I rode south on horseback with Ragnar, safe against his chest as the winter sun came out from behind the clouds and brought, for the first time that year, the first whispers of the spring on her rays.

We were happy, the Viking and I. It wasn't the screaming, fist-pumping happiness of your football team winning, it wasn't showy, it didn't need to be spoken of. But it was there, radiating between and out of us, the pure, quiet joy of being with the person you would rather be with above all others. Jarl Ragnar's men rode behind us by a short distance, letting their Jarl lead the way south in the sunshine, with his woman in his arms.

Just before we arrived back at the camp Ragnar spotted his horse loose in the woods and dismounted to bring the beast back with us.

"Why is he out here?" I asked, knowing the Vikings were usually very careful with their animals.

"I let him go," Ragnar told me. "Back in the marsh, when I could go no further with him, I let him go."

"You meant to walk across the marshes?" I asked, confused. "But –"

The Jarl smiled and took my hand in his, as I was still on horseback and he was now on foot leading two horses, to kiss my palm. "I wasn't thinking straight, girl. I was crazed. The men found me half-dead, half-frozen in the middle of the marshlands. Don't leave me again, or I'll probably travel south and try to cross one of the great deserts without water or a head-covering to keep the sun from burning me up."

His men were close to us, then – within earshot – so I held my questions back, not wanting to force Ragnar to speak of personal matters in front of them.

Later that night, when our bellies were full of stewed venison, bread, cheese and dark ale and our bodies were sated after taking our fill of each other, we lay on the furs in the roundhouse, watching the flames dance in the fire-pit.

"Don't leave me again," Ragnar said once more, pulling me back against him and kissing my bare shoulder. "I've seen how I am now, without you. I don't wish it ever again. Promise me, girl. Promise me you'll not leave."

I leaned back into him and thought of my family. It was too soon for things to have settled for them, and I knew poor Katie had quite a task ahead of her in convincing our parents that I was fine. I also knew she would be successful, because even if they didn't believe her words they would come to see from her lack of worry that she did, in fact, know I was safe. But I could not promise Ragnar what he asked of me. Not exactly.

"I cannot make that promise," I told him. "But I can make a slightly different one."

He smiled ruefully. "Ah, I should have guessed it. You haven't come back to make life easy for me, have you?"

"I can promise I won't leave again without your permission," I said. "I can promise it won't be a surprise – I won't do that to you again."

"And what if I don't give my permission, foreigner?"

"Then maybe I'll take you with me."

I meant to keep the promise I had just made. Ragnar's pain at even my brief absence was too evident, too strong to deny. I loved him, and I wasn't going to hurt him like that again. Even if it meant taking him with me to the future? Maybe so. That bridge could be crossed if and when we ever got to it.

"I would like to meet your parents," he said. "I would like to thank them for bringing you into the world, for bringing you up so full of fire and wit."

"Maybe you will," I mused quietly. "And my sister, too. She'd like you, I think. Maybe a little too much. We might have to bring her one of the warriors, to keep her distracted."

We fell again into the warm, comfortable quiet of being together – until I remembered the question I'd intended to ask as we arrived back at camp.

"Ragnar?" I asked, checking if he was still awake.

"Mmm? What is it, girl?"

"Were you exaggerating earlier, when you said the men found you 'half-dead' in the marsh?"

I rolled over so I could look into his blue eyes and he answered me plainly:

"No. Why do you ask me about this? Do you think it strange?"

"But what if the men hadn't come back for you?" I continued. "Are you saying –"

"I'm saying I would be in the next world now, girl. I was too taken up with the loss of you to pay attention to anything else – even survival."

"And what did you mean when you said there are worse fates than death? What is a worse fate than death?"

Ragnar rolled me over onto my back and let his eyes roam over my naked body before gazing, once again, up at me. "Loss, girl. That's what I meant. It felt that way in the marsh, as I lay imagining that I heard your voice whispering in my ear – I felt that I would happily die if it meant staying with the sound of your sweet sighs, that I would not mourn a life spent without you." He pushed his big, rough fingers between my own, entwining our hands together. "And now, lying here with you, I see what my mother drove at when she spoke of necessity."

"Of necessity?" I asked, stretching out beside my Jarl, luxuriating in our perfect closeness.

"Necessity, yes. My mother said that's how I would know when I loved. When I found the girl who was necessary to me, as necessary as bread, as breath and slumber. This is what you are to me, now. It feels we are not so much even separate people right now, here – doesn't it?"

"It does," I whispered, very quietly, as sleep stole over me and I nestled a little closer in Ragnar's arms, smiling without even realizing it.