Marriage!
The mere thought was shocking. Annynlea was many things but a foolish and giddy young maiden was not one of them. His only child, she had been raised as a warrior, the only person who could ascend the throne of Hendocia at Eathesfed’s passing. She had been strong and true and brave, as evidenced by her preventing the Northmen to enter the forbidden chamber, which was why her father had been so surprised when she had spoken of the Northman who had no interest in the treasure chamber and only in her.
Eathesfed thought his daughter had gone mad.
But madness had been far from it. As the months passed, Annynlea continued to speak on Rhonan, the prince from across the sea, and how he planned to return for her. Eathesfed could see a longing in her eyes that he had never seen before, something that frightened him. His strong, level-headed daughter had somehow been bewitched by a man who had come to raid their home. Eathesfed was sure she would forget about such a man but more time passed and she never seemed to forget. She would stand on the shore near the great tombs of her ancestors, watching the sea, waiting for this Northman to return.
Even now, she was still on the edge of the sea, waiting and watching.
It would be an eternal quest.
Therefore, Eathesfed thought it simply best to immediately discuss the situation with the Northman who had introduced himself as Rhonan Gray Sword. Annynlea’s Rhonan. A young king that was tall and proud and true – Eathesfed could see it in his eyes. He could also see what had his daughter so enamored; moreover, he could see the same look in Rhonan’s eyes that he had seen in his daughter’s.
Longing, anticipation… and love.
Eathesfed had no idea how it was possible for two people to fall in love in the midst of a battle, but his daughter and the young king had evidently done so. Gazing into the young man’s anxious eyes, he motioned to him.
“Walk with me,” he said quietly.
Rhonan gladly followed the man as he began to head south along the shoreline. He had expected resistance from Annynlea’s father and was prepared with any and all answers to ease the old man’s mind. He recalled, clearly, that Annynlea had told him she would not be able to leave Hendocia because she would rule at her father’s death, and Rhonan had an answer for that as well.
We shall live six months in my land and six months in Hendocia….
“My daughter told me the story of the night of the great raid,” Eathesfed said, cutting into Rhonan’s thoughts. “She said you did not try to kill her in order that you should enter the forbidden chamber.”
Rhonan shook his head. “I did not wish to kill her,” he said honestly. “And my not entering the chamber was not for lack of trying. Your daughter is a fearsome sentinel. She did her job well.”
Eathesfed nodded. “She was gifted that way,” he said. “She was the best warrior in the kingdom.”
Was. Rhonan immediately picked up on the past tense of the word as Eathesfed spoke of his daughter and a hint of warning filled his heart.
“She is a great warrior,” he corrected. “That is why I will marry her. I know it seems inappropriate, even odd, to make such demands, but I assure you that in all of these months, my feelings for your daughter have never changed. I have come to seek your permission to marry her, Great Lord. I swear to you that I will make her a fine husband and I shall be true to her unto my death. She will want for nothing and she will be treated with the utmost respect.”
Eathesfed grunted softly. “Great Lord, you must….”
Rhonan cut him off. “What I am offering is an allegiance between Hendocia and my people,” he said earnestly. “Your daughter will be the queen over two lands. If I did not believe she was worthy of ruling over my people, I would not have asked for her hand. She is clever and kind, and she is fierce in a fight. I know because I have battled her. Will you please give us your blessing, Great Lord?”
Eathesfed had led them down the coast to the City of the Dead, where the tombs of the ancestors sat among the sea grass. The wind kicked the salt up off the sea, filling their nostrils, as Eathesfed came to a halt and faced Rhonan.
“I do not doubt your sincerity,” he said. “The mere fact that you have returned and brought back all of the possessions your men stole on that night tells me that you are a man of honor. But it is a fact that my daughter cannot marry you.”
Rhonan wouldn’t let his denial discourage him or disappoint him. “I understand your concern,” he said patiently. “Your daughter, in fact, had the same concerns. But I assure you that I will make a fine husband. I… I have never forgotten your daughter, Great Lord. I love her, if that makes any difference to you.”
Eathesfed looked at the man, pain rippling through his expression that was just as quickly gone. He started to walk again. “Come with me.”
Puzzled, and trying not to feel disheartened, Rhonan resumed his walk beside the man. He noticed that they were amongst the dead of Hendocia, the tombs along the sea, but it did not concern him, not until Eathesfed came to a rather large and new tomb, made from stone with some growth of sea grass about it. It was square, and bulky, and Eathesfed came to a halt beside it. When he turned to Rhonan, his eyes were moist with emotion.
“And my daughter loved you,” he said hoarsely. “She cannot marry you because she now rests among her ancestors, here in her tomb by the sea. You see, this past winter was quite terrible. Annynlea would stand here on the shores, watching for your return, and she soon caught a great cough from the cold winds that blew off the sea. As the weeks passed, she could not shake it. The physics attempted to treat her with herbs and other things, but she grew weaker. She spoke of you, Rhonan, and I believe it is why she held on so long. She spoke of your return and she was determined to live long enough to see you come for her, but it was not to be. With her dying breath, she asked that I bury her near the sea so she could still watch for you and she asked that I have this flower, these bluebells, carved into her tomb so that you would know she was here. She wanted you to know that she is waiting for you, still. Would that I could give her to you, for I would. It was what she wanted. But all I can give you is my sorrow and this sepulchre by the sounding sea.”
Rhonan was looking at the burial mound by the time Eathesfed finished, seeing the bluebells carved into the stone. Bluebell. Oh, my dear Bluebell….
Tears sprang to his eyes as he looked at the tomb. Sweet Odin, was it possible that she made herself ill waiting for his return, exposing herself to the cold winds of the winter sea so that they eventually killed her? Rhonan could hardly believe it. His heart was crushed by the news, laid to waste by what he was seeing, and he reached out to touch the stone with the flowers carved upon it, knowing that his love lay inside the cold and unfeeling walls.
It cannot be possible!
A sob escaped his lips as he touched the stone with both hands now as if attempting to reach through and touch Annynlea inside. His voice, when he spoke, was tight and faint.
“How…,” he started, swallowed, and spoke again. “How long ago?”
Eathesfed could feel the sorrow from the man, so powerful that it swept out its hand to slap him across the face with it. These were not the tears of an insincere man and Eathesfed knew, in that moment, that Rhonan had not lied.
He had, indeed, loved her.
“I have counted the days,” Eathesfed said softly. “It has been sixty days and two.”
Tears spilled down Rhonan’s face, down his cheeks and onto his neck. He ran his hands over the stone, over the flowers carved within, and his grief knew no bounds. He ended up on his knees beside the mound, his cheek against the stone.
“She waited for me,” he whispered. “I made her promise to wait for me. It was the waiting that killed her.”
Eathesfed shook his head. “It was not the waiting,” he said. “It was the cold. She would not come out of the cold as she watched the sea for the longships.”
Rhonan was swept with guilt, with agony, knowing that she put herself in such a position to wait
for his return that it would put her in harm’s way. The cold wind blew off of the sea, chilling her, killing her. He was beside himself with grief.
“The winds killed her, then,” he said. “Winds sent by the gods. Surely they were jealous of what I felt for her.”
Eathesfed watched the man grieve. “They would not do such a thing,” he said. “What happened was the will of God. Even Annynlea would tell you that.”
Rhonan was not comforted. He was in a swamp of misery, sinking further and further into the quagmire of anguish. He ended up on his arse, sitting by the tomb, leaning against it, his left cheek pressed against the stone. He was trying to be close to her, as close as he could get without physically climbing inside of the tomb with her.
“Mayhap I spoke too much of her and did not pray enough to Odin,” he said. “Mayhap I am being punished for my lack of piety and for my pride. Surely this must have everything to do with me. It could not be her or anything that she did. She suffered punishment for my sins.”
Eathesfed felt a great deal of pity for the young king. Impulsively, he reached out and put a hand on the man’s shoulder.
“She knew you would return,” he said. “She told me to tell you, when I saw you, that she will seek you in the next life. The teachings of Christ tell us that death is not the end and that we ascend to heaven to be with our Lord, but the old ways tell us that life is cyclical. What is old is born new again. I believe that my daughter wished to place hope in those teachings, that she would be born again someday and that she would look for you. Surely… surely true love will never die, Rhonan. Mayhap you should have faith in that.”
Rhonan simply nodded, seated by the tomb, his body pressed against it. Eathesfed knew there was nothing more he could say to ease the man’s pain so he simply left him there, returning to his great house and awaiting Rhonan’s arrival when the man had reconciled himself to Annynlea’s death. It was a sad situation, indeed.
But Rhonan never returned.
Days passed and reports would come from Eathesfed’s men that Rhonan was still by Annynlea’s tomb, never moving, and that his men had come to camp on the shore near him to bring him food, which he would not take. It went on for days and days turned into weeks, and even Eathesfed would emerge from his longhouse and make his way down to the City of the Dead only to watch, from a distance, as Rhonan continued his tragic vigil by his daughter’s tomb. Sometimes the man was sleeping against it but sometimes he was talking to it. Whatever he did, it was clear that he would not leave Annynlea. It was truly a pathetic sight.
But then one morning, the longships that had been anchored offshore suddenly vanished. Surprised, Eathesfed and his men rushed down to the City of the Dead, positive that they would find Annynlea’s tomb violated and her body missing, taken away by her distraught lover. But instead, they found the tomb still sealed as it had been the day Annynlea was put in it. Next to the tomb, however, now appeared a tall pile of rock.
At first, everyone thought it was a monument of some kind, left behind by the grieving Northman. But upon closer inspection, it wasn’t just any rock, at least not any rock that Eathesfed had ever seen. It was tall, seemingly in one piece, and porous, as if salt had been taken from the sea and molded into a great pillar. There weren’t any distinguishing characteristics, like words carved upon it, or much of a shape for that matter. It was simply a tall salt pillar, next to Annynlea’s tomb. But then Eathesfed peered very closely at it and he swore he saw something beneath the top layer of this porous, pale stone. Something was in there and he strained to catch a glimpse.
He swore he saw the hint of a square jawline.
Puzzled, and perhaps a bit frightened, he didn’t say what he thought he saw. He simply told his men that the pillar must have been a tribute to his daughter’s memory left by her Northman lover when, in truth, Eathesfed was fairly certain the pillar was her lover. As Eathesfed’s men cleared out and headed back to the settlement, the king of Hendocia lingered behind, wondering if what he saw was real. Wondering if, in fact, the Northman’s gods had taken pity on his broken heart and had encased him, in salt, to be forever next to his love.
It was a shocking thought, one that went against his Christian beliefs, but there was no other way he could explain the pillar of rock and salt. A man encased. Eathesfed was bewildered but in a strange way, he was also greatly comforted. Annynlea had waited for her Northman to return, every single day until the day she passed away, and now her Northman had come, perhaps he was never meant to leave her again.
“The sea brought him and the sea shall keep him here,” Eathesfed murmured to himself as he envisioned the pillar. “Stand guard, Northman, over my daughter’s tomb. It is where you are meant to be, in death as in life – with her.”
Only the wind and the sea answered him, the crashing of waves and the cries of the seagulls. But it was enough. With a smile on his lips, and a tear of joy in his eye, Eathesfed turned for the settlement, his thoughts lingering over his fierce, stubborn, and loving daughter, and the Northman who had loved her.
A love tale for the ages, he thought. Mayhap they will find one another again, as Annynlea had hoped.
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
Part Eight
~ My Darling – My Life And My Bride ~
The Hendocia Horde.
The young woman was still standing next to the tomb as people from her tour walked past her, talking about something called The Hendocia Horde. They had been over in the settlement area, listening to the guide shout over the wind about the ancient Kingdom of Hendocia and how, back at the turn of the last century, the Victorians began poking around in the ruins and came across an underground vault filled with treasure.
The Hendocia Horde was still, to date, one of the richest archaeological finds in history, second only to Tutankhamun. It was, literally, an Aladdin’s Cave full of ancient gold, at least according to the guide.
Now, the tour for this site was finished and the guide was herding his tour back onto the bus. They brushed past the young woman still standing next to the tomb, heading for the car park where anther tour bus had rolled in and people were emerging from the vehicle, all dressed in yellow rain slickers to distinguish themselves from other tour companies. The young woman noticed the yellow-slickered tourists as they headed towards the seaside tombs and the ruined settlement but she didn’t give them much thought. She was still wrapped up in the story of the young maiden buried by the sea and her lover, the pillar that was lodged beside the tomb, now worn down with the centuries of wind and salt.
The maiden and her Northman lover.
Off to her right, she could hear the boyfriend and his parents bringing up the last of the tour group as they headed to the bus. The mother talked so loudly that it like was listening to the gulls overhead scream; blah, blah, blah is all the young woman could hear as the mother told the boyfriend and his father how she was positive her family came from the Picts along these shores. The young woman moved to the other side of the tomb so they would pass her by, or hopefully just leave her behind, but no such luck. The boyfriend called out to her as they walked past.
“Coming, Annie?” he called.
Annie wanted very badly to ignore him, or tell him that she never wanted to see him again. She didn’t want any more to do with the bossy parents and wimpy boyfriend. But she had to be realistic; looking around, she could see that they were, literally, in the middle of nowhere, so finding a ride back to the hotel might prove to be a challenge.
So she had to go with them unless she wanted to be left out here with no way to get back. The truth was that she really didn’t care much if she made it or not, because her connection to this tomb, to this entire site, was something she’d never experienced before. It was a powerful sense of déjà vu that kept her near the tomb and the odd thing was, she kept looking out to sea as if expecting something, or someone, to make an appearance on the horizon.
Her deep blue
eyes lingered on the distant horizon; how many ships had this coastline seen over the centuries? How many Northmen had come to these shores, raiding and fighting? Except for one Northman; the one who had fallen in love with a daughter of Hendocia. That man had come to stay, according to the legend. Looking at the pillar, she wondered if he was still here.
Annie made her way around the tomb, running her hands on it, feeling that same odd buzzing in her body when she touched the stone that she had felt the first time she’d touched it. An electrical current, she thought. It was the only explanation. What else could that sensation possibly be?
Coming around the corner of the tomb that sat along the path to and from the car park, she noticed all of the tourists in their yellow slickers following a man who was speaking both English and some other kind of language. Some kind of Scandinavian language, Annie thought. The people were pale, fair-skinned, all wrapped up in those yellow slickers as they walked past her, buffeted by the sea wind.
In the distance, she could see the boyfriend and his parents as they headed for the bus, with the boyfriend lifting his hand in her direction to wave her on. Realizing her time with the tomb was now at an end, Annie felt a tremendous sense of loss. She had no idea why she felt so desolate, so sad simply for leaving an ancient tomb behind. She ran her fingers over the bluebells one last time, memorizing the shape and feel, before pulling out her phone and taking several pictures of the bluebells and of the tomb itself.
Now, her bus was honking its horn, calling for her, and she put the phone away with the pictures tucked safely inside on the memory card. She would look at them a lot in the years to come. With one last lingering touch on the tomb, she went back to the footpath and started heading towards the bus.
Annie wasn’t ten feet from the tomb when the last of the yellow slicker group came by her and she happened to glance at the last man and noticed he was carrying bluebells in his hand. The bluebells jolted her and she came to an unsteady halt, look into the face of the man who was carrying them. He was tall, and blond, and decidedly Scandinavian looking. He had a square jaw and a big dimple in his chin.
Sirens of the Northern Seas: A Viking Romance Collection Page 6