‘I’ve wanted things I’ve had no right to want. Things I didn’t even know I wanted, or maybe I’d forgotten I’d wanted...until you,’ she said.
His eyes narrowed in on her and a flash of pain crossed his features, twisting them slightly. ‘It’s the same for me.’ He raised his hand so slowly that she had plenty of time to back away or stop him, but she couldn’t. Despite herself, she wanted to feel his touch one more time. When his fingertips touched her cheek, it was all she could do not to shiver with the yearning that worked its way through her body from that touch.
‘I want you.’ His voice was rough and it scraped over her skin, abrading it and making her remember that it had been only moments earlier when he’d held her against the table. She still ached from how deliciously rough he’d been.
‘Do you even know who you are?’
He shook his head. ‘Not entirely. I know the men, but my memories are still hazy.’
‘You’re their leader, M-Magnus.’ She couldn’t help but stumble over the word. It didn’t seem to belong to him. ‘You’re the reason Godric is dead.’
For a moment, only their breaths filled the space between them. Finally he moved closer, crowding her against the table until only a hair’s breadth separated them. He kept a hand on her face, while the other pressed into the table beside her. ‘If that turns out to be true, is that the only thing keeping us apart?’
She turned her head, but it didn’t make her less aware of him. His scent surrounded her and she loved it. Craved it. ‘Do I want to be tied to a Danish warrior? Is that what you’re asking?’
He didn’t deny it, but it didn’t lessen his intensity. Daring to meet his gaze, she saw the flicker of longing within them. She couldn’t deny that it sent an unwelcomed thrill through her entire being. ‘I want you, fair one.’
There was a pause and all she could hear was his breath, all she could feel was the heat from his body. She wanted him, too. She couldn’t deny that, but she wanted the Magnus who’d lain beside her at night and the Magnus who had held her close and made her feel that everything would be fine.
Not this one. Not the leader of Danes. Not the murderer of her husband. Not her enemy.
‘Come with me.’
The low command sent exquisite chills through her body. ‘I cannot.’
He looked away, shoulders bowing in momentary defeat, but when he looked back at her, none of the fire in his eyes had been banked. They were vivid, the gold flecks sparkling with intensity. ‘You can.’
‘You’re still a warrior. That hasn’t changed. The Danes roam the countryside. Would you take me with you only to leave me for months while you fight?’ She had him there. She recognised the surrender when she saw it, the fading of that intensity. They didn’t suit, regardless of him being a Dane. Her heart was raging.
Finally he moved back just a little. Just enough that she could take a breath, and his throat worked once, twice, before he said, ‘Let me know when you find out if you’re with child.’
‘Nay.’ She shook her head and her stomach clenched in on itself. If there was a baby and he decided he wanted it, there was very little she could do to stop him from taking it. She’d been so terribly foolish. ‘Your debt is paid.’
‘This isn’t about the debt, Aisly. I want to know. I won’t abandon you with a child.’
‘That wasn’t the agreement. I don’t need anything else from you.’
He must have seen the panic in her eyes, because he took a step back and his hand fell to his side. ‘I have to go. I need to get back to who I am. I’m their leader and have neglected my responsibilities.’
She nodded and a weight lifted from her chest with the growing physical distance between them. However, she also wanted to weep from the loss of his touch. She was so confused in her feelings that she couldn’t determine which emotion was the right one. ‘Goodbye.’ She managed to say that much before the ache swelled in her throat.
‘Make sure you do as I’ve asked.’ When she frowned, he elaborated. ‘The dugout. If I’m not here to keep you safe, I need to know that you’re taking defensive measures.’
She nodded, having already forgotten he’d mentioned the safety measure to her. There’d been no need to heed his advice before and she realised it was because she’d known that he would be there to protect her. There’d been no doubt in her mind that she could rely on him.
‘Aye, I’ll do it.’
He nodded. ‘I’ll have men in place to help defend the village. Keep vigilant around Wulfric. You cannot trust him.’ He looked as if he wanted to say more, but changed his mind. Turning, he walked to the door and gave her one last lingering look. ‘Come for me if you need help.’ Then he walked out of her life.
Chapter Seventeen
It was all so vivid now, the scene so clear...
She was dying.
No one had said the words, to say them would invite Death in on the howling wind to take all of them, but Magnus knew. Her screams of the week before had long since faded, but they lived on in his memory. He huddled back into the limbs of the fir tree, hiding himself from the buffeting wind coming in across the water and the people stirring in the small village below. Drawing his knees up to his chest, he wrapped his thin, right arm around them and tried not to shiver too hard. His left arm he kept cradled against his ribs. It was the only way he’d found to ease the near constant pain in them.
Despite how he’d prepared himself for the moment, he couldn’t stop the jolt of terror that bolted through him when the door to the small house opened and his father stepped outside. He despised that cowardly emotion, so he forced himself to watch the man walk down to the dock where his boat was moored, not looking away once. His father hadn’t left to go fishing for a sennight and Magnus half-feared that the gentle snow would keep his father home again today. But after talking for a long time with several of the other men he usually fished with, they all set about preparing their boats for the day.
Magnus breathed a sigh of relief and his chest lightened as he watched the men push away from the dock. He forced himself to wait until they’d disappeared down the river towards the inlet before crawling out from under the branches, the sharp needles jabbing him through his clothes. Glancing around once to make sure no one would see where he’d emerged from, he took his first step out of the forest in a sennight. The pain on his left side tried to slow him, but he ignored it. There was no telling how long he had, so he must make the most of it.
Still...he hesitated when he reached the door of his home, afraid of what he might find inside. His hand was shaking when he reached out to push the door open and his heart was pounding in his ears. A blast of hot, stale air warmed his cheeks. The heat was nearly stifling as he stepped inside, though to look at the woman huddled under a pile of blankets on the bed, it might as well have been freezing.
Closing the door behind him, he forced himself not to limp as he approached the bed. He didn’t want to worry her needlessly. He’d heal just as he had in the past. He worried needlessly. His mother’s eyes were closed as if she were asleep, though her mouth was too tense for sleep. She was battling pain. Her entire face was drawn with it, so that she was almost unrecognisable to him.
Thoughts of his mother always conjured to mind the smiling visage of an exceptionally pretty woman with a plump face, fair hair and bright blue eyes, not this broken creature with sunken cheeks, lined skin and hair so stringy and faded it bore no resemblance to the silk he remembered. He disgraced himself by gasping at the change and her eyes opened. They were the only part of her to retain a recognisable shadow of the woman she had been—a clear blue that always warmed when she saw him, as they did now.
‘Magnus.’ Her hand reached out and touched his face. The act nearly caused the ache in his throat to overwhelm him. ‘I knew you’d come back.’
‘I’d never leave y
ou.’ His voice came out too scratchy as he hurried to assure her.
But his words didn’t reassure her at all. To his surprise, her eyes filled with tears and her voice was sad when she said, ‘Aye, I knew you wouldn’t. Not while I’m living.’
He sensed the words had some profound meaning that he couldn’t grasp. When she merely stared at him as if she were trying to commit his face to memory, his gaze went to the other side of the bed, looking for a smaller bundle at her side. It wasn’t there. He wondered if the babe—who’d been born months too early for the spring birth his mother had planned—had lived or if it had joined the others. He didn’t ask. The others had left her sad and nearly despondent—he didn’t dare bring it up.
‘I want you to know that your father cared for you very much, Magnus.’ Her thin voice drew his attention back to her. It was so small and fragile that fear flamed to life again inside him and he grabbed her hand, squeezing it hard, as if that alone could infuse some of his life into her. She didn’t seem to mind and only smiled as she continued talking. ‘He’d sing to you when you were in my belly. I called him a fool, but he insisted you could hear and would heed his words. They were always songs about warriors and their heroic deeds. He knew you would be a great warrior. He knew you would do great things.’
He frowned and wondered if she’d already begun to slip into the next world. Magnus couldn’t reconcile that man with the one who’d beat her and then turned his fists on him when Magnus had intervened. ‘Why would he think that? I’m a fisherman like him. I—’
Still smiling that odd smile, she shook her head. ‘Nay, not Vakr. Vakr is a fisherman and a poor one at that. Your father was a warrior. I should have told you the truth before, but I thought it might be easier if you thought Vakr was your father. I thought it might help if... It’s time for you to know the truth.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘Your father was killed before you were born. It’s why I named you Magnus. It was his name.’ Raising her other hand, she made to touch his face, so he went down on his knees beside the bed to make it easier for her. He wanted to be a man now, but he couldn’t deny the way her touch soothed him like a child. ‘Even though you’re only ten winters, I see him in you. You have his eyes, his brow, his mouth and soon you’ll have his strength. It’s why Vakr is jealous.’
It was too much to take in at once. He picked the one thing he knew to be untrue to argue. ‘I’m not strong. I couldn’t save you from Fath—’ Calling him that seemed wrong now, but to say his name seemed even more so. ‘I couldn’t save you. I couldn’t fight back. Everyone says I’m too thin.’
She ran her fingers through his matted hair and he couldn’t help but turn into her touch. ‘You’re perfect, Magnus. You did what you could. I love you.’ The ache in his throat cracked, giving way to the tears that had been threatening all along, proving that he wasn’t strong at all. A warrior wouldn’t cry. But she didn’t seem to mind and rose up to kiss his tears, her body shaking with the effort. ‘I want you to know that your true father and I loved you very much. We wanted you from the very first moment I suspected you grew within me. It is your birthright to be a great warrior. I want you to leave here and make that happen.’
‘Nay! I’ll not leave you.’
She ignored him and pointed to the far corner. ‘Move the chest there and dig below. You’ll find a small satchel of coins.’ When he protested, she looked to the door, reminding them both that their time was limited. Vakr had forbidden him from coming back when he’d thrown him out the last time. ‘Hurry, Magnus. If I’m to die, I want to die knowing you’ll be safe.’
He hesitated but did as she directed. Digging with his hands, he quickly found the pouch and replaced the dirt before moving the chest back to cover their secret. Moving back to her side, he took her hand again, unable to keep from touching her. ‘I have it.’
She nodded. ‘Your father’s master was Jarl Hegard. Travel northward along the coast and you’ll find his hall. Tell him that you are Magnus’s son and he’ll take you in. I should have let you go before, but I was selfish and wanted you for myself. Please forgive me, Magnus.’
Tears ran down his cheeks again and he nodded, hiding his face against the blanket so no one saw them.
‘If he refuses you, then offer him the coins,’ she said, her hand gently resting on the back of his head. ‘But only if he refuses. You’ll need it to buy your sword and armour.’
* * *
It had taken them two days to get to the settlement. Over the course of those days Magnus had spoken at length with Vidar and the other warriors, coming to small realisations about his life. The memories had come back disjointed, like pieces of a broken urn he needed to fit together, turning them different ways until he found the right way that would make them all fit.
This one of his mother was the first of them to come back fully formed. He had just dismounted to stand on the bank of the River Tyne outside the settlement. The boats docked along the river had caught his attention, jarring that first memory loose of watching Vakr with his boat, bringing back that first portion of a dream he’d had in Aisly’s bed. But it was the cool gust of wind bringing with it the fresh scent of the fir trees on the other side of the river that brought the rest of the memory to life.
‘Magnus?’ Vidar walked over, loosely holding the reins of his horse with one hand. His other hand went up in a greeting to the men just bringing in the boats from their day out on the river. ‘Are you unwell?’
Magnus’s heart was pounding so hard from what he’d just remembered that he wasn’t at all certain he was well. It nearly brought him to his knees to have to relive her death over again. After he’d left her that day, he’d waited in the woods, half-starving, but unwilling to leave her completely as long as she lived. It hadn’t been a long wait. On the morning of the second day there’d been a flurry of activity and they’d brought her body out wrapped in a shroud. He’d left then, unable to stay and know that she wasn’t there.
‘Aye, I’ve just had a memory.’ He forced his gaze away from the fishing boats and to the walls of the settlement.
‘It’s good they’re returning.’ Vidar smiled. He’d been coming back to the jovial man Magnus remembered with each mile that took them away from the Saxons. ‘You just need to be home. We’ll get some mead in you, not that Saxon piss they were feeding you. They’ll all be restored in good time.’
Magnus nodded, for the first time feeling as if he were coming back into his own. ‘We need to find Heir, the man I told you the rebels were talking about.’
‘I’ve sent for the traitor. We’ll deal with him tomorrow, after you’ve had a chance to settle in.’
Magnus’s gaze went over the walls—high enough not to be easily breached—and then the settlement beyond as they walked towards it. The houses were in a similar style to the Saxons, but everywhere he looked he saw warriors. This felt familiar. This was home.
Vidar let out a cry of victory as they entered the gates. Everyone within hearing distance looked up from their tasks, their faces revealing surprise and recognition. Immediately they were swamped with men and the few women who lived there, each welcoming him back from the dead.
He was the leader of the settlement. Vidar had told him as much and the men had treated him with deference on the trip home, but this was the first time he’d truly felt it. As he greeted each person by name—aye, their names were coming to him—he had very clear memories of the path that had led him to this role.
Half-afraid that Vakr might come looking for him, he’d run for days after his mother had died until he finally arrived at Jarl Hegard’s hall. The Jarl had taken him in and that was how he’d met the Jarl’s bastard son Gunnar. To say they’d shared similar childhood experiences would be an understatement and they had bonded quickly. It was probably the best thing that had happened to Magnus—up until Aisly found him in the for
est—as it had shown him a different way to live. He’d become a warrior like his father had wanted and amassed a modest living working on Jarl Hegard’s longboats.
He, Gunnar and Gunnar’s brother Eirik had eventually made the crossing to the Saxon lands. But three winters ago Gunnar had been injured. He’d been so wounded that Eirik, now a jarl, had sent him home to their father, because it had been assumed he would die. Gunnar had lived, but he’d stayed in their homeland and married. Upon Jarl Hegard’s death, he’d assumed his place as a jarl rather than coming back to resume his place as leader here in the Saxon lands.
Magnus had been given his place here. He was leader despite Vakr’s taunts that he’d never amount to anything. As he looked into the faces of these people so joyful to welcome him home, he realised that he’d been a very good leader. He saw himself leading men in battle and counselling them at his table. He remembered the pride he felt in taking a group of men and teaching them how to excel in battle. There was an intoxicating sensation of gratification and contentment to be found in watching the settlement grow and flourish under his command. He’d grown to crave it in a way that made him realise he’d never have been completely content in the Saxon village.
This is who he was.
He was smiling as they walked through the settlement, but not so much as he did when he saw the hall looming before them. It was nearly as large as Jarl Hegard’s back home to accommodate long winters with many warriors and entertainment. It was at least three times as large as the Saxons’. He could smell the freshly cut wood they’d used and remembered helping to design and build it. It was his.
As he stepped inside, a wave of familiarity passed over him. There were three large posts made from tree trunks down each side of the building, holding the vaulted ceiling up high. Beams crossed overhead where smoke from the two hearths wafted up to the slits in the top. Tables and benches lined the walls for all of his warriors. The back held a loft for storage, with chambers beneath it, three on one side, two larger ones on the other. Pride swelled within him as he walked in, his fingers stroking the harsh wood of a post. He only wished that his mother could see the warrior he’d become and how he’d earned all of this.
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