by Jen Black
“It will soon pass. It’s reaction, that’s all.” Flane pulled his striker out of his belt-purse, knelt with care and struck against the flint until a spark flew into the kindling. He concentrated furiously on the newly-born flames, but he was aware of her every movement as she drifted about the hut.
“You haven’t asked,” she said from somewhere behind him.
Flane looked up from his careful pyramid of sticks and met her wide, dark glance. “You would tell me, if there was a problem. I shall probably kill him tomorrow, so he will not trouble you again.”
She did not reply.
He laid larger sticks over the half-burned ones and kept his eyes on his hands. Eventually he could stand it no longer. “Emer, for the love of Thor! Did he succeed?”
She shook her head in vehement denial and turned from the dark corner. “No! But your last words reminded me…of the day we met. Gamel was an annoyance, even then. You threatened him. Such violence frightens me.”
“Ah!” Flane sank slowly back on his heels and looked at her. The strengthening flames cast a mellow glow across her young face and the much maligned pink gown. She was really much too young and gentle for all this heartbreak. He nodded slowly. “You’ve gone back to thinking I’m a killer, and how you hate me.”
She did not speak, but her eyes accused him.
He put a few pieces of wood on the flames and made the place comfortable with sheepskins. An encounter with Gamel was enough to make any woman think all Vikings were killers. “Come and sit down,” he said. “Perhaps it will help if you tell me all the things you want to say. I always feel better when I vent my frustrations. Usually Skeggi is my punch bag.”
She knelt on the opposite side of the fire, closed her eyes and pressed her lips together until they all but disappeared. A stick rolled free of the flames and he gently replaced it in the pyre.
In a softened tone, he said, “I’m sorry if you—”
“Even you,” she said. “You have killed men.”
“I have. So has Skeggi, and every other man in this steading. I’ve tried to tell you this before. Skuli Grey Cloak has killed more than most. Why don’t you hate him instead of me?”
“I do hate him!” She banged both fists on her knees so hard she winced. “I hate every man in this steading!”
“That’s unfair. Most men have killed someone,” he said mildly.
“My father and brother have not. Nor has anyone on our island!”
“But you live in a place so remote I’ve never heard of it.”
“And we live peaceful, Christian lives!”
“Easy to do when you live in isolation.”
“You are all Vikings, and Vikings snatched me from my home.”
“Emer, you are thinking of the old days, when Vikings first came to these shores. You were taken by a raiding band, and you think they were Vikings. They’re not; they’re the riff-raff of the seas. They attack us, from time to time, and if we want to keep the steading as it is, then we have to fight them.” Flane shrugged, and wished he hadn’t when pain flared across his back. “I suppose it is always possible to live away from the struggles of men, but one day the raiders may find your island, and then what will your father do?”
She bit her lip, and tears shimmered in her eyes.
“You must think I’m no different to Gamel.”
Emer drew a hasty breath. “Of course you are different. Perhaps I am misjudging you. But my people do not kill and loot and rape. They work hard and take their living from the land.”
“Vikings had a reputation as killers,” he said slowly, “and it lingers on. But now many are farmers, tilling the land as your people do. We have a strong code of ethics, we have slaves, freemen and chieftains and our lives are regulated by laws. Justice is swift. The bonds of brotherhood are what we value, along with courage and hard work. Blood ties are sacred to us and we must avoid besmirching the honour of our family at all costs.”
He hesitated and looked down at his hands. It was a long time since he’d thought of all these things. “Those warlike people are turning into farmers. They work the land, and live on their crops as you do.”
“You have given up raiding?”
He nodded. “It is a long time since Grey Cloak led a raid. He admires the standards of his forefathers, yet in his fiftieth winter, he negotiates with his neighbours instead of fighting them. He will marry his daughter to Snorri Longnose, who is not yet thirty and he too looks for new ways.” A grin spread across his face. “He will control Katla, too.”
Wary disbelief crossed Emer’s face.
Flane’s grin faded as he looked at her. “I understand tonight has upset you, but don’t let Gamel’s viciousness undermine your belief in me. I will do everything I can to build a good life for us.”
She glanced at him from under her lashes. “I know he is strange in the head,” she said, so softly he had to strain to hear her over the crackling flames. “I wish your parents were still alive.”
Something about the way she said the words caught him by the throat. “My parents died in a summer fever. They were not raiding, nor were they raided. There is no reason to refuse me because they are dead.”
“No.”
Flane sighed. “In the middle of life, someone can die. The rest of us have to go on. It isn’t that we forget them. We absorb their memory into ourselves, name our children for them sometimes, ensure that their names are never forgotten. No one is safe, at any time. The dragon of darkness comes flying straight from Nithafell without warning. Even the gods must die.”
Emer’s eyes widened at his words, and firelight danced in their golden brown depths. The tip of her tongue moved across her lip, and when she spoke, it was hesitantly. “I suppose you are right.”
“We have a word on it in our Book of Sayings. ‘Wealth dies, kinsmen die; a man himself must likewise die; but one thing which never dies—the verdict on each man dead.’” He smiled. “Word-fame may last a thousand years if we ask a skald to make a song about us.”
A tremulous smile quivered on her mouth.
He stretched out one hand, palm up.
She hesitated a moment longer, then slid toward him and huddled against his chest. She felt so small and fragile in his arms, as if she belonged there. “We have poetry of great beauty from our skalds, and I could teach you some of it. I could tell you some more sayings from our Book. Would you like that?”
She nodded, gazing into the fire, and lay still against him. At least she was not trembling now. “The most important is the one that tells you to look carefully around doorways before you walk in, for you never know when an enemy might be there.” He stole a glance at her white, besmirched face and saw her lips twitch. “Another tells us that there is no better load a man can carry than common sense; no worse a load than too much drink.” The slender form in his arms shook with brief and silent amusement. Encouraged, Flane dredged his mind for more sayings. “Be a friend to your friend, match gift with gift; meet smiles with smiles, and lies with dissimulation.”
“Very clever.”
“The halt can ride, the handless can herd—” He stopped suddenly. “I can’t remember the rest.”
“Oh, I like them.” Like a child begging for another story, she pleaded. “Think of some more, Flane, please?”
He looked into those expressive eyes and his heart gave an extra bound. “You might not like them all.”
“Try me.”
He thought hard and long forgotten words floated into his mind. “Confide in one, never in two; confide in three and the whole world knows.”
“What a cynic!”
Good! At least she was reacting. “This one is the one you’ll really like. Ready? Praise no day until evening, no ice until crossed, no ale until drunk, no sword until tested, no wife until buried, and no maid until bedded.”
She jerked away from him and sat bolt upright. Her wonderful eyes narrowed only a hand span from his face. “Say that last one again, please, Flane. Don’t g
abble this time.”
He pretended to cower away from her, but stopped when his back complained. “Only if you promise not to strike me.”
Her lips wobbled. “Praise no maid until bedded, I think was the way it went. How do you praise me, Flane Ketilsson, now that you’ve bedded me?”
“I adore you.” Flane saw his chance and seized it with both hands. “You are the equal of Lady Freyja and I want you for my wife. I’ve wanted you since the first day I saw you, when I saw you cowering by the wall in the slave market.”
“Really?” she said dryly. “I bring you nothing. No land, no ships, no steading. Are you sure you haven’t had second thoughts about your very suitable marriage to the lady Katla?”
He reached for her with one arm, gathered her in close and nuzzled her throat. She smelled of wood smoke, grass and ale, but he found her own scent drifting up from the neck of her gown. “I have no thoughts at all about Katla.”
“You are such a strange people,” she said. “All those sayings…such a mixture of violence, good advice, practicality and cynicism.”
“I know. We’re a very practical people. But we have our poems, our beautiful ships and the courage of our warriors. They’re all good things.”
“You’ll need the courage of a warrior tomorrow,” she said slowly, sobering at the thought of the coming battle against Gamel.
“I can’t think of him, or tomorrow. I look at you,” he said softly, “and I think of another of our sayings. Man delights in man. In this case, man delights in woman.” Emer was softening toward him. He could sense it.
***
Flane’s eyes in the firelight made Emer think of harebells on the hillside, nodding gently in the soft breeze. Even in the first few horrid moments in the slave market when she’d first seen him, she’d been struck by his eyes. Her lips parted; her breathing altered and took up another rhythm. With uncharacteristic diffidence, he seemed to be waiting for her to decide what she would do.
Should she reject him, or accept him? It would be more than physical acceptance. She tried to think of all the things that had brought her to this point, and found that while he sat so close to her, she could not manage it. The only thing that mattered was that she was here, and because of her this gorgeous young man was prepared to leave the only home he knew.
With one hand, she reached out. Her fingertips touched his face, slid slowly down the taut skin of his cheek, veered toward his mouth. His eyes flickered, and a shudder ran through him. She smiled; all she could manage, because her heart thudded in her chest and threatened to choke her. She tried to draw in a long, calming breath and gasped instead when his hand moved, found and clasped the back of her neck and drew her slowly forward and into his arms.
Held against the width of his chest, cushioned against his thighs, Emer stared up into his face. “You’ve shaved off your beard,” she said, scanning every line and curve. “When did you do that?”
“Before I found out you’d gone missing,” he said, running his fingers through the stubble breaking through his skin. “I don’t care for all that hair hanging around my mouth, do you? Though I have heard tell that some women like to be kissed by a man with a beard.” His head tilted, his brows rose in a question.
“I’ve never been kissed by anyone with a beard, so I don’t know. You had the beginnings of one the other day,” she added. His head dipped slowly closer. Emer looked up. “But it scratched.” His blue eyes crinkled in amusement, and her heart leapt into her throat. She could feel his breath, the heat of him around her, and her nostrils flared as she caught his scent. It held all the normal, everyday smells of smoke, food and horses — but underneath it, a perfume all his own. Wild, somehow woody, it made her think of forests and green leaves waving in the breeze.
She closed her eyes and waited. Feather-light, his mouth arrived. She sighed and drew in air that carried his life-force, and felt a surge of utter contentment. This was where she wanted to be. Her arms lifted, found his shoulders, and explored — clasped his face in her fingers, felt the play of muscles in his jaw as he opened his mouth and kissed her, truly kissed her; a kiss that grew and deepened until there was no division between them. Her hands slid over his shoulders. He jerked and then stilled.
She looked into his eyes. “Flane? Your back? Let me look at your back?”
Chapter Eighteen
Emer woke next morning to a glimpse of Flane’s booted leg sliding silently around the edge of the door. Daylight dazzled her for an instant before the door closed. One soapstone bowl still flickered and by its mellow light she recognised the bathing hut. Blinking sleepily, she wondered, as she stretched out on the warm sheepskin and lifted her arms above her head, why he always got up so early. Niggling aches in her arms and shoulders made her groan. Her glance fell on a pair of discarded wrist guards. She picked one up and traced the pattern of silver studs across the stiff brown leather. The inside surface was still warm from his body. He always wore them, so why had he removed them today? The hólmgang! He was slinking off to his precious hólmgang without her.
“Flane!” She sat up with a jerk. There was no reply, of course. He would be out of earshot by now. She hesitated, looking wildly around the hut for her clothes. She heaved to her feet, groaned as strained muscles complained, and limped to the carefully folded garments laid across a stool. He must have done that before he left, because last night, she remembered, she tossed away her gown and chemise without looking where they fell.
Her arms felt like fire as she pulled her chemise and gown over her head but she tightened her lips tight against the pain. If Flane believed he could go off, fight and possibly die without her knowing about it, he was very wrong. How could he fight with a back as sore as his must be?
She had checked Skeggi’s bandaging last night and seen the livid weals across Flane’s back. Not all had broken the skin, but the long open wounds were puffed and angry and what made it worse was that there had been nothing she could do to help beyond slapping more salve over the wounds. She couldn’t even fault Skeggi’s wrappings, though she did manage to tie flatter knots.
Where were her sandals? Ah! She pushed her foot into the leather, slipped the toggle through the loop and patted her pocket for her comb. Dragging it through her hair, she coiled the strands round her hand and knotted them so they hung down her back. A swift splash of cold water over her face, and she limped to the door.
Movement slackened her stiff muscles, and by the time she reached the hall, she walked normally. She snatched a hazel twig from the pot at the door and rubbed it against her teeth as she looked for Flane.
He was nowhere to be seen. One or two folk gave her black looks which she ignored. Skeggi and Oli had disappeared. In fact, she realised as she glanced around the hall, most of the men had vanished. She hastened across the hall to Steini’s mother.
“Where are they?” she begged, quite unashamed of her need to know. “Please tell me! Please!”
Steini’s mother was not much older than Emer, and had always been sympathetic when Katla was not present. Now she nodded toward the open door. “Down by the strand,” she said quickly. “Near the river mouth. All the men are there.”
Emer pressed her palm against the woman’s sleeve in a gesture of thanks, grinned at Steini, whirled around and tore through the door. Though her muscles might pay for it later, she ran the quickest way of all, in a straight line across the grass behind the settlement. A stone got into her sandal and made her hop a step or two, but she only slowed when she approached the group of men clustered on the raised beach by the river mouth. Panting, she looked around.
It hadn’t started yet.
Her muscles twanged uncomfortably as she slid down the slope toward Skeggi and Oli. They barely registered her presence, for they couldn’t bear to miss what was happening in front of them, but they made space and allowed her to stand between them. Emer caught her breath and looked around. They had chosen a pretty spot for the hólmgang. The dark water of the loch led the eye
to the shoulder of the brown and green mountain behind it. Sunlight sparkled and glittered on the dew-bespattered grass and gulls wheeled and cried in the blue sky above their heads.
Flane stood off to one side, quite alone. A lump rose in her throat as she gazed at him. He stood like a warrior out of the old stories with shoulders relaxed, hips jutting forward and his hands crossed over the hilt of the long sword held point down against the earth. The sun winked on his silver-chased wristguards and flashed now and then on the arm rings above his elbow. His long brown tunic hid the bandages, but something else was different.
Emer studied him critically, and decided it was the narrow band at his brow that made the difference. Made of smooth leather, it held his long hair out of his eyes. Tied at the back of his head, the long ends of the leather strip dangled between his shoulder blades. Cloth strapping bound his trousers close to his calves. Her gaze drifted back to his brown arms. His wristguards were longer, much more ornate and covered much more of his forearm than the ones he wore every day.
She hoped all the metal studs and arm rings offered protection against steel blades. Frightening though the hólmgang sounded, and though fighting was against everything she had been taught, she was also aware of a fierce pride in him. He was so brave. Her feelings ought to shame her, but they didn’t. Instead she thought of their lovemaking and her inner body flickered and leapt.
She took a deep breath. “What’s a hólmgang, Skeggi?”
“It’s a duel of honour to resolve disputes.” He reeled off the information in his deep voice without looking at her. “The Holm is the area within the nine-foot square and the man who steps out of it loses the fight.”
Oli turned bright hazel eyes briefly in her direction. “I wanted to lay out the marking ropes, but they wouldn’t let me. They said it’s a man’s job.”
Emer smiled, laid a commiserating palm on the lad’s shoulder and surveyed the nine-foot square with some doubt. Even she could appreciate it was a small space to contain two men fighting with swords two feet long. Two or three linden shields lay in a pile by Flane’s feet.
