Free Daughter of Sherwood by Laura Strickland

the circle is weakened.”
    “And if Wren runs, we will all be doomed.”
    “Where would she run? She has nothing, save us.”
    “A creature escaping a trap cares not for that. Why do you not spend some of your time on Sally, who needs your comfort?”
    Martin shook himself like a wet hound. “You know I am no good at holding hands and speaking soft words. That is more your ilk.”
    “Yet you had time for Sal when you wanted a warm bed, this winter past, a few hours’ comfort. The lass loves you right well, and she needs you now, as you needed her then.”
    “She will just have to get over her feelings, then, will she not? For what we must do here in Sherwood is far more important than the feelings of one foolish lass.”
    “So Sally must weather her hurt and her father’s death as well?”
    “As must we all. Because, you mark my words, Sparrow, there will be far more deaths in Oakham, and beyond, if we do not keep Sherwood strong.”

Chapter Eleven
    “Does that man ever listen to any words besides his own?”
    Sparrow could feel Wren’s anger even before he approached her. She had fled deep into the trees beyond the far side of the clearing and now sat on a fallen tree, looking distracted.
    With some hesitation, Sparrow seated himself beside her. Right now her feelings were those of a startled hawk, wild and primed for flight, and he knew he needed to go carefully.
    “No,” he replied. “Martin’s head is made of pure rock.”
    “I told him last night I will not be bullied. This situation is intolerable. I feel like I have been torn up by the roots and am being battered from every side.”
    “I know.”
    She turned her head and looked at him. “How could you know?”
    Sparrow drew a breath. “Because I feel what you feel, at least in part. ’Tis as if I pick up the echo of your emotions, just as you surely must mine, and Martin’s. We are all three linked.”
    She continued to stare at him with those wild eyes. “How is it that we are linked? You and I do not even know each other.”
    “I believe we are connected through Sherwood itself, by ties both of blood and devotion. Martin and I were dedicated by our fathers, soon after our births.”
    “But my father was already dead when I was born, and my mother abandoned me.”
    “And Lil dedicated you before she took you with her to Nottingham.”
    “Well, I do not want to hear your thoughts, or Martin’s. And I do not want you to hear mine. Such intrusion is more than I can bear. I am used to the solitude of the scullery and the bustle of the kitchen beyond. No one ever cared if I lived or died, and my greatest worry was the salt biting my hands.”
    “Salt?”
    She made a face. “We scrub the Sheriff’s kettles with a mixture of salt, sand, and lye.” She held out her hands. “They are only now starting to heal.”
    Sparrow fought the tendency to catch her fingers in his; he remembered again the taste of her, during their flight, and had to wrestle his desire. She did not need that from him, now. “It sounds like a hard and joyless existence.”
    “No, this is hard! Pray, how can I get Martin to leave me alone? As it is, I want nothing so much as to stab him with his own knife.”
    Sparrow’s mind groped hurriedly for the right thing to say. Wren balanced on the very edge of control. “Perhaps a wee prick might be the best solution—just here, under his jaw, you understand.”
    Unexpectedly, she smiled. It transformed her face and made Sparrow think suddenly of her father. Surely Robin himself had such a smile.
    “He is a wee prick,” she declared, and they laughed together.
    More easily, she said, “I still cannot believe any of this is true—the forest, and the two of you, and the fact that my father was the legendary Robin of Sherwood. I went from knowing nothing of my parents to having two of the most well-known of all.”
    “Aye, it must seem strange.”
    “Tell me more about this triad everyone keeps talking about, the three of