Title: The Space Between (4/?)
Characters: Allan, Will, Djaq (with appearances by the other usual suspects)
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Gen, het
Warnings: None.

Summary: Djaq and Robin have a chat, and Will shows that he can think his way through a problem too!

Chapter 4. Journey

She tied the small bundles of herbs together, finding solace in so routine and simple a task, a measure of calm that had been sorely absent from her life for the past few days. It was only in the past hour that it had finally dawned on her that she was going home. Home…she had not allowed herself to think of the word for so long that even the sound of it seemed strange. Long suppressed memories began to trickle back into her mind, some pleasant, some not, but all oddly comforting just the same. She allowed herself a rare daydream, but her reverie was quickly interrupted when Robin walked by.

“Djaq! I was hoping to find you here.” Robin’s voice had none of its usual impish cheer, but there appeared to at least be a spring in his step, and Djaq suspected it had something to do with the fact that they would be on their way soon, and he would be that much closer to finding Marian.

“You found a map then!”

“Yes…or rather, Allan did. I have no idea where or how…” Robin’s voice trailed off, and he gave her a look that said he would rather not know how Allan had got hold of the map.

He spread it out on the floor in front of Djaq. She recognized that it was a map of France, although many of the names and markings on the map were unfamiliar to her.

“We’ll cross here, to Caën,” he said, as his finger swept over a patch of sea between England and France. “From there, we’ll travel through France and Italy, and hopefully, we will be able to find passage on a ship from there to the Holy Land.”

Djaq shivered, the thought of another journey by sea filling her with dread. Even the relatively short ferry trip across the English sea was more than she was willing to face, even though it had been almost two years since she first arrived in England, and her first voyage to these shores should have been long forgotten. She had known that they would soon board a ship, considering England was an island and traveling over the oceans was the only way to get to the Holy Land. But now, hearing Robin speak of it made the journey and her fear far more real and palpable.

Robin seemed not to notice and continued talking as he rolled up his map. “I think we’re only a day behind the Sheriff and Gisborne. If we travel light and move fast, we should be able to keep that pace. We need to get to the king before it’s too late…”

She noted that Robin said nothing about Marian, but she expected all his thoughts ran in that direction. A week ago, such determined pursuit of a single human being would have amused her, but now she could at least begin to see what really drove Robin, and she suddenly felt a great wave of sympathy for the man. Not for the first time, it occurred to Djaq that love must be one of life’s great tragedies rather than one of its great triumphs.

She sighed and Robin gave her a strange look. “Djaq…do you trust me?”

She frowned at him, and considered the question for a moment. She had never had reason not to trust him, and she had no idea why he would ask such a question now.

“Yes, of course, Robin. Why do you . . .?”

“It’s just that…well…” Robin scratched his head and looked lost for a second, but then he nodded and continued.

“The part of France we’ll be traveling through is Angevin...loyal to King Richard. Most of his men, almost all the Crusaders are from there.”

Comprehension came to Djaq quickly. “And they would not understand why one of the king’s most loyal men travels with a Saracen.”

Robin looked genuinely sad for a moment.

“Do you wish me to remain here then? In England?” Djaq thought for a moment. “I could find my way back to Sherwood. It would not be too difficult.” She held her breath, the thought of returning to a familiar place where things made sense lifting her spirits even as it saddened her to find the possibility of returning home receding quickly out of her reach.

“No, of course not. You are one of us. And more than that, you will be needed on this journey.”

Djaq let out the breath. “So what do you want from me?”

“Don’t misunderstand me, Djaq. I’m just trying to make sure that…I just think it would be better if there was no…unpleasantness…on our journey.” He did not elaborate, but she had a fairly good idea what he meant.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You wish me to remain hidden somehow? What are you going to do? Put me in a box and carry me as luggage?”

Robin looked stunned for a minute, but he recovered quickly and laughed. “No, no. But it might be…easier…if people did not know you were…er…a woman.”

It was Djaq’s turn to be stunned. “I…I’m not…” She nodded and gave him a weak smile. “You mean it will be safer. For you. And for me.” Distracted, she ran a hand through her hair and instantly regretted it because Robin seemed to think she was lamenting the impending loss of her longer locks.

Robin put a hand on her shoulder. “I am sorry, Djaq. I know it’s going to be hard for you, but I really can’t think of another way.”

She nodded. “It’s alright, Robin. I did it before, you know.”

He gave her a grateful smile. “If you like, I can talk to Will…make sure that he…”

Djaq bristled. Not Will, of all people. “No, Robin. I can take care of it myself. I don’t need help just because I’m…”

“Yes, I know…you don’t need help just because you’re a girl!” Robin sounded exasperated, but something about his expression made Djaq laugh, and she was glad for the levity, if only for a moment.

“So what happened with Will and Allan anyway?”

Djaq shrugged, not willing to share her thoughts about those two with Robin. “Nothing serious. But wounded pride is hard to fix with just a needle and thread.”

Robin chuckled, and then shook his head. “It’s just odd. It’s not like the two of them to brawl.”

Djaq smirked. Robin was wrong, of course. It was just like Allan and Will to brawl. The only odd thing was that it had taken them this long to get to it. It was also just like Robin not to notice. He had all the qualities of a great general. He was a good soldier, a quick thinker and a decisive actor. He knew the strengths of his men and demanded action accordingly. But with all this came the failure to see his men as anything more than soldiers in the cause, a failure to see that his men were mere men, with all the usual foibles and flaws that came with being only flesh and blood. Indeed, Djaq suspected it was this omission in Robin’s personality that led to Allan’s departure, but it was unfair to lay all the blame for that on Robin. To care for the ordinary needs of his men beyond food and shelter was perhaps one charge too many, even for Robin. No, it would have to be her charge instead.

She turned to him. “Do you trust me, Robin?”

There was no hesitation. “Absolutely.”

“Then leave Allan and Will to me. I’ll sort them out.” The only question that remained now was how.

--

The ferry to Caën

Will watched England ebb away, the coastline only a dark blur against a gray sky as the ferry made its way across the sea. The water was choppy, and the roll and pitch of the boat was a constant reminder that they were no longer on dry land.

Although it had taken several hours for him to adapt his gait to the motion of the boat, his feet felt reasonably steady. His mind was a different matter altogether. He felt a bit like the sand at Porstmouth, shifting and changing, not at all like the hard-packed earth in Sherwood Forest, or the loamy soil in the fields in Locksley. It was not that he was frightened, of course. There was the possibility that this journey would end badly for all of them, but they lived with that sort of fear everyday, and Will himself had been far too close to death too many times to think of it as anything but inevitable.

That did not make this particular journey any less disconcerting. There was the fact that for all of his bluster, Robin did not have an actual plan for saving King Richard. Of course, Robin rarely had an actual plan. He worked mostly on instinct and sheer bravado, and Will was both awed and amused by it. But it was one thing to fly by the seat of your pants in Nottingham, where you could escape into Sherwood Forest, where the trees would give you shelter and the leaves would keep your secrets. Where did you run to in the Holy Land?

The Holy Land. He shivered, frightened by the thought. The place was so far beyond his knowledge and even his dreams that he could not imagine it, except as a vast blankness out there somewhere. It was half a continent and an entire ocean away, and there would be no way to run back to the camp if things went awry.

The Holy Land was also Djaq’s home, but that thought did not comfort as he had expected it to. It only served to pound home Allan’s suggestion that Will hardly knew anything about her. He cursed himself for not having thought to ever ask her about her home, in spite of all the time they had spent together, and all the things they had spoken of. Of course, he had never considered that he would ever need to know. He had grown used to the idea that Sherwood was her home…their home.

He shook his head, irked by the idea that there was so much distance between him and Djaq, more than there had ever been when they were only friends, and not…whatever it was they were. And besides, he could not shake the feeling that there was something very wrong with Djaq just now.

She was not speaking to him, of course. That was as much as he deserved for lashing out at her, but he had not meant any of it, and he was not concerned that Djaq was angry with him. It was not like her to be angry, at least not for this long. She was the sort who sought you out and asked you for an explanation, and it troubled him greatly that she had not done this so far.

That was not even the only thing that troubled him about Djaq. He had watched in confusion as she had cut off her hair with some help from Much. The cutting itself did not bother him. It was only hair, and if it made a difference to her appearance, it was not something that stood out in his mind. He supposed it might even be safer for everyone to assume she was a boy. He was far more bothered by the fact that she had not sought him out at all, not for help with her hair, not even just to sound him out as she usually did.

It was possible that she was scared, of course. He recalled vividly the night she had told him about her first terrible journey to England. He had thought that another ship’s journey would have frightened her, that the prospect of returning home after everything she had been through would be daunting. Yet when they had boarded the ferry, he had noticed nothing out of the ordinary, nothing except the determined expression and efficient manner she used when she was collecting herbs or sewing up a wound. He shook his head. This was Djaq. She was never frightened. Something else was wrong.

The boat lurched suddenly, and as he gripped the rails to steady himself and keep from falling, it came to him. His first instinct was right. She was afraid. But it was not of the ship, or the journey, or even the prospect of returning home. She was afraid of him. Of them.