Nils sat and leaned his head on her lap. When she gasped at his brazen motion, he smiled up at her. “Then Tuthill is a greater gaurr than I had guessed.”
“Oh, don’t use that word!”
“Why not?”
Linnea quickly explained how she had used it by accident while talking with Randolph. When Nils began to laugh, she could not help doing the same. “You are a bad influence on me, Nils Bjornsson.”
“And you still cannot speak my name correctly.” He put his finger against her lips to halt her reply. “Do not say that you will not speak it again, because I have come to enjoy the sound of it in your voice, unnasta.”
She laughed again, hoping that it would hide the pulse of delight that coursed through her each time he used that endearment. She was silly to let him entwine her life with his even a moment longer than necessary, but she would be even more foolish to throw aside this ephemeral joy simply because it was fleeting.
“When we are alone,” she said, but she delighted in any chance to bring a smile to his lips. Or more importantly, to bring his lips to hers. “When we are alone, I shall use the name you first gave to me when I found you on this beach.”
Linnea gasped when Nils stood and walked back toward the center of the cove. Jumping to her feet, she went after him. Sand coursed into her slippers, but she ignored it.
He raised his hand as she neared, and she stopped more than an arm’s length from him. Why was he trying to keep her distant?
“It was here,” he said.
She scanned the low cliffs burgeoning from the strand and recognized the pattern of colors in them. “Yes, it was right here that you were when I found you.” Mayhap it was not her he was trying to keep away, but anything to do with this time that was not his.
“It was here that I was meant to die.”
“No!” she cried. “If you had been meant to die, you would not be here alive now.”
Turning to her, he grasped her shoulders. “It is not that simple.”
“I know that. You shouldn’t even be here, but you are! There must be a reason.”
“My chieftain’s knife—”
“Could have been returned to him by someone else.”
Nils shook his head. “The duty was mine. It remains mine.” His gaze drilled her as he added, “It was here that I asked Freya to send her Valkyrja to take me from the beach to Valhalla or...”
“But you are here, not in some paradise.”
“Yes.”
Linnea frowned. Nils was occasionally taciturn, but never more so than when she brought up questions about how he had been brought to this place and this time. Mayhap it was simply that he did not know, and he was bothered by what he could not understand.
“You are more accepting of your peculiar circumstances than I would be,” she said.
“I have no choice.” His hands glided down her arms until his fingers laced through hers. “But I did give Freya a choice that day. I asked her to send me to Valhalla or to send me help to find my chieftain’s knife. You see the results?”
“I have told you that I would help you, Nils.”
His lips quirked as she used his real name, but his voice lashed her. “How soon can we leave for London?”
“Papa has been talking about taking the family there before summer’s end. When he goes, we can go.”
“That will be several more weeks from now.”
“I am sorry. I explained why I could not go with you.” She drew her hands out of his. “I wish I could recall when I had seen the knife like the one you have described. I know it was at the home of someone we know well, for I must have seen it more than once if I remember it, so why can’t I remember where I saw it?”
“Loki.”
Linnea looked up in amazement. “Please, do not muddle things more with nonsense.”
“It is not nonsense. Loki seeks every opportunity to trick us mortals for his own amusement.”
“But me? Even if I believed in that silliness, which I don’t, I am not of the Norrfoolk.”
Nils bit back his retort. Why should he expect Linnea to believe in the old ways? He had seen that what he considered true was now dismissed as mythology. If he spoke of his conversations with the gods which once had been worshiped here as well as in the northern lands, he would be considered mad. Maybe even by Linnea, and he could not risk her questioning his story. She must be the guide Freya had sent to him. Otherwise, there was no reason why he had come to this time and this place.
Except...His gaze devoured the tempting curves that were revealed so lusciously when the rising breeze pressed her gown back against her. When he was with her, alone as they were now, he did not wish to think of anything but her. She could be both his guide and his betrayer, for she stole his thoughts from his quest.
Was this fascination with her another trick perpetrated by Loki? The wizard exulted in confusing mortals until they completely lost their way. Nils must not allow that to happen.
Linnea held out her hand to him. “Scamp is barking as if he found something interesting. Shall we see what it is?”
“Yes.” He slipped his hand into hers. “After all, that is how you found me.”
“I hope Scamp has not found anything that unexpected again.”
Her smile caressed him, inviting him to sample her lips. She did not offer him the chance as she led him toward where the puppy barked excitedly. Maybe she had guessed Nils’s thoughts, because she chattered on like a spring bird meeting the morning. She spoke of the days when she and her siblings had enjoyed playing on this beach while their governess and tutors watched.
She smiled as she drew her hand out of his and ran to where Scamp was still yelping at a crab that had been washed up onto shore. “Scamp, leave the poor beast alone.” Picking up a branch, she tossed it along the edge of the water. The puppy took after it with glee.
“Your dog is not only a great hunter but offers you protection against such wild beasts.” Nils squatted. He lifted the crab from the sand and flung it back into the waves. “You are fortunate to have grown up here.”
“I am. As I told you, any time we have traveled from home, I have always been delighted to come back here.”
“As I was always glad to see my home whenever I went a-viking.”
Her smile disappeared. “When you came here to attack England.”
“This was to be my last trip to Britannia.” Standing, Nils drew his knife from the waist of his breeches. “I made the vow to complete my search for my chieftain’s blade and be done with the life I had taken as mine when I was little more than a boy.”
She glanced uneasily at the long blade. If she had thrown it into the sea instead of giving it to Jack to hide in the stable...Berating herself was futile, because she knew Nils would have found some weapon to wear as had been his custom.
“I don’t understand,” she said as his words echoed through her head, forcing her to pay attention to them instead of the honed blade that glistened in the dimming sunlight. “Why weren’t you going to go a-viking any longer?”
“I was hoping to go west to Iceland.”
She shivered. “Iceland? I have never wanted to go there. It sounds dreadful.”
“But it is not. My brother went to Iceland and returned to tell of the rolling meadows that were spread in valleys beneath smoking mountains, and the hordes of fish in the cold waters.”
“Brother?” They had spoken of his dead wife, but Linnea wondered why she never had given much thought to the rest of the family he had left in the past. Family and friends and allies and enemies. Looking toward the chimneys of Sutherland Park, visible above the sea cliffs, she tried to imagine how it would be to lose all that was familiar and to know that she might be separated from her family forever. She could not imagine it.
“My brother Hastein told me wondrous stories of the people who lived in Iceland. They were creating a government that was ruled by the freemen who lived there. They have no kings like the ones who fight to claim al
l of the lands of the Norrfoolk.” His lips twisted as he put the knife back in his waistband. “I should say they had no kings. I thought I would be accustomed to this change by now.”
“So why did you come to England this time? I know you were looking for your chieftain’s knife, but why did you make that vow when you wanted to go to Iceland?”
“I had to atone for our family’s disgrace before I could think of my future.”
“Disgrace? What disgrace?”
“The disgrace that was put upon us when Hastein stole our chieftain’s blade, embarrassing him.”
Linnea sat on a nearby rock. “Your brother took the knife? You never mentioned that before.”
“It is something that I wish I never had to say. Hastein believed that our chieftain was more concerned about his own grasping for power than leading our people.” He lowered his eyes for the first time since she had met him. Shame rang through his voice when he added, “For his actions, my brother was outlawed. He took Kortsson as his friend, which is why it is possible that my blood-enemy has the knife that Hastein stole.”
“So you vowed to recover the knife to restore your family’s honor?”
“Yes.”
Rising, she put her fingers against his cheek and turned his face toward hers. “I am so sorry that this has not come about as you had hoped, Nils. It seems that the Fates are determined to make your search more difficult than anyone could have imagined it would be.”
“Not fate, but the gods. I know you do not believe in their powers, but they exist.”
“Tell me more about Iceland.” Linnea did not want to change the subject, for she wanted to learn more about the private man he hid so often behind his blustery exterior. “Why did you want to go there?”
“It was a place where a man might be free to make a life for himself. The laws were few, and they were made by the people themselves at the annual meeting called an Althing where people came together and decided how the island should be governed.”
“Like our Parliament?”
“Save that, from what your father has said, you send others to represent you. At the Althing, it is said that any free man can speak.” He smiled at her as he walked to a nearby stone. He scooped out some dark material, and she realized it was his coat that he had set aside when he came to the beach. “Any free woman can speak as well. Even a slave might be heard if the claim was deemed worthy.”
“A woman could be heard?”
“The ways of the Norrfoolk required women to make important decisions while their men were a-viking. Why should they be denied that privilege when their men came back home?”
She laughed. “That is so different from what I know. A woman might oversee her husband’s estate while he is away on business or personal matters, but when he returns to that estate his wishes dominate.”
“Your ways are different.”
“Your ways are different.”
“Isn’t that the same as what I just said?”
She shook her head and chuckled. “I mean that your ways now are different from what they would have been if we had met in your time. If I had had the misfortune to stumble over you on the beach as I did, we would not speaking like this.”
“No, for I would not have been restrained by your customs. I might have been weakened by my wounds, but not so weak that you could have slain me.” His smile became predatory, and she backed away a half-step in spite of herself.
He matched her pace. Pulling off her bonnet, he loosened her hair. He caught her hands when she reached up to halt him. Twisting her arm behind her back, he tugged her to him. His grip was not painful until she tried to back away. She froze, and he eased his hold on her arm, but not enough so she could escape.
“Nils, are you out of your mind?” she gasped.
“You would not ask that if we stood here, face-to-face, in my time.” His finger slid along her throat. “I would have seen you dead for standing in my way.” His finger edged lower to settle over her heart. “This fierce pulse would have been from fear.”
“Please stop this,” she whispered, wondering if her heart pounded with fear now, or from something else altogether? The resonance of his touch pierced her even more savagely than a blade.
“Do you think I would have heeded such a request?”
“We are not in your time. We are in my time now.”
“But I am not of this time. When I stand here on this beach where I faced English warriors and watched my comrades fall to mingle their blood with our enemies’, I think of what might have happened if you had chanced upon me at that moment.”
“You have already said. You would have killed me.”
“I am not so certain of that. Maybe I would have taken you as my traell back to the land of the Norrfoolk.”
“Traell? What is that?”
“A captive slave.” His voice grew low and rough. “Unnasta, you have a word in your language now that I have heard others use. A word that is much like traell. Enthrall. It means captivated, doesn’t it?”
She met his hungry gaze as she whispered, “Yes.”
“Then you would have been my traell while I was enthralled with you.” His finger swirled along her breast, and she gasped at the powerful need rising through her. She gripped his sleeve, knowing she should halt him, but unwilling to lose even a second of this bliss.
Again he swept her against the hard line of his body. He pressed his mouth against the sweaty stickiness along her neck. “You taste wondrous, unnasta.”
“You should not...We should go back to the house.” A rumble of thunder was nearly drowned out by her raging pulse as he bent to let his lips follow the path his finger had.
With a moan, she curved her hands up his back, only realizing he had released her arm when her fingers splayed across his hard muscles. She gasped his name when his mouth moved along her bodice. When he put his hand on her sleeve and began to lower it along her arm, she stared up into his fathomless eyes that blazed with savage, primitive emotions. Knowing she should look away, she could not. Being dishonest in his arms was something she could not conceive of. She wanted to be swept into this wild rhapsody of rapture. She closed her eyes when he pulled her even closer before bending to let his fiery tongue glide along the curve of her breast.
She clasped his face between her hands. Bringing his mouth to hers, she feasted on his lips. His fingers tangled in her hair, but she barely noticed. Every sense was centered on his kiss and the spot where his bare chest pressed against her skin that had been moistened by his kiss.
Light flashed. Thunder shook the shore so hard that the ground rumbled beneath Linnea’s feet. With a gasp, she stepped away. Nils whirled her back against him as the storm swirled around them. No tempest flinging itself upon the sea could be as strong as the fired winds of passion surrounding them.
When lightning struck the water not far from where they stood, Nils whispered, “Where can we find shelter?”
“The house—”
“At the house, we cannot continue this.” His fingers stroked her breast.
Rain slashed at them before she could answer. With a gasp, she ran along the shore to retrieve her bonnet as it skittered away before the wind. She laughed when Scamp caught it before she could. Taking it from the puppy, she put it on her already soaked hair.
She turned and discovered Nils just behind her. He said nothing. He did not move. The choice was all hers. He had made up his mind.
“My family will be anxious,” she said, looking up at him through the rain.
“That you are out in this storm or that you are out in this storm with me?”
She grasped his strong forearms that were now covered with the dark wool of his coat sleeves. “You are here in order to preserve your family’s honor. Would you have me dishonor my family?”
“There is no dishonor in wanting us to be one.”
“In this time, there is for me.”
He started to reply, then his arm slipped around her shoulders. She
was startled when he set his coat over her drenched gown to protect her from the blustery wind swirling the rain. The odor of wet wool surrounded her, but it was not unpleasant because the coat also held his scent. He turned her toward the path leading back to the house.
“We will return to your father’s house,” he whispered. “We will reassure them that you are unharmed.” His rakish smile returned as he climbed up on the rocks and offered his hand to assist her up. When she stood beside him, he said, “Once we have shown them you are safe, surely your father will feel obligated to repay me for protecting his daughter.”
“Papa will be grateful.” She watched her footing as she went from rock to rock. Stepping onto the path, she waited for Nils to do the same.
He jumped down from a boulder and swung her up against him. “I can think of no better way for him to repay me then by agreeing for you to stay with me tonight.”
“I do not think he will be that grateful.”
“And what of you, unnasta?”
Linnea pulled out of his arms again, although she wanted to remain there. “I did not think you would wish me to feel anything as tepid as gratitude.”
“I want you to savor every emotion as I savor every bit of you.” He captured her face in his hands and kissed her hard. “Come to my bed tonight, unnasta.”
“Tonight?”
“Why not?”
“Nils...” Her voice trailed away, as she could not tell him no when her heart shouted that she accept. “If it were possible...”
He laughed. “It is very possible.”
“Not now. Not with me.” She put her hand up to his face, then flinched as the lightning exploded across the sky again.
Without speaking, he took her hand and ran with her along the path toward the house. Scamp raced after them, barking with excitement. She faltered as she stepped into a puddle. Nils laughed again. Sweeping her up into his arms, he continued up the path.
“I can walk...or run,” she protested.
My Lord Viking Page 18