Post of the Month

~ June 2006 ~

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Robert & John ~ Written by Siiri & Gwyn. Posted on the HoS Yahoo group May 2005.

Robert and John took the network of small deer trails East to reach Maybury.

They avoided the main paths through the forest. The way they took was a shortcut that very few people knew about, and it would lead them to the fringe of the forest only a few hundred yards from the village of Maybury.

Now, they walked a rutted deer track, fringed by clumps of bracken. Robert's stick swept from side to side across the line of massed ruts, following them onwards

The deer trail was narrow; just enough room for he and John to walk side by side. He felt the forest close around him like a friendly screen. Birds chattered in the trees above him; a pigeon softly cooed. Occassionally he felt warmth splash across his face and knew it was the sun reaching its fingers down between the treetops to touch him.

He and John walked in silence, apart from John uttering the occassional word of what could be seen around them. It was more addittional information rather than description intended to colour Robert's perception of the world around him. Robert's perception of the world around him was colourful enough, and this the others had learnt. Robert listened and absorbed that addittional information, storing it away in case he needed to draw on it. And he was silent, and as he followed the deer trail, he fell to thought.

Tuck's conversation with him about his father down at the stream shortly before setting off on this journey had unsettled him more than he had cared to admit. He wondered if he had shown that on his face; it was sometimes difficult to tell how good he had been at disguising his inner feelings over something. His sighted friends, he was aware, studied him and had learnt to read him in their visual way, in a way similar to how he could read them, without sight of eye. A certain tone of voice...the way they moved, the way they touched him...an aura of distraction or irrititation or preoccuppation, however slight, were all vital clues to knowing the real feelings behind the actual words. And to Robert, his friends couldn't disguise their voice, as much as he couldn't seem to wholly disguise his face to them.

Maybe Tuck had realised he had been unsettled when the conversation had touched on his father. And Gisbourne.... At the thought of his half-brother, Robert wasaware his brow twitched a frown.

What was to be done there? He did not know. Things would have been easier if his father had not publicly acknowledged Gisbourne. But what else could his father have done? Except deny the relation....and Robert knew that his father was not the sort of man to do that.

_What is Father thinking about this matter?_ Robert thought. _I wish I knew..._

He was Herne's Son. There was no denying it. He had no desire to deny it. But he was also still his father's son. And the uncomfortable suspicion that his father's other son - the elder, illegitimate one - could bring about the downfall of his - their - father the Earl, still prickled in Robert's mind.

_Were I still the legitimate heir,_ thought Robert, _things would be different; Gisbourne wouldn't have any chance to get his foot in the door._

_But I am disinherited and outlawed, and Gisbourne MUST see some sort of chance, even if it hasn't all jelled in his head yet. He's not stupid. He's impulsive - but he's not stupid. The Sherriff under-estimates him..._

Robert sighed inwardly. Were he still the legitimate heir... But he wasn't, and somehow the hardest part of it all was knowing that he had made the right choice by coming to Sherwood and being Herne's Son. It had been the right choice for him....but he knew that the consequences of his choice could ultimately prove damming for his father.

John was in thought, too.

He walked beside his young leader as they headed East along the deer trail, not offering a guiding arm. He knew well enough by now that if Robert needed guiding he would ask. After a year, Robert knew his way around all the routes of Sherwood, all the intricate network of streams, rivers, trackways and trails, and could guide himself around the forest, using his stick, his ears, his other senses and a whole host of other awarenesses that John had glimpsed but could not explain or describe.

John glanced at Robert's profile as they walked. Robert kept frowning slightly to himself, and John knew by now after a year of learning to read the blind young man's face that that meant something was on Robert's mind. John figured he knew what. The news of these Lincoln outlaws and the potential threat they brought to existence in Sherwood, was, John felt sure, preying on the back of
everyone's mind....

He watched Robert's stick as it tapped from side to side, in perfect rhythmn with his stride, feeling the way ahead and warning of every obstacle which was stepped over or avoided without Robert breaking pace or hesitating. Robert walked steadily and confidently onwards, completely unconcerned. It was like Robert's stick was an integral part of him, John thought, an extension of himself. He had admired Robert's skill and ease of use of it ever since the start. He had sometimes tried to imagine what it was like to walk forwards without being able to see, without knowing what obstacles could be ahead, without having any visual idea of the world around him, and he could not imagine. Sometimes he thought he grasped a glimmer of what it was like to not have visual concept....but that glimmer was as vague as a wisp of smoke; gone before he could grasp it, just leaving a hint that he could not explain to himself in words.

All he knew was that being blind and having no visual concept was not bad. Not for Robert. Not for anyone born blind, John supposed.

Robert kept turning his face up to the warmth of the sun every time they stepped out of shade and into a brief patch of hot sunlight that pooled onto the trail they walked. John glanced up at the sky that could be seen framed between the leafy branches overhead. Not a cloud hovered there, the air was hot and still. John sighed, feeling out of sorts. He had felt unsettled ever since visiting Meg at Sedgeley yesterday.

Robert was quick to pick up on the sigh and turned his head to listen to John's presence beside him, immediately alert. Ever since leaving camp, he had sensed John's preocuppation. "You've been very quiet," Robert observed.

"Thinking," John answered simply.

"Wishing you'd gone to Sedgeley in place of Will?" Robert questioned.

John found he answered with honesty. "No. Relieved, if anything. I think me going to see her upsets her.....she was so quiet and withdrawn yesterday..."

"Give her time, John," Robert said gently.

John looked down at the ground as they walked on. "I know."

His mind went back over the past few months - seeing Meg fall in love with Adam had been hard. Knowing that Adam of Sedgeley could give Meg what he could not - a steady life and security and a true home-life - had been hard, also.

_If you really love someone, you set them free,_ thought John. He had done that with Meg - and look what had happened. Wed and widowed within the year - and with a child on the way. Adam's child.....

Looking ahead of them, John saw the trees begin to thin out, and he touched Robert's arm briefly. "Nearly at the edge of the trees." He glanced warily around him as they neared the end of the trees, but there was no-one to be seen or heard. No sign of soldiers.

Robert grinned at John's piece of information given so seriously with sincere intent to inform; he had known for several minutes previously to John speaking that they were nearing the edge of the trees. The forest no longer felt so closed around him, no longer so shielding. The echoes of their voices had begun to sound different in the widening space as they had walked on, and the trail they were on was beginning to widen and peter out, and the deer tracks were growing fewer, avoiding the wide open space at the fringe of the forest where there was human habitation.

"Nearly there, then," Robert observed with humour.

"Aye." John was watching Robert curiously; Robert kept smiling to himself as though amused, and John could not fadthom the cause for it. He wondered what the joke was and if Robert was going to share it. Obviously not. Robert often found some strange things amusing, things which John and his sighted friends sometimes could not grasp the humour of.

John was also aware after a year that the born-blind Robert often found sighted people and their behaviour and way of thinking amusing too, which sometimes both bemused him and took him aback. Robert's own behaviour and way of thinking could sometimes appear both alien and amusing to people - though no longer unsettling to the rest of the outlaws - and it had been difficult at first for them to accept and understand that they themselves could appear alien and amusing to Robert, when they were the sighted majority and considered themselves normal and ordinary....whatever normal and ordinary was. John was beginning to wonder....

John halted at the fringe of the trees, and Robert halted beside him. He scanned curiously around him, and became aware of a tall vertical patch of hardness out to his right. He put out his right hand to feel, and and found a tree trunk next to him. Taking a step up to it for possible extra cover, he stood still and listened, turning his head from side to side and scanning over the large open space he could sense before him, casting all his senses out like a net to gather every single scrap of information.

Not far before him, the small stream flowed, trickling and burbling its way onwards. Beyond that came the sounds of the village itself, the ring of a hammer on anvil, a cockrel crowing, a dog barking, a few voices, muffled by distance; mothers calling to their children, and children shrieking and laughing as they played about the village.

Where he stood beside Robert, John warily surveyed the village of Maybury and its surrounds. But there was nothing out of the ordinary to be detected. A man was driving his cow from the scrubland where it had been grazing; another man herded a pig with a whole collection of piglets back into its pen. The fires in most cotts were lit and the smoke spiralled out through the holes in the roofs. Everywhere was peaceful and serene, and everyone in the village seemed to be getting on with life as usual. He and Robert were as yet hidden from view from them, here in the shadow of the trees.

John glanced at Robert beside him. Robert's head was uplifted and still, his face attentive and concentrating. Listening - and so much more. John knew that by now. Robert kept rolling his eyes, but that meant nothing. Robert often rolled his eyes, it was a simply a product of his blindness, he did not know he was doing it, and it gave out no meaningful message. John had long since learnt to ignore Robert's peculiar eye-movement and read nothing meaningful into it, and instead concentrate on reading Robert's face as a whole for the emotions and signals consciously or unconsciously transmitted to the people around him.

"No sign of trouble, Robert," John said quietly, "at least nothing that I can see. There's people moving about the village as usual. You hear or sense anything out of the ordinary?"

Robert twitched a frown, still listening and absorbing his surroundings for anything that seemed different. "No, nothing," he replied quietly at last. He leaned his hands on the top of his stick at chest height, and he listened for a moment longer. "I wonder what sort of reception we will get from the villagers."

"They should be glad to see us," John said wryly, "considering we've brought them money to buy them enough grain to last them till harvest time."

Robert grinned. "Poor Abbot Hugo....what with Benfield, Sedgeley and Maybury able to buy grain on the sly from old Eli over at Rufford from the Abbot's personal store....the Abbot is suddenly going to find far less bread on his table!"

John chuckled. "Do him good. He'll have to tighten his belt a bit."

"Won't hurt him to be in the position of some of the villagers and wonder where the bread for his next meal is going to come from." Robert changed his grip on his stick to extend it before him once more to feel the way ahead. "Come on." Sweeping his stick before him, he stepped away from the tree and walked forwards, heading for the sound of the stream that seperated them from the village.

John followed. He didn't offer to help; Robert knew his way.

It wasn't far to the stream. Robert reached it, then turned left and using the edge of the stream as a guideline, followed it along till his stick connected with the bridge spanning the short stretch of water; simply two old thick logs lashed together. Finding the edge of the logs with his stick, he stepped up onto it and nimbly crossed the narrow bridge, continually feeling from side to side across its slippery width with his stick to guide himself safely over. John followed, stout quarterstaff in hand.

As he walked across the log bridge, smelling the smoke coming from the homes in the distance ahead of him, hearing and sensing the movement of general activity around the comunity, Robert was suddenly reminded of the villages on his fathers estates, at Huntingdon and elsewhere. They suddenly seemed just like Maybury and it brought back oddly happy memories. How many times as a young boy had he played in and around such a village like Maybury, gone sliding on its pond in the winter, fished from its stream in the summer, crossed log bridges like these?

The memories were not that distant. Robert smiled to himself, stepped down from the log bridge onto the opposite bank, and halted to wait for his friend.

He turned his head in the big man's direction as John's presence came lumbering over the bridge and towards him. John halted by him, and there came the touch of the large square hand to his arm. "We've been spotted," John's voice said, and Robert detected a note of wariness in it.

Robert turned his head in the direction of the village; that faint blur of movement and sound and scents some distance ahead, and tried to scan over it, with little success; it was as yet too far in the distance for him to be able to focus on with any clarity and detail. "People are looking at us?"

"Aye." John cast an uneasy glance across at the village where women had come to the doorways of their cottages to stare, and a gaggle of children who had been running about the edge of the village now stood in a bunch and watched, whispering curiously to one another. "They must be wondering what we've come for."

"Well, let's not keep them in suspence," Robert replied, and moved past John's large presence, briefly laying a hand on the man's shoulder. "Come on."

Sweeping his stick over the ground in search ahead of him, he found the track that led away from the bridge and towards the village, and with John beside him, they headed away from the stream and the shelter of the forest and towards the centre of the village.

Maybury was of average size. A potholed stone track ran through the centre of the village instead of the mire of mud that so many villages had at their centre. Most of the cottages were situated along either side of this track, and as Robert walked along the track, he was aware of the dwellings to either side of him, approaching into his awareness and then fading away behind him as he walked on; curious whispers of women at their doorways, and children tagging along behind he and John, curious and excited and fearful.... "It's Robin i the Hood...." "...what's he come here for?...." "Look, he's blind....he's still blind...."

Robert merely grinned, hearing the whispers, and tapped his way onwards, unoffended and completely unconcerned. He was used to such whispers and the fact that many folk in the villages still found him an object of curiosity, still hoped for a miracle by Herne as far as his sight was concerned. Still found him an oddity, come to that. All the other blind people that these villagers ever encountered were beggars in gutters asking for aid.

"Where's Geoffrey the headman?" Robert said to John as they walked through the village past the scatter of cottages. "Working out in the fields? Do you see him?" He lifted his head higher to listen beyond his immediate surroundings, attempting to pick up on any approach that was recognisable as the headman's, but could not focus on anything.

John scanned beyond the village, to where most of the men of the village could be seen working on their strips of land. "Don't see him out in the fields...."

"That's because he isn't," said a familiar voice suddenly to Robert's left, emerging out of the nearest cottage, and the familiar presence of Maybury's headman suddenly moved forwards and came clearly into Robert's focus, past the whispering cluster of women and the gaggle of agog children who had been tagging along after Robert and John as they had walked almost the length of the village.

Robert halted immediately at Geoffrey's approach, scanning blindly first in his direction then in other directions; John touched Robert's arm briefly, seeing his young leader was still trying to get his bearings within the village. "We're just by Geoffrey's cottage," John said.

"Came down from the fields to grab a bite to eat," Geoffrey explained, looking curiously and a little warily at John and Robert, as he waded through the loose cluster of women and children gathered around the two outlaws.

Robert turned his head to track the man's sounds and movements as he moved to stand directly before Robert. Robert smiled, and putting out his hand, found the headman's shoulder. He moved his hand down the man's scrawny arm to clasp his forearm in friendship, and found his was clasped back in reciprocation. "How fare you, Geoffrey?"

"Well enough, as does everyone here." Geoffrey nodded to John. "John."

"Geoffrey," John said with a nod back. The man had been headman of Maybury for a number of years, and was a trustworthy individual. A mutual respect existed between he and the outlaws.

Geoffrey studied Robert curiously. "You ain't been here for a while. Been keeping your heads down?"

"You could say that," Robert replied. "Gisbourne and his soldiers always seem to be at their most...prolific come the advent of the summer months."

Geoffrey gave a short laugh. "Well, he don't like to stir his backside from his warm fire much during the winter, do he? Not if he can help it."

"Friend," said John amusedly, "none of us like to do that if we can help it."

"Come to my home," said Geoffrey, "and we'll talk." Robert heard him turn away in the direction of the small crowd of villagers who had gathered around them. "Off with you - haven't you got any work to do?" Geoffrey shooed the curious women away with. "Go and look to your children - off with you!" he shooed the gaggle of whispering children away also.

"Thurstan," he added aside to the old potter who sat outside the doorway of the next cottage, working at his wheel, "keep on watch for us. Any sign of trouble or soldiers, let us know."

Thurstan, an old but bright-eyed individual with clay-stained clothes nodded, and went back to working at his wheel. The women and the children who had gathered, reluctantly dispersed.

Geoffrey half-turned back to the two outlaws standing on the track, nodded to John and Robert and beckoned, then faltered as he caught sight of Robert's oblivious face; John merely grinned, looked at Robert, and touched his arm to get his attention. "Come on," said John. "To your left, off the track."

Robert turned to his left, and kept his hand touched to John's arm for guidance as they walked off the stony track and across a stretch of soft grass, following Geoffrey. He had only visited Maybury a few times since his blindness had been restored, and as yet his knowledge of its layout was not complete.

Putting his hand up to find the lintel of the low doorway, remembering only too well the last time he had come here how he banged his head on it, Robert ducked his head under the height of his hand and entered the headman's cott, following Geoffrey in. John followed Robert, his large frame momentarily blocking the bright sun from the doorway as he passed through it into the cottage.

Five paces in, and Robert's stick clashed against a low wooden object to his right; running the stick over it in exploration to determine its size and shape, he recognised the object as a bench. He moved up to it, and put out his hand before him to feel and he found the edge of the rickety table. He stepped over the bench to sit on it at the table, propping his stick against his knee. John moved to sit beside him at the table.

Robert turned his head to listen curiously around him. There came the crackle of a small fire over to his left in the centre of the dwelling, and the movements of a woman - Geoffrey's wife Agnes - by it. She was stirring something in a pot, her wooden spoon clashing against its metal innards as she stirred. By her came the the fretful sounds of a toddler, protesting sleepily, and as she moved around the fire, the sounds of the toddler moved also, so Robert presumed she had him sat on her hip, as he sometimes carried Ellie around when he was moving around camp and involved in some task.

"Some food for our guests, Agnes," Geoffrey said to his wife. She shushed the squalling toddler sitting on her hip and moved to the back of the cott to take down wooden platters from a hanging shelf.

"I don't want to take what you cannot spare," said Robert.

Geoffrey grinned, clapped a brief friendly hand on Robert's shoulder as he moved past behind him to take his own seat at the table. "We have some to spare - thanks to your men. Scarlet and the Saracen made a kill near here yesterday, and alerted two lads from the village where they'd hidden it, after they'd taken what they needed. We went into the forest and brought the rest home. Still have some of the meat left - and it needs to be eaten, lest we be discovered harbouring venison."

John chuckled. "Can't be discovered harbouring venison, Geoffrey. I'll help you dispose of the evidence, by all means."

Robert turned his head in the direction of the headman's wife as her movements bustled around in the far corner of the cott, her toddler still squalling. "He sounds fractious," Robert observed.

"Wait till your little one reaches this age," she answered with dark humour.

Robert winced slightly at that prospect.

"Fine son I have, though," Geoffrey said with pride, looking at his wife. "About time I had one, after four daughters, eh woman?"

"You'll get what God gives you, man," Agnes said, "it ain't in my control."

Robert grinned. "You tell him, Agnes. Nothing wrong with having daughters. Speaking as the father of one."

"You wait till you have four and have to find husbands and marriage portions for them," Geoffrey replied.

Robert laughed. "I'm going to encourage Ellie to choose for herself a husband that doesn't demand a marriage portion."

Geoffrey planted himself down at the table also and looked at Robert and John. "Are you camped near here?" Geoffrey asked.

"No," Robert replied, and left it at that.

Geoffrey asked no more questions on that subject. Sometimes it was best not to know too much about the outlaws, including their current whereabouts.

Where he sat opposite Robert at the small table, Geoffrey looked the young man in the face, watching the blind eyes curiously. They roved past Geoffrey as though he was invisible. Geoffrey always found that somewhat unsettling when Herne's Son faced him. Unsettling too, were those blue irises, ringing nothing but solid white of eye. No black pupils - just those eerie small white circles ringed by blue irises. They took some time to get used to. Every time Geoffrey met Robert, he felt initially startled by those eyes.

Witchcraft, people in the villages around had initially said in shock upon first seeing Robert's eyes. That was what they had initially believed. Herne's Son had been bewitched, and his blindness and those peculiar eyes had been the mark left. It had taken Geoffrey time to believe in Robert's story; that he had been born blind but the Powers of Light and Darkness had kept it disguised until his blindness had been needed to be used as a weapon against some evil sorcerer who had suddenly materialised and threatened Sherwood and Herne a year ago.

Geoffrey thought back to a year ago. He still didn't know much of what had happened then. The outlaws never spoke of it and did not invite questions about that time. But rumour had it that Robin of Loxley had somehow been brought back from the dead for a while to aid Huntingdon and the other outlaws as they had battled this sorcerer... Not that any of the villagers around had actually SEEN Loxley...

As for Huntingdon....it had needed a man blind since birth to defeat that sorcerer, and thus the Powers of Light and Darkness had restored Robert's blindness, and also cast away the veil of disguise which apparently had been cast over Robert's eyes all his life, at last revealing them how they really were.

That was all Geoffrey - any of the villagers - really knew - but it was quite enough for them to get their heads around and accept, and believe...

There came the sound of an ale-skin being uncorked, the glug of liquid being poured into beakers. A stir of movement from Agnes passed in front of Robert, and there came the dull sound of wooden items being placed on the wooden table, one in front of him. Robert carefully moved his fingers across the table before him, aiming for where that sound had come, and his fingers found the smooth turned shape of a wooden beaker full of ale.

"There's food, too," said Agnes's voice, the child on her hip still muttering fretfully, and there came the sound of something else being placed on the table before him. Robert immediately explored the surface of the table before him with the fingers of his other hand, and his fingers met upon the rim of a wooden platter.

"Like I said," said Geoffrey's voice opposite him, "we've food enough for today, and the meat we should dispose of."

"That's the last of it, anyway," Agnes said, moving back to the fireside. "Making a broth from the bones. Once they're picked clean, ain't no soldier can accuse us of harbouring venison."

Robert was sitting facing the open doorway. He could feel the warm sun on his face. He turned his face more up to it with pleasure whilst fingering over the contents of his platter in exploration, finding where everything was, and he smiled, discovering a hunk of bread, a smaller hunk of cheese, and several thick slices of venison.

Geoffrey watched him curiously, still unsettled by the blind man's actions at times. It was odd in the extreme to see Robert not look down at whatever he was doing; odd in the extreme to realise he simply had no instinct in him to turn his face down to whatever task occupied his hands.

John watched Geoffrey amusedly, having a year ago found Robert almost as alien at times as Geoffrey still clearly did, then latched enthusiastically onto the venison and bread set before him, washing it down with gulps of ale from the beaker Agnes had set before him.

"We came because we've something for the village." Robert took the small leather purse of coins from his belt and held it out across the table to Geoffrey. "We relieved a fat merchant of his money a few days back. Thought it would be put to better use feeding some of the village children in the area rather than add more fat to his bones. You'll be able to buy grain now." He grinned. "Eli at Rufford has plenty from the Abbot's store he'll sell you. Send a couple of men and a cart along to him."

"I'm more grateful than I can tell you, Robert," said Geoffrey, taking the purse of money and stowing it away inside his tunic, and with the other hand, giving the back of Robert's hand a brief pat where it rested on the table; Robert smiled in response at the comradely touch, interpreting the gratitude it conveyed. "The grain we have is about used, and harvest time is still several months away."

Robert's mind went back to the grain-fields at Sedgeley that he and Rhiannon had walked through only a few days ago. He had run his hand in exploration over the swaying heads of wheat and barley as they had waved on strong stems in the gentle breeze, and his fingers had felt plump moist ears in the process of ripening. "You'll get a good harvest this year, I'm thinking, Geoffrey. Everyone in these parts will. The weather's being kind for once."

"About time too," said Geoffrey. "We've had a run of poor harvests these past few years. Even after observing the Time of the Blessing..."

John nodded sympathetically, still munching on his food, and for a while the three men did not speak, but concentrated on their meal of meat and bread and ale, whilst Agnes returned to her seat by the fire.

Finally, Geoffrey finished his meal and sat back and regarded Robert. "So...what else have you come here for, Robert? Besides delivering the aid of the money." He looked from Robert to John and back again, trying to read their faces. "There's something more, isn't there."

Robert finished his last mouthful of food, and pushed his platter aside. Leaning his elbows on the uneven surface of the table, he felt for his beaker of ale and cupped his hands around it but did not lift it from the table. "Geoffrey, you may be able to help us in terms of information. Do you know anything about another band of outlaws who are in the woods outside Lincoln? They seem to have set up residence there, robbing all the folk who come through the woods. Rich or poor - they don't discriminate."

"Aye, I've heard about that." Geoffrey scratched his head. "That news filtered through to us a few days ago. You know about them being caught, don't you?"

John glanced startled at Robert; it was still a knee-jerk reaction in him sometimes to start to exchange a glance with Robert - before realising that was impossible now.

Surprise flashed across Robert's expressive face at that piece of news. "No, we didn't know that - when did that happen, Geoffrey?"

"Yesterday, so I gather," Geoffrey replied. "A labourer seeking work came through here this morning and told us of the happening. Apparently yesterday, some of Gisbourne's soldiers captured some outlaws. We feared at first it was you lot, but no mention of Robin i the Hood was mentioned, so we figured it was another band of outlaws."

"GISBOURNE?" John echoed, scarce believing it. "Gisbourne's men managed to catch them?"

"He must be getting better," Robert said wryly.

"Or they couldn't have been very good as outlaws," John replied just as wryly. "Summer outlaws, just as Naz said. A bunch of inept bastards...."

Robert frowned to himself in unease. "Maybe....but if they were in the woods outside Lincoln....that's out of Gisbourne's jurisdiction... They must have been closer to home, for them to be caught by Gisbourne's men..." Robert leaned forwards across the table and spoke intently to the headman. "Where were these outlaws when they were caught, Geoffrey, do you know?"

"Just outside Elsdon, I gather," Geoffrey said.

"Elsdon...." Robert sat back, straighter, resting his hands on the edge of the table, troubled expressions crossing his face.

"Damn, Alan and Much were headed there, Robert," John muttered, feeling a cold hand of apprehension squeeze on his heart.

"I know, but we can't help that now," Robert replied quietly back. "We'll just have to hope that soldiers no longer linger in that area. Anyway, they both have good heads on their shoulders - they can recognise potential danger before they walk into it."

Geoffrey looked uneasily at the two outlaws, all too well sensing the sudden change of mood about them. "Wish I had more to tell you. But that's all I've heard."

"We're grateful, Geoffrey. Well, maybe if Gisbourne's men have caught these other outlaws...that may mean the end of our problem." Robert tried to sound convinced but did not feel so inside.

"They were apparently heard boasting that they were going to come into Sherwood and see us off," John told Geoffrey, seeing the puzzled look on the man's face.

"Looks like Gisbourne's helped you, then, without realising it," Geoffrey commented.

"Maybe..." Robert paused in thought to himself for a moment longer, then shook himself out of his thoughts and feeling for his stick, rose from the headman's table.

"We should go. Get back to camp and wait for Alan and Much to return from Elsdon."

"Aye." John rose too.

"If I hear anything else...." Geoffrey began, rising from his own seat at table.

"Send one of the young lads into Sherwood with the information. We'll find him." Robert was reluctant to say where the band would be camped whilst they dealt with the Lincoln outlaws - if there was anything to deal with now, that was. But he could not shake the knot of unease that had grown in his stomach.

Geoffrey nodded. "Very well."

"And if anything happens here...if whatever is left of that Lincoln band - a few hangers-on maybe - come here or to any of the other villages around and start causing trouble....."

"We'll let you know," Geoffrey said.

Robert tried to smile, felt his way round the table as Geoffrey rose to face him, and he clasped the man's hand in farewell, but also in a renewal of the bond that existed between the village of Maybury and the outlaws. "If the village needs us, we'll come. You know that. Maybury's been good to us in the past year."

"Turn and turn about," Geoffrey replied, looking the young man in the face. "You and your men have ensured we haven't starved."

Going over to the open doorway, Geoffrey stuck his head out and looked suspiciously up and down. He looked inquiringly at Thurstan the potter who was sitting working at his wheel outside the door of the next cottage. Thurstan glanced at him and gave a slight nod, indicating that nothing was out of the ordinary.

Geoffrey withdrew from the doorway and turned to Robert and John. "All's clear outside," Geoffrey said.

Robert smiled, clapped the headman on the shoulder as he moved past him. "Until we meet again, fare you well, Geoffrey." He headed for the door, his stick found the threshold and he vanished through the open doorway, remembering to duck his head under the lintel.

"Thanks for the meal, Agnes," John said.

She eyed him humourously. "I see you're not exactly fading away."

John grinned and ducked through the doorway after Robert. Just outside, he found Robert waiting for him. He paused long enough for Robert to find his arm, and then they walked fast back across the village to the stone track. Once they reached it, Robert did not start using his stick but instead carried it clasped in his left hand and kept his right hand lightly grasping John's arm just above the elbow. John took that as an indication that Robert wanted to move fast, and be guided, and so John quickened his pace.

"Let's get back into the cover of Sherwood and fast," Robert said low and seriously to John as they walked. "The sooner I feel the trees around me again, the happier I'll be."

John looked across at his young leader as they marched away from the village along the track, towards the stream and the fringe of the forest. Robert had lifted his head to listen for any potential sounds of trouble or danger around them, and kept frowning slightly to himself in thought. "You're worried, aren't you," John said.

"What with the news that these Lincoln outlaws have come as near to us as Elsdon, and Gisbourne's soldiers actually managing to CATCH them - and added to that the knowledge that we sent Alan and Much to that very village this morning - yes," Robert replied quietly, "yes, I'm worried."

They headed for the fringe of the forest.