They found him at the blacksmith’s giving exact details on the sword he wanted made to replace the one lost during the thieves’ ambush. He was forewarned by their number that he wouldn’t like the reason they had sought him out en masse. He was right.
“Marry her? You have each lost your mind!”
Royce ended up sounding the most reasonable at that point. “Alfred wants to forge alliances through marriage. You knew that, were involved in it yourself. ’Tis not unusual that he would suggest it.”
“And not unusual that I would refuse it,” Selig shot back tersely.
“Tell me you do not find her the least bit appealing,” Brenna said.
He knew it then, without a doubt, that she had indeed seen Erika beneath him in the corridor, naked, and had merely kept that part of the tale to herself. Stiffly, he told her, “That has no bearing. I am to marry a woman who hates me? Is that what you want for me?”
It was Kristen who answered, and indignantly. “Certainly not. We expect you to come to your senses and give her back to her brother, because it looks as if you must do one or the other.”
And Garrick said, quite calmly, “We cannot be responsible for keeping the Saxon king here. He was to depart on the morrow. And if we just let the siege continue, the girl’s brother could grow tired of the wait and attack instead, and he would unknowingly be attacking the King of Wessex. Do you want the responsibility of starting the war between these Saxons and Danes again, son?”
How was it fathers always knew how to pile on the guilt just so, so that there was no hope of digging your way out of it? And they were on his side? Mayhap he could put his honor aside and fight Ragnar Haraldsson after all—nay, he could not. He would have to give the lady up. He was not about to marry a woman he despised.
Alfred appeared in the doorway just then, tall, fair—regal. “I see you have found him,” he said to no one in particular, then pinned Selig with his blue eyes. “What is your answer?”
Selig could argue all he liked with his family, but like most men, he found it extremely difficult opposing a king, even a Saxon king who held no exact allegiance from him. “I will marry her.”
Alfred had expected no other answer. “Excellent. Then all that must needs deciding now is whether to invite the lady’s brother to the ceremony or inform him after the feat is accomplished.”
Royce suggested, “If we are to avoid an immediate assault, afterward.”
And Kristen came out of her shock long enough to point out, “He is like to attack anyway. Think you he will not know she is forced?”
The word stung Selig to the quick. Any other woman he had ever known would be thrilled did he offer marriage. Anyone but this one…
“She will not be forced,” he said tightly, only to know it for a lie and amend, “at least she will wed me willingly, and convince her brother of that.”
It was his mother who cocked a brow at him. “How will you manage that miracle if she hates you as you say?”
He gave her an annoyed look. Verily, she didn’t seem the least bit sorry for him, seemed almost amused. If anyone was being forced, he was, and his own mother should at least grieve a little that it was so.
“I will see to it,” was all he said.
“Then you had better get to it right quickly,” Brenna said. “If you mean to do this thing, it should be done this eventide, the brother told in the morn. He will need knowledge of a wedding night come and gone to keep him from thinking he can undo this match.”
A wedding night? The thought was galvanizing—and chilling. A wedding night, with her—nay, there would be none. Without temptation thrown in his face, he did not want her. Revenge was all he wanted from her, had ever wanted—and would still have.
Chapter 29
BY THE TIME Selig reached his chamber, he was so furious he could barely contain it. It was in every line of his handsome face, and it was without direction. He wanted to blame Erika, the fates, even himself, but the rage wouldn’t settle on any one person or thing specific—it was just there. And with it was the strangest exhilaration he had ever felt. If he did not know better, he would think it was pure joy, which, of course, it couldn’t be.
Wearing her chainse, she stood before the window, from which she could see at least half of the army camped before the gates. He didn’t doubt she had stood there since the Danes’ arrival. She wouldn’t even look away long enough to note who had entered the chamber, though he knew she had heard him, saw her tense, then force herself to relax.
He crossed the room, stopped just behind her, and could see the Danes for himself in the light of their campfires. They were impressive. They were deadly serious—at least her brother was, and he apparently led them.
She had tensed again at Selig’s nearness, and did not relax this time. He didn’t have to say a word for her to know it was him, yet she still wouldn’t turn to confirm it. Not doing so, she was unaware of his fury, might not have said what she did if she could have seen it.
Her voice was soft, tired. “It is over. I will even apologize now.”
He was amazed his own tone was moderate. “For having no heart?”
“For letting your insults provoke my temper into ordering that lashing.”
His voice was sharper, though no less curious. “How did I insult you?”
It took her a few moments before she would say it. “You invited yourself to my bed.”
He didn’t recall it, but he would not be surprised were it true. It was his nature to court all women, and she was one of the lovelier ones. There would have had to be something wrong with him for him not to try to charm her—but there had been something wrong with him. And he could do no more than curse that damn fever that had so muddled his memory.
“Most women would consider that a compliment,” he said. There was no conceit in that, just a statement based on his life experiences.
“Then I must be quite different from most women.”
He could agree with that wholeheartedly. Never before had a woman played such havoc with his emotions. He despised her one moment, and the next he wanted to bury his hands in her hair and ravage her mouth. And he despised himself for that weakness of the flesh that she provoked so easily.
Were she any other woman, he would have leaned into her. His mouth would be on her neck, tasting her, his hands on her breasts, bringing them to budding life.
The sensual habits of a lifetime were so ingrained, he had to make a constant, conscious effort to keep his hands from her when she was this close to him. But he didn’t move back to make it easier.
He should have, but he didn’t.
“You could have saved your apology, wench,” he said now. “You still do not leave here.”
She spun around. “But my brother—”
“Has had no luck in dealing with my sister, so has decided to besiege us. Since we have had ample time to prepare for it, who do you think will last the longer, or lose patience first and attack?”
She was incredulous. “You would take this to war?”
“Not I.”
“Most certainly you!” she snapped. “Just let me go home. I have suffered enough—”
“How have you suffered? Have you marks to show for your lashings? Do you ache from your labors?”
She was exasperated enough to yell at him. “I suffer from your presence!”
His color heightened at that, and she finally saw it, the rage he had come in with, that she was provoking even more. A thrill of fear shot through her. She stepped back, only to come up against the ledge of the open window. For the briefest moment she thought of jumping. His hand twisting in the chain wrapped around her neck took that option from her.
“So you cannot stomach the sight of me, wench?” She wasn’t about to answer that now. “Then ’tis your misfortune that King Alfred was here to offer suggestions for the settlement of this matter, and one he particularly favors. ’Tis the king’s wish that we marry.”
She gasped so hard she choked on i
t. He pounded on her back. She dodged his hand quickly before he dislocated something. She ended up glaring at him.
“That was not funny,” she said.
“Do you see me laughing?”
He wasn’t. What he was, was still seething with anger, and not even trying to contain it anymore.
She wailed almost desperately, “But you were not serious!”
“How was I not? ’Tis not healthy to ignore a king.”
“Are you in trouble, then, for doing so?”
“You think I refused?” His laugh was hard, bitter. “Nay, wench, I am not that foolish.”
Her eyes flared. The words came out breathless with shock. “You would marry me?”
“Aye.”
She shook her head. “Lash me instead. Have done with it, then let me go.”
“Are you finally begging?”
“I am not,” she gritted out. “’Tis obvious you have not had enough revenge, or you would release me. I am offering an alternative to this madness.”
“Madness? Nay, I think not, for it has just occurred to me that marriage puts you at my mercy forever, rather than for a short length of time. What better revenge?”
“But you ruin your life as well!”
“How so? My life will not change for having a wife. I will still go on as I have.”
In other words, faithfulness did not come into this, not that she would have expected it from any husband. But she would have expected respect, discretion, a degree of kindness, none of which she would have from Selig. His life would not change, but hers would go from this hell to a worse hell, the humiliations endless instead of temporary.
He had let go of her to pound her back. She moved farther away from him now to say, “You will go on as you have without a wife—at least without this wife.”
“The king’s bishop awaits us below even now.”
“The Saxon king is not my king,” she reminded him. “I do not tremble at his displeasure.”
“You are presently in his domain.”
“Not by choice.”
Selig ground his teeth together. He had been hasty in saying she would come willingly to the marriage. Prideful confidence that was misplaced. She wouldn’t. Inducement would be necessary, something she would find more loathsome, something truly repugnant, something even he would find appalling. And fortunately, he was angry enough to make her believe it.
“You prefer pain to wedding me?” He crossed to her, taking her arm for once, instead of her chain. “Very well, come with me.”
Her heart leapt into her throat as he dragged her from the chamber. “Where?”
He didn’t stop to explain, had determination in his every step. And his voice was positively chilling. “I am taking you to the stable, where you will be staked out on the ground, naked, for the use of any man who finds you there. I would imagine you will gather quite a crowd in no time at all, and that crowd will grow rather than dispense.”
They had just reached the top of the stairs when she gasped out, “I concede!”
That got her released instantly. She hurried back to his chamber, wishing she could hide, knowing she could not. He would have done it. The thought came again and again, and she trembled with that knowledge.
“Well?”
She turned to face him. His hands were braced one on either side of the doorframe. His eyes were a stormy, wintry gray. How could a man so handsome have such a devil’s soul?
She dared to bargain. “I will wed you, as long as you do not touch me afterward.”
He was angry enough to say, “Gladly will I agree to that—but I also have a condition. No one is to know you remain untouched—especially your brother.”
She nodded curtly. Mischievous Loki could not have made a better bargain for them. But he was not finished. She had believed the other, and it sickened him how quickly she had believed it. But it was fortunate he had not mentioned the debt he owed her brother, or she would not believe what he was about to add.
He came before her again, slipping a finger through the ring on her neck shackle, forming a fist that lifted her chin. “My strength is recovered, wench. If you do not want to see your brother still die over this, you will not cry to him your woes when you are allowed to see him. You will, in fact, tell him how happy you are to have wed me.”
She groaned at such an impossible task. “He will not believe it.”
“Then you must think of a way to convince him.”
“Loki must have exchanged one of his sons for you at your birth,” she said bitterly.
That Loki’s offspring were all reputed to be monsters made her remark a grave insult. He merely laughed now that he had gotten what he wanted of her.
She supposed she would have some time later to think of what she could possibly tell her brother, but right now Selig led her from the room again. To be married. To be married to him, and still bound in his damned chains. She hoped she could get through it without crying.
Chapter 30
THE BISHOP WAS to wait a while more for their appearance, because Selig’s mother appeared at the top of the stairs before they reached the landing. And having asked Selig if Erika went willingly to the sacrifice—she did not use those exact words—Lady Brenna lost her temper. It took him a moment to figure out why.
“I will not have it!” she told her son, though it was at Erika’s chains that she was looking so balefully. “Remove them. What you do later is your concern, but you have her consent for this wedding. You have agreed to it yourself. She will not go to it chained any more than you will.”
Selig didn’t argue, though it was a close thing, so annoyed was he. But with an expression of chagrin and not a little embarrassment at being so sharply upbraided, he simply slapped the key into his mother’s hand and stalked off to await them below.
“Thank you,” Erika said in a small voice.
Brenna gave her an impatient look before she started opening the shackles. “Do not thank me. You are as like to have them back as not. I wouldst suggest you learn quickly how to deal with my son. You will be the happier for it—and so will he.”
Erika didn’t expect to ever be happy again, but refrained from saying so. “I am not actually willing to marry him,” she said instead.
Brenna sighed. “No one supposes that you are, child. But whatever means he used to gain your consent for this wedding, be glad for it. There would eventually have been bloodshed without it.”
At the moment, Erika did not feel like being a martyr to save many lives. If her brother’s was not one of them—Nay, she was forgetting what might have happened in the stable, what had frightened her so badly that she was willing to marry a man who hated her instead.
“Here,” Brenna said as she stood up from removing the last of the shackles. She handed all three to Erika. “Put these away while I fetch you a gown. My daughter has suggested one of hers, since you are closer to her height than to that of any of the other women here.”
Another shock, Kristen doing something nice for her, and that on top of Lady Brenna’s taking Erika’s side against her son—in the matter of the chains. It was the wedding, and the fact that however unwelcome she was, she was still soon to be part of their family. But she didn’t expect these kindnesses to last beyond this day.
Brenna actually left her standing there alone while she continued down the hall to her daughter’s chamber. And Erika held her chains in her fist. For the moment, she was as free as she had ever been here, as free as she was ever likely to be. Yet were there stone walls still between her and her brother. Freedom from chains didn’t mean she could escape her fate. She was as trapped as if she still wore them.
She returned to Selig’s chamber, taking wide steps because she could. But she didn’t move to his coffer to put the chains inside it. She walked straight to the window and tossed them out of it. And she smiled with actual pleasure for the first time since she had been taken from her home.
“This will do nicely, I think.”
&nb
sp; Erika turned to see Brenna with a long-sleeved chainse draped over one arm, in a shade so light a blue it nigh matched her eyes. And over the other arm, a sleeveless outer gown of midnight-blue in the rare velvet prized by kings. It was trimmed in thick silver braid along the slit sides and hem, and across the deeply scooped bodice. There was also a gossamer headdress in the light blue, with a silver circlet set with sapphires to hold it in place atop her head. The girdle was wide, of brocaded silk, with more of the silver braid sewn to it.
“They are too fine,” Erika said in soft appreciation.
“Not for this occasion. We have appearances to maintain, despite the circumstances. And I heard the Saxon king say he would escort you to the groom himself.”
Why not, since he was responsible for this farce? But Erika didn’t say that. She dressed hurriedly at Brenna’s urging, and, surprisingly, with her help. Selig’s mother even combed her hair and arranged the sheer veil, and pinched her cheeks to put some color in them.
Erika wanted to thank the lady again, and in an odd way she did by saying, “I could wish you had raised a less vindictive son.”
Brenna actually smiled. “I have not raised any vindictive sons. When you finally see that for yourself, this battle between you and Selig will end.”
Which made not a bit of sense to Erika, but nothing did today, especially why Selig would marry her when that was the last thing he could really want to do.
She was to be even more grateful for the fine raiments Brenna had picked for her when she noted the richly garbed court ladies who were to witness the wedding. And Selig would have had her wear those ugly and ill-fitting servant’s garments—and chains. Her humiliation would have been extreme if not for the intervention of his mother and sister. Which was no doubt what he had hoped for.
Yet when she was led to him, he did not seem annoyed to see her dressed so. He was startled, certainly, before he concealed it beneath an inscrutable visage.
He waited for her, magnificent, on the steps of the small chapel which was in the bailey. The ceremony would take place there, allowing all to hear the solemn words intoned by the bishop, who stood with Selig. And the King of Wessex did indeed escort her.