My Lord Viking

by Ferguson, Jo Ann

  Did he understand why she had let him be lauded for the deed? She feared he did not. It had been a futile attempt to show him that he could have the glory and honor he craved in this time, too. But he knew the truth. She had killed Kortsson, and he could take no honor from that. The only way he could expunge the shame on his family would be to return with the knife to the past and present it to his chieftain.

  Minnie was waving her fan in front of her face, which was, Linnea noticed with sudden alarm, a sickly shade. Taking her sister-in-law’s arm, Linnea steered her to a chair near an open window.

  “Thank you, Linnea,” Minnie said. She waved her fan more quickly. “Is it extraordinarily hot in here, or is it me?”

  “It is warm...and it is you.” She sat next to Minnie. “Do you want me to have Martin come over?”

  “No, he is too squeamish. I fear he will sicken before I do.” The air from the fan wafted the curls on Minnie’s forehead. “If I sit quietly, I am sure I will be fine.”

  “If you want me to call a carriage, I can.”

  She shook her head. “That would mean explaining to everyone about the baby.”

  “Mayhap it is time anyhow.” She chuckled. “Randolph has wanted to have an announcement made tonight. Why not a happy one?”

  Minnie did not smile. “You sound as if you expect to be making a not-so-happy announcement as well.”

  “I would rather not speak of it.”

  Grasping Linnea’s arm, Minnie said with rare intensity, “You must speak of it. With Lord Tuthill, and without a delay.”

  “He will not heed me.”

  “You must make him heed you.”

  “And then what?” The words slipped past her lips before she could halt them.

  “Marry Lord Barrington. He clearly dotes on you. He could pay no mind to anything but you when he saw you at Sutherland Park tonight.” She flung out her hands. “He saved you from that horrible interloper as well, risking his life and his eyesight to make sure you were unharmed.”

  “No, I cannot marry Nils...Niles.” Linnea hoped Minnie did not notice her mistake.

  “Why not?”

  Coming to her feet, Linnea said, “There are many reasons.”

  “He loves you, Linnea.” Minnie snapped her fan closed, halting Linnea’s reply. “Do not argue with me and tell me that I am mistaken. I know I am not.” She took Linnea’s hand. “And I know you love him.”

  “Sometimes love is not the only reason to marry or not to marry.”

  “I agree. Not being in love is a reason not to marry, but, if you love him and he loves you, do not forfeit this one chance at true happiness.” Tears filled her eyes. “Martin and I fought the opinions of others to wed, even our families who did not understand that we had more than a calf-love for each other. I have no idea what is standing in the way of you marrying Lord Barrington, but ask yourself if you will think, even a few years from now, if it was worth throwing away this chance for a lifetime together.”

  Linnea nodded, but said nothing as she went to where her father was gesturing at her. The tears that had glistened in Minnie’s eyes now burned in hers. A lifetime together? She and Nils had had two lifetimes together, but not a single one they could share beyond these precious days.

  She had a smile in place as she reached her father. “Yes, Papa?”

  “Our host was looking for you.” He stepped aside so she could see Randolph beside him.

  “Forgive me,” Randolph gushed, “for neglecting you for so long. A host’s duties are unending.”

  “I understand that.”

  “Will you stand up with me, Linnea?”

  She hesitated. She did not want to hurt him or her father who had thought he had chosen wisely in allowing Randolph to court her. Looking from Randolph’s expectant face to Papa’s smile, she nodded. She could not hurt both of them when they had done nothing wrong.

  She was the one who had done something wrong...by falling in love with a man who should not be here now. While she had resisted Randolph’s attempts to give her a chaste kiss, she had shared delicious love with Nils. She should not have listened to her heart, for it had betrayed her before she could betray Papa and Randolph.

  “Thank you,” she said quietly. “I would enjoy dancing with you, Randolph.” She let him take her hand. A part of her wished that her heart would leap with excitement as it did when Nils touched her. How much simpler all of this would be if she could come to love Randolph as she did Nils! But her heart continued its steady rhythm, as indifferent to Randolph as always.

  Randolph’s fingers tightened around hers as they walked away from her father. When she tried to tug her hand away, he growled, “Have you no shame, Linnea? I will not get into a tugging match here in the middle of the ballroom floor.”

  “Then loosen your grip. That hurts.”

  “Oh.” He did as she asked. “I thought...That is...”

  “Randolph,” she said with sudden sympathy, “mayhap we should talk instead of dancing. There are some things we need to discuss.”

  “I would prefer to dance.”

  Linnea kept her sigh silent. She might have been changed in recent weeks, but Randolph had not. She doubted if he ever would. And why should he? This was the life he had chosen for himself—the quiet, quite respectable life of country aristocracy.

  As the music played, she matched her steps to his as she waited for him to say something. Even if they had been strangers, it was his responsibility as a gentleman to make conversation with her while they danced. She was amazed that he had asked her to waltz. If he did not want to talk with her, why had he chosen this time to dance with her?

  Her heart sank further when she saw Nils sitting next to Minnie. She wanted to be in his arms, twirling to this beautiful music. She closed her eyes as she imagined moving with him to the serene song that became a crescendo when they were joined together as one in the need that overwhelmed them. Swallowing her moan of yearning, she tried to smile at Randolph.

  He frowned at her and did not speak during what seemed to be the interminable length of the dance. Only when it was over did he ask her if she would like something cool to drink. She nodded, and he led her to a table where a wine fountain offered the choice of a dark red wine and a pale one. Taking a glass of one—she paid no attention to which—she sipped.

  “The air is close in here,” Randolph said abruptly.

  Linnea glanced about the room. “There are so many candles. They make a room seem more close than it is.”

  “Then let us get some air.”

  “Randolph, I do not think we should. After all—”

  He yanked on her arm, nearly pulling her off her feet. By the time she had recovered, they were outside on a low terrace that was shadowed on both sides by huge trees.

  “I shall not be treated so rudely,” she said as she tried to twist her arm out of his grip.

  “You? You are the one who is treating me rudely!”

  “Me? I have done nothing.”

  Randolph took a sip of his wine, then tossed it and the glass toward one of the trees. As the glass splintered, he herded her toward him. “That is right, Linnea. You have done nothing.”

  “So why are you in a pelter?”

  “Because you are going to be my betrothed! It would seem that you should show me a modicum of affection on the night we are to announce our betrothal.”

  She shook her head. “I am not going to announce my betrothal to you tonight.”

  “I have been patient with you, Linnea. I have courted you and paid you compliments, and I tire of waiting for you to make up your mind.”

  “Randolph, I have made up my mind. You simply will not heed me when I tell you that.”

  “You are a foolish child, pampered by your parents and your older sisters and brothers. It is time that you understood what a man expects from a woman.”

  “But I do not love you,” she said, trying to turn her face away as he bent to kiss her.

  “Love? Love is not impo
rtant in a reasonable marriage. Marriage is for other things than love.”

  “What other things?”

  He gave her a haughty smile. “Do not worry yourself with that, Linnea. If you want love, I would be glad to show you how I will make love with you.”

  She opened her mouth to scream, but a laugh from the shadows intruded. Tugging against Randolph’s arms around her, she broke free. She stared at Nils who was leaning against the thick trunk of the tree at the other end of the terrace.

  “What are you doing out here?” demanded Randolph.

  “It is possible,” Nils replied, walking casually toward them, “that I came out here to raise a cloud.”

  Randolph sneered. “You turned green last time you smoked a cigar.”

  “That is why I said it was only possible.” He took Linnea’s hand in her lacy glove and bowed over it. “It is also possible that I have the next dance with Linnea.”

  “As possible as you smoking a cigar out here?”

  “Quite correct, Tuthill. These dances are not of my taste. I admit that I have become so lost in my studies that I am not as familiar with the dances that are au courant.” He grinned at Linnea as he used the French cant that so often baffled him.

  Her urge to smile back vanished when Randolph asked in a heated tone, “Maybe you should request that the orchestra play some ancient song. Or didn’t the Vikings dance?”

  Nils laughed, and, by the doorway, heads turned. Several people peered outside, curious about what was so funny. “The Vikings, as you persist in calling them, enjoyed many entertainments.”

  “Raping and burning and looting.”

  “Randolph!” Linnea gasped.

  He grasped her hands. “My dear, forgive my coarse speech. Such words are not for your delicate ears.”

  “‘Tis not your words that I find objectionable, but your constant unkind comments to Niles. He is my father’s guest, and you treat him with endless insults.”

  Randolph’s mouth worked, but no words emerged.

  “I do not take insult,” Nils replied, although his narrowed eyes suggested otherwise. “One cannot take insult when another speaks out of ignorance.” He held out his arm. “Allow me to take you back inside, Linnea. I feel in the mood for a dance lesson.”

  Linnea put her hand on his arm, grateful for the chance to escape, but even more grateful for the excuse to touch him. Her fingers stroked his arm, and she was powerless to halt them. When he smiled, she was sure she could never be happier than when she was with him like this.

  “I am sorry,” Nils said.

  “Sorry?”

  “For the state of your toes when I step on them over and over.”

  At his words, she glanced back at the door where Randolph stood, watching them, rage twisting his face. “I do not think I want to dance now.”

  “If I was wrong in intruding on you and Tuthill—”

  “No, Nils, you were not. I need to be alone with my thoughts. Your voice and Randolph’s and Papa’s and Martin’s and Minnie’s fill my head, and I cannot hear my own thoughts.” Putting her other hand on his arm, she fought not to splay her fingers across his chest as he slipped his brawny arms around her. “Give me the time to think.”

  “It cannot be for long.”

  “I know.” She walked out of the room before he could ask another question. When she looked back, he was not following. She should be pleased that he respected her request, but she was not. She did not understand her own desires any longer. At the very moment they urged her to be reckless and give in to her need to be held by him while she could, she knew that anything less than forever with him would not be enough.

  Twenty-Three

  Linnea followed the maze of corridors in Tuthill Hall until the music from the orchestra was silenced beyond the stone walls. When she reached a door opening to the gardens, she faltered. Rain was beginning to pelt the walkway, and a chill clung to the air. Mayhap the storm was her escape. Surely no one would follow her out into it.

  But Nils would.

  Averting her face from the rain, she went down another passage. There were no wings on this house as there were at Sutherland Park, and she had to find somewhere to hide, somewhere where she could have a chance to think.

  She came around a corner and gasped. A soft glow floated along the passage in midair directly in front of her. It was like the light reflecting through the crystal globe that had taken her and Nils to Fensalir. What was it? She hurried forward, not sure what she would find. Fear trembled through her. When last she had seen such a glow, it had been accompanied by what Nils insisted was a Norse god. That made no sense, but neither did this light that seemed to be coming from nowhere.

  As she got closer to the glow, she stopped, then inched forward. It vanished. Stepping back, she watched it reappear.

  Her disappointed laugh was shaky as she raised her hand and moved it up and down. The glow appeared and vanished in the center of the passage. It was just lamplight reflecting in a looking glass on the wall. Letting her longing to be in Nils’s arms betray her was stupid.

  Nils...

  Linnea saw a tufted settee just inside the door. Going in, she dropped onto it. She loved Nils. That was the only thing she was certain of as her life spun out of control.

  Her eyes widened as she stared across the room and saw a glass case set between the two windows. It had three shelves. The uppermost one held only a single, ragged bag. Bits of embroidery clung to it, but most of it had been ripped away. The middle one was filled with stones marked with the strange sort of writing she had seen on the memory stone by the mound. She paid them no mind, for on the bottom shelf was a knife in an ancient, water-stained sheath.

  She jumped to her feet and ran across the room. Although time had stolen much of the glorious color from the haft, she could see the dragon’s open mouth and how its tail vanished beneath the sheath. She stood on tiptoe to see the knife better. A gasp burst from her when she noted the three small creatures holding up one part of the dragon’s elongated, snakelike body. She stared at another figure carved within the dragon’s mouth. Not a man, but a god. Loki!

  This must be the knife Nils’s brother had stolen, the knife that had compelled Nils to come to this time so he might find it and fulfill his oath to his chieftain. Why had she thought she had seen it in London instead of here on the neighboring estate? She frowned, then recalled how Randolph had spoken of cleaning out his father’s house in Town before it was sold. She must have seen it there when she went with Papa to call on the late Lord Tuthill.

  Why hadn’t she recalled that? She had been at the Tuthill house in London a score of times.

  The sound of distant laughter was faint, but she could not fail to recognize it. Loki! He had had a hand in this from the very beginning. Somehow, he had betwattled her memory, playing tricks on her mind as he had with Nils.

  It no longer mattered! The knife was here.

  Looking back at the doorway to make sure no one was there, Linnea lifted the hook closing the door of the glass case. The hinges screeched as if to warn that she was trespassing. She lifted out the knife and cradled it in her hands. It was heavier than she had expected, and it would take a strong man to wield it.

  A man as strong as Nils.

  A half-sob threatened to bubble past her lips as her exultant smile faded. If this truly was the knife that Nils sought—and it must be because she doubted if there could be another— once he had it, he could be returned to his time and the completion of his quest. She stared at the open case. She could put the knife back in there, blow out the lamp in this room, and leave, closing the door behind her. Nils had no reason to suspect the knife was here. They could go to London, and he could search there. He could seek and seek and seek the knife...and he would remain in this time with her.

  “Linnea?”

  She whirled to face the door and Nils.

  “I know you wished to be alone,” he said, “but we must talk about what has happened between us, unnasta.�
��

  Without speaking, Linnea raised the knife in both of her hands.

  A gray sheen ruined Nils’s healthy bronze complexion. It was as if she were seeing him again when he was lying battered and near death on the shore. Taking the knife from her, he ran his fingers along the dragon’s head. He drew it out of the sheath and touched the carving in the blade.

  When he tilted it toward the light, she said, “Loki and the dwarfs are on there as well.” She touched the haft. “Right here. Just as you described it.”

  “This is my chieftain’s sax.” He put it back into its sheath. “Thank you, unnasta.”

  “Now you can return it to your chieftain.”

  His lip curled with fury. “When I have repaid Tuthill for not telling me about this knife.”

  “No, you cannot blame Randolph for denying you that knife.” She grasped his coat sleeve. “Nils, you must listen to me.”

  He whirled to face her. “How many times have I mentioned my search for anything of the Norrfoolk? He never spoke of this.”

  “Randolph may not even know it is of the Norrfoolk. He is not interested in old things. How many times have you heard him mention that?” She touched the knife. “He probably considers this nothing more than a useless trinket that was not worthy of his time, although he clearly considered it valuable enough to bring it from London.”

  “This? You believe he sees no value in my chieftain’s blade?” He raised the sheathed blade between them. “You recognized its worth.”

  “Because you spoke candidly to me of it.” She put her hands on his arm, lowering the knife so she could see past it to his eyes that were slitted with rage. They widened as she added, “To you, Nils, this knife is the reason you were denied the death you believed would be your reward as a loyal warrior. It is the symbol of an obligation you have taken upon yourself to redeem your brother’s name and your family’s honor in a way that slaying your blood-enemy never could.” She touched the jewels sewn into the embroidery on the fraying sheath. “For Randolph, it is only one of the many things collected by the Denner family during the past thousand years.”