“You see,” Ignatius said, extending a finger over the cut on my knuckles and looking to Much. “It isn’t so much the cut, but the worry that the bones aren’t setting straight. And won’t be able to.” He turned his gaze to me. “My lady, you seem to so treasure your hands and yet you are impeding their healing.”
I grit my teeth as he pressed the bones. “I ain’t meaning to.”
“Aren’t,” Much said. “Come on, Scar, you have to try harder to speak right.”
That made my heart thud heavy and I looked down at my hand.
“That’s why they keep hurting you,” he plowed on. “Isn’t it?”
“No,” I snapped, not looking up at him. “They keep hurting me because they like to hurt people. Same as the old sheriff. It ain’t nothing I’ve done wrong.”
He eased off my shoulder, coming round front. He crouched in front of me, his stump near to my wounded hand. “Scar, that isn’t what I meant. I just thought that you started talking like this for a purpose, didn’t you? You must have, being noble to start with. But why don’t you adapt back? Change again and prove them all wrong.”
Ignatius set to wrapping my hand again and I turned into my shoulder ’gainst the pain. “It isn’t that easy,” I hissed after a moment that stung at my eyes. “And I don’t see why I should. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want this.”
“Scar,” he said soft. “Didn’t you see how the people looked at you today? Same way they look at Rob. You are nobility and they all know it. If you want, you can live up to that. Embrace that. Use that.”
I thought of Isabel and Prince John, and damned Gisbourne. “I never want to live up to that. I never want to be part of that, Much. That’s why I ran away in the first place.”
“Was it?” he asked.
I lifted my shoulder, hindered by the Brother tugging on my hand. “Somewhat. I knew I weren’t never going to be the lady my mother wanted me for. I knew I didn’t want to marry Gisbourne. And that were enough to make me run.”
“You can’t run now,” he reminded me soft.
“I can always run,” I growled at him. “But running won’t never change that these are my people. Running won’t give me an annulment and let me be with Rob, proper and right.”
“Then fight,” he told me. He grinned at me, slow and bright like the sun, holding my hurt hand gently as the Brother tied it off. “And try and use your words.”
Chapter Fourteen
The Brother gave me a cloth sling to keep my arm tucked away, and I fidgeted with it on the way to supper.
“Will you stop that,” Gisbourne grunted.
“The damn monk tied me up,” I grumbled back. “I can bare move my arm.”
“I believe that’s the point.”
“I don’t like it.”
“That doesn’t really matter, does it?” Gisbourne snarled. “Be still.”
I frowned.
“I won the joust, since you’re so concerned.”
Were I meant to have been outside, watching him get his prize? “What did you win?” I asked.
“A gold figurine of a jousting knight.”
“Fitting.”
“Quite. I’ve had it melted down.”
I snorted. “So much for symbols of glory and the like.”
“I won’t need symbols when I’m sheriff. I’ll need money, and a lot of it.”
My belly twisted up at the reminder. It weren’t the archery tournament yet, but what had I been doing to see that he would lose? Not much. Mooning after Rob, without any hope for a replacement in the contest.
The smell broke my thoughts, long before we turned into the hall. The halls were filled with scents of food, like fat roasting, and something sweeter too. We turned into the Great Hall, and I saw the cause of it.
Three great spits had been built over giant copper bowls of fire in the center of the hall, three giant pigs skewered on the spits and pages slowly turning their round, heavy bodies over the fire, basting them with honey that dripped onto the flames. They must have been doing it all day.
Around the spits were huge tables filled with lavish foodstuffs. There were woven breads several feet long, geese that were in their full feathered glory but still and clear dead—one even had a tiny crown on his head. I had no idea how they could do such a thing, or if it were even meant for eating—the creature looked like it were about to leap into flight, but it never flinched.
There were pies with such decorated crusts, slathered and buttered and baked brown, and I could only guess what were in them. The tables were studded with finery, velvets, and gems, like even the furniture needed jewelry.
I frowned, and my stomach turned. There weren’t enough people here to eat a third of this food.
We took our seats, and the prince and princess entered. All the men stood for them, and the ladies just looked solemnly to them. Prince John helped Isabel to sit, and then took the wine glass that were already filled and waiting for his touch. He held it aloft.
“To Guy of Gisbourne, Lord of Leaford,” Prince John bellowed out. “Our brave champion this day and the guest of honor for our feast this night!”
The hall cheered and minstrels struck up, and I saw Isabel clapping hard, gazing upon my husband. Christ, but she were daft.
I drank to him, wishing there were more of the drink to let me forget that I were married to the beast.
Far across the hall, past the fire of the spits, I saw people coming in the back of the hall. They looked to be servants of the castle, maybe folk from Nottingham. They came closer, the fire playing in their wide, wanting eyes and making their faces look brighter and warm.
He had invited common folk to the feast? Were this Prince John’s idea, or my husband’s?
I looked to Gisbourne, and he frowned at me. Doubtful. I looked to Prince John, who were listening to a whispered word from his wife. He wrinkled his nose a touch and drank deeply, waving a hand for the food to be served.
Then his eyes caught across the way, same as mine had.
He stood, violent, so his heavy chair rocked back on its legs before settling. “What is the meaning of this?” he bellowed over the minstrels. They stopped, scared straight out of their instruments. “Guards!” he roared, using his arm like a lance of earlier in the day to doom their fate. “Remove the rabble!”
I put my arm on my chair to stand, but Gisbourne grabbed it, steel in his eyes. “Our deal is off if you say a word,” he said.