They say you know how a man lived by how many came to his funeral. In that case, Robin must have been the best man in the world. 

He was to me, thought Marian bitterly, as she hovered close to the casket. No one disputed her right to stand at the front, to lead the prayer. And no one saw her take his gun. 

"I'll always protect you, Mary," he would say, with that rascally grin. 

For a while, she'd believed that. She'd been a foolish girl, the one before she was sold to the Flower Bed, before they gave her a maid's costume and forced her to clean for men - and then do far worse. They forced her to do it all. 

Suddenly, as she picked up the gun, cocked it and pushed it into her skirts, she was herself again, in a way. That practical, bitter, cynical girl, who'd definitely rob dead bodies to survive. A sadness lingered over her as she considered this, but she pushed it away. 

She had no choice: if she wanted to survive now, she had to go to the Flower Bed, meet the men who asked...and keep the gun under her pillow. 

He couldn't protect her anymore. 

You were too good to live here, Marian thought, People like me survive, Robin, but people like you get a hole in the ground with no name on it. This valley is a place of blood and dirt and coal. Heroes don't belong here. 

She shut her eyes and said a prayer. She didn't know any real ones - the Flower Bed was hardly a place where prayer was welcome - but she had nothing fancy to say anyway, just goodbye and thank you. Anyone could say that. She stepped back. Her house Madam, Rose, gave a slight nod, a tinge of sadness in her eyes. Had she hoped too, as Marian had, that life could be better? Had she been foolish too? 

It was so sad, you'd think they'd have learned in the box that brought them here as girls of barely twelve, or in the years that followed. 

The casket lid shut, and the square - the only place big enough to hold the entire valley's inhabitants, fell quiet. A thousand people, and not a sound, a feat only Robin could manage. That's when she heard it, footsteps. Boots, with gold toes, the tap-tap shed recognise anywhere. 

The crowds parted and the slimy Sheriff swaggered in, hands on his belt, his hat at a jaunty angle and his smile visible even through that dirty red beard. He spat out Tobacco he was chewing and moved up to the casket. 

Grumbling and murmuring broke out behind Marian, and the Sheriff yelled, "Shut your corn holes!" 

He bent down and patted Robin's cheek and Marian's gun hand came up of her own accord, pointing the barrel at him. 

The Sheriff raised an eyebrow and said, "You don't know how to shoot, flower." 

Marian shivered and said, "can't be too hard. You do it."

The Sheriff slapped her and the valley hushed. Marian clutched her cheek, as the bruise throbbed. She'd been hit before, so very much, but now, after years of safety and kindness, it felt harsher than ever. She better get used to it, though, if she wanted to live. 

He seemed to agree. "You don't have your big hero to save you. So watch your place, woman. Now, I bet you wish you'd taken up in my homestead now, don't you?" 

That foul, horrific offer, from so long ago, still made Marian gag. She'd die before she'd be this pig's mistress, and how sorry she felt for the wife. She glared into his eyes. 

"I don't need the devil when I have an angel," she said. 

"You," he said, "Dare talk back to me? I picked you from the filth, was willing to make you a respectable woman, save you from that hell-hole and you turned me down for this slave boy?"
Marian cocked the gun.

"Do it," the Sheriff challenged her. "You don't have it in you, do you?" 

Marian's hand trembled. She gulped, and suddenly realised the sheriff was right. But also, she couldn't fire a gun unless it was for the downtrodden. Not Robin's gun. 

She whispered, "Robin wouldn't do it." She lowered the gun and the Sheriff grabbed her by the scruff of her neck. 

"Yes! And now, he's dead. Look at him and tell him you love him now." The Sheriff said. 

"I love you," Marian said to Robin's corpse, his ebony skin, his open brown eyes, his curly hair. He arrived as a slave and left an angel. Her angel. 

The Sheriff raised a hand and she flinched, but he lowered it and burst out laughing. "That piece of rat really is dead! He's gone! There's no "Robin Hood" to save you now!" He turned to the valley. "You are alone! He's gone! From now on, you do as I say. You do as the Baron says. If you, 

in any way, piss us off, fight, rebel, even mention the Hood's name... I will end you and everyone you care about!" 

A shudder ran through the crowd, and this time the silence was terrified, not grieving.

"Taxes," said the Sheriff, "whores, slaves backbreaking mining, whipping, bribes, it's all back! 

We're going back to the way things were. We'll take everything we want when we want it. The mightiest are in charge, and whoever fights the hardest gets it all." 

The crowd whispered and gasped.

"A new era of order and law," said the Sheriff, "as divined by God himself. Us on top - and you -," he turned to Marian who kept her eyes on Robin, "at the bottom."

Marian willed Robin to rise and smile, to shoot the Sheriff in the backside and sit up with that grin. But it didn't happen.

"Robin," whispered Marian, "please save us. Please come back."

The sheriff caught her whisper and turned around. "Put this mother in the hole where he belongs," he said. 

Three black slaves - one of them Robin's half brother, Sam lowered him into the pit. Sam straightened and caught her eye, shaking his head.

Don't. Don't fight. Give in. 

Marian watched as they buried him.

"Back to work, everyone who doesn't want to feel the toe of my boot," said the Sheriff, and they spilled out. "Or I'll take you to meet the Baron."

Marian followed the crowd, and the Sheriff caught her arm. "You're going to choose me, Marian. Things will get worse for everyone unless you give in. Come with me quietly and I'll let it go."

"You don't care about me," Marian said. "You want your ego, and you'll take it any way you can." With that, she wrenched free and left. 

"Remember," the Sheriff warned, "everything that happens is your fault. It's your damned fault I killed my old slave instead of sending him to the workhouse. He took what belonged to a white man." 

"I belong to no one," 

"You belong to whoever pays. Whore," he said. "It's your damned fault he's dead. It's your fault he chose to face me alone in the saloon. Didn't you tell him you were scared of me?"

Marian froze....no. It can't be.

He smiled. "And now. This is your fault too. Time to pay your debt to society, Marian."