The overwhelming silence beyond the walls of the hut crept into Kolbjorn’s awareness as he slowly awakened. His body, too, felt peaceful. The house did not shake anymore, and the wind did not wail in between the slats of the hastily repaired roof. It was as if Fimbulwinter, the great winter before Ragnarok, had finally passed, and all the world lay new and quiet.

Crisp air cooled his nose and cheeks, but when he looked at the fire, he saw that it was still burning its small dance on the scorched wood. They had not slept long if the fire was still going. Despite the chill air, it was warm and cozy under his bear fur cloak.

He felt Rachel’s warm, silky body spread on top of him and breathing in unison with him, and, having wrapped his arms around her, he felt that everything was right with the world.

Last night had been the highlight of his life. The woman from the future…

She was fire and love and—

He tensed, and the feeling of peace evaporated.

A thief.

He had never felt accepted by his father, and because of her, his father had cast him out completely. What was Kolbjorn thinking? That he’d bring a thief home as his woman?

How could he have been so weak? How could he have drunk her wine? He, who’d sworn to the life of sobriety because he feared doing things like this when he drank. Feared letting himself be fooled, losing control.

This was over. The storm was gone, and with it, the protective cocoon that enveloped the two of them. He had to take Rachel and the necklace to his father—the sooner, the better. He shifted to peel Rachel away from him, and she opened her sleepy eyes. Her gaze found him and she smiled, planting a kiss on his chest.

She was so beautiful, her auburn hair spread over his chest, her cheeks rosy, her lips swollen from their lovemaking and calling for him to kiss them again.

“Come back to sleep,” she croaked. “I can give you space. I must be heavy.”

Heavy? She was as light as a feather, and the feeling of her pressed against him was as sweet as honey. “The storm is over. We must go back.”

Rachel pushed herself against him, her face paling. She knew what this meant as well as he did. She, too, had seemingly forgotten everything that existed beyond the storm, everything that put them on the opposite sides of the game.

He shifted from under her and then from under the cloak, fresh air covering his skin with goosebumps. He felt her eyes on him as he dressed.

“Are you really going to take me to your father?” she asked.

He turned to face her, and she was a sight to see—her naked, delicate shoulders peeking from under the fur, the tops of her breasts visible. The sight made his mouth dry and heat rush to his groin, but he chased the feeling away.

He had made a mistake by allowing himself to act on his attraction. There could be no future for them. She was a thief. And she belonged in a different time.

Even if Kolbjorn allowed himself to think about what would happen if she decided to stay with him, presenting a thief to his father as Kolbjorn’s future wife was impossible. It went against everything the jarl wanted Kolbjorn to be. With a thief as his wife, his father would never accept him into the family. Merely considering the possibility was foolish, though, since his father would surely kill Rachel, even if Kolbjorn attempted to convince him to spare her life.

No. He must shut down his feelings towards her, feelings he never should have had in the first place. She was probably trying to manipulate him anyway.

“I am going to take you to him,” Kolbjorn said, putting his clothes on. “Better get dressed.”

Without throwing another glance at Rachel, Kolbjorn walked to the door. He needed to see how bad the snow was.

He opened the door a little to see, and a small drift fell inside. The snow was up to his knees. He shoved the door back into place. They could go, but the trek would be difficult.

“Do you want to have some breakfast?” Rachel said with a nervous smile. “There are still hot dogs. I can roast them.”

Kolbjorn’s stomach growled at the thought, but he did not want to give in to the memory of the happiest night he had ever had.

“Get dressed. We need to go.”

Rachel sat upright and clutched the edges of his cloak tight around her. “Why are you being like this?”

“Like what?”

“You know like what. As if nothing happened yesterday.”

He met her eyes. They were big and full of emotion. “Nothing happened yesterday,” he said. “I had you as a man, like I have bed slaves and servant girls. So what?”

Rachel jerked back slightly as if he had hit her. “It was not just sex, and you know it.”

He did know it. Nothing had ever come close to what he felt with her. As if every hair on his body filled with tenderness and pleasure. And not just pleasure, something more.

Completeness.

As if he’d found home.

Her.

“It was a mistake,” he said. “I should not have become drunk, and I should not have— It won’t change anything. I must take you to my father, and you—you must face the consequences of your actions.”

Rachel paled, her eyes darting around the room as if she was looking for an answer.

“Listen,” she said, when her eyes fell on her purse. “I have a solution. You don’t have to take me to your father. Let me take the necklace.”

Kolbjorn tensed, gripping his belt purse where the jewel lay, but Rachel held out a hand as if calming a wild animal.

“No, no, listen. Let me take it so that I can save my mother’s life. In exchange, I’ll bring you stuff from modern times. Valuable stuff. Food and drinks, modern jewelry with many, many gemstones. Modern technology allows us to produce stones that look just like rubies, emeralds, diamonds, at a fraction of the cost. They are almost indistinguishable to the naked eye. Your father will be so, so much richer with them than just with this necklace. He’ll become a king in no time. I’ll bring a lot. Look in my purse. Take the ones I have with me!”

Kolbjorn listened to her with a frown. If she told the truth, she was right, it would be a good solution. But most likely, she lied. She wouldn’t come back.

“Look, look,” she urged him, standing on her knees. The fur cloak slid slightly from her movement, and Kolbjorn clenched his jaws at the delicious sight of her.

Kolbjorn picked up her purse and took out a packet of the same transparent material as the bag with the sausages.

It was full of sapphires. All the exact same size, glistening in the firelight like the eyes of the Midgard Serpent. There were at least a hundred of them. He watched them, not quite believing he held such treasure in the palm of his hand.

She was right, this was much more valuable than the necklace alone.

“And these are made?”

“Yes, manufactured.”

“Out of what?”

“Minerals.”

“And they are cheap?”

“Yeah. Compared to the real deal. But they look almost the same.”

He could not tell the difference.

“Why do you have them with you?”

“I wanted to throw them on the street so that people would fight for them, in case I was out of luck and the jeweler or the guards didn’t leave the house. Take them. Just give me the Necklace of Northern Lights”—her voice broke —”and let me go,” she finished in a whisper.

Kolbjorn opened the transparent purse and spilled the gemstones onto the palm of his hand. They glistened just like the real ones.

“Someday people will be able to do this?”

“Yeah.”

He shook his head as if shaking off a bad dream, then put the jewels back into the transparent purse. “You must think me a fool if you suggest that I trust your word.”

Rachel frowned. “I know I seem like a thief… Well, I am. But I will come back. I swear on my mother’s life.”

She was in earnest. If he believed any word she had said before, nothing was more important to her than her mother. Still. He would not step from the path of honor, even for her.

“No.”

Rachel scoffed and threw off the fur cloak. Her ripe breasts bounced before him, and he turned away as his cock hardened from the sight and the urge to take the beautiful flesh in his mouth, one breast after the other, until she could not withhold her moans.

As she dressed, Kolbjorn remained turned away and breathed, trying to calm down his lust.

Rachel’s voice came closer, and he could hear the rustle of her pulling on clothes behind his back. “I don’t understand why you must be so stubborn. I proved to you that I am from the future, and you believe me, don’t you? Why can’t you just trust me when I swear on the most important person in my life? What do I need to do to make you believe me?”

“I am not going back empty-handed.”

“You won’t! The whole pack of sapphires—there are three hundred of them!”

“Your fake gemstones won’t buy my loyalty.”

Rachel appeared in front of him, in her shift and her apron dress; her bare feet must have been freezing on the packed-dirt floor.

Her eyes were huge, her mouth round, her lips full. She was pleading, and he hated seeing her like this.

“Kolbjorn. Anything. Medicine, clothes, food, more gemstones. Darn it, even weapons. Ask me for anything and I’ll bring it. Stuff that will make your father beg you to join the family. I’ll be like your personal genie. Just give me the necklace and let me go.”

Kolbjorn eyed her. Even if he did not want to admit it, somewhere deep, he believed her. There was nothing to prove that she’d actually go through with it, though, and he’d probably be a fool to trust her in the first place.

Did he doubt that she was from the future? No. All the things, the food, and the wine that she had—all were undeniable proof. And the Norns could do anything, even send people through time.

He needed her to stay so that he could restore his good name in front of his father.

But a huge part of him wanted her to stay for a whole different reason.