questions asked, I became a rather elderly apprentice for a few days. I learnt a thing or two, as well.’
My mind went back to a figure I had glimpsed on the day of Robin’s trial. A tall blond man with an eye patch who seemed to have absolutely no interest in a large force of mounted soldiers appearing right on his doorstep.
‘So it was you who arranged Robin’s escape?’
Little John laughed. ‘My master at the smithy was asked to provide the Templar’s gaoler with the locks and chains to shackle Robin. And I arranged with the blacksmith to have the honour of undertaking the task.’
I snorted at this. The thought of Little John as a biddable blacksmith’s apprentice was almost too comical to believe.
‘I locked up Robin in the presence of the gaoler, but — would you believe it? — I botched the job: loose pin in the locking mechanism. Well, I was so ashamed of my shoddy work that I thought it would be better to take Robin and myself away from there as soon as possible. Once Robin was loose, we only had to kill a couple of Templar sergeants, climb a wall, and ride like Hell for Sherwood. The whole thing went as smoothly as shit passing through a goose.’
The big man was laughing now, and I joined him. I was very pleased to see Little John again: I had missed his rough good humour, appalling impiety, and his unique attitude to life, viewing the world as such an easy place in which to live. As we laughed, Robin came over to me.
‘It’s time you were going, Alan. So, I’m afraid, you need to decide — where do you want it?’
‘What?’ I said, stupidly.
‘Your story when you get back to Nottingham is that you were wounded in the fight — knocked out, perhaps — and when you came to, you were the only man left alive. Does that sound plausible?’
‘Oh, ah, I suppose so…’
Robin looked over at Little John, and gave a tiny nod.
And I ducked.
A fist like a granite boulder whistled over my head, its massive flight ruffling my blond hair, and I turned to look at Little John in alarm.
‘Stand still, Alan. It’s got to look authentic,’ said John, frowning. ‘Unless you’d rather have a flesh wound?’
‘We could always do that,’ said Robin, drawing his sword. My lord was enjoying this — the steel-eyed bastard.
‘All right, all right.’ I braced my feet, clamped my mouth shut and closed my eyes.
Are you ready?’ said John.
‘Yes — just get on with it,’ I said through gritted teeth.
The blow, when it came, was like a whack in the face from a well-swung mallet. I was knocked up and backwards, and landed with a winding thump on the horse-churned grass of the clearing. A moment’s deep blackness, then bright-red sparks shooting through my skull. When I opened my eyes, Robin was standing over me, his face full of concern.
I sat up groggily, and spat out a fragment of tooth. I could feel blood running down either side of my mouth from my smashed nose. I saw that my hands were trembling as I gently felt my squashed hooter. By the wiggle at the bridge, I knew it was broken.
Little John came over to me, leading Ghost.
‘Can you sit a horse?’ asked Robin, helping me to my unsteady feet.
‘Course he can,’ said Little John, handing me the reins. ‘Christ’s crusted bum-crack, the boy’s no weakling. And I only gave him a gentle tap. He’ll be fine.’
My head spinning, my face dripping gore, I climbed wearily up on to Ghost’s back.
‘I’ll pay you back for that one day,’ I mumbled to John, before nodding painfully at Robin and guiding Ghost out of the clearing and back on to the road to Nottingham.
It took me half a day to ride back to the castle: my head was splitting, my mouth and nose throbbing with pain. I amused myself on the ride back by thinking of ways I could revenge myself on Little John — nothing dreadful, I mused, but it’d be good to get my own back on the big lug.
It was dusk when I rode through the wooden gates of the outer bailey and up the rough road to the stone walls of the castle. I did not bother to wash before reporting to Sir Ralph that catastrophe had occurred to his Tickhill silver convoy. I figured that a bloody visage might speak volumes in my defence. And so, with the skin on my face cracked with dried blood, and my nose and mouth swollen and still smarting badly, I entered the great hall in the middle bailey to make my dolorous report in person to the Constable of Nottingham Castle.
Murdac was not alone: while I had been away Prince John had returned to his strongest English fortress, and as I walked over to his throne, I felt an air of something not quite right stir the hairs on the back of my neck.
I bowed to the Prince, and nodded at Sir Ralph Murdac, who as usual was standing hunch-shouldered close beside his master. On the other side of the royal chair was a third man: Sir Aymeric de St Maur, the Templar knight. Interesting, I thought to myself — the Templars are siding openly with Prince John. And then I pushed the thought aside and began my report on the robbery of the silver wagon train by the notorious outlaw Robin Hood and my fictional role in its heroic but unsuccessful defence.
The three men listened to me in silence and I was just finishing my tale, describing how I came back to consciousness to discover the wagons were gone and I was surrounded by the mounds of dead, when Prince John interrupted me: ‘You really are quite a good liar, for a steaming pile of low-born pig shit.’ He sounded as if he genuinely meant it.
‘A liar, sire? I hope not…’ I said, trying to look confused, but with my belly dissolving.
‘Be silent,’ said the Prince. ‘I have heard enough of your dissembling. Guards, bind him.’
Half a dozen men fell upon me and removed my sword, misericorde, and my mail coat. My hands were roughly tied behind my back. I did not resist: the only way out of this was to keep my head.
‘Sire, might I be permitted to know the meaning of this? Is it some playful jest? A game, perhaps?’ I asked with as much humility as I could muster.
‘You know very well what is happening,’ Sir Ralph Murdac answered for the Prince and smiled nastily at me. ‘We have known for some weeks now that you, through your German servant, have been supplying information to the outlaw Robert of Locksley. Did you think we were completely stupid? You have forsaken your oath of loyalty to your Prince; you are forsworn, and a traitor. You have betrayed us and will suffer the penalty that is your due.’
If Sir Ralph was visibly enjoying himself, Prince John seemed merely bored. ‘You have fulfilled your function here,’ he croaked. ‘Once we were sure that you were still labouring on Locksley’s behalf, we hoped to use you to trap the man. If you knew that a great shipment of silver, weakly guarded, was coming here from Tickhill, you would be bound to inform your master. And he would be bound to try to steal it. We arranged for a force of knights to trap him in the very act of the robbery — but it seems they failed to defeat Locksley’s rabble. I am at a loss to explain why — we sent sixty brave knights to intercept him. Perhaps your master really does consort with the Devil — if such an unlikely creature really exists.’
At this, Sir Aymeric de St Maur gave Prince John a sharp look. But the Templar said nothing.
Prince John continued in his harsh voice: ‘Your usefulness is over, Dale. Too many of my men have died at Locksley’s hand, and I will lose no more. It is time for you to pay for your crimes — and his. So I have arranged a match tomorrow afternoon, a public wrestling match: you will fight my champion to the death — as a little “amusement” for the loyal men of Nottingham. Tomorrow you will face Milo in the list; no weapons, no rules — man to man. And you will die.’
Part Three
Chapter Fifteen
All is not well here at Westbury. The peril from Osric has grown and looms much nearer — he now has a confederate! I saw my bailiff meet his accomplice in secret in the back of one of the disused stables at the edge of the courtyard, the night before last. As I peered through a chink in the wooden slats of the wall, I saw Osric by the light of his lantern, greeting and conversing with a soberly dressed man in a neat black skullcap — but one look at
