Outlaw Princess of Sherwood by Nancy Springer Page A

all of you!” King Solon raged as the outlaws removed the gag from his mouth. “Get your hands off me, dirty churls!” as they seated him on a heap of soft doeskins at the guest’s place of honor upon the mossy roots of the great oak, with the campfire near his feet. “A pox take you!” as they unbound his wrists and served him venison with mushroom gravy for breakfast.
    Standing nearby, Etty turned her back to all this, feeling tired. Very tired. No wonder. She hadn’t slept.
    â€œAre you all right, lass?” Robin asked, walking up to her.
    She nodded, wondering hazily what he meant. Why should she not be all right?
    â€œWell, then, we need to think what to do next. May my yeomen rest, or must I keep them at the ready? How long will it take your father’s retainers to come looking for him?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Etty admitted.
    An unexpected voice spoke. “It will take them the better part of the day, if not longer.” Beauregard, seated on the ground with his booted feet thrust out, gestured with a hunk of bread in his slender white hand. “The men of our good King Solon, they are grumbling,” he said. “They have not been paid, and the food is poor. The captain is old, the sergeant challenges him at every turn, and the men do no more than they have to.”
    Robin wheeled to peer at him. “How do you know all this, lad?”
    â€œI heard and saw. Yesterday.”
    Etty found herself wide-awake within a moment. “What has become of your Frankish accent?” she demanded.
    A grin as bright and sudden as lightning flashed on his fine-boned face. His black eyes glinted with fun. “ Mes yeux, mademoiselle,” he said. “ Merci beaucoup for to remind me.”
    â€œPlease forget that she reminded you.” Robin eyed the page boy thoughtfully. “Master Beauregard—if that is indeed your name—why did the high king send you here?”
    â€œAh, it is just a small matter of taxes.” He waved his breakfast languidly. “King Solon has not paid them.”
    â€œFor that, you followed Solon here ? To Sherwood Forest?”
    â€œ Oui , most assuredly.” Beauregard grinned again. “The better part of my task is to spy. King Solon is in much difficulty.”
    Etty peered at Beauregard, feeling certain now that the stranger boy liked to rattle the bushes. He meant his foppish clothes and his so-called Frankish accent to annoy any yeomen who would judge him shallowly. Or perhaps he was actually mocking the dandies of the high king’s Frankish court. He was a gadfly, with a kind of nerve new to Ettarde. Intent on him, she moved a few steps closer, so that she looked down at the top of his golden head.
    â€œYou have the high king’s ear,” Robin was saying to Beauregard, “yet you would throw in your lot with outlaws? But you could have risen—”
    â€œBeauregard,” Etty blurted, interrupting in her surprise, “your hair is as fair as flax, but the roots are raven black.”
    The boy dropped his bread as his hands jerked up, trying to cover his head in the absence of his hat. His dark eyes widened, all their glitter gone, leaving only stark fear.
    And Robin sucked in his breath with a hiss, stepping back as if he had seen an adder. “Guards!” he called sharply. Will Scathelock was already standing by. “Much, Rafe, John!”
    â€œ Mon foi, ” faltered Beauregard, regaining some of his poise, “a simple potion turns the hair yellow to charm the ladies, what is the harm of that?”
    Etty gawked. He had changed the color of his hair? She had never heard of such a thing. But still, as he had said, what harm—
    â€œHe’s a black-haired blackguard,” said Will Scathelock, as harsh as flint. “He’s one of the foul folk. A Wanderer.”
    Etty stiffened as knowledge broke upon her, truth as sharp as glass shattering. That narrow