More than anything, she would relive the discovery of what it meant to be female. Despite her “damnably inferior brain,” her kinship to King Richard opened the doors of England’s court just enough for her to learn about the cases being ignored. To be a woman was to wear an invisible cloak, but that loathsome fact was absolutely advantageous in the world of misdeeds. She had learned how easy it was to fake apologies, feign ignorance, to smile wide and let men blame her gender and forget. If she had time to waste, she’d relish it all.

But Lady Marion Fitzwalter was ever a lady without time to waste.

“How did it go?” she asked John of Hathersage, lumbering beside her as they walked away from Locksley Castle. He did an admirable job of keeping up with her overland, despite his size. A decade ago his mass would have intimidated any man, but now the muscle had been reluctantly replaced with something decidedly spongier, and the thick beard of his neck showed more grey than not. Gratefully, neither age nor stuffing could slow down John Little.

“How did it go?” he repeated her question back at her, sing-song and out of breath. “Well it didn’t go … why don’t you tell me again how it was supposed to go?”

“That’s reassuring,” Marion said flatly. “It was supposed to go simply. You were to intercept the Lord Oughtibridge’s convoy between Sheffield and Locksley, drive its grain wagon into the forest and eventually back here, with nobody injured or alarmed.”

“Yes, that,” John replied.

“Yes, that, what?”

“Yes, that.” He laughed. “That’s exactly how it didn’t go.”

Marion’s love for the man could survive any mistake he made, but she cringed to think what could have gone wrong with this job. “Tell me.”

“Best walk. Better to see it.”

It had admittedly been bold in concept, but the beauty was that its consequences should have been nonexistent. Lord Geoffrey of Oughtibridge, a middling lord of well-more-than-middling weight, had spoken openly in Marion’s company about his unsavory tactics in avoiding his taxes. When confronted with an impending assessment from the county’s tax collectors, he opted to temporarily transport several wagons full of rarer foodstuffs to a friendly neighboring lord rather than let them be counted against him.

Since Lord Oughtibridge had no legal recourse to complain about lost goods he claimed never to own, there should have been no risk. Marion had been the one to inform him of the tax collector’s upcoming visit, and she legitimately felt a twinge of guilt that this was an absolute lie. But she simply didn’t have time to linger on such trifles. That time was better spent doing more worthwhile things, and moving food from noble hoarders to people in need was, inarguably, a thing worth doing.