Eduard only shook his head. “Shout all you want, Gisbourne. They cannot hear you.”
The governor slashed his sword toward the landing and met cold steel for his trouble. Another thrust and sparks flew the length of both blades as they sliced together, venting fury to the hilts. Gisbourne whirled on the balls of his bare feet, his sword gripped in white-knuckled fists, swinging it like a hatchet at the level of Eduard’s knees. FitzRandwulf cleared the arc easily and parried with a backhanded cut that turned the governor far enough off balance to allow Eduard to kick out and plant a boot in the back of Gisbourne’s thighs.
Sir Guy’s legs went out from under him and he landed heavily on his knees, skidding several feet on the rough stone, leaving two streaks of skin and blood in his wake. He roared with the pain and scrambled back onto his feet, but by then Robin had severed through the rest of his bindings and was able to put the dagger to better use, jabbing it up and under Gisbourne’s chin, reversing their positions of only moments ago by making him dance backward to the wall and stand on tiptoes, his neck strained in a painful arch, his eyes bulging.
Gisbourne’s hand sprang open and he dropped his sword with a metallic clang that bounced a time or two off the stone walls before fading to a dull ring.
“How dare you raise a knife to me, boy. Move it now. At once. And perhaps I will let you live.”
Robin nudged the steel tip higher. His face took on a terrible maturity; his eyes burned with blue flames, contempt and revulsion aged him swiftly and savagely beyond his fourteen years. Having looked death in the face and knowing there was nothing to fear there, he could look a paltry creature like Guy of Gisbourne in the eye and scorn him. He could hate him too, not just for what he’d almost done to him, but for the delight he took in doing it to others.
Eduard was not unaware of the changes that had come over his young brother. If anything, he saw himself standing there, his thigh opened to the bone by the Dragon’s blade, and he knew Robin was angry enough, sickened enough, to kill Gisbourne just as he could have killed Etienne Wardieu. He also knew that killing Gisbourne would make the loss of Robin’s youth irretrievable, and for that reason alone, Eduard reached out a hand and laid it on his brother’s arm.
“See if you can drag yon hub of womanly beauty into the bedchamber while I settle a few matters with Sir Guy.”
Robin swallowed, brought the tremors in his arm under control, and nodded stiffly, lowering the knife by slow degrees as if it was the most difficult thing he had ever forced himself to do.
Gisbourne waited until the knife was safely lowered to the boy’s side before he straightened and glared fiercely at Eduard —a difficult thing to do stark naked and grayer than the cobwebs that floated overhead.
“Enjoy this moment while you can,” he spat, “for you are both dead men.”
“But still able to walk and talk,” Eduard said with narrowed eyes. “Which is somewhat more than you will be able to do with”—he glanced askance at Robin—“what was it Little-john said?”
Robin looked startled a moment, then quoted, “Not with two broken legs and a cracked skull.”
“Ahh. So it was. And so it shall be,” he added softly.
Gisbourne saw FitzRandwulf lift his sword and watched in horror as the mighty shoulders put their all into a swooping swing. An instant later, Gisbourne’s senses exploded in a starburst of pain as the flat of the heavy blade smashed across both bleeding kneecaps. Robin had adroitly stepped aside to avoid the blur of steel, but as Gisbourne’s arms flailed and his body began to pitch forward, it did so in Robin’s direction. A reflex action brought the lad’s hands upward to fend off the possibility of catching Gisbourne and saving him from an unchecked fall. The dagger he clutched came up at the same time, and as Sir Guy plunged forward, the well-honed edge slithered between his thighs, met a limp protrusion of unresisting flesh, and sliced it off without undue strain on Robin’s wrist or … after the fact … his conscience.
Sir Guy’s scream was bloodcurdling enough to prompt a curse from Eduard’s lips as he swung his sword again, this time bringing the blunted end of the hilt