Rolf had talked Meredith into signing papers to take over temporary guardianship of Thea, and the girl was already enrolled in the local junior high school. Meredith suspected he'd been so persistent because he feared for her state of mind when he left her behind.
But she wouldn't dwell on those depressing ideas today.
Rolf glanced up suddenly and caught her staring at him. He'd told her as dawn broke today that the best thing about making love in the morning is that you feel like you have a secret all day long. He was right.
The rogue winked, as if reading her thoughts.
She took the bread over to the cooks and asked about the progress of the Maine lobsters and side of venison thing baked in a pit filled with layers of moist grass and red-hot rocks. She tasted the skyr, a form of Norse cheese curd being made on the spot by Frank and Henrietta Burgess.
The elderly couple, obviously still in love after all these years, also showed her how they'd prepared the flat oak cakes baking on the open fire.
"It was a beautiful ceremony," Henrietta gushed, tears brimming in her eyes.
"And I congratulate you on a job well done with this project," Frank added. "When your grandfather first formed this foundation, I had reservations. I never envisioned that the project would encompass so much more than just the shipbuilding and voyage. Though that in itself is an admirable achievement."
Meredith's jaw dropped open in astonishment at the praise coming from this unexpected quarter.
"What you've pulled off here, my dear, is a true students learning experience for college," he went on. "History, culture, sociology, language, anthropology—"
"Don't forget women in his studies," his wife piped in.
"That, too." Frank laughed. "But, really, Meredith, I'm hoping you'll consider staying here in Maine and making this a continuing project."
"Oh, I don't know about that."
He put up a hand. "Now, now, just think about it."
She nodded and proceeded around the clearing, pondering that interesting suggestion. As she stopped and chatted with the various people, all dressed in period costumes as required in their invitations, her gaze kept returning to Rolf, again and again. And each time, he was watching her, love shining openly in his eyes.
This time he walked up to her and linked her hands with his, drawing her over to the side. Dog came trotting after him.
"What is that in Dogs mouth?"
"Oh," Rolf said, unconcerned, glancing down at the huge mutt, "it's Oreos."
"You fool! You shouldn't be feeding a dog cookies."
"I shouldn't?"
"No. Especially not chocolate. It's better if he eats the dry dog food I bought for him."
He pondered a moment, but then seemed to disregard her opinion. "Have you e'er sampled that dog meal, Merry-Death?"
"Have you?" she choked out.
"Well, of course. Dost judge me so cruel that I would give your pet something I wouldn't eat myself.? And I tell you true, it tastes worse than dried cod on a North Sea voyage."
She retched.
He chucked her under the chin. "I was eating with you, Merry-Death. I fed only one Oreo to Dog because he loves them, just as I do. Almost as much as I love you. "
Now that was a love declaration for the poetry books. And the heart. Love and Oreos.
Really, she thought, you gotta love a Viking.
Chapter Seventeen
For the next three weeks, their love blossomed and unfurled like the sails on the Viking longship that neared completion in her yard.
Meredith had never been so happy in all her life, or so miserable. She often awakened in the middle of the night and wept silent tears, knowing the sands of her happiness were slowly sifting away.
She didn't question his decision to leave anymore. In a way, she understood. But she didn't want to put a damper on the little time they had left, so Meredith tried to put on a cheerful face even as she was self-destructing inside. With increasingly exposed nerves, she walked a tightrope whenever in Rolf's company.
"Was I wrong to have forced you into this?" Rolf asked as he pulled her closer into the cradle of his arms. They were lying side by side on the sofa. Thea had gone to the mall for some Sunday afternoon hanging-out with girlfriends she'd met in the neighborhood. Dog snored contentedly in the corner on his very own bed furs.
"Watching the zillionth episode of Home Improvement! Yes, you were wrong. Tsk-tsk," she tutted, pointing at the TV screen where Tim Taylor was explaining to his wife Jill why big breasts were God-given male magnets.
"Not that," Rolf chuckled, and then turned serious. "Was I wrong to force you into marrying me? Was I wrong to force you into sharing these last weeks together, knowing we had no future?'' He took her chin in hand so that she had to meet his gaze. "Mike speaks often of the pain of losing his wife, even after two years, but he says that having her, for even a short time, was a blessing, something he would ne'er regret. I thought.. . well, I thought 'twould be the same for us. Now I wonder, though, if I erred in judgment."
Meredith stiffened and would have bolted if she weren't trapped against the back of the sofa. Rolf was going to insist on the conversation she'd been avoiding for weeks, ever since their marriage.
He saw her panic and soothed her by gently stroking wisps of hair off her face. The loving concern in his golden eyes tore at her heart strings and brought tears to her eyes.
"Don't, sweetling. Don't," he coaxed hoarsely, kissing her eyelids closed.
"No, you weren't wrong, Rolf," she confessed with a sigh of resignation. "I wouldn't have traded these wonderful weeks with you for anything. Marrying you—" she gulped to get the words past the huge lump in her throat "—marrying you was the best thing I've ever done in my life."
" 'Tis the same for me, dearling. Sometimes... sometimes—" He fought for the right words. "It's as if I have so much caring for you here that my heart nigh bursts." To demonstrate, he put her palm against his chest, where his heart thudded under her fingertips. "I ne'er imagined loving a woman—really loving a woman—would feel like this."
She couldn't have spoken if she'd tried.
Rolf continued. "Time races so fast these days. I even unplugged your wall clock in the scullery yester-morn. 'Twas lackwitted, I know, to play such games with myself, as if I could stop time." He shook his head sadly at his whimsy. "At night, I lie awake looking at you as you sleep. I have this overpowering urge to grasp each moment... to store the memories."
"Hah!" she said, trying to lighten Rolf's sober mood, though his words touched her deeply. "You probably just needed a breather between bouts of making love. You are insatiable, you know?"
"Do you complain, my lady?" he grumbled with mock ferociousness, arching a brow.
Even though he jested, it amazed Meredith how vulnerable he was and how much reassurance he needed all the time. Despite their vast differences, they were alike in that regard.
"Not in the least," she answered, blinking back tears as she traced the line of his strong jaw with her fingertips.
"Well, I should hope not," he said huffily, leaning down to take a chastising nip at her exposed shoulder. She was wearing only the pink teddy, and Rolf a pair of white boxer shorts covered with red hearts—a post-wedding gift. "Especially since I shared with you the secret of the famous Viking S-spot, which even you agreed was far superior to your modern G-spot."
She laughed and jabbed him playfully in the ribs. How many times these past precious days had they made each other smile in the midst of making love? Meredith had never realized that sex could be so much fun. "You've spoiled me, Rolf. I don't think I'll ever be satisfied with any other man now."
His face went somber again. "I feel the same, heartling."
"You'll probably be boating right off to Sweet Alyce the Slut the minute you get home." She'd intended her tone to be teasing, but her voice broke at the end.
"Nay, I'll not be seeing Alyce again. That I vow to you."
"Oh, Rolf, don't make me promise
s like that. I don't expect you to be celibate for the rest of your life. It will be hard for me when you go—very hard—but—''
"Shhh," he said, kissing her lips lightly. "I wish I could spare you the pain. If I could stay, I would. If I had not made an oath to my father—"
"No," she said, putting two fingertips to his lips. "You can't stay. I know that now. There's no sense playing the 'what-if' game. You'd become like a caged animal in a contemporary setting, always pretending, always lying for fear someone would connect the dots of all your strange words and perspectives on history."
"Do you say I could not adapt?" he asked, bristling.
She shook her head at his pride. "Oh, you might change, adapt to these times, lose your primitive, Viking identity. That would be nice for me ... a way to keep you here, but—"
" 'Twould certainly be true to the tradition of my fellow Norsemen, who have no trouble melding into the societies of the countries they settle. 'Tis why no separate Viking culture has lasted through the centuries, I warrant."
"Believe me, Rolf, I've thought about ways you might be able to conform to modern society. A 'Last Viking,' so to speak."
He grinned. ' 'Lust Viking?''
"You silly fool! I said 'Last Viking,' not 'Lust Viking,' " she remarked dryly, "though it would be an appropriate appellation in your case."
"Last or lust. It matters not. If I had no obligations to the past, I would stay, Merry-Death, do not doubt that. And I'd manage to adapt. For you, I could do anything."
"But would it be what you really wanted? I'm not even sure anymore that it's what I want. Think about it. You in a three-piece suit, carrying an electronic organizer. You mowing the lawn and jogging off extra pounds on a Stairmaster. You playing golf or speeding about the ocean in a powerboat. You buying insurance and growing old."
Rolf had rented a sailboat the day before to take her and Thea out for an afternoon on the ocean. If ever Meredith had doubted his expertise with boats, or his love of the open waves, she knew better now. He wasn't a man who'd accept being landlocked for long.
She sighed deeply. "As much as I yearn for you to stay, I just can't picture you in any modern role."
He sighed, too. " 'Twas the same when I tried to imagine you in my time. You cracking ice off a fjord stream in the midst of winter to tote water into my farmstead. You taking on the subservient role of women in my society. You waiting idly at home whilst I go off a-Viking or trading. You cooking over a hearth. You growing old far too young under the strain of a harsh life."
Meredith knew he painted a deliberately bleak picture. He failed to mention cold winter nights when they'd be bundled together under the bed furs. Or the fact that he would take great joy in introducing her to the beauty of his land. Not to mention the fact that she could go on trading voyages with him. And what if... oh, what if she were able to bear his children in another lifetime?
She exhaled wearily. It was useless to dream of the impossible.
"The bottom line is, you can't stay," Meredith said firmly, hoping to put an end to the discussion. "You would start to hate yourself for what you'd consider a dishonorable choice—reneging on your father's mission, letting hundreds of people die in a famine that you might be able to stop. As ridiculous as the notion is that a restored relic could halt an act of nature, I can't argue the point. After all, a talisman belt and a mystical occurrence in the sky caused you to travel through time."
"I have to go back," he agreed.
"And the alternative—my traveling in time with you—is equally impossible. I accept that now."
He patted her hand comfortingly. "The celestial fates decreed my adventure, and I feel certain they designed the time portal for me, and me alone."
"You don't have to convince me anymore, Rolf. When you asked what I'd do if I were able to travel back with you and then you died, I asked myself whether I would want to live in the tenth century without you. The answer was 'no.' Bad enough being abandoned in the twentieth century!"
He flinched at the word abandon. "Then you're reconciled to my departure?" he asked.
She nodded.
" 'Tis as a noted philosopher once said. 'Tis better to have experienced the joy of love, despite the pain of parting." He paused and tilted his head in concentration. "I think 'twas Will-son, the neighbor on Home Improvement who spoke the words. Or was it Ernie on Sesame Street? I misremember now."
She frowned, and then burst out giggling. "Oh, you dolt! That was Tennyson, and the exact quote is: ' 'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.' "
"Tennis-son, Will-son, Ernie"—Rolf waved a hand dismissively—"they are all great thinkers, like the skalds of my time." Then his eyes twinkled mischievously at her as he trailed a forefinger from the center of her chin down her neck, over her breastbone, skimming the silk fabric of her teddy till his fingertip pressed into her navel. ' 'Have I shown you the famous Viking X-spot?"
Had he ever! "About five times. Or was that the equally famous Viking Y and Z spots?"
"Which are not to be confused with that age-old S-spot, of course," he reminded her.
She grinned sadly at him, finding it harder and harder to banter when her heart was breaking. "I must say I'm rather partial to X."
"Ah, well, 'twould seem a Viking's job is ne'er done.'' He sighed as if vastly overburdened. Then, jiggling his eyebrows at her, he boasted, "Did I e'er explain how a Norseman practices his alphabet?'' Meredith laughed then. But inside she was crying.
By the following week, Geirolf s longship, Fierce Dragon, was completed, and the major portion of the Trondheim Venture vessel had been finished, as well. Oh, the school project had many weeks of finishing work to be done, but Mike and the students could handle that type of labor themselves. They'd even contracted with a skilled sailing expert from Annapolis, Maryland, to captain the vessel in August, when it would be launched for the voyage to Norway.
But he wouldn't be here then. Tomorrow, the Demon Moon would appear again, and he would be gone.
He should have been elated that the day had arrived at last. Instead, he was dying inside at the prospect. Unbelievably, this time and place—mostly, this woman, Merry-Death—had become his home. But he was trying his best to hide his inner turmoil from Merry-Death. He didn't want to spoil their remaining time together.
Leaning on a braced elbow in their bed furs, he watched his wife sleep. Four times this night he'd made love to her with feverish desperation, and he would wake her soon to cleave onto her one last time. Though he would never admit as much to Merry-Death, he'd coupled more times with her these past weeks than he ever had with any one woman, and still 'twas not enough.
He'd prepared methodically for his time travel tomorrow night. His small longship had already been transported by truck to a docking site a few miles down the coast.
He'd mapped out a route whereby he would be able to maneuver his small ship with a single mast, wooden rudder, yardarm, and square sail. He needed no modern compass, knowing from years of experience how to map his journey by following landmarks, stars, the presence of certain seabirds and their lines of flight. He wished he had the traditional two ravens to carry aboard, both to appease the gods and to give notice of nearby land, but, to his amazement, there were no ravens available for sale in Maine. If he hit a storm, he'd never manage on his own. But, from the start, this mission had been in the hands of the gods. So be it now.
Assuming the time travel worked, he'd be back in his own time twenty-four hours from now. Would it be the same night then as when he'd passed forward, or would it be a month later? Would he find some of his men drifting at sea? Or would he make a solitary trip to Greenland, or even Iceland, where he'd hire on men to sail with him to Britain and then his homeland?
He'd already lost one month's time chasing after Storr Grimmsson. If he'd lost another month with his time travel, and it took another month to return to Britain, that would be three months since he'd left his father's side. How many of his countrymen wou
ld have lost their lives in the famine during that time? Would an earlier end to his mission have made any difference?
So many questions! It was all such a risky venture. Impossible, really. But his coming here in the first place had been impossible, too.
All Mike and the students knew was that they were taking the ship out for a trial run tomorrow afternoon, that it would be anchored, and that he wanted to stay aboard overnight by himself to test its watertightness. Mike and the students would return to shore on motorboats he'd leased. Presumably, they would find the wreckage of his ship the next day and conclude he'd drowned.
Not a completely believable explanation, but it would do. He hated the distress this deception would cause Thea, Mike, and the students, but he saw no other alternative.
Like a man preparing for his death, he'd made arrangements this past week for when he would be gone.
Thea—who slept even now in the keep bedchamber whilst they were in the longhouse—would live with Merry-Death; so, his wife would not be alone. He'd checked and double-checked the Trondheim ship and pecked out numerous notes to Mike on the come-pewter keyboard so that it could be finished without his supervision. And he'd helped interview the man who would captain the vessel on its journey to Norway this summer.
All of the modern purchases he'd made, especially the power tools, he'd instructed Merry-Death to give to Mike. He still thought Merry-Death should accept the Home Improvement show's offer to participate in her project, but the stubborn wench dug in her heels when it came to his idol, Tim Allen.
There was one contingency he'd been unable to control. Even though Merry-Death claimed to be barren, he'd hoped—in fact, he'd prayed—that his seed would take, even knowing he'd never see his own babe. He would have given her that gift, gladly. Especially after they'd watched the Starman video about a man from another planet who'd given an earth woman his child in parting. And if travel through time was possible, why not the miracle of birth? But, alas, Merry-Death had told him earlier today that she suffered stomach cramps, the beginning of something called pea-amiss.
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