Chapter Twenty-Five
Sweat poured down his cheeks, mixing with cleansing rain. Healing him. Calming the brute within. Across the field, Safira’s face twisted in a mask of shock and horror.
She’d seen him fight and was sickened by it.
Feet in a wide stance, he held his ground. This battle with Vlad and the short fight with Sigurd was tame, a mere glimpse of who he truly was. A beast of war bred to kill. Sword arcing slowly, he watched her watching him. His iron blade passed in front of his eyes, blocking his vision of Safira for a split-second. She was beautiful and fierce, black hair blowing in the wind, gold eyes bright and hot as the flames lighting the field. She fed his heart, and she fed his body.
But he would never change. She had to see this.
From the corner of Rurik’s eye, Vlad charged at him.
His father raised his sword. Rurik expected this...knew it was coming. He side-stepped Vlad and tripped him again. The warrior went sprawling in grass and mud.
Rurik stood over him, his sword jabbing the side of Vlad’s neck. “You are, if anything, predictable.”
“Grab him!” the jarl shouted, pointing at Vlad. Four housekarls raced into the ring with spears and shields. The jarl and Ademar followed.
Vlad’s breaths riffled the grass around his mouth. “Should’ve cut off your hand the first time.” He coughed. “Your mother—”
“You are not fit to speak of her either.” Rurik planted his booted foot on Vlad’s sword hand. There was a satisfying crunch of bone.
Vlad moaned, his visible eye squeezing shut. Rurik’s sword hand shook from the urge to kill. The need hummed in his bones, but footfalls pounded the field. Safira bumped into him.
Her hand closed over his. “Don’t do it. The land...”
The jarl’s orders. This was a new mantle to wear, thinking of the consequences of his actions when he thirsted for vengeance.
“Rurik...” Safira’s accented-voice cut through the haze in his head.
Land comes by blood and force. It was the Viking way.
More bodies jostled him...the housekarls flanking Vlad, their spears pointing at him on the ground. Rurik’s feet rooted in place. Slowly, his tunneled vision expanded. Curious people crowded around him and the two fallen Vikings. The drenched Forgotten Sons stood shoulder to shoulder among the onlookers. Abbott Ebbo knelt beside Sigurd’s dead body, rain sluicing the holy man’s bald pate. Gudrun’s pale grey eyes shined oddly within the shadows of her hood. Her stare honed on Rurik. Chilling. Sending a shudder down his back. Without a word, the tall seeress turned north and left the field with her sister, wind battering both women’s skirts.
Longsword broke through the wall of people. “Soren, lock Vlad’s men in the empty store room. Take Vlad to the healer. If she says he must stay with her, have two men watch him at all times.”
Stepping back, Rurik let the housekarls heft Vlad off the ground. The older man’s bloodied, swollen hand dropped his sword. Safira surprised them all and picked it up.
“I will take this to the jarl’s hall.”
She wrapped both hands around the hilt and gouged the tip into the earth. The weapon was unwieldy, nearly half her height. A gust knocked back her hood and tangled jet-black hair, bringing a whisper light as smoke. It teased Rurik. Here and gone. He couldn’t make out the words.
Longsword waved off the gathered remnant. “Go home. All of you.”
Bit by bit, Rouen’s people bustled off to seek their warmth. Rurik would do the same. Battle’s hard, flat taste still flooded his tongue, but he tamped down the creature of war within. The fight was truly over when the jarl’s men carried Vlad off into the darkness. The Forgotten Sons helped Ademar take Vlad’s men away. The field was almost empty save the nine tall torches. None would touch them until morning. They were a tribute to the gods.
Longsword faced Rurik. “Let’s get you inside where Astrid can tend your wounds.”
“I will take care of him,” Safira said proudly.
The jarl’s rain-slicked mouth pinched with displeasure. Lady Brynhild stood beside him, her cool green eyes flashing within her fur-trimmed hood.
“It’s not...fitting.”
“But it will be done.” Safira’s lilting accent was firm.
Did Lady Brynhild expect to succor him? It was a wifely thing to do, but she wasn’t his wife. Not yet. She gave the jarl a scathing glance and stormed off in silence, her embroidered hems dragging in mud. Hands clamped behind his back, the jarl sighed and watched her go.
“I suspect I’ll get an earful tonight.”
“Not your best day, Longsword.” Rurik shook off his broken shield. It landed in the dirt where two men, who the chieftain had hoped would work together, had nearly killed each other, and an upstart woman of Paris stood her ground, muddling the leader’s plans for an easy marital alliance.
“Nor was it my worst.” The jarl gave a curt nod. “I will see you in my hall.” He quickly exited the field, his red cape a banner fluttering in his wake.
Rurik stepped gingerly onward. Battle’s excitement waned, replaced by aches and pains screaming through muscle and sinew.
Safira came alongside him and slipped her arm around his waist. “I know you don’t need me to hold you up, but it would please me greatly if you pretended this once that you do.”
His laugh was rusty. “I need you, Safira.”
“I tried to tell you that the first time we met. I—” her light voice faltered and she swallowed hard “—I am good for you.”
She was a sight, wet hair stuck to her neck, rain streaming down smooth cheeks as she dragged Vlad’s sword alongside her. They were mismatched in every way. All wrong for each other. Yet, very right. He fed off her presence. Nor was it lost on him that Safira walked at his side through the empty battleground.
Just the two of them.
He transferred his sword to his left hand and rested his right arm across her shoulders. “Does this mean I’m not bad? For a Viking?”
Her features tensed. His gentle tease must’ve struck a tender nerve. Or was it the exchange with Lady Brynhild? Learning the lay of a woman’s mind baffled him. He cosseted Safira’s shoulder and kissed the crown of her soaked head.
“Would it humor you if I said we look like a pair of beat-up warriors?” He looked over her shoulder. “You, carrying a sword, and me with mine?”
Mirth glinted in her eyes. “Speak for yourself, Viking. You are the only one who looks like he had a bad day.”
He laughed again and clutched his ribs. Vlad had kicked him in that exact spot. An ugly welt was forming by the throbbing feel, but despite it, he would sleep well now that this business was done. Facing his father had dredged up black, putrid emotions. Keeping them under control and not killing the man had taken all his might.
Safira knew this. He sensed it and was grateful for her quiet presence.
The ragged twosome walked through Rouen where not a single body stirred. Doors were closed and shutters latched. Turning up the road, they headed to Longsword’s hall. Two torches burned beside his wide front door guarded by two soaked housekarls.
Astrid popped out from a smaller building beside the hall. “Rurik. Safira. Come to the eldhus. I have bandages ready.”
The eldhus blazed with warmth. Five soapstone lamps hung from the ceiling. Water-stained buckets were stacked along a wall of weathered wood. Thralls scurried around bearing rounds of cheese, bowls of stew, and fresh bread. One gawking woman set a water bucket and bandages on a bench by a long work table.
Astrid shooed the women. “Go. All of you, and stay in the hall. Pour lots of ale. That will keep them satisfied.” She shut the door behind the last thrall and motioned to the pine table. “Take a seat or lay across it, if you prefer.”
Rurik sat on the table top and removed his helmet, blood and sweat dripping over one eye. Firelight danced across new dents in the iron. He’d need a new helmet. Safira set aside Vlad’s sword and put a knee on the bench. Her quick hands finished the tear in his trousers around his thigh. When the last thread gave, she dragged the cloth down his shin. Soil and blood smeared an angled cut in his thigh no longer than a man’s finger, but the wound was deep.
“Have you any yarrow?” Safira smiled at Rurik while speaking to Astrid. “If not, I know where I can get some.”
Astrid set an earthen pot of pine-scented salve beside Rurik. Her brow furrowed when she checked his thigh wound. “I have plenty of yarrow. I will make a tincture.” She went to her cooking fire and plucked dried leaves from herbs hanging on the wall. “Do you think he bleeds inside?”
“No, but I won’t risk it.” Safira dabbed a nick in his hairline. “All it will cost him is a hot, bitter drink.”
Rurik breathed her peppery scent. “If I knew a little blood would get this much attention, I would’ve bled sooner.”
“You do not need to be hurt to ask for softness from me,” she whispered.
His gaze dipped to pretty cleavage right under his nose. Two light-skinned, womanly curves pressed together, creating an enticing shadowed line. He could stay in bed for days and worship the hills and valleys that formed Safira.
“I like your softness.”
Black lashes spread wide. “Are you flirting with me?”
He brushed strands of hair off her cheek. “Is it working?”
Safira checked Astrid, who had her back to them as she crumbled more yarrow in her brew. Water rumbled in her pot, the fire crackled cheerily, and rain pattered overhead. With their voices low, they would not be heard.
She wetted her cloth, this time to clean his arm. “How can you think of sex at a time like this?”
His mouth grazed the shell of her ear. “Flirting is not sex. But now I know what you’re thinking.”
Safira’s chin dipped, a smile ghosting her mouth. Head shaking, she applied the piney salve to his arm. She wore a plain weave tunic bare of embroidery, a garment suited to a servant. Her bearing hinted at high birth the same as the first day they’d met, but time had whittled away some of her sharpness.
“What kind of woman are you, beguiling me with your wiles?”
“Beguiling you?” Her laugh was light as air. “I am wearing the ugliest mud-splattered clothes and my hair has not seen a comb all day.”
“The sight of you makes me weak.”
“Weak,” she huffed. “There’s nothing weak about you. I think you would charge into a fight for the sake of it.”
He grinned at her assessment. He was that warrior years ago. Not anymore. He wouldn’t shirk the call to battle, but he wouldn’t go searching for a fight either. He wanted to spend his time building his holding and having children. There were better things, better people to live for. Like Safira. Brows twitching and lips parted, she wrapped a linen around his arm.
“You’re pretty when you focus,” he murmured.
She tried for sternness, a valiant effort thrown off by eyes brimming with affection. “And you are a single-minded man,” she whisper-hissed. “You need to let me tend these wounds. We can speak of...other things later.”
“Other things. Is that what you call our time alone?”
Safira bent over his thigh, checking the gash. “Astrid, is the tincture ready? My Viking warrior needs something to occupy his mouth.”
My Viking warrior. He could imagine she laid claim to him the same as he claimed her. The goodness of being with Safira warmed his skin better than a fire. Astrid brought her bitter brew and he drank it. Famished, he devoured rabbit stew while both women cleaned him and worked on the cut. A knife had been sitting with the blade angled into the fire. Astrid picked it up and sprinkled water on the iron. Droplets danced on the metal.
“You know what I must do.” Her voice was solemn.
“Do it.”
Rurik set the bowl down and gripped the table’s edge with both hands. Steam floated off the knife. Astrid’s timeworn face filled his vision. A nod from her and iron seared his skin. Sharp, white hot pain. Molars grinding, air whistled past his teeth. A sickening sizzle and the acrid scent of burning flesh filled the eldhus.
Astrid removed the blade. “It is done.” Mouth pursing, she added, “I wouldn’t be too...energetic tonight. The wound could reopen.”
Sweat beaded his skin. Worn out, he wiped his forehead, unable to jest with the older woman busy cleaning her knife. Safira dabbed his thigh with the salve, and he jolted. The wound throbbed horribly.
“Shhh...” She soothed him. “I will take care of you.”
Inches from his face, her eyes glossed with unshed tears. She shared his pain. Each tear meant for him sowed tender seeds in his cracked-open heart. The dark crevices saw light because of Safira.
He was speechless. He wanted nothing more than to find his bed and lay with her.
“We’re nearly done,” she said.
Safira was bandaging his thigh when the door opened. The jarl entered, his face grave. He stood at the lintel, the torque gone but the silver penannular pin still gleaming on his shoulder.
“You are looking better than the man I saw an hour ago.”
“I am well-tended, but you look like a man with something to say.”
One side of the jarl’s mouth curved up. “I appreciate that about you. A man who gets to the point. You inspire me to do the same.” Shoulders squared, he folded both arms across his chest. “Ademar spoke to Vlad’s men. They were surprised that Sigurd attacked you.”
“Did you think they would say otherwise?”
Longsword acknowledged that truth with the barest nod. “In time, their actions will bear them out. I came to tell you I’m letting them go in the morning.”
“To leave?”
“To serve me.”
Safira set one knee on the bench and bent low to knot the bandage.
“What about Vlad?” he asked quietly.
“He will also serve me.”
Safira bolted upright. “How could you let that man serve you?”
“Vlad honored my word,” Longsword bit out. “Sigurd did not, and he paid the price with his life.” His glower could split wood. The jarl honed it on Safira, his bearing sending a message of, Have you lost your mind, questioning me?
The table creaked under Rurik. It hurt to move, and it hurt to stay still. This battle of wills was what happened to the man who cast his lot with two proud, highborn people. He’d let the jarl have his say as long as the chieftain respected Safira’s right to hers.
“Today’s fight was about a show of skill and the ability to take orders, no matter the circumstances,” the jarl explained. “Both men have lived by their word as law. Now they must live under mine.”
“The holmgang was never about stolen beer,” she said with disgust.
Longsword’s shrug was unrepentant. “Don’t forget, Rurik was ready to fight to the death.”
“You play with people’s lives.”
“A man in my position must be sure of the warriors who serve him. The enmity between Vlad and Rurik is unfortunate, but their renown speaks for itself. And I want the best.” Longsword’s voice was steely before his gaze sought Rurik. “You were in the southern forest. You know I need good fighting men.”
“But Vlad?” He winced at pain lancing his ribs.
“You both come with well-deserved reputations and equally skilled warriors following you. You both served an overlord in a similar arrangement once. There is no reason to believe it can’t be done again.”
“In a vaster kingdom than this.” Rurik slid off the table and loosened the ties at the side of his vest. “What about the land?”
“It’s yours.”
“Because he won,” Safira said fiercely. “And because you know he is the better man. You’ve known it all along.”
Rurik basked in her passionate defense. She was quite the lovely, black-haired Viking maid.
“I have no regrets,” Longsword said. “Rurik showed his mettle and will be richly rewarded.”
Astrid gave a disapproving snort and plunked a bucket of sand on the table. The jarl frowned at his matselja who stood tall before her chieftain.
“It would seem you have a great many supporting you,” he said to Rurik. “Among them, Abbott Ebbo. Ademar explained your history with Vlad. The abbott was impressed with your restraint in not killing your father.” A wry smile cracked Longsword’s grimness. “Because of your conduct today, you’ve won a new and powerful ally.”
“I walk away from revenge in a Viking kingdom, and I’m rewarded.”
“One of the strange truths I live with every day,” the jarl said.
Land comes by blood and force.
Did it...truly?
Rurik shook his head. That was wisdom to contemplate another day. Safira’s footsteps shushed on the earthen floor beside him. She tossed a handful of sand across the table and kept her counsel. Very unlike her, this unbidden cleaning and her sudden quiet.
Longsword watched her, displeasure writ plainly on his face until he addressed Rurik. “You are a revered warrior and now second only to Ademar. The lodgings I offered on your arrival are still yours.”
“I found another woman in my bed.”
The jarl laughed. “And that is a problem?”
Cloth in hand, Safira’s vigorous swipes sent sand flying across the table. She polished the wood, her spine stiff. When the time was right he’d tell her Longsword wasn’t an odious swine. He was callous. Used to making alliances and maneuvering people for his own ends. No woman had touched his heart, and by the calculated moves he took with those around him, none would.
Rurik grabbed Safira’s hand and linked his fingers with hers. “I will sleep on your drakkar ship with Safira.”
“Sleep wherever you want,” the jarl groused. “As long as my orders are obeyed.”
Astrid banged wooden platters and gave them her back. Skirts swishing. Clanking jars set right. She burst with opinion that she dared not voice, not with others in the room.
Longsword’s stare traced the woman who had cared for him in childhood. “Will I have no peace in my own home? Women thwart me at every turn. The Breton Queen. A Paris maid. And a cranky Lady Brynhild—” the jarl’s gaze shot to Rurik “—who came to Rouen expecting to meet her future husband and now refuses to pay her tribute because I failed to deliver one as promised.”
“A leader’s troubles,” Rurik said. “Someday may you find a worthy woman to stand at your side.”
“Better yet, may you be worthy to stand at hers.” Safira’s Norse had never been so true.
The grim-faced jarl opened the door to mist blowing past the lintel like wisps of wool. He stepped outside and turned to face the warmth within.
“The holding is yours, Rurik. You won Abbot Ebbo’s respect and the confidence of Rouen’s people. But these lands will bear Viking seed. Make no mistake—you must marry a Viking woman.”