Far After Gold

by Jen Black

  Emer looked up. A dog peered over the edge of the cliff, and froth from its jaws floated down and narrowly missed her face. The dog was a long way above her. She would likely die here, and for what? Was her pride really worth her life? Well, it was too late now. The chance with Flane had gone.

  She hugged her knees and rested her chin on her kneecaps. Life was a strange thing, but death would be even stranger. A dog whined, another answered. They were as puzzled as Emer. They weren’t used to their prey disappearing over the edge of cliffs.

  Emer looked up at the sky and wondered if the dogs would really have torn her limb from limb. She shivered. The breeze was colder here in the shadows above the sea, and she no longer had the exertion of walking to keep her warm. Wrapping her long skirts around her ankles, she wished for warmer clothing, and snuggled her hands into her armpits.

  It was all very well to declare that she would rather die than give in and accept Flane’s offer, but she hadn’t really expected to be tested. Part of her wished she had given in. Chastising herself for such weakness, she shut her eyes. At once, a vision of Flane, poised on the wooden platform of the bathing place, intruded on her thoughts. She would never see him again, clothed or unclothed. She would never dare put her hands on his shoulders, touch her lips to his or feel that strange, alarming frisson of excitement run through her whenever he happened to walk by.

  Hot tears pricked at the back of her eyes. She stared wildly upwards, and blinked rapidly, but the tears still fell. She let them, since there was no one to know if she cried or not. It wouldn’t do her any harm, but crying and self-pity never did anyone any good.

  The tears calmed her. When they subsided except for an odd hiccup or two, she found herself thinking of Flane once more. Was it only two days ago, or three, that he had made love to her in the bathing place? Passionately, and with deep feeling. At the thought, pangs and quivers unsettled her.

  She had been foolish enough to believe that afternoon had changed things for him, but all he really wanted was exactly what had happened in the bathing place. Older women warned young girls often enough that men wanted only the pleasure of the bed place. She had thought them cynical, and vowed it would never happen to her.

  She remembered his tenderness, his concern that he should not hurt her. She was grateful for that, and the many times he had protected her from the worst Katla had ordered, fought Gamel on her behalf and no doubt kept other men away. It dawned on her just how much he had protected her in the last few days, and how much of a nuisance she must have been for him. She remembered how magnificent he had looked when locked in battle with Gamel. But for Flane, that horrid man would have raped her. Nausea rose in her at the mere thought.

  Odd then how bedding Flane proved to be so very different. Doing intimate things with Flane did not make her feel sick. Quite the contrary. Such thoughts made her blood run warmer, faster and —

  Had someone shouted, or had she imagined it? She blinked, cocked her head and listened, but heard nothing. The cold had stiffened her limbs. If she fell asleep there was a good chance she would roll off the ledge. What if she never saw daylight again? Oh, Flane! Where was he now she really needed him?

  Above her, the dogs snuffled and whined. One of them barked, but gruffly and only once. They were not alarmed. From the sound of it, they were pleased. Locked in some stiff, cold limbo that was neither sleep nor waking, Emer wondered if she was dreaming.

  A clicking noise drifted to her in the silence and she recognised the sound of a horse’s hoof against stone. It might be the kennel boy, come to find his charges. “Get down! Down, boy!”

  She knew that voice! Surely that—fired by hope, Emer prayed she was right.

  “Help me!” Her voice came out as a pathetic squawk. She coughed, cleared her throat and called again, louder. “Oh, please, help me!”

  The world filled with silence. Even the dogs stayed quiet. She heard the murmur of waves far below, and the faint whisper of the wind as it breathed across the grass above her head. The jingle of a horse’s bit was unmistakable and she pictured the animal shaking its head when someone put a hand across its nose. Emer peered up anxiously. She opened her mouth to call again when a dark shape appeared against the sky at the top of the cliff.

  “Be careful,” she cried. “It’s dangerous! Please don’t slip. Will you help me?”

  She couldn’t see. Surely it was Flane? The figure moved and moonlight found and lit pale hair that shone like silver.

  “Emer? I can’t see you! Where are you?”

  She couldn’t keep the relief out of her voice. “I’m here! Below you! I fell. Please can you help me?”

  “I’ve been looking for you all day.”

  “I’m sorry. I should have been at the other longhouse by now.”

  “Are you hurt?”

  “I’m cold. I’m so glad it’s you.” She was surprised to hear herself say the words, but she couldn’t lie. Already she was confident Flane would somehow get her back up the cliff even though he sounded tired.

  “Are you sure you’re not hurt? Get back, damn you! By Thor, I need Skeggi here.”

  A dog whined and yipped in excitement. “Get off me, you stupid brute!” He sounded tired and irritated. Sounds of a scuffle drifted down to her.

  “I’m going to tie these damned dogs up or they’ll have me over the edge as well as you.”

  Emer leant her head against the rock face of the cliff, and sent up a brief, jumbled prayer of thanks into the air. She wasn’t going to starve to death, or fall into the sea or have seagulls peck her eyes out come morning. Flane would rescue her. She had no doubts about that.

  Suddenly, his voice spoke above her. “I can’t see you. Can you see me?”

  “Yes. You are on one knee, and peering down at me.” She checked how far the moon had moved against the cliff face. “In a little while the moon will give us light.”

  He grunted. “I thought you said you were cold? Let’s see if I can pull you up. Stretch your hand up to me.”

  “Should we wait for the moonlight, Flane?” With no idea how solid her perch might be, moving about in the dark seemed like madness. One of her shoulders brushed the cliff face but only cold empty air moved against the other. She should turn to face the rock. Hooking her skirts out of the way, she rolled to her knees, leaned in against the cliff and then realised, with a sickening lurch of her stomach, that her toes hung over the edge of the ledge.

  “What’s the matter? Have you moved?”

  “Flane! Let me concentrate! I don’t have much room…” If she simply leapt to her feet with legs as stiff and cold as they were, she would undoubtedly fall. Her right foot felt numb, so numb she doubted the wisdom of moving immediately.

  “Come on, Emer. Don’t just sit there! Move!”

  “Don’t rush me! I’m doing my best and I don’t want to fall now.” Awkwardly, she gripped her right ankle and carefully manoeuvred her foot into position beneath her.

  “What are you doing?”

  Emer ignored the impatient voice. She shifted her weight once or twice, and her foot seemed to be coming back to life. Pins and needles made her groan aloud. Slowly, cautiously, leaning against the cliff, her hands outspread for balance, Emer rose to her feet. Once there, she let out the breath she’d been holding, and smiled. “I’m standing.”

  “What?”

  “I’m standing,” she screeched. The pale head didn’t seem so far above her now.

  “No need to shout,” he growled. “You’ll set the dogs off again.”

  Emer gritted her teeth. In a voice suddenly authoritative rather than petulant, he told her to lift her arm as high as she could. She did so, and felt warm fingers fumble against her own. Emer let out a squeak of excitement.

  Then he said, “I can’t reach down far enough to get a good grip of you.”

  Emer’s heart contracted. She bit her lip and let her forehead dip against the damp, cold face of the cliff. How long before her legs gave way, or she lost her balanc
e?

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Here’s my belt.’ Flane’s voice came out of the darkness above Emer, accompanied by the tiny chink of metal against rock. “It’s as long as another arm, and it’s good leather. I’ve run it through the buckle so there’ll be a loop for your wrist. Have you got it?”

  She looked up, groped around in the dark and finally found it. “Yes.”

  “Let go again,” Flane said. “We need to think about this. I can’t just haul you up when I’m lying flat on my stomach. The ground slopes—there isn’t much to stop me falling.”

  Emer rubbed her arms and moved her legs to improve her circulation. “What should I do?”

  A soft snort of laughter reached her. “I can support your weight, but you’ll have to use your feet to scramble up. Can you do it?”

  She hesitated, scanning the black, shadowy face of the cliff.

  “If you can’t,” he said, “we’ll have to wait for morning, perhaps get help from the settlement.”

  Emer didn’t want to stay perched on the cliff face any longer than she had to. “I can do it.”

  “It would only take a couple of hours to get down and back again. It might be safer.”

  “I can do it,” she said in a determined voice. “Wait until I do something with my skirt.” It was trickier than she’d expected, given her precarious situation, to bundle her long skirt out of the way. The woven grass pouch she’d spent an hour making fell silently away into the darkness as she forced folds of her skirt through her belt, but she did not spare it a single glance. The cold air brought goose bumps to her bare thighs, but her blood surged with excitement and she sent a bold stare at the place where she thought Flane would be. “Don’t you dare laugh at me, Flane Ketilsson!”

  “I wouldn’t dare. I can’t see you anyway. Are you ready? Here’s the belt.”

  Emer gritted her teeth, took a deep breath and realised the benefit of the slight delay as the first shafts of moonlight slid gently across the cliff. She saw the belt, slid her wrist through the loop and got a firm grip.

  “Keep it steady, please, Flane. Don’t pull until I say so. I’m searching for a foothold.” The belt was a huge boost to her confidence, and she soon found a tiny pocket into which she could insert her toes. Before she moved, she felt a little higher and found another niche, this time for her left foot. That should be enough, she hoped, to enable her to grab Flane’s arm. She wanted to reach him as quickly as she could, needed his arms around her. Her heart raced. “I’m coming, Flane. Are you ready?”

  “Ready.”

  She took a deep breath, held it, got her right foot in the niche and sprang up. The belt steadied her and she found the second foothold, moved up again and found herself face to face with Flane. He lay flat on the grass, his face contorted with effort. The slope was indeed steep; now she was higher, she saw there wasn’t really an edge to climb over. She hooked one hand over Flane’s arm, kept hold of the belt with the other and scrabbled for leverage with her feet.

  Somehow it all happened at the same time: her feet found purchase, Flane yelled, rolled and pulled her with him. Her knees hit the ground hard. Yelping, she pitched forward and scraped her cheek on the grass. It didn’t matter; at last, she was away from the dangerous drop to the sea.

  Flane gripped her belt and shuffled them both further away from the cliff edge. Coarse grass brushed her palms and her nails dug through sandy soil and found rock. Panting with effort, Emer glanced behind her. Moonlight lit the gentle curve of the grassy slope and contrasted starkly with the empty darkness beyond. She turned back to Flane. His hair shone silver in the moonlight. She smiled and found she couldn’t stop. Euphoria and relief made her giddy, and she laughed out loud. The dogs howled and yipped, the horse plunged against its tether, and Flane’s arms closed about her like a vice.

  “Don’t ever run off again,” he muttered. “Don’t you ever stop to think? You may not have wolves on your island, but they surround us here, and a bear or two. There are men who wander the land—”

  Her arms enfolded him. She found his mouth, kissed him with an enthusiasm that bowled him over backwards in the grass and heard him grunt. A shiver of movement ran through him and he went rigid in her arms.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, suddenly afraid he might be angry with her. “I’m glad I didn’t pull you over the cliff.” Moonlight didn’t give her much light to judge his expression, but from the tension in his body and the sound of his voice, he was probably glaring at her. “Don’t be angry with me, Flane. Perhaps I was stupid, but I was so…so…I don’t know—confused? Unhappy?”

  In the long dark hours on the ledge, she had contemplated the various ways in which she might finally die and accepted that the fault that brought her there had been her own. She should never have let Oli persuade her to run away. She ought to have known better, ought to have made her own decision even if she had been distraught over Flane’s betrayal.

  “I feel guilty about that,” Flane said slowly. “I tried to force you to do something you didn’t want to do. I was very selfish. But yesterday I burned my boats, so to speak, with Katla. I told her to get another husband.”

  With an exclamation of delight, Emer threw herself forward and entwined both arms tight around his neck. He grunted, grasped her arms and held her off. His grip hurt, and she cried out.

  “Sorry.” Flane ran his palms up and down her arms as if the action would soothe the pain.

  Emer pressed against him, heard his long, indrawn breath and breathed a sigh of relief when, slowly, his arms closed about her. This was the man she wanted to spend her life with, a man she would trust for ever. “I needed you,” she whispered against his throat. “I prayed for you, and you came.”

  “I followed the dogs,” he said. “I might never have looked over the cliff but for them.”

  “I wouldn’t have fallen over it but for them. Was it Skuli who sent them after me?”

  “Katla.”

  The thought that Katla hated her so much chilled her heart. Emer buried her face against Flane’s warm throat, and clung to him.

  “No more confusion,” he muttered. “You will be mine. You are mine.” His hands found the smooth skin of her thighs and sat back on his heels to study her bunched skirts and long bare legs. He looked up, and Emer thought he offered a faint smile. “I like this new style of skirt you’ve adopted.” Amusement and appreciation melded together in his voice.

  “Oh! I’d forgotten!” Wriggling wildly, Emer grabbed her skirts and wrenched the fabric free of her belt. “There,” she said. “That’s better.”

  One of his hands tilted her chin. “I liked it the way it was,” he murmured, found her mouth and kissed her.

  Her response was joyous, and spontaneous. His willingness to risk his life to rescue her, and the fact that he had repudiated Katla plus the huge relief of being safe again all conspired to launch her into his arms. He welcomed her there as if she belonged. With his mouth on hers, heat flowing and growing between them, she had no wish to stop and think about anything at all.

  Emer bit his lower lip, slid her tongue into his mouth and heard him growl deep in his throat. Her excitement grew, her heart raced, a pulse thudded in her ears and she gasped aloud as his hands drifted with exquisite slowness to her gown. Cool air rushed over her skin as he eased the fabric from her shoulder.

  He frowned when it stuck, swore under his breath and tugged at the material. Emer batted his hands away, unfastened the brooch-pin that held the two edges together and watched him drag the fabric down and off her shoulders. He smiled briefly, a flash of white teeth in the darkness when he saw her nipples already stood proud before his mouth closed around one and his thumb rubbed across the other.

  Her head fell back and her mouth opened as she stared at the night sky without really seeing it.

  Small, convulsive movements rippled through her body. Flane must have felt it in his hands and mouth, for he let go. For a moment her skin tingled with cold fire where he left
her vulnerable to the air, then he took her down to the grass, ran his hard warrior’s hands up the smooth skin of her inner thighs and shoved her skirts up high till they bunched around her waist.

  “Flane!” It was a gasp of sheer pleasure, of wanton desire and a plea for him to continue, all contained in one word. His finger found and parted her, slid inside her and whispered his name, bunched the cloth at his shoulders in her grasping fingers. Flane covered her body, positioned himself carefully and drove slowly and steadily forward. Emer erupted around him, her voice rising and falling in wordless pleasure in the dark night.

  “Lady Freyja!” The exclamation of pleasure seemed torn from him. He eased deeper inside her, and she twisted and gasped beneath him, gripped his shoulders so hard her nails cut into his skin and all too soon shudders of pleasure ran through her.

  His head lay close beside hers on the cool grass. He swallowed hard, sucked in air and inched away from her, his weight on his forearms and groaned. Their eyes met, and at the same moment, they grinned at each other. “Welcome back…to safe ground, lady.”

  Emer made as if to rise on one elbow and then abandoned the idea. She had hardly enough breath to speak, but made a huge effort. “Thank you again.” She shut her eyes briefly, and gathered her resources. “Who is the Lady Freyja?”

  He laughed weakly. “The goddess of love and beauty.”

  “Ah, no rival, then.” Unable to stop smiling, she watched the pale glow of moonlight on his hair. “I’m glad.”

  “It is she who should fear a rival.” He grinned and shook his head. “You were—you are magnificent.”

  “Really?” Pleased, she stared up at the darkening sky for a few moments and then frowned and inhaled sharply. “But what about Katla? She—oh, dear Lord, we can’t go back, can we?”

  “Don’t worry. She’s not important any longer.”

  Emer sat bolt upright. “Not important? Flane, she’s so in love with you she set dogs after me! We can’t go back to the steading. I suppose we must go on, and speak with Snorri Longnose.”