I wanted to tell him his secrets were safe with me, but he knew that already. And I were too tired to form the words. He led me to a ladder and we climbed up it slow.

There were a door in the hayloft to pitch hay down from, and Rob opened it, letting the sun and fresh air in as he arranged bales and loose hay. He brought me to it, kissing me and pulling me down to lie on his chest.

I laid my cheek on his chest, drowsy, bare able to keep my eyes open. “I love you,” I whispered.

“I love you too,” he told me, threading his fingers through mine.

Chapter 19

I woke up only a few hours later. It were still daylight and Rob were breathing deep beneath me, chest rising and falling under my cheek, his heartbeat drumming light and steady in my ear.

“I can tell you’re awake, you know,” he told me.

I lifted my head, and he opened his eyes. “We have to get to work, don’t we?” I asked.

His nose nudged along my cheek. “I’m more interested in you telling me these secrets. Particularly the ones keeping us from sleeping in a bed.”

I pushed off him, sitting up.

He sighed, sitting up too. “Work it is, then.”

We joined the rest of the shire in the city, laboring along just like we’d done before. As we got to houses that were ruined but still half standing, we had to get the bigger men to do most of the work. Most of the women went to cook and prepare food, look to the little ones, and tend to a hundred other tasks that had to be done now that the knights were with us and stronger men could do the bulk of the hardest work.

Robin set them all to tasks, and I watched, as I’d become a bit useless too. My muscles were sore and I felt the grime of days of sleeplessness and sweat and pain upon me. I went to see Bess. She smiled when she saw me, and I sat by her on the bed. The tiny little girl were in her arms, silent and sleeping.

“She’s peace itself,” I said.

Bess laughed. “Until she starts wailing for something. Sometimes I don’t know what she wants. But she’s beautiful, isn’t she?”

She blinked her eyes open like she knew we were talking about her, and she looked at her mum, then over at me. Her eyes watched me steady. “The most beautiful,” I told her. “What’s her name?”

She sniffed. “I wanted to call her Hannah, but Much—he insisted we call her Maryanne.”

“Why?” I asked.

“It was John’s mother’s name,” she told me soft. “He wanted her to have a piece of him to hold on to. Always.” A tear slipped from her eye and she wiped it off. “And we both liked the closeness.”

“Closeness?”

“Maryanne,” she said, smiling. “Marian.”

A warm rush swept through my body. I’d never heard my given name sound so beautiful, so lovely before. “Maryanne,” I whispered. I touched her cheek, and she blinked but kept staring.

“She likes you,” she told me. “Do you want to hold her?”

I nodded, earnest.

She handed her to me, and it were easier to take her than yesterday. My hands were still a little sore, but I didn’t mind the soft weight. She wriggled a bit and settled into me, shutting her eyes again.

“It’s strange,” Bess said with a sigh, leaning back. “To see you as a noble lady, and with a baby. A year ago I wouldn’t have known such a thing could happen with Will Scarlet, the village rascal.”

I wrinkled my nose. “I wasn’t a rascal.”

“You had a lot of ladies sighing after you. The lot of you did. Everyone fancied they were in love with one of you.” She laughed. “I remember telling Ellie at Tuck’s that I thought Robin must have been of the wicked sort, the way he looked at you.”

I laughed too. “Easy to say that now! Rob and I couldn’t tell how we felt about each other; how could you?”

She shook her head. “Do you remember that night when Gisbourne came to Tuck’s, and he was looking for you lot?”

“When he killed that boy,” I said soft.

“And nearly killed Much,” she breathed. “And you shot up into the trees like a squirrel and Rob were on the ground. He were right near me and he looked—” She shook her head. “That look, I’ve never seen the like of it. I was sure that he loved you then, boy or not. You can’t look like that at someone—worry about someone like that—without loving them true.”

I sighed. “He does love me. I just don’t know if that will ever be enough for us.”

“What do you mean?”

My shoulders lifted, and Maryanne opened her mouth and shut it. “John were the first one who told me love isn’t enough. You have to choose that person, over and over again, every day. And Rob—we don’t choose each other first, not like John chose you. John put you above everything else. And I don’t know that Rob and I will ever do that.” I shivered. “I don’t know that I can do that.”

She smiled. “John told me that. It was what finally got me to agree to marry him—he told me he’d choose me, every day. Of all the women he’d ever been with, he’d choose me. Day after day. Moment after moment.” She shook her head. “But the bad things—you don’t choose those, Scarlet. You deal with them. And if I’ve only ever listened to one moment of everything Much has ever said, you two make each other strong. Strong enough to make choices that the rest of us can’t make.”