The air in the dungeons was damp and colder than Alicia had imagined, and the woman wrapped herself in her coat with a shudder. She raised her face to look at Guy who was walking beside her, following the guardian and the archaeologist.
"I shouldn't let you in here, this part of the dungeons is closed to the public," Jonathan said, worried.
The archaeologist made a vague gesture with his hand.
"They won't tell anyone, will you Dr. Little? Guy?"
Alicia nodded.
"Even if I did, I don't think anyone would believe me," Guy said with an ironic smile.
They kept walking, and Alicia watched Gisborne, noting that the more they went into the dungeons, the more he seemed to become tense and immersed in his own thoughts.
"It's all right, Guy?" She asked quietly.
"This place... It hasn't changed much..."
"This isn't a good idea, I shouldn't have taken you here. Let's go back."
"No, that's fine. I would still see it in my memories. Maybe coming here could be a good thing."
Alicia took his hand.
"If it gets too hard, we'll go back, okay?"
Guy nodded.
"When I came here the last time I was looking for my sister," he said in a whisper, so only Alicia could hear him. "I fell into her trap, she wanted to get me here and deliver me to the sheriff... And she succeeded perfectly."
They entered a room and Guy shuddered.
"It's here, isn't it? Is this the place where they wounded me?"
Jonathan heard him and nodded with his head.
"Right there."
Guy looked down at the floor and he could see a darker trace, a remnant of the blood stain, of the blood he had shed when the Sheriff and Isabella had wounded him and left him to die.
He knelt down and put his hand on the ground: here was where he was supposed to have died, the place where the miracle had happened.
Alicia touched his shoulder and Guy raised his face to look at her.
"I'm fine," he reassured her, with a slight smile. "It's strange, but it's not that terrible."
The woman stared at him, trying to figure out if he was being honest, then she turned to the archaeologist.
"What did you want to show us? This?"
Peter pointed to one side of the room where they could see a table and where some wooden chests had been gathered.
The archaeologist carefully lifted one of the smaller boxes, laid it on the table, and removed the lid, inviting the others to come closer.
Alicia let out a exclamation of surprise, seeing a human skull, and she was astonished to see the precious gemstone decorating one of its teeth. She turned to look at Guy and she was scared to see the expression of his face.
To see the place where he had almost been killed hadn't shaken him so much, but being in front of that skull had upset him: he had become white in his face and he began to tremble convulsively.
"Guy..."
Alicia tried to touch him, but Gisborne flinched, turned his back to her, and ran away.
Alicia climbed a flight of stairs and sprang outdoors. She paused and looked around. She had tried to follow Gisborne, but the knight was younger than her, his legs were much longer than hers, and she was almost immediately left behind.
"Guy!" She called, distressed. "Guy, where are you?!"
"Dr. Little!"
Jonathan and Peter reached her, panting too, and the archaeologist looked at her, sincerely sorry.
"It's my fault, I shouldn't have shown that skull to him..."
"No, you shouldn't have," Jonathan said. "What were you thinking?"
"I didn't think he could react like that."
"What did you expect? You showed him the corpse of the man he was working for, how did you think he could react?"
"Won't you think it's true? I admit that what he said has proven to be right, but there are other more plausible explanations."
"That doesn't matter at all. It doesn't matter whether it's true or not, for him it is. You archaeologists are more used to dealing with mummies and ruins than with people! Now let's go and search for him. Dr. Little, do you have any idea of where he might have gone?"
"Maybe he went back to the car... Oh, we have to find him right away! Guy is not used to the modern world, he could be in danger!"
"Go and check the car, I'll look for him in the museum. Peter, make sure he's not in the dungeons. Do you both have a cell phone? The first one who finds him will be able to alert the others."
Guy had run away blindly, instinctively tracing back the path they had followed to get into the crypt. He didn't know what to do or where to go, he was only sure that he had to get away from the Sheriff's skull as quickly as possible.
Rushing out from the dungeons, he almost crashed into a family who was leaving the museum and he was forced to stop for a moment. The father of the child who Guy had almost hit, rebuked him, telling him to be careful, and those harsh words brought him to reality, tearing him off the horror that had clouded his mind when he had seen the remains of Vaisey.
He murmured a few words of apology, but the parents of the child gave him a disgusted look and they rushed away, dragging the kid with them.
Guy wrapped in his jacket as he entered the building: it was cold and he was trembling, but the real frost was what he felt inside, and that made him to want to cry. He blinked to try to hold tears, suddenly aware that the passing by museum visitors all looked at him in the same way: a mixture of surprise, concern, and pity.
He couldn't stay there, he didn't want everyone to see his humiliation and weakness.
He looked around, looking for a hiding place, he saw the sign pointing at the toilets of the museum and he hurried in that direction. That was a place where he could take refuge and where nobody would look at him with pity, a place where he could stay alone for a while, at least for the time he needed to avoid to have a breakdown in front of other people.
He recognized the symbol of the men's restrooms and he pushed that door: fortunately no one was there and Guy could slip into one of the stalls without being seen. He managed to close the lock and leaned on the door with his back. Only then, he hid his face in his hands and allowed himself to cry.
Jonathan Archer hastened to check the security camera monitors, but he couldn't see Gisborne in any of the rooms of the museum, then he returned to the entrance hall, thinking of where he could look for Guy. Over the years, he had been tracking innumerable lost children, and he always found them in the same two places: in the gift shop, looking at the souvenirs of the museum, or in the toilets.
A quick glance was enough to exclude the shop and Jonathan walked toward the toilets. He noticed immediately that one of the doors was locked and he approached it with caution.
He waited for a moment before knocking, and when he did, he didn't hear an answer. In fact, the silence became deeper, as if the person inside the stall was holding his breath to avoid being heard.
Jonathan knocked again.
"Guy? I know you're there. Open the door, please."
For a long time he didn't get an answer, then, when he was beginning to fear that Guy might have fainted, he heard his voice, soft, but strong enough to be heard through the door.
"Go away. Leave me alone."
The guardian thought for a moment before talking again.
"Dr. Little is worried for you, can I make a call to tell her that you're here?"
Guy did not answer right away and Jonathan said nothing, and just kept waiting. After a while, the door opened by a slit.
"I don't want Alicia to see me like this. Not for the sheriff. I just need some time."
The guardian nodded.
"You've been working for him for so many years, it's normal if seeing him dead was a trauma for you. But if you want to be quiet, you don't have to stay in a toilet. Come to my office: you can sit and drink something warm and no one will disturb you. I'll tell Dr. Little that you're safe and that you want to be quiet for a while. What do you say?"
Guy decided to go out and Jonathan saw that he was still very pale and that his eyes were reddish and bright with tears.
"I say that you shouldn't speak to me as if I were a child or a poor idiot."
The guardian looked at him for a moment and smiled.
"You are right, sorry. But the offer is still valid."
Guy glanced at him, then he nodded briefly.
"You are right, Alicia has done so much for me and I shouldn't make her worry. Tell her I'm fine."
Gisborne turned on the water of the sink while Jonathan dialed Alicia's number on the cellphone.
"Dr. Little? Guy is with me. No, he's fine, but he needs some time. Why don't you ask Peter to guide you in a visit of the castle in the meantime? We will wait for you in my office in an hour or two. Yes, don't worry, I'll stay with him."
The guardian closed the call and he waited for Guy to wash his face.
"Are you really fine or did I just lie to her?"
Guy sighed.
"I shouldn't feel like this. Not for him. He has made my life a hell, I should jump for joy seeing his remains. Maybe I'm really crazy."
"Things are never as simple as they may seem at a first glance. When Peter opened that box, it wasn't pleasant for me either, and I didn't know the sheriff, but your reaction isn't strange at all if we consider your past."
"Do you believe me?"
"I do not think you're crazy, let's put it this way. Then I don't know how things really are and maybe I will never know. But is it so important to find out? You're here, you survived the wounds you had received, and now we're talking, isn't it enough? Although it might be better to chat sitting comfortably in front of a cup of hot tea and not in a public toilet, don't you think? If you want to talk. Otherwise we can also drink tea in silence."
Jonathan made his way and Guy followed him to the office. The guardian told him to sit and Guy promptly obeyed: he dropped himself into a chair and put his elbows on the desk, taking his face in his hands.
"Are you all right?"
Guy raised his head.
"I feel so tired..."
"It's normal after a very strong emotion. And according to Dr. Little, you've had a rather challenging day."
As he talked, Jonathan had taken a kettle and poured tea into two cups. He added a few teaspoons of sugar to Guy's one and handed it to him, then he took another chair and sat down too.
"Drink it and you'll see that then you'll feel a little better. Peter shouldn't have shown that... thing to you. I'm really sorry."
"Why? It's not your fault."
"No, but I still feel responsible. Peter is a great archaeologist, but he is not as good at understanding people, he lives in his own world. He didn't even think that he could upset people by showing them human remains. For him, it was simply an archaeological find. But I should have asked him what were his intentions and prevented him."
"I don't know why I reacted like that. In the past I fought against the sheriff. For some time I've been convinced of having killed him and I was proud of that, I don't know why it's so different now. Perhaps it is because that skull seemed so fragile, weathered by time..." Guy touched his belly, searching for the scar beneath his sweater. "Just a month ago he planted a sword in my body... This wound just healed, but now all that's left of him are just a few fragile bones, corroded by the passing of centuries... It seems so absurd!"
"It doesn't just seem absurd to you, it is! Really, if I were in your situation I probably wouldn't even have the courage to get out of bed. Oh, look!" Jonathan noticed a box lying next to the coffee pot and he took it, placing it on the desk. "Apparently Peter went to buy donuts during lunch break. Well, if he thought about eating them all on his own, he was terribly wrong. Take one, come on."
Guy gave him a perplexed look and the other smiled.
"After the scare he gave you, taking some of his donuts seems to me the least we could do, right?"
Gisborne nodded, smiling in turn. He had told Jonathan Archer that he wanted to be left alone and in silence, but he realized that instead, the small talk of the man helped him to distract himself from the thought of Vaisey, and he was pleased that the guardian was the one who found him.
He finished eating and he took another sip of tea. The guardian had been right: that hot and sweet drink had made him really feel better. If nothing else, he had stopped trembling and he didn't feel so cold anymore.
Guy put the empty cup on the desk, and he noticed a book, half hidden under some printed sheets.
He touched it with a finger and smiled ironically.
"Robin Hood... How do I die in this version?"
Jonathan hesitated, fearing that he could hurt him, but he realized that Gisborne would be offended if he told him a pitiful lie.
"Robin hits your head with a sword."
"And then there is all the drama of Robin cutting my head and wearing that ridiculous cloak made with the whole skin of a horse?"
"Yeah."
Guy made a sort of snort.
"That's ridiculous, Robin would never do it. He didn't like to kill if it wasn't absolutely necessary."
"And was he really that good with the bow?"
"Yes, yes, yes. In this case, the legend isn't wrong."
"Can you tell me something?"
"About Robin?"
"Also about you, the outlaws, Lady Marian, about whatever you want."
Guy held his breath in hearing Marian's name, but he realized that Jonathan couldn't know how much those memories were painful for him. For the guardian, Marian was only the one described in the books: the woman of Robin Hood, a lady like every other."
"Okay, I'll tell you of the time when Robin and I had to defend the ruin of a castle from an army of mercenaries, but I have a condition."
"Name it."
"Tell this story to other people. Pretend that you invented it or read it in some old book, it doesn't matter, but I'd love to see that amidst all these fanciful stories about Robin Hood there is also a true one. One in which I don't meet a bad end."
Jonathan held out his hand to him.
"We have a deal."