She feared her skin would catch fire from the heat of his measure, but she refused to look away. Though he laughed at her, and she felt more lacking in wit than ever, she would not cower.
“No more questions?”
She made no answer.
A look of what might have been respect skipped over his face, but he merely said, “Good.” He glanced at Sindre and gestured toward the western horizon. “Daylight flees.” His head lifted and he sniffed. “I smell water. Likely, there is a brook nearby. We will seek shelter and rest until the moon rises. Then we will go again into the water to further confuse our trail.”
∞∞§∞∞
Brandr followed his nose to a hillcrest overlooking a thickly wooded valley. At the far end, a single mud and wattle hut was visible in a tiny clearing. Naught of animal or human moved nigh it, and no shifting shadow rose from the smoke-hole in the thatched roof. An air of neglect sat upon it.
Sindre came beside him. “It looks deserted.”
“Já, and the water would be down there, and maybe fish to be had.”
“And if we are wrong, and it is not so empty as it seems?”
“We pass it by.”
“Then let us hope Odinn has led us to a place abandoned, and let us also hope the water is more than a rill. The day has been unseasonably warm, and I have been too long without a decent wash.”
“As have we all.”
He found a sheep track leading downward. They soon passed from sparse, sunny woodland into the cool gloom of the valley’s green canopy.
Sindre called softly, “Hold, Músa! I will go to determine if we are alone.”
“No bloodshed, Sindre!”
“Have no fear. If any inhabit the place, they will never know I was there.”
Brandr turned to find Lissa staring at him. He raised one brow. “What is it?”
She shook her head and leaned against the bole of a tree.
He had not liked the stunned disillusionment in her eyes when she realized he had come, not to trade, as she believed, but to despoil her village. He liked it less she seemed now to view him as less than a man of honor, as one who followed not the laws and warrior’s code of his people.
Anger at himself for allowing her opinion to matter sharpened his voice. “You sulk like a child.”
“I do not. Must I speak when I have naught to say?”
“If I command it, já.”
“Then tell me what would you have me say.”
“I have a better idea. Come here.”
Eyes the brownish gold of leaves in autumn slewed toward him. She stiffened. “Why? What is it you want?”
He narrowed his eyes. “Have you forgotten so soon my warning? A thrall has no rights. A thrall is not allowed to question. A thrall obeys instantly or suffers punishment. Come here.”
Alarm flashed in her expression and she swallowed.
He thought she would refuse. A part of him hoped she would, for her small rebellion kindled a familiar need to conquer, to bend her to his will.
Her movements lacking their usual grace, she sidled toward him as if deeming dissent unwise, but wishing otherwise. She stopped an arm’s length away.
“Closer.”
Her lips pursed, but she took one small step forward.
His vexation drained away and he almost smiled. She looked like a wary fawn confronted by a large and unknown animal. He touched the sun-pinkened tip of her nose with a fingertip, fascinated by the way it tilted up ever so slightly. Then his gaze dropped to the enticing curves of her mouth. Desire sparked with a suddenness that tore at his breath. Everything vanished except a surge of primal heat. His hands settled on her shoulders and drew her near, and nearer still until his arms closed to sweep her into the embrace he had wanted from the moment he first saw her.
Her face grew flushed and she gasped. He felt the inhalation against his chest and closed his eyes. The heady scent of woman engulfed his senses, igniting the spark into sheets of roaring flame, billowing, cascading, burning. He trembled with the unexpected need that rioted through his veins.
One hand tangled in her shorn tresses as he cupped her head in his palm. He could not stop staring at the parted fullness of her lips. Their softness beckoned. His head bent in slow descent until their breaths mingled. Flesh touched. She quivered. He slowly rubbed his lips back and forth against hers in the barest of strokes. She panted. He nuzzled her. She leaned into him, the movement restless, uncertain. His palm stroked her back from neck to hips.
He lifted his eyes. His gaze first clashed with, then captured hers. Passion blazed, innocent, but heated and powerful, within those golden depths. He stroked her again, and watched the desire build.
She wants me!
The realization shook him to his core. He thought of the open hunger in her look as she had gazed at his bared chest the first morning after the raid. The haze that locked him in its grip deepened. He shuddered with the effort it took to keep from dragging her to the ground and ravishing her now, on the moment. He fought for control. Then the tip of her tongue swept in rapid caress over her lips. Fire flashed. Thought dissolved. Control fled. He groaned, took her mouth and plundered her sweetness with all the hunger raging through his body. She tasted like all the fleshly dreams of a warrior’s heart.
His arms tightened. She moaned and rose to her toes, her softness pressing, clinging to his frame. The inferno spiraled.
Her small hands lifted to clasp at his nape, then slid upward into his hair, increasing the contact of her curves with his hard lines. His palm settled low on the small of her back to gather her closer still. She urged him on with little cries that somehow escaped his rampage.
Triumph and possession soared at her surrender. The hand at her back slid around to come between them, seeking the soft fullness crushed to his chest.
“Now is not the time for this, Músa. Unless, of course, you intend to invite me to share.”
The sneer in his uncle’s voice crashed through the enchantment like the thunder of Thorr’s hammer.
He jerked, and broke the kiss, but when Lissa gave a low cry and tried to pull away, he would not let her go. His arms enfolded her, and he buried his face in the tender curve of her neck, trying to catch his breath, to understand what had just happened. He was no stranger to passion, but never, not once in all his days, had he ever lost control so completely as he had with her. Another powerful shudder swept him.
She had gone very still. He lifted his head. Her golden eyes were dark, the desire now tempered by fear.
Freyja’s tears! If the maelstrom had nigh overwhelmed him, a man experienced in the ways of love, how much more had it ravaged this maiden?
With all the gentleness he could muster, he stroked her cheek, hoping she failed to notice how his hand still trembled. “Do not fear, lítill blóm. I have never taken a woman against her will.”
Sindre guffawed. “From what I saw, she was aught but reluctant. She nigh crawled into your skin.”
Lissa flinched, but glowed with a fiery blush.
Brandr pulled her heated face against his chest and threw a scowl at his uncle, who held in his hand a small stewpot covered with a tattered piece of fabric. “Report!”
“Have it your way, Músa, but only a fool would refuse to take what she is so pleased to give. Think you I saw not that look she gave you earlier? She wants you. Nei,” he said, and held up his hand at Brandr’s start of protest. “I have finished my say on the matter.
“As we thought, the cottage is abandoned, though I think not long past. Three graves lie behind it, the dirt still mounded beneath the rocks that protect from scavengers. Whoever buried the dead does not appear to have lingered. I found evidence of a charcoal maker’s bonfire.”
“Which explains the isolation of the hut.”
“Já. There are signs the place has been used by travelers who, like us, stayed but a night. I found naught of value except this.” He held up the stewpot, and removed the covering cloth. It was filled with dried
apples. “I ate one. It was sweet and good. Also, a brook flows through the valley. It passes by the hut. At this end there is a glade, perfect for our needs.” He grinned. “We will have good bathing and fishing, if we make time.”
Thinking of Lissa, Brandr agreed. He set her from him but slid his hand down her arm to clasp her hand. She tugged against his hold, but his fingers entwined with hers, tightening the grip. She made no protest as, following Sindre, he towed her along behind him.
∞∞§∞∞
Talon spit gristle to the ground. With his teeth, he tore another bite from the still sizzling partridge breast. His men, except for the guard, lingered around the fire, satisfied to fill their bellies with bread, meat and ale. He had moved a little distance away, to ponder their next move.
As expected, the quarry had turned inland, but if Wat was right, they had somehow learned they were followed. The track had been clear and easily detected up to the point where they spied on the island. His suspicion they had meant to meet there with their ship companions appeared to be confirmed, but they had not known of the watchtower King Alfred had ordered built. There was evidence they had lingered at the spot for a short time, probably discussing options, but then they had set out north and east, in the general direction of the borders of Guthrum’s kingdom. From that point on, their trail became less apparent. Wat assured him he would have no difficulty tracking them, but had admitted their progress would be slowed.
He ripped into the succulent flesh of the bird, the restrained violence of his action echoing the rage in his heart. His Lissa would not have willingly warned them of the pursuit. What had they done to force her to tell? The darkness of his thoughts threatened to overwhelm him. Only the strict discipline he demanded of himself kept him from imagining the worst. She was alive, and Wat had found no further traces of blood since the day before. His tracker believed the droplets came from one of the men, insisting the víkingrs would never bother to drag a wounded captive on a difficult journey. They would have killed her, instead. He accepted the logic of the argument, for he would do the same. That did not mean they had not beaten her, or worse. Abuse took many forms, and he well knew it was possible to torture a man to death without ever spilling a drop of his blood.
He finished the meal and flung the bones, picked clean, across the camp. They plopped into the fire, sending sparks flying and startling the men. They recoiled and reached for their weapons, then offered chuckles at his jest.
He wiped his hand across his mouth, grabbed his skin of ale and rose. Walking to the rill trickling nigh the camp, he washed the hadseax used to chop apart the bird. Moving still farther from the fire, he stopped to have a word with the guard, then dropped to the base of a tree and leaned back. On the morrow, when they learned more about the probable route of the Northmen, he would consider the merits of a plan that simmered in his mind. But there was time, for now. He could afford to wait for the right moment. He swallowed the last of the ale and listened to the night. Soon, the clean darkness closed over him, and he slept.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Suppressing a groan of sheer pleasure, Lissa scoured away days of grime with crushed soapwort leaves and sand. She could not remember when simply being clean had felt so wonderful. Lady Eadgida had insisted her servants bathe once every cycle of the moon, and Lissa had learned to appreciate the feeling of stepping, refreshed, from the bathing tub, but it had never felt like this.
When they arrived in the clearing Sindre mentioned, the two men had dropped everything and gone downstream to clean up while she made camp. They splashed and laughed like boys while she boiled the clutch of partridge eggs Sindre had poached from a nest earlier in the day. For the evening meal, she set out the eggs with the last of the smoked beef and fish salvaged from Yriclea.
The men returned, scrubbed and smelling much better than she did. It made her uncomfortable and once she served them, she moved away to eat. Brandr’s eyes had laughed blue fire, but as soon as the meal was over, he ordered her to gather what she needed, and escorted her to this spot.
The stream was wide and crystal clear with a gentle current. Little more than knee-deep, she could not immerse herself without lying down, but she could certainly sit and be covered almost to her shoulders. As she lathered her hair, she shivered and ignored the cold bumps on her skin. The air was quite warm for early evening on a day in the month of reaping, but the water felt like melted ice.
She ducked under to rinse and came back up, gasping and sputtering. From beneath dripping strands, she cast a watchful eye in Brandr’s direction. Her guard reclined with his back to her on a boulder not far away, one knee drawn up with his arm resting across it. Despite the relaxed posture, his bearing gave the impression of unusual tension, but he had promised not to look and so far, his word held. Still, while she had removed and washed her syrce, she had refused to take off her cyrtel. It would wash, well enough, with her in it.
A sinuous movement in the deep shadows beneath the far bank caught her attention and she froze. Fat fish hid among the rippling strands of brook moss in this stream, but what of sleeping eels? The nocturnal creatures were not normally aggressive unless provoked, but she did not know if bathing in their territory constituted goading. Perhaps it was time to get out.
“Are you not yet finished?” Brandr growled the words over his shoulder, as if in echo of her thoughts. “You will melt and wash completely away if you stay in there much longer.”
His tone was huskier than normal and she wondered why. She hoped he was not catching the ague.
“I have been in the water less than half the time you took.”
He rose and swung round to stalk toward her, determination in every step. “And I have decided you have had long enough.”
She shrieked. “What are you doing? You promised!”
“What you are screeching about, woman? You are fully clothed. Get out and dry off.”
“But I have to change out of this wet cyrtel. I cannot sleep in it.”
He rolled his eyes, but turned around again. “You have until I cease counting, to change. If you have not finished by then, I will do it for you.”
Sure her face was redder than the sunset, she lunged through the reeds at the bank of the stream, stripped off the wet garment and dried off with the clean cyrtel as fast as she could manage. But getting the thing on after using it as a towel was quite another matter. She struggled with the damp fabric, fearing it would get caught around her shoulders. All the while, she heard him murmuring. He had not said how long he would count.
“I am turning around.”
She nigh ripped the fabric, jerking the hem over her hips. By the time the very interested blue gaze flicked over her, she was breathless from the race, but she was covered.
His lips twitched. “I like the new blue tone to your skin. Perhaps, it will become a fashion among the ladies.”
She shivered again and threw her wet cyrtel at him.
He plucked it from the air and wrung it out, then handed it back.
She pulled on her boots and gathered her meager possessions. “You know our meal this eve was the last of the food.”
He caught her upper arm and guided her back toward camp.
“I know. Sindre hunts.”
She glanced at him. “I thought he was asleep.”
“We have to eat. It must be done before dark, and it is almost that, now.”
For the first time, she realized the shadows had deepened. “Brandr. Have you anything with which to trade?”
Curiosity limned his look. “Why?”
“We have passed several villages. They look prosperous enough. If you had coin, besides the gold, that is, I could go into the next settlement and buy the supplies we need.”
His face closed. “Nei.”
“Why not? I am familiar with the price of many things. I could say I am traveling to a distant town with my husband, but that he has fallen ill and sent me to fetch food. None would question it.”
He shook h
is head and his face was now cast in hard lines. “Nei. Do not mention it again.”
“You do not trust me.”
He made no answer, but she knew. She could not think why it should hurt. Had she not planned all along—aye, and especially after learning of his true intent to raid Yriclea—to leave when chance came, and make her way to some place far from Talon and the bitter, painful memories of her home? But such a place would also be far from the man who stalked beside her, and that thought upset her more than she understood. In truth, she no longer knew what she wanted.
∞∞§∞∞
It was full dark by the time Sindre returned to camp.
Brandr, polishing his ring-shirt, grinned as his uncle held up two large trout and a skinned hare, all threaded on a sharpened stick. Using the stick as a spit, Sindre set the meat to cook over the fire.
“Good eating for a day or two,” Brandr said, his voice quiet, for Lissa slept.
Sindre leaned against his rolled up húdfat to keep watch on the roasting meat, his eyes gleaming in the firelight. “Já. But it will be difficult to find time for hunting when we must move so swiftly. Have you given thought to stealing clothing from a peasant, so we may enter villages to buy food? We are both fluent in the language.”
He flicked a look at his uncle from beneath raised brows. “Our intent is to stay clear of the people of this land, to give that tracker no more sure path to follow than can be helped. Two strangers purchasing supplies would be as a signpost declaring our presence. As well, they would take one look at you, Uncle, and know you were no Saxon.”
Sindre grinned. “You however, begin to look straggly enough to pass as a hearth companion, separated from his fellows and seeking to meet up with them.” He paused and switched to their tongue. “You could take the female with you and pretend she was your wife, that you are traveling to a new village, seeking work.”
Viking Sword: A Fall of Yellow Fire: The Stranded One (Viking Brothers Saga Book 1) Page 9
