by Sandra Hill
“And levitation is something to be desired?”
“Oh, definitely. Lady Thora and the others look down on me ’cause I carry the blood of witches in my veins, but we do no evil. More good than harm.”
They walked in silence for a bit, heading toward a storeroom where she could get soap and towels for bathing. Several people along the way cast surly looks toward them or went out of their way to avoid their path.
“What is that all about?” Rita asked.
“Ulf wanted to get rid of the bald spot on his head. My spell worked, but the hair grew on his backside, not his head.”
Rita put a hand over her mouth to stifle a laugh.
“And Sela was flat-chested. Wanted big bosoms, she did.”
“And the problem with that was?”
Sigge held her hands away from her chest, far away. “So big they are that she nigh needs a harness to keep them from hanging down to her belly.” She sighed deeply. “Some of my spells do work, especially those dealing with herb remedies. Unfortunately, folks only remember the bad ones.”
“Honey, if people know you’re a witch in training, and you’ve made a few mistakes, they can’t really complain.”
All of a sudden, Sigge burst out, “I am so glad that you have finally arrived. My aunts will be pleased, too.”
“Your aunts, the witches?”
Sigge nodded vigorously.
“Let me get this straight. You and your two aunts practice witchcraft here, and nobody objects?”
Sigge nodded. “Because we are good witches. Some are more cautious with me, however, since I sometimes make mistakes.”
“You said you’re glad that I finally arrived?”
“My aunts predicted your coming months ago. That is why I was able to arrive in time to offer my services to you.”
Rita put a hand to her head where the two lumps were starting to do a drum duo. Da, dum! Da, do. Da, dum! Da, do! People were staring at her in her strange attire . . . sleeveless man’s tunic and tights, bare feet, ashes marring her arms and probably her face, sweaty hair plastered to her head. Why Lady Thora would think any man would want her was beyond Rita.
“For sennights now, they have spoken of the bright light of the future melding with the blue shadows of the past,” Sigge blathered on. “Opposites will meet and explode, creating a new life for Norstead, which has been like a barren woman for many a year. Beautiful but empty.”
“And I’m supposed to be that light?” She laughed, too tired to cry. “Well, I better go take a bracing bath so I can be ready for the explosion.”
The explosion didn’t come for another week.
She’d done some crazy stunts before, but this was ridiculous . . .
With Sigge introducing her as the “light” everywhere they went over the next few days, she was welcomed as some kind of savior, rather than the sea monster pariah the Lord of Norstead had deemed her before his departure.
Not that Norstead needed a savior far as she could see. It was a well-run, prosperous Viking-style estate. A wooden fortress castle, but more than that. The landscape was dotted with well-tended farmsteads and longhouses with thriving fields of oat and barley, fat cattle, poultry, sheep, and goats, all within a valley. Through this valley, and over one palisaded rise, a road led down to the massive Ericsfjord with its wharves, docks, and places for beaching the watercraft over the winter months. You couldn’t see the water when at the castle, but Rita could smell its fresh semi-saltiness, the fjord being one of thousands of tributaries to the North Sea.
This settlement was unusual for the Norselands, apparently, which was not conducive to farming with its rocky landscape and harsh climate. Someone had worked diligently over the centuries to make this place hospitable for sustenance. Not self-sufficient entirely because they couldn’t raise their own produce in great quantity, but still pretty damn impressive.
In outbuildings there was a blacksmith, carpenter, cobbler, weavers, dairymaids, sheep shearers, and God only knew what else. Not to mention an impressive stable. The men of Norstead were expert amber harvesters, and once a year they traveled to the Baltic, where they gathered and brought back a shipload of the stones to be marketed in trade for all the goods that could not be produced in the cold Norse climate.
The surly Steven apparently ran a well-run ship, and that didn’t just refer to longships, of which there were twenty, not including the dozens he had taken with him off to battle pirates.
Largely, he relied on well-placed, designated people to carry out his orders. Arnstein, the steward who ran the keep—that’s what they called the huge fortress-type home in this neck of the woods—like clockwork, with every single person having a job from chambermaid to raker of hearth ashes. Brighid, the no-nonsense head cook who had a staff of two dozen to help in preparing and presenting the vast amounts of food needed for such large numbers . . . three hundred when all were at home. The castellan Geirfinn made sure there was plenty of weaponry on hand and that fighters were constantly kept up to par with exercise, even those left behind. She and Geirfinn had become great pals once he learned of her WEALS service. Then there was Farli, who took care of anything dealing with horses, and Haisl who worked with the cotters in making sure all the farmsteads were operating properly. Skar organized hunters, fishermen, and trappers who brought back boar, bear, deer, rabbits, ducks, geese, and every type of fish imaginable. And so many others . . . tanners, seamstresses, a scissor, knife, and sword sharpener, and a cheese maker . . . yes, they had a person whose sole job was to make cheese. Even the children had to work, gathering both chicken and seagull eggs, checking the wicker traps and the nets in the fjord for fish, picking berries, and slopping the pigs.
It was all efficient and tidy and all that, but it was rather sad. No running children within the castle walls. No shrieks of laughter. The people were right. It was kind of dreary here.
The question was: Where did Rita fit into this picture?
Well, as far as the people were concerned, she was here to bring light, however the hell she was supposed to do that. That did not mean they were not wary of her. The original picture of her in the wet suit lingered, and they weren’t entirely convinced that she wouldn’t one day suddenly turn into a sea serpent, or at least a mermaid.
Her short hair bothered them, too.
“Are you a harlot?” Geirfinn had asked on first meeting her.
The curious manner in which he had asked the question had saved him from being belted a good one. “No, why do you even ask such a question?”
Geirfinn shrugged. “Women convicted of adultery often have their heads shaved when ordered by the shire courts in Saxon lands or Althings in this country.”
“And the men who commit adultery . . . do they have their heads shaved, too?”
Geirfinn laughed, understanding perfectly what she meant. “Nay, they do not, but best you do not ask that question of the wrong person.”
“Like one carrying scissors and a shaving mug?”
“Precisely.”
They’d shared a grin after that.
Still others harbored entirely different reasons for why she’d needed to cut her hair. The cook, Brighid, had put a halting hand up when Rita had approached her kitchen. “Do not enter if you are diseased.”
“I beg your pardon. I’m no more diseased than . . . than you are.” The cook, in fact, kept an immaculate kitchen, and she, as well as all her helpers, wore pristine, open-sided aprons of various colors, often with embroidered edges, over their long gowns. The front and back of the aprons were held together at the shoulders with brooches. In the case of Brighid, her brooches had a chain connecting them like a necklace from which hung the keys to various valuable storerooms. Some of the women had their hair pulled off their faces into a bun; most covered their hair with a kerchief that tied at the nape. Young women had long single braids hanging down their backs.
“Why else would ye cut yer hair if it weren’t fer fleas or lice or other vermin?”
&nb
sp; “For comfort,” Rita had answered, and explained that with the hard work she did as a female fighter, short hair was easier to handle.
Her answer alleviated their concerns about disease but raised all other kinds of questions.
So Rita moved freely about the estate, with her sidekick Sigge at her side. People gave them ample room as they passed by, mostly fearing that Sigge would inadvertently cast one of her spells and turn them into toads or dancing pigs, both of which had presumably happened in the past. Cook wouldn’t allow the girl in her kitchen, because one time beans suddenly started jumping out of the companaticum, the stockpot of thick broth that was always simmering in the huge cauldron inside a hearth big enough to fit a whole cow. Unfortunately, the pot was rarely cleaned . . . new meat and vegetables were just added to the existing liquid, so at some point beans might very well want to jump out.
Rita wore lady’s gowns when inside and a boy’s tights and tunic when outside. She slept in Thorfinn’s old room. She could have fled, she supposed, but where would she go when she wasn’t sure where she was? No, she was in a sort of limbo, waiting for the master to come back and, hopefully, help her get back to Coronado.
If he could.
And that was her biggest problem of all. While she bided her time, she’d been able to examine her surroundings in detail. They were too authentic to be modern re-enactments, and there was not one little bit of evidence of modern times. Not a speck of paper, not a factory-made nail, not a tampon or sanitary napkin, not even toilet paper, nothing.
That must mean she was in the Norselands, or long ago Norway. How long ago she feared to find out. Seriously, by some twist of science or celestial destiny, she had traveled back in time. It was impossible, of course, but what other explanation was there?
This was something she had to discuss with Steven, along with a million other things. She couldn’t wait. Not!
So, while all the folks around her expounded on her being the light, she wondered what the Prince of Dark, aka Steven the Surly, would think about her being sent here from the future to lighten him up.
Even she had to smile at that.
Home from the wars . . . sort of . . .
Steven was about to return to his keep at Norstead after being gone for a sennight. If his mood had been dark before leaving, it was pitch-black now.
And he hadn’t even lost a man.
Helvtis! Damn! The only way they would have been able to die was of boredom, since there had been nary a battle waged.
And he still didn’t have his sister.
On the other hand, he did have her maid, Sigvid, who was the most irksome, weepsome, noisesome woman he had e’er met. She hadn’t stopped crying since they’d found her standing alone on the shore of one of the islands Brodir had been reputed to use . . . a living, speaking message left there for him.
But that wasn’t the worst of it. She had developed a bad case of the hiccups. Constant, never-ending hiccups. So that every sob and every word she spoke were punctuated by the grating noise.
Neither Sigvid nor his sister Disa had been harmed in any way, apparently. In fact, “We were—hiccup—treated like—hiccup—princesses,” according to the wailing maid.
“Then why in Freyja’s name are you crying?” he’d demanded.
Staring at him as if he were barmy, she had sobbed out, “’Cause we were—hiccup—captured by—hiccup—pirates.”
So, if they’d been kidnapped by Saxons, or Huns, or Arabs, it wouldn’t have been so bad? That’s what he’d wanted to ask, but he’d shut his teeth, lest he prompt more wailing . . . and hiccups.
Then she’d added some alarming news. “Lady Disa insults—hiccup—the pirate at every—hiccup—turn.”
“Brodir?”
Sigvid had nodded vigorously. “And he laughs—hiccup—and insults her right back.” She then burst into another bout of sobbing.
They’d tried everything to help her get rid of the hiccups, and wasn’t that a lackwitted picture? Grown men jumping up and down attempting to scare the hiccups away. Forcing her to drink cup after cup of water, sometimes whilst her forefingers were plugging her ears, hadn’t worked either; it just caused her to have to piss every other minute. Making her swallow a palmful of salt had been Oslac’s opinion, which resulted in a pile of vomit on the ship’s deck. Even throwing a burlap bag over her head . . . one seaman’s mother’s remedy . . . had accomplished nothing, except more weeping and hiccupping. Another seaman suggested that she bend over at the waist and touch her toes, then slowly raise her arms upward until she stretched to the skies. While that gave his men an appreciative view of outthrust bosoms, it did naught for the hiccups.
In the end, Steven and twelve of his hersirs took horses ashore at the joining of the North Sea with Ericsfjord and took a blessedly silent shortcut through the woods. The ships would blow horns to announce their arrival when they approached the keep, but Steven figured the horsemen would gain hours on them.
“I’ve been worried about something,” Steven confided to Oslac.
He arched his brows.
“I forgot to tell Arnstein, or anyone else, to feed and water the sea woman.”
Oslac winced as if that was not good news. As if he didn’t already know that.
“What if she died in the cage?”
“Would it matter?” Oslac asked.
“Yea, it would. She has much to tell me about Thorfinn.”
Oslac was still convinced that Steven’s brother was long dead and said only, “Aaaah.”
“Well, what will be will be.”
“And the other . . . the message carried by Sigvid . . . will you agree to meet with Brodir?”
“I have not decided.” He shrugged. “It leaves a bad taste in my mouth to negotiate with nithings. But my sister’s life could be at stake.”
“The maid says that they were not hurt, and she believes Brodir, for some reason, when he promises that Disa will continue unharmed.”
“Disa is a sharp-witted woman. She is no doubt pulling a flummery on Brodir.”
“I had not thought of that.”
“Still, his idea of harm may be different from mine, if you get my meaning.” Enough thinking for now. He kicked his horse to a gallop and rose to the top of the crest where he could look over the valley . . . all that encompassed Norstead. He reined the horse in for a moment, just gazing downward, and his heart swelled in his chest. It really was beautiful here.
For the first time, Norstead began to feel like home to him . . . even without Thorfinn. And he was beginning to understand what Oslac and others meant about the gloominess here. In truth, he knew exactly when it had started: seven years ago when Thorfinn’s wife, Luta, left him, taking their newborn son, Miklof, with her. Thorfinn’s rage and sorrow were like a living shroud about Norstead. It had been deemed that Luta and her merchant lover, along with the infant, had died in a shipwreck. Not that Thorfinn hadn’t continued searching, and in fact, Steven and Thorfinn had been in Baghdad five years later on another futile search. That had been two years ago, and the time and place where Thorfinn had disappeared.
So, yea, there had been a cheerlessness about Norstead caused by Thorfinn’s loss of Miklof and Steven had no doubt carried on the sense of despair for these two years hence, in his case mourning the loss of his beloved brother.
But enough of dwelling on the past. Steven was home, and despite the worry over rescuing his sister, he looked forward to a warm bath, a cold ale, and a soft bed, in that order.
But wait . . . what was that? “Do you see what I see?” he said to Oslac, who came to a halt beside him. On the exercise fields, far below, a barefooted youth in a leather tunic belted over slim braies was engaged in teaching a half dozen young boys how to shoot an arrow good and true.
Oslac nodded. “I wonder who the youthling is. He is really good. Mayhap Geirfinn recruited him from a neighboring clan to join forces here.”
“’Tis not a he. ’Tis a she. And not a youthling, either. Do you not r
ecognize the short blonde hair?”
“Oh good gods!” Oslac looked at him with disbelief.
“Leastways I do not have to feel guilty about having left the woman . . . or creature . . . or whatever the hell she is, untended in a cage.”
“You were feeling guilty?”
“Just a mite. But, Oslac . . . Holy Thor! Did you see that? She just hit the target head-on, then immediately nocked another arrow and split the first arrow in half.”
“Well, this is good news, right? A skilled bowman is always welcome.”
“Nay, it is not good news. Can you see my men fighting alongside a woman? But worse than that, a stranger . . . perchance one sent here by Brodir to spy . . . has had access to all the weapon stores and layout of Norstead’s defenses for the past sennight.”
Steven kicked his horse into a gallop, but not before noticing something else. With her legs spread for balance, the fabric of her braies pulled taut over her rounded buttocks and with sunlight creating a sort of glow about her short golden hair . . . well, he had to admit to being aroused.
Dangerous, dangerous, dangerous! A sly woman could use a man’s lust against him.
Best I be careful. No touching. No kisses. No bedplay.
He could swear he heard laughter in his head . . . or was the laughter coming from that other portion of his body? The one with not a jot of sense.
Chapter 6
Flip that, bozo! . . .
“You need to keep your eye on your target, Naddod,” Rita told the boy, who was only twelve years old but deemed of sufficient age to begin military training. “Forget about watching your bow or arrow. Remember what I said: eyes straight ahead, on your target.”
Naddod did as she instructed, and while the arrow didn’t hit the center of the bale of hay they were using for a target, it was close. The boy jumped up and down and whooped his superiority to his friends, who would take their turns next.