The Viking Prince

by Sarah Woodbury

  The former king Torcall hadn’t realized how much support he’d lost and the precarious position he was in until it was too late. Brodar and Godfrid had been younger and less experienced then, unable to protect their father and salvage his throne. Both sons had learned to be less trusting and more underhanded since then. While Brodar would never possess Ottar’s cunning, he had a practical mind and a genuine gift for strategy. While the Danish army had defeated the men of Brega under Ottar’s leadership, the victory had been due more to greater overall numbers than any particular genius on Ottar’s part. These days, Ottar’s rule had degenerated to the point that the king appeared to have only sycophants.

  Upon leaving the warehouse, Finn should have escorted Sanne and Marta to Rikard’s house—his own house now—but instead, he turned in the opposite direction, towards the docks. That was a far more interesting place for him to be going, and Conall found himself more than a little curious as to what this prodigal son would do next.

  First Finn had to pass through the gate that guarded the river entrance to the city. According to Holm, the gates had been closed, but either that order was being ignored or someone had decided that it was too much of a hindrance to commerce to actually have to open and close the gate whenever anyone wanted to pass through it. Regardless, the dock gate was open, and people were moving in and out of it, most with no more than a wave of a hand in acknowledgement to the guard.

  While Rikard’s warehouse was inside the city walls that ran along the course of the Liffey, the docks, by necessity, were outside the palisade. Finn strode through the gatehouse at a fairly rapid clip, raising a hand, as others had done, to the guard, who merely nodded and waved him through.

  Conall’s eyes narrowed to realize that, despite Finn’s two-year absence, already the guard at the gate knew him. Then again, his resurrection, along with Rikard’s death, would be all over Dublin by now, moving from house to house like a fire from one thatched roof to another.

  Still frowning, Conall paused a moment, not wanting to appear to be following Finn, and thus was forced to wait a few beats until several more men had gone in and out of the gate. Then he tossed his apple into a nearby pigpen, straightened his shoulders, and walked with high head under the archway.

  The soldier on guard duty bowed at his approach. Conall was glad to be recognized as himself rather than Fergus the sailor, who’d been in and out of the gate a hundred times in the last three weeks. Danes had red hair often enough that Conall didn’t stand out in a crowd, and he’d attempted to improve on his chances of not being recognized by growing a beard and cutting his hair short. He’d then hid his hair under a woolen cap, which he’d rarely taken off, even to sleep. Enough time had passed since then that his hair had grown a little. Coupled with being again clean-shaven, he was looking more like the ambassador from Leinster should.

  Conall had surprised his uncle when he’d taken on the ambassadorship of Dublin. It was outside his former scope of activities. But after his sojourn in Wales, though Conall would never admit this to anyone, he had been skittish. Being captured, beaten, and imprisoned had shattered his confidence, and he had known within himself that he couldn’t undertake another assignment like that one until he made himself whole again.

  Disguising himself as a seafarer had been a promising first step, and he could honestly say that he’d enjoyed his time on Dublin’s docks. If nothing else, the hard labor had been good for him. He was past forty now, a time when many men went into decline. He had almost died in Shrewsbury, and he had found the thought not to his liking. He wasn’t ready to sit before the fire like an old man, to drink mead and argue.

  Once through the gate, Conall paused, his eyes questing for Finn. He finally spied him walking west along the waterfront, wending his way among dockworkers and their goods.

  Conall watched for a moment, and then he waved at the guard, whom he could still see underneath the gatehouse, beckoning him to come to him. When the man obeyed, Conall pointed ahead to the figure of Finn and, feigning ignorance, asked, “Who is that man who walks ahead of me?”

  The guard answered immediately. “My lord, that is Finn, returned from Iceland after being thought dead these last two years. Have you not heard? He is the son of Rikard the Merchant, who died today.”

  “That’s Finn? He is younger than I imagined. When did he arrive in Dublin?”

  “Only this morning, my lord.” The guard gestured towards a ship moored at the far end of the wharf. It appeared Finn was heading straight for it. “That is the ship he came on. There has been much joy among the sailing folk today. More than one husband was restored to his wife, though I’m sorry that Rikard died before he was able to see his son.”

  “Are you certain of the timing? It’s such a tragedy if you’re right.”

  The guard blinked at the question, and when he spoke next, he drew out his words, enunciating them carefully, as one does when trying to convey an idea to someone with a poor grasp of one’s language. “I am sure.”

  Conall patted the man on the shoulder. “Thank you for the information.”

  The guard looked slightly mollified. “My pleasure, my lord.”

  The guard went back to his post, and Conall continued along the dockside after Finn. The first Danish adventurers to Ireland had simply pulled their boats up the bank to moor them, but with prosperity and growth, an actual wharf had been built, with pilings driven deep into the riverbed. Today, the dock stretched nearly the entire width of the city from west to east.

  Unfortunately, a hundred years or more after the original construction, the dock was not being properly maintained. Conall had just spent three weeks in and around the dockside and had made an inventory of every snapped off piling and rotted support. Dublin needed a new wharf, and although Ottar had sworn to invest in its construction, the work had not started. Fortunately, that neglect hadn’t extended to the palisade wall, which was rebuilt every few years because, if it wasn’t, the supporting timbers that had been placed deep in the soil of the riverbank would rot away and the wall would fall.

  All things being equal, as a man of Leinster, Conall was in favor of maintaining as weak a king in Dublin as possible, but instead he found himself irritated with Ottar’s failure to keep his promises, which was only one of many objectionable qualities. He was also a blowhard and had an eye for other men’s wives. His rule seemed to consist of outsized promises that never came to pass, and he promoted men beyond their capacity, men such as Holm, caring more for their personal loyalty than their integrity or ability to do the job they’d been set. And if all that weren’t bad enough, when things went wrong, it was never his fault, never because of his actions or his failure to act.

  And yet, even with all that, he could have been forgiven if the prosperity and increased wealth he’d promised to bring to Dublin had ever come to pass. But it had not, despite his sacking Kells several times and following Prince Cadwaladr to Anglesey. Ottar still didn’t understand that wealth didn’t come from a single raid or adventure anymore. It was made day by day, week by week, by men working towards a common goal.

  It was because of Ottar’s lack of vision that Conall had wished for some time, even before his appointment as Dublin’s ambassador, that his king would support Brodar more openly. Though Diarmait had been angry for some time about his loss of revenue from Dublin, up until now, he had accepted Ottar’s excuses. To Conall’s mind, it was long past time Ottar was held accountable for his lack of stewardship.

  Continuing along the dockside, Conall stopped within hailing distance of Finn’s ship, observing Finn as he’d stopped to speak to the man in the bow. The conversation didn’t last long, and Conall was able to hear only bits and pieces of Finn giving the man an outline of the events of the last hours. After the man bent his head to express his sorrow at Finn’s loss, Finn moved on down the wharf, greeting numerous men along the way, with his ultimate destination the main door of the warehouse of Thorfin Ragnarson, Sanne’s father.

  The groun
d in Rikard’s vault had been dry, even with all the rain they’d had this spring. But this warehouse was on the wharf, where the land was saturated with water much of the year. Thorfin had taken the danger into account and put the main floor of his warehouse on stilts. It was a recent construction too, built over the remains of what had once been a barracks to hold slaves before auction. These days, the auction house had fallen into disrepair as well, as not only Rikard but most other merchants in Dublin had ceased to buy and sell slaves in any kind of quantity.

  Before pulling the door wide, Finn looked left and right, in a way that implied he was worried someone was watching him. Conall ducked behind a large crate, hoping that he’d hidden in time. Then, after a moment, he stood on his toes to look over the top of the crate, to find that Finn had disappeared.

  “May I help you, my lord?”

  Conall spun around at the thick Welsh accent and then smiled to see the squat, bow-legged sailor standing before him. “You are of Gwynedd?”

  “Born and bred.” The man tugged his forelock. “Excuse me for speaking out of turn, my lord, but haven’t I seen you in the company of our Prince Hywel?”

  Conall laughed. “You have.” He paused, hope rising in his chest. “Is he here?”

  “No, my lord. When I left, he was occupying the palace at Llanfaes.”

  Conall gestured to Thorfin’s warehouse. “The man who just entered. Have you seen him before?”

  “Yes, my lord,” the Welshman answered immediately. “That’s Finn, heir to Rikard, who died today.”

  “Is that so? When did Finn arrive in Dublin?”

  “Just this morning, just as his father was dying, it seems.” He lifted his chin to point to Finn’s ship. “I was asleep when he docked, but I heard them come in. Just before dawn, it was.”

  The information confirmed what Conall had already heard. It was a relief, really, to know that Finn could have had nothing to do with his father’s death. The murder of a father by a son would have torn Dublin society apart.

  Having dismissed the sailor, with a request that when he returned to Llanfaes he give Prince Hywel his greetings, Conall stared at the door to Thorfin’s warehouse. He very much wanted to know what was happening inside. Finn hadn’t yet visited his father’s body, nor even asked where it was. His comforting of Sanne had been perfunctory at best and, as far as Conall knew, he hadn’t even been to his father’s house. And despite assuring Godfrid that he would continue his alliance with Arno, he was currently visiting the warehouse of Sanne’s father, who also happened to be his greatest business rival.

  There could easily be a good explanation for everything Finn had done, but Conall didn’t know what it was. Since he couldn’t barge into the warehouse and demand answers—at least not yet—he decided to return to the warehouse to discover what Godfrid and Cait had found in the vault.

  Other than each other.

  Conall grinned.

  Chapter Ten

  Day One

  Godfrid

  “Is this how it was for you after your husband died?”

  Cait looked over at Godfrid, apparently startled by the question. They were the only two people left in the warehouse, other than Godfrid’s own guards, who remained at their posts, one at each entrance. “Are you wondering if I am comparing my experience to Sanne’s?”

  He nodded. They’d known each other for only a few hours, so he had no right to a serious answer, but he was hoping for it anyway.

  She frowned as she thought about what to say. “Even had I loved Niall, I think I would have felt freed at his death. Among my people, no woman can be forced to marry, but at the time, I was too young to understand what I might gain by refusing. I could only see what I’d lose. What was never explained to me, because my uncle didn’t want me to understand, was that I had an obligation to myself and to my future husband to say no.”

  “You didn’t want to displease your family. It would have felt like a betrayal.” Godfrid canted his head. “We all feel that way when we are young.” He paused. “So you never loved him?”

  “He gave me no reason to love him. My sense is that Sanne felt the same about Rikard. He treated her with a kind of detached benevolence, but she was no more than an appendage to him. I found that a hard way to live, tied to a man who cared nothing for who I was inside.” She gave a low laugh. “I have no idea why I’m telling you this. I haven’t said this to anyone.”

  Godfrid didn’t know why either, but he wasn’t going to complain. “It is easier for men. If we want to avoid family entanglements, we go to sea, and it looks like adventure. Just ask Finn.”

  Cait smiled. “I see why my brother likes you. At first, I thought you were just another member of his collection.”

  “His collection?” Godfrid wondered if he should be offended.

  She put out a hand to him in a gesture of appeasement. “He likes people who are different from him. Traveling to strange places and meeting new people—and making friends—that’s what he does.”

  “I like that too.”

  “Apparently, so do I.” She smiled before adding, “The fact that I feel a kinship with Sanne doesn’t mean I’m certain she didn’t sneak out of the party and kill her husband. Dublin isn’t a large city, and the warehouse isn’t that far from Arno’s manor house. Any absence could have been explained by a long trip to the latrine.”

  “You told me yourself that Rikard cleared everyone out of the warehouse. He was meeting someone not his wife.” Godfrid took in a breath and let it out. “Speculation is fine, but we should keep it to a minimum. And we should work hard not to assume anything.”

  “Is that what Gareth the Welshman says?”

  Godfrid laughed. “I suppose he does.”

  “Well, he’s wrong.”

  Godfrid guffawed, but then looked hard at her. “Why do you say that?”

  “We speculate all the time, as we should.” Cait pursed her lips as Godfrid continued to gaze at her. “And we are certainly assuming a great number of things, all of which are very sensible.”

  “For example?” Godfrid’s tone was amused and curious rather than offended, which encouraged Cait to go on.

  “For example, we are assuming Rikard was killed for a reason, not by chance. We are assuming his death has something to do with his business or his spying. We are assuming that the little girl whose family lives down the street from the warehouse is not the murderer.”

  Godfrid laughed again. “You are absolutely right, and by way of our assumptions, I am beginning to wonder if Rikard’s death itself was unintended. He could have been in the vault on his own accord and merely died. He was an old man. Perhaps his heart gave out.”

  “So not murder.” Cait nodded. “That doesn’t mean there was no crime.”

  “Another assumption.” Godfrid canted his head. “I grant your point.”

  Cait blushed. “I don’t mean to offend. Conall speaks very highly of Gareth’s abilities.”

  “For good reason. And I believe Gareth’s point in telling us not to assume was to emphasize the danger in allowing one’s assumptions to guide the investigation too soon, excluding possible paths of inquiry prematurely.”

  “And I grant that point.”

  With a new camaraderie, they began to move about the room, lifting lids and prying into the various crates and chests, particularly the one to which Rikard had been pointing. It was locked, and Godfrid pulled out the ring of keys to find the one that opened it. Then the main door banged, and they both jumped. Someone taking long strides crossed the floor, and then Conall appeared at the top of the stairs.

  At the sight of them with their hands in Rikard’s things, he grinned. “Good. That’s the chest he was pointing to, Cait.”

  As usual, she bristled slightly at his tone. “That’s why we opened it first, but all I can see are bolts of silk. They’re lovely, but they don’t convey treachery to me.”

  Conall came down the steps. “We need to think harder about why Rikard was found down
here, but with nothing missing.”

  “As far as we know nothing was missing,” Cait pointed out. “If the item was small, the men who put him here could have taken it, and nobody but Rikard would be the wiser.”

  “And since he’s dead, he can tell us nothing,” Godfrid said.

  “It all comes back to him writing your name.” Cait looked up at Godfrid. “Let’s focus on that. There has to be something here.” She began to remove the bolts of fabric from the trunk, handing them to Godfrid one at a time to create a large stack in his arms, until she finally exposed the wooden bottom. She leaned forward. “That’s not right.”

  Godfrid set the bolts on top of a nearby trunk and peered with her. The bottom plank of the trunk wasn’t fitted correctly in the trunk’s frame.

  Meanwhile, Conall measured the depth of the trunk’s interior and compared it to the exterior. “It’s a false bottom.”

  “One that someone didn’t take the time to seat properly.” His heart beating a little faster, Godfrid got his fingers underneath the uneven edge. He wiggled it until the whole plank broke free, revealing a hidden compartment containing books and papers.

  Cait waved a hand at her brother. “Close the trapdoor! We don’t want anyone coming upon us unaware.”

  Conall bounded up the steps and pulled the trapdoor closed, plunging them into near darkness. Godfrid grabbed the lantern he’d brought and set it on a hook conveniently located on the wall above the trunk, likely for that very purpose. No light came through the ceiling to shine on them, making him think that their light in the vault could not be seen inside the warehouse proper, and they could truly continue in secret.