19. Laurel
LAUREL
My days fell into a familiar pattern. Each morning, I woke early, choked down the disgusting slop the other servants called breakfast, and went about my duties.
I cleaned the great hall once the courtiers and royalty finished dining, then tried to minimize the damage left in the mess hall where the lower-ranked servants and soldiers ate.
I always tried to avoid the soldiers when I could.
Now that Baron’s platoon had moved into the barracks, there was always the chance I might be recognized.
Most men didn’t pay close attention to servant girls, which worked in my favor, but it only took one soldier with a decent memory to ruin everything.
So I kept my head down with my hair covered and did my best to remain as dull and unobtrusive as possible.
It was excruciating.
I had to continually remind myself of my role.
Baron and I were here to collect information so we could help prevent a war, not to do anything more dramatic.
Prince John had grown entirely too comfortable during his brother’s extended absence.
His arrogant complacency hung over the castle and I longed to humble him.
Every time he spoke of his brother as though Richard were already dead rather than still the king, my fingers itched to do something.
James and Baron both continually reminded me that my duty was to maintain my cover and gather any tidbits of information I could until Father returned with King Richard. I was not to do anything besides collect information.
I tried to listen but despite the reassurances that our work mattered, I longed for more action in my routine.
Scrubbing floors and carrying trays was useful, perhaps, but it didn’t make my blood race.
It didn’t make me feel alive. I wanted to feel the snap of a bowstring against my forearm or run until I thought my lungs might burst.
But I managed to do as I was told and besides, the servants themselves were not entirely unpleasant.
I could tell Agnes and Walter genuinely did their best to make life bearable for everyone.
Agnes was sharp-tongued and had no patience for laziness, but she gave out small rewards for the staff who worked hardest each week.
Often it was an extra sweet from the kitchen or the ability to sleep in.
Once, she awarded a girl an entire extra day of rest.
On every tenth day, when most of the servants had some time off, Walter would frequently bring in a minstrel or acrobat to perform.
The entertainers he hired were usually ones who were either just starting out or down on their luck.
Their clothing was patched and shabby, and sometimes their instruments were held together with more hope than craftsmanship, but their eagerness for employment showed in every bow and flourish.
I understood that kind of eagerness. Dale had taught me to recognize performers who were hungry, desperate, or one bad evening away from giving up entirely.
Walter seemed to recognize it too, and even when the performances were not especially impressive, he clapped loudly and made sure the servants did the same.
On one such night, I hurried down from Prince John’s apartments.
My investigation had yielded no results that day.
The only papers I had seen were dull and useless, documents enumerating trade prices with various countries and a list Prince John’s wife had written of all her many complaints about the staff.
Things had been so quiet as of late that I was beginning to wonder if Father would ever come back.
I hated not knowing where he was. I hated waiting.
It was going to drive me mad. Up ahead, I saw Walter turning a corner and broke into a jog to catch up with him.
He heard my footsteps quicken behind him, glanced over his shoulder, then grinned and began to run as well.
“Oh, so that’s how it is?” I called after him. He only laughed and ducked around another corner.
We were nearly back to the servants’ quarters before I finally caught up. “Will you hold still for two seconds, you lout?” I teased, reaching for his gloved hand to pull him to a stop. My grip closed around strangely empty fingers and the glove slid smoothly off Walter’s hand.
I stopped running and froze.
The glove in my hand had wads of cloth stuffed into the spaces where fingers should have been. For a moment, I didn’t understand what I was seeing, then Walter turned toward me, and I saw his exposed hand.
I knew I should look away. I knew staring was rude.
I knew better than to let my face show every thought that passed through my mind.
But I couldn’t help it. My gaze fixed on his hand before I could stop myself.
His thumb was mostly gone, and his fingers were all shortened, each one ending after only one joint.
My stomach twisted. I had heard of mutilation as a form of punishment, but this was my first time seeing the result up close on someone who stood in front of me, smiling as though it were nothing.
“Quite a piece of work, isn’t it?” Walter said.
He watched me gape at his hand, then held it up a little higher so I could see better. His tone stayed casual. “It’s what I got for mouthing off to the captain in my last platoon one too many times. Charming man, right?”
“I’m… I’m sorry,” I stammered, forcing my eyes away at last. “I didn’t mean to stare.”
Walter shrugged. “I know it makes people uncomfortable. It’s why I usually wear the gloves.” He looked meaningfully at the glove still clutched in my hand.
“Oh.” I awkwardly handed it back, looking anywhere but at his uncovered hand as he pulled the glove on again.
Seeing injuries shouldn’t have bothered me.
There was a girl back in Sherwood Forest, Dale’s youngest daughter, who had been born with one leg oddly short and twisted so her toes pointed out to the side.
Teresa always limped around with a crutch, but she had inherited Dale’s lightheartedness and was one of the few girls I could tolerate being around without wanting to rip out my hair.
Her disability didn’t frighten me; it was simply part of her. But Walter’s hand felt different.
This was not a body being born a different way or healing poorly after an accident. This was calculated, deliberate cruelty. Someone had chosen it. Someone had decided that taking part of a man’s hand was an acceptable response to words.
Trying valiantly to appear blasé, I forced out a weak laugh. “Well, that must have been quite the mouth-off to deserve something like that.”
“Ah, little lady, be glad you’ll never serve in the military.
” Walter patted my shoulder with his other gloved hand, the touch kind and steady.
I could tell by the touch that this hand was whole and undamaged.
“Places like that aren’t for an innocent girl like you.
You wouldn’t last ten minutes with those brutes. ”
I nodded solemnly to show my absolute acceptance of his statement. “Which platoon were you in?”
“John’s First Battalion.”
First Battalion… That was the group that had held me captive all winter long. It was Baron’s group.
A horrible, creeping sensation moved through me. I kept my face still, though every part of me seemed to go cold at once. “How long ago?”
I wasn’t sure whether Walter was opposed to talking about it, but he didn’t seem to mind.
If anything, he looked almost relieved to have the matter out in the open now that I had seen his hand.
“About four years ago. I should’ve known better than to give lip to someone who felt like he had something to prove. ”
“What do you mean?” The creeping sensation grew heavier.
Walter shrugged. “The captain was barely in his twenties and needed to make an example out of someone. His father was the Sheriff of Nottingham, so most of us felt he hadn’t done anything to deserve the promotion over older and better qualified candidates.
” He adjusted the cuff of his glove, tugging it into place.
“He’s the sheriff now. That’s why I was so worried about you when I heard he brought you in for questioning.
I make sure to steer well clear of him whenever I can. ”
The words struck me with such force that the corridor seemed to tilt under my feet.
Baron.
It felt like learning about his parentage all over again. In the back of my mind, I could hear Walter continuing to talk, but his words blurred together until they became nothing more than a distant hum and time seemed to slow around me. Any noise felt strangely separate from where I stood.
Baron did this?
The image of Walter’s damaged hand flashed through my mind. Then, before I could stop it, that image was replaced by one of Baron with his sword raised high, his face twisted into the same cruel expression his father had worn so often.
I forced the thought away. It made me physically ill to imagine it.
It couldn’t be true. Baron was kind and patient.
He was the one who made sure I had been fed and kept warm during my captivity.
He was the one who had risked everything to set me free.
He had left his father’s side and chosen ours.
He worked ceaselessly to help the Merry Men and wanted to be inducted as one of us.
He cared about me. He loved me. Baron could not have done something this horrific…
Could he?
Walter’s voice faded in and out, but I couldn’t concentrate on any of it.
Memories rose too quickly for me to stop them.
Baron’s father had shouted at me that I had no idea what Baron had done.
He had told me I would never love his son if I knew what he was really like.
I had dismissed it at the time because the Sheriff was hateful and had wanted to hurt both me and Baron.
But had there been truth hidden inside the cruelty? I swallowed. I couldn’t think like that.
I knew Baron.
I trusted him.
Baron was working undercover for us, for the Merry Men. I couldn’t see him as the foul-tempered, power-hungry tyrant Walter described. But was that because he wasn’t one, or because I didn’t want to see it?
The thought tore through me.
Could everything I knew about Baron be a facade? Was it all an elaborate act he put on whenever he was with me? Could someone pretend that well for months and months?
The answer came too quickly.
Yes, they could. I was doing it right now.
Every day, I became Isabella. I lowered my gaze, curtsied, scrubbed floors, lied to everyone, and carried wine and crumpets to a man I despised with a smile on my face. I made people believe I was harmless and simply eager to earn a few coins because I needed them to believe it.
What if Baron had done the same thing?
Each day as the new Sheriff, he dealt out punishments, often harshly. Was that the act, or was it what he was putting on for me and James and the rest of the Merry Men?
What if, all this time, while I thought he had chosen our side, he was passing information back? What if every smile, every careful touch, every quiet moment in the forest had been part of a performance better than mine?
I wanted to scream with frustration. What was real and what wasn’t?
All the time I had been held prisoner, Baron had never mistreated me.
Since my escape, he had protected me. He had lied for me, fought for me, risked discovery for me.
Here at the castle, he had never betrayed me.
He had swallowed a secret message because I told him to.
He had put me in the pillory only because I asked him to.
He had held me afterward as though the sight of me hurting had hurt him too.
He couldn’t be the man Walter described. He just couldn’t be.
And even if everything Water said was true, Baron had changed. He had forsaken his previous life to be with me and to join the Merry Men. He wanted to become something better than his father had taught him to be.
Could anyone really change that much in such a short time?
Could Baron truly switch his loyalties, his habits, and his inclinations to become the complete opposite of what he had been raised to be?
I tried to imagine myself in his position, choosing to alter myself so completely.
I doubted it would ever last. People could pretend for a time, but eventually, pressure revealed what was underneath.
How long would it be until Baron relapsed into his old ways?
Walter continued talking, and I became only vaguely aware of nodding and agreeing with whatever he said. My mind had become consumed by the sudden, repulsive image of Baron’s face twisting into the same awful smile his father had worn.
Could I ever stay with someone who had intentionally hurt people like Walter?
Another memory surfaced, one I had not thought of in some time. After Baron and I had survived being pushed off the cliff, he had nearly whipped the man responsible. At the last moment, Baron had decided not to, claiming that doing so might kill him and that he wanted the man alive to suffer.
Had that been restraint, or was it cruelty of another kind? How had I explained it away so easily? How had I looked at a man raised by the Sheriff of Nottingham and convinced myself that love alone could erase everything he was?
Baron had once told me that he was a monster.
A chill ran through me.
What if he had been right?
“Izzy? Isabella?”
Walter’s hand touched my shoulder and shook me gently. I blinked hard and looked up at him. His face was creased with concern. “Are you all right?”
“Oh, sorry.” I forced a fatigued smile, though my mouth felt stiff. “I’m just tired. Cleaning all day, you know.”
“Best get some rest, then,” Walter said kindly. “That morning bell comes early. But just think, it isn’t long until Festival Week. You can have some fun and catch up on sleep then.”
He clapped his undamaged hand on my shoulder, gave me a tiny, reassuring squeeze, and left. I slowly walked back to the servants’ quarters, every step feeling heavier than the last. Around me, the castle continued as it always did. Nothing had changed for anyone but me.
I reached my straw tick, lay down, and stared into the darkness long after the other girls fell asleep around me. I couldn’t sleep. I wouldn’t be able to rest until I got some answers.
I had to know the truth.