a snatch of conversation floating in the air. Timothy's heart pounded and he immediately stopped short at the sound, listening, wondering if that had been Tuck's voice.

Will halted too and watched Timothy. The blind man's head was held high, listening, and Will saw expressions of tension and apprehension sweep across Timothy's mobile face. Why was there apprehension there instead of joy at meeting with Tuck again after so long? Will asked himself for the first time, studying Timothy's face closely. Had there been trouble between the two? Was there going to be trouble because he had brought this man into camp?

He hoped not, but there was no going back now. He couldn't very well leave the blind man to wander lost around this part of the forest, Will thought irritably. He had taken the blind man off his known route along the Lincoln Road, and now felt responsible for him.

He gently tugged at Timothy's arm. "C'mon." He took Timothy forwards just a few more steps, then halted him.

Timothy felt his wrist taken and his hand directed forwards - his fingers met upon a loose flexible mesh of thin twigs and leaves at arm's length directly ahead of him. He briefly fingered the leaves and found them small and oval, sharply pointed at the tip and sprouting in great profusion from all along the length of the cross- cross of twigs. He ran his hand to his left and then to his right and then upwards - and found this screen of bushes extended beyond where he could reach. He wondered where it ended.

"Camp's encircled by a thick screen of bushes an' trees," Scarlet's voice said from beside him. "The bushes go above head-height as you can feel, and we have to push through them; they'll whip back in your face, so keep your free arm in front as a guard an' follow me."

Timothy grasped his guiding stick by its shaft and raised his leftforearm in front of his face as Scarlet ploughed forwards with a swish of bushes - and then he found them all around him also. Spindly twigs whipped back against his upraised arm, and clung to his hair and clothes as he moved forwards, and to him, it felt as though their clinging fingers were fingers of warning - warning him that he was not an outlaw, he should not be here, and they resented him for his intrusion. It was an eerie feeling.

Scarlet, half a step ahead, was still forging through the forest of whiplashing, clutching twigs that constantly kept coming up to meet them. Then he twisted sharply to the right and halted. Timothy was quick to halt also, and suddenly he felt nothing but space directly before him - no more bushes, though he put out a tentative hand and swept it in cautious search before him to check.

They had broken through the bushes into a clearing, Timothy realised. Almost immediately he was aware of two things - the crackling of a fire thrown into sharp focus some distance ahead of him, and the movement of people by that fire. People who immediately ceased their low idle talk as soon as he and Will halted in the clearing.

 

Much had been on watch by the edge of the camp. Sitting on a large rotting tree stump, he had been engaged in sharpening his knife and then disconsolately whittling away at a bit of stick he had found. His thoughts were largely centered on Robert and his own private fears, not on the stick or on keeping watch - however, as soon as he heard the swish of bushes at the camp's perimeter, he jerked his head up to listen, immediately alert, and straightened his shoulders at the familiar low whistle, given to indicate that the approach was friendly.

"There's Will!" he exclaimed.

Where he stood at the campfire, disinterestedly watching Tuck stir the contents of the old blackened cookpot, John turned with fear and hope mixed to face the direction of Will's whistle. His heart leapt up into his mouth as two figures broke through the bushes and halted just inside the camp -for a moment he thought Scarlet had found Robert.

Where she stood near John at the fireside, Rhiannon took a step forwards, Ellie in her arms, Robert's name on her lips - and then in the next instance she saw that the man with Will was black-haired, and her heart sank miserably. Hugging Ellie to her, she stared numbly at the stranger, unable to offer a greeting.

"What the-?" began John in surprise, staring at the young man at Will's side. He had to look twice before he took in the stranger's hand holding Scarlet's elbow, the long stick, the head that turned to listen, not to see, and he realised the stranger was blind.

Much rose slowly from his perch on the tree stump, mouth open as he gazed at the stranger. His eyes slowly travelled down the thin ebony stick the stranger carried, and then travelled upwards to curiously rest on the stranger's face. He stared; they all stared.

"Tuck," said Will as the friar rose slowly from his kneeling position by the fireside, "I found 'im an' he says he knows you," and he jerked his head at Timothy beside him.

Timothy's heart immediately leapt as Will addressed Tuck - so the friar was here. Restlessly he scanned the blur of movement over by the fire, seeking a presence he recognised amongst the handful of strange people that seemed to be there, but he could not define one particular presence as his old friend.

"Tuck?" he asked tentatively in the direction of the sounds of the camp fire, not sure if Tuck would know him after eleven years. He found his heart was suddenly pounding in his ears, so loud he was sure everyone in the clearing could hear it, and he reached out his hand towards the sound of the fire and spoke more urgently: "Tuck?"

Tuck as he rose, peered through the evening streams of sunlight that filtered at an angle down into the clearing, and then as the stranger spoke his name, he felt his heart give a lurch, the likes of which it had rarely experienced before.

He stared at the young man with Will, in an instant taking in the long slender guiding stick and the way his head turned to listen - this man was a stranger yet somehow familiar - then as the young man turned his face towards the sound of the camp fire, Tuck's heart lurched again. The form was taller, was of an adult male - but the face hadn't changed - the oval, handsome face, the straight narrow nose and the set of the chin, and the way the dark hair waved into the nape of the neck.

"Timothy?" he breathed. "TIMOTHY??"

Timothy immediately swung towards the voice, fine-focusing on the direction of it, and felt his face twitch with a multitude of emotions - here was the voice of his old friend, the closest thing to a father he had ever had. The voice saying his name that had so often echoed in his memory over the last eleven years - the voice he had made himself remember in his head, so afraid had he been that he might forget what it had sounded like.

He found now that he had not forgotten at all what it sounded like, and the voice brought forth a torrent of emotions awakened in him.

"Tuck!" he cried out in eagerness and fear and anxiety, released the unmoving Scarlet's arm, and literally ran across the clearing towards the direction of his old friend's voice, stumbling forwards across this unknown, unexplored space, sweeping his stick before him, intent only on reaching his target of that familiar voice in this strange place.

Tuck had rarely moved so fast in his life; with a few strides he crossed the clearing, meeting Timothy halfway across it in the last sun-dappled patch of evening sunshine that slanted across the open space. "Timothy, I'm here." He wheezed, and had to pause, suddenly breathless, and Timothy half-collided into him, clipping shoulders with him and halting in mid-stride.

"I'm here, I'm here," Tuck quickly caught hold of the young man's shoulders in reassurance as Timothy swung round to locate him, reaching out both his hands in search. Timothy's hands found the shape of the human form he had clipped, and he ran his hands frantically over its shape; finding the broad shoulders and barrel chest and short squat frame of his old friend clad in the rough-woven cloth of a friar's habit.

Travelling his hands up from the broad shoulders and bull neck of the man, Timothy lightly brushed both his hands across the tense face before him, running his thumb over the lips which were parted in astonishment, gliding his fingertips swiftly over the plump cheeks, the face his fingers had always remembered, and to his joy, it had not seemed to have changed much in the eleven years, if at all.

"Tuck," Timothy said in both delighted recognition and fearful anticipation of what the man's response might be, and found his heart was thudding shaking the very core of him. He hesitated, both hands paused lightly on the face before him, trying to read it by touch as he did with faces, and then far more uncertainly with shaking voice he faltered: "Tuck....?"

Tuck gently took the young man's face between his hands and looked into the eyes that had never been able to see him. His own voice shook.

"Oh Timothy....where have you BEEN? Where did you GO?"

Tuck's plaintive questions spoke to Timothy only too well of all the time the man must have searched for him, all the heartache he must have caused. He felt tears fill his eyes and then overflow and slide down his cheeks as the enormity of this reunion hit home to him. He, embarrassed by the show of tears, aware of the strangers watching, lifted his hand and made an attempt to cover his face, wishing he could hide his emotions from those strangers, then gave up, and buried his face against Tuck's shoulder and sobbed. "Forgive me, forgive me!"

Tuck could not speak, he but fiercely wrapped one arm around the young man's shoulders and hugged Timothy to him. He planted a kiss on the top of the bowed dark head buried against his chest, which only made Timothy sob afresh and cling more to him, and a solitary tear of his own slid slowly down his cheek as he looked over the top of Timothy's head and across at the others in the clearing. No-one watching said a word; everyone stared.

Timothy held on tightly, pressing his face into the front of Tuck’s broad shoulder, then he felt Tuck's hand with the gentle touch he remembered so well lain against the back of his head and and he heard Tuck's soft voice in his ear, intended to be heard only by him. "Nothing to forgive."

Timothy drew in a deep shuddering breath, and for long moments did not lift his face from Tuck's shoulder.

Finally Tuck drew back a little, and taking Timothy's face between his hands, gazed into it searchingly. Timothy's face was still, solemn, waiting for response, understanding he was being surveyed.

Tuck groped for words to express how he was feeling, suddenly aware that this was a man who stood before him now, not a youth of fifteen. He stroked his thumb across Timothy's damp cheek, hoping that the young man would remember the familiar touch of love from years gone by.

"It's been so long..." Tuck managed to say at last.

Timothy reached out both hands and again explored the face before him; the wide-spaced brows, the large protruding eyes that now twitched and blinked nervously under his fingers. The short nose with heavy lines that ran down either side from it to his mouth; the small mouth with its slight downwards set at the edges which always made Tuck seem pensive or even sullen even when he was not, the fleshy cheeks and double chin, the frayed scapula bunched around the heavy neck below the face.

"Tuck," Timothy said in pleasure again, and this time smiled, and put the fingers of one hand back to that small mouth to find that it smiled tremulously back at him. He felt his smile widen even more in response.

The outlaws stood awkwardly some distance away, looking on at the reunion. Much stared. John and Will exchanged uneasy glances. Ellie in Rhiannon's arms, sensing the emotional atmosphere in the clearing, struggled restively and let out a wail.

Timothy suddenly swung his head round in surprise at the sound. "There's a baby here...?" he queried, tilting his head to listen in the direction from where the wail came.

"Aye, it's Rhiannon's child - Rhiannon is Robert's wife." Tuck patted Timothy's arm and looking past him to where Rhiannon stood, nodded at her to come over.

Rhiannon, still crestfallen by the appearance of this stranger and that he wasn't Robert, stepped slowly forwards and faced Timothy. She shifted Ellie over onto one hip and looked Timothy curiously in the face.

She did not want him to touch her face, she found. Not because of the scars - she was well used to people staring - but a blind man's touch at the moment against her face she was afraid would prove too much for her in her heightened emotional state. It would remind her too much, too sharply of Robert, and his loving, featherlight touch caressing her face.

Instead, she reached out and laid a gentle hand on the stranger's arm, and made sure she spoke evenly. "I'm Rhiannon."

Timothy covered her hand lightly with his as it rested on his arm in a gesture of greeting. She stood slightly further away from him than usually a person would do when giving a greeting, he realised. It gave him the impression of someone wanting to be friendly but somehow straining against that. As if she would like to keep him at arm's length for now.

The baby made snuffling noises, and guided by the sound, Timothy ran his hand up the woman's arm to find the child she carried. The chubby little form twisted restively in the woman's arms, and lightly feeling over the shape of the wispy haired head, Timothy realised the child was about six months old or so.

"Son or daughter?" he asked of the woman softly, laying his hand back on her arm, sensitive to the fact that her husband was missing. What Scarlet had briefly disclosed to him about the disappearance of Herne's Son leapt back into his mind.

"Daughter. Her name is Ellie," Rhiannon replied quietly.

Timothy consciously aimed a smile in the direction of the woman's voice, wishing to set her at her ease. For at ease she was not; something about her suggested all too clearly she held back from him. Perhaps because he was blind. Not because of the blindness itself, but because her husband was also - or had been - blind, and perhaps he reminded her of the man in some way. For this reason, he did not reach out to touch her face. He was fearful that action may remind her too much, too painfully of her missing blind husband.

"She is beautiful," Timothy said still softly, tracing a fingertip across the plump rounded cheek of the child, and then tickled the child under the chin. The child gurgled with delight, small hands grabbed hold of his finger, and Timothy felt himself smile afresh. He was suddenly minded of Lisbon and all the infants the working women at the palace had carried around with them in a sling against their body as they had worked at their tasks.

Another presence, that of a young man, had sprung to Timothy's right side and was now studying him curiously; Timothy could feel this new attention upon him, and he jerked his head round uneasily to scan over the presence hovering by him. Suddenly so many strangers to get used to, with their different ways of moving, their different voices; they all smelt different too, and the different scents of them criss-crossed the air and space around Timothy's head; a confusing trail that he struggled to make sense of.

The young man at his right side clasped Timothy's right arm and tugged at it, and Timothy found himself being swung away from Tuck and the woman with the child on his left, towards his right.

"Meet John," the youth's voice said eagerly.

Timothy had been aware that there was a presence different from all the others in the clearing. Different in the fact that it was larger, and now it approached and suddenly loomed close into Timothy's perception without a word. Its sudden closeness was so intense, that Timothy read it as an almost overwhelming pressure against his face, and he immediately took a step backwards away from it in an effort to rid himself of that uncomfortable pressure. He swung his head in some alarm, casting it around to find a gap of space away from this pressure right before him, this large presence, and flailed out a searching hand to the left side of him for Tuck who was nearby but who had relinquished contact.

Tuck's memories came flooding back at watching Timothy's reaction; it was like they were back at Thornton, and he was teaching the blind child. He secured Timothy's seeking alarmed hand between both his and squeezed it in reassurance.

"Aye, he's a bit different from the rest of us, is John Little," Tuck said comfortingly.

"John Little," sniggered Much.

Timothy swung his head uncertainly again, not sure of anything or anyone around him at the moment save Tuck. "Why do you laugh?"

The youth sniggered again and pulled on his arm once more, pulling him forwards a couple of steps, and Tuck relinquished Timothy's hand. Timothy shot out both his hands before him in uncertain search, and they met on the large presence looming before him. His hands found a pair of large shoulders clad in a shaggy over tunic, made from the pelt of a long-haired sheep. Somewhat alarmed and surprised, he registered the height of the man. He knew he himself was tall, at six foot - this man was at least six inches taller than he.

"John...LITTLE?" Timothy queried uncertainly, feeling over the shoulders of the form before him.

John looked into Timothy's face that was full of curiosity and wonder as Timothy felt over the front of his chest and shoulders. He looked into the oddly moving dark eyes and realised the man could see little, if nothing at all, as his face was directed downwards at John's chest, whilst his hands felt above what would have been his direct eyeline.

"Aye, John Little," John said wryly. He watched Timothy feel over him, gaining a clear idea of his stature, and would have liked to have ruffled the lad's hair in a friendly gesture of greeting, the way he did with Robert - but he knew enough of the blind by now to know that a stranger touching Timothy's head or face would no doubt startle him and make him jump. John knew now that it was always best to let a blind person come to him and explore first, and get to know the person they touched. So it had first been with Robert when his blindness had been restored.

Intrigued, Timothy raised his hand to find the face that had spoken, and he fingered thoughtfully over it. It was a long, rugged face with a high forehead. Deep-set eyes under low short sparse brows, a long nose, somewhat broad and flattened at the end, that seemed as though it had been broken in the past, and a thin-lipped mouth. The mouth was encircled by hair, almost hidden by a wiry, bushy beard that also hid a large square jaw and pronounced chin. Fascinated, Timothy circled his fingertips lightly over the beard.

He lowered his hand to feel once more over the shoulders that were a good six inches above his own, and he suddenly laughed, in spite of himself, finally understanding the joke. "Little John!"

The man he felt before him gave a deep rumbling chuckle of amusement which seemed to resonate from the very core of him.

Timothy felt an insistent tapping on his right shoulder and realised it was the youth who had taken his right arm and swung him round to meet John Little. He turned towards the youth, who still had him by the right arm, disentangled his arm from the light grip, and instead reached towards the person in search.

"I'm Much," the voice before him offered eagerly with, and his right hand was taken and to Timothy surprise and pleasure, was shaken in friendship.

The form before him was shorter than he. Timothy ran curious fingers over the young man's shoulders, finding his stature was solid enough, and then moved his hand up to feel over the top of the youths head, finding thick wavy hair cut close to the neck, before trailing his fingers down to the face that was turned attentively to his.

It was a young face, a mild face, with nervously blinking eyes and a parted mouth; a youthful jaw spattered with a rash of stubble, and a furrowed brow as though the youth was watching him and trying to fathom something out. A curious face, and in some ways, a face possessing the innocent expressions of a child. It was a gentle face, and he smiled at it, feeling over it, and he felt the lips twitch uncertainly back.

And this was all who were here? thought Timothy. Where was the minstrel Jenet had mentioned - the one he had promised to deliver her message to? He had met all the presences around him, learnt their names - no-one was Alan. He wasn't the giant, he wasn't this boy, he certainly wasn't the quietly spoken woman with the restless sounding baby in her arms.

Bewildered and disorientated by his new surrounding, he drew a step back from the youth Much, relinquishing contact with him, and swung his head to himself in unease, aware that he was frowning. Almost immediately he heard Tuck move up to his left side, felt Tuck's warm hand cover his and squeeze it in reassurance, and he felt the frown rapidly melt from his brow; instead his mouth widened in a smile, and he turned his head towards Tuck's presence beside him so that Tuck might see, because Tuck had taught him long ago as a boy of two or three, to turn his face towards the people he engaged with when he smiled, so they could see he smiled. Sighted people needed to see smiles.

Although she had come forwards and been introduced to Timothy, Rhiannon felt loathe to engage in any conversation. She withdrew to the other side of the clearing to pick up Ellie's blanket which lay under the tree, and standing there, her daughter in her arms, stared at the stranger, taken aback by the fact that here was another blind man.

Timothy was tall, lean and muscular. He was bareheaded, his thick black hair waved into his neck and was dishevelled by the evening breeze. His eyes were dark and moved unfocusedly around - much the same as Robert's did, Rhiannon thought with a pang, staring at the stranger.

His face was a handsome face, and he possessed a quick vivacious smile which he bestowed delightedly in Tuck's direction now at the continued sound of Tuck's voice; the smile showed a full set of strong white teeth. Rhiannon, ever the step-daughter of a Leicester tailor, dropped her eyes to knowledgeably study Timothy's garb. His clothes, though dusty from travelling, were plain and unadorned but were of a good durable quality, and they fitted his tall slim figure well.

He looked no more than twenty-five. He carried a light leather pack on his back. A dagger was slung at his right hip, with a leather purse, and in his left hand he carried a long stick of ebony topped by a silver knob. The guiding stick of a blind man, and he employed it now, sweeping it curiously before him in an arc of investigation as he stood beside Tuck. Learning about the lay of the ground around his feet.

Rhiannon glanced up from her pensive study of the man as Will came over to her, and then John lumbered slowly over, scratching his head. They had the look on their faces that suggested they knew how she was feeling - strange at this blind man come to camp, when the only blind person they knew was Robert.

_We shouldn't feel strange,_ thought Rhiannon, _for we are used to the blind...but maybe it is Robert we are used to more. And this man is not Robert, and I wish he was Robert..._

Tuck watched Will and John go across the clearing to Rhiannon, obviously to discuss the new arrival, and Tuck shook his head slightly to himself in doubt.

He looked round at Much who still remained by his side, like a faithful dog, watching he and Timothy with his wide candid eyes and Tuck managed a smile at him, and then looked at Timothy, whose face was apprehensive as he heard the people who had greeted him, move away from him. It was clear he was wondering where they were going. Tuck could almost see Timothy listen, as he tried to work out the dimension of the area around him. He seemed greatly unsettled, and Tuck realised it was partly due to the current formlessness of Timothy's surroundings. The young man needed a landmark to anchor himself to, he needed to establish set points of reference for himself.

Tuck squeezed Timothy's arm. "Come over to the fire," Tuck said gently, and nodded to Much to follow.

Timothy took Tuck's elbow and followed the man as he moved forwards, swinging round to the right and across an expanse of soft grass, even ground, towards the sound of a small fire. The youth on his other side kept pace with them, without a word, and all the while, Timothy was aware of being watched by everyone in the clearing.

Tuck halted, and Timothy immediately did so as well. His stick found before him a curving line of large hearthstones that surrounded a fire. The low crackle of the fire was directly before him; the heat from it rose up into his face. Food was cooking; he heard the simmer and bubble of the contents of some pot set on the fire below, and the rich savoury smell of rabbit meat and chibol being stewed together with wortes and barley rose to his nostrils. He turned his face downwards to the heat of the fire, sifting through the smell of the smoke the myriad of scents rising from the cook pot, and he suddenly realised how hungry he was.

Tuck patted Timothy's arm. "Wait here by the fireside with Much," he said, looked at Much and gave him a meaningful nod to stay with Timothy, before moving across the clearing to where John, Rhiannon and Will stood in quiet conversation.

Much watched him go, then switched his anxious gaze to Timothy, who stood before the fire, clearly uncertain at Tuck relinquishing contact with him.

Timothy put out his hand to the side and briefly touched Much's shoulder, to ascertain the youth's precise location beside him, and then turned slightly to warm both hands over the rising heat of the fire. Much watched him curiously and could not think of anything to say.

Timothy jerked his head uneasily round to the sounds of Tuck's quiet tread away across the grass of the clearing to the murmurs of the others; the low
rumble of the giant, the mutter of the sharp Scarlet. He kept his head held high, listening, trying to pick up the odd word of the murmured conversation,
very aware he was being observed and discussed.

Tuck reached Scarlet and John, and they broke off their murmured conversation and looked at him. Tuck wondered if they had been discussing him. That gave him an odd feeling - usually the group were so open and did not whisper much behind each other's backs. But Robert was missing, and Will was becoming increasingly unsettled and suspicious of anything.

"So you do know him, he spoke the truth," Will surmised grimly to Tuck.

"Aye," said Tuck calmly, "he spoke the truth."

"Where'd you find him, Will?" Rhiannon enquired quietly.

"Walking the Darkmere Road. Said he came into Sherwood to find you," and Will looked at Tuck.

John darted a glance across the clearing at Timothy who stood at the camp fire, warming his hands over its rising heat, Much by his side, watching him
wonderingly. "Has he always been blind, Tuck?" John asked quietly.

"Aye," Tuck said softly "as far as I know. He was certainly blind when he was left as a foundling at Thornton's gates at around a five month old babe. There is something about his eyes - the way that the pupils don't enlarge or contract with light or the lack of it - that suggests to me his blindness is due to a defect that happened before his birth. He has never been able to see even the brightest of light. I suspect that he was formed with blindness in his mother's womb, much the same as Robert was."

John shot another glance at Timothy. "He reminds me of Robert in some ways."

"Aye, I know," Tuck said quietly, feeling heavy hearted over their missing friend. Seeing Timothy again had only made his heartache over Robert more
intense. His feelings still swirled within him like a maelstrom - here was Timothy, after so many years - one of his prayers had been answered and he had prayed for so long that Timothy was safe, that he might find him again.

Now, Timothy had found HIM. And Tuck's heart was turning over with joy, but also surprise. For in his memories, Timothy had been a youth of fifteen, had remained so in Tuck's mind, stuck there eternally at age fifteen. Now Tuck had been confronted with an adult, and his mind still struggled to catch up. There were eleven missing years, in which Timothy had grown up and matured - he still SEEMED the same Timothy - but passing Time was sure to have wrought differences, and as yet Tuck did not know what they were, what he might find, and he felt uneasy.

For the moment, he only knew to feel glad that Timothy was alive and had found him; only knew to feel immense love for this young man. The love had never left him, and he knew from his brief interaction with Timothy, that Timothy still felt the same about him. Love and relief at hearing his voice, at being in contact with him, had been etched all over the young man's face.

"Well I was watchin' the Lincoln Road from an overhanging tree, and when he walked past, tapping his stick before him, he had the hood of his cloak pulled up - and I thought he WAS Robert," Will said quietly, reluctant to admit his mistake. "The way he moved....used the guiding stick....you know."

John nodded. Ellie let out a wail, struggled in Rhiannon's arms; Rhiannon shushed her gently, and looked across the clearing to where Timothy stood by the fire. Her gaze went to the long slender guiding stick secured to Timothy's left wrist by a leather loop; the way his left hand held the shaft. He was running the stick along the ground in an arc before him, discovering with it the line of hearthstones that encircled the cook-fire, seeking what could be around him, gathering information with his stick in exactly the same way Robert did.

Will broke into her thoughts, speaking a little louder than he had previously. "So what we goin' to do with him?"

Over at the fireside, Timothy swung round to face the direction of their voices, overhearing the last muttered question. "I beg your pardon?" he said sharply out loud across to the knot of men by the edge of the clearing. "What do you mean, what are you going to do with me?"

Will rolled his eyes at Tuck. "Ears like a bleedin' fox...."

Timothy frowned and tapped his way forwards over the grass towards the sound of the murmured voices, still very aware he was being watched by all. Reaching the small knot people he halted and reaching out found the rounded comforting shape of Tuck. He felt briefly over it, then he reached out his hand before him and found Scarlet's shoulder opposite, facing he and Tuck. He recognised all too well the man's now familiar outline, the slight restless shifts of movement he made, and the smell of sweat and old leather that swirled close around the shape of him.

"What are we going to do with him?" Timothy sharply repeated Will's question at him, feeling over the man's shoulder. "I pray you, have the decency not to exclude me from your whispered discussion as though I was a child. You do not have the right to decide anything about me."

"We could always send you on your way," Will half-threatened, looking hard at Timothy.

"Oh no you don't, Scarlet," Tuck said firmly, looking hard at Will in return; Timothy moved closer to Tuck so his shoulder touched Tuck's, glad for the
contact, and his hand found Tuck's arm. "Timothy came to find ME, to see ME. I've thought him dead these past eleven years; I am not about to let you or anyone send him on his way now."

Timothy remained quiet, deciding for this once to let Tuck fight his corner. He remembered well this final, decided tone of his old friend - when Tuck took on that tone of voice, people usually backed down.

Will looked hard at Tuck and was made with an unwavering glare. He glanced at Timothy who stood beside the friar, shoulder to shoulder with him. Timothy's head was held high, listening, a series of uneasy expressions crossing his face. It reminded Will even more of Robert; the way Robert stood and listened to a discussion that was easily getting out of hand.

Will did not often back down, but faced with Tuck's cold final firm tone, he decided to. They had enough problems with Robert missing; he could not afford to cause any divisions amongst the group and especially not with Tuck, who in times of crises was the rock of the group, the anchor.

"All right," Will said steadily in response to Tuck, looking hard at him, "he can stay this evening an' share our fire and food. But he's your responsibility,
Tuck. If there's trouble - if we're attacked or anythin' - you'll have to look after him."

"I can look after myself-" Timothy began aggrievedly, and his hand went to his dagger at his belt; Tuck laid an immediate hand on Timothy's arm in an warning gesture to halt the action.

Will came close; Timothy froze as the man's presence loomed right in front of his face, sour hot breath against his cheek, and he waited, listening.

"Oh, I'm sure you can," Will said softly with the merest hint of a threat - awarning not to argue, "but while you are here, you do as we bleedin' say,
because we all want to keep our bleedin' heads. Understand?"

"I understand," Timothy replied quietly.

It was fair enough. Scarlet might be abrasive and - he suspected - pig-headed at times, but there was no doubting he had a deep loyalty to Tuck and the other people here and was doing his best to ensure they were safe. Timothy respected that element of the man. Scarlet was an unlikely protector, but he was a protector.

"Good," was all Scarlet's voice said just as quietly, and the presence swung away and walked back across the clearing. Timothy turned his head to follow the firm soft footfalls across the grass - they headed in the direction of the fire. Both the woman with the restive child in her arms and the giant after some hesitation broke away from the gathering also and headed after Scarlet's direction, so only he and Tuck still stood where they were, and Timothy felt his brow furrow momentarily in uncertainty.

He was only glad to be reunited with Tuck once more - but what had he landed himself into, coming into this close-knit gang of outlaws, troubled by theabsence of their leader?

Timothy broke away from his inner thoughts as he felt Tuck's hand squeeze his. "Come back to the fire," Tuck's voice by him said, taking on a happier, cheerful tone. "We've a lot to catch up on."

Timothy's hand sought Tuck's elbow for guidance, still unsure of hissurroundings - and then stopped short as he turned and became aware of something large in front of him, some distance away.

It was a sense of physical pressure, characterised by a certain stillness in the atmosphere. Where he should have perceived the movement of air and a certain openness, as he did with the rest of this clearing, he now became aware of a stillness and intensity in this particular direction instead of an openness. In this direction, he felt a sense of vague solidity.

The exact source of this sensation was usually his face and head, but sometimes he had found that it could extend to his shoulders and sometimes even his arms. It did now. Whatever what was in front of him was very large and very solid. He turned his head from side to side, trying to find the extent of this feeling ofsolidity before him, but there was no sudden edges to it to be found.

"What is that?" Timothy asked, bewildered.

Tuck watched the young man curiously; he kept turning his head from side to side as though trying to scan over something. He secured the young man's hand in his and gave it a gentle squeeze. "What is what, Timothy?"

"There's something ahead of me...I don't know what. It's large. There's a pressure against my face. I feel it. The echoes....different from when they bounce off the tree trunks..." Timothy hesitated, loathe yet to move forwards with Tuck until he knew what was causing this pressure against his face. He paused, aware he was frowning, and sifted through the feeling of pressure further, and then queried uncertainly: "Rocks....?"

Tuck had never ceased to feel intrigued over this type of sensitivity the born blind seemed to have. It seemed peculiar to them. It seemed in part to be based upon awareness of echoes; an awareness of pressure - but the sense of pressure seemed to be felt by the skin of the blind person's face, rather upon or within their ears.

Robert had described it as feeling with his face, as feeling without touching; it seemed the best way of describing it that he could manage. Tuck had seen this awareness plenty of times in Robert over the past year, and now he was reminded that Timothy had it also. His mind went back over years, to many occasions when Timothy as a child at Thornton, had displayed such sensitivity. The brothers there had never been able to understand it, but they had accepted that it was a gift Timothy had been given in place of sight.

He gave Timothy's hand another squeeze and spoke fondly. "Aye, you're right. Rocks. Or rather, a high almost sheer face of rock in the direction we face now. This outcrop of rock that the clearing is backed up against forms part of the natural lay of the land around the lake that is nearby."

"I smelt a large body of water nearby as we came here, and heard a waterfall in the distance, though Scarlet would not give me much detail about what was around me," Timothy said wonderingly.

Tuck smiled. "Scarlet is ever cautious. We always guard our location carefully."

"So this clearing has an almost sheer rock face at its back, and the rest of it is ringed by close-knit trees and that tangle of thick bushes I came through with Scarlet. A well-protected place this must be, then," Timothy said.

"Aye; if it's possible to feel safe anywhere in Sherwood, we feel most safe in this spot. We oft change camps and move around the forest - but if we need to feel safe, we tend to withdraw to this place. It's a good place. Here, I'll show you what you can sense ahead of you. There's a small cave in the rock face that we use for shelter and storage, and you'd best learn of its location." Tuck touched Timothy's arm.

Timothy took Tuck's elbow once more and walked forwards with him across the grass, aware of the sounds of the crackling fire on his left as they passed it, and the murmurs of the other outlaws whose movements hung around it. He sensed they still watched he and Tuck with a mixture of wariness and curiosity and he wondered just how much Tuck had told them about himself.

Then the distance suddenly appeared to grow thin, and Tuck halted; Timothy immediately did so also, and wanted to put up an instinctive hand to protect himself, so intense was the feeling of something large and solid before him.

"Here," said Tuck.

Timothy stuck out both hands before him in search. Both struck against rock; a rugged uneven wall of rock festooned with clumps of weeds and strung with the occasional cobweb. Timothy moved both hands slowly over the striated surface and a few small loose stones broke loose and skittered down to the ground at his feet.

"If someone was up there at the top of this, spying on us, we'd soon know about it," Tuck's voice said from beside him. "Their feet would dislodge small stones like that, and we would hear them, even if they were hidden from our view."

Timothy registered the information. Standing facing the wall of rock, the flat of both hands placed against it, he lifted his head to face the sky above, trying to scan where this wall of rock might end. The sounds of the summer breeze came rushing above into the sky, around what he judged was the top of this rock-face. "How far above does it end?" he asked.

Tuck squinted up at the top of the rock face above, which was still bathed in the pale late evening sunshine. "Higher than the treetops by a bit. I'd say as tall as a good sized cathedral."

"Higher than the Abbey wall at Thornton I climbed over, then," Timothy said wonderingly, still feeling over the rock face before him.

Tuck's voice was suddenly sober beside him at mention of past years. "I guessed that that was how you left, that night eleven years ago."

Timothy registered the change in Tuck's tone and regretted bringing back those memories the man clearly had. He turned to face his old friend and ran both hands over the line of his shoulders. Tuck's form was still, as though he was thinking back over the past. Lost in memories.

"I wish I could have said goodbye to you that night, Tuck, you don't know how much I wept over leaving you without one word of explanation," Timothy said quietly, "but I was so afraid that after learning what I knew, I would be placed under some sort of lock and key at Thornton."

"Father Lawrence would not have done that," Tuck half-scolded.

Timothy's quiet reply was telling. "Are you so sure, considering what he knew?"

Tuck looked in the young man's solemn face and shook his head to himself. "No," said Tuck soberly at last, "I cannot be sure, I find."

"Abbot Hugo had much sway over him, and I was frightened by that realisation. I was afraid I would be sent somewhere far away and pressed into the Church as a novice in some remote abbey, made to live out my days there whether I liked it or not. Taken from you, and my freedom taken from me. I was only fifteen, and frightened - there was desperation in me, an urge to flee and indeed that night after we returned from Nottingham, I felt that to flee was the only thing I could do." Timothy found his voice trembled, still agonisingly unsure that Tuck did not harbour a grudge for his leaving, and he pulled tentatively at Tuck's sleeve much in the same way as he had done when he had been a child. "Forgive me?"

Tuck was suddenly minded painfully of being eight years old, and his father leaving him at the Abbey of St Augustine, over the moors from Tuckenby. He remembered walking there in near silence with his father and his dog Bess - and then just being left there on that chilly frosty day, standing inside the gates, shivering with cold and the feel of being abandoned, of being locked away from the world, possessing nothing but the clothes on his back which were soon enough stripped from him in place of a coarse habit instead.

He had been pressed into the Church at eight years old, whether he had liked it or not. And now Timothy's remembrance of his fifteen year old self's fears hit home all too well to Tuck with clarity of understanding.

"Timothy," was all he said in feeling, took the young face between his hands and kissed the forehead. "I understand. There's nothing to forgive."

Timothy wrapped his arms around Tuck's ample form in a hug and laid his cheek against Tuck's shoulder and was quiet. Understanding shuttled between them and no more words needed to be said on that particular subject.

Tuck lifted a hand and stroked the dark wavy hair.

"Tell me where you've been all these years, Timothy," he said quietly. It was not a reproach.

"Many places," Timothy replied just as quietly. "I went to Normandy first. Rouen..."

"Normandy?" Tuck's voice was surprised. "How did you find your way to Rouen?"

Timothy did not lift his cheek from the friar's shoulder. "Do you remember Gilbert de Guesclin, cook to my lord Renald Chenistelei, baron of Shewsbury?"

"Oh aye," said Tuck wryly. "when you were a lad, de Guesclin often stopped at Thornton, didn't he, with his master. I remember Chenistelei - he was often a "guest" of Thornton Abbey, sometimes for weeks on end."

Timothy smiled, feeling mischievous as memories of those days came flooding back with greater clarity. "For the good of his soul, you think?"

Tuck chuckled. "For the good of his skin more like! My lord Chenistelei was oft either in debt or oft in the displeasure of the then Prince John over the matter of the succession. He was a cousin of Father Lawrence and often went on retreat to Thornton to lie low whenever the situation demanded it."

Timothy chuckled too, and then he was aware of his smile fading as he thought back over the past more. "Do you remember, that when we went to Nottingham that last time....we encountered Gilbert de Guesclin in the Bell?"

"Oh aye." Tuck cast his mind back. "We stopped there for a bite to eat upon arriving in Nottingham - and we found him by chance there. He was greatly pleased to see us and welcomed us to the table where he ate, and shared his food with us. I had little like for Chenistelei, but de Guesclin I always thought was a good man."

"He was who I ran to, that night I left Thornton," Timothy said quietly. "He had told us in the Bell that day before that he had left the service of my lord Chenistelei some months previously and now could be found in Nottingham. - I remembered the name of the alehouse he frequented. The Bell. When I ran away that night - I walked straight back to Nottingham. I followed the road from Thornton to there. I walked swiftly all through the night, and was back in Nottingham by the morning," Timothy said softly. "I found de Guesclin once more at the Bell and asked for his help. I asked him to take me on as his apprentice..."

"Apprentice?" Tuck murmured in surprise.

Timothy drew back from Tuck, straightening up, and felt over the plump face, curious as to his old friend's expression at this piece of news. "Why sound so surprised, Tuck? I needed to work. I needed to learn a good trade."

"Never come across a blind cook," Tuck said wonderingly, looking into the young face.

Timothy smiled. "There's always a first time for everything, as you well told me. You taught me that anything was possible."

"I remember when you were a lad, learning from Gilbert de Guesclin in the refectory when he prepared his masters meals," Tuck recollected. "He took an interest in you, a liking to you." He suddenly chuckled and looking at Timothy, laid a hand against his cheek in fondness. "You always had your nose in the spices and the herbs, and your fingers exploring every dish. Your ears tuned to the bubbling cook pots and your tongue tasting every subtlety of what was produced."

Timothy smiled. "Ears and fingers and nose and tongue are all I have ever needed, Tuck, you know that. Eyes are nothing. I have never needed eyes that see. I have never WANTED eyes that see."

"Aye, I know that well enough." Tuck looked wonderingly into those eyes now. In all the years he had spent raising Timothy, he had never heard the boy once utter a desire or longing to be able to see. He saw now that nothing had changed. Here was a young man perfectly at ease with himself.

He smiled, put the smile into his voice, and stroked the rumpled dark hair back from Timothy's forehead. "Never wanted you any different, Timothy," he said. It was true, and he knew Timothy knew it was. He felt no regret over Timothy's blindness. Unlike many people he did not see it as a punishment from God, as blindness was oft viewed in the Bible. He saw it just as part of Timothy. Timothy was not imperfect because he was blind; he was perfect just how he was, which was how God had made him, how God had intended him to be.

Timothy smiled at the feel of the hand stroking his hair back from his forehead and lifted his face, turning his forehead into the stroking of Tuck's gentle hand. This gesture had often been soothing and it was no less soothing now, after all the tumoult of emotions and the long walk of this day. He was tired, hungry, and drained by his emotions, but Tuck's hand stroking his hair back from his forehead was like a soothing balm applied. "When you think about it, my senses were well-suited to becoming a cook."

"So when you found de Guesclin in Nottingham and asked him to take you on, what did you say?" Tuck studied Timothy's face curiously. "Did you tell him-"

"-No," Timothy replied quickly. "I just told him that Father Lawrence was intent on making a monk of me, and that I did not wish. I told him I was afeard I was being pressured into taking a vocation I had no skill for. I told him I wanted to make my own way in the world and be successful at what I did - not live my days out at Thornton as a blind monk, nor be a blind beggar on some street corner with a tin platter."

"I see." Tuck grew thoughtful.

"Well, all that was true enough," Timothy said, hearing the tone of thought in Tuck's voice.

"Aye," Tuck agreed, "aye, it was."

"I had a hard task persuading de Geusclin to take me on as his apprentice," Timothy said wryly, "but fortunately he must have looked at me and seen some potential. I think at first he took me on, thinking he would try and give me a basic job of some sorts so I wasn't left to beg in the streets of Nottingham - but he soon realised I had a good nose and tongue, had a strong pair of arms to help him, and he realised I was worth training as his apprentice."

"Was it difficult?" Tuck could only imagine the trials the young man must have undergone. Timothy had always shown himself at Thornton to be readily adaptable and a quick learner, but the outside world was mighty different from the confines of Thornton Abbey.

Timothy smiled, thinking back over the trials and tribulations of seven years of apprenticeship. "Oh yes. It was very hard at times. The world is geared to the sighted, as you well know. Always I was met with the reaction of surprise and disbelief, in whatever household Gilbert de Guesclin and I sought employ in."

Tuck cast a sideways glance over at the other outlaws who were grouped around the cookfire across the shady clearing. They were talking quietly amongst themselves, too quietly for him to make out what was being said, but he wagered the subject of conversation was Timothy. They kept glancing across at him where he stood with Timothy, doubtless wondering what they were talking about.

He turned his attention back to Timothy before him; Timothy's face was a little puzzled, wondering why Tuck had gone silent, waiting for him to respond. Tuck gently laid his hand on Timothy's arm once more, wanting to keep a physical connection with him, so that Timothy could read him easier as they spoke. "So how did you get from Nottingham to Normandy?" Tuck asked.

"Like you know, de Guesclin had left the employ of Chenistelei," Timothy answered. "When I found him in Nottingham, he was in the process of seeking new employment and decided to seek it in his native Normandy. I as his apprentice, travelled with him. We left Nottingham the very next day. Headed south to Southampton, and from there took a ship for Normandy."

"You fulfilled one of your dreams then, and travelled on the sea," Tuck said wonderingly, watching Timothy's face, alive with memories. He wondered what those memories were. Maybe he would come to learn of some of them, in later private conversation with Timothy. But nothing ever came at once, and Tuck was wise enough to realise that. He was still adjusting to the adult man before him and not the fifteen year old lad.

Timothy laughed. "Yes, and I was horribly seasick on the voyage from England to Normandy on a rolling, pitching merchants ship that smelt of tar and wet rope and bilge water, and the sea lost much of its romance for me! How many times I hung over the side of that boat and gave the contents of my stomach to the waiting fishes below, I could not begin to tell you."

Tuck chuckled. "I've heard say that happens to many." He patted the back of Timothy's hand. "So de Guesclin headed back to Normandy, did he? How did you fare in Rouen, working there?"

"Well enough. I thanked the stars I had been given such a good grounding in French and Latin as a child by the brothers at Thornton. My blindness actually helped de Guesclin, funnily enough, we came to find. I became a talking point." Timothy smiled. "No-one forgot the blind cook, and thus no-one forgot his master he was apprenticed to. De Guesclin found a great deal of work because households remembered him because of me. He stood out, not only because of his skill, but because he was the master cook with the blind apprentice."

"Oh aye, and I suspect de Guesclin liked standing out, he always was a showman," Tuck said knowledgeably. "Well...." he fell to sudden uneasy silence, not sure of what to say next, still adjusting to the man before him and not the youth he had last seen, and keeping his hand over Timothy's, he gave another uneasy glance across the clearing to where the others were. Scarlet was hunched on his heels by the fire, poking it up with a stick, and John was hovering over the cookpot, inspecting its contents, both were pretending to get on with things as usual, but it was clear to Tuck that both were snatching many a glance over to he and Timothy on the sly. Much was openly staring.

Timothy frowned in puzzlement, trying to read his friend's sudden lapse into silence, and fingered over the back of the friar's hand in exploration, sensing Tuck's attention had for the moment gone elsewhere. "What is it, Tuck?"

"Just that the others are watching us where they are grouped by the fire," Tuck replied softly. "Curious, and not a little suspicious."

"Can they hear what we say from over there?" Timothy questioned.

"Not if we speak quietly." Tuck turned his attention back to Timothy, smiled in spite of himself and taking Timothy's hand, steered it up to his face, so Timothy could be aware of the smile directed at him.

Timothy passed light fingertips wonderingly over Tuck's smile. "Scarlet told me that your leader was missing."

"Aye." Tuck felt the leaden weight of anxiety and hopeless suddenly weigh down his heart once more.

Timothy registered the tone of the reply and regretted mentioning the missing man, if it caused Tuck pain. It was clear that Tuck was fond of him. He solemnly dropped his hand from Tuck's face. "Maybe I have come at the wrong time...." Timothy murmured pensively.

"It is not the best of times, with Robert missing," Tuck answered soberly, "but I'm more than glad you came." He softened, looking at Timothy and reaching out, stroked the young man's cheek, putting reassurance into his touch as well as in his voice, and was glad to see Timothy twitch a brief series of small uncertain smiles at feeling his cheek being stroked. "Nay, Timothy. Don't think I'm anything but glad you came. My heart is sad and anxious over Robert, but you've brought some joy and hope to me this day, and for that I'm grateful. Your arrival has proved to me beyond doubt that we must always have hope, never give up, proved to me that the missing person can turn up again."

Timothy reached out and sought the friar's hand and took it between both his. "I hope you find him, Tuck. For the sake of your heart and all these people who know him. For the sake of his wife and child." Timothy paused, hesitated. "No child should be without their father to steer and love them," he added softly at last with meaning.

Tuck squeezed Timothy's hand without saying a word, and understanding shuttled between them on the subject.

"What is Robert like?" Timothy was careful to mention Robert in the present tense.

Tuck smiled, in spite of himself. "Determined. Resourceful. A healthy sense of humour. Proud to be who he is, blindness and all. Stubborn-natured at times, and mischievous and like a lad at others - he be only two and twenty."

"You sound fond of him." Timothy was curious, and wondered at it - no, he was not exactly jealous of this other blind man for having Tuck's love and attention, he found, but still.... He had always been aware from a very early age that his blindness made him unique from others, in a way. He had always liked that sense of uniqueness, been proud of it. Many sighted people thought he must constantly consider being blind a curse, but Timothy was only proud of being such an individual. It seemed the outlaws leader was something of the same ilk, and Timothy was intrigued. He had only very rarely met another blind person, and certainly never one who felt about their blindness the same way as he did; proud and happy of it.

"Aye, I am," Tuck admitted. "In some ways he has reminded me of you." He made an effort to come out of his somewhat sombre thoughts over Robert's disappearance, put a smile back into his voice for Timothy, and patted the young man's shoulder. "Come on, we're just by the cave; I'll show you what we have in it. Follow me - and have a care to duck your head a little as you pass through the threshold."

Timothy did as he was bid and followed Tuck into the cave, keeping in contact with its wall on his left. He followed with interest the line of the rock wall with both hands, feeling over it in curious exploration as he progressed.

At first the line of the cave wall went forwards from the entrance some ten paces, and then it twisted round to his left and led onwards. Timothy felt his way carefully along, following the sounds of Tuck ahead of him; Tuck's waddling tread and heavy breathing. His hands glided over the wall on his left and met upon crumbled bits of rock, and small clinging meshes of spiders webs.

He found a natural ledge at chest height, and swept the fingertips of one hand over it in exploration. They found the heaped rounded shapes of a few wooden turned bowls and beakers, alongside some fine straight lines of barbed arrows that had yet to be flighted with goose feathers which lay beside them in a pile.

The cave was musty, smelt of root vegetables and pine resin, rope and dead wood and dust. Dry earth was beneath his feet, and pieces of dry rock crunched under them too. The ground sloped slightly upwards to the right of him. As he followed Tuck onwards into the cave, Timothy explored away to the right of him with his stick, sweeping it over the ground in search, but could not find the other wall of the cave with his stick. Yet he sensed it was not that far away from the reach of his stick.

"Tuck?" Timothy spoke aloud to test the echoes and learn the dimensions of this space rather than needing any reassurance about where he was heading. The echoes bounced back to him - this was a narrow, low-ceilinged confined space. He reached right above him to try and find the roof of the cave, and his fingertips just grazed against the rock above.

"Do I need to duck my head at any time in here, Tuck?" he asked.

"No, the roof of the cave is never that low at any point," Tuck voice said from a few paces ahead. His heavy footsteps halted; and hearing them halt, Timothy immediately halted also. "Come further up and stand beside me," Tuck's voice said from ahead of Timothy. "There's room enough here for two abreast."

Timothy reached out both hands before him and found Tuck's broad back within reach. He felt his way over the back and moved up to stand beside his old friend, aware that they had gone some twenty paces from the entrance. Here was a dead end in the cave, he faced rock wall; he could feel it with his face. He reached out both hands and felt before him but could not find that rock wall and determined he was not quite in reach.

"It's dark in here," said Tuck.

"Is it?" Timothy was only mildly interested at the information. Darkness and light meant next to nothing to him. He could not begin to imagine what darkness was like, even though he had been told by sighted people all his life that he was in complete darkness.

"It is round this corner. We're facing a natural alcove in the cave. Here we store supplies and some weapons well away from the damp of outside. Here." Tuck took Timothy's elbow and gently steered him forwards a couple of steps and round to the left, and touched Timothy's hand against the woodpile.

Timothy ran his fingers over the wood and found a stack of snapped off branches with splintered ends propped upright against the cave wall, and a few thicker, sawn off bits lying at his feet; perfect to keep a small fire going throughout the night.

He felt down past the store of wood and found the bundles weapons tied in oiled sackcloth; daggers and swords. They had been placed on some of the larger logs to keep them away from dampness and the possibility of rust.

Curiously, he felt along the line of the wall in exploration past the stack of wood. Here, there were all manners of nooks and niches, and his fingers swiftly explored them all, finding set in them a coil of rope, a couple of empty water-skins, a small coarse sack which contained a few withered apples, another which contained a few handfuls of pearl barley - always good for eking out pottages and stews when meat was in short supply, thought Timothy.

"Here," said Tuck's voice beside him, "take this bundle of firewood from me. It'll see us through this evening, and then tomorrow we'll have to gather more. The fire is always kept going."

Whilst they were in this cave, they could not be heard by the other outlaws, and Timothy supposed that he and Tuck could not be seen by them, either. He decided to seize this moment of privacy.

He reached out and found the firewood Tuck was holding, and took the bundle for carrying under his left arm, and with his right hand he reached out and caught Tuck's arm to get his attention as Tuck turned towards him.

"Tuck," Timothy said low, "do you know a woman called Jenet of Elsdon?"

Tuck was surprised. "Aye....we met the once. How is it that you know
of her?"

"I became lost on the way to Sherwood....took a wrong turning," Timothy said. "I ended up near the village of Elsdon. She came to my aid and guided me back to the Lincoln Road. She told me her name, and we talked a little as we walked. I told her where I was headed, that I knew you - and she said she knew you."

"Aye," Tuck said quietly. "Must have been six years ago that I last met her..." He cast his mind back those years to the quiet woman with the long fair hair hanging loose to the waist. That fair hair hanging loose had falsely signalled to Scarlet that she was unwed, and he had become enamoured of her.

"She told me the story - of drugging you all. Is it true?" Timothy asked. He did not doubt Jenet's honesty, but wanted Tuck's side of the story.

"True enough," Tuck replied simply, "but she did it out of desperation in order to save her husband from de Rainault. I don't hold any bitter feelings against her for that." He suddenly thought of Anna; Anna who he would have done anything for. Aye, he understood.

"When she knew where I was headed, she asked me to pass a message on to you all," Timothy said. "To tell Robert of Huntingdon that a man called Gisbourne had been at Elsdon the previous day, and to warn you to stay away from Elsdon."

"So Gisbourne's been near Sherwood then," Tuck said thoughtfully.

"The man Scarlet seems to think this Gisbourne may have your leader," Timothy ventured.

"Robert was not in the Elsdon area when he disappeared," said Tuck, "but who knows where Gisbourne was by then...."

"I was not sure whether to tell you in private of Jenet's warning first," Timothy said. "There was something about Scarlet's manner as he and I walked here that somehow sealed my lips on her message till I had spoken about it to you."

Tuck nodded to himself in thought. "Think you did right, lad. He's touchy enough at the moment, what with Robert missing. And Jenet of Elsdon is a sore subject around him. He had....feelings for her back then, and then found out she was married."

"His pride was hurt," Timothy observed quietly.

"Something like that." Tuck patted Timothy's arm. "Let's get some ale down him to soften his mood before we break that particular bit of news to him. Come on, let's go back over to the fire, and we'll eat."