“No, it was more about it being a circle. About each point being decisions we make, or mistakes we make, I forget. He said that we travel in a circle, endlessly, thinking it’s a straight line, but all we ever do is make the same choices again and again, in different places. I forget what the point of it was. I never really thought much about it.” He put it down again, but his fingers traced its tips. “But he kept it. He kept it up.”

On the door, a faint light silhouette of the wreath was barely perceptible in the wood, the area its metal had protected from flame. All William could do was nod in agreement.

“Sorry, William,” Robin said, “you caught me in mid-thought. It’s good to see you.”

“It’s good to see you. Four nights, you say?”

“Yes,” Robin dragged out the word, and left the room to start down the hall. “I received your message, wrapped in a pretty package. But they weren’t exactly interested in listening to me. So I left them a bit early, I thought that might slow them down.”

William could only shake his head. “Do you want to tell me about Robin Hood?”

“That wasn’t my idea,” Robin chuckled, “and it turned out they were really only interested in using me for my name. They practically worshipped my father, and they wanted another Locksley to rally behind.” He rapped his knuckles on another door. “They should find my brother.”

William let a solemn moment pass. “You were supposed to be making things better, Robin.”

“I tried. I taught them discretion. And you know I actually thought it was working, too. We were helping out the poorer communities, making a difference.” Robin continued forward, down a large set of stairs at the side of the dining hall. William had been here before, when Gisbourne was held hostage at the edge of a sword. He suddenly felt terrible for having left Robin with these people at all. “But some of them wanted more. They wanted blood. I don’t think I could have bred that out of them. I almost don’t want to know, but … when I left them, they seemed eager to go get themselves killed. Have you heard anything?”

William eyed Robin for a moment. “So you didn’t know? Just promise me you had nothing to do with planning what happened.”

“Excuse me?” Robin smiled.

“With what happened three nights ago.”

“Three nights ago I was here, I told you. What … what happened three nights ago?”

“Robin. They assassinated the Sheriff.”

Robin’s jaw dropped, and he turned away. Eventually he lowered himself and sat on the stairs halfway down, and covered his face with his hands.

“I wasn’t as successful as I would have wished, either,” William admitted. “But I was close. Roger de Lacy was finally willing to find a peace. That’s not exactly an option anymore.”