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Chapters (76)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Notice
  3. Dedication
  4. PROLOGUE
  5. PART I
  6. ONE
  7. TWO
  8. THREE
  9. FOUR
  10. FIVE
  11. SIX
  12. SEVEN
  13. EIGHT
  14. NINE
  15. PART II
  16. TEN
  17. ELEVEN
  18. TWELVE
  19. THIRTEEN
  20. FOURTEEN
  21. FIFTEEN
  22. SIXTEEN
  23. SEVENTEEN
  24. EIGHTEEN
  25. NINETEEN
  26. PART III
  27. TWENTY
  28. TWENTY-ONE
  29. TWENTY-TWO
  30. TWENTY-THREE
  31. TWENTY-FOUR
  32. TWENTY-FIVE
  33. TWENTY-SIX
  34. INTERLUDE
  35. PART IV
  36. TWENTY-SEVEN
  37. TWENTY-EIGHT
  38. TWENTY-NINE
  39. THIRTY
  40. THIRTY-ONE
  41. THIRTY-TWO
  42. THIRTY-THREE
  43. THIRTY-FOUR
  44. INTERLUDE
  45. PART V
  46. THIRTY-FIVE
  47. THIRTY-SIX
  48. THIRTY-SEVEN
  49. THIRTY-EIGHT
  50. PART VI
  51. THIRTY-NINE
  52. FORTY
  53. FORTY-ONE
  54. FORTY-TWO
  55. FORTY-THREE
  56. FORTY-FOUR
  57. FORTY-FIVE
  58. INTERLUDE
  59. PART VII
  60. FORTY-SIX
  61. FORTY-SEVEN
  62. FORTY-EIGHT
  63. FORTY-NINE
  64. FIFTY
  65. FIFTY-ONE
  66. FIFTY-TWO
  67. PART VIII
  68. FIFTY-THREE
  69. FIFTY-FOUR
  70. FIFTY-FIVE
  71. FIFTY-SIX
  72. EPILOGUE
  73. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  74. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  75. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  76. Newsletter Sign-up

“Once you have someone to pass your life on to, then your actions are for them. And though you die, you live on in a way, through your lineage.” Ferrers scratched at the wispy little hairs that had escaped from his chin, awaiting a reply. The natural response was a place Robin didn’t care to go, and Ferrers seemed to guess that. “I’m familiar with your family’s history, if not the details.”

Robin ground his teeth. “Then there’s no reason to speak of it.”

“You talk like him,” the earl said softly. “Your father.”

“I’ll consider that an insult, thank you.”

“You talk of saving people. You don’t think you got that from him?”

“I talk about judging people, so that you know when to save them. So you know who deserves it, and who doesn’t. My father would let one hard worker starve so two useless skivers can each have half a meal. That doesn’t save anyone. That hurts three people, rather than two.” Memories of his father, memories of her, they were better left untouched. It was easier to talk of them when they were so far away, they had the same surreal nonexistence as the war’s violence. “You have a son though, yes?”

The earl nodded.

“Let me guess, you named him after yourself.”

Ferrers laughed at this, because it was true. “I had my chances in life,” his smile soured, “and failed. My son has to live in that shadow. My mistakes have become his burden. I’m not here for me, I’m here for him. So that someday Ferrers will be a name to respect again.”

Robin smiled and said no more. He had heard the name Ferrers used as an insult before, but assumed it was just a slight variation of frère, the French word for brother, and that it was meant to poke fun at the French. It was slang for a useless man, a fool. Sometimes even a traitor.

Names carried powerful weight to them. And the most insulting thing he could imagine would have been to ask Lady Marion Fitzwalter to bear the name of Locksley.

SEVEN

GUY OF GISBOURNE

NOTTINGHAM CASTLE

“SHE COULD BE PLAYING you,” Simon FitzSimon warned, giving a demonstrative swing of a felling axe above a pile of uncut firewood. “She pro’ly rolled with some Guardsman and turned sour when he left her. Trying to get you to punish the man.”

“You grant her a good deal of cunning,” Guy said absently. Arable’s news of the five Gerolds conspiring in the wine cellar had consumed his thoughts for the last day. “She isn’t the type. She’s the type that believes in good and evil and that praying for her family is going to protect them.”