Path of the She Wolf Read Online Free PDF

lass!’ she cried. ‘It would sound real and even familiar, but if the Sheriff should sendhis men to hunt St Bridget’s nuns, they’d find nothing, but a deserted convent.’

5
Ollerton Crossroads

    Magda laughed. ‘It seems we have our plan.’
    ‘Yes, but we must speak with Mother Veronica,’ said Isabel. ‘I know she’ll help
    ‘I’ll take my bow and arrow,’ Magda cried. ‘Though I never thought to see myself as a nun.’
    ‘Yes,’ Marian agreed, her cheeks flushed and eyes bright with anger. ‘And I must go to Ollerton too. I do not like to leave the clearing without a Forestwife, but my shooting skills will be needed.’
    ‘Shall I come with you?’ Brigit whispered.
    Magda shook her head smiling, touched by the offer. This quiet child was certainly no coward. ‘She really is as brave as a wolf,’ she murmured.
    The hopes raised by their plan made Gerta calm and strong once more. ‘No honey,’ she told Brigit. ‘You and I, little lass, we shall be Forestwife while Marian is away. I dare say we can manage well enough together, just for a while.’
    Marian nodded. ‘That is a good plan Gerta.’ She unfastened the beautiful woven girdle that she wore, the girdle of the Forestwife, retying it carefully around the old woman’s thin waist. ‘Take care of it,’ she said. ‘And any who come seeking help.’ She kissed them both, then reached to take down her bow from the nail above the small window.
    ‘Get mine too,’ Magda was eager to be off. ‘I shall fetch the new made arrows from the lean-to.’
    ‘No,’ Marian told her. ‘There is something important for you to do first. Ride with Isabel and fetch Mother Veronica and Sister Rosamund? We need some real nuns, if we are to be convincing and ask if we may borrow extra veils and habits. Oh, and Isabel, I think we are going to need more horses. Can you find us some?’
    Magda and Isabel rode through the woods, obedient to Marian’s orders. ‘I love her when she is like this,’ Magda cried. ‘Suddenly she throws aside all her carefulness and hurls herself into a wild adventure, all fired up.’
    ‘Yes!’ Isabel agreed, her face drawn with anxiety. ‘But what we plan is fraught with danger. Magda?’ she said, touching the young woman’s arm. ‘I do not forget how you came with Marian to rescue me when the wolfpack walled me up, leaving my mother and me to die. You risked your lives to save us then, and now we all risk our lives again for Gerta’s lads. This is just as desperate and fearful a thing to attempt!’
    Three new-made gibbets stood on the old platform outside the lock-up at Ollerton Crossroads. The Sheriff of Nottingham’s men were busy stringing up nooses. The newsthat there was to be a hanging had caused quite a stir so that the worn grass around the lock-up thronged with people. Some cheerfully elbowed their way through the crowd to get a good view of the spectacle, but many were moved to pity.
    A skinny washerwoman pushing a handcart piled with dirty linen and small children spoke with sorrow. ‘So young I hear. Nobbut bairns!’
    ‘Does not this new charter change the law?’ asked a stooped and aged alewife who carried her wares in buckets, fixed onto a wooden yoke across her shoulders. ‘A hanging’s good for business, but I thought the laws were to be changed.’
    ‘Who knows what it does? Can laws change over night like that?’
    ‘They say the Sheriff is making an example of them, won’t let it go unpunished. He fears to have every young ruffian in the wastes ripping down palings if he shows mercy’
    ‘That man hasn’t got a drop of mercy in his veins,’ came the reply.
    Others saw humour in the tragedy. ‘Good on the lads,’ an old man chuckled. ‘They don’t die for nowt. The King’s deer run wild through Barnsdale and there’s plenty with a full belly for once.’
    ‘Aye,’ the washerwoman laughed and dug him in the ribs. ‘The scent of stewed venison reeks from every hut.’
    Shortly before