Chapters (76)
- Title Page
- Copyright Notice
- Dedication
- PROLOGUE
- PART I
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- PART II
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- PART III
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- INTERLUDE
- PART IV
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- INTERLUDE
- PART V
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- PART VI
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- INTERLUDE
- PART VII
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- PART VIII
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- FIFTY-FIVE
- FIFTY-SIX
- EPILOGUE
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- Newsletter Sign-up
“I’m not going to play your game.” She smirked. “You and Robin of Locksley, working together. Doing damage on opposite ends, fighting your way into the middle. Sorry for disrupting your little war.”
“War, now?” William actually laughed. “Girl, don’t pretend you know a thing about war. You imagine yourself on one side, and the Nottingham Guard on the other, and that’s all it takes to constitute a war? This is no war, Elena. This here … this is a holiday. What a luxury when paying your taxes is your greatest concern. I’ve spent my time at the brink of humanity, at the war’s edge, where civilization ends. Real war. You probably can’t even dream of it.” He thought of the dumbfounded citizens of Acre, rioting on a whim, getting cut down in their own streets, in their own homes. That was where Elena’s tactics would lead. “I promise you, killing people never solves anything.”
She didn’t answer. She was staring at a leaf on the ground. Eventually, “I agree, more death won’t help anything. I can save you two dead bodies. Let us go.”
That’s what he needed, her plea for survival. “I can’t do two,” William said casually, in a way he hoped might catch her attention. He lowered his voice, conspiratorially, such that even Marshall might not be able to hear him at the base of the staircase. “But I may be able to help you. Perhaps you’re willing to bargain.”
Frankly, escaping the gallows to spend the rest of her life in a cell was a poor trade, but she might be young enough to think otherwise.
“Willing to bargain?” she asked with feigned innocence, a mocking I’m just a girl and I don’t understand tone.
She didn’t want to be patronized, so William tried at the truth. “You killed the wrong man. Sheriff de Lacy did more to help the people of Nottingham than you could possibly understand, but you killed him before he could finish what he started. The man you should hate, the man who killed that boy of yours, Much? His name is Lord Guy of Gisbourne. You put a sword to his throat. Taking it away may have been the biggest mistake of your life. He’s a ruthless one, that, with more support here than I. He has the desire to take this role of sheriff from me, and he may have the ability, too. He will storm into the Sherwood, he will hunt your people and kill them like dogs, he’ll parade their corpses through the towns. Our rich friends will hail him as succeeding where Roger de Lacy and I failed. His family is far more influential than mine. This is inevitable. Which means my only option is to beat him to it.”