Wild Boy by Nancy Springer Read Free Book Online Page A

a swineherd’s son.” His face must have changed when she said this, for her voice softened. “Tod told us.”
    Rook turned his head, and yes, there was the Sheriff’s freckled brat sitting nearby with his broken leg stretched out, holding Runkling on his lap. Scratching the little pig along the backbone and behind the ears. Runkling lay snoring with pleasure, his eyes closed. Rook noticed what long eyelashes the shoat had. And he noticed Tod’s silence, and the look in Tod’s eyes. Tod met Rook’s glaring stare with—was that pleading? The young snot had not begged when he was dying in the man trap, yet he was begging for something now?
    Rowan added, “My father was friends with your father, Rook, did you know that?”
    “I knew him well,” said Robin Hood’s voice out of the hemlock shadows. “Everyone knew Jack Pigkeep. A man of few words, wisely spoken. A man with a strong back, a brave arm and a generous heart. I should have guessed before now that you are his son.”
    Painful memories twisted in Rook’s gut, made him bare his teeth in a snarl.
    Rowan repeated, “You are his son, Rook. Would your father want you to act like a wild beast?”
    “Don’t speak of him!”
    Silence. Silence so deep, Rook could sense the breathing of dozens of outlaws all around him, in the shadows amid the sheltering trees.
    “All right,” said Rowan softly. “But would a wolf wear a strand of my ring, Rook?”
    It was as if the contagion had put poison into Rook’s heart; he wanted to snatch the silver strand resting on his bare chest, tear it off and fling it away. But he had strength only to turn his face away from Rowan, trying to lie down. He wanted to be let alone. He wanted to rest. The poisonous feeling passed through him and left him feeling watery, with no retorts in him.
    Rowan’s gentle hands were yet strong enough to hold him where he was, sitting upright. “You are not a wild beast,” Rowan said. “You are one of us.”
    Undeniably so. Yet Rook shook his head as if he felt flies bothering him.
    An outlaw called from the shadows, “Rowan, he’s not in his right mind. Do you want us to hold him down while you cut—”
    “No!” A fresh jolt of rage gave Rook strength to shout even though Rowan waved the outlaw’s offer away. “No, I’ll die first!”
    Rowan appealed, “Rook, for the love of mercy …”
    “
Sacre amour
of the toad, Rook,” came Beau’s mocking voice, “for what is to be so stubborn? Here.” She strode out of the shadows to kneel facing him, beside Rowan. “Look.” She pulled her dagger, seized a long hank of her own hair with her other hand, and sliced. Her bleached-blond tresses fell away, leaving black stubble. “See?” She sliced again, laying more long, bleached hair on the ground at her feet. “Is not so hard! Rowan, you do the back?”
    “You want it all off?” Rowan’s face looked as if she were studying some new creature she had not seen before.
    “
Mais oui
, of course.”
    Between the two of them they finished the job quickly. On the ground lay a mess of long blond curls, all that was left of Beau’s former life as the high king’s page boy. On Beau’s head stood stubble as raven-black as Rook’s long tangled mane of hair. She flashed Rook her most shining glance, gave him her most dazzling grin. “Now you do it. And then we be twins, yes?”
    Rook saw one of Rowan’s rare smiles quirking at the corners of her mouth as she studied Beau. “Twin brothers?”
    “Your turn,
mon frère
.” Beau offered Rook her dagger.
    He stared at it. Filigree hand guard. Carved hilt. A crystal globe of chalcedony in the pommel. The dagger with which she had killed a wild boar and saved his life.
    And now she was trying to save him again. Let him cut his black tangled mane of hair himself. Save his pride.
    She continued to offer the dagger with patience as unusual, coming from her, as her silence. No one spoke. The only sound Rook heard was Runkling snoring, still being