by Twist,Tommy
Trying to open his eyes was its own adventure. They flickered open, and then the bright light hit him and he let his eyes close again. A woman's voice—Deirdre's—spoke softly.
"Welcome back."
He tried to open his eyes again, blinking back the blinding light until his eyes adjusted. There was a beam of light falling straight across his face. When he turned he could see her there, kneeling over him. She had a bottle in her hand, most of the way empty.
Gunnar recognized it as some potato alcohol that they had stolen during the raids. Someone must have parted with it, or Deirdre was a better thief than he had given her credit for. It was a blessing that he kept little in his tent, or she might have been off with anything she'd laid her hands on.
Then again, he hadn't let her spend much time without his eyes on her, though he knew that she wanted her privacy. He'd wanted to give it to her, as well, but that wasn't how it had worked out. Something about her drew his eyes, drew his attention. Even now.
He looked back toward the sky, letting the lights fall on his eyes now, closing them again. She pressed something into his side, something that stung badly. Another pour of alcohol burned, taking away any hope of going back to his rest.
He was so tired. Why couldn't he just be allowed to sleep? Couldn't they leave him be?
It took a long moment before he realized that he wasn't laying in his bedroll, wasn't on the ground. He wasn't in his tent.
He looked around again, paying more attention to his surroundings. He was in the wagon that they'd stolen, the one where they were keeping the prisoners and the wounded. He tried to move, to sit himself up, and then felt his arms straining against bonds he hadn't realized that he wore.
Just great, he thought. He'd just been thinking that if he wanted to take command back, he would need to be able to play nice. So much for that. Apparently, Valdemar had been more prepared for vengeance than Gunnar had given him credit for, after all.
He sat up anyway, pulling himself upright without grabbing onto the side. It sent a ripping pain through his chest again, and Deirdre cursed at him and pushed him back down. Her hands were soft, yet they moved with a steadiness that he had rarely seen in anyone.
As if she were completely confident in her actions. She pressed on his wound again with the palm of her hand and re-tied something around him, tightening almost to the point of discomfort.
"It's good to see you," he said softly.
"I'm glad you're having a good time."
"You're angry." His voice was dull and soft, and he struggled to find even the simplest of words.
Deirdre looked at him for a moment, and their eyes met. She almost looked as if she felt sorry for him. That was a first—he'd inspired different feelings in almost everyone he'd ever met. Fear, anger, pride, confidence. Never, at least not so far as he knew, had he seen anyone feel pity for him.
What had he done wrong? If he'd tried to free her, she would have just been recaptured again. If he didn't have command, he couldn't exactly set her free. He told her so, as best he could, and her face hardened, but she didn't respond right away.
If they were going to be stuck together, then he couldn't afford to have her angry with him. He could hardly sit up without blinding pain, could barely move an inch. She was an important ally… and at the same time, she was so much more than that.
A woman. His woman, he thought, and then pushed the thought away. No, she wasn't his. If she didn't want him, then he wouldn't force the issue, and she clearly didn't want him.
But that didn't change the fact that he would need her if he was going to recover, if he was going to reclaim what he'd lost. She was clearly a capable healer, and a gifted witch. More than that, she could move, and seemed to be the only one of the prisoners they had taken with any guts.
He should apologize to her, he thought. If he hadn't taken her, if he hadn't found her in that hidden chamber, then she would have been free and clear. She would never have had to deal with being his—or anyone else's—prisoner.
But when he opened his mouth, the words wouldn't come. He couldn't feel bad about having her near him, no matter what he wanted to say.
"I know it's bad," he said, instead.
She didn't respond. Whether it was because she had nothing to add, or because she was angry, he couldn't say. She'd put up a front of a medicine woman, and she would play professional until he finally gave up.
Finally, Gunnar let out a breath he hadn't realized that he'd been holding, wincing at the discomfort that it caused him.
"I can't set you free. Not any more." He looked at her, but she didn't look back at him. She made herself busy sorting through the herbs that she had picked with him the day before. "I can't promise that you'll be freed, because I don't have that power, but I can promise you something else. I can promise you that no matter what happens, you'll live through it."
"And how can you promise that? Look at you. You can hardly move." The words stung, and more than that, the way that she said them. As if she were just stating the facts, without emotion. The way that she hid her anger.
"If anything comes for you, I'll let myself be hurt before I let them do anything to you."
"Pretty words," she said, finally looking at him seriously. "But you still haven't answered me. What are you going to do when you can't even move?"
"I will move when I need to," he answered.
Keeping from hurting himself in the stillness that followed the claim proved too much, and a twitch sent a shock of pain up his spine. She was right—he couldn't protect her if he wasn't healed. The first time that he had gotten what he wanted, he immediately regretted it.
"You see! You barely twist to get your body comfortable, and it is too much. If someone wanted to do me harm, there would be nothing you could do."
Gunnar looked her in the eyes, a mixture of pity and frustration playing out on them. He grit his teeth and pulled himself upright. The pain came—and then went. There were more important things than pain, and he had to show her that.
Of all the things he'd learned, in the years since he had learned that he could survive the most grievous wounds, that was the most important lesson. There was more to life than being able to avoid pain.
And right now, though he couldn't begin to say why it mattered, it was the most important thing in the world to teach Deirdre that lesson, too.
Eleven
If Gunnar was a liar, he at least told the lies she wanted to hear. Deirdre had to give him credit for that much, at least. She relaxed back into her seat, watching him deliriously lie on the floor of the wagon, pressed in with the other two wounded.
He wasn't the sort of charitable person who was going to save someone for no reason, and he certainly wasn't reliable enough to believe everything he said. But that didn't mean that he wasn't serious, either.
She didn't have any illusions about his intentions, either. He saw her as a ticket back to his position of power. She saw him the same way, she conceded, but it wasn't exactly the same. She had no reason to be here, except for him. Expecting the man who'd taken her to get her free again wasn't too unreasonable—was it?
It didn't matter much, she reasoned. She would let him think what he wanted. She needed him, after all, if she hoped to get away herself. She wouldn't be able to do it on her own. But if she lacked the speed, the strength, and the stealth to get away on her own, he gave her all of them in spades.
It would be easy for Gunnar to fight his way out. She only had to be faster than him, and if he were injured it would not be hard. If he were uninjured, then it would be easier still. He could just carry her. And with a two-hundred pound distraction, she could sneak out with no one any the wiser.
No, the real problem wasn't that she couldn't find a use for him, it was that she would need to make sure that he was on board with whatever plan she devised. To that end, she would have to make sure that she got on his good side.
She shouldn't have needled him while he was laying there injured. Ki
cking a man when he was down was the furthest thing from what she wanted to do, and the furthest from what she should have been doing. It was stupid, but she couldn't help it. She'd have to make it up to him when he woke.
The wagon's abrupt stop, though, made her pause. What was happening? Another ambush? Could she run? Without Gunnar focusing on her…
She looked at him, looked at the bright red mark that had already bled through the shirt she'd used as a makeshift bandage. If she left him, if she left these other two, how long would they last? It was one thing to say that if she stayed, more would die. They might die anyways.
How could she know for certain that the loss of a handful of northmen would stop the rest from killing? Perhaps their deaths would only drive the group to greater heights, pushing them in their grief and rage to try to avenge their comrades' deaths.
But these boys lying in the wagon, she knew for certain. Without her help, they would die. Gunnar might make it without her, with his peculiar body. Then again, he hadn't healed from the wound in his side yet.
If they'd applied the poison liberally, he should be dead from that alone, but it seemed that his ability to survive applied to more than just spears stuck through his gut, or they'd been light on poison.
She had spent half her life learning how to use herbs, to help people. Not to kill them. Not to give their enemies weapons to be used against them. She straightened herself and tried to watch out the flap of the wagon.
She wasn't about to let three people die so that she could have a hope of getting home again. Not when she had no way of even knowing how to get there.
The sound of someone outside the wagon, though, sent a shiver down her spine. When an Englishman came into view, for a moment she hoped that he would save her. That he would decide to cut her free. She didn't have time to feel happy to see him before she realized how mistaken she'd been.
With a gleam in his eye he stepped up and into the back, his knife gleaming. It didn't take any magic to see where he was looking and know what he was thinking. He was reaching down to fiddle with his belt when a two-hundred pound blur caught him in the side, throwing him hip-first into the bench seat hard enough to hear wood splintering.
Gunnar was breathing hard, blood already starting to seep through the bandage further, trickling down his side. His hand flashed to his belt, reaching for a knife that had been taken from him. Too late, he saw the English reading his own knife, and he only managed to catch the man's knife with his forearm, turning aside what would have been a bad wound.
A heavy fist hit the man in the chin. Deirdre thought that she saw the man's eyes rolling around in his head, as if he were about to pass out, but after a half-second he had straightened up and another arcing stab made it around Gunnar's guard and the blade caught in his side.
The Northman grabbed for the other's arm, but the Englishman was too quick. He pulled back and attacked again, embedding the point deep in Gunnar's shoulder. The smile on Gunnar's face told the Englishman and Deirdre both what a mistake that had been.
He tried to pull his hand free, but it was no hope. Gunnar wrapped a thick arm around the knife-arm of the Englishman and then twisted with a sickening pop. When Gunnar dropped his arm, the Englishman still crying out in agony, the arm hung limply at his side.
Gunnar took that moment to pull the dagger from his shoulder, wincing just a bit as he pulled it free, and started to drive the blade home in the enemy's chest.
Deirdre watched with mixed amazement and horror. This was who he was, she realized. He wasn't a farmer who had been soldiering on the side. Not like the men that she had seen in her life. Not like the other prisoners.
Gunnar was good at one thing, and it was killing. She couldn't begin to say whether he felt bad about it, whether he thought about the lives he snuffed out. But he was better than a good fighter—if he had been uninjured, how much faster, how much stronger would he have been?
He pulled the knife free and kicked the Englishman back to the ground, sending him toppling. That was a mistake, Deirdre thought, but she didn't want to say anything. Couldn't afford to say anything, for fear that her premonition of someone seeing the body fall and coming to investigate would come true.
She realized a moment later, as two more men climbed the buckboard, investigating the wagon where their comrade had fallen from, how silly that thought had been. A body falling out was enough reason to investigate.
What did it say about how things were going outside, though, that three separate English soldiers had found time to investigate the wagons in the back?
She didn't have time to ask. The wagon was dangerously full, and all it would take was one bad turn for a knife to find her. Her mind immediately flashed to the bottle, the one that no one had come back to collect. She reached down, thankful that it hadn't rolled far.
Her hand wrapped around it, and she gave a silent apology for what she was about to do.
Gunnar's hand started to move, even the easy and practiced movement of stabbing sending a shock of pain through him that would have told him to stop if he could afford to. Then, before the knife hit home, a loud, high-pitched thump rang out and the man slumped to the ground as a wide-eyed Deirdre watched him fall.
The bottle of liquor in her hand fell to the ground and she pulled herself back away from the man's unconscious body, unable to take her eyes off him. Gunnar smiled to himself at the sight as he turned himself to the remaining Englishman.
Unlike the other two he had already pulled his sword free of its scabbard, and though the weapon would be unwieldy in the close quarters of the wagon it meant that he had a considerable amount more to work with when it came to swordplay.
He slapped away a thrust and put his elbow into Gunnar's gut, pulling the sword back again before the Dane could right himself. It would be hard to kill him, but only one good thwack with the blade would put Deirdre in the grave, and Gunnar's hopes of reclaiming command would be dead along with her.
He wasn't sure that he could afford the time to ready his knife again as the sword started to move, so Gunnar used his shoulder again, trying to dive out the back of the wagon before the rope that had been tied 'round his wrists came taut as he breached the outside.
Rain hit him, the drops bigger than they'd appeared from inside, and lightning crashed seemingly only feet away. Gunnar smiled. Thor had decided to join in for their glory, as well.
What could it have meant for the fight he was in now, though? Gunnar's shoulders strained, the twist and pull of the rope causing a bad ache. He could hear the wood straining to keep him up, but even still he tried to pull himself back into the wagon.
He was unable to twist back to face it, so his shoulders just kept pulling, tighter and tighter as he tried to either fall the rest of the way, or get back in. The wood splintered behind him and then with a pop he fell.
The fall itself wouldn't have been a problem, but as he took the drop the English brought his hands up defensively, sending the point of the sword through his shoulder, and Gunnar cried out in agony. The pain brought him back to the present, pushing away thoughts of what the Gods were thinking of the battle that he fought in.
Gunnar had no time to think about whether or not Thor supported what he was doing. The way that his vision danced in front of him, he might only have moments to finish the fight. With his hands tied, and the knife held between them, he brought it down hard into the English skull, bringing it down again and again until the enemy soldier stopped moving.
Then he turned and surveyed the battlefield. No casualties, he noted, on the Dane side. That was good, at least. But they all seemed to have their hands full, even as the English bodies piled up. He wanted to join them, wanted to take his share of the glory, but…
He turned his blurring vision on Deirdre. She could protect herself, he thought, smiling at the sound of the bottle coming down on the English head. But not if they had another pair of men come through. He would have to stay, to protect her. As he'd promised.
&nb
sp; Thunder rumbled around him, as if in the same moment as the thought occurred to him. He had to get back into the wagon, to protect her. He put his hands on the base, then tried to step up to the buckboard, made it halfway on, and his foot slipped on the rain-slick foothold. Deirdre reached forward, grabbing at his shirt and helping him up.
"Thank you," she said softly. His vision was starting to dim, but he couldn't afford to pass out yet. He had more to do, there would be more men coming.
But more men didn't come, and Gunnar's vision dimmed. More and more, until he could only see for flashes. Thunder rumbled as Thor tore through the battlefield, and finally he could hear the cries of victory from a thousand miles away.
He had to find Deirdre, had to make sure that she was okay. Had to make sure she wasn't hurt. He had to have her, had to keep her safe. Thor had spoken, had told him that she was necessary. And she was important to him.
She was the key to his plans to retake the band from Valdemar. And, as the delirium took her, he added to himself—the most important woman in the world and the only thing that mattered.
Then the world was black and he cursed himself because he couldn't protect her. How could he protect someone when he couldn't even move?
The question echoed in his mind, and then exhaustion and pain wrapped him up and sent him spiraling into the land of sleep.
Twelve
The noise of battle faded long before Deirdre's heart stopped racing. She'd been in the battle before, but only far away. She'd left before she had really felt the effects of the last ambush, and every raid she had known to be happening, she had been far away from—tied to a pole, or stuck sitting in the wagon.
This was the first time that she'd really had to confront it, and seeing the violence only reminded her what she had already learned about Gunnar watching him fight Valdemar.
He wasn't anything like her, not the least bit. He lived somewhere she would never be able to go. Yet, how different were they? She'd hit that man over the head, and he'd crumpled just the same.
