He stopped, and stood looking at her, his face all iron, stunning in his size, backlighted by the sullen evening. After a moment, he laughed — if one could call that short bark a laugh. Her fear, her preparation to fight him even though her wrists were fettered, even though she was hardly half his size, seemed to amuse the cruelty in him.
He moved another step toward her—just to tease her, it seemed — then threw a skin of water and a package of meat on the deck at her knees. She didn't move, didn't even look at it. A gust of wind blew up, tossing her hair wildly about her face and arms. He waited, then said, "Eat, Saxon, and drink deeply. It may be the last time you taste anything but salt and fishes."
He walked away with all the ease and grace that came of great physical strength. To Edin he'd become the sum of evil. She felt ashamed to see her people looking at her, patiently waiting for her to apportion the food among them. So far she had done nothing for them. She wanted to cry with fear and tension and this awful sense of helplessness.
Instead, she shared out the food and ate the meat as daintily as she could with no utensils. Hungry as she was, she soon found she couldn't swallow her meat. Round and round it went in her mouth, the mutton fat getting colder and more congealed.
***
Though the Blood Wing danced easily enough on the wave tops, she could be contrary to handle, being so broad in the beam, and Thoryn preferred to handle the steerboard as much as he could.
The coast of Britain was just visible. As long as it was in sight, he could steer by the shoreline. On the open sea, he would navigate entirely by the sun and the stars. He'd learned early to recognize the Pole Star and 'to depend on it. But he always kept an eye out for portentious signs: A strange bird, a bit of floating wood, fish surfacing unaccountably, a cat's-paw of wind on the water —these all had meaning for the seawise.
The sun slipped down between a great slow-rolling cloudbank and the horizon, and stared at them across the open sea. The Vikings lay at their ease in the low-planing light, letting the wind belly the four-square sail and drive them homeward. They were weary from voyaging and sated with looting. Most of them had removed their battle dress and were back to wool trousers and shirts of linsey-woolsey. In most cases, the trousers were brown or grey and the shirts red or blue or green —though Hauk Haakonsson's was a definite mulberry color. Hauk, with his high, axe-blade nose, was fashion conscious. It wasn't cold, so no one had put anything more than a sleeveless leather vest over his shirt. With their helmets put away, they protected their heads with woolen caps. To a man, they stuck to beards and long hair. It took a good growth of hair to protect against the bitter winds and burning sun of the North Sea.
Some napped, sitting up on their sea chests with their arms folded, as motionless as flies in the last sun. Most of their personal property was stored in these chests. Thoryn, as captain and owner, was responsible for "finding" the ship, for furnishing all necessary equipment —lines, spare sails, buckets, etc. Each man brought his own warm sea clothes, his kit of needles and thread, weapons, and so forth, which he stowed in his chest and his allotted section called his "room."
One or two had climbed into their sleeping bags. Ottar Magnusson and Jamsgar Herjulsson, called the Copper-eye, were playing chess. A few others watched the game, trading coarse jibes. Several men were seeing to their weapons. Time at sea was often filled with wiping weapons dry against rust, and touching blades to whetstones.
Hauk, Jamsgar, and Ottar were among those in Thoryn's private hire. They lived on Thorynsteading in the longhouse in return for acting as his personal men-of-arms. They were men built to feast on other men, so brisk and strong and well armed that they had no enemies, men made of iron true enough to hold an edge. Sweyn the Berserk had been one of them.
Thoryn sighed. The darkening sky was full of enough high clouds that the breeze should last the night. That would put them nearly a third of the way home.
His ever-shifting gaze moved to the Saxons. He'd waited to feed them until he was sure none of them was going to hang miserably over the gunwales retching up his meal. The boy, lying by the shield-wall making little marks on the deck planks with a wet finger, would make a good shepherd. When he grew, he'd do for a field worker. The three servant women were for Inga, who needed more help in the longhouse as she got older. The man was a thin weedy type, and Thoryn wouldn't have brought him except that he was obviously a carpenter. Thoryn had a notion in his mind that was going to require carpenters.
One spear of rosy light picked out the maiden. Now, there was a prize. She was tilting the waterskin to drink and caught his stare with a sideways look —and nearly choked. He averted his face and schooled himself not to scowl.
He'd finally quelled her. One of his strengths was his unerring nose for frailty in others, and at first he'd been amused to see how thoroughly he'd ferreted out hers; but now the joke palled. She was too frightened. Her eyes burned for sleep, and her face was as pale as a linen shroud. He resisted the idea, yet felt mayhap he had done wrong.
Don't think about wrong. I have enough troubles without taking on "wrong" I don't even understand "wrong!"
After all, what had he done but show her the reality of her situation —that he had the power of life and death over her, right down to the power to decide what the quality of that life or death might be? She was sound, not harmed in any way except for that lump on her head; she could bear a well-deserved lesson in discipline.
But disciplined or not, with that hair like amber seaweed, and that skin as fresh and soft as a babe's, and those eyes, wide-set —and green!—and that mouth with its lilt at the corners that gave her a seductive expression capable of melting any man's metal, aye, even undisciplined he would get his price for her. He imagined her on the block, her shift stripped from her shoulders. . . .
Blood Wing tugged hard on the steering oar and surged ahead. It was as though the dragonship had spoken aloud: Keep awake and steer, Northman! Thoryn felt the overlapped planks of the hull twist. She was like a live beast bucking the waves.
But even the dragonship couldn't keep all his attention right now. He soon fell back to thinking about the woman.
Mayhap it would be a mistake to sell her in Kaupang. It was the closest big mart to Thorynsteading, but he might get a much better price for her in Hedeby, where sometimes Rus traders visited in search of new faces and bodies to take down the Volga for the Arabian harems. The Arabs were said to crave fair women, and this one was certainly fair.
"You gloat, Thoryn?" Rolf Kali clapped him on the back as he joined him on the steering platform. The evening was cooling, and Rolf had his grey cloak on, held to his chest by twin gilt-bronze brooches.
Thoryn raised his brows in question, though he knew exactly what Rolf thought he was gloating about.
Besides that rusty-red hair and beard, Rolf sported a widespread, unrefined nose and the scar of an old gouge wound on his cheek. He was somewhat older, and a different kind of man from Thoryn altogether. He was, for one thing, much less serious-minded. Friendship, to Thoryn, was a matter of expedience, but if he possessed such a thing as a true friend, he supposed Rolf was it.
Right now the man's complexion was high, whipped by the wind. He said, "Whatever you told the woman seems to have scared her badly enough. She sits there like a hazelgrouse in the woods on hunting day. You've shown her who's boss."
Thoryn preserved his silence for a moment, then said, "Whatever I told her she well deserved. She needs to learn she's but a thrall."
"And at her master's mercy."
"Aye."
"And you are her master."
Thoryn's eyes grazed the soft curve of her shoulders. She looked tired and defeated. He said, "Aye, I am — for the time being. I was just considering whether I could get a better price for her in Hedeby."
Hedeby lay on the east coast of Jutland at the head of Schleifjord on the shores of the lagoon of Haddeby Noor —far from Dainjerfjord in Norway. Thoryn saw Rolf considering this. "We couldn't make th
at voyage until spring," he said. "Were you planning to keep her a maiden that long? Over the winter at Thorynsteading? With the men?"
"The men will leave her alone."
At just that moment Jamsgar Copper-eye squatted before the captives and pulled on the bare foot of the one with dark short curls. The girl woke with a start.
He smiled broadly, pointed to himself, and said, "Jamsgar. Jamsgar Copper-eye."
The girl giggled and pointed to herself, saying, "Juli—"
The maiden sat up straighter, threw her arms around the dark-haired wench, as if she were the girl's protector, and said, "Juliana, don't speak to him!"
Thoryn bellowed, "Jamsgar!"
The Copper-eye looked at his jarl and shrugged. With a grin, he went back to his room.
"The men will leave her alone?" Rolf said. "If you say so. But she's a tempting bit, axe-friend. Those lips, and that hair, and . . . have you ever seen a woman with green eyes before?" He sighed hugely. "She'll cause trouble. Winter is long, and there are days when the longhall feels like a corral and the men start acting like stallions."
Thoryn shrugged. "The profit I'd turn on her would justify a little trouble."
"Most likely; but truth be told, she would get you a good price even if she weren't quite a maiden."
"The men will leave her alone —or else."
"During the day when you have your eye on them, aye. But what about at night when you go to your own chamber and nothing but a curtain keeps the wolves from invading her good and fragrant pasture? If I were her master, I think I would see she was safely locked up at night. Preferably with me."
Thoryn saw the twinkle in his eye.
"Come, Thoryn, this talk of selling her! As if I'm not a man who knows men —more important, a man who knows you. The lass is beautiful — and she's yours! Since when were you so monkish? No one sells a thrall like that. The best a man keeps for himself. Take her to your bed and be happy. Then, when you've had enough of her, we'll talk of markets."
Thoryn exhaled through his nose. "You talk nonsense. She won't command eight half-marks if she isn't a maiden."
Rolf shrugged. "Mayhap you'll lose a few half-marks. It depends on how sorely you use her. And mayhap, after a time, you'll decide not to sell her at all. Think of it, brother!" He pretended to consider the woman. "Having her in your chamber, alone. She would probably be reluctant at first, being a maid. She would need training—much training—many a pleasant night's work, that. You would want to take her slowly the first time or two, so as not to frighten her. I know there are those who prefer a good scuffle, but this one—no doubt she's been brought up cautiously on a diet of piglet and lamb and fresh milk straight from the goat's udder. I don't think you would want to frighten her. No, take her slowly and teach her to shudder with—"
"You give me much helpful counsel, friend, none of it worth a horse's cast shoe." He glanced pointedly at Rolf's crotch. "I see your body has outgrown your brain again."
Rolf laughed. "When a man has been as long from a woman as I have, even a hole in a water keg seems inviting. I've been eyeing the younger men aboard for the past week. Now I have something better to eye."
Thoryn snorted and looked away, out to the sea. "The woman doesn't tempt me half as much as does the idea of eight half-marks of pure gold. Besides, my father took a Saxon thrall to his bed, and later regretted it, as I recall."
Rolf was wise enough to let that pass. A moment slipped by. He stepped away to pull on a line of the striped sail, then came back and placed a hand on Thoryn's shoulder. "Beornwold is nearly gone. Hark to his gasping; he can hardly put one breath after another."
Thoryn nodded, keeping his eyes from where the dying Viking lay sprawled. Instead, he looked up at the bellying sail. "And what of my berserk?"
"That one will live —and live to cause you grief."
Thoryn lowered his eyes to the sea again, avoiding any glance at Sweyn, who was muttering from the corner of his spittle-flecked mouth. Thoryn should have killed him rather than condemned him to a life of uselessness.
That woman!
He said, "It must be in Odin's heart for Sweyn to cause me grief, for he has certainly done so often enough. Him with his berserk ways, stamping himself into fury, biting his shield rim, going around bellowing in the coldest air without a stitch on. He's made many a virtuoso performance of speed and brawn and complete brainlessness."
"He's fought for you without fear."
"He's fought for a leader of rank and means in return for good pieces of gold and the promise of meat in his belly all the winter long. True, he has no fear, but he has no care, either. Mayhap, when we reach home, I'll give him enough blood-money to buy a small steading and a few cattle, and be rid of him."
Mayhap, he thought privately, being his own steading master would give a cripple enough self-respect to make his life as worthwhile as it had been when he was a proper-shaped man. Thoryn felt he owed him that much, having made him useless as a warrior.
Rolf again moved to adjust one of the intricate system of clue lines that enabled them to reef the large sail. When he was finished he said, in a considering tone, "I would ask you a question, Thoryn Kirkynsson."
"Ask on, Rolf Kali, provided you don't want to know where the winds come from, or where the tides start, or what makes the moon round. I don't know those things."
"Why did you do it; why did you spare him? Beornwold will die only once, but you've condemned the Berserk to die daily. What did the woman say to you?"
A cold serpent twisted in Thoryn's vitals. He cast a glance at the Saxon —
— and met her eyes. They emptied his lungs. They were enough to fell a forest, to move a field, to drain a lake. The whole world could be dismantled and dropped into those green eyes, to sink without a trace.
By Odin, she was a woman to tempt a man!
Don't think of that.
He struggled to find his wits again, to achieve a semblance of solemnity. "Sweyn broke his oath to me; he disobeyed my order."
"I didn't ask why you challenged him—"
So easily did Rolf put that aside! He had no conception of the will Thoryn must summon up to get himself through such fierce and bloody tests of dominance.
" —I asked why, when once you bested him, you didn't finish it?"
"She said 'please' " he answered shortly.
Rolf frowned, unsatisfied.
"What's that look now? Say what's in your mind, without fear or favor"
"It makes no sense, Thoryn. She pleaded because she's a woman and can never understand that a lame fighting man is worthless to himself and everyone else. Or that giving and taking death well are two of the things a proud man does. Sweyn Elendsson lived by the axe and reckoned to die by it."
Thoryn grew irritated. "Call me a madman and pelt me with bones if you like, but I'm afraid you must take my unseemly answer anyway."
Rolf eyed him with a look that eased into affection. "Then . . . did you hope to gain her favor by it?"
"Aye, right after killing her bridegroom before her eyes and right before someone dropped his torch and so set her home afire. Considering how much was taken from her at one blow, I'm sure my sparing of Sweyn created a real lust of gratitude in her."
"If not her favor — "
Thoryn clicked his tongue. "This conversation tires me. Can you speak of naught but the thrall? By Odin, I swear you yourself would like to get into her secrets"
Rolf's look turned sly. "I won't answer that, Oh Hammer of Dainjerfjord. I prefer to keep my sword arm intact ."
Rolf left, and Thoryn fell to thinking about how he had killed the maiden's groom. He recalled how she'd crooned over the body, speaking senselessly about mending the boy's shirt. And he had been just a boy, hardly a man yet. Thoryn recalled a thinnish beard and a drooping mustache. But when Thoryn had seen in the maiden's eyes that there was someone behind him, it had been pure reflex to turn and swing his sword. Then, seeing the boy sliced open and in agony, he knew it only merciful
to pierce the boy's heart so that his end would be swift.
He could still feel the iron going in, and how he'd leaned on it to drive it farther, and pushed his weight after it. I think I felt the boy's last heartbeat.
Chapter Five
"They're talking about you."
Juliana whispered what Edin knew well enough already. By their glances, she knew the two men beneath the curled tip of the stern were discussing her. Now and then she caught snatches of the jarl's deep, compelling voice. Was he telling the redheaded Rolf that soon he was going to throw her overboard? Oh, why hadn't she used her dagger on herself when she had the chance? Better that than. . . .
She looked at the darkening water and shuddered, then looked at the Viking once more. She saw no signs of clemency in his face.
Juliana whispered again: "The big one wants you."
Edin could have laughed. Wanted her! He only wanted to kill her.
"It's no shame on you, my lady. With your looks—"
"Juliana, please!"
The girl shrank back behind Arneld to sulk. The boy went on scribbling on the planks, using his finger as a pen and drops of sea water as paint. Edin was left to herself once more, left to consider her situation.
She had no defense; she felt dwarfed and helpless among these immense men, awed by their masculinity. She'd lived in gentle, pleasant household. Cedric had been manly in the way of a young gentleman, not in the harsh way of these warriors. Comparing him to these was like comparing the barnyard rooster to the hawk soaring overhead.
Cedric! She pressed her fettered wrists to her forehead, trying to block out the image. The dragon had thrust out its tongue, and poor Cedric was pierced through. Edin was caught anew by the horror of it.
Her eyes didn't tear, however; in fact, they were too dry. She blinked them hard. They burned. She was so weary. The food had only increased her craving for sleep.
Both Vikings were staring at her now. Their expressions made her feel naked. She had to look away.
Edin's embrace Page 6