Hearts Aflame

by Johanna Lindsey

  But not five seconds after Eda turned back to the hearth, Kristen deliberately moved the heavy cauldron of shelled peas to the edge of the table, where it balanced precariously for half a second. When it crashed loudly to the floor, peas rolling out like a green carpet toward the hearth, her eyes flew not to the mishap she had caused, but remained fixed on the Celt. His was not the only head that turned at the sound of the crash. But his was the only one Kristen saw.

  "God's mercy, wench!" Eda exclaimed behind her. "What ails you to be so clumsy today?" Kristen did not even hear. Her eyes were locked with gray eyes she had never thought to see again. A strangled sound came from her throat, escaping through the hand that covered her mouth. Her other hand pressed against her breasts, for her heart pounded so it hurt. It could not be true! God help her! Selig! Alive!

  She rose from her stool to go to him. He rose from his chair to meet her halfway. At the exact same moment they both came to their senses and stopped. Kristen swung around, her hands now gripping the table behind her to keep her there. Alive! Her eyes closed tightly. Really alive! She breathed deeply, fast and hard, to try to stop the urge she had to scream, to laugh, to cry.

  She couldn't go to him. God help her, she couldn't hold him in her arms. To do so would have him locked away with the others. Yet joy washed over her in rapid degrees and she thought she would burst from it.

  She finally noticed Eda staring at her in bewilderment. On an impulse she leaped forward, grabbing the old woman off her feet and swinging her round and round, laughing at her shrieks. She could laugh at that. She had to have this excuse to laugh. Oh, God, her brother was alive!

  "You are mad, wench! Put me down!" "I am apologizing!" Kristen's smile was brilliant. "For all your advice I did not heed. I concede you are wise beyond your years, Eda. Oh, Eda, I love you!"

  Kristen twirled the old woman once more before she set her down to commence the worst grumbling and scolding Kristen had ever heard before. She smiled through it all as she hurried to collect all the scattered peas, not daring to look again across the hall.

  But across the hall, Selig was also smiling. His search was indeed at an end. He had found Kristen, and she was hail and hearty and making a fool of herself to keep from racing to him. He knew her exuberance. She had knocked him flat on his back more than once when he returned from a sailing trip and she threw herself into his arms in greeting. How she contained herself now was a wonder, but it was a warning, too, of which he was already aware. He could not go to her, could not acknowledge her in any way. Throughout his search he had been tormented with the thought of her death. But she was alive. Alive! "What do you make of that, Royce?" Alden wanted to know.

  They had both watched Kristen behaving most bi-zarrely. "What can I say? She ceases to surprise me with the strange things she does. Nay, she still surprises me, but I am more used to it now." "Well, 'tis strange indeed that she should find such humor in spilling peas." Royce laughed at Alden's disgruntled tone. Several feet away, Selig tensed, seeing the lords watching Kristen. He nudged Seldon beside him. "What do they say?" "They are speaking of the Viking wench." "She is a prisoner here, too?" "Aye, but 'twould be more meet to call her Lord Royce's personal slave, if you know what I mean." Sel-don chuckled. "That is one Viking he has tamed."

  Selig closed his eyes. Beneath the table his hands clenched into fists. He had only feared for her death. Not once had he thought of her ravishment at the hands of these Saxons. His eyes opened slowly, a dark and violent storm gathering there. He was going to have to kill this Saxon lord.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Kristen came to Royce as soon as he stepped into his chamber, her arms going around his neck to drape loosely there, while her fingers played with the hair at his nape. His brow rose questioningly at this unusual display of welcome.

  "Alden tells me you gave him a look earlier that could have smote a man to his knees, and not two hours later, you smiled at him." "Ah, well, milord, I let my hate pour out of me, the last of it, ere I put it to rest." She laughed at his doubtful frown. "I took your warning to heart. Is that so strange?" "From you, aye." "Time will tell." One finger traced circles about his ear. Her eyes were soft, inviting, yet her mind was not in tune with what she was doing. She thought if she did not show some curiosity about his new retainer, he would think that strange too. Casually she said, "I noticed you have a new man. Is that normal, for you to retain strangers?" Her question had the opposite effect from what she sought, arousing his suspicion instead. "You show not one whit of interest in the King of all Wessex, nor his nobles, yet you ask about this Celt. Why is that?" "I was no more than curious, milord. All the women talk of him." "They can talk," he said roughly. '"But you will stay away from him. He hates all Vikings as much as I do." It was time to redirect his thoughts. Her eyes half closed. Her finger came down along the edge of his jaw, then moved up to slide across his lower lip. "Do you, Saxon?" she murmured huskily. "Do you still hate all Vikings?" His answer was to crush her to him with a groan. And Kristen no longer had other things on her mind. But her joy in her brother's return from the dead was prevalent in all she did. Just as she had grabbed Eda earlier because she had to share her joy with someone or burst, she shared it tonight with Royce.

  She was playful and passionate, shy and aggressive. By turns she was the seductress, the virgin, the wild vixen. She was everything to him, until Royce ceased to marvel at the changes. Her throaty laughter, never before heard in his bed, fired his blood to boiling. He took her again and again, and was only vaguely amazed that he could. But when she whispered that she wanted more of him, she tempted his soul. She wrung him dry, and when he finally slept, it was the sleep of the dead.

  Kristen slept too. But with her emotions still so charged, for her it was a fitful sleep, from which she was able to awaken early, long before dawn. She spared only a moment to savor the feeling of being held in Royce's arms. Then she carefully worked herself loose from his hold and quietly dressed in the dark. Intuition told her she would find Selig waiting for her. He was, at the bottom of the stairs. He had waited through the night, sitting with his back to the wall and facing the stairs, sleeping in only short bouts, waking with each little sound he heard. So he had heard her soft tread and was standing when she reached the bottom of the stairs. And he was braced to take the weight of her body, which she did indeed throw at him.

  They held each other fiercely for long golden moments. And then Kristen leaned back to run her hands over his beloved face. She could not see him. All the torches had ceased to burn, and only vague moonlight came in through the open windows. She did not have to see him. "I thought you were dead, Selig." The tears in her eyes were heard in her voice. "I thought you were." His hand caressed her hair, and then he pulled her close again, pressing her head to his shoulder. "It is not manly to cry." "I know." She sniffled, thinking he spoke of her tears, until she felt one of his own fall on her cheek. She smiled, leaning up to kiss his cheek. "Come. We cannot talk safely here." Kristen took his hand in hers and led him around the stairs and to the back door. Like the windows, the door was not locked. Selig hesitated as he stepped outside, expecting to find a sentry on guard.

  Kristen recognized his caution. "I do not think guards patrol. I have been out once before at night and saw no one about the yard. But it is not like these Saxons to be so careless. Mayhap there are patrols outside the walls." "Then we will deal with them when we come to them. Let us be gone, Kristen." She jerked him back when he started to pull her away from the shadows of the hall. "Selig, I cannot leave." "Cannot?" "I gave my word I would not." "By Odin! Why?" She flinched at his tone. "To keep from being chained again." There was silence, and then softly: "Again?" "I had been chained like the others since our capture. My—" "Who is left, Kristen?" he interrupted. She gave him every name, and then waited while he thought of those who had died. She noticed the breeze while she waited, teasing at her hair. She heard the sound of night insects chirping. She felt his pain, but knew it could not be as bad a
s it could have been, for he had thought them all dead.

  At last he said, "Go on." "My own chains were only removed earlier this week when the Saxon's King and his nobles came here. I was harassed by some of the lords, and Royce had my chains taken off so I could look to my own protection while they were here. But they left this morn—or, rather, yester-morn—and my freedom would have been lost again if I did not swear not to try to escape from here." Frustration marked his words. "You condemned yourself willingly to never leave here?" "Nay, I compromised. When Royce weds, I am freed from my word." "When will that be?" "Soon." He relaxed some, digesting that. She felt it in the easing of his grip on her hand. She said, "Now tell me, before I burst. How did you escape? I saw you wounded." "You saw?" "Shush!" she hissed at his raised voice. "Of course I saw. I could not stay on the ship after I heard the sounds of battle. I had to help." "You, help?" She ignored the scorn of that. "So I did not help much. But at least I took down the Saxon who wounded you." "You did!" "Selig!" "Odin's teeth! You could have been killed!" "But I was not. Alas, he was not, either. I only wounded him. He recovered and has since done me a good turn, though I would have still tried to kill him. I am glad now I do not have to." Selig was shaking his head at her, and she added impatiently, "Well, tell me. The last I saw of you, you were lying unmoving on the ground, covered in your own blood." "Aye, my wound was bad. I came to my senses as the carts left, taking the captured away. I had been left with the dead, and as we were all thought dead, no one was left behind to watch. But I did not know if they would return or not for the burials, so I managed to drag myself away from the carnage in case they did come back. I meant to stay hidden in the forest for only a few hours, then to follow and see where you were taken. But as I said, my wound was bad.

  "I lost consciousness again and did not wake until that night. I found myself too weak to even rise at that point. I do not know how long I stayed there. The cursed wound festered. A fever raged, but I recall little of it. I know I left my hiding place at some point. I remember wandering, searching for the Saxons." "As if you could have done much good if you found them," she chided. "My mind did not grasp such logic." He smiled at her. "I only know I kept moving, kept trying to find you and the others before it was too late." "Too late?" "I did not think any of you would be allowed to live. I thought you would be taken to the lord of those Saxons who ambushed us, so that he could dispose of you." "He very nearly did," Kristen admitted softly. "This place, Wyndhurst, has been raided before by Vikings. He lost most of his family in that raid, and has hated Vikings ever since." Selig chuckled. "No wonder he let me stay. I told him the same had happened to me. He must have commiserated." "How could you tell such a story?" she demanded sharply. "God's teeth! He will tear you apart if he finds out who you really are. And to think I only worried that you would be chained and confined with the others if he knew!" He grinned at her surliness. "He will not find out. Ohthere and the others have enough sense not to hail me when they see me." "If they do not faint dead away, as I nearly did," she retorted. "I noticed your quick recovery." He laughed. Kristen hit his chest in exasperation. "Will you just finish your tale!"

  Selig choked back another chortle. "You have lost your sense of humor, Kris." He gave in when she hit him again. "Very well. I have said I wandered. Even now I do not know for how long, nor how long I lay near death the last time my senses left me. I woke up in the hut of an old Celtic woman. It was she and her daughter who found me on their way back from market at Wimborne. It was a day's ride from where they found me to their home farther north." "Where is that?" He shrugged. "I do not think I could find them again. Loki has had a fine time with me. You would not believe how lost I have been." "You had only to find the river," she pointed out. "Aye, so I thought," he said with a measure of disgust. "I was with the old woman for nearly two weeks. She was suspicious of me because of the way I was dressed, and I mumbled in a foreign tongue when I was delirious. But because I also spoke Mother's tongue, which was hers too, she nursed me back to health and even led me to a trader, who took my belt and gold armbands in exchange for these clothes you see and a broken-down horse. She even directed me to the nearest river." "So?" "So that river was so far west of here that I had nearly reached land's end. The problem was that I did not know in which direction I had wandered, or whether I had managed to cross the river somehow in my delirium. I had no way of knowing if the Saxons I sought were east or west of me. And when she directed me west, I assumed I had wandered east. So I went west, to the waste of good time."

  "And when you found that river, you knew you had gone the wrong way?" "Aye. But then I did not know how far from the river I sought, where you and the others would have been taken, so I was forced to stop at every fortified hall as I progressed back this way. I gave the same story to each lord, which stood me well. But I moved on as soon as I ascertained they had no knowledge of Vikings come from the sea. I did not know when I came here that I had found the right place, until the lord admitted they had also been raided this summer." "And your wound is completely healed?" "Aye, it bothers me no more." "Well, it is fortunate you said you were from Devon and not Cornwall, or you would not have been welcomed here." He chuckled. "I learned of the hostility between the Cornish Celts and the Saxons at the first hall I approached. I nearly found myself in chains there, but you know what a golden tongue I have." "Aye, I know it. Oh, Selig, I am so happy now—"

  His fingers at her lips stopped the rush of her exuberance. "Make me as happy, Kris. Tell me you suffered no ravishment by these Saxons." "Ravishment? Nay, I have not been ravished." She did not give him a chance to feel relief. "But I have been well and truly bedded by Lord Royce." Air hissed through his teeth, but she quickly put her fingers to his lips, as he had to hers. "Do not say something that will make me sorry for speaking plainly to you, Selig. I think I love the Saxon. I am more sure about wanting him. I have wanted him from the first... well, mayhap not that soon. But I was fascinated by him from the first, when he rode into the yard where we were all chained, and looked at us with such loathing. He gave the order we should all die. But he had changed his mind by the next day and came out to tell us we would be put to work building his stone wall."

  "We? He put you to such work?" She laughed. "Aye. Thorolf and the others helped to disguise me. I was thought a boy, and that lasted for about a week. But the men could not keep it straight that I was supposed to be a boy. They kept helping me, and I think that is what gave me away, or at least it drew too much attention to me. The Saxon concluded that they protected me because I must be their leader. Anyway, that is what led to his finding out I was a woman, and I was moved into the hall then." "And into the Saxon's bed?" She hit him solidly in the belly for that. He bent over double with a loud whoosh. "Thor's bones, Kristen! Have a care!" "Then you have a care what tone you use," she warned angrily. "I am a woman full grown. I am not answerable to you for what I do. And I did not go right to his bed." She was not going to tell him everything she had told Thorolf. She ended more quietly, "The truth is, he resisted me." "What?" His amazement made her grin despite her annoyance with him. "God's truth. I knew he wanted me, but he fought it. No man has ever resisted me before." "Well I know it, for how many heads have I clobbered for their lack of resistance?" She couldn't help but giggle at that. "But the Saxon did fight his attraction to me, and the more he did, the more I came to want him. I deliberately tempted him, Selig." That was hard to admit to one's brother, but she wasn't going to have him blaming Royce for seducing her, when it was in fact the other way around. "Two weeks ago the victory was mine—he took me to his bed. I have slept in his chamber ever since. I just came from there now."

  "You really love him, Kris?" "I must. I do not agree with everything he does. I have been furious with him many times. But I could not hate him, not even for chaining me, when I hated those chains more than anything." "And what does he feel for you?" "I do not know. I have his protection. He has shown some concern for me. But that is no more than he would give any posse
ssion of his. Yet he did naught to me when I tried to escape. And I know he did not really like chaining me. I just do not know," she finished. "Does he still want you?" "Aye, that has not changed." "Then—" "He will still marry someone else." "Aye, you did mention that," he said, then suddenly exploded. "By Odin, nay! He will marry you." She shook her head at him. "Selig, I am his slave. To his thinking, why should he marry me when he already has me in his possession?" He grunted. "Father could tell him a thing or two about that." Laughter glittered in her eyes. "Aye, he could, but he is not here to." "Then I could—" "But you will not, for Royce is not to know you are my brother, at any cost." "Then what do you do, Kris?" Her chin hardened. "I will enjoy this man while I can. When he weds, I will leave here." "Just like that? Even though you love him?"

  "What else can I do? At least you are here now to help me escape when I am ready. And if you can help the others to get away any sooner, do so. You can come back forme." "So be it." She clasped his face in her hands and kissed him. "Thank you, Selig, for not scolding." He squeezed her tight. "As you said, you are not answerable to me. But Odin help you when you try to explain all this to Father." "Oh, unfair, to remind me of that!" she cried. He whacked her bottom playfully. "Come, we have been out here too long." The sky had begun to lighten, too much. "Aye." She stepped back to the door, but hesitated there, touching his cheek once more. "I will not speak to you again for a while. And do not be surprised if I ignore you completely in the hall. He has already warned me to stay away from you." He chuckled. "He probably thinks I will harm you if I know you are a bloodthirsty Viking." "Whatever his reason, his anger is not pleasant, so do be careful, Brother." They were extremely quiet in entering the hall, to no purpose. Royce was there, angrily kicking several of his men awake. He stopped when he saw her. And then his eyes narrowed dangerously when he saw Selig beside her.