rain, shoving him away when he tried to take hold of her. “They’ll hang us all now—you could have—”
“For God’s sake, Marian, be quiet!” Gisborne dragged her toward him, behind the dubious shelter of the gallows frame. A sword bit into the wood above their heads, showering them with splinters. “If I am guilty, then all I told him about you is suspect. You and your father, and your maid, and her brother—all of you are cleared.”
Marian glared at him, breathless, eyes burning. “So I am to watch you hang?”
A guard tried to clamber up the side of the platform, and with a grimace of effort, Gisborne bared his teeth and shoved him back into the sea of bodies below. “I have no intention of hanging.”
“But—”
He still had a grip on her arm and tugged her close enough for him to raise his other hand and take hold of her chin. “Surrender, Marian.”
The word made her stop, her mind stuttering to a halt. Even the raindrops coursing down his face seemed to slow, each carving its own path across his skin. Gisborne’s cheek twitched, and before Marian could recover, he pulled her sideways and dropped her neatly and abruptly off the edge of the platform and into the mud.
Steel scraped, and she heard him roar as he got to his feet and began to fight. Marian rolled, narrowly missing being trampled by multiple sets of boots. She was forcing herself to her feet when hands seized her around the waist and pulled her down. The impact of hitting the ground a second time nearly knocked the breath out of her, and when those same hands dragged her backward into the darkness beneath the platform, she swung out wildly, unable to see her assailant.
Her fist met solid flesh with a meaty thump, and somewhere nearby a familiar voice said placidly, “Ow.”
Eyes glittered in the darkness, which was cut into slices by knives of light between the boards of the platform. Another voice, equally familiar, said cheerfully, “Ho, Robin.”
Marian’s capacity for astonishment had been drained. She sat back with a hard thump. “Alan?” she gasped.
“And Will,” said a third voice. “They keep accidentally kicking my foot. It is broken, lads.”
The strips of light flickered wildly as people passed by above. The fighting had intensified, and there was now more than one man on the platform. Marian’s eyes began to adjust, and she gazed around at the three silhouettes huddled in the gloom, damp with rain dripping through the boards overhead. One was distinctly larger than the others.
Little John grinned, his teeth visible in the dim light. “You don’t punch very hard.”
“I was off guard,” Marian said weakly. “What . . . how are you . . .”
Alan spoke quickly, words tumbling out one after the other. “It was the only plan we could think of, the only way to get close enough to stop the hanging, and hopefully escape with you in the chaos that ensued. We’ve been here since dawn, my Lady. Marian. Robin. Christ, what are we to call you, anyway?”
“Shut up, Alan,” Little John said mildly. His large bulk moved toward the edge of the platform, the thin gray light bringing him into view as he peered out through the rushing feet all around them.
“Where is Elena?” Marian asked breathlessly.
“Under guard in Edwinstowe Manor, along with your father.” Alan’s voice was grim. “Safe for now.”
Thudding footsteps showered them with rain and mud from the slits above, and Marian caught her breath and scrambled to join Little John in surveying the rush of feet and bodies beyond the edge of the gallows. “They’ll hang him—we have to get him out of here.”
“It’s Gisborne,” said Will, voice hard and flat. “Let them hang him.”
“He just saved her life. You really do have shit for brains. Pardon my language, Lady.” But Alan didn’t sound all that sorry. “I hate to point out the obvious, but you’re still—your shoulder is not healed. You can’t fight like this.”
Marian’s eyes darted back and forth, trying to make sense of the chaotic tumble of limbs beyond the shelter of the platform overhead. A body fell heavily to the ground nearby, and a pair of dazed eyes met hers from beneath a guard’s helm before he was dragged away by a horde of onlookers. She looked up, trying to peer through the boards, but could see nothing but the flash of light and shadow as limbs and bodies moved across the gaps.
She cast about for a plan.