The Nightwatchman (English)(From Ashes Vol.2)

Chapter 43 - My Place

Marian smiled when one of the younger children threw his arms around her neck and kissed her on the cheek, but at the same time she wanted to cry. Those children needed everything: more food, warmer clothes, repairs to the roof of the orphanage, medicines, or many of them wouldn't pass the winter.
She sighed: once, when her father was sheriff, or even when they still had Knighton Hall, it would have been easy for her to bring some help to those orphans, but now she knew she couldn't afford it.
Her father and Guy spent hours and hours studying the account ledgers of Locksley, trying to reduce all the expenses and increase the profits of the few lands around the house, so they could pay the taxes imposed by the sheriff. And without the belongings that Guy had bequeathed to Sir Edward, Vaisey would already have taken Locksley back.
Now Marian regretted the stunt she had done before the disastrous attempted wedding with Guy, long before: as the Nightwatchman, she had robbed her future husband, taking away most of his possessions.
From that exploit, Marian obtained a bad abdominal injury that had threatened to kill her, and late remorse for what she had done to Guy.
Gisborne had never reproached her for that theft, even after finding out that she was the Nightwatchman, but she realized only now how much she had damaged him. She had been convinced to do well, but she had taken from Guy most of the savings of a lifetime at the sheriff's service, destroying in a few minutes the sacrifices of years of effort.
If now Guy had to spend so much time away from home, it was because he had to make money from the mysterious lands that he had obtained from the sheriff after saving his life. He never spoke of those lands and Marian had imagined them to be sterile and almost totally unproductive, and that Guy was ashamed to the point of not even wanting to show them to her.
However, neither she, nor her father, nor Guy had the financial ability to provide for the needs of the children at the orphanage. Marian decided with a sigh that she should seek the help of Robin Hood.
She would rather avoid it because the thought of contacting Robin made her feel disloyal both with Guy and with Robin. But she had no choice, she couldn't let those children die of cold and hunger.
For a moment, she entertained the idea of intervening as the Nightwatchman, but she rejected it immediately. She had promised to Guy that she wouldn't act rashly, and she couldn't break that promise.
Thinking about Guy, she wondered, where was he?
He had left the orphanage a few hours before, and he had said that he would visit Tuck at the abbey, but, since then, he hadn't shown up.
Just as she thought of him, she saw him coming down the road with the monk, immersed in a conversation with Tuck.

Tuck turned to Guy of Gisborne, with a vaguely disbelieving smile, as he finished telling him one of the Nightwatchman adventures.
"You can't say that in the last few months you've lost your time," the friar said, and Guy nodded enthusiastically.
Tuck was pleased to see that light in the eyes of the other man, although many of the actions of the Nightwatchman weren't entirely acceptable from the point of view of a religious man, and they just added to the already large bunch of sins that Guy had to confess .
When he met him for the first time, Gisborne was a broken man, destroyed and hopeless, and the friar had feared that he might only be able to heal the wounds of his body and not those of his soul, but now it was different: in his eyes he saw life and the determination to build a better future, starting from a past that had hurt him so much.
Gisborne stopped talking when he saw Marian from afar, but Tuck didn't regret it. There would be time to talk again later, and the black knight would come back to visit him to confess his sins and to tell him the rest of his recent adventures.
Guy saw Marian's face lighting up in a smile when she saw him, and for a moment he looked at her, enraptured. He still couldn't believe that she could be so glad to see him, that her smile was directed to him, and it seemed impossible how he could find Marian more beautiful every time his eyes rested on her.
In that moment, laughing and a little disheveled, with a scrawny kid dressed in rags clutching his arms around her neck, she as was beautiful as she could be and Guy had to stop himself from running to her, throw himself at her feet, and beg her to marry him now, without waiting another second.
Thinking about Knighton Hall, burnt for the second time, made his chest to swell with sorrow and hatred toward the sheriff. Guy hastened to repel those thoughts and to bury them deep in his heart: he wouldn't allow anything to ruin the moments he could spend with Marian.
He touched his chest with his hand, looking under his jacket for the shape of the ring he wore around his neck, tied with a silk ribbon belonged to the girl.
He had to wait.
He would rebuild the house and lay the foundation in order to offer her a future, and only then he would ask Marian to become his wife.
The girl let the child go and she watched him running to play with the other orphans, then she went to meet Gisborne and the friar.
"Hi Guy, hello father."
Tuck greeted her politely, then he looked at her and at Gisborne for a few seconds, and decided to leave.
"Now I must return to the abbey, but I'm really happy to have met you again. Guy, I count to see you soon, there are still many things that we need to discuss."
Gisborne nodded and the monk returned to the abbey.
Marian gave a surprised look at Guy.
"Didn't you spoke with him all the morning?"
"Apparently my soul needs a lot of effort and a lot of words to be saved," Guy said with a wry smile, and the girl looked at him reproachfully.
Gisborne assumed an innocent expression, and Marian smiled, shaking her head.
"You're terrible, Guy," she said with an amused sigh, then she looked better at him, a bit worried. "And you're pale, do you feel well?"
Guy nodded.
In recent days he had slept too little and he didn't allowed himself a moment to rest, ignoring the protests of Allan who was trying to make him slow down a little. Now the weariness of the previous days had fallen on him all at once.
"I haven't slept much in the last few days, that's all."
She stroked his cheek and Guy leaned on her hand for a moment, smiling.
"Do you still have nightmares?" Marian sighed. "Wake me up next time that it happens to you, I wish I could do something to help."
"You are already doing so much for me," Guy said, looking into her eyes.
She touched his lips with a light kiss, ignoring the evil eyes of a handful of women who were walking to the church.
"Did you already eat?" She asked, taking his hand and Guy shook his head.
"Not yet. You?"
"They had offered me a meal, but it didn't feel right to accept. Those children have barely enough to feed themselves, I couldn't eat their food. I wish I could do something to help," the girl said in a distressed tone.
"Ask Hood for help."
Marian looked at Guy, amazed that that suggestion came from him.
"Won't you mind if I ask Robin to help those children?"
Guy shrugged nonchalantly.
"After all, isn't that what he does all the time? Robin Hood, the hero who steals from the rich to give to the poor... Those kids seem very poor, Hood might as well aid them instead of the usual good for nothing peasants."
Marian rewarded those words with another kiss.
"I'm so glad that you agreed to come with me today."
Guy tried to dispel the guilt he felt for making her believe that he was with Tuck whereas he had gone to rob the sheriff, and smiled.
"You still didn't tell me why you cared so much for this."
"I'm tired of seeing people who fear you like you're a demon. I want you to stay by my side even when we're in public, I can't stand when we go to the market and you are forced to stay apart because otherwise the sellers would refuse to serve me, or could be rude. They have no right to behave like that and I will no longer tolerate it. Your place is by my side and if others don't like it, they might as well get used to it."
Guy stared at her for a moment, then he pulled her into his arms, hiding his face in her hair, so nobody else could see his emotion.
"And this is the place where I want to be," he whispered into the girl's ear.
Marian hugged him stronger and Guy closed his eyes.
He thought back to his actions of that morning and he felt guilty towards Marian. To impersonate the Nightwatchman was always a risk, it was true, but since Vaisey had burned Knighton Hall, Guy had been carried away by the desire to take revenge, ignoring all cautions.
Stopping to open the cages of the sheriff's birds had been a dangerous and unnecessary act that could have killed both Robin and him.
If that had happened, if he had been killed for his stupid recklessness, what would have happened to Marian?
He had to take it easy, he decided. If he continued to act on the wave of emotions, he would only hurt himself and the people around him, beginning with Marian.
She touched his face with a caress.
"It's everything all right, Guy? You're trembling..."
"I couldn't feel better. Come!"
Guy lifted her into his arms with a sudden movement that made her cry with surprise. A group of women who had gathered to chat turned around, and they began to look at the scene disapprovingly.
"Aren't you ashamed? So close to the Abbey?" A woman said loudly, and another one elbowed her, afraid.
"Shut up! Don't you know who is that man? Do you want him to kill you?"
"So is that one the lover of Gisborne? I thought she was prettier..."
"Her hair is too short, she should be ashamed to go around like that!"
"And that scar on her face? Was it him to make it to her?"
"Is it true that he has escaped from hell?" One of the women asked, whispering.
One of the other women looked mischievously at Guy.
"But I can understand why she has yielded to sin with him..."
The others shushed with scandalized murmurs, however, none of them openly contradicted her.
"In any case it's a scandal!" The oldest decreed, loudly enough to be heard even from Guy and Marian.
Gisborne looked at the group of women, then he looked down at Marian's face, worried about her.
"Are you really sure that you want to face this? I can wait, stand aside when there are other people around..."
Marian put her hands through Guy's hair and drew him into a passionate kiss, then she pulled away and stared at him, determined.
"I hope I made myself clear."
Guy smiled.
"Very. But you can explain it to me again whenever you want."
He carried her to the horse, passing on purpose near the gossiping women. The group dispersed, frightened to see him getting closer to them, and Guy mounted, lifting Marian on the saddle behind him.
The girl wrapped her arms around his waist and Guy galloped away.
"Where are we going?" Marian asked.
"You'll see it soon."
Marian asked no more questions and she simply clung to Gisborne. The black stallion was fast, although he had two people on the saddle, and Guy was letting him to run freely, without slowing his pace.
The girl smiled, excited by the speed, and she thought that it had been a long time since she had felt so free.
Guy stopped his horse near the river, rummaged in his saddle bags and smiled.
"I knew it."
"What?" Marian asked, and Guy put a bundle and a wineskin in her hands, then he lifted her back in his arms.
"That Allan would leave me something to eat. If I could afford it, maybe I should give him a raise..."
Marian smiled and held to Guy's neck with one arm when Gisborne began walking along the bank of the river, penetrating through the vegetation that grew there, without putting her down.
"Guy, aren't you tired? You'll hurt yourself carrying me, I can walk by myself."
"I could carry you like this forever and never be tired."
Marian tickled his neck with her fingers, chuckling.
"Why are you panting, then?"
Guy smiled in defeat.
"Let's just rest here for a while."
Then he laid her at the foot of a tree, kneeling on the ground next to her and Marian looked around.
At that point, the river was slow and the vegetation was lush, giving the place the appearance of an enchanted place. The tree under which they had sat sheltered them from the sun with the shade of its branches, and Marian sighed with joy.
"How did you find this place? It's beautiful!"
"It's not very far from the castle, but not visible from the road. If you don't know of its existence, you could pass by for years without ever getting here. I found it by accident a long time ago and I've never told anyone. I used to come here when I'd had enough of the sheriff and wanted to stay alone for a while without being disturbed."
"And now you've shown it to me..."
"Yes." Guy took the bundle from her and he began to open it. "Don't you want to see what Allan left for us? I'm hungry."
Marian nodded. She was hungry too, but she didn't care so much to find out what was in the package prepared by Allan, anything would be fine for her.
She looked at Guy and smiled: that moment was perfect and she was happy.