'Who is there?' he called.

No answer. Willoughby glimpsed a flash of colour amongst the trees but his eyes were blurred with tears after his violent retching. He squatted on the ground, head thumping and his body aching, his clothes all soiled. There was no sign of the outlaws. No indication, apart from the scraps of food and the smouldering ash, of their wild banquet the night before.

Willoughby sat cradling himself for a while. Again, out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a flash of colour but his mind felt battered and his body drained. He dared not concentrate. A ring of pain encircled his hand. He felt feverish and almost wished he had died quickly the previous day. A huge magpie, bold and daring, swooped from the trees and started pecking with its cruel yellow beak at a piece of fat-caked meat. Willoughby got to his feet and walked to the line of trees. He looked up. Once again, he caught the flash of colour and stared fixedly.

'Oh no!' he sobbed. 'Oh, Christ, have mercy!'

He fell to his knees and stared round. Other snatches of colour caught his gaze.

'Oh, you bastards!' he murmured, and then crumpled to the ground like a child, whimpering and crying. From the overhanging branches of the trees around the glade, every member of his retinue, stripped of clothes and boots, hung lifeless by the neck.

Chapter 1

'Murder, Sir Peter, that's why the King has sent me north!'

Sir Hugh Corbett, Keeper of the King's Secret Seal, stared across the table at Sir Peter Branwood, under-sheriff of Nottingham, now acting-sheriff after the mysterious murder of Sir Eustace Vechey. Corbett propped his elbows on the table and ticked off the points on his fingers.

'The outlaw Robin Hood has reneged on his pardon. He has re-formed his coven of outlaws and wolvesheads and taken refuge in Sherwood Forest. From there he has attacked merchants, pilgrims, and finally royal tax-collectors. He has pillaged and plundered. Now he has murdered the King's officer in these parts! That, Sir Peter, is why I am here!'