Amidst the merry streets in Nottingham that day, an old puppeteer with his aged companions (the puppets, we would say) were performing a little tale for the children and people going to the market. Tale of a princess whose life and sword had been devoted to her people, a princess whom he was too familiar with. Amongst his audience was a cloaked man, whose fearful eyes just stared unblinkingly at the puppets. He was scarred, grumpy and abominable, no one dared to stand near him. At the middle of the play, an old minstrel, who seemed well-dressed and noble, suddenly appeared and joined his lute to the puppeteer's dancing puppets. The puppets danced to the lute's singing, and the children danced with the puppets. Coins rained down his tattered wooden box like autumn leaves. When the puppeteer concluded his little performance, the crowd dispersed as the sun went down the horizon, and the only ones remained at the spot were the puppeteer himself, to clean up his instruments and counted his earnings, the minstrel, and the mysterious cloaked man. The mysterious man picked up a puppet from the box and glanced at it silently; the puppet bore the likeness of a princess, which he held for a long while. Finishing strapping his lute, the minstrel bowed to the cloaked man a greeting, and said man replied the respect with a nod.
"Fancy seeing you here to-day, milord...", greeted the puppeteer to the strange man.
"Thou art not a little too rich to-day, my friend?", laughed the man to the puppeteer.
"I intend to perform a little bit more, to afford a visit to my master's grave next month, milord...", replied the puppeteer, shaking his seemingly full pocket after a day's earning.
"Milord?", said the minstrel in a moment of confusion.
"Well, let us keep this our little secret, shall we? But before I can tell thee anything, let us have a supper at our favourite forest, just like the olden days, as we avoid the eyes of the guards...", smiled the puppeteer connotatively.
Later, deep in Sherwood Forest, in an abandoned house, sitting by the light of a small candle was three men we had seen earlier. One man kept his face always hidden under the shadow of his cloak, while his fellows shared him a bowl of cabbage soup for supper, and there was the minstrel's constant glare at him with unanswerable questions.
"Okay, my old friend, canst thou explain for me what all this means?", inquired the minstrel.
"Well, firstly, let me pay a little respect to my guests here...", said the puppeteer, standing up and bowed at the two men respectively. "Sir Alan, it's too long since the last time I called you so and it's too long since the last time we dined together like this..."
"A knight no more I am, just an ordinary minstrel now. Wilst thou just call me old Alan-a-Dale, good fellow?", laughed the minstrel at his friend's sudden politeness.
"...And milord, I'm glad you are here with us to-night", bowed the puppeteer to the cloaked man.
"All right, wilst thou tell me who this man is? Now that we are alone and void of attention?", interrupted the minstrel, his eyes still staring at the cloaked man whom in his sight was utterly suspicious.
"Who am I? Wilst thou vow to keep my identity, and what thou wilst hear a secret to everybody, not excluding my daughter?", smiled the cloaked man, who then slowly pulled down his cloak, revealed his hardened and tattered with ages visage. Immediately, the minstrel had to hold back a scream which he was just about to let out.
"L-Lord T-Ti—", stammered the minstrel, which amused his friends. Not even after a while he regained enough of his consciousness.
"Surprised, ain't thee?", laughed the puppeteer.
"I— I thought you ha-have—"
"Have been a goner, correct?", chuckled the cloaked man. The minstrel just nodded.
"Then— perhaps milady too has been—", claimed the minstrel in a burst joy. However, the two men just shook their plopped head mournfully.
"Let me explain, everything...", interrupted the puppeteer before his friend could finish, while the other man remained silent. "I hurried to the household after the incidence and found milady dead— a fatal wound at the neck, not unlike what our royal highness once suffered— and milord laying unconscious— not quite dead, I mean— seemingly poisoned. Initially I thought I should brought him somewhere else, to distract and mislead them that he had survived and would seek revenge on them— at least that was what I would like them to think— I would then plan to masquerade as him for a while, whether or not he would actually survive..."
"Thankfully, the poison they used was of the same kind I had accidentally gotten when I was a child and was nearly died by it. The antidote, I still remembered and just managed to tell this fellow the recipe of the concoction before my consciousness slowly slipped away from me. When I returned from the Death— I owe you a life, Little John— he told me my Sylvia had been assassinated and my daughter sent to the orphanage. It has been how many years since that day?", told the cloaked man the rest of the story, musing about what was in the present.
"If I recall correctly, this year is the tenth year, milord...", replied the puppeteer, Little John.
"This morning I had visited Mother Maiseline, coincidentally the children had come, too...", smiled the minstrel, Alan-a-Dale.
"How was my daughter, then?", asked the man.
"The child is as beautiful as a blossoming flower, milord. Her beauty is just like milady in her youth and her grace is seemingly from—", suddenly he paused, "—our departed young queen..."
Alan-a-Dale bowed his head lowly in remorse. Despite more than twenty years had passed, he could never forget her. The princess, whose youth and life were dedicated for the good of the kingdom and its people, and who had fallen on the executing scaffold. Whenever wandering on the streets and hearing a woman with her child in her arms begging the guards to see her husband, the poor man had been captured for hunting a King's deer, he wondered, would this kingdom be better if Anaivere Plantagenet was still the Queen? If there was any crown that he would unconditionally served and be devoted to, it would be the departed Princess Anaivere's. Her naïveté and innocence had costed her a life, yet gained her the trust and loyalty of her knights. The cloaked man at the time clutched the princess puppet in his hand and briefly mused about his daughter, who was now the mistress in the King's court. Would his little girl suffer the same fate of his liege?
"So, how was our fellow, Will Scarlet doing then?", asked the lord.
"Age hath taken its toll upon him like any of us, but overall, still as swift as a squirrel!", replied Little John, "Actually, I must thank him for taking care of the little girls all those years. Perhaps on Sunday I'll buy him a supper..."
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Nottingham Castle...
"One day we would have Uncle Alan as our enemy? I cannot think about that day... that is to come...!"
"We are in the other side of the river, sister. Either pledge our loyalty to King Henry, or all will be annihilated. You did not forget the incident which made us orphans, did you?"
"I absolutely never forget it, even just one day. My parents... My mother... why was she assassinated? She had no connection to either the Royal or the Rebels!"
"Please calm down, Lucille. You must keep your head cold, or else they will know..."
"I've been silent for too long, waiting and no one has given me an answer! Why am I orphaned? Why were my parents assassinated?"
"Your parents... And my parents..."
"My mother was just a seamstress... Why was she assassinated? What was the Royal thinking? To rob a child of her mother and father, for no reason!"
"Dear Lucille..."
"And now they art trying to rob Uncle Alan from us!"
Anais grasped her little sister into her arms as the latter was in the verge of tears. They were not related, but they had grown up with each other.
"Enough, Lucille. I keep my mask, and you must keep yours. Who will avenge our parents if we are both perished?", whispered the elder Anais, comforting the younger Lucille. "You have been so calm for all those years, you have long been keeping your anger sealed, your soul has been strong... I understand your rage, Uncle Alan is the closest person we have to a relative, and now we are threatened to lose him..."
Lucille wept silently in her sister's sleeves, letting out the tears she had been keeping inside for years. Poor Lucille hadn't been allowed to cry for one, for if she showed a moment of weakness, it would be her doom. Never she be able to mourn her parents, or the sorrowfulness that was growing day by day.
"Perchance, sister, have you ever heard the name 'Anaivere Plantagenet'?"
"Who?"
"Anaivere Plantagenet, the name that was mentioned in the scroll Uncle Alan sent us...?"
"It sounds familiar, though I just cannot recall..."
Lucille came to her bed and pulled out an old scroll sealed with wax, which had been carefully opened, and showed to Anais. The scroll which Alan-a-Dale had sent them prior along with a letter.
"I don't recall this coat-of-arms belongs to anybody...", said Anais, examining the sealing-wax.
"Me neither...", nodded Lucille.
"It seems Uncle Alan only allowed you to read it. What was it inside?", inquired the elder sister.
"It was—", Lucille sounded hesitate for a moment, "the will of the Rose of Eden..."
"What...?"
"It was what was scribed in the scroll. The will told us to release people of England from high taxes and unfair power of the King... However, who or what was the Rose of Eden, I— just have no idea..."
"Whomever that was, they must have been confident in bequeathing the children their will... Let us not make the will's writer, as well as our uncles, disappointed, shall we?", smiled Anais warmly to her sister, comforting the younger.
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"I will depart for my mission to-morrow, and I entrust you with the children... Do not tell them anything in relation of the Princess, just to be sure. They needn't know it now, but they will learn what happened as the cause of our war later..."
On behalf of his departed uncle as well as the late Lord Timbley, Will Scarlet nodded a promise. Only more than two decades had passed, but most of the Merry Men and the late Queen's court had already been six feet under; the lone candles left of the candelabrum were himself, the old minstrel Alan-a-Dale and perhaps Little John, if he was still alive. Though he wasn't devout a person, Will Scarlet started praying each night, for the deceased who were once his camarades, to give those who still clinging on the past to continue walking toward future strength to protect what was dear to them all. What would the future of England be, if the King ruled with lies and deceit on his ears?