and she swept her hand across her brow, weariness and despair urging her to give up. She was about to turn away when Will’s voice finally broke in, slow and unsteady.
“Ye-es,” he said, watching her with a faint frown. “Yes. He did say . . .”
Marian’s breath caught, and she looked up. She nodded again, stepping closer to the bars. Tomorrow, she mouthed, and when Will blinked at her, she did it again, exaggeratedly.
“Tomorrow,” Will said slowly. “He did say he would . . . meet the other outlaws working with him? Yes. Working with him. Tomorrow. In the forest. Sherwood Forest.” He was watching her gestures and her lips with outright bemused confusion now.
Marian wanted to gasp for breath. She gave him an encouraging smile. “Do you know where?” She drew a line in the air, painted trees on either side with her fingertips, mouthed the words.
“The King’s Road,” Will blurted, then watched her more closely. “Off the King’s Road. In the forest, by . . . by a river.” He spoke more quickly, warming to the deception, elaborating. “There’s a bend in the river that cuts close to the King’s Road, where a series of granite shelves make a hollow in the wood. That’s where he’ll be. Tomorrow.”
Marian let out her breath, gazing at Will, who gazed back with something altogether different from that despairing hatred his eyes had held at the start. Now there was light in them. Hope.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “I know the man helped you, but it wasn’t Robin, Will—I would have heard from him, if it was, and you know that. Whoever it was—you owe him nothing. The important thing is to think of yourself and your sister. I’ll speak to Sir Guy. There must be room for mercy, if he knows the only reason you held your tongue was out of loyalty to your Lord.”
Will reached back out through the grate barring him inside the rock-cut cell. Marian took his hand, ignoring the patina of slime and dirt on his skin, and squeezed.
“Well met, my Lady,” he murmured just as softly, running his thumb over the little ruby ring on her finger, and bowed his head.
SIXTEEN
MARIAN WAS SHAKING BY the time she reached the corridor where she’d left Gisborne. He was waiting for her, his face more unreadable than ever. He made a quick, stifling gesture when she lifted her eyes to his, and reached out to grasp her arm.
She bit her lip, a bright, hot flash of fear making her want to tear herself away—but he wasn’t embracing her, but rather pulling her along the corridor, away from the cells. The heavy door slammed behind them, and still Gisborne went on. His grip was tight but not painful, his movements taut with agitation.
It wasn’t until they’d emerged from the caves altogether, the weighty air lifting, the torches brighter, the hewn stone walls rising around them once more, that he released her.
Marian gaped at him, reeling from the rough treatment—and even more so from the aftermath of her double conversation with Will. She wanted to fall to the stone floor, let every muscle go, abandon the white-knuckled grip she had on the reins and let her mind break into a run.
“How did you make him speak to you?” Gisborne asked, his face close to hers, the ordinarily cold eyes suddenly burning, intent, penetrating.
Marian opened her mouth but found she’d already lost her grip on herself enough that she couldn’t regain it. Mind empty, consumed with an overwhelming desire to flee, she did the only thing left to her in that moment: she burst into tears.
She was dimly aware of Gisborne taking a step back with a muffled exclamation, and she sagged against the wall for a moment before her knees gave way and she dropped to the floor. The emptiness of her mind filled abruptly, overflowed, spilling thoughts in every direction: Will had trusted her; she’d figured out a way to get Gisborne and his men out of the castle; she could breathe again, the smells of rot and urine and death barred again behind the door to the jail; she was, perhaps for the first time in her life, acting as she was expected to act, crumpled in a ladylike heap. She buried her face in her hands, not sure if she was hiding her tears or the fact that she wanted to laugh.
A hand brushed her arm. She lowered her hands and saw a blurry shape before her. When