Chapter 27
Ian wrinkled his nose, holding back a sneeze for the thousandth time that day.
Robin had pasted a rather convincing beard on the lower half of his face.
She had also rubbed a walnut into the skin around his eyes, and the oil had sunk into the lines and shadows on his face, accentuating them to make him appear several seasons older.
He felt far more comfortable and unpretentious in his dark clothes, and had spent the entire morning imitating Ulli’s quiet swagger.
Lane told him he swayed more when he walked, and Robin kept telling him to relax his shoulders.
Ian did his best to remember both as he ambled up the familiar road toward the castle.
The archery tournament was the main event of the harvestreign festival, as the winner took home a small bag of coins.
Though Ian had participated in it several times as a young man, he had never been good enough to make it to the final round.
He and Onric usually made it to the second to last round, which would consist of only the final ten contestants.
Ian shrugged, reminding himself to relax his shoulders. He missed his younger brother. Seeing the castle just up ahead, he wanted to ignore the carefully crafted plan and walk straight into his old home.
He looked back at the people around him, distracting himself from the bright white walls of the castle.
Around him, several other men and women, bows strapped to their backs, made their way toward the entrance tent.
Beyond it, a flat section of the hill had been transformed into an archery range, complete with a dozen targets and tiered benches for the nobles and villagers to watch the tournament.
Keeping his hood up, Ian stood in line outside the tent to add his name—a false one—to the entrants list. This was a part of the process he had never participated in before, as someone else always added the princes’ names to the list. Though he knew his brother would not be present, Ian could not help glancing around at his fellow archers to search for him.
When he got to the front of the line, the scribe seated under the shade of the tent looked up at him expectantly.
“Marian of Lockwood,” Ian said, wishing that Onric were present to enjoy the jest he played on his own name.
The scribe looked down, scratching ‘Marian’ onto the parchment, and Ian moved out of the line. Not having an invitation to one of the nobles’ tents, Ian moved with the crowd to stand in the designated place for tournament contestants.
He tried to listen to the conversations happening around him, to see if he could glean any information about Gareth or his father. But most of the chatter around him was mundane discussion about bowyer techniques or the best food cart in the markets below.
“They say Prince Ian is not competing this festival.”
At the sound of his name, Ian looked up, trying to identify the speaker.
“If he doesn’t,” another voice replied, “we will know for sure that he has run off.” The man was standing to Ian’s right, but a few people stood between them. Ian eased himself in that direction, wanting to hear what they thought of him.
“I can’t make sense of it,” the first voice replied. “He knows me by name. It just isn’t like him to run off.”
Stepping around another person, Ian caught a glimpse of the speaker’s face. He recognized the man instantly. It was Ormunder, one of the castle guard.
At that exact second, the guard looked over, staring Ian straight in the eye.
Ian froze, afraid he had been found out. He made a motion to lift his finger to his lips, hoping that the man did indeed trust him.
But Ormunder’s gaze quickly moved on.
“Our Onric will be here,” said the second man, also a member of the guard. “Maybe you or I will best him this time.”
Ian turned quickly turned away, reaching a hand up to stroke the beard on his face. Robin’s disguise had worked.
He wanted to look through the crowd and find her, as he had not seen her since the band had parted ways that morning. But the risk of being recognized felt too great, so he kept his face lowered, hiding beneath the shade of his hood.
Finally, the blast of a horn signaled for the tournament to start. In groups of twelve, the archers approached the line, where they each shot six arrows. The only requirement for making it to the next round was landing every arrow in the target itself.
This part of the process was tedious, and Ian waited until the crowd had significantly thinned before he stepped up to the line.
Spectators had begun to gather around the sides of the field, filling the benches and spilling out over the green grass.
Some of them cheered for specific archers.
Their presence provided anticipation, but even they would not be fully engaged until the competition got fiercer.
Ian easily landed his six arrows on the target ahead of him and was invited to cross to the far side of the field and wait for the second round.
When Onric and several other nobles came out of the castle to join in the final set of archers for the qualifying round, the spectators cheered. Now the tournament had begun. Onric smiled, lifting his bow to the crowd for a short moment before he took his place on the line.
Ian watched his brother focus in, not letting the crowd distract him even though this round was simple. When he finished his set of six arrows, landing them all in a tight formation near the center of the target, the spectators cheered again.
But Ian had no chance to approach his brother, as Onric was immediately escorted into a large gray-and-white tent on the corner of the field.
Only nobles could enter the tent, which meant that Ian could enter it, but he would have to reveal himself to do so. So he waited.
Before the next round started, the targets were moved back several paces. Then, the archers were again invited up to the line in groups of twelve.
Ian hung back, waiting for as long as possible to be in the same group as Onric, who would again come to join the final group.
But the crowd of archers around him quickly thinned.
He saw Robin, then, recognizing the thin set of her shoulders beneath the green cloak wrapped around her. She stood on the edge of the field, keeping her hooded face forward and hidden, as though she were intently interested in the competition.
The two of them were in the final set of the village contestants. Ian walked slowly to his place by the line, waiting for the three nobles to join them and fill out their set of twelve.
Onric stepped out of the tent along with several of their friends. But Onric stayed back, standing against the tent to watch, waiting until the next set while three of the other nobles stepped forward to fill out the empty spaces.
Ian took his place on the line, standing second from the last with his back to everyone. Except for Robin, who had taken the final place in line and was facing him.
She smiled at him from below her hood.
Ian smiled back, happy to be standing on an archery line with her face-to-face despite the pressure of the situation.
“You are using a straight longbow,” he said, feeling comfortable speaking to her as no one else was close enough to hear.
“I always compete with a longbow, so as not to draw attention to myself,” she replied, twisting the end of the long piece of wood between her ankles to bend the string into place. “And, I am strong enough to draw a longbow now, at least at this range.”
Ian strung his own bow, resting the tip of it on his leather toe so as not to set it on the muddy ground. He waited for the quick double blast of the horn that signaled it was safe to shoot.
His mind revisited Robin’s words as something stood out to him. “You always compete with a longbow?” he repeated, his chest tightening. “As in, you have competed in the harvestreign tournament before?”
Robin looked over at him quickly, her eyes tense, but she did not hesitate to answer. “Yes, I have.”
The horn blew its double blast, and a quiet descended on the field as the archers raised their bows.
Ian methodically grabbed an arrow from his own quiver, nocking it to his bowstring.
He had participated in this tournament nearly every year.
Which meant that they had competed, together.
And he had never known. Just as he now saw Onric standing outside of the royal tent, watching the competition from afar.
She had likely done the same thing—known he was there, seen him from afar.
Ian drew back his bowstring, focusing his gaze on the center of the ringed target ahead as the grief of that realization hit him. He held steady, exhaling so that his shoulder and arm were in the exact position he always set, then released the arrow.
The twanging of bowstrings and the thudding of targets sounded across the field. This round was scored by ring, with only the top contestants moving forward.
His arrow hit the third ring from the center. A decent shot.
Robin’s shot a moment after him, her arrow also hitting the third ring.
Ian knew she could shoot better than that, but his mind was consumed by a different thought. “And you never sought me out?” he asked. “Spoke to me?” He looked down at his quiver instead of at her as he chose another arrow.
She did not reply, and when Ian looked up she had her next arrow nocked and drawn, eyes focused on the target.
Ian did the same. He hit the second ring.
When he looked over, she still had not released her arrow, and her arm remained steady under the strain of the bow.
She finally released. Also hitting the second ring.
“You never sought me out,” she said, looking down, her voice so quiet he almost missed the words.
“The location of Lockwood is no secret, yet you never came.”
Ian selected another arrow. He had known where she was. But it was not that simple. Reducing it to a visit was not entirely fair.