He had no appetite, but forced himself to eat some of the food. ’Twas fish mostly, both salted and pickled, and a gruel of what smelled suspiciously like turnips. He picked at the meal while she studied him.
As his head cleared and his strength returned, he took stock of his situation. ’Twas not the best of circumstances he found himself in. Shipwrecked and alone, without a weapon to his name.
His hosts, if one could call them that, were folk the likes of which he’d ne’er seen. They spoke his tongue, but mixed it with strange words. Norse words. Though they were not like any Norsemen he knew. They were grittier, more primitive—as if time had passed them by.
He counted at least a dozen men in the smoky room, and half again that many women. Somehow, he knew this wasn’t all of them. This was but one house, and he seemed to recall others when they carried him up from the beach.
Fair Isle.
George knew not where it was. Only that he’d been bound for Wick from Inverness, and a winter gale had blown them off course, far to the north. Past the Orkneys, if he had to venture a guess. How would he ever get back?
“You wish to go home,” Rika said, reading his mind.
He dropped the bit of fish back into his trencher and met her gaze. “That I do.”
“You shall, as soon as you’re fit.”
“Ye have a ship then! Thank Christ.” His spirits soared. They would leave immediately, of course. “Who shall take me? Whoever it is shall be well paid for his trouble.”
“I shall take you, as soon as our business together is finished.”
“What business?” His brows collided in a frown. Something in her voice, and the way she seemed to look right through him, caused gooseflesh to rise on his skin.
“Simply this,” she said. “You wish to return home, and I can arrange that. But first, there is something you must do for me.”
George set the trencher aside and sat up in the bed. “What, pray tell?” He wasn’t used to dealing with women, and this one had rubbed him the wrong way from the start.
For a long moment she didn’t answer, just sat there staring at him. He could almost see her mind working. Once, she opened her mouth to speak, then thought better of it.
His gaze lingered on her lips. They were lush, ripe, as they’d been on the beach that morning when she hovered over him, her breath hot on his face. He felt an unwelcome tightening in his loins and grasped the edges of the wool blanket that covered him.
Finally she spoke. “You and I shall marry.”
“What?” His eyes popped wide. He thought he’d dreamed that bit of conversation she and Lawmaker had had on the beach. God’s truth, it had seemed more nightmare than dream. “Say again?”
“You heard me. We shall marry.” Her eyes were inscrutable, yet her lower lip trembled, belying her confidence. “I need a husband to claim my dowry. Once I have it, you may go home.”
“Ye’re daft, woman.” He’d be on his way now, thank you very much. He glanced around the bed box for his plaid, but saw neither it, nor any kind of garment. Wrapping the blanket around his waist, he again tried to rise. This time, when Rika tried to stop him, he slapped her hand away.
“I have a bride,” he said, and rose shakily to his feet. “’Tis all a—” Rika rose with him. Sweet Jesus, the woman was nearly as tall as he. “Arranged,” he croaked. “By William the Lion, my king.”
Her eyes widened as she stared up at him, as if he’d said or done something unexpected. She eyed him up and down, then frowned. “You’re tall, Scotsman.”
“As are ye.” He raked his eyes over her body with a lack of tact that matched her own audacity. “Not like a woman at all.”
She flinched at his words. “It matters not.”
Oh, but it did. Women should be small and delicate. Submissive. A proper Christian woman wouldn’t dream of talking to a strange man. Her brash demeanor repelled him, yet his body felt strangely stirred.
“About your bride, I mean. Once we are divorced you may go home and claim her. The dowry is all I want. It’s mine by right, by law, and I will have it.”
He shook his head, not understanding her at all. What kind of scheme was this? “There can be no divorce. Ye are mistaken. A man weds for life.” He tried to move past her, but she stepped into his path.
The sandy-haired youth at table shot to his feet, eyes blazing. George had guessed the lad would be trouble. No matter. George was about to snatch the dirk from Rika’s belt when Lawmaker reached up and yanked the youth back down to the bench.
“Not always for life,” Rika said, ignoring the lad’s move. “Ask Lawmaker. He’ll tell you. Divorce is not common, but does occur among my people and suits my purpose well.”
The woman was clearly touched. “And what purpose is that?”
“I told you. I want my dowry—nothing more. Once we are wed, you shall acquire it for me from my father. When the silver is in my hands we’ll declare our divorce before the elders.” She shrugged. “After that, I care not what you do. Our ship will take you anywhere you wish.”
George opened and closed his mouth. Twice. He shook his head again, as if he didn’t understand her, but every word was clear despite her strange accent.
“Just like that,” he said.
“Ja, just like that.”
What she proposed was unthinkable. Outrageous. ’Twas a blasphemy against God. Did she think to use him to gain her fortune, let her think again.
Marriage was a sacrament and, at its best, an arrangement designed to secure an alliance between clans. ’Twas not a pagan ritual to be done and undone on a whim, simply to gain the bride her coin.
“I willna do it,” he said.
“Fine.” She stretched her lips into a thin, tight line. “I hope you enjoy our island, Scotsman, for you’ll be here a very long time.” She turned her back on him and marched toward the table, where all eyes were now trained on him.
“A lifetime, perhaps,” she called over her shoulder, and didn’t miss a step.
Chapter Two
The Scot was stubborn beyond belief.
For days Rika and her people watched, amused, as Grant worked in vain to build a seaworthy raft of driftwood and pitch and bits of rotten rope.
She stood on the cliff overlooking the beach, her cloak pulled tight about her, and observed him. The wind whipped at his hair and the loose-fitting tunic one of the men had given him to wear. His legs were bare though booted, and she knew not how he could stand for so long in the icy water, his gaze fixed on the southern horizon.
Winter was at its height. A thin crust of snow clung to the rocky outcrops and grass-covered moors of the island. Daylight was short, and no sooner did the sun rise each day then the wind waxed with a vengeance. She turned her face skyward and breathed of the salt and dampness.
All she knew was the sea, what it gave up and what it kept. As she fixed her eyes on Grant she found herself wondering what Scotland was like in the spring.
“He’s given up.”
Rika turned at the sound of Lawmaker’s voice. “Not yet, old man. Still he believes there must be a way. I see it in the set of his shoulders and in the way he clenches his fists at his sides.”
Lawmaker smiled and spared a backward glance to the sheep he tended on the moor.
Rika slipped her arm through his, as she often did, and huddled close. “You might have been right. This chieftain may not agree after all.”
“He’ll agree,” Lawmaker said, as they watched Grant in the surf. “In his own time.”
“Hmph.” They had precious little of that. Her patience wore thin. “He’s done naught but rage and pace the beach all this morn.”
“With you stood here openly watching?”
She nodded.
“Ha!” Lawmaker shook his head. “No wonder the man’s enraged.”
“What do you mean? I don’t understand his anger. The solution is a simple one. He has only to agree and we can move ahead with our plan.”
“You make i
t sound so simple.”
“It is.” It wasn’t, but she could see no other way.
“Have you thought what you will do after?”
She hadn’t, in fact. “I’ll do what I always have done—take care of you and Gunnar. Until my brother takes a wife, of course.”
Lawmaker flicked her a sideways glance. “And what of you, Rika. Have you not thought about a husband for yourself?”
She frowned at him. “You know well I have not. How can you suggest it knowing how my father treated my mother? And how Brodir—” she turned away and bit down hard on her lip “—what he did to me.” Her arm slid from his.
“Had I known of Brodir’s misuse of you—”
She raised a hand to silence him. “It’s of no import now. All is behind me. Gunnar’s freedom is what matters.”
“Not all men are like Brodir, you know. Or your father.”
That she could not believe. She sought Lawmaker’s eyes, prepared to make some retort, but caught him studying Grant. The Scotsman moved with purpose up the beach toward them, eyes fixed on her, his face a grim fusion of unconcealed hate and barely controlled rage.
“He is,” she said. “Just like them. I see it in the way he looks at me.”
Lawmaker shrugged. “The man’s out of his element, here in this place. Fair Isle is a world apart from his, and you a woman unlike any he has known, I’ll wager.”
“Ha! So he’s made it plain each time I’ve spoken with him. This wager I shan’t take.”
“Have you never thought to marry for love?” Lawmaker asked.
Thor’s blood, would the old man not let the subject go? “Love.” She snorted. “An emotion for the weak of spirit. Men use it to bend women to their will. Some, to crush them. And I won’t be crushed like an insect under a man’s boot.”
Lawmaker sighed.
He’d heard it all before, but she cared not, and continued. “You speak to me of love, and conveniently forget that you yourself never wed. You and I are alike, old man. We need not such weaknesses.”
“Ah, but there you are wrong. I have loved, more deeply and fiercely than you can know.” He looked into her eyes and smiled bitterly. “One day I shall tell you the story.”
She had never seen him like this, so direct and forthcoming with his feelings. “Tell me now.”
“Nay, for you are not ready to hear it. Besides, look—” He nodded toward the beach. “Your bridegroom comes.”
He did come, and at a pace that caused her to take two steps back. She met Grant’s gaze and saw his rage had subsided. She hardened her heart against what remained.
Hate. Disgust. For her.
She felt it as keenly as she’d felt Brodir’s fist on numerous occasions. Rika knew she was not like other women, and she certainly didn’t look like them. Nay, she was far from the ideal. Perhaps that was another reason she’d evaded marriage.
Who would have her?
Who, besides Brodir, who favored the arrangement only for the coin, and for the humiliation he could wreak on her?
Nay, wifery was not for her, and as Grant scaled the craggy hill before her, she took comfort in the fact that her marriage to the Scot would be mercifully short.
“Woman!” Grant called.
She did not answer.
Out of nowhere, Ottar appeared on the hill behind him, and moved with a speed Rika had not known the sandy-haired youth possessed.
“Ottar, no!” she cried.
Too late.
Grant turned on him, and Rika froze. “I must help him,” she said, and started forward.
“Nay. Be still.” Lawmaker grabbed her arm.
“But—”
“Quiet. I’m trying to hear what they say.” Lawmaker jerked her back, and she watched, her heart in her throat, as Ottar confronted Grant. The howling wind made it impossible to hear their conversation.
“He’s only ten and six,” she said. “Grant will kill him.”
Lawmaker shook his head. “I think not. For all his rage, methinks George Grant is not a man who’d harm a reckless youth.”
“How can you be certain?”
Ottar went for Grant, and Rika shot forward, prepared to intervene.
Lawmaker yanked her back. “I’m a good judge of character.”
One hand on Ottar’s shoulder, Grant held the youth at bay. Rika held her breath, her arm burning from Lawmaker’s steely grip, and watched as the two exchanged some unintelligible dialogue. Finally Grant released him, and Ottar scaled the cliff. Rika breathed.
“See?” Lawmaker said. “I thought as much.”
Ottar shot her a dark look as he brushed past her.
“The boy’s jealous,” Lawmaker said.
“Jealous? Of whom?”
“The Scot. I told Ottar about the marriage.”
“That’s preposterous,” Rika said. “Why would Ottar be jealous? He’s just a boy. Besides—”
“He’s smitten with you. Has been e’er since he was old enough to walk and you to lead him by the hand.”
“Nonsense. We’re friends.”
“He’s nearly a man. Take care to remember that, Rika.”
She had no time to reflect on Ottar’s peculiar behavior or Lawmaker’s explanation of it, because Grant had scaled the cliff and now stood before her.
Rika drew herself up, ignoring her fluttering pulse, and looked the Scot in the eye. “You will agree to my plan?” She pursed her lips and waited.
“I will not,” Grant said between clenched teeth.
She had expected him to yield. Could he not see that he’d lost? That she would prevail?
“In that case,” she said, “there’s more driftwood on the opposite side of the island. I’m certain some of the children would be pleased to help you gather it.”
The fire in his eyes—slate eyes, she noticed for the first time—nearly singed her, so close did he stand. She was uncomfortably aware of his size, his maleness, and let her gaze slide to the stubble of tawny beard on his chin and the pulse point throbbing in his corded neck. Perhaps she’d been wrong to so quickly dismiss his masculinity.
Yet there was something different about him. He was not like the men she knew. She had not the feeling of foreboding she did as when Brodir loomed over her in anger. After a long moment, she realized why.
Grant dared not lay a finger on her.
Likely because he knew Lawmaker would kill him if he did. Or mayhap, as Lawmaker had said, Grant wasn’t the kind of man who…Nay. They were all that kind. Besides, it didn’t matter the reason. The knowledge of his reserve gave her power, and power was something she’d had little of in Brodir’s world.
“How far is it?” Grant snapped, holding her gaze. “To the mainland.”
“Three days’ sail—by ship.” Lawmaker glanced pointedly at the makeshift raft on the beach. “In fair weather.”
Grant’s eyes never left hers. “Three days. No so far.” He brushed past her, deliberately, and stalked off onto the moor. Bleating sheep scattered before him.
Her skin prickled.
“You’ve not much time left,” Lawmaker said to her as they watched him go.
She knew well what the elder meant. Brodir was long past due and could return any day. When he did, Rika’s one chance to save Gunnar would be lost forever.
“This is one of the complications you mentioned,” she said as she watched Grant charge a ram in his path.
“Precisely.”
“Well, then, old man, I leave it to you to sort it out.”
George settled on a bench in a corner of the village brew house and wondered how the devil to go about getting a draught of ale to slake his thirst.
He’d been given free range of the island, much to his surprise, and since he’d been strong enough to walk he’d covered every desolate, wind-whipped inch of it. Save sprouting wings and flying off, for the life of him he couldn’t fathom any way of escape.
Damn the bloody woman and her clan.
All had been instructed—by
her, no doubt, though she seemed to hold no great position in the eyes of her own folk—to speak nary a word to him save what was necessary to feed and shelter him.
What little he’d been able to learn about the place and its people, he did so from his own observation and from snatches of overheard conversations.
The village was small, housing less than a hundred folk, and sat atop a cliff on the south side of the island. Below it lay a thin strip of rocky beach, boasting a tiny inlet at one end that harbored the single craft Rika had called a ship.
’Twas not much of one in George’s estimation. There was no natural timber on the island. Clearly the byrthing, as the locals called it, was built of scrap wood gleaned from shipwrecks. The low-drafting vessel looked barely seaworthy, but was heavily guarded all the same—likely due to his presence. Right off he saw ’twas too large for one man to sail alone.
Though sleet and the occasional snow flurry pummeled the surrounding moors, George was comfortable enough in the furs and woolen garments the islanders had loaned him, and with the food and shelter he’d been offered. He was neither prisoner nor guest, and felt a precariousness about his situation that was intensified by the fact that he had no weapons.
’Twas not the first time he’d been forced to use his wits in place of his sword to get what he wanted, though he’d feel a damn sight better about his chances with a length of Spanish steel in his hand.
He supposed he could just wait it out. If it were spring, he’d do exactly that. But few ships dared negotiate even coastal waters in the dead of winter, let alone chanced an open sea voyage. It could be weeks, months even, before another craft lit in Fair Isle’s tiny harbor.
The memory of the shipwreck burned fresh in his mind, though no trace of it, save scattered bits of wood, was left along the rocky shore of the island. He’d hired the vessel and its crew out of Inverness, and had taken a dozen of his own men as escort, including his brother.
Oh, Sommerled.
He raked a hand through his hair and blinked away the sting of tears pooling unbidden in his eyes. What had he been thinking to let the youth talk him into such a daft scheme? They should have traveled up the coast by steed, as was expected.
Ice Maiden Page 2
