This time he didn’t feel as if she’d struck him; he felt as if he’d been kicked by a horse. “The famous Rollo,” Merrik said more to himself than to her. “I was raised on tales about the brave and ferocious Rollo. He is truly your uncle?”
“Aye, my father was his older brother. Rollo was wedded to a girl from a royal family in Spain. He loved her, so I have been told. She bore him some six children, three of them boys. However, only the second son, William Longsword, lived to manhood. Thus, Taby is second in line after William. His older brother, Hallad, my father, had four children, three daughters and one son, Taby. Unfortunately our mother died when Taby was only a year old. Our sisters, by my father’s first wife, are much older. They are wed to men of high rank and all live in Rouen at my uncle’s palace. Someone betrayed us. One or both of my sisters, or their husbands. I don’t know who. William Longsword was out of Normandy at the time of our abduction, at the Frankish court in Paris. Also, I trust William. He would no more harm Taby or me than he would harm his own father. He realizes Taby’s importance in the scheme of things. He, too, has a wife, but she has borne him no children as yet and they’ve been wed for five years. At least this was true when we were abducted. Perhaps by now he has a son. Perhaps by now Taby isn’t so very important. But until we know, Merrik, Taby is very important to Rollo, very important to Normandy.”
He said nothing for a very long time. Then, “At least they didn’t murder you out of hand.”
“No, that is why I believe it must be one of my sisters, or both of them, or their husbands. It would salve their consciences were Taby and I only to be sold as slaves, not killed outright. They surely must believe that they have won, Merrik. They haven’t, unless William Longsword has died leaving no son, but I have heard naught about it. If there is no direct heir, why, then one of the husbands would become the heir to Rollo.”
“That is what you meant when you told me you understood vengeance.”
“Aye, I have lived with the thought of it strong and sweet in my mind. Aye, and on my tongue. I can nearly taste it. As long as I’m alive they haven’t won.”
“No, they haven’t. You have spent the last two years surviving, keeping Taby with you, keeping him alive.” He looked back up the winding path to Malverne, now his farmstead, enclosed within its mighty wooden palisade. He saw smoke rising from the hole in the roof of the longhouse. Then the barley, hay, and rye fields, surrounding the palisade, the crops nearly ready for harvest. An endless cycle. “Life is not at all what a man expects it to be. I suppose it is better that way. My parents are struck down by a plague, my brother is murdered, the assassin still unknown, and now the child I want as my son is in line to the great Rollo.” He paused a moment, looking down at his brown feet. “It is almost more than I can accept.”
“And I am his niece. It is all true, Merrik.”
“Aye, I do not doubt you. But I do doubt myself. I went to the slave market in Kiev to find a comely female slave for my mother. Instead I found you and Taby. As I told you, you have made my life a confusion. And now I learn you are Rollo’s niece. I am impressed with your lineage. Who you are will convince my people that you could not have murdered Erik. Your blood is too purified, too noble, to stain your hands on a man of Erik’s station.”
“You will now return me to Normandy? With Taby?”
He became very still. He looked down at her, at the shifting expressions on her face, his own face unreadable to her. Finally, he said, with no emotion in his voice, his eyes flat, not meeting hers, “If it is your wish.”
He watched her scuff the toes of her leather shoes against the pier. They were an old pair belonging to Sarla. He could see a hole along the side of her foot. “Ah, then you don’t wish to wed me now.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then what do you want, Merrik?”
He clasped her left hand in his and flattened her palm over his chest, laying his hand over hers. “I won’t return Taby to your uncle Rollo until I have found out who betrayed you. The danger is still there. To return both you and Taby there now would simply result in your deaths this time, doubt it not. I will not take that chance.”
“Perhaps, but still, I must go back. I will find out. Uncle Rollo will punish my sisters, if it is they who had us abducted. If it is their husbands, they will be killed. I would protect Taby as would Uncle Rollo. Taby could be the future duke of Normandy, if something happens to my cousin before he breeds an heir. He must go back. My uncle grows no younger. He must train Taby, teach him, just as he did William.”
“I had not expected this,” Merrik said slowly, now looking beyond at the distant sheer cliffs, her hand now clasped in his at his side. “I hadn’t expected you to be an innkeeper’s daughter, however. I just didn’t imagine that you would be royalty. I imagine that your Danelaw prince, Askhold, believes you long dead. I imagine he is wed to another by now.”
“Aye, it is possible. He needed a wife to bear him children.”
“What is he like?”
“I don’t know. I never met him, but I heard my sisters talking about him. They said he was thirty and his first wife had died, and she had given him five daughters. He wanted a young girl. He thought I would produce sons for him. Uncle Rollo and the king negotiated the alliance.”
“I do not want you for his reasons. You know me. I have saved your life. You have given me your virginity.”
“Aye, that is true.”
“This prince wouldn’t want you if he knew you were no longer a virgin. That is the way of things.”
She could only stare at him. “Aye, you are probably right.”
“Surely you had already thought of this before you came to me. You are not stupid, Laren.”
A cormorant flew low, its thick dark wing a brief shadow over her face, then gone. She said as she looked after it, “I wanted you, and I didn’t want to think about a future that had no more texture than those clouds yon. I wanted to know what it was like, this joining between a man and a woman. You are a beautiful man and you have been more kind to me than not. Aye, I wanted you to show me what it was like.”
“You are blunt and it pleases me. I haven’t liked the deception between us. No, don’t disagree with me. I understand why you refused to tell me about you and Taby. There was much at stake, too much. You are like the slave who was captured by Rolf the Viking, in your skald’s tale. I will keep my word always, Laren. Do you trust me completely now?”
“Aye, I do. I must, but I’m afraid, Merrik.”
“There is no reason now.” He fell silent, just looking down at her hand held in his. He looked down at her silently for a long moment. Then he began to rub his hands rhythmically up and down her arms. “Do you want me to discover if this Prince Askhold still needs a wife?”
She stood on her tiptoes and kissed his mouth. He was so surprised he simply didn’t move, didn’t respond. She smiled up at him. “I would wish him thrice wed, all three of his wives malleable sheep who will give him more children than he can count, more children than a sultan in Miklagard, all of them female. There can be nothing more wondrous than kissing you, Merrik.”
“Then you give your loyalty to me? You will wed me?”
“Aye.”
“And if I wish to keep Taby with me, as my son?”
He was testing her, but it was only right. She’d tested him enough. Now it could only be the truth, nothing else. “I must return his birthright to him. He must be trained by Rollo to be the future ruler of Normandy, to be the heir, if something happens to William. You know well, as do I, that death is over your shoulder every moment of every day. The future of Normandy is important. There must be heirs. As for myself, surely what I choose to do isn’t all that important.”
“It is to me.” He kissed her then, lifting her until her feet dangled above the wooden pier, and drew her close. He kissed her until she was frantic with need, until she was arching against him, pressing and pressing even more.
He said even as he laug
hed against her warm mouth, “Do you promise that once I have meat back on your bones, you will not become fat?”
Her laughter rang out and she kissed his mouth, his nose, his cheek, her hands cupping around his head, her fingers smoothing his thick eyebrows. “I swear,” she said between kisses. “Since I am such a good cook, do you promise your belly won’t stick out over your belt?”
“I swear it. Now, do not worry about Taby. All will be well, it is my vow to you.”
She believed him. He was a man like her uncle —strong and intelligent, a man of honor, a man to trust, a man to embrace in all ways. She remembered her father, Hallad, the same way, yet he had killed her mother and fled. She flinched at the memory, as she always did.
“Do not worry about my people not accepting you. We will find out who killed my brother and all will be well.”
And she believed him again.
“You are the niece of Duke Rollo,” he said, shaking his head in wonder even as he said the words again.
“Aye, but I was also a slave.”
“You were doubtless a much better niece than a slave.”
“And now I will be a wife,” she said with a good deal of relish. “It is strange, Merrik. But I think it will be enjoyable, with you as my husband.”
“Under my tutelage you will make an excellent wife, despite your illustrious blood. Were you unpleasant, Laren, when you were Rollo’s niece? Were you spoiled and capricious? Could you have given Letta lessons in pettiness?”
She punched his arm, then immediately began to caress where she had hit him. He grinned down at her.
“Nay, all my time was spent with Taby, for he was my son as surely as he was my brother.”
She wanted to kiss him right now, right here, in the middle of the longhouse, standing near the fire pit, with all his people here, doubtless looking at them, looking, nay, staring, at her, the niece of the mighty Duke Rollo of Normandy. Did they truly believe her?
“Will you continue to be my skald?”
“I brim with new tales, even now, at this very moment, and all of them are about you, my lord, and your splendid body and your beautiful eyes.”
“You once told me that all Vikings looked alike, that we were boring with our fair hair and blue eyes.”
“I was wrong. Your eyes are unique, the blue is softer than the blue of a robin’s wing yet as bright as the sun-drenched sky in mid-morning, as—”
He clapped his hand over her mouth. “Your skald’s mouth is spewing out nonsense.”
He felt her kiss his palm. He drew his hand away, but continued to look at her, wondering for a moment what was in her mind, then he knew, and said, “Stop looking at me that way. Tell me of your father instead.”
“I will also tell of your noble heart.”
“I will retch if you mention such a thing.”
She laughed and shook her head, saying, “It is difficult to tell you of serious things knowing that Letta would rather be gulleting me with a knife than preparing to leave Malverne. Her father is still looking at me as his skald. He doesn’t believe me to be Rollo’s niece. What did he say to you, Merrik, when you told him who I was?”
“He laughed, a great belly laugh, and wiped his eyes, and reminded me I was master of Malverne and had no need to weave tales so unbelievable.”
“Does he believe you now?”
“He must. Am I not to wed you in two days?”
“I cannot wait for them to be gone from here.”
“Tomorrow. Now, tell me about your father.”
She dipped a wooden spoon into a barrel of mead and poured it into a cup. She handed it to him and watched him drink it down. “You wish me drunk?”
“No, it is just that I would put off the telling. It is painful, you see.”
“It can wait,” he said, and lifted her hand. He studied her fingers, the short blunt nails, the red chafed flesh. A slave’s hands, used to endless hard work, his wife’s hands. In two days. He turned and smiled a welcome at Sarla, who looked hesitant to approach them.
“Come, sister, and tell my betrothed that you will drink mead with us at our wedding feast. She fears Letta will try to gullet her before she leaves.”
“I will drink and dance and sing, Laren. I am pleased. I would have been just as pleased had you not been Rollo’s niece. Now I am not certain how to behave around you.”
Laren said nothing. She merely walked to Sarla and wrapped her arms around her. “You are my sister. You have been kind to me since the moment I arrived here, and I was naught but a slave. This is your home. Please, I am still the same.”
Merrik was pleased. He started to tell her so when he looked up to see Taby, rubbing his eyes, wearing a loose tunic that flapped around his feet, standing there yawning and looking around. He saw Merrik and smiled, a big sleepy smile, and made Merrik feel like a king, not just a simple duke. He went down to his haunches and opened his arms. “Taby, come,” he called out.
The child ran to him, wrapping his arms around his neck. Merrik nuzzled the child’s cheek, breathed in his child’s sweet scent. He’d known him for such a short time and now he would lose him again.
Laren said to Sarla, “Once we return Taby to Uncle Rollo, Merrik won’t see him except when we pay them visits. It will hurt him deeply. It hurts him now just to think of being parted from him.”
“Aye, but you will have your own children.”
Laren stilled. Then she smiled hugely. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
Sarla grinned at her. “Perhaps it’s time you gave it full consideration. Oh goodness, here comes Letta. Now that you will be mistress of Malverne, you have nothing to worry about. Do you wish to enjoy yourself, Laren?”
“I just wish the girl would keep her mouth closed. She hasn’t much sense, Sarla.”
“She is jealous, very jealous of you. She wanted Merrik and Malverne. She believed both in her grasp.”
Laren said nothing. She had been cooking and there was a stain on the front of her overtunic. Her face was heated from the fire pit and her hair was wet on her forehead with sweat. Letta’s very ample bosom, she saw, was heaving.
Laren saw Sarla turn away to attend to the woman Thyre’s little boy, who had crawled too close to the fire pit. She took the child in her arms and hugged him, softly singing to him. Laren knew she would stay close, in case. In case of what? Letta sticking a knife in her heart?
“So,” Letta said, coming to stand in front of Laren. “You have won. You have blinded Merrik to the truth, mayhap given him a potion to dull and confuse his mind.”
“Nay. All his dullness and confusion are his very own. I have done naught.”
“Now you insult him. But you are careful to be certain he is not close to hear you laugh at him.”
“You have no humor, Letta. You should consider finding some.”
“You are a whore. My father is furious. He wanted to buy you from Merrik.”
“Now that is humorous. Listen, your father can take Deglin with him. I doubt he wishes to stay here.”
“Deglin is a whining pig. I don’t want him. All he will do is complain. He hates you more than I do.”
“You can clout him, Letta. Under your tender care he will improve. There is no reason to hate me.”
“Ha! You have Merrik. Once he knew that you were Duke Rollo’s niece, he had to have you.”
“No, he asked me to wed with me before I told him who I was.”
“That’s a lie. All know that it is your family that has turned him from thoughts of revenge for your murdering his brother to marriage and a more mighty alliance than with the Thoragassons. I no longer want him. He has no honor. He turns from his obligations too easily. He is not a man to trust or to follow.”
“You will be quiet, Letta. I will allow no such words to be spoken about Merrik.”
“It is true! He is an oath breaker and there is no more vile a thing.”
“I could have held my temper had you only insulted me. But you spew your venom on Merrik
and that I will not tolerate. He never agreed to marry you. He would never break his oath.” Very calmly, Laren set her hands around Letta’s neck and shook her. “No more. Your father has accepted Merrik’s decision. You will as well and you will keep you mouth shut. Do you understand me, Letta?”
She felt his strong hands close over her wrists, gently tugging her fingers away from Letta’s throat. She didn’t let go.
“You defend me well,” Merrik said close to her ear. “Release her. She must oversee preparations for their departure on the morrow.”
But Laren felt rage still boiling in her and she said to Letta, “You will never speak of Merrik again, do you hear me? I will kill you if you dare to insult him thus.”
Letta very slowly nodded, her own fury momentarily tamped down because of her aching throat. Laren saw Merrik’s face, saw the stern set of his mouth. But she also saw the near laughter in his eyes. She wanted to kill both him and this miserable slut with her too strong fingers.
“Nod your head again, damn you, for I won’t release you until you do.” Laren shook her again for good measure.
Letta nodded again, her eyes dark with anger. Slowly Laren eased the pressure of her fingers. There would be marks on Letta’s white neck, she saw with satisfaction.
17
“IWON’T BE your guardian, but I will be your brother, just as Laren is your sister. Surely that binds us just as close or even closer.”
Taby looked from Laren back to Merrik. “Why do you sound sad, then?”
Merrik wanted to smile, but he couldn’t find it inside him to do so. “There will be changes, Taby. You know you are something of a prince, don’t you?”
The child nodded his head slowly. Suddenly he looked scared. “I don’t have to be, Merrik. I can just be me and your little brother.”
“Sometimes,” Merrik said very slowly, “there are circumstances that we cannot change. You are a prince, Taby, actually you could become the heir to the duke of Normandy, the illustrious Rollo. Do you remember him? No? Well, you will probably recognize him when you see him again. If you don’t recognize him, it won’t matter, for you will come to love him and respect him. Laren tells me that he spent hours with you before you and she were taken away.”