“Good night,” she said, shutting the door to the room.
Changing into a clean shirt were all I could bear to do before falling asleep.
CHAPTER
I slept like the dead. When I woke, it were to full, body-aching pain, but it were also to the sun. It came in through the window to lie over me like a blanket, and I didn’t move for a long while, looking at the light, feeling the heat of it on my skin. I trailed my fingers through it, wondering if I could just touch it, just hold on to it, maybe I could change everything else.
Shutting my eyes, I remembered it so clear—the feeling of waking up with Rob, his heartbeat under my cheek, making me feel that we weren’t so separate, that if we stayed like this long enough we’d melt into each other. Like somehow we could become unbreakable.
Standing from the bed, I put on the rest of the clothes that Kate had given me—boy’s pants and a thick tunic. Outside my door I found a clean pair of soft old boots, and I put those on too.
Downstairs, David and Allan were swallowing bread and bacon and hard eggs like men possessed. Kate were watching them, fair disgusted.
David saw me first. He stood from the table, and Allan swallowed a bite and did the same. David bowed his head to me, looking surprising less like a knight without his royal uniform. “Good morning, my lady.”
“Lady thief,” Allan said, mocking him a little. David scowled.
“Please don’t do that,” I told them both.
Allan sat back down, but David looked uncomfortable. “My lady, you’re a princess. I can’t—”
“And yesterday I were a prisoner,” I told him. “Please sit.”
“Yes, my lady,” he said.
“Yes, my lady,” Kate mimicked under her breath. I frowned at her, and she lifted her shoulders in innocence.
“How did the palace fare last night?” I asked, scared of the words.
Allan waved this off. “Very well. They never so much as got within the gates, and all the nobles had already fled.”
“They had?” I asked.
Allan nodded, pushing the bowl of hard eggs to me. I took one and a piece of bread. “The lot of them got out when the word about Richard first came; that’s why everyone thought he was dead.”
“So Eleanor isn’t at the palace?” I asked.
He shook his head. “She’s with most of the court at Windsor, last I heard.”
I frowned. “Could Prince John be there?”
“I don’t know, my lady. Why do you want to see the queen mother?”
I glanced at Kate. “When Prince John thought I were about to die, he told me that Richard had been captured and held for ransom—but he said that Richard would never set foot in England again.”
“That makes no sense,” Allan said. “The queen mother would happily raise any sum to retrieve her son, and she certainly has the will to do it.”
I nodded, raising my eyebrows.
“Unless he has some sort of plot in place to make sure that the ransom isn’t paid,” Allan realized.
“Or that Richard doesn’t live to see it,” I told him.
“Christ on a cross post,” Allan murmured.
“The queen mother will want to hear of this as soon as we can get to her,” David agreed. “And I shall relish reporting her son’s behavior to her besides.”
“Very well,” Allan said. “Eleanor first.”
“You shouldn’t go to Windsor,” Kate said, looking at me. “The whole royal court is there. Even if Prince John isn’t, there will be someone loyal to him. You’ll never get to the queen without being seen. And the longer you can stay dead the better, especially with this information.”
I frowned, but I couldn’t disagree.
“For what it’s worth, I’ll look to the sea. If he’s taking men or orders across the water, someone will have heard about it,” she said.
“What about my lord Winchester?” Allan asked.
Confused, I looked to him. “What about him?”
“Winchester Castle is little more than a day’s ride from here. We could send word to the queen mother to meet us there; his men would never betray you, would they?”
The Earl of Winchester had been the truest friend to Rob, and by virtue of that, to me. “No,” I said. “Never. Do you have some you trust to get a message to Eleanor?” I asked.
Kate nodded. “I do.”
“I’m coming with you,” Allan told me, his face serious for once. “I promised Robin that I would find you. I’ll see you back to him before I leave your side.”
My breath caught at the idea of seeing Rob again. How easy it would be to leave here, to slip from David and ride north until my body broke, until I found myself in front of Nottingham Castle.
I cleared my throat, wishing it cleared my head, and nodded. “Very well. And thank you, I suppose.”
“Thank you, I suppose,” Allan repeated, one eyebrow lifting up. “Well, from you, my lady, I’ll take it as the sweetest endearment.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Thank you.”
“You don’t need to apologize, my lady,” David insisted, meeting Allan’s eyes in challenge. Allan smirked at him.