“Ready?” he asked.
She nodded.
He helped her into position and captured her gaze. “I pledge myself to you,” he said as he grasped her waist and urged her hips down over him.
Brenna sank down—and froze, for a moment feeling like an animal sliced apart by a hunter’s knife. A groan escaped her. “I’m glad you didn’t promise it won’t hurt,” she said on an indrawn breath. “I wouldn’t like to be married to a liar.”
“Take your time. The pain will go.” He gave her a wry smile. “It’s the truth.”
To her surprise, it was the truth. Soon, the piercing sting inside her eased, leaving an unfamiliar sensation of fullness. Laird Olaf’s hands settled around her waist, urging her up. Following his guidance, she rose and then tentatively inched back down over him.
“Hmmm...” She let out a sound of pleasure. Closing her eyes, she found her rhythm, rising and falling, varying her speed, listening to her body and to the low groans she heard her husband make deep in his chest. The lusty grunts that had so frightened her when she’d listened to the men with Martha became friendly guideposts that told her how to move, how to best please the man who was giving her pleasure in return.
Inside her, something tightened. Something hovered at the edges of her consciousness, a promise, a temptation, and then it exploded, like a dam on the river breaking. Shudders of satisfaction rolled through her. She couldn’t quite tell how it happened, but for an instant the world around her became a wild whirl of curtains and linen, and then she found herself on her back, Laird Olaf poised above her, his weight propped on his forearms, his hips between her thighs, his rigid shaft firmly embedded inside her.
“Not afraid?” he asked.
Brenna shook her head.
He set into motion, invading deep and withdrawing. His golden hair swayed in time with his trusts. His eyes held hers, and then that magic tightening inside her happened again, even stronger now. As the release pulsed through her, she coiled her legs around him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders to pull him close—and discovered that being crushed beneath a man’s weight wasn’t such a terrible thing after all.
* * *
Pain sliced through his gut. Cold sweat drenched his skin. Olaf tried to open his eyes, but another spasm racked his body. Sharp claws tore at his belly, as though he’d swallowed a hawk that was now fighting to find its way to freedom.
Finally, he managed to peer into the darkness that surrounded him. Beside him, his wife sat up on the bed, her naked body shining like pale marble. The bed curtains were pushed aside, and faint candlelight streamed in. In its glow, he could see Lady Brenna’s dark eyes glittering at him. Through the haze of pain, he took it as a sign of triumph.
“Why?” he rasped. “We could have built a life together...shared the toil...” He clenched his muscles to withstand another onslaught of pain. “I would have liked to...I’ve never known love...not just a woman’s love...love of any kind...never known...would have liked to...know love...just once before I die....”
“You won’t die.”
“What?” Even in his misery, Olaf managed a harsh gust of laughter. “Did you fail to feed me enough poison, my lady wife?”
After consummating their marriage, they had eaten, sharing the strongly spiced meat on the two trenchers. In his hunger, and in the heady afterglow of making love to his wife—his willing and responsive wife—Olaf had been careless. He’d given in to his hunger and not worried about every bite he took.
“Feed you poison?” Startled, Lady Brenna stared down at him.
“That’s...what...people...say.” Fighting the spasms that rippled through his body, he choked out the words. “Your brother first...and then any husband forced upon you...dead by your hand.”
Lady Brenna’s face furrowed. “Dear Lord. Is that what people say?” Her mouth moved but she managed no sound at all as she tried to deal with the horror of the idea. “I loved my brother,” she said finally. “He died when something ruptured in his belly. I had no reason to wish his death. If he’d lived, I wouldn’t be in this predicament right now.”
Olaf studied her face in the candlelight, seeking signs of treachery but finding only confusion and shadows of remembered grief. “Why did you drug me when I arrived?” he asked.
“To keep you from getting in the way while I rejected the other suitors.”
“Then why?” He struggled to his feet. Pushing Lady Brenna out of the way, he lurched to the window, shoved the fox pelt aside and crammed his shoulders far enough into the narrow opening to retch down the outside of the thick stone wall.
The cold air soothed him. The cramps in his stomach eased a little.
Soft footsteps pattered behind him. Gentle fingers brushed his shoulders. “It’s the meat,” Lady Brenna explained, anguish in her tone. “We only had enough venison left for one meal, and when you didn’t sign the marriage contract yesterday, I told Martha to save the feast for today. The meat was going off. She added the last of the saffron into the stew to disguise the rancid flavor.”
“You’re not sick,” Olaf pointed out.
“I’m used to eating meat past its prime. You’re not.”
Shivers racked his body but Olaf could tell the worst had passed. An image rose before his eyes of the sturdy housekeeper holding pieces of cooked meat to her nose, sniffing them. Perhaps it was true. Relief swamped him, so powerful he had to cling to the stone sill to keep from slumping to the floor as his legs almost gave beneath him.
He turned to face his lady wife, his back seeking support from the wall. “Swear that you never gave your brother poison. Swear it on the memory of your mother. Swear it on your honor. Swear it on the honor of Kilgarren.”
Lady Brenna’s head snapped up. Even in his wretched state, Olaf noticed the sway of her naked breasts as she squared her shoulders. It occurred to him that without thinking, he’d given her a great compliment. A woman’s honor was linked to her virtue, not to her word, but he had treated her as his equal—a knight whose word was his bond.
He heard her sharp intake of breath. “I did give Cedric poison...but he asked me to do it...he was sick.... We’d told no one, and he’d learned to make a drug to reduce his pain. When he got too weak, he taught me how to prepare the mixture for him, and once I rode to Inverness to buy the herbs we needed...” Lady Brenna paused. She pressed a hand to her chest and spoke in a strangled tone. “Dear Lord. I can see now how people might have assumed that I poisoned him. I’d been seen buying herbs that can cause death....”
She looked up at him, and Olaf realized he’d been wrong. The glitter in her eyes that he’d taken as a sign of triumph for his imminent demise was the sheen of tears—in sympathy for his suffering, in memory of a brother who’d met a painful end.
In a torrent of anguish, Lady Brenna told him about the burden of a grown man placed on the shoulders of an inexperienced girl. She told him about finding the courage to lead her people, to protect Kilgarren, trying to keep everyone from starving, trying to keep strangers from invading her beloved land.
Despite the pain twisting in his belly, a sense of peace settled over Olaf. Being accepted would have been enough. Being needed was much better. He’d been a soldier all his life. He’d fought for pay in foreign lands and he’d served his masters well. He’d earned glory on the battlefield. But nothing gave the same honor for a soldier, nothing gave the same sense of purpose, the same satisfaction and pride, as fighting to defend what belonged to him.
Chapter Five
The pale winter light woke him. Even before he rolled over on the bed, Olaf could tell he was alone. A fire crackled in the stone chimney. His stomach no longer roiled. He got up. His dirty clothes were gone. Folded on a stool he found linen braies, a shirt, a black velvet doublet and a pair of striped wool hose. The garments were too fine for everyday wear, and it da
wned on him that this would be his wedding breakfast. Lady Brenna might have arranged a celebration. Through the small square hole in the stone floor, loud voices filtered up from the great hall below, suggesting some kind of a gathering.
He washed in the barrel in the corridor outside the laird’s chamber, dressed and climbed down the ladder. Apart from a slight trembling in his hands and a touch of dizziness, he seemed fully recovered from the effects of the spoiled meat. His belly felt as if he’d been scooped hollow inside, but he suspected it would be a while before he might want to eat again.
Glancing ahead as he descended, he saw the trestle table set up in the middle of the great hall and five people sitting around it, two on each side and one at the end. At least a dozen more, including a few children, perched on low stools and benches scattered around the edges of the room. The villagers from the dugouts, he gathered, dressed in their best but still a ragtag crowd.
When Olaf reached the floor, Lady Brenna jumped up to her feet. There was no separate dais for the laird and his family, but she had taken a seat at the head of the table. The chair at the opposite end remained free. Olaf’s lips twisted into a smile as she saw her outfit—the same as his, black velvet doublet and striped hose. At least she had left her hair cascading down her back. With the slender curves of her body, the ebony curls were more than enough to make her look feminine.
Lady Brenna gestured at the vacant seat. “Please, sit down, Laird Kilgarren.”
Olaf picked up the heavy chair. The narrow space around the table was cluttered with people, and he hoisted the chair high over his head as he circled to where Lady Brenna sat.
He lowered the chair to the floor with a determined clunk. “Stand up so I can move your chair out of the way,” he ordered.
A notch of rebellion appeared between Lady Brenna’s dark brows. “You want to take my place?” she demanded.
“No,” he told her. “I want us to sit side by side.”
A blush stained her cheeks. “As you wish.” She rose and started to drag her massive oak chair along, one inch at a time.
Olaf laid his hand over hers. “Let me.”
Lady Brenna looked up. The color in her cheeks deepened. She let go of the chair and moved aside.
The buxom housekeeper spoke. “Foolish is a woman who takes on a husband and then continues to perform a man’s tasks.”
Olaf gave a nod of approval and said, “I couldn’t have put it better myself.” He waited for Lady Brenna to sit down again, and only then did he take his seat.
Confusion flickered in his wife’s brown eyes. Olaf stifled a grin. He’d smother her with courtesy. He’d show her that she might enjoy being treated like a woman. Perhaps then she could relax and understand that he had no wish to dominate her. She might even like to wear a gown once in a while, although he couldn’t quite decide if he preferred seeing the curve of her breasts in a gown or the shape of her legs in the close-fitting hose.
Lady Brenna gestured along the table. “Martha is the housekeeper. She does the cooking and cleaning.”
“We’ve met.” Olaf sent a rueful smile in the woman’s direction. From the sympathetic glances around the table, he understood that his plight had become known. “In future,” he said, “you might wish to take more care not to serve bad meat.”
The housekeeper emitted a harrumph sound. A thought crossed Olaf’s mind that the woman might have caused his misery on purpose, like some induction rite, to remind him of the power she wielded over his welfare.
He dismissed his suspicions and watched in respectful silence as Lady Brenna pointed at each of the three men in turn. “Robert takes care of the animals,” she explained. “Alistair and Ian do the hunting, with help from the men in the village.”
Each man got up and bowed. Alistair and Ian looked alike, with angular features and rawboned bodies, and fair hair tinged with red. Olaf guessed they were brothers, and from their height and coloring, he assumed they had Viking ancestry. Robert was dark, with a neatly groomed beard that grew patchy on one side, likely hiding a scar. He had a severe limp, evident even when he merely rose from his seat and settled back into it again.
“Have you looked after a destrier before?” Olaf asked the dark man.
“Aye,” Robert replied. “Even one of them Nordic trained bastards.”
Olaf grimaced. Taught to protect a fallen rider, the northern warhorses kicked and thrashed about when the saddle was empty, only calming when the weight of the saddle was lifted off or the rider mounted again. He’d coveted one himself, but four men were needed to hold the horse still from the moment it was saddled to when it felt the knight’s weight pressing down on its back. He didn’t have four men and, as he could scarcely afford one mount, he had to make do with a horse suited for both traveling and warfare.
“Robert is also my steward,” Lady Brenna said.
“Our steward,” Olaf corrected. “Or have you forgotten that you acquired a husband last night?”
Raucous laughter boomed around the room. Lady Brenna’s cheeks flamed.
Robert rose once more and walked over, dragging his left leg. He laid a roll of hide on the table and unraveled it. “This is the map of the estate. Sea to the west and north. River to the south. Stone cairns to mark the eastern boundary.”
Olaf leaned closer to study the ink markings on the map. The pungent smell that rose from the hide gave him a reminder of what a rough, primitive world he’d become part of.
“There is also a parchment map, but we don’t like to use it,” Lady Brenna said, as if reading his thoughts. “It might disintegrate if it gets wet.”
Olaf didn’t life his gaze from the map. “Which side is Erskine?”
Robert tapped his finger on the line of dots that indicated the cairns. “East. He doesn’t have shorefront. That’s why he wants Kilgarren so badly.”
Olaf nodded. He would have preferred south, where the river would have separated them from the enemy, but it made little difference. He didn’t have enough men to fight. The best they could hope for was to hold out in a siege until Erskine got tired of it, or find someone to side with them and send reinforcements, both events equally unlikely.
Lady Brenna cleared her throat. She swept her gaze along the bedraggled guests clustered along the walls. “As you all heard, I married yesterday. Kilgarren now has a laird.” She turned to him, her face solemn, her voice and manner formal. “Olaf Stenholm, the laird of Kilgarren, meet your vassals.”
Slowly, Olaf rose to his feet. Now it would be his turn to make a show of his gifts to the bride. It hurt his pride not to have much to give her, but perhaps something was better than nothing. He could mark the occasion with what little he’d brought with him. He directed his words to the dark man who held the position of the castle steward. “I shall return in a moment. Is there whisky or ale to make a toast?”
“Whisky,” Robert said, his chest swelling with pride. He pointed at the fireplace. A cauldron sat on a stone hearth, releasing a cloud of steam into the air. Next to it stood an empty steel bowl, and a pitcher of whisky and a jar of honey, waiting to be mixed. The empty bowl looked very big, the pitcher of whisky looked very small, and the jar of honey looked nearly empty.
With a resigned shrug, Olaf returned upstairs. He dug inside his sacks for the spices he’d brought and the handful of battle standards he’d collected in tournaments. His eyes fell on the leather bundle that contained his mother’s sword. Apart from his horse and armor and his own weapons, it was the most valuable thing he possessed.
He inhaled a long, hesitant breath. Scents of lavender from the canopied bed drifted toward him. His pulse surged. Surely, a happy wife was a man’s most prized possession? He reached for the bundle, pulled the sword from its sheepskin sheath, and used his sleeve to wipe a speck of dust from the blade.
Upon his return to the great hall, instead of
sitting down again, Olaf propped the sword upright against the side of the chair, the tip catching the floor, and set the rest of the goods down on the seat. One by one, he lifted up the small parcels and placed them on the table.
“Saffron from India. Pepper from Africa. Nutmeg from the Moluccas.”
Although the quantities were small, the crowd murmured respectful oohs and aahs.
“Silk banners from knights vanquished in the tourney field.” He held up a fistful of flowing lengths of fabric and tossed them on the table in front of Lady Brenna. “For you to do as you wish. Cut to hair ribbons for the women or use as battle standards for the men.”
Lady Brenna fingered the slippery silk. “Do you have a battle standard?”
“No,” Olaf said after a pause. “The Stenholm colors are no longer mine.”
“The Kilgarren colors are black and white.” She pulled out a faded green-and-yellow banner and raised it in her hand. “I shall add green for Olaf Stenholm into the Kilgarren colors.” Lowering her arm, she raked what Olaf considered a purely feminine glance over the remaining silks. “The rest shall be cut to make hair ribbons. One for each woman.”
Joyful female voices rippled around the room.
“Stand up,” Olaf told Lady Brenna.
She got to her feet, and he led her a few steps away from the table, toward the chimney, where everyone would enjoy a good view of them. Going down on one knee in front of her, he balanced the sword on the flat of his palms, holding it out to her. “This is the sword my father gave to my mother when they married. He said that if he ever raised his hand against her, she had the right to cut off his arm. Today, I give this sword to you, with those same words.”
Eyes wide, Lady Brenna stared at him. “For me?”
“I promised I would teach you to fight. You’ll need a sword.”
“Did your mother ever use the blade?” Martha called out. “Does your father still have both his hands?”
Tatiana March Page 5
