Oh he knew that of course. Remembered it all too well. His hatred of Robin had near taken him over then and of course that ever present voice in his ear telling him he could still win it all. "I was hurt Marian, I was bitter and I was listening to the wrong person. But I thought I made some amends for all that. Or had started to." There was nothing he could do was there. No way he could make her see him as anything other than the monster that had killed her. Because the things she said, saying she didn't fear him, a vain attempt to make him feel better. Because it didn't get easy like that. She didn't 'understand him'. But she was stepping closer to him, and god help him, she was meeting his gaze and not in a long time had he felt a guilt like that.
"You understand do you? Well tell me, tell me why I snapped. Why with one action I destroyed the one good thing in my entire life. Tell me Marian, why everything I do, everything I try to be turns to dust."
His voice was low, dangerous even. But not toward her this time. He would never treat her as he once had, he'd realised, rotting in Nottingham's jail. Meeting Meg, watching even his own sister turn to such a terrible cruel darkness. Maybe it was the family, maybe they were cursed. Or maybe it was what they all said. He'd sold her to a cruel man and he'd done it for money enough to make something of himself. And then Vaisey had seen potential in him and used it to his own gain. "Do you think I want to be here? In a world where you and...and Hood can live and be happy, I should not be. He would rather I was not here and if I was where he was, I couldn't say I blame him. He holds his revenge because you ask it of him. No more no less."
There was a bitterness in Gisborne, ever present when it came to Robin Hood. The boy who had taken everything from him with one stupid selfish childhood act and now in adulthood had claimed England's Greatest Prize. "I would never hurt you in my right mind. But you know that I was not and time, I understand, is something I have to allow you here. But in the meantime, what? What do I do? I have always looked to someone else for guidance. I have always looked to you for...what passes for goodness in me. And I am trying to be a man you can respect again. I have been trying for a long time. But what if he's just not there? What if Hood is right and I'm not capable of change."