Page 94 of Queen of Sherwood

The man ruthlessly stabbed into her, and Maria staggered with a gasp. She fell to her knees.

One more slice, and Maria fell from her knees to her side with a severed throat, blood pooling around her unmoving body.

“NO!” screamed another voice across camp—Griff, the young man who swore to protect her in Much the Miller’s Son’s absence.

Griff had already seen death tonight when he joined us on the raid to capture Bishop Sutton.

Sutton! Where is he?

I scanned the field and found Sutton at the tree, tied where we’d left him, glancing around with wide eyes of shock and awe.

My eyes swiveled again.

Enid crawled away from Maria’s murderer, silent and mute as she had been since the carriage incident. The murderer stalked toward her, stepping over Maria’s body.

I closed one eye, aimed, and loosed my arrow.

It struck the man in the back, causing him to arch as his hand lifted. He dropped his sword.

Griff ran in holding a burning log and slammed it across the man’s face. Sparks and embers sprayed across flesh as the man collapsed with a wail. Griff threw down the log and went to his knees over Maria, lifting her limp head onto his lap. “Maria . . . no!”

Behind him crept a woman—that gray-haired lass, one of the two women from the Meddlers. She had a sickle in her hands. Griff didn’t see her coming.

I drew another arrow as quickly as I could, took aim, and launched it before I could get a steady shot.

It struck the woman in the shoulder, twisting her old body sideways and unbalancing her as she lifted the sickle to plant into Griff’s back.

Griff looked over his shoulder, croaking—

Just in time to catch the blade in the soft part of his shoulder. He cried out and fell back, the curved blade stuck in his body.

Little John appeared and swung his quarterstaff so hard against the old woman’s face that her head exploded like an overripe melon in a shower of bone and gore.

Blood splashed across my huge lover as he roared, “Stop killing my friends!”

Tears came to my eyes. I stuttered a step and my vision swam.

Armison dashed out of the shadows near me, blade in hand. My stomach curled into knots.

He swung once and I lifted my shortbow crossways.

Thank God for Alan’s excellent carpentry, because it stopped the blow with little more than a knick in the fortified wood.

I swung the bow left, right, batting it across Armison’s body.

Then Tuck was beside me, fists flying, and with quick and precise strikes he punched Atonement and Discipline into Armison’s ribs and torso, flattening muscle and crunching bone.

Armison wobbled in place, eyes wild, and dropped to his knees.

I moved on, knowing he was out of the fight if not dead, and pulled out another arrow in anticipation.

The remaining woman from the Muddy Meddlers—a woman near my own age—was rampaging across the burning camp like a banshee. She chased orphan girls, yelling, “Come here, you filthy little bitches! Earn your retribution!”

A horse whinnied and stampeded across the burning embers of various fire pits. Someone I didn’t recognize rode atop the steed, head bent low.

I led the man and beast with my bow, not recognizing him as a Merry Man, and loosed my arrow.

It caught a tree branch and bounced harmlessly away.

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