He said no more. Neither did she. A short while later she had started to doze off, despite the discomfort of her hard bed, when she heard the chains rattle.
She opened her eyes and turned to see Ivarr coming across the room toward her. Alarm struck her first, and she sat up, then realized he must be there to tie her. He had done so on more than one night before. She relaxed, only to hear the chains again.
The alarm was back, worse. Her eyes flew to his hands and widened. He held chains, all right, replete with shackles, a great many of them.
Selig spoke before Ivarr bent to her. “Are they to my specifications?”
“Exactly. The smith got two others to help him and has worked all day. He only just finished.”
“Did you test them?”
“Aye,” Ivarr replied. “The links held firm, despite their thinness.”
“Good. Then bring her here.”
Ivarr lifted a brow, since Selig had risen as he said it. “You had better not let Lady Brenna see you sitting up like that. The word is out, she is not letting you out of bed for a fortnight.”
Selig ignored the warning completely. “Bring her, Ivarr. I want to put those shackles on myself.”
Ivarr shrugged his compliance. Erika drew back as he reached for her, but she had nowhere to cringe to. Without strain, he was able to yank her up and drag her toward the bed, even with her holding back with every ounce of strength she possessed.
She didn’t actually fight him, though the urge was powerfully strong to do so. She knew how pointless that would be. They would have her chained anyway, and also be pleased to know how much she loathed the idea. So she didn’t fight, and only Ivarr could feel her resistance.
To Selig she showed an indifferent expression. He wasn’t going to know how frightened she was. Chains were so permanent, so unbreakable, freedom so completely at the whim of one’s captor. Ropes offered a slim chance at escape. Chains offered none.
She knew now why the candles still burned, why Selig had not tried to sleep. He had been waiting for this, likely savoring the thought of it, and now was going to thoroughly enjoy putting the chains on her himself.
Sweet Freya, she didn’t want to be chained. Selig the Blessed was not offering a choice.
She was shoved in front of him, practically between his spread knees. It was too close. He was naked sitting there on the bed, with only a corner of his blanket drawn over his lap. But when she tried to step back, it was to encounter Ivarr directly behind her.
The chains were tossed on the bed beside Selig, where Erika was able to get a closer look at them, and in fact jumped at the chance to look elsewhere than at the man. She had understood from Ivarr’s words that they were not normal chains, were made special to Selig’s specifications, but she was surprised now to see how unusual they were.
The metal links were not just thin, as Ivarr had mentioned, but were also quite small, like none she had ever seen before, at least not for this purpose. Silver and gold chained girdles had links this small. These looked, frankly, useless, too flimsy to hold anything. Hope rose, only to drop in the same instant. Ivarr had tested them. If he couldn’t break the links, she certainly couldn’t.
The shackles attached to the chains were of a normal size, but again she found the unexpected. The wide iron bands were covered in sleeves of stitched leather, with narrow slits for the attachment rings. Her skin would be protected from the iron. Why Selig should have a care for her skin, she couldn’t begin to guess.
“Give me your right hand.”
She hesitated for only a second. If she could help it, she wasn’t going to show him how much she hated this. Let him think it made no difference to her, what form of restraint he used. But it was difficult to keep from cringing when that first shackle clicked on.
It was a tight fit, with no hope of her being able to slip her hand through it. Not made for a man, then, but still weighty. It dragged her hand back to her side when he let go of her.
She gave him her other hand before he asked. His expression altered at that, wasn’t so pleased. Had he hoped to force the chains on her? Too bad.
“Hold to Ivarr and give me your right ankle,” she was ordered next.
To hell with Ivarr. She lifted her foot without losing her balance, and maintained her balance as the next shackle went on. Again he got the other foot without having to ask. But when his last command came, her resolve ended.
“On your knees, wench.”
She didn’t budge. He looked up at her, one brow raised in question. She glared back at him, crossing her arms over her chest. The chain between her hands, a good two feet worth, allowed that.
Selig shook his head when Ivarr put a hand to her shoulder to shove her to the floor. And in the next instant he demonstrated what, besides restraint, the chains could be used for.
He did it slowly, grasping the chain that presently dangled across her waist and tugging it downward. Her arms came uncrossed, then were straightened fully as the chain reached her knees. At that point his own arm was extended, and rather than bend himself, he lifted one leg to hook his foot on the chain, then abruptly brought his foot back to the floor, the chain with it. Erika’s arms, perforce, followed, bending her completely over.
To her horror, her chin hit his upper thigh, and her eyes were mere inches above his groin. And with Ivarr still behind her, she couldn’t change the position.
“You have a choice, wench. You can remain like this, the rest of the night if necessary, or you can get to your knees as I requested.”
He hadn’t requested, he had ordered. She knew the difference. A choice? If she bit the thigh her face was fairly pressed against, would she gain her release, or merely punishment and a return to this position? She wanted to swear and rail at him. She did, in fact, want to bite him. On her knees he wanted her. Her only choice?
Erika sat down instead, right between his feet.
Selig and Ivarr both laughed heartily at her temerity, surprising her. She had expected anger for not taking one of the choices given her. She had expected to be set on her knees by force. She didn’t expect them to be amused by her outright defiance.
She crossed her arms again, now that she was able to, and stared stonily at Selig’s left knee. A hand came to her chin to lift it. She shook it off, but it returned, the grip increased just enough to keep it there.
She disdained meeting his eyes, keeping hers lowered. So she was able to see his other hand reach for what was left on the bed. She stiffened. The last shackle went around her neck anyway.
Her chin was released, for he needed both hands to click it into place beneath her hair. Her own hands came up in a frantic rush to pull the shackle away. But his grip on it was stronger than hers.
She heard the click, felt the snugness around her throat. It wasn’t choking, but might as well have been for all the panic she felt. She pulled on it uselessly now. The chain between her hands carefully tugged her fingers away from it.
She looked up at him then. Fully chained, defeated, no longer just a prisoner. The shackle around her throat declared her a slave.
He studied her for a moment before he asked curiously, “Will you beg me to remove it?”
“Go to hell.”
He smiled, that smile she hated. “You have had your way. Now I will have mine.”
He hooked a finger through the iron ring at the center of the neck shackle. With it, he lifted her, bringing her to her knees after all.
“I knew I would find excellent uses for this,” he continued. “Just as I knew chains would become you. Get used to the weight, wench, for they are never coming off.”
Color deserted her cheeks. That he had said it gently, softly, made it all the more horrible. And she had not been given all of her chains yet. There was one more, some six feet in length, with larger round links at each end, that he brought to the ring at her neck.
After a few moments of feeling his knuckles brushing against her skin, she heard him chuckle in defeat. “The smith
is to be commended. You will have to do this for me, Ivarr, until my strength returns.”
He couldn’t open the clasping link, which meant she wouldn’t be able to either. But she would, somehow. Desperation added strength, and she was not the weakling they seemed to think she was.
Ivarr, of course, did as requested, and within seconds, the last chain was attached to her. “Where do you want the spike?” he asked Selig.
“The corner she favors will do for now.”
She hadn’t noticed the hooked spike tucked in Ivarr’s belt. As he dragged her back across the room by her neck chain, she saw the hammer tucked in his belt at his back. Two strikes embedded the spike in the wall. Two seconds more and she was chained to it.
He left the room immediately thereafter. Erika stood there in the corner, staring at the spike in the wall. It wasn’t so high that she couldn’t lie down, but she couldn’t move more than six feet away from it.
She heard Selig getting comfortable on his soft bed again. He likely watched her for a long while before he finally slept, the candles still burning, savoring her defeat. Erika didn’t sleep at all.
Chapter 21
BRENNA SLAMMED A fist into her pillow before she dropped down onto it. She was a cauldron of seething emotions, and had been ever since she realized her son was in pain. She loved all of her children too dearly not to empathize with them completely, and just now she raged over what Selig had gone through.
She looked toward her husband as he stood brooding at the window, which he had been doing for the past hour. He was as bad as she was where their children were concerned. He simply contained his emotions, whereas no one could doubt her mood was on the explosive side.
“She is not going to get what she deserves,” she commented, expressing what was on her mind. “He is too softhearted when women are involved.”
Garrick didn’t need to ask of whom she spoke. “But one has never hurt him before,” he reminded her before he drained the wine in his goblet and joined her in the bed. “Just what is it you feel she deserves?”
“I saw his back. It has been nigh a sennight since he was lashed, yet the bruises are still there to attest to the severity of it. And when I think of the pain he was already in from his head injury—”
“You would take a whip to her? A man is strong enough to bear it, but a woman?”
“That is just it,” she insisted. “He was not strong enough at the time.”
He pulled her close to rest against his chest, his hands on her back attempting to soothe her. “He is ours. You are upset because he was hurt at all. I do not like it either. But consider, love, what he was accused of—”
“Falsely—”
“But accused nonetheless, and the Danes have not been at peace long enough to treat spying indifferently. He could have been tortured for a confession and hanged. He could have been whipped instead of lashed, which he might not have survived. Instead of bearing bruises, his back could have been shredded. Be grateful it was a woman deciding the matter and she did no more than have him lashed.”
“You can be grateful for that,” she said. “I can still resent her.”
Her tone was less severe, a mere grumble, telling him she had listened and even agreed, though she wouldn’t admit it. “It will be interesting to see how Selig perceives the matter once he is hale and hearty again.”
Brenna raised her head to look at him. “You think he will just shrug it off and let her go?”
“Not that, but I doubt he will require pain for pain, as he would were she a man.”
She shook her head at him. “I know what you are thinking, Garrick, and ’tis just like a man to think it, but you are wrong. He will not force her to his bed. He said as much. His women would tell you that would be a reward, and he does not intend to reward her.”
Garrick laughed. “I remember how you felt about that first time.”
She did as well, with less humor. “Do not remind me of my ignorance and Delia’s petty idea of revenge, to make me fear something so wonderful.”
He rolled over to grin down at her. “What I remember was that once was not enough for you.”
Her fingers came up to trace his beloved face. “Once is never enough for me with you, Viking. But then, I have taught you how to please your wife well.”
“Have you indeed?”
“Or mayhap you require more lessons?”
He chuckled, and bent down to kiss her. The noise stopped him, which they both heard. Brenna raised a questioning brow. Garrick had had forewarning from Ivarr, and so guessed accurately.
“You should be pleased,” he said. “The dangerous prisoner has just been chained.”
The sound made sense to her now. “To a wall?”
He shrugged indifferently. “Merely secured to it, I should imagine.”
Brenna snorted. “She is not dangerous.”
“Selig must think so.”
Garrick had not been present for that bath incident, but she had. “What Selig undoubtedly thinks is that she will hate it. I believe our son has a number of things in store for her that he hopes she will not like.”
“So that is the revenge he will take?”
“Or merely part of it. He would not say what he means to do with her. ’Twould seem we must wait to find out the same as she…”
A while later they were awakened by more noise, but this much more obvious, Kristen shouting, Royce growling back, a crash as one of them tackled the other to the floor out in the hall. It was anyone’s guess which one.
Brenna started to get up. Garrick pulled her back down with a sigh. “We could have wished he had chosen a less quiet hour to chastise her.”
She squirmed to get loose of his hold, but that was one thing she had never been able to accomplish. “She does not appear to agree she needs chastisement.”
“Like mother, like daughter.”
She ignored that to demand huffily, “You are going to do naught?”
“And what would you have me do when Royce is justified in his grievance? She would not be getting this chastisement if he did not love her. She acted foolhardy. Even she knows it—which is why she is protesting so loudly.”
“That makes as little sense as everything else going on around here today,” Brenna grumbled.
“Were she not guilty and feeling it, she would have just said so. Instead she shouts excuses.”
“Valid ones, from what I can hear.”
“Not valid enough to ignore the risk she took. Royce could have brought Selig home just as easily, without her help. If she had no husband right now to point that out to her, I would do it.”
He grunted from a punch in his side that he got just before she rolled on top of him. “You know better than to account women helpless, Viking. I say Kristen did the right thing, the same thing I would have done.”
“Then mayhap she is not the only one who needs chastisement.”
“I would advise you not to try it.”
Garrick thought about it, he really did. When she challenged him like that, it raised his fighting instinct every time. But he could not see having his wife mad at him over a moot point.
“’Tis well, then, that you were not here to take her place.” And he kissed her before she could take the argument any further.
Chapter 22
ERIKA AWOKE TO raised voices and the bright light of a new morn pushing at heavy eyelids. The voices she recognized with little difficulty—Selig’s and his sister’s. She had had more difficulty, though, recognizing the same sort of shouting with the addition of loud thuds when it had awakened her sometime in the middle of the night.
So much racket had occurred, she had wondered aloud, “Are we being invaded?”
She had not expected an answer, but got one, for the noise had awakened Selig, too. “Do not sound so hopeful, wench. ’Tis only Royce chasing my sister. Likely he has recalled that he owes her a beating.”
Kristen would blame that on Erika, too. Another reason to hate her. Bu
t right now it seemed she was blaming it on Selig—nay, that was not what they were arguing about.
“Chains?” Kristen shouted as she paced back and forth beside the bed. “I cannot believe you would do that! And for what? She is not going anywhere.”
“That is a certainty now!” he replied just as loudly in his defense, though he winced in the doing.
Kristen didn’t notice the pain so much noise was causing him. She continued to make more. “Damn it, Selig, you know how I feel about them!”
“What I know is that anytime you are angry at Royce, you come to take it out on me,” he complained. “Mayhap you could spare me this time, Kris.”
“This has naught to do with that great lout,” she insisted. “Why could you not wait until you take her to your home, so I would not have to know?”
“I do not intend to lose her because of your prejudice. If you had not been made to wear chains yourself, you would not object so strenuously to them now.”
“But I did, and I do. If you are so worried about it, lock her up. But get rid—”
“The chains stay.”
“Selig!”
“Give it up,” he said adamantly. “My mind cannot be changed on this.”
She let out an explosive, frustrated breath. “I wish I could hit you!”
Without heat now, seriously, he replied, “I wish you could, too.”
Her demeanor changed abruptly, contritely. She bent over him, her hands to his cheeks, her brow to his brow. “I am sorry.”
“I know,” he said simply. “Now sit down. You have made me dizzy with all that pacing.”
“Very funny.” She resumed her pacing. “Very funny indeed.”
His brows shot up at her sarcastic tone, which led him to make a guess. “So you did not win the argument last night?”
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