No, Tara was home. This would never be home. I am still surrounded by the enemy, she thought defiantly, but said nothing.
“Brice and Leith will be staying for several months,” Niall offered, speaking of his two younger brothers. “And Gregory will be here with you as long as you wish.”
Gregory. Thank God for Gregory. I’ll not be alone, Erin thought gratefully.
The hall, which had been flooded with idle chatter, suddenly went silent. Erin turned to see that Olaf, resplendent and awesome as always, had entered, his mantle flowing behind his tall golden body making him appear as if he were more than human, a god himself.
His eyes scanned the hall quickly, then locked upon Erin’s. He lifted a hand toward her.
Erin approached him with her head held regally high. Remembering her mother’s training, she seemed to float across the room.
She felt the heat of his hand as he silently led her to the richly carved chairs at the head of the table. Once she was seated, he released her as if he held dirt.
It was a test, Erin thought, silently raging against the fates that had forced her to live a life of humiliation when she wanted to rip and tear and pummel with anger. It was a test to see if she did or didn’t plan to be the docile wife he wanted.
Norwegians and Irish alike filed toward their chairs. The conversation within the hall began to bubble curiously as new allies warily assessed one another. Servants carried in platter after platter.
“So, madam, how did you fare on your first day?”
She could always feel his eyes, just as she could always feel the terrible tension about him. She kept her eyes glued to her plate and the piece of meat she speared delicately with her knife.
“Well,” she replied coolly.
As she could sense his eyes, she could sense the cock of his golden brow, the tightening of his fingers around his goblet.
“I assume you have learned the extent of your duties?”
“I was raised at Tara, Lord of Norway. I’m sure I shall find no task too difficult … here.” She spoke sweetly, making the sound of her sarcasm a double-edged knife. She may have accepted certain things, but she had not accepted the man beside her with his overwhelmingly vibrant power and fundamental masculinity. Every nerve within her seemed to prick when he was near, and she was determined now that since she was here to stay, she would do so with her dignity intact. Conqueror or no, he could not lord it over her if she refused to let him beneath her guard.
He did not reply, but shifted in his carved and inlaid chair to speak to the man beside him. Erin stared down the hall. It was evident that any actual peace between Irish and Norse would take time. Hot-tempered warriors already quarreled garrulously as they filled their mouths. The number of Norse far outweighed those of the Irish, and there were those of his own men who thought Olaf a shade daft to sup with the enemy.
“Do you expect trouble?”
Erin started to find her husband’s eyes upon her again. She shrugged. “I expect nothing, my lord. I am still amazed by what I see, therefore there is little to expect. I should, however, pray against trouble, since your invaders far outweigh the rightful heirs of the land.”
He leaned close to her, his breath touching her cheek as he spoke low. “Ah, so if it was the Irish who outnumbered the Norse, you would love to see the spilling of a little blood or perhaps a lot. Mine in particular?”
Erin turned to face him with a smile curving her lips, ice frosting her eyes. “Olaf, I have never pretended otherwise.” As before, her words were soft and sweet.
He smiled in return, his arm coming around her shoulders as if they were lovers whispering pleasantries together. “Are you planning to murder me still and escape into the countryside?” It was a softly toned question, as if he had asked her about the color of the sky.
His touch sent little shivers rippling down her spine. She gazed disdainfully upon the powerful broad hand that dangled over her shoulder and then again turned her eyes to meet his. “No, my lord, I would not take the chance of harming my people. I shall wait until the day comes when a Dane shall split your skull.”
She was surprised that he found such a comment amusing. He laughed, and the sound was warm and throaty … a dangerous sound. The little shivers attacked her again and she turned her attention to the jugglers performing down the hall. Olaf again listened to something being said to his right. Erin surreptitiously took a glance at the Viking who so held her husband’s attention and who was seated in a place of authority. He was large, not quite so steeled as Olaf, and probably a hair shorter. His hair was flaming red, his eyes a gray blue. He had stared at her before, but assessed her merely with no comment other than a snort, which Erin had taken to mean that he was not fond of the Irish, but as a woman, she would do. She wondered if he might be Moira’s Sigurd. Probably. Poor Moira.
She was not called upon to speak to anyone. The Viking at her right was deeply engrossed in conversation with the Irishman placed next to him.
She began to pray the meal would end. Bede and Niall were far down the hall and, as yet, she hadn’t even seen Gregory.
To her dismay she learned that Viking ships had just returned from a journey to Spain. The meal would continue because fresh fruits were being laid out on immense platters.
She ate half an orange, feeling more alone than she had ever felt in her life. How will I bear this day after day? she wondered. She took a long draught of her ale, then sat back in her chair. Perhaps she could feign illness and enjoy her meals in the privacy of her chamber.
The jugglers ended their entertainment. A man began to relate a tale of a Viking King Fairhir who had fought with the god Frey. The tale was amusing, as it was meant to be, and Erin enjoyed the diversion. The man ended his tale and bowed deeply. Cheers rose up about the hall, and Erin believed the man would begin another story. Instead a woman rose from her place at the table far down the hall and motioned him away. Dancers came in his place, but Erin had no eyes for them. The woman had turned mocking eyes to her, a direct challenge. It was Mageen.
She smiled across the distance at Erin. Then with a dismissive blink of her sultry eyes, she sat again, her laughter rising high in response to a jest. Erin felt blood rush to her face with her fury. She glanced at Olaf to see that he merely looked up with temporary interest at the change of entertainment, smiled vaguely at Mageen, and returned to his talk of proper shipbuilding with the red-haired giant.
But then Erin noticed that many of the ladies about the room, the few Irish and the Norwegian alike, glanced her way. Pity and curiosity filled their eyes until they would catch her return stare, then they would quickly glance away. She kept her head held high until she had simply had enough. She stood, drawing Olaf’s eyes to her sharply.
“I wish to retire, my lord. My journey here was wearisome and I have not yet caught up on sleep.”
For a moment it seemed as if he might argue with her, then he shrugged as if her presence were unimportant.
Erin escaped the hall to find that Moira awaited her in her chamber.
“Why were you not at dinner?” Erin demanded.
Moira raised her shoulders helplessly. “I prefer to avoid the banqueting hall at night,” she said softly.
Erin felt hysterical laughter bubbling within her. “You hide up here because you live with Sigurd while that … that witch flaunts herself!”
Moira lifted a brow but said nothing. Erin closed her eyes tiredly. “I’m sorry, Moira. You must do what you wish.”
“Come, Erin, I’ll help you disrobe.”
Erin stood still as Moira assisted her into her nightgown. No words passed between them as Moira combed out Erin’s hair. “Erin, would it help to talk?” Moira asked.
Erin shook her head. She couldn’t talk when she didn’t understand herself. She shouldn’t care that all knew Olaf’s whore held more power than his wife-by-bargain. She shouldn’t care that he had smiled down the table at Mageen. It shouldn’t bother her that the man who had lain naked
against her only to ridicule and subdue her brought that same naked body next to a woman of her own race who seemed determined to prove that she also ruled.
“I will say good night then,” Moira said quietly, crossing the stone floor and attempting a cheery smile as she opened the door. “Lord Olaf shall probably be up soon.”
As the door clicked, Moira’s words brought new confusion to Erin. She wanted to confront Olaf, to swear and rage and pummel him bodily. She wanted to cry out her frustration. She wanted to go home.
She could do none of those things, not if she wished to establish a relationship of cool propriety and distance between them.
She got in the broad down bed, wondering with surprising bitterness if he would even bother to enter his chamber when it was obvious that he preferred to sleep elsewhere. I should suggest that we maintain separate quarters, she thought. He can have his freedom, I can have mine. We shall not not break into constant war. He does not want me other than to taunt me.
She heard his footsteps, the creak of the door, and closed her eyes. She felt his every movement as he stripped. She could feel him, sense him, smell the pleasant vital maleness of his body as he approached the bed. And she knew that he stood watching her.
“Your wrists, Erin,” he said softly. “I have no wish to allow you to become a joyous widow tonight.”
She froze, fighting tears that seemed to rush to her eyes. Not again, she thought, please not again, but I cannot beg him.
She shifted to stare at his face, studiously keeping her eyes on him. He didn’t appear so terrible this evening. There seemed to be a glimmer of sorrow in his eyes.
Her mouth had gone dry. Part of her wanted to lash out at him, demand how he could treat her so miserably when he had assured her father respect, but there was another part of her that simply couldn’t bear spending another night in bondage. She wet her lips. “I will make no attempts against you. I-I promise.”
“I wish I could believe you.” His voice held both determination and regret. “Place your hands out. Despite the fact that you wish me dead by the most odious means, I don’t wish to harm you. I will if I must.”
He meant what he said, and she was no match for him. She didn’t want to scuffle again, didn’t want to feel the radiating power of his body against hers. Her lip was begging to tremble. She couldn’t allow him to see it. Tightening her jaw, she obediently did so.
He began to tie them together with a silk sash, then paused, staring probingly into her eyes. Suddenly he released her, his voice taking on a harsher quality as he spoke. “If you make another attempt at me, be sure that you do kill. For if you make another attempt to draw blood and I do not die, I will see that you receive twenty harsh lashes as would any petty criminal.”
Erin said nothing. His warning eyes left hers as he moved to extinguish the candles. He silently crawled in beside her, leaving a foot between them—a gulf that could never be crossed.
She slept miserably, free to move, but careful not to. He was like a powerful and hypnotic heat that she did not want to be drawn to. But she wondered miserably how she would endure this night after night after night. She wouldn’t, she tried to assure herself. She would speak to him about separate sleeping quarters. And she would somehow manage to alert Mageen to the fact that she was the queen, and not the traitorous Irish whore who coveted the enemy.
CHAPTER
12
Erin’s first week as the new Irish queen of Dubhlain was one spent in almost continual misery. Olaf had elected to stop taunting her, and ignored her, except when he would demand some small task and expected it as his due. Erin did her best to thwart him—leaving his mending to other women, pretending to have forgotten when he wished her to send for food or water or ale. Generally he held his temper, but she was aware of the irritation building within him. She could not help herself. He refused point-blank to allow her a separate chamber. He wanted her where he could keep an eye on her. And so, as the week passed, she lost more and more sleep, knowing he was within inches, sometimes jerking awake in horror to find herself curved against his frame, sometimes finding his arm draped around her. Neither his nakedness nor her accidental touches disturbed him. Erin thought rather indignantly that he assumed he was sleeping with a pet wolfhound. He was supposed to be the animal, the barbarian, yet he left her completely alone whereas she, to her great self-disgust, found it harder and harder to loathe him. One night she lulled herself to sleep with the fantasy dream that she would be rescued by a magnificent Irish warrior. Fennen should have been the man within her dreams. But she awoke time and again, shaking, when she realized that she had bestowed upon her dream prince not only her husband’s superbly muscled and powerful form, but his golden clipped hair and hawk-strong features. She had gone so far as to give him eyes of piercing Nordic blue.
After her first week within the walls of Dubhlain, she had escaped Moira and duty to see a bit of the city. The wood-planked sidewalks had amazed her, as had the endless rows of pretty, thatched-roof houses, some of stone, some built with split logs as their foundations. Interspersed with the homes were shops of merchants and craftsmen. The quantity of items available was stunning. Toward the eastern walls of the city were farmlands and fields where cattle and horses grazed. Erin found herself turning toward those unbreachable walls and staring at them longingly. She was so engaged when she heard the thunderous hooves of a war horse approaching. Frightened, she turned to see her husband’s sardonic gaze.
“Dreaming of running?” he mocked.
Erin tilted her head to see him above the massive charger, taking care to avoid the prancing hooves of the black stallion.
“A dream only, my lord,” she retorted in turn.
He reached a hand toward her. “Come, it grows late. We will ride back together.”
“Thank you, I can walk.”
“I’m quite sure that you can. However, you will ride.”
She had no chance to protest further. He leaned amazingly low from the saddle to slip an arm around her waist and pull her up in fromt of him. She didn’t like the feeling that assailed her with his arms around her, and she didn’t like his breath against her hair, the heat of his chest against her back, that elemental male scent of him. But he was like the steel of his sword, a physical strength she couldn’t match. She sat silently, feeling the muscles of the great horse move beneath her.
“We are lucky you speak our tongue.”
Not knowing if he mocked her or not, she again replied in kind. “We are lucky that you speak ours.”
She felt his shrug. “If one wishes to invade and conquer a land, it is only wise to know that land and its people.”
“And if one’s land is being invaded …” By her pause Erin stressed “invaded”; she had no need to say “conquered.” “It is only wise to know all that one can about the … invaders.”
He chuckled softly. “Tell me, wife, what else do you do?”
She was glad she did not face him. “The usual, Lord Olaf.”
He laughed again, but the sound was a bit hoarse. “Wife, I’ll remind you, you do not exactly perform the ‘usual’ …”
A tickle seemed to race down her spine, hot one minute, cold the next. Did he mock her again? She had no reply, but he was speaking again.
“I have the strangest feeling, Erin mac Aed, that you are not at all the usual. Tell me—what other languages do you speak?”
“Latin and that of the Franks.”
“Quite accomplished. Latin you will eventually teach me. I wish to understand more about this God I must tolerate for the Irish.”
The magnificent entry of the king’s residence loomed before them. Erin managed to escape his unguarded arms with a smooth leap from the horse. “If you wish to understand the Christian god, Lord Olaf, speak with my sister Bede. Her commune with Him is far greater than mine.”
Erin was fully aware that he watched her as she ran inside. She heard the deep, throaty sound of his laughter echo after her and she pressed her han
ds to her flushed face, hating him, wondering how it was possible to find so many things so pleasant and stirring about a man she hated, a Viking, a man who mocked her, ridiculed her, ignored her, and held her trapped by bonds to her family and people. A too-proud princess held beneath the twist of his thumb. She was so preoccupied with her thoughts that she literally ran into the man at the foot of the staircase. Pulling away in quick apology, Erin was torn and saddened to find herself staring into the face of Fennen mac Cormac.
“Erin,” he murmured softly, breathlessly. “I’ve been trying to see you alone.”
She caught her breath as he placed his hands on her shoulders longingly. “I know how you suffer,” he added quickly. “And I have not forgotten you. I don’t know how yet, but I will free you from this horror.”
“Oh, Fennen,” Erin murmured miserably. “There is nothing to be done. I am legally wed to Olaf.” Escape, she realized, could never be anything but a dream, unless she wanted to know that she had been the cause of further wars, of fresh bloodshed, of a greater death toll. She smiled sadly as she stared into his earnest brown eyes. She had never really loved Fennen, as much as she had cared about him. He was suffering a far greater pain than she. “You must leave here, Fennen,” she entreated him. “You are hurting yourself.”
“I cannot, Erin,” he swore sincerely. “I cannot leave you to that northern barbarian—”
“He is not a cruel man,” Erin heard herself say, and with the words out she had to admit to their truth. “I am fine, Fennen, and we both must accept what is.”
“But, Erin,” he began miserably, and then his eyes suddenly left hers and he stiffened as he stared over her shoulder. A chill seemed to invade her system as she turned slowly to follow Fennen’s line of vision; she already knew what he saw.
Olaf had followed her in. He stood a short distance behind them, his expression as impassive as the stone of his house. Dear God, what has he heard? Erin wondered, a pain tightening around her middle like a band of fear.
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