The StoneHeart took his leave, aimed for the garrison gate then to the London streets toward SouthWark.
Glad of the early start, he must endure the throng through the center of town, gravel streets crowded with fish and fruit carts, stalls of pottery, glass and cloths. Merchants and buyers would negotiate, a brown fog grazing their heads. He would avoid the refuse and stench of the butchers and tannery if he could, dodge garbage and wash water flung from windows of listing, rain soaked houses. Sidestep whores, pickpockets and beggars, piles of horse manure. Aye, instead of skirting round it all, he must search through the market square to find a vendor, a silversmith.
Damned if he had lost the wedding ring and needed a replacement.
Chapter VIII
Secrets from the shadows emerge into the light.
You know now what you did not know last night.
Take this newfound piece of me and guard it with your life.
No longer strangers, we. My husband, I am your wife.
A cavernous chapel, this of St. Paul’s, a novel building. It was made near entirely of hewn stone, a throwback to Roman times, a hint of a revival. From its center, Slayde made mental notes as the priest began, raised his eyes to the vaulted ceiling, its timber beam support spanning a length of at least three rods. Rare windows gave Slayde the idea to contract a glassmaker for his next endeavor into house construction. Yea, an upper loft with a view, impervious to rain and wind made possible by the wonder of the transparent element. A window from which his wife would look away from her loom and see his coming after a day’s labor. An errant thought since Athelswith could not thread a needle.
“Take her hand in yours.” Tall, violet-robed, Father Ordheah cleared his throat, repeated the instruction, and the StoneHeart came to attention across from Athelswith. She wore a cyrtel of white and scarlet brocade, pinned at the shoulders with gold brooches, festooned with a strand of jet beads. A gilded fillet encircled her head; an emotionless smile hung on her face. A ring purchased swiftly and a fortuitous meeting with his intended on the streets of SouthWark brought them together two hours before the appointed time. All was prepared, she had said, the priest ready, the chapel unused ... why wait? Indeed, to accomplish this piece of business in so timely a fashion fit the rational sobriety of the match, and the schedules of each.
Many knew of the wedding, but since the hour had changed, none attended save Athelswith’s four handmaids. The arrangement suited quite well the unceremonious couple. Slayde would explain to Byrnstan later.
“If any here shall know of an impediment to this marriage, speak now.” The priest’s words echoed into deep empty corners, died in damp shadows. Handmaids shifted on hard benches. “Ealdorman Slayde of Kent, put the ring ...”
“StoneHeart! Are we too late?” Byrnstan shouted from behind.
Slayde wheeled at the outburst and the bang of the chapel door. Flushed, dressed without her linen cloak, Llyrica peered over Byrnstan’s shoulder. A lovely sight to see her unshrouded, wide-eyed, her hair an unadorned disarray, flaxen gold against lavender silk. Her female items clacked slightly from her shoulder brooches. The fragrance of ginger accompanied her. But this was an inopportune visit in the least. He had suffered without hope of seeing her again, but was now plagued by her return. Byrnstan should have been on his way to the border, in heed of Slayde’s note, but the woman was without her belongings. And the border lay in the opposite direction.
StoneHeart suspected his godfather of another misdeed. “Nay, come sit.” The hairs on the back of his neck bristled. “Our vows have not yet been exchanged.”
Llyrica heaved a strange sigh.
“And must remain so,” Byrnstan said. He brought Llyrica to the altar where Father Ordheah stood frowning, and Athelswith with arms crossed patiently. Byrnstan glanced from face to face, then fixed on Slayde’s. “A private discussion, son. One I meant to have with you upon rising, had you not left so early and slumber not kept me drugged until this hour.”
“A discussion can wait until after I am wed.” Slayde ceased extraneous thoughts and turned to Father Ordheah. “Continue.” Athelswith resumed her position facing her groom.
Byrnstan’s hand lay on Slayde’s shoulder. “But StoneHeart. You are already wed. To Llyrica.”
Barely audible, Athelswith gasped, Ordheah’s mouth gaped, and the handmaids twittered. Byrnstan nodded solemnly, withdrawing a document from the gray folds of his longa tunica.
“I have no reply to such a preposterous statement. How could ...” Slayde turned to the silent, pale Llyrica. Her skilled hand, soft from the benefits almond oil, covered her mouth in guilty trepidation. His mother’s ring of twisted silver was on her finger. This thievery or hoax evoked instant anger, but was dimmed as quickly by snippets of an odd memory, a dreamlike realization he could not dispute. Neither could he disclaim his signature on the parchment held before him by Byrnstan ... or its legality. An unexplained phenomenon. Instigated by Byrnstan no doubt, an event had taken place, its circumstances somehow veiled by daylight hours, where night might reveal them. Slayde’s head threatened to split in two as he addressed Athelswith, who now regarded him with narrowed eyes. Silence reigned before he could speak.
“Something has happened which I must explain to you at another time.” Yea, when he knew himself. “I regret this marriage will not take place today. I will, of course, recompense you for this inconvenience.”
She took the parchment from Brynstan, regarded it with tight lips for a long moment. “Indeed, you will pay, scoundrel,” she answered, also flashing cool ire at Llyrica. Unease permeated the chapel as Athelswith pondered, boring dark eyes into Slayde’s face. “My first inclination is to demand you bear the brunt of this embarrassment and leave me blameless. But that would merely reward you by reaffirming your reputation as the StoneHeart and make me another spurned conquest. Neither do I wish to look daft or foolish as the one to call off this marriage. Therefore I deem we announce it was a mutual decision and you pay me a sum to be determined later. My priest will confer with your priest.” She re-rolled the parchment and slapped it into Slayde’s chest, and then motioned for her handmaids. “I rescheduled appointments with two merchants in order to attend this event. Now I must see if I can get them returned me. Time is, after all, money.” Athelswith swirled from the altar, joined her maids at the exit. “My offer stands if the Viking wants to sell her wovengoods,” she said over her shoulder. The chapel door banged shut behind her, resounded in an echo.
Byrnstan addressed Ordheah. “You will abide by her wishes? ’Tis a matter between two consenting parties, after all.”
“Or three, as the case may be,” Ordheah said. “You and I will be in touch as to the settlement.” He appraised Llyrica critically before he took his scroll of scriptures and scuttled to the door. “Another one for my memoirs,” he muttered as he left. The scent of rain and its pattering on the road outside, whisked into the chapel, deserted now save three.
“The vixen and the priest. In a devious plot from the beginning.” Slayde studied the parchment, speaking through set teeth. “Explanations, Byrnstan,” he said, raising his eyes. “What scheme is this, and why and how have you managed it? You have gone too far, this time, in your meddling.” He did not yet look to the silent Llyrica. Though the particulars remained a bedeviling mystery, a dim certainty told him she was his wife. Holy Christ. It would wreck his life if it were true, inexplicably leave him bereft if it were not. His head continued to pound. “How came my name to be on this document?”
At once, Llyrica took his hand, her soft touch engaging his hard. Colored in shadowed pastels, her face lifted to his. “For three nights you came to me in your sleep. On the first you wooed me, the second bade me marry you, the third it was made so. Indeed, last night we were wed. Say you are not sorry, for I am not.” Persuasion shone on flushed cheeks, flaxen hair, and ripe peach lips. Warmth surged from her smooth fingers to his weapon-worn palm.
Incredulous, confounded, Slayde received another a
ffirmation with Byrnstan’s sober nod, considered the last three mornings he had arisen with perplexing aftereffects.
“In my sleep, you say? Without memory of it in daylight, I come to you able to speak and scribe? And ... ” The taste of soap, the cushion of a breast and wet desire flooded his senses, and his knowledge of Llyrica’s body could be attained only through intimacy. Strange proof, but to awaken at night, yet asleep, was a serious malady, surely the border of madness.
“Erase your frown, son,” said Byrnstan. “None know of the sleep-awakening, the sleepwalking, save your new bride and me. This marriage will be your cure.”
Outrage ruled, but sanity demanded denial. “Bald trickery, I vow.” StoneHeart pulled his hand from Llyrica’s. She inhaled sharply at his abruptness. “Even were I to think this sleepwalking true, it would not sanction the two of you playing me as witless.”
“I should also complain,” protested Llyrica, her cheeks flushing pinker. She brushed aside a wisp of bright hair. “In your sleep-awake state, which finds you most lucid, you seduced me from the start, plied me with sweetness. Took liberties. How vexing to witness your true nature by day, which I find callous and uncivil.”
Plied with sweetness? Small wonder the order of his life had collapsed. Now disconcerted and indignant, Slayde struggled to remember what might have occurred with Llyrica. He recalled more mental glimpses of her sweet skin surrendering under his touch, mouth, words. Heat pooled in his loins, inciting a rage he let simmer beneath a controlled facade. “You plead the victim, yet now I see you and your true nature exposed. I suspected it from the beginning. You are a siren who lures the unaware into a soft trap. You made your mark on this parchment though you find me crude, so you must be after some selfish gain I have yet to determine. ”
A start and a gasp. Ah, his indictment hit its mark. Slayde need grab this troublemaker, shake the truth from her, or fall upon her and extract it with a fierce kiss. A rough squeeze of her breast, a firm stroke of her soft thigh, then a swift thrust into her depths would prove to her he was the StoneHeart, not a dalliance at the whim of his godfather’s interference. Byrnstan was mute, perhaps unprepared for the results his plot had produced.
Llyrica stared unblinking at Slayde, her gaze containing as much compassion as it did deceit, and lured from him his unwanted nature, a weakness, the need for affection. Hers. It was blessedly doused though, with aqua eyes sparked with anger. “If I had briefly thought it a pleasure or advantage to be married to the sleepwalker, I now disavow it! Tear up the document, Byrnstan! Take me into Danelaw as the StoneHeart wishes. I would rather wander brotherless and friendless for eternity, than spend another moment with a man who needs me at night, but scorns me by day!”
Slayde flung the marriage document at Byrnstan. “Nay, you will not go, vixen, until I have had answers.” He gripped her shoulders, pulled her closer, his gaze drawn to her lips. Curse his untimely erection. He wanted her, envied the so-called sleepwalker’s nights with her. “Tell all now. Why you have come hidden in a barrel, have not denied wrongdoing and would dare marry me when ...”
“She is married to me.”
Slayde spun to whence the voice came, discovered a fleshy-faced man in the doorway, garbed in a garish tunica, blowsy braccas, and green boots to the knee. A half-dozen men, three Frisians, two Moors and a Rus, similarly arrayed in gaudy colored stripes and embroideries, flanked him. Among the bizarre hair modes, the Twisted Beard of Rochester harbor was one. Bloody damn, another plight: it must be Llyrica’s past arrived at St. Paul’s chapel. She shrank behind him with a gasp, while he fought a rising dread. He straightened, his thumb stroking the pommel of his sword, and became Llyrica’s shield. Byrnstan took to his side.
“State your name and the business that deems you interrupt this private meeting,” StoneHeart said, though he was unwont to hear the reply. Plainly seen, the marks of flesh-peddlers scarred the men’s hands.
“Xanthus am I. And I have come to hunt for the murderer of my crewman, for a money purse stolen from me and for damages owed for my burned ship, the BoarsJaw. But foremost, I have come to fetch back my property that escaped from me. I have come to fetch back my wife.”
Wife? Protection from this man and a criminal past. These proved reasons enough for Llyrica to trick the ealdorman of Kent into marrying her. Worse and worse.
One moment Llyrica clutched at Slayde’s back with trembling fingers, the next she sprang out from behind him. “You may have married me, Xanthus. But the StoneHeart is my true husband.”
Circumstances turn on a coin. Hours before, Llyrica was lying as a new bride in the sleepwalker’s arms, the next she was bound to flee the harsh StoneHeart. Now she must make him her salvation. A deadly moment passed when she thought he might hand her over, but he took her instead by the arm, tucked her once more behind him. His grip though, was far from kind.
“How have you come here and what evidence have you for these claims?” Slayde asked Xanthus. StoneHeart pulled himself taller and broader, made seven men adopt wary expressions and eye Slayde’s sword.
Xanthus hiked up his braccas over his round middle, planted his feet wide apart. “She left an easy trail. There were few along the journey who had not heard that the renowned StoneHeart pulled a silk-clad Viking from the sea. Vlas here, heard of your inquiries at Rochester’s, saw you with her. It is also well known where you reside and where you would be today. As for evidence of the stolen money purse, no doubt you have it in your possession. As to her being my property and wife, these men, as well as six others, will provide testaments to the transaction. I have no witnesses of her burning my ship, but I am as sure of it as I am my own name. Ask her yourself about all of it!” His men smirked, then exploded in laughter.
Slayde did not move, neither did Byrnstan do other that await her reply. “My Broder accidentally killed one of Xanthus’ men,” Llyrica said, stepping out slightly from behind Slayde. She yet clung to his tunica. “I sought appeasement through payment of my hard earned coin! Xanthus declared it not enough, but would take me as well in exchange that he not take Broder’s life. I had no choice but to submit!”
“How did the marriage fit in, lass?” Byrnstan asked. Expectancy lit his features, but she was bound to disappoint him. Slayde’s back stiffened under her hands.
“Xanthus hauled me to an ale lodge, where in a drunken state he thought it a joke to marry his newest prize. A foul priest was present, equally drunk, to perform the rites. In this I also had no choice.”
Slayde remained motionless, kept his sights on the men in the dim chapel. “Pray tell all, Llyrica. What of burning the man’s ship?”
She did not find it a pleasant memory to recall. “Xanthus would have me first, took me to a dark, portioned corner of the hall. His men continued to drink, waiting their turn. Very shortly, though, I was able to crawl out from under Xanthus, who was soon dead to the world. With the money purse once more in my possession, I made my way out through a hole in the rotten wall. In darkness, Broder and I made our escape, first securing a faering and a barrel of my wovengoods, which were on a ship also at port. Yea, we did set fire to Xanthus ship before we set off. This was to slow his pursuit.”
Slayde turned his head to look at her, his brow knitted in apparent disbelief. He regained a stern expression as he again addressed Xanthus. “It seems neither party disputes the facts. But I say a new bargain can be made. Llyrica will hand over the money purse and I will pay an additional amount for the price of your ship and for you to divorce her. You will leave her with me. Name your ...”
Xanthus appeared to have heard enough, and looked ready to explode. “Indeed I will take the money purse! ‘Twas payment for my crewman’s life! And yea, I need reparation made for my ship. But nay, StoneHeart. You will not keep her. She was part of the deal and is my wife to boot.”
“We will pay well for her,” Byrnstan added. “Surely you will name a sum.”
Xanthus fingered his beard smugly. “Nay. I want her as my wife, after al
l. She is pale and comely and soft in her silks. I will keep her.”
Llyrica pressed her way around Slayde to address Xanthus face to face, cursing the trouble her silk garments had reaped. “Many may have witnessed our vows, but our marriage is not bound in the eyes of the church. It was not consummated.”
Puffy cheeks reddened, Xanthus sputtered indignantly as Byrnstan stepped forward, encouraged. “And look here,” the priest said. “We have a signed document. Clear proof of her marriage to StoneHeart.”
Xanthus opened his palm and Vlas, the TwistedBeard, handed him a scroll. “I have a marriage document as well, marked by the woman and me. As to her claim that we are not bound by our flesh, I did so do the deed!”
“He did not, I swear it!” Llyrica said. Turning to tilt her face to Slayde, she found him unreadable, his mouth hard. She feared now that StoneHeart would let Xanthus take her back, sentence her to a life with a slaver. “He was ale-soaked and unable to – to do the act in his unconscious state! And since he did not, then I am not truly wed to him, as I am to you.”
Byrnstan’s eyes were on Llyrica, and she knew his thoughts were in agreement with hers. Neither had Slayde and Llyrica done the deed. Slayde pinned her with a stony stare, but his attention seemed to lie within himself. He must be trying to recall what did or did not transpire on their wedding night.
“I can prove it to you, StoneHeart, that Xanthus was not successful,” she said. “I have such proof in your house. If all can grant you and me an hour’s time to return there, I will show you. Bring two priests. Byrnstan as one and the other chosen by Xanthus.” She then turned to address her first husband. “If I can prove it, I will return you the money purse, a sizable payment from StoneHeart, and you must agree to let me go. If I am unsuccessful, then I shall be yours.”
“I need not submit to a test! I have the prior claim!” Xanthus took a step forward, but moved back when StoneHeart leaned in.
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