That the Northman dared challenge Conor told him that the man spoke true. He waved away his men-at-arms and pushed Ardan back onto his bench. “Do you believe that Erika can be happy here?”
“That is up to you to decide,” Olan answered, his blue eyes still flat with anger. “She has loved Iraland since she first stepped onto its soil, and does not want to leave it. I do not know what you intend by the marriage to my sister, but if you treat her as well as you treat your people, then I believe she will come to be happy here.”
He resumed his seat, his eyes never leaving Conor. “If you do not, all the fires of hell will not keep me from putting my hands about your throat.”
Conor knew he meant it. He felt the same for his sister. After all, he had killed her husband for daring to beat her. “And I make that same vow to you, my friend.”
They shook hands, and the talk turned to things most men enjoyed, ships and horses and fighting and women. Over refreshed tankards, the tentative bonds of friendship were extended.
A sudden silence gripped the hall, causing Conor to look up. When he saw what captivated everyone else, he rose to his feet, aware of his mouth wide with surprise.
Gwynna and Erika paused at the foot of the stairs. Gwynna wore a sleeveless gown of emerald over a pale green underdress. Dark green ribbons were threaded through her black curls, and the gold belt about her waist was worked with emeralds. She was stunning.
Conor didn’t even notice his sister. He only had eyes for Erika.
She wore a gown of deep lilac embellished at bodice and hem with silver thread. Her hair was a glorious crown of curls and braids that gleamed golden in the candlelight. A belt of worked silver was fastened about her slender waist, from which hung a silver-handled dagger.
Conor felt desire pull him, harden him. She was magnificent.
She was terrified.
The entire hall—soldiers, servants, and pets—stared at Erika as if she had suddenly sprouted horns. Even Conor was staring at her as if he had never seen her before. No, he was staring at her the way he had when he kissed her. Erika felt her cheeks burn. She felt naked in the dress, showing, she believed, much more of her figure than her trews did.
They had been dressed more than half an hour ago. The delay occurred when Erika tried to walk in her dress. She hadn’t been in skirts since she was a child, and found it hard to shorten her stride. Already she had tripped several times, and the stairs were particularly difficult. She knew she would fall on her face before Conor’s people and disgrace herself for all time. For the first time in her life, she wanted to run.
Conor and Olan came towards them. Gwynna squeezed Erika’s hand reassuringly. “Do you think Olan will like this?” Gwynna whispered, straightening her skirts with her free hand.
Erika was surprised. Was Gwynna nervous as well? She decided to reassure her. “He wanted you when he first saw you, when you were drenched in his blood,” she whispered back. “He will not want you less now.” Gwynna made a choking noise, but she nodded.
Olan stopped before Gwynna. “The sight of your beauty has driven coherent thought from my head,” he admitted. “Might I have the honor of escorting you to table?” Gwynna murmured her assent and slipped her arm into his.
Which left Erika alone with Conor. He continued to stare at her, as if he could not believe his eyes. She looked everywhere but at him. That didn’t mean she wasn’t painfully aware of him, however. The man did know how to overwhelm the senses. He was still dressed in black, but his tunic was worked with silver and gray that glinted off the silver in his eyes. She could also see every muscle in the man’s legs. Oh, how she wished she had her breeches—or even her sword—to hide behind. “Say something, damn you,” she hissed, her nerves at the breaking point.
He did. “Is this the same woman who tried to kill me?”
Erika felt the heat rush to her ears. If he had kicked her in the seat of her breeches, he could not have shamed her more. It was bad enough that his people did not know whether to poison her or run away screaming, but did he have to pour greater humiliation upon her? It hurt bitterly, and even more so to know that he could cause her hurt.
“I told Gwynna that this was foolishness,” she whispered. She turned to flee.
She heard him mutter under his breath as he caught her hand. Before she could extract it and escape, he brought it to his lips.
“Forgive me, Erika,” he said softly, his breath warm on the back of her hand. “That was not what I meant to say. It’s just that I have never seen anyone more beautiful in my entire life.”
Surely he was mocking her, but the touch of his lips on her hand was sending tendrils of desire streaking through the deepest parts of her body. It was even headier than the other kiss they had shared. She suddenly forgot the hall and everyone in it. She wanted him to kiss her again.
“Conor.” Gwynna’s low voice reached them. “Quit tormenting the girl and bring her to table.”
Relieved by the distraction, she said, “I would propose a truce, at least for dinner. You cease trying to mock me, and I’ll cease trying to kill you.”
His lips curved minutely into a smile. “I accept your truce.” He put her hand in the crook of his arm. “But if I may say so, if you lift the hem of your skirts you would walk much better.”
She glared at him but did as he suggested and was relieved to discover she didn’t trip once on her way to table. But if she thought she was being given a reprieve, she was mistaken.
He insisted on sitting close, so close she could feel his leg, solid muscle, through her skirts. And his arm, as it brushed against hers. But she was not so overwhelmed by his presence that she didn’t notice he was careful to place her to his right, away from the ravaged side of his face. No torch glowed behind him, leaving his left in shadow.
She realized then that it had become a habit to him, to them all, to avoid the scarred side of his face. Only in anger did he face her full. And as careful as he was to shield his scar, his people were as careful to avoid it. Erika shook her head. Vikings wore their scars proudly and with honor, boasting of the battles they survived, the enemies they vanquished. Their scars proved them to be warriors.
But Conor’s scar did not come from an enemy. It came from a wife, a wife who betrayed him.
The trenchers were served. “Where is mine?” she asked after noticing a maid place a trencher of choice cuts before the lord. The girl looked up, caught Erika’s frown, and squeaked in fright before she scurried away.
“We will share, my lady, if you do not mind,” Conor replied, his eyes alight with amusement. He broke off a piece of bread and offered it to her. “You may want to smile more. You near frightened Maire out of her wits.”
She was not the only one. Erika knew there were strict laws regarding serving choice cuts of meat. Bards and brehons were given the finest cuts, then clergy, then the chieftain. Conor had the highest rank this night, since the elders and the priest had left soon after her embarrassing exercise in the practice yard. That meant he, and she, dined on the best cut of beef.
She took the proffered chunk of bread, noticing that her hand shook. Conor, blast him, noticed it as well. “Are you afraid, Angel?” he asked her, his voice pitched low so that only she could hear.
“I am not afraid,” she whispered back, lifting her chin. “I am...uncomfortable.”
Even that admission seemed to cost her a great deal. The Angel of Death was not one to display anything other than supreme confidence. Conor could understand that. He knew the energy it took to remain controlled and confident.
“Sure now, being the object of everyone’s scrutiny is not uncommon?” he asked. Indeed, everyone focused their attention on the head table.
“No, it’s not. However, this dress, sitting at the head table, the food... You honor me.”
Conor heard the disconcertion in her voice and sought to ease it. “And I should. We did not begin well, you and I, and my anger earlier was not warranted.”
It was the
closest to apologizing that he could get, but it seemed enough. She plucked a morsel of beef from the trencher. “Unwarranted but understandable. I do not know why I seem to be making a habit of pointing blades in your direction.”
She plopped the bit of beef in her mouth, licking droplets of gravy from her fingers. Conor’s arousal grew almost painful. He would be hard put to await the duel. “The meal agrees with you?”
“It does,” she replied. “I have not had so sumptuous a meal since I left home.” A shadow crossed her face, and Conor knew she thought of her youth.
“Do you miss it, your homeland?”
“There are days when all I can think of is keeping my head,” she answered, staring into the hearth. “But there are other days...I miss my father’s laughter and my mother’s songs. I miss riding through the hills in the summer and slipping on the frozen lakes in the winter.”
“Do you ever think about going back?” Conor was touched by the sadness evident in her voice. Without thought he reached for her hand.
She rebuffed the comforting gesture by pressing her hands to her lap. “I can never go back. I would be killed if I did. But it matters not. Denmark ceased to be our home after our father died. Now home is wherever my brother and I are.”
He’d have to have been a fool not to see the pain and longing in her eyes. His desire left him, to be replaced by a feeling much more tender and profound. “And right now, you are here.”
The remainder of the meal passed in a blur.
“An mbeidh aon cheol ann anocht?”
Startled by the soft question, Conor turned to the woman beside him. The pale-haired beauty looked out over the feasters, a wistful expression on her face. He could not deny her, he realized. Not if it would bring a smile to her eyes. “Yes, there will be music tonight,” he told her. “And singing and dancing and shouting and drinking and fighting. It is our way.”
A smile flitted across her lips. “And ours.”
Conor signaled the harpist to begin a light tune. “You told me that you know chess. Are you for a game?”
A place was set up for them, and the noise level in the hall rose another notch as Dunlough’s people relaxed from the day’s endeavors. Erika was a formidable opponent, taking the game as serious as he.
Now that her focus was away from him, Conor took the opportunity to learn more about his betrothed. “Did your mother approve of your warrior’s way?”
“Mother died in childbirth when we were four,” Erika replied. “Father did not wed again. He said watching a wife die for a third time would surely kill him. He didn’t know much about taking care of girls, but he knew his women tended to die, being as fragile as they are. I didn’t want to die as my mother did, so I decided to become a boy.”
Ardan, who had remained nearby, nearly choked on his ale. “How did you do that?”
“She cut off all her hair, that’s what she did,” Olan interjected. “Not even six was she, yet used one of our father’s daggers to do it.”
He grinned at his sister, who glared back.
The glare was softened into a smile by memory. “Father threatened to feed me to Fenrir if I ever cut my hair again. He gave me the dagger as a rite of passage, then told me if I was going to own a dagger, I needed to learn how to use one. Training warriors was what he did best. So I became a warrior.”
“Had you no aunt or female relatives to teach you?” Gwynna asked.
Erika shook her head. “My mother was captured by my father on a raid. Father only had brothers, and they were scattered to the four winds. But I had a nurse who looked after me until she died.”
Conor exchanged looks with Gwynna, who blinked back tears. Erika had reached womanhood without the guidance of a mother and with a father who denied her the right to be what she was.
Erika realized that Conor and Gwynna were both staring at her in horror. Even Olan seemed chagrined. “We had a good life,” she insisted, defending her father. “Father was happy that I was learning to take care of myself, and I liked to make him happy. Father did the best he could before he died. It is not his fault that Gunthar was such a pig.”
“Gunthar?”
“He was our father’s firstborn. He hated the fact that Father replaced his mother with ours, and as a result he hated Olan and me. Another reason I learned weapons was so that I could defend myself against his pranks. He never forgave me for being better at swords than him.” Her eyes grew grim. “He had his revenge though.”
Conor and Ardan had heard the tale from Olan, but they were riveted by Erika’s blunt account. “How did he do that?”
Erika didn’t realize she was holding Conor’s hand in a death grip. It was her only outward show of emotion as she said, “When Jarl Thorold died, Gunthar the Spineless became jarl. We were fourteen. He accused Olan of treason and imprisoned him. Olan demanded the right to a trial or be met in combat. Gunthar refused, knowing the gods would be on Olan’s side.
“Meanwhile, Gunthar arranged for me to be wed to one of his friends. By our father’s decree I had the right to choose my own husband, and I refused Gunthar’s request. He locked me in my chambers and threatened to kill Olan if I continued to refuse. I asked him to release Olan and I would consider his request, but he decided to starve me into submission. When that did not work, he tried to whip me.”
Hard, metallic sounds jerked Erika from her commentary. She looked up and was surprised to see that both Olan and Conor had crushed their mugs in their hands. They wore identical expressions of anger. Even Ardan looked outraged, and Gwynna was stricken. “The scars on your back?” she whispered.
When Erika nodded, Olan made a strangled sound. “He scarred you?”
Her brother’s voice was a harsh whisper. Erika knew that when Olan got that quiet he was about to go into the red rage. “Why did you not tell me?”
She stretched a hand towards him, feeling his anguish. “I thought it more important at the time to escape, Olan,” she answered, begging him to understand. “It would not have taken long for the men loyal to Gunthar to surround us. I wanted to get us to safety.”
Even through his beard Erika could see the tight clench of his jaw as he fought to subdue his anger. The tips of his ears were fiery, marking the effort a failure.
With a curse, his fist came crashing down on the table. Gwynna threw up her hands, as if to ward off a blow. The dark-haired woman scrambled quickly to her feet, breathed an apology, and fled.
Olan made to go after her, but Ardan restrained him. “Not while you’re steaming like a horse that’s been ridden too hard, lad.”
“I wouldn’t hurt her!”
The old warrior’s eyes were agate-hard. “She’s not after knowing that, I’m thinking. Calm yerself. Mayhap she’ll return.”
Olan sat down, stricken. He was no less so than Erika. A simple game of chess and telling tales had become a disaster. Had she upset Gwynna with her tale? Why did the Irishwoman think Olan would strike her?
Erika turned to Conor. “Forgive me. I did not intend my tale to spoil the evening.”
Conor was silent as he tried to smother his own rage. The idea of Erika being whipped made his vision turn red. He was consumed with the need to bash someone’s head in. How dare anyone hurt her? That he had once chained her and threatened to execute her was burned away.
He asked only one question. “Is this man dead?”
Erika looked at him in surprise. His expression and tone was the same as her brother’s, but while she knew Olan’s stemmed from the love and protectiveness he felt for her, she knew Conor felt no such things. His anger on her behalf confused her.
His gaze compelled her to finish the tale. “Gunthar made the mistake of binding me with ropes instead of chains. I had worked most of the braid away with my dagger before he came to whip me. He taunted me before applying the lash, which gave me time to free myself.”
She would not tell them how Gunthar had looked at her with lust in his eyes. How he had pressed against her, his fetid breath
on the back of her neck as he told her how he and his friend would share her.
“The lash only reached me twice—once on the back, the second time around my arm, when I grabbed it and jerked it from Gunthar’s hands. I stabbed him with my dagger, took his sword, then went to free Olan. I had to kill two men to do it, men I had known my entire life, but they were loyal to Gunthar, not us.
“We took Olan’s longboat and made it to Larangar’s holding. We sank our ship in a fjord, making it seem as if we drowned and washed out to sea. Larangar gave us safe passage to France, then chose to sell his boat and stay with us.”
She looked down at the table. “I did what I had to do,” she whispered. “Larangar was more our brother than Gunthar ever could dream of being. I will be forever grateful to him for what he did for us.”
After she ended her tale, Olan excused himself from their company. Erika longed to go after him, but did not. She knew that he walked a fine line between grief and fury. Seeing her would not alleviate it.
“He will be fine,” Conor assured her, his voice gruff.
Blinking to dry the moisture in her eyes, she said, “Olan’s feeling of responsibility to me is great. He believes he has failed to safeguard me, but he has not.”
“When we are wed, I will be your avenger.”
Erika frowned at the possessiveness in his tone. “I am my own avenger. And our marriage is not a given.”
Conor frowned back. “I see I have many things to teach my future wife. The most important is to never disagree with your husband. You surrendered your blade to me. Our marriage is as good as done.”
Her scowl deepened, and even Ardan moved back. “I surrendered my dagger, true, but never my sword. I will marry you only if I lose our duel. Is that why you are trying to break my hand?”
With a muttered curse he let go. Erika shook her abused hand to restore the life to it, then quickly hid it in her lap. The Devil didn’t know his own strength, but she did. She would be hard-pressed to win her freedom from him. Why did he want to wed her anyway? She could think of no other reason, except perhaps the kiss they had shared. But surely he didn’t have to marry her to kiss her, as he was already doing so now? Did he still mean to have revenge upon her for attempting to behead him? As his wife, Erika would be at Conor’s mercy, and she would be honor bound to endure it without Olan attempting to kill him.
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