Outlaw: A Lesbian Retelling of Robyn Hood by Niamh Murphy

Author:Niamh Murphy [Murphy, Niamh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: series, Romance Suspense
Publisher: NIM Publishing
Published: 2019-07-24T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

The Road to York

Robyn was woken by the sound of dirt being thrown on the fire. She sat up in alarm and scrabbled around trying to remember where she was.

“Now then, lassie. Take thy bow and be off with thee.” A giant of a man stood over her in the cool morning air. She squinted at him, and her head felt foggy and full of sleep. “Mayhap a lass such as thou can make it up t’York and find thyself honest work.” He turned away and began collecting the last of his things.

Robyn looked around. The burnt ground of the nightfire was swallowed by fresh dirt and his little lean-to had been dismantled. It was as if neither of them had ever been there.

She hadn’t thought her plan through further than luring the Sheriff’s guards to the woods. She hadn’t thought much beyond the night. She knew she had to hide, and perhaps running away to York was the best way to stay hidden forever...

Leave Nottinghamshire. Leave Loxley. Leave her family. Leave Marian.

Then what?

What would she do once she had got away? What would she do for the rest of her life?

She would have to live as a boy for a while. That much was certain. She couldn’t risk being seen as a maiden alone wandering through the woods. She wondered if she would ever be able to pass as a man, or would she have to wear a scarf over her face her whole life? Perhaps she could pretend to be mute to disguise her voice or a leper...

Robyn, eldest daughter to the Baron of Loxley, had never thought that she would one day be seriously considering begging her way through life disguised as a male leper. She shook her head. Had it really come to this? She wasn’t even sure if she had won or lost.

But even as she worried about what would happen to her years in the future, her body felt heavy. The gnawing hunger and thirst had returned; the death of the nightfire had forced the warmth to sink away from her bones, and for a few moments she couldn’t find the will to care about running away. All she wanted to do was curl up on the ground in the smallest ball possible and close her eyes. Just for a moment.

“York be thataway.” The Green Man, loaded up with the essentials of his campsite, pointed to the west with the head of his axe. His whole world was packed up and he was already moving off, taking everything he owned with him.

Robyn stood. More out of duty than a desire to travel. She looked around the empty clearing but she had nothing to leave behind save her bow. From a noble daughter managing an estate of several hundred acres, with horses and chests filled with clothes, rooms filled with furniture... she had been reduced to a vagrant with nothing more than she could carry.

But it wasn’t the things she missed. It wasn’t riches or rooms.

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