Robin Hood and the Dragon’s Mate

Will normally fell asleep easily, but with a beautiful girl lying so closely beside him, he found himself wanting to brush her soft brown curls away from her face. When his thoughts drifted to kissing those soft lips while staring into her sapphire eyes, he shook himself and rolled over to see Robin watching him.

“If you are going to spy on someone you should utilize your chameleon mode,” he muttered grumpily.

“Ah, but then I couldn’t tease you about it later,” Robin said with a grin.

Will returned his friend’s smile with a blush. He could never stay mad at Robin.

“Will,” Robin said, his tone turning serious, “Perhaps we should switch places.”

A surge of jealousy washed over Will. He was surprised by the strength of it. After a moment he was able to quash the anger that rose within him, “Why, Robin?”

His friend sighed, “Because I fear that you are growing attached to this girl, and it is clear that she lives far from here. Once we find her brother, we have told her we will help her return home.”

Will shrugged, trying not to think about it too much, “It’s fine.” He snuggled down into his spot as if to make it clear that he intended to stay.

Robin shook his head, “I just don’t want to see you get hurt, Will.”

Will forced a smile, “I’ll be fine, I promise.” After a time, he drifted off to sleep.

He woke to find that Ashlyn had rolled over onto his chest. His heart rate sped up and he tried very hard not to breathe, for fear he would wake her and end this wonderful closeness. She trailed her fingers on his chest as she slept and he shuddered at her touch. Looking over at the outline of the still sleeping Robin he thought, Okay, maybe he was right. But I wouldn’t miss this for anything.

* * *

When Ashlyn woke the next morning, she found that she had rolled over in her sleep. Her head was resting on Will’s chest and her arm was draped across his stomach. She sat up quickly, a furious blush heating her cheeks. “Sorry,” she muttered.

He smiled sheepishly up at her, “I figure my chest was more comfortable than the log.” He shrugged and then climbed to his feet. “I’m going to gather wood. Robin’s over there still, just a bit blended in like he does.” She looked over to where Robin had lain the night before. Once again she couldn’t see any sign that he was there. “How can you tell where he is?”

Will shrugged, “I guess I’m used to it, I can still see his outline.” She tried to see Robin as Will made his way into the trees to gather wood, but she just couldn’t pick him out amongst the grass and log.

One moment it was an empty spot and then suddenly he was there. He appeared so quickly that she jumped. Robin grinned over at her, “Sorry, I can’t control it when I’m asleep. I guess it’s a defense mechanism.”

She forced herself to smile back, but it fell short of sincere. He stood and made his way over to her side of the fire pit. Lowering himself to sit beside her, he turned to study her for a moment before speaking. Finally he asked softly, “How are you feeling?”

She shrugged noncommittally, “I’m okay.” He continued to study her until finally her façade cracked.

“I’m scared about what might be happening to Athyn. I’m still freaked out that one minute I was in a museum and now I’m in the middle of the woods with a bunch of men who claim to be Robin Hood and his band of thieves, and at least one of them is not quite human.”

He slipped an arm around her shoulders as she shook. Even though he was the one who was not quite human, she felt comfortable with him. “I’m sorry that my gift frightens you. It is perhaps the only reason I’m still alive right now. The life of an outlaw is hard on a person.”

She shuddered and turned to him, “You guys aren’t just acting are you?”

He shook his head, “No, but we are going to help you get your brother back, and then we will help you figure out how you came to be here. I promise you, and Robin of Loxley always keeps his promises.” He grinned over at her, holding out his hand to shake. She smiled back and shook his hand, but when she went to pull her hand back he held it firm. He was staring at her arm. Quickly he pushed her sleeve up, taking in a sharp breath of air.

“That is an odd tattoo,” Robin said softly.

“Tattoo? I don’t have a tattoo,” she stared down at the intricate design etched on her arm. It looked like a dragon curled around her arm, across the back of her hand to wrap once around her ring finger. The dragon’s head rested on her knuckle. “It’s just like the bracelet,” she whispered.

He looked up at her sharply. “Perhaps you should tell me about this bracelet you speak of.”

She told him about the museum, how that dragon room was closed for renovations but Athyn had run in there so she had run after him. She told about brushing the bracelet with her fingers and how it had seemed to come alive and wrap itself around her arm. “That was when I started to feel faint. When I woke up I was here, in the woods.”

Robin bit his lower lip and nodded. He took a deep breath, seeming to be trying to calm down. He stood up and backed away slowly until he backed right into Will who had come into camp with a pile of sticks and branches in his arms. The branches fell and both Will and Robin lost their balance and fell to the ground. Will stood first and then, laughing, reached down to help Robin.

His laughter died as he saw his friend’s expression. “Robin, are you well? You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

Robin turned his gaze on his friend. Will backed up a step at the intensity in his eyes. “Robin, what is it?”

Robin took a deep breath, “We may have more to deal with than we first believed.”

Alan entered the camp then and nodded toward Ashlyn. He saw Robin and Will deep in conversation and hurried over to them, “What is it? What’s happened?” He asked.

John and the friar entered the camp then and seeing the impromptu meeting they hurried to join. Ashlyn felt a thick lump in her throat. She studied the tattoo on her arm. Where had it come from and why did it have Robin so upset all of a sudden? Will kept looking over at her and each time his gaze seemed more and more worried.

Ashlyn closed her eyes and listened as hard as she could. Mostly she heard voices that were too low to make out, but Alan’s voice rose above the others, “Look, there’s not a problem here, we’ll just take her to the nearest town and drop her off. Then we’ll go our way, no worries.”

Will whirled on him, his voice raised in anger was loud enough for her to make out. “We can’t abandon her! We said we would help her find her brother.”

“That was before we knew what she was!” Alan argued, “Robin, this is asking for more trouble than we are prepared to handle.”

John mumbled something and Alan attempted to placate him, “I know you feel bad for scaring her, but we’ve taken her in and dressed her wounds and fed her, what more must we do to make amends for your hasty actions? Must we all give our lives as well?”

John growled and started to stalk away, but Robin called him back, raising his voice to be heard above the bickering. “I gave her my word that I would help her, and I never break a promise.” Alan started to argue but Robin held up his hand, “I won’t ask you to stay with us, but I will continue to help the girl.”

Will piped in, “I, as well,” and John nodded his agreement.

Ashlyn didn’t hear what the friar and Alan said, but when the others returned to the fire, they were with them. She folded her arms and glared at Robin, “Now that you’ve decided my fate, care to tell me what that was all about?”

Robin looked sheepish for a moment. Finally he gestured to her arm. “That tattoo… your story about the amulet. It implies the involvement of a higher power here.”

She raised her eyebrow, “What, do you mean? Like God?”

Robin shook his head, “No,” he answered gravely, “the Great Dragon.”

Ashlyn stared at him, “D-dragon?” she sputtered. The earth seemed to tilt beneath her feet and she felt a little sick inside. “Yesterday I didn’t believe in slavers or Robin Hood, and now you expect me to believe in dragons?”

Alan frowned down at her seriously, his voice hard. “I think you should start believing, because only the Great Dragon marks a woman in such a way as that.” Gesturing to her arm, he looked as if he were afraid the tattoo would rear up and bite him.

She eyed them suspiciously, “Why would the Great Dragon mark a woman with a tattoo like this?” She looked at Will who was the closest to her, hovering as if he wanted to comfort her. At her expectant stare he backed up a step and looked around as if seeking an escape. When he found none, he reluctantly returned her gaze, “I…well…to mark her as his, I guess.”

Alan stepped in, “Don’t you know anything, boy?” His bark of laughter was sounded bitter, “That mark is his seal. The Great Dragon has marked her as his mate.”

“What!?” she shouted. “His mate? How? And why would a dragon…” She stopped asking the question as she remembered the images on the tapestry from the museum. The scenes had shown a huge dragon transforming into the form of a man and then laying with a woman.

She couldn’t be certain, but thought that the women in the tapestries may have had tattoos similar to hers. She remembered the image of the baby with the dragon image superimposed over it. She shuddered and turned back to Will, unleashing her anger and fear on the closest target.

“I am not going to be any dragon’s mate! And I’m certainly not having a dragon’s baby,” she insisted.

Will held up his hands in surrender against her onslaught, his face pale and drawn. Robin stepped over to her, draping his arm across her shoulders. A strange look crossed Will’s face as Robin leaned in and whispered comforting words to her. Robin assured her that they wouldn’t stop until they found her brother and a way to return her home, dragon-marked or not.

* * *

After what seemed like hours of endless walking, Athyn was allowed to rest while the men met with another man who was driving a wagon. He had thought of approaching the man and telling him that there had been a terrible mistake. He was an American. He should not be a slave. But the wagon driver had the same cruel look on his face as the others while he appraised Athyn, so the boy kept his mouth shut.

After what seemed like a long while of haggling, the three men removed the chain from Athyn’s waist and he felt a brief surge of hope before the back of the wagon was opened and he was lifted inside to face a group of children, bedraggled and miserable looking, and all chained together.

The man slipped the end of the children’s chain through his iron band and Athyn was once again attached to the end of a chain. After the man took his seat on the driving bench and clucked at the horses to go, Athyn removed his wristwatch and tossed it into the nearest tree. He saw it catch on a branch and he hoped that Ash would see it if she were looking for him.

The image of Ashlyn lying unconscious in the clearing came to him as he fought tears at the knowledge that he had left her all alone. He knew that if anything bad happened to either of them, it would be his fault. Looking around at the other children he sighed, it seemed that something bad was bound to happen to him at least.

Turning to the boy nearest him on the wagon bench he whispered an introduction and the boy responded, “I’m David, I was working in my father’s field and some men grabbed me. If my dad ever finds out he’ll kill them, but he has to find out first.” He added despondently.

Still fighting tears, Athyn asked, “Where are they taking us?”

The boy shrugged, “They’ll take us to one of the towns and sell us at an auction.” He frowned, “At least I hope we’ll get sold.”

Athyn stared at him incredulously, “How can you hope that? I just want to be free. How could you want to be sold?”

David shook his head, “Because if we’re not sold, we’ll end up in Devonshire. Trust me that would be much, much worse.”

Though he was tempted to ask how it could possibly be worse, Athyn was afraid of the answer so he leaned his back against the side of the wagon and kept his mouth shut.

* * *

Will started chopping wood and making a fire for the friar to cook breakfast on. Once the fire was burning, he went back to his comforting task. He felt as if his whole world would come crashing down on him if he let himself think for even a moment. The tattoo on Ashlyn’s wrist was so incredibly familiar to him. The implications of where he had seen it before made him physically sick, but he chopped through the ill feeling, trying not to think.

Robin was always so good with people. The fatherly type who was so quick to encourage or comfort, and yet seeing him with his arm around Ashlyn had caused a hot wave of jealousy to surge up in Will and he had felt the urge to forcibly remove his friend’s arm from her shoulder.

He was surprised by the depth of his emotions and began to wonder if Robin had been right when he had encouraged Will to keep his distance from the girl. After all, Robin had been like a father to him over the last few years, the idea that he would feel such anger towards him over this girl that he barely knew seemed incredibly wrong to him.

The mind numbing work served its purpose in releasing some of the tension that the tattoo had caused, but he knew that it would all come rushing back the moment he stopped. At some point he would have to face the memories of the last time he had seen that tattoo, and what it meant to him personally.

* * *

Noticing that Will seemed unusually quiet as he set about his work, Ashlyn felt bad for yelling at him. When the friar handed her a bowl of food, she waited and gathered Will’s as well. Taking him his bowl, she held it while he put away his axe and pulled off his shirt to wipe the sweat off his face.

She stared at the rippling muscles that she hadn’t noticed beneath his loose tunic. He pulled the rough fabric back over his head and down over the beautifully sculpted chest. She looked away embarrassed. Getting hold of herself, she held out his bowl once more. He gave her a crooked smile and took it following her silently to the log they had slept against. Gently he sat down beside her.

They ate in silence for a few minutes. When she couldn’t stand the quiet any longer, she turned to him, “I’m sorry I yelled. It’s not your fault all this is happening.”

He managed a brief smile, “I know it’s not me that you’re angry with.”

She gestured to the pile of logs he had split and stacked. “I thought we were moving on after breakfast. Did you really need to cut all that wood?”

He shrugged, “It’ll be there the next time we need it. Besides, chopping wood helps take my mind off of things that bother me.”

He looked troubled again so she laid her hand on his arm, “What is it? What’s bothering you?”

He hesitated and she wondered if he would just shrug the question away, but after a moment he frowned and lowered his voice, “I’ve seen that mark before. I just…I didn’t know what it meant.”

“Oh,” she wasn’t sure she should pry, but he seemed to need someone to talk to. “Where did you see it?”

He swallowed hard and stared at his hands. For a long moment she thought that he wouldn’t answer. Then a tear slipped from the corner of his eye and he wiped it away quickly.

Concerned, she leaned close and laid her hand on his arm trying to ignore the thrill that she got at being so close to him. “Will? What is it?”

“I…it was…my mother had one just like it when I was a child.”

With difficulty she resisted the urge to gasp and waited for him to continue.

When he spoke again his voice was distant as if seeing things that had happened long ago. “I saw the dragon fly over our village once. My mother hurried me outside to see it.”

He turned to face Ashlyn, a haunted look on his face. “Every other mother was shooing their children inside where it was safe, and my mother hurried me out to see the dragon. I never thought there was anything odd about it, but my mother’s tattoo faded away soon after that.”

Ashlyn shook her head, “Tattoos don’t just fade away.”

Alan laughed bitterly from across the fire, “Of course they do. Dragon marks fade when the woman has served her purpose to bear the dragon a son. All you have to do is give the dragon a son and you’ll be free to do as you please.”

He tossed a stick on the fire and frowned into the flames, “Of course, most women don’t survive bearing a dragon’s child. That is why dragons are so rare. Only the sons of dragons ever survive, and so the dragons have to take human form and father half human sons. There are no female dragons anymore. The bloodlines are being slowly thinned by mixing in human blood.”

He looked thoughtful as he continued, “In fact, I think the Great Dragon is the last living full-blooded dragon.”

Will looked sick. Ashlyn glared at Alan then turned her focus back to Will, trying not to think about the idea of giving the Great Dragon a son. “What is it Will?”

His eyes were haunted as he stared at her. He spoke softly as if to ensure that only she would hear, “If my mother had a tattoo like that, and then it faded after I saw the dragon…or after the dragon saw me…”

Ashlyn suddenly saw where he was going with this, “You think that you might be…”

He nodded and swallowed hard, “She never talked about my real father. She only said that he was very powerful. She never said smart or kind or even a useless deadbeat, she just said powerful.” He whispered, “If I…Why wouldn’t she have told me?”

Ashlyn thought for a moment, “Maybe she wanted to give you a chance at a normal life.”

He stared at his empty bowl until Robin finally said it was time to pack up camp and head out. Ashlyn was hopeful that they would find her brother today. Maybe then the world would start making sense again.

Will walked beside her in depressed silence as the group made their way through the woods. Alan cast him the occasional thoughtful glance. Ashlyn wondered if he had overheard their entire conversation, in spite of Will’s efforts to keep it private. Wanting to offer what comfort she could, Ashlyn hooked her arm through Will’s. She felt like one of those ladies in an old fashioned movie. She nearly laughed at herself. He looked down at her with a soft smile and she knew that he was grateful for her efforts.