Heartling? I like that. “Like what?” she asked, caressing his hair and shoulders.
“Destiny is sweet,” was all he said.
She couldn’t argue with that.
Man (even virile Vikings) cannot live on love alone….
Magnus awakened a short time later, totally invigorated. There was naught like a good bout of swiving to replenish a man’s juices.
He looked down at Angela, who was sleeping soundly beneath him. Poor lady! He had worn her out. He gave himself a mental pat on the back for his prowess, which apparently hadn’t been diminished by a year of abstinence.
He was tired, too, but in a sated sort of way. Mostly he was hungry…famished, in fact. After all, he hadn’t eaten since morn, when he’d consumed eight waffles, six sausage links, four scrambled eggs, and two slices of buttered toast.
Carefully he lifted himself off of Angela, gently kissed the mole above her lip, and eased his body off the bed. After visiting the bathing chamber, then pulling on a pair of jaw-keys, he made his way to the scullery. Opening the cold box, he leaned against the door and looked inside for a long time. What I would not give for a horn of mead! No such luck! He settled for half a carton of orange juice and drank it straight down in a series of long gulps. There was nothing else in the cold box that would satisfy his huge hunger…certainly not those thin slices of cheese in clear wrappers. So he called the dome-nose on the tell-of-own to order two large sausage-and-pepperoni pizzas. While he waited for the delivery, he settled down at the table with a bowl of granola—which was the same as grain and nuts, but tasted like bark—with milk and five spoonfuls of sugar. Who would have ever thought that he—a thirty-seven-year-old man—would be slurping up sugared milk, but there it was!
While he crunched away, he pulled a news sheet over toward him. He still had trouble deciphering all the written words in this land, but one thing stood out: the date. June 30, 2003. A stark reminder of what he had been able to forget this past hour.
Magnus closed his eyes for a moment and raked his fingers through his hair, which had come loose during his bed romping. When he opened his eyes again, the date was still there, and he could not ignore the fact. He must have time traveled. What other explanation was there?
He flipped through the news sheets. Everywhere were glaring examples of what he should have seen before. Men had traveled to the moon on spaceships, for the love of Odin! People had heart transplants. Women bragged of breast augmentations. Now, that is a type of surgery I would be interested in knowing more about. Then there was computer sex. That, too. Not that I know what a computer is. Drug busts. Police brutality. Middle-East wars. Animal cloning. Comic strips. Ah, who is this Hagar the Horrible? Methinks I would like to meet this dumb Norseman. He appears a fine, though misguided fellow. And sports. Well-muscled men in this time were paid vast treasures to run about on a field kicking a leather ball or knocking their comrades to the ground. He liked that concept. Mayhap he would become a football player, if forced to stay here. Then again, he was probably too old. Nay, old or not, that occupation did not really appeal. He would much rather be a farmer.
Magnus shook his head from side to side in confusion.
Had he really time traveled?
Why?
Would he stay here or time travel off somewhere else? If so, would it be back to his own time, or forward? Was he doomed to be an eternal time traveler? God’s blood! That would be a living hell.
What should he do now?
Well, one thing was certain: he would have to disclose all to Angela. That was a task he did not relish. He needed fortification for the disbelief he was sure to encounter. Since mead was not available, he would have to settle for pizza.
One question kept nagging at him, though: How would Angela react to having made love with a thousand-year-old man?
You’re a what…?
“Are you hungry, sweetling?”
Through a cloud of sleep, Angela heard Magnus’s whispered question against her ear.
“Oh, no! Not again! I mean, really, Magnus, you are a magnificent lover, but let’s not try to set an Olympic record here. Can’t we save something for another day?”
A deep male voice chuckled as the mattress dipped and he sat on the edge of the bed. “Not that kind of hunger, you suspicious wench, you!” He tweaked the side of her breast. “And do not try to paint me as the only insatiable one in this bed, oh you of the pop-sigh-call trick. You told me we could try it later. I can hardly wait.”
Angela’s eyes flew wide open at that reminder of the outrageous suggestion she had made mere hours ago, and Magnus’s more than willing agreement to follow through. That was when she noticed the box of pizza sitting on the mattress between her and the insufferable, grinning rogue. Oh, that kind of hunger.
“You called Domino’s?” She sat up in bed and pulled the sheet around herself. A bit of belated modesty on her part. Very belated, if Magnus’s arched eyebrows were any indication.
“I did,” he said, placing a paper napkin on her lap and handing her a glass of iced soft drink. “1 already ate one.”
She smiled at him. She was hungry, and she had soon devoured three slices and the entire glass of Pepsi.
“Now, about that pop-sigh-call trick?” Magnus asked silkily as he removed the box and glass from the bed and slid under the sheet with her.
Who knew Angela Abruzzi could set Olympic records?
Would wonders never cease?
Well, apparently not…because soon thereafter—with Magnus sitting up in bed propped against a pillow and the headboard, and she lying facedown on the bed, her face buried in her own pillow—Angela was hit smack-dab with the biggest wonder of them all.
“By the by, there is something important I must tell you,” Magnus said in a voice that was surprisingly serious…and oddly nervous.
“Oh?” Her response was muffled by her pillow.
“I am a thousand years old.”
“Yeah? And I’m sweet sixteen and virgin to the…uh, bone.” Her voice was still muffled by the pillow.
“I am serious, Angela. I was born in the year 963. I reached my thirty-seventh year two months ago, in the year one thousand.”
“Puhleeze!” She raised her head to look at Magnus. Even though he was sitting, his height was still immense.
He stared back at her, looking concerned. He kept flexing his hands in an agitated manner.
She rolled over on her back so she could see him better. “You’re mighty virile for such an old man.”
“Do not make mock of me, Angela.”
“How can I not make fun of you? You’re trying to say I just made love with a man old enough to be my grandfather more than fifty times removed.”
“Precisely.”
“This is a joke, right? Next, you will be proposing another one of your sex games, though I can’t for the life of me think what the appeal would be in senior-citizen sex games.”
“Huh?” Magnus scratched his head and appeared to ponder her words. “Exactly what would senior-citizen sex entail?”
“I haven’t a clue.” She had to laugh at his interest in what would surely be a perversion. But then she sat up and wrapped the sheet around herself, sarong-style. It was obvious Magnus had something he wanted to discuss, and it wasn’t sex, despite his momentary curiosity about yet another fantasy game.
“I do not know how to tell you this, Angela, except to blurt it out. Alas, I am a time traveler.”
“Ha, ha, ha! You and Jules Verne. Quit joking.”
“I wish I were joking.”
“Okay, big boy, exactly how long have you known you were a time traveler?”
“Since yestermorn. I was in the winery cellar with Miguel and noticed the date on the bottles from your last year of producing wines, It said 1997. That gave me my first clue.”
She rubbed her forehead with one hand to erase the headache that was beginning to throb behind her eyelids. “There is no such thing as time travel, Magnus.”
> “That is what I would have thought…till yesterday. Now it is beginning to make sense.”
“How could it possibly make sense? By the way, Flash Gordon, did you come by spaceship? Ha, ha, ha.”
“I came by longship, not a spaceship. And what I meant by ‘making sense’ is that all the wonders that have stunned me and my children since our arrival make sense when you consider that we are of another time.”
“I do not believe in time travel. I’m sony, Magnus, but it just doesn’t pass the giggle test.”
“I do not believe in time travel, either, but…”
“But what?”
“I do believe in miracles.”
“You’re crazy.”
Still crazy…the next morning…
They were in a nearby Barnes & Noble before noon the next day with books on Viking history spread out on the reading table before them. Angela was determined to prove to Magnus that he was not from the tenth century and therefore not a time traveler. In a way she felt foolish just making the effort.
“Before you start your proof-search, let me tell you some facts, and see if your books can back them up.
“I, Magnus Ericsson, am a Viking, born and bred. I lived in the Vestfold province of the Norselands…from 963 till the year 1000, when I started on my voyage. My father, Eric Tiyggvasson, was a Norse jarl…comparable to a Saxon atheling, or high nobleman. My uncle, Olaf Tryggvason, was high king of Norway.”
In addition, Magnus took a pen from Angela’s hand and drew a quick sketch on her notepad. “That is our family crest. See, it is similar to that which is etched on my armrings, and those of Torolf, as well.” Magnus’s rough drawing showed writhing wolves intertwined with runic symbols, which meant “Honor before self,” he explained. In addition, he gave her detailed information about his brother Geirolf, a famous shipbuilder, and the names of his ships, all of which began with the word fierce, as in Fierce Wo1f Fierce Dragon, and so on. He also told her of his other brother, Jorund, a warrior-for-hire who was known for his military prowess. His sister, Katla, was not famous, but she was married to a Viking of noble birth in Normandy. She had been married at the ungodly age of fourteen.
After an hour and a half of reading and note taking, Angela slammed the last book shut. Everything—everything—that Magnus had told her proved true, right down to the design of his family’s crest, the wars in which his one brother had fought, and the ships his other brother had built. Had he somehow researched all this material ahead of time? If so, for what purpose? Just to get a part in a movie? To impress her?
None of it made sense, least of all Magnus’s contention that he was a tenth-century Viking who had somehow shot through time to land in Hollywood.
She looked across the table at Magnus, who was leaning back in his chair, his ankles crossed and propped on another empty chair. He was flicking through the pages of two magazines—Cosmopolitan and Playboy—which he’d insisted she purchase for him after seeing the pictures and titles of articles on the front. There was a photograph of a nearly nude nubile young female on the one, which he’d proclaimed looked just like Girta the Great. She hadn’t bothered to ask what Girta was so great at. The other magazine had articles such as, “The World’s Greatest Sex Fantasy,” “How to Get a Hard Butt in Half the Time,” and “Best Methods of Oral Sex.”
“Is oral sex like the pop-sigh-call game?” Magnus asked, putting his magazines aside.
“Shhh,” she said, not wanting anyone to overhear. Her long, tall, way-too-handsome Viking was already garnering enough attention. Even in jeans and a plain black T-shirt, he was drop-dead gorgeous, with a butt that needed no hardening, thank you very much. Not that appearance mattered to her. Much.
He waggled his eyebrows at her. “Well?”
“Yes, it is.” She felt her face heat up with embarrassment, though how she had a shred of modesty in her after the past twelve hours was beyond her.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk!” He flashed her a mischievous grin. “I was wondering about the Norse history books you have been buried in.”
“Oh.” Her face heated up some more. “Yes, I have to admit that everything you say is true, but that doesn’t mean you are a time traveler.”
“What does it mean then?”
“I don’t know, but I’ll think of something.” She bent over to pick up her purse from the floor and gather her papers. When she straightened, she caught him in the act of doing the one major thing women hated—ogling her behind.
“I am hungry,” he said.
“You just ate four cheese danishes and two blueberry muffins with two lattes.”
“I am hungry,” he repeated.
She looked at him then, giving him her full attention. He licked his lips slowly and sensuously, the whole time staring at her—and her behind—with unwavering…hunger. “I am hungry.”
Angela thought of a dozen answers she could have given him, but the only one that seemed appropriate was, “Me, too.”
Unfortunately—or fortunately—they made love on the front seat of her BMW, under a lap rug, in broad daylight, at the far end of the Barnes & Noble parking lot. It was by far the most scandalous thing Angela had ever done in all her life.
Who knew reading could whet such appetites?
A-viking he did go, via the TV….
Angela had to go to her office to work that afternoon, but she had stopped on the way home to rent some videotapes for Magnus to watch while she was gone.
Magnus lay on the sofa for more than four hours watching one incredible tape after another on the tell-a-vision. First he viewed The Vikings, or started to. It was a very old move-he that starred Kirk Douglasson, and was silly beyond belief. If Dare-All No-Land thought Magnus was going to prance about a longship wearing a helmet with a giant eagle atop it, like this act-whore did, he had better think again. Magnus shut that video off after only a half hour.
Then he began another move-he called The 13th Warrior, which was bad…but not quite so bad as the Kirk one. In this story, the Vikings were portrayed as vicious and fanciful, believing in sea monsters and such, but the most unpalatable character was the Arab merchant as portrayed by Aunt-toe-knee-oh Band-arrows. Or was it Aunt-toe-knee-oh of the Band of Eros? Whatever. This fellow had a heavy accent more like an Italian than a Saracen. Plus, the move-he perpetuated the most outlandish theories about Vikings. First there was the claim that Norsemen were filthy in their daily habits; in truth, they were often fastidious to a fault. In addition, this Arab claimed that Vikings routinely had sex with their servants in front of everyone. Ironically, this move-he was based on a book that purportedly portrayed legendary events taking place in the tenth century…his very time period.
Finally Magnus began a series of five videos that were produced by Pea-Bee-Ess, entitled, Vikings, and narrated by a man with a fine Norse name, Magnus Magnusson. These were documentaries, according to Angela, and therefore more reliable historically. Some of the subtitles were, “Hammer of the North,” “From the Fury of the Northmen,” “Here King Harold Was Killed,” “Halfdan Was Here,” and “England at Bay.” He was riveted to the screen by these mostly accurate portrayals of the Vikings of his time, and he was still watching closely when Angela returned early that evening.
“So what do you think?” she asked as she sank down to the carpet next to the sofa and gave him a quick greeting kiss. He liked the way people in this country gave each other greeting kisses, farewell kisses, congratulatory kisses, sympathy kisses, kisses for each and every occasion. He could become accustomed to that.
“I think that there are many false rumors perpetuated about Vikings,” he answered, “but these last videos are interesting. Even I am learning things about my own people.”
She smiled gently at him.
His heart tightened with emotion, just looking at this woman. He had only told her one time, back at the Blue Dragon, that he loved her, but Magnus feared it was so. At this late date, in these unbelievable circumstances, he was falling in love. And it mi
ght very well be an impossible love…one with no future. That was why he had not repeated the words. Then, too, she had never said the words to him.
“Would you like to go out for dinner?” she asked.
If you only knew what I would really like! Hot, perverted, blister-my-bones sex, but I would settle for plain sex…for now. “Nay. Can we not eat here?”
“Sure, but no more pizza.”
Just sex. He laughed and chucked her playfully under the chin.
“How about if I cook a steak and baked potato, with a salad?”
And sex. “Whatever you want…though I could do without the weeds.”
It was her turn to laugh. “Okay, I’ll put the potatoes in the oven, but I won’t start the steaks for an hour. I think I’ll take a shower first.” She rose to her feet by bracing one hand on the low table.
This must mean sex. “All right,” he agreed, and stood as well.
“All right?” She cocked her head to the side in question.
“What? That was not an invitation?”
At first she seemed not to understand. Then she smiled her understanding. “You are insatiable.”
Sex, sex, sex! “Yea, ’tis one of the best things about us Vikings…but you won’t find it on any of these documentaries.”
“The best-kept secret?” She giggled.
He loved it when a grown woman like Angela giggled. It made her appear girlish and not so lofty. Plus, it must mean sex. “Only our special women know about it,” he proclaimed.
“And I am special?”
“Oh, lady, you are more than special…to me.” And we are, for a certainty, going to have sex now.
As it turned out, they never got a chance to take their combined shower, or to eat the steak dinner, or to engage in sex. The tell-a-phone rang just then, and it was bad news from Grandma Rose. There was a huge fire at the Blue Dragon in one of the grape fields, and it had been deliberately set.
Chapter Twelve
When life kicks you in the grape cluster…
Sandra Hill - [Vikings II 03] Page 18
