by Delle Jacobs
Once more he stood, and this time jerked off the Celtic woolen tunic Ronan had tossed to him hours before, baring his broad chest. Birgit stiffened. Then with a smoldering flash in his eyes, he pulled on his own tunic and the leather jerkin. He knelt and bound his boots about his thick calves.
"There is a pot beneath the bed," said Birgit, in a calm voice that belied her tension.
"Nay," said the blond Viking with tightness in his voice. "Come and bolt the door behind me."
Arienh watched her sister rise and edge toward the door. The Viking's eyes seemed to bore into the woman's flesh, as if he meant to grab Birgit and make off with her into the night.
Birgit set her jaw and faced the man boldly. "I suppose you will want me to get up again and let you in."
"Nay. Bolt it." He jerked it shut behind him. The latch clicked.
Birgit slammed the bolt into its slots and dashed back to the bed. Even without touching her, Arienh could feel the tension in her sister, taut as a bowstring.
Birgit would be reliving her horror. For that was what Egil was doing to her, whether he meant it or not. With Ronan, it had not been so bad, for he had been dying, and was not much of a threat. And Ronan had paid little attention to Birgit. But Egil was a different story. He was huge and blond, yellow-blond, with great waves of hair and braids, and piercing blue eyes, just like the man who had come in the raid six years ago, the one who had caught Birgit by the hair and thrown her to the ground. The one who had clubbed her against the rock, leaving her for dead, leaving her to go blind.
Be they as innocent as the Virgin, the Vikings had to go.
CHAPTER SIX
She heard geese.
They had no geese.
Arienh sat up abruptly in her bed, shaking her head to dispel the sleep. Birgit stood in the open door, jaw tight, glaring, as Ronan yanked on his jerkin and rushed out past her into the bright sunlight.
Shouting. Squeals and squawks, the whinny of horses. Not a battle, nor invasion. Well, maybe an invasion. It was much like the sound made earlier by the arrival of Egil's warriors, but with the addition of animals. Arienh leaped from the bed and grabbed her shawl.
"Damn them," said Birgit softly.
The dark-haired Viking hobbled down the path toward the narrow mouth of the valley where three great Viking ships, one magnificently graceful longship and two broad knarrs were pulled ashore. Just as Ronan's gait began to falter, several more of his kind rushed up to surround him, shouting, to support him and slap him on the back. The last time she had seen so many Viking ships, her father had been killed, and she and the others had barely escaped into the cavern.
"A raid?" Birgit asked with characteristic cynicism.
"Hardly. Unless they've trained their sheep to do their raiding for them." The second of the knarrs was heeled over onto its side to let a flock of sheep with black faces and oddly scraggly long wool descend upon the valley's new grass. Enough sheep that the valley would quickly become brown mud again.
There really were geese. Geese honked and strutted, and challenged little black and white dogs. A small herd of horses, shorter and shaggier than the sort Arienh knew, were herded and staked. Cattle. Enough for food, enough for the plow. Not that she expected the Viking to remember his promise.
Arienh released a disgusted huff. "I believe you were right, Birgit. They have come to take our valley. No wonder the Viking sped out the door as fast as he could. I would have stabbed him again if he'd stayed."
"If I hadn't done it first," grumbled Birgit. "What do you see, Arienh?"
Arienh always wondered just how much Birgit could recognize of a distant drama such as this. Sometimes Birgit was simply good at fooling people, often could piece together movement and sound, and other clues, enough to know what went on.
"They are all men," Arienh said. "Nay, I see one woman."
The woman with arms around her Viking, with hair even darker than Ronan's, small, barely half his size, and almost hidden by the man's embrace.
"I suppose it is too late to head for the cavern. Do you think the others have gone?"
"Aye. Did you not hear their screams?"
Arienh shook her head. Had she slept so soundly that she had not noticed? "They seem to be ignoring us. We could still go."
Hardly a muscle moved in Birgit's rigid face. "Why? They are not like the others, Arienh. If they have come to stay, then we cannot hide long enough to save ourselves. And if they bring their sheep, they do not mean to go away. If they want to kill us, it matters little if they do it now or later."
Arienh's strategy had always been not to give up, even when she could see no solution. Many times in the past, that determination to live just a little longer, even one more moment, had sustained her when she might have been killed. Even that one time when a Viking had chased her up the hill, and she had no hope of escape. Yet she had been saved by one of their own kind. One never knew what the next moment might bring.
But Birgit was right, this was different. The Celts probably weren't going to die, but there were worse things, especially for Birgit. Yet Birgit stood tall and calm, so Arienh would stand with her.
"Send Liam to the cave," Arienh suggested.
"Nay. He will be all right with us. Let’s go closer so I can at least tell what my fate will be."
"Mama, you're hurting my hand."
The boy was wincing. Fear and excitement mingled in his eyes. Arienh watched Birgit loosen her tense grip on Liam's hand.
They walked down the path and stood by the oak tree by the stream, watching the Vikings swarming around the valley's lower end. Even though Birgit could probably see only movement from here, this was her way of challenging the intruders.
Of the four empty cottages in the lower valley, the Vikings had already taken over three, including Weylin's. Several men with axes worked on the hill trimming out small saplings to mend the enclosures that had fallen into disrepair. Three men and several dogs herded those odd-looking, black-faced sheep along the stream bank to graze.
Toward midday, the two brothers walked side by side up the rise from the lower valley to where Arienh stood with Birgit and Liam beside the oak tree. Ronan still leaned on the other occasionally, still struggling with his weakness.
There was barely a finger's width difference in their height, and their eyes were the same clear, pure blue. But beyond that, for the life of her, she could see no resemblance between them. Egil was built like a huge tree trunk, straight up and down, where Ronan's broader shoulders and chest tapered to meet slightly slenderer waist and hips. A week's growth of dark beard softened the sculptured features of Ronan's rugged face, but Egil's longer yellow beard and great flowing moustache sharpened already menacing eyes. The pair of them was truly intimidating.
Not until now, as Ronan stood before her, no longer so weak and ill, did she realize how truly massive her Viking was. He could have snapped her in half that day, had she not managed the lucky blow. She had never fooled herself that it had been anything but luck.
Somehow in her struggle for his life, she had forgotten he was such a threat, for he had needed her just to cling to life, and she had freely given what he needed. She had forgotten how big he was, and how strong. Forgotten who he was, or that he had chased her down the mountain. Nay, no matter how he might frame it, that had been no benign act. Nor was this invasion. She should have killed him, as Mildread said.
Yet she knew she never would, nor could.
She folded her arms, glaring, growing braver with her growing anger. "So this was planned from the beginning. You are like all the others, save that you have come to take everything, Viking."
Ronan shook his head, giving her a beguiling smile that threatened to topple her resolve. "We meant to come here, and I did not tell you that. But we take nothing from you."
"You will graze your sheep on air? I think not. This valley is ours. There is no room for you."
"Nay," said Egil, his sweet smile belied by wicked eyes. "There is more than enoug
h room. We will take your flocks with ours to the upper valley."
"So you will take our flocks from us as well."
"Nay," Ronan protested. "But who else will tend them? You have no men."
"We will do without men, as Vikings will not do to replace them," Arienh replied. "We do not need your kind."
"Aye," said Birgit. "We will tend our own flocks."
"Your fields need plowing and sowing," Egil offered. "You cannot wait any longer for what already should have been done."
Arienh had tried, but the rusty plowshare had crumbled. She had even tried to make one of wood, but it could not cut the stony soil.
"Aye," she said, "and I can do that as well, save there is no plow. But you did not keep that promise, either. You have shown us you cannot be trusted."
"But I have," said Egil. "And the team as well. They have but to be harnessed and led to the fields. When the soil is dry enough, I will plow for you."
"You will not. We do not need you."
"You need us," said Ronan. "We can help you, Arienh."
"And at what cost? Nay, you will not make slaves of us, Viking. Do not think we will cook for you and warm your beds, no matter what you take from us."
Birgit snorted. "This is how they repay your kindness. I am glad I did not waste my time with them. I am going back to my loom." Taking wide-eyed Liam's hand, she stalked back up the hill.
Arienh also turned.
"Arienh!"
She stopped, turned, and lifted her chin high. "I have nothing more to say. And I have work to do."
"We will not go away, Arienh."
A bitter quirk took over the corner of her mouth. "Do not be surprised if you change your mind, Viking."
Once again she whirled away, but the dark-haired Viking rushed around her to block her path. "We will not go away. We will stay, and take wives. You are mine, Arienh."
She raked a murderous glare over him. "I thought you addled in the pate before, but I blamed it on the blow to your head. Now I see you come by it naturally. Celts do not marry Vikings."
"You will marry me. I’ve come for you, Arienh, and I will have you."
He was. He was truly addled.
"You owe me your life, Arienh. Have you forgotten me so easily?"
Arienh stared. "Forgotten you? I know no Vikings."
"But you know me. I came here with my uncle ten years ago, and if I had not pushed you into a hole, you would be a Moor’s slave today."
Her Viking boy? But how could it be? Surely not this magnificent giant of a man with hair as dark as richest earth. The boy had been little more than a starving waif, his wheat-colored hair thin, filthy strands. Yet, the eyes, blue like summer...
She had prayed for him every day of her life, for his salvation from the vicious man who had beaten him all the way down the hill. The only one of his kind she might have trusted.
Now he returned to take everything, even her valley, from her? Enslave her family and friends, force her to marriage? He didn’t know Celts very well.
Fury rose in her like a whirlwind. "When the mountains crumble into the sea, I will still look at you and see only the faces of my murdered kin. Never will I marry one of your kind."
But he met her anger with an arrogant chuckle. "Do not be surprised if you change your mind, little Celt."
She shoved him away, forgetting momentarily his weakness, and he staggered back. The blond brother rushed to protect him, and she flashed a fiery glare at him, daring him to punish her.
She stalked away, never looking back.
***
Within the cavern, in the yellow light from smoky reed torches, Arienh studied the anxious faces of her villagers. Seated on rocky ledges, or standing about on the cavern's uneven floor, their eyes reflected back her own grave concern.
"So what are we going to do?" Arienh asked.
"It is entirely your fault," grumbled Mildread. "You think of something."
Elli rose from her stone seat and stood beside her grandfather, a gaunt, bent man whose face glared his hatred for the intruders.
"Nay, Mildread," Elli said. "Arienh is not to be blamed for what they have done. They are the ones who have come to invade our valley and take our land."
"If she had not let that one live."
"And then they would have killed us all," Elli replied.
Old Ferris interrupted. His eyes gleamed as if he sensed approaching triumph. "You have no sense of these things, Mildread. They are animals. They live for blood and revenge. If we are to kill them, we must be sly. Slyer than the fox."
Areinh stiffened, sensing trouble. The man would destroy all of them for his own vengeance if he must. She stepped forward to head him off. "We aren't going to kill anybody. We just need to get rid of them."
Small Selma, her golden curls glowing in the torchlight, winced at the harsh talk. "But we do need help, Arienh. What if they are telling the truth? If they only come to settle, can that be so bad?"
"Settle?" Birgit snorted. "You would live among Vikings? Their sheep will take all the pasturage. And we will die because our animals starve."
"Aye," said Elli, "even if they do not also claim our animals for their own."
"They will make slaves of us, I tell you," Mildread insisted. "They are merciless devils."
Elli nodded. "They are naught but marauding rapists and murderers, Selma, no matter how they disguise themselves. I am surprised you could think of them otherwise."
"I only meant-"
Old Ferris' black eyes gleamed from the narrow confines of his wrinkled lids. "Do you not know they kill and eat the children they capture?"
"They do not!" Liam shouted. The women turned surprised stares at the boy, whose blue eyes shone brightly with tears. "He promised he wouldn't hurt us."
"Who?" asked several surprised women.
"Egil, the big one," Arienh said. "He did make a promise to the boy. We heard it." She put a comforting hand to Liam's shoulder.
"They lie, too," said Old Ferris. "You are foolish to believe him, Liam, for he will beguile you into the woods, and then-"
"Stop it." Birgit threw protective arms around her son. "You do not know any such thing, and you say it only to scare the boy."
"Do you defend them now too, Birgit?" Elli asked.
"Nay. Only that things are bad enough as it is. You do not need to be making up things to scare children."
Elli snorted and folded her arms. "What do you think they will do to you when they find out about your eyes?"
Birgit flinched at Elli's words.
"Aye," Mildread replied, nodding. "'Tis said they drive the old and feeble out into the winter storms to die, when they don't want them anymore. We must protect our own."
"And expose babies they don't want, too," said a woman from far in the rear.
Elli nodded, certain of herself. "And their sexual appetites. They cannot be satisfied. And I have heard, their organs are so huge that they cannot help but hurt a woman."
"Is it so, Birgit?" Old Ferris' malicious grin punctuated his words.
Birgit's mouth closed tightly.
The old man went too far. If the Vikings got rid of any, surely Old Ferris would be the first, for he had become as useless a human as she had ever known. Arienh stepped between him and Birgit. "And how shall we defend against them if we have no more sense than to attack our own?"
Mildread pushed herself up beside Arienh, buttressing the barrier between the old man and Birgit. She had a soft spot for her dim-sighted cousin, and could always be counted on to help protect Birgit. And she didn't like Old Ferris any better than the rest of them. "Arienh is right. We must stick together. We must get rid of them, but Arienh, there isn't any other way but to kill them."
Arienh shook her head. "That is impossible. They are big and strong, and they have all the weapons. They almost outnumber us."
"Not impossible," said Old Ferris. "We have something they want."
"What?"
"It's very simple. You are w
omen. You lure them into your beds. Then all on the same night, we kill them as they sleep."
A collective gasp echoed in the rocky chamber.
Arienh shuddered. "Ferris, how can you even think of such a thing? Are you no better than their kind?"
"They killed my son," Old Ferris retorted with sharp, glistening eyes. "Aye, that's what you must do. Avenge your families. Kill them for the sons and daughters they have murdered, raped, and stolen into slavery. You, Birgit, do you not want revenge for what they did to you? Your body ravaged, your sweetheart butchered? Do you think we would be so hungry if your father and my son had not been killed? Will you have your revenge?"
But Birgit stood tall and proud against Old Ferris's maliciousness. "Nay, I will kill no one, not in so evil a way."
"Nor I," agreed Mildread. "Besides, it would not work. At the very best, some would escape and kill all of us."
"And I will not kill anyone at all," said Selma. "Do not even think I will help you."
"Nor I." Arienh's words were echoed by others, and she breathed out her relief. "We must outsmart them, for we have not the strength or weapons to combat them. And for all that they are barbarians, they are clever men. But they could be pushed to their limit, I think. We do not need to make life easy for them. Perhaps, in fact, we could make life hard for them."
Selma brightened and tossed her curls. "Perhaps miserable," she added. Her round brown eyes sparkled.
Other women caught the idea as a murmur of interest swept through the crowd. Everyone seemed to speak at once.
"Such as what?"
"Nothing truly harmful," Arienh cautioned. "We must beware the Northmen's fury."
"Ruin their food supply," suggested Selma.
Mildread shook her head. "We are all too hungry ourselves. I could easier slit their throats than ruin perfectly good food."
Everyone laughed.
"Of course," Mildread continued, "we could steal it and eat it. That would be fun."
Other voices babbled in the cavern's dimness, overlapping each other, so fast that Arienh was not entirely sure who spoke.
"Pranks. Like boys do to old men."