One step at a time.
I glanced down at the papers in my hands. Moonlight spilled over my clothing, and something about it looked wrong. My head bobbed as I tried to focus. I didn’t remember putting on anything red today. How confusing. I didn’t own a scarlet tunic.
I blinked again, but the color didn’t vanish. A cold fear slid through the fog in my mind. How much time did I have before I lost consciousness?
One more step.
Every breath was a struggle. Every footstep felt as though I were wading through waist-high mud and keeping my eyes open took a monumental effort. My head felt far too heavy for my neck. I pinched myself. I had to stay awake. It couldn’t be that much farther.
Just one more step.
I couldn’t stop. I needed to get to James. He would know what to do. He would take the papers. He would laugh at melater for being dramatic, and I would tell him that if he wanted stealth done properly, he should have done it himself.
I was so close.
Just one step at a time.
Just one…
More…
Everything went black.
BARON
It was dawn.
Something had gone wrong, I knew it. I paced the perimeter of my tent until a shallow groove was worn beneath my boots. James should have come and gone by now. Laurel should have reached him, passed over whatever papers she had stolen, and slipped back to Sherwood Forest.
But James had not come. The sky had already begun to pale, and every moment that passed sharpened the dread lodged beneath my ribs. Part of me wanted to abandon the campsite and return to the castle at once so I could question the guards, search the cells, and find out whether any prisoners had been taken. If Laurel or James had been captured, they might already be in Prince John’s hands. Were they being tortured at this very moment?
Not knowing was going to drive me insane.
An inkling of doubt held me back. Being delayed didn’t necessarily mean something catastrophic had happened. James had been waiting for Laurel before coming to me. Perhaps she simply had to wait for some guards who were chatting in the wrong place for too long, or she and James were reviewing thedocuments. If it was merely a delay, I needed to stay here and wait.
But if it was more than that, I was doing more harm by waiting. My mind filled the silence with every terrible possibility it could invent, from Laurel being whipped and screaming for mercy to so much worse than even that.
Why had I agreed to this plan? I should have cautioned her against this instead of going along with it. When she had told me about Peter, I had pulled away and focused so much on trying not to feel the pain of her kissing someone else that I’d failed to consider all the dangers that Laurel was walking into.
If I lost her now, the last memory I would have of her would be of her trying to confess something and of me pushing her away. Just as I thought my head might split in two, a figure emerged from the trees.
It was James.
I strode toward him at once. “Where have you been?” I demanded. “You’re hours late.”
“It’s Laurel,” James said urgently. He spoke in his usual quiet tone, but there was nothing calm in his face. Then he finished with the words I had feared. “She’s hurt pretty badly.”
The world narrowed. “Where is she?”
James began leading the way back through the trees. “I left her near our meeting place; I can’t carry her myself all that way and I had to make sure you were alone. Hurry.”
My heart beat wildly against my ribs. “What happened? Tell me.”
“I’m not sure,” James admitted. “She collapsed the instant I saw her. I only had time to hide her before everyone came searching.”
“They knew it was her?”
“I don’t know.”
