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“Why? He’s worthless. I’m Sir Gregory of Wilford. Don’t you know who I am, cur?”
“Can’t say I do,” John said easily, tugging the old man’s leash harder. “I’ve heard of a Baroness Joan of Wilford, however. Given your proximity to the Queen of the Lace Market’s linens in that carriage, I take it you are related? Your wife, perhaps?”
The knight said nothing. A tough nut to break, maybe. But they always broke. Eventually.
At mention of Baroness Joan, the lordling I pulled along sucked in a sharp gasp. I didn’t miss it. My head swiveled over my shoulder, brow rising.
“Whatever your relation might be to the baroness,” John finished, “the way you looked at that lad when you woke up tells me he’s not worthless, either.”
“What do you want with me?”
The voice behind me was so low I barely heard it.
I turned to stare down at the hooded boy. I wasn’t particularly tall, but this one was shorter than me. A slow smile sliced across my face. “Ah. So he’s not mute after all. That’s good.”
The lordling said nothing more. He blinked, bowing deeper into his hood.
I reached over, tilted his chin, squeezing his supple flesh, forcing him to look up into my eyes as his lips puckered. “We want your blood.”
His face paled, mouth falling open.
“Short of that,” I said with a wink, “we want everything else you have to offer.”
Chapter 16
Robin
Just who the hell were these men? Because that’s certainly what it felt like being led through the woods like a dog on a leash—that I was in some bizarre version of Hell.
They spoke whimsically of robbery, murder, and arousal, smiling and cheering like children at their triumph. Yet they spoke of these things with blood-covered faces, minutes after a slaughter.
Could these thugs be so desensitized to violence they didn’t even realize the atrocities they’d just committed?
Those men guarding the carriages had been brothers, husbands, sons. They’d had families. And they’d been cut down without a second thought.
After seeing the extreme violence up close, I was shocked they hadn’t killed Uncle Gregory, too. For sport, if nothing else. He was the only one who put up any meaningful fight against that vicious, youthful swordsman, and posed the greatest threat to these cretins.
When Gregory woke and saw I was alive, I’d noticed the flash of relief mixed with fear on his face. To see him brought to such a state—blood caked on the side of his head, eyes dazed—made my heart sink.
I had hoped he’d be able to hide his surprise and dismay, but alas. I was too important to him.
Luckily, even in his injured condition, he had seamlessly recognized the situation and continued to call me “lad” and made no correction when I was called “Prince” or “lordling.”
My disguise wouldn’t last forever. Once night gave way to dawn, or my hood was thrown back, my feminine features would be recognized: A face too heart-shaped; hips too wide, falling to thick, shapely thighs despite my thin waist; the slender column of my neck, devoid of the protrusion all men sported.
The sinister swordsman who wanted me dead had already recognized my too-soft skin, unmarred by labor or the leathery aftermath of too much sun. I had the features of a noble person—fine, refined, untarnished.
These men were tall, muscled, and frightening. They wore beards and sneers on their faces, with knowing smirks and cunning looks in their eyes. More barbarian than anything else.
Their garb was ragtag and threadbare. I didn’t get a sense of uniformity within their ranks. They did not appear to be a dedicated mercenary force, which I’d expect from highwaymen and robbers. At the same time, they clearly weren’t a unified militia.
So what do they fight for, or whom do they work for? What was their cause or purpose? Why would perfectly able-bodied men engage in such terrible violence and heart-stopping dangers to take what wasn’t theirs from the higher rungs of society?
I didn’t understand this life at all.
Surely it can’t be for sport, or fun. I figured if I wasn’t killed by night’s end, I may deduce some things about them.
In some twisted way, Father had been trying to shield me from this degenerate section of life throughout my upbringing. He often warned me about the vermin who infested the streets of Nottingham as beggars, pickpockets, and other purveyors of skullduggery. His sternness and severity were warnings. His cruelty was only a hint of what cruelty others would wish to inflict upon me.
