Betrothed to the Enemy Viking

by Michelle Styles

  Behind Brother Palni’s head, Cynehild spotted the forked oak she’d been searching for and wondered how she’d missed it before. She could make out the faint pathway off to its left, which she knew led to the cave.

  ‘I know where the cave is.’

  Again, a raised brow from Brother Palni. ‘You appear very certain that this cave will revive him.’

  ‘Once there, we can examine him further, to see if there is truly nothing which can be done.’ She gestured up to the darkening clouds. ‘A hard rain approaches, Brother Palni. I can feel it in the air. My covered cart cannot accommodate all of us, and it does leak something dreadful.’

  ‘You’re right about the hard rain. My scar has started aching.’

  Brother Palni absently rubbed his calf muscle in a reminder of how he’d come to be injured and how he’d first entered her life, as a member of a raiding party on her home who had been repelled by the brave actions of her sister Ansithe.

  ‘You’ll not want to hear my views, my lady, as you are stubborn when your mind is made up, but I beg you to listen to me all the same.’

  ‘Explain the problems to me later.’ Cynehild pointed towards where the man lay. ‘First, help save this man’s life.’

  Palni pressed his hands together and made a low bow—almost a perfect mimic of Father Oswald. ‘I exist to serve, my lady. I’ll tell the men to prepare for trouble...deep trouble.’

  ‘I sincerely doubt whoever did this will return. Why should they?’

  ‘I know what the Deniscan are like.’

  At her sharp intake of breath, Palni bowed again.

  ‘Pardon an old warrior for speaking bluntly. I have little practice yet with being a monk. The good Father is constantly exasperated with me over it.’ He ran his hand through newly tonsured hair. ‘Oddity and the Deniscan rarely augur well for anyone else.’

  ‘It seems fairly straightforward to me—the man was attacked, robbed and left for dead.’

  Palni pointed towards the man’s cloak. ‘Whatever happened here, robbery was not the intention. He wears far too much gold, but has no sword or weapon of any kind.’

  Cynehild peered more closely at the man. His cloak was fastened with two large gold brooches and he wore a torc about his neck and several arm rings. His clothes were fashioned of fine wool and his cloak was a thick soft pelt.

  ‘I gave my word to him that help was coming and Mercians do keep true to their word—unlike others I could mention.’

  The man groaned slightly and mumbled a few words which sounded like a name and another plea for help. His fingers scrabbled at the moss.

  Cynehild went to him and caught his hand. ‘You’re safe now. I will ensure it.’

  ‘So cold. Stay with me.’ His fingers tightened about hers, becoming almost painful in their grip. ‘I beg you. I need you. Always.’

  Cynehild was unclear if he was speaking to her or to someone he saw in his fevered imaginings.

  ‘I’ve little intention of leaving you. You’ll be safe once we’ve moved you to the cave.’

  His lips turned upwards. ‘Believe you.’

  She gave a triumphant glance over her shoulder towards where Brother Palni stood, with an increasingly gloomy look on his face.

  ‘Does he seem like a man who is about to die? Help me to bind his head so that he will be comfortable during the short journey to the cave. That is an order, Brother Palni.’

  The monk departed and returned with linen strips and several of the men, who were able to fasten together a makeshift stretcher. Cynehild carefully bound the stranger’s head so it wouldn’t begin bleeding again on the journey.

  ‘I just hope you don’t have cause to regret your actions, my lady.’

  * * *

  The driving rain trickled down Cynehild’s neck. She lifted her hood and concentrated on getting inside the dry warmth of the cave. After showing Brother Palni that the cave existed, she had accompanied him back to the covered cart, so she could ensure the right selection of herbs and bandages were procured before her men carried the patient to his new resting spot.

  ‘We will be safe here for a little while. Water is nearby and we now have a dry roof over our head,’ she said with satisfaction.

  Brother Palni moved the vines at the cave’s entrance to one side. ‘How long are you reckoning on staying, my lady? I’m willing to wager that man will not last the night, but if I’m wrong he will need several days before he can move. Can we afford that time? In and out, you said. Jaarl Icebeard is ever likely to change his mind about agreeing to allow you to honour your husband.’

  Cynehild allowed the words to roll over her. All Palni’s negative predictions did was increase her determination that the man would live.

  ‘There are plenty of provisions, and we have Lord Icebeard’s solemn promise of safe passage to the church so I can finally fulfil my oath to Leofwine and lay his sword at his ancestors’ feet. Icebeard will hardly wish to make an enemy of my brother-in-law by reneging.’

  Cynehild crossed her fingers. The angels had smiled on her so far. Bringing the injured man here solved everything. She could find the jar with the silver and gold coins that Leofwine had buried in this cave and look after the stranger at the same time, without having to answer awkward questions. If Brother Palni knew about the true nature of her quest, he would turn the party around and head straight back to Baelle Heale.

  Brother Palni tapped a finger against his mouth. ‘This cave bothers me. Something in my water tells me trouble is coming. It is the way I used to feel before I went into battle.’

  ‘At the first sign of trouble the guards will race up here to help with our defence.’

  ‘Bury the sword on your old lands without confronting Icebeard and be done with it, my lady. Your late lord would never know.’

  ‘I swore before Almighty God that I would deliver that sword to his ancestors.’ Cynehild gave Brother Palni a hard stare—the sort which usually sent her son scurrying for his nurse when he’d been misbehaving. ‘Would you have me break that vow?’

  ‘I’m sworn to the church and to you, my lady.’

  ‘I could hardly have planned to encounter this man and his injuries,’ she said, going over to where one of the men had piled wood for the fire.

  She spotted one of her favourite spindle whorls lying in the dirt beside a flat stone.

  Cynehild gasped and bent to pick it up. Surely its presence here was an omen? She must have dropped it when she had last been in the cave. She’d hunted for it ages ago, when they had first arrived at Baelle Heale. Her sisters and Leofwine had been less than understanding about its loss.

  She squinted in the dim light. The pile of stones at the back of the cave appeared undisturbed. The time to search for the jar of coins would be after everyone was asleep.

  ‘I’ll take one of the night watches,’ she said, quickly fashioning a makeshift pallet for the injured man out of dried fern fronds and her second-best cloak. ‘I’m used to being awake in the night. Many times when my son was small I’d simply sit, watching his cradle and listening to his soft breathing.’

  ‘As my lady commands.’

  After the man had been brought in and deposited on his new bed, Brother Palni rapidly lit a fire in the mouth of the cave, just under the overhang so that the space remained clear of smoke.

  Cynehild put her heaviest cloak over the injured man. The trembling of his limbs settled as the warmth from the cloak combined with the fire seeped into his bones. His breathing eased and became much gentler and steadier. Within a little time, the man’s skin ceased to be quite as deathly pale and his lips recovered to a rosier hue.

  ‘See, Brother Palni, he still lives.’

  ‘Did you find what you were looking for? I saw you pick something up,’ the monk said in a low voice. ‘I mean no disrespect, my lady. I merely seek to understand. I am certain you came to
this cave for some other purpose than to save this man’s life. I’ve been a warrior far too long not to know an excuse when I hear one.’

  Cynehild curled her fingers about the spindle whorl. ‘Trust no one—particularly not a Northman or a Deniscan.’ Leofwine’s final warning held true both for Brother Palni and for her new patient.

  ‘I found a spindle whorl I lost many years ago, that is all. It is a sign that our journey will be a fruitful one. I look forward to your apology in due course.’

  Chapter Two

  Kal struggled against the thick, all-pervasive darkness which clawed at his soul. His head felt as if it had been gnawed by Fenrir the Wolf, or worse. The heaviness of his limbs meant he could barely lift his arms. It was as if he’d fought long battles back to back, holding both an axe and a sword.

  His fingers instinctively searched for his sword, but encountered a woollen cloak instead of the more familiar scabbard which he always wore into battle.

  He cautiously opened one eye, then the other. The embers of a small fire cast shadows on rough-hewn stone walls. If he craned his neck, he could just make out the inky darkness of the night sky beyond the fire. Night. He was certain it had been morning when he’d last opened his eyes. Worse, he had no memory of where he’d been, how he’d arrived here or who his companions were.

  How had he come to be in this place?

  He rolled onto his side and wished he hadn’t as a searing pain washed over him. His body jerked upwards. The dark wall which had invaded his mind threatened to send him into the deep abyss again.

  ‘Keep still. Hold your tongue if you can.’

  A woman’s voice, low and gentle, but one which held the note of command. Her accent was not Norse, but something more pleasing to his ear.

  ‘Others sleep in this place.’

  ‘Who?’ he whispered around the dryness in his throat, moving his aching head towards the voice.

  A woman with golden hair silhouetted against the firelight appeared on the other side of the flames. She bent down, retrieved something and put it on the fire, sending up a cloud of sparks which flickered and then died. The fire highlighted her ample curves. She could be a Valkyrie—or maybe an angel such as the Christian priests spoke about. Until he’d encountered this woman he’d had his doubts about their existence, but no longer. He would be prepared to swear that such creatures were beyond beautiful.

  ‘Who are you? Am I even alive?’

  She came over and smoothed the rough wool cloak which covered him. ‘One who wishes you well. Lie back. Gather your strength. All will soon become clear but, yes, you are alive.’

  He struggled to think what this woman meant to him. Nothing. No woman could mean anything to him now that his wife and their child were dead. The grief of their passing still clogged his throat.

  He frowned. Surely he’d only left her grave this morning. How had he arrived in this place?

  The memory of his last sight of those freshly dug graves suddenly swamped him and a lump formed in his throat, but no tears came. He had been unable to cry at the graveside either.

  Toka had screamed like a harridan at him, saying her sister’s death had been his fault for failing to provide the food she’d needed. She had held out the body of his child, a boy who had lived no more than two days, and demanded he bury it instead of being useless, before turning on her heel and leading her nearly grown stepson away.

  He’d dug the small grave with his own hands and then left, vowing to be the successful warrior his wife Ranka had always said he could be if he simply tried. The farm he’d loved had yielded only a bitter harvest.

  Did this angel woman on the other side of the fire know about his wife and child and his unwitting part in their deaths? Was that why she’d watched him earlier, with an uncertain expression marring her lovely face? Did she know how the rains had come late, becoming unceasing? How the crops had all failed, and how he’d argued that he should stay with his wife instead of going to Ribe to sell the remaining cow and her calf? How he’d come back to find her insensible and burning with fever after giving birth, the newborn baby lying by her side, crying? How he’d tried to give him something to eat? How he’d begged her sister to save the child?

  ‘Where am I?’ he whispered, instead of asking for forgiveness. The words came like a groan.

  The angel woman put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Remain still or you’ll do further injury to your head. Do you have a name?’

  She spoke Saxon, not any of the languages from the North. An escaped captive? He’d learned the language years ago, from the captive his father had bought to assist in the house when his mother had died.

  ‘A name? What should I call you?’ She spoke again, this time in something which was more akin to the language of his childhood.

  ‘Who are you? Should I know? Why am I here?’ he asked.

  She rocked back on her heels. ‘I...we found you lying on the ground, having taken a blow to your head. You requested my help. Brother Palni predicted you’d never wake again, but you must have a hard skull.’

  ‘I requested help?’

  He shut one eye. Palni was a name from the North—from the lands now controlled by Harald Finehair rather than by the Deniscan. But she called him brother, as if he was one of the Christian monks. A Northman as a monk? He was tempted to call this a strange dream, except his body ached far too much for it to be one.

  ‘Death would have stalked you if you’d spent the night in the bone-chilling rain.’ She held out an unadorned hand. ‘Lady Cynehild, daughter of Ealdorman Wulfgar of Baelle Heale in West Mercia. We’re in the Five Boroughs controlled by the Northmen—what used to be the eastern edge of Mercia.’

  He turned her words over in his mind. No jolt of recognition. Either from her name or the location. Nothing but a void.

  ‘Lady Cynehild...’

  A distinct prickling went down his spine. Her name suddenly seemed to have some meaning, but it slipped away like water draining through a sieve.

  He concentrated, willing his brain to furnish him with his own name to give her in return. For three heartbeats there was nothing but suffocating blackness. Then the knowledge rose with certainty from the depths of his being.

  He lifted his hand towards her. ‘Kal, son of Randr, from the homestead near Ribe in the land of the Danes, my lady. How far are we from Ribe? Less than a day’s march, by my reckoning.’

  She shook her head. ‘We are far from Baelle Heale’s boundaries today. Travelling towards where I once lived. And a long way from your home in Ribe. Across an ocean, in fact.’

  He released a breath of air. One less thing to concern his mind. This Lady Cynehild was a stranger to him. But that meant he’d have to solve the mystery of why he was here, wherever ‘here’ was, without assistance, in whatever Danelaw country was. Across the ocean from Ribe? He didn’t remember sailing.

  ‘Where is my cousin? Where is Alff, son of Alfuir the Long-Legged?’

  ‘You were alone when I discovered you.’

  He tried to concentrate and think, rather than panic at his growing bewilderment. He knew he dealt in certainties like the heft of a sword, the weight of a shield or the feel of an oar under his palm, rather than in the niceties of navigation. He was the shield who refused to bend. A man with ice in his veins in the face of the enemy.

  ‘I’ve never heard of any of these places you say,’ he confessed. ‘Perhaps I was journeying to Northumbria when I hit my head. I’ve no notion why my comrades abandoned me. My cousin Alff and I swore a blood bond never to leave the other on the battlefield. Is he alive?’

  Lady Cynehild did not suck her teeth or make a cutting observation about his inability to command loyalty, as Toka would have done. Instead she tucked the cloak tighter about him, putting her cool hand on his brow before rocking back on her heels.

  ‘I came upon you in the woods, near the large stones. Abs
olutely alone. You suffered a fierce blow to your head. Such a blow can cause your mind to play tricks. Your cousin may be elsewhere for a reason you can’t remember.’

  Her words were soft and soothing, helping to keep the darkness from invading. Kal knew he could listen to her gentle voice for days and not be bored.

  ‘I know I want to live,’ he whispered between parched lips. ‘I’m a warrior, not a sacrifice to the gods.’

  ‘A human sacrifice to the gods?’ She shuddered. ‘The Deniscan have odd practices.’

  ‘Some believe it appeases them.’

  He didn’t add that he’d stopped believing in the gods when his wife had died. He’d raged and sworn that never again would he trust anything but his own two hands. But those were private thoughts, and this lady travelled with a monk.

  ‘Then it is settled. You will live. You’ll be able to travel to Northumbria to meet your sworn king once you’re healed.’

  Her face turned away from him, revealing the length and slenderness of her neck in the firelight. He followed her gaze to the flickering shadows on the cave walls.

  ‘This land has seen more than its fair share of death. It’s long past time to celebrate the living,’ she said.

  ‘I owe you a life debt, Lady Cynehild,’ he said into the silence.

  ‘You are not in my debt.’

  She turned back towards him, looking straight at him for the first time. She was not the young maiden he had first thought, but a woman who had gone past the first flush of maidenhood and emerged even better-looking for it. She moved with an air of authority. A managing woman.

  Kal grimaced. Normally he avoided such women, but right now he would follow her to the ends of the earth. She was mistaken—he did owe her a life debt...one he’d struggle to repay.

  ‘The pain in my head prevents me from knowing many things about my recent past, but my gut instinct tells me you are kind. And I know my instinct has kept me alive many more times than I care to count.’

  Lady Cynehild’s soft laugh resembled the brook which bubbled over the rocks at the back of the longhouse where he’d grown up.