by Lea Bronsen
Normally, the sight of Hedin’s cock up-close and his naughty words would make Alv salivate, but he groaned in annoyance. “I’m too tired to play. Let me sleep.” He wanted Hedin to leave him alone so he could drift into sleep with someone else’s erotic image in mind.
“Are you sure? ‘Cause I can wake you up. Wake something up.” Hedin spun and pulled the sheets off Alv’s legs.
He gasped, stilled, and a silence ensued.
Alv sighed. “Just go.”
“But…you’re hard?” Hedin moved off him, stood, and tore the sheets off the bed, leaving Alv naked. “You’re telling me you don’t want to play, but you’re aroused!”
Yes, recalling how he’d plastered Roeland’s manly body to his on the ladder aroused him, but he didn’t need to make excuses: Hedin was his slave, and according to custom, Alv didn’t owe him anything. His conscience said otherwise, of course, but in their world of stupid social codes, he couldn’t always listen to it.
“If I’m not the one making your dick hard like that,” Hedin shouted, kicking the mattress, “who is it?”
Alv frowned. “Ssh, keep your voice down. You aroused me with your hard dick, but I’m too tired to fuck right now.” Not exactly the truth, but Alv wanted to calm him. The last thing he needed was for the neighbors to hear this conversation. “I’ve been traveling for eight days. Can you respect that?”
Hedin held Alv’s look, his gaze a dark, angry green, then picked up his tunic and put it on with hasty moves. “Liar,” he sneered.
“No, I’m—”
“Shut up.” Hedin turned on his heels and headed for the door.
A slave would be punished for insulting his master, but Hedin was spoiled. Alv had allowed their relationship to escalate to a point where Hedin believed they were equals, that he owned Alv, and that they would be together forever.
Well, Alv loved the boy, and he loved sleeping with him. But the community would never accept that they were an official couple. Didn’t Hedin know that? Not because he was a slave, for slaves could earn their freedom and marry whomever they wanted, but because they were men.
Alv would have to sit down with him later and explain these things once and for all.
* * *
Something or someone blocked the faint light in the animal barn. Seated against a wall, Roeland shook himself from his apathy and looked up.
Torsten, the big, bearded warrior who’d captured him up on the terrace, went down on a knee and loomed over him, filling his vision. “The young man you killed was the son of earl Gunnulf, who I considered my brother,” he growled low to Roeland’s face, spittle flying with each word. “And if it wasn’t for your sister, I’d bleed you to death like a pig. Slowly.” He lifted a hand. His sword blade slid against Roeland’s throat, cold and sharp, and made a hair-rising ziiiiiing as it glided along his metallic slave collar.
Roeland flinched, closed his eyes, and pressed the back of his head to the hard wall board behind him to gain a few millimeters. Coldness invaded him. He didn’t have strength to hold his ground like when the elf-like man, Alv, had charged him and sliced his cheek open. That day, Roeland had been so frightened for his birthing wife and carried so much anger and outrage over Elke’s rape, he would’ve faced off the Devil himself. Now, locked up and chained by the neck like some animal, he suffered from hunger and thirst, ached from exhaustion, was drained of energy, and had lost his fighting spirit. The future that awaited him—if the Vikings let him live—was the one of a slave.
By miracle, the blade edge didn’t cut into his skin. He blew out the breath he’d held and opened his tired eyes. “Wh-why my sister?” he whispered, throat too constricted with fear to produce a sound.
He hoped to God she hadn’t been forced to give her young body to that brutal man, or any others, to save him. His mind flashed back to one of his worst memories; a blond Viking savagely raping her, the family jewel, on a street corner. It had sparked a succession of terrible life-altering events and ended with his enchainment in a stinking barn with the other prisoners from Bjorgvin. He could no longer protect Elke, nor the little baby girl his wife had birthed before death viciously took her away. Things couldn’t get any worse. Unless one of them died, too.
Torsten pulled the blade back and stood, as tall as he was large, the low light from a door silhouetting and rendering his features invisible. “I talked to her on the boat. I asked her about what happened before you left Bjorgvin.” His voice came out thick and low, strangely compassionate. Or sad. “It seems she was victim of an act of abuse.”
I know…
“You call us savages, but we have morale. Well, most of us do.” The warrior sheathed his sword with a new ziiiing. “And she has a pure heart. Her suffering is the only thing that saves you.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Loud banging tore Alv out of his dream.
He opened his eyes wide, but saw perfect blackness. It was night. He’d slept several hours.
By Odin, the pulse in his head pounded from the sudden awakening.
Groaning, he sat up and called, “Who is it?”
The door squeaked open, and the yellowish light from an oil lamp sneaked in, casting an eerie feminine shadow on the wall. A woman whispered, “The prisoners are sick. Gorm needs you.”
A deep shiver went through him. Roeland was over there. “What’s going on?”
“They’re vomiting.”
“I’m coming.” In no time, he scrambled out of bed, put his pants on, and joined the woman outside in the chilly night.
She was one of Gorm’s assistants, specialized in midwifery. Guided by the light of her lamp, they hurried through the quiet, darkened village to the animal barn, a big longhouse at the outskirts of Eðni.
A fire burned near the entrance, with bugs whirling in the fumes. Gorm, the old medicine man, stirred boiling water in a large pot. A choir of whimpers, groans, and retching sounded from inside the barn, and the sickening stench of slaughter drifted out the door.
Gorm gazed up at Alv. The flames’ shadows danced on his face, sharpening his lines of age and pointy features. “There you are.”
“What’s happened?” Alv peeked inside. Several oil lamps lit the big room. A fence separated the cows from the prisoners, men and women chained to poles in the ground. Some laid twitching and holding their stomachs, others threw up.
Alv turned back to the old man. “By Thor, what is this?”
“They’re sick,” Gorm replied, voice gruff.
“I can see that. Can we do anything for them?”
“I’m making a brew. Water to rehydrate them and herbs to lessen their suffering.”
“Do you think it was their food?”
“I don’t know.”
“What have they been given to eat?”
Gorm wafted at insistent bugs that flew too near the steaming pot. “Who knows.”
“Well, who’s responsible for their food?”
“The guards. But…”
“But what?”
“I’m not sure.”
So annoyingly enigmatic. “So, you have no idea what’s wrong with them?”
“I have my suspicions.” Gorm continued chasing the bugs.
“Tell me.”
The old man shook his head. “Only open your mouth when you’re sure that what comes out of it is the truth.”
This wasn’t leading to anything. The stubborn old man held something back, but what? And why? In the meantime, Alv needed to check on Roeland. “Is the brew ready yet?”
“Soon.”
“Give me some.”
Gorm filled a cup and handed it to him. “Beware, it’s hot.”
Steaming cup in hand, Alv went inside the barn looking for Roeland. He held his breath, but the stench of vomit snuck into his nose and nauseated him. He had to swallow repeatedly to keep bile from rushing up his throat. He walked between sick men and women lying on the ground, and tried not to step on anyone in the semi-dark.
There! Roeland slumped ag
ainst a wall, his head lolling to a side, neck chain fixed to a thick iron ring on the wall. Black hair hung in his face.
Alv’s chest squeezed with worry. He hurried over, hadn’t realized how much he cared for the prisoner until he found him in this condition. “How are you?”
Roeland glanced up, sunken eyes feverish. “My stomach’s…burning up.” A sheen of sweat covered his unusually pale skin.
“Drink this.” Alv knelt and handed him the cup.
Roeland grimaced. “What is it? Another poison?”
“Another poison?” Alv frowned. “No, a medicine brew my teacher made. I hope it can help.”
“You’re learning medicine?”
“Yes.”
Roeland accepted the brew with trembling hands and managed not to spill any. “The nausea is one thing,” he said, drinking a little, grimacing. “But there’s another thing that scares me more.”
“What?”
“My heart’s galloping.”
“Drink up, and I’ll check your pulse.”
When Roeland had swallowed everything, Alv grabbed his wrist. Faint beats pulsated against his fingertips, but they were quick, very quick. Odd. “Let me listen to your heart.”
Roeland lifted his shirt. His ribs protruded beneath the golden skin. He hadn’t eaten well in weeks.
Alv leaned forward to press his ear against Roeland’s chest and forced himself to ignore their proximity and the heat of his body. Now was a bad time to think “sensual”. Besides, Roeland’s heart beat a thud-thud-thud at an unusual speed. An even faster cadence than the one Alv had heard from babies’ hearts, and theirs was normal.
Gorm had told him about a plant that could change a person’s heartbeat. Foxglove. “But beware, it’s highly toxic.”
Toxic! Roeland just mentioned a poison.
A chill crept up Alv’s spine. He rose to his feet. “I need to talk to my teacher,” he told Roeland with a calm voice, not wanting to alarm him. “I’ll be back.”
Roeland closed his eyes and let his head roll to the side.
Alv hurried back to Gorm. If Roeland had been the only sick prisoner, the poison hypothesis would be plausible. Gunnulf had been a popular leader and his son a praised warrior, so a lot of people wanted Roeland dead. Mother, since he’d killed her son; Torsten, since Joar had been the son of his brother-in-arms; and many more, surely. But…all the prisoners from Bjorgvin were sick. It didn’t make sense.
Outside, he halted and gulped mouthfuls of fresh air.
The old man filled a cup with brew and handed it to his midwife assistant, who hurried back inside the barn.
Alv asked him, “Did you check their heartbeat?”
Gorm nodded, filling another cup.
“And?”
“It isn’t normal.”
“You’ve told me about this before, the same combination of symptoms, after someone drank a brew of foxglove.”
“Yes.” Gorm looked up and studied him.
“So it’s not bad food. They’ve been poisoned.”
“I believe so, yes.”
Alv frowned, feeling cheated. “Why didn’t you say it earlier?”
“Because…” the old man said, and lowered his voice, “it implies someone intentionally poisoned them.”
“Yes, and?”
“It’s scandalous. Imagine the consequences if they die, and the Dutch on the continent get word that all the prisoners we raided in Bjorgvin have been murdered? We’ll have their entire navy coming here to exterminate us.”
Alv shuddered. Torsten had given a similar warning up on the hillside, after they caught Roeland. The image of white sails on the ocean flashed. “Could it be a political maneuver? A trap? Should we inform the king?”
“I don’t know, but you see, before I speak aloud about this, I need to be sure of what I’m talking about.”
“Yes. How do you intend to do that?”
“I need more time to observe the sick. Besides, there’s another problem.”
“What?”
Gorm gave him a pointed stare. “Eðni doesn’t have an official leader. Who’s going to handle an eventual scandal?”
Alv looked down. Did the whole village know Mother wanted him to be elected jarl? In any case, if he succeeded, this was the kind of responsibility that would ensue with the title. He didn’t want it. To divert the subject, he asked, “Who could gain from their deaths?”
“Frankly, I have no idea.”
Alv shook his head in frustration.
Gorm filled another cup of steamy brew and handed it to him. “Now, help me distribute this to the sick. Tomorrow, hopefully, we’ll know more about their condition.”
“Right.” Alv would obey his teacher, of course, but as soon as he was done, he would order the guards to bring Roeland to his house so he could tend to him personally. He didn’t care what people said when they found out. It was a matter of life and death.
* * *
Hours later, Alv sat cross-legged on a fur skin beside his mattress watching over the sleeping Roeland. The sick man lay on his side, a bowl close by in case he had to vomit.
In the low, swaying light from a candle flame, his cheek looked terrible. The cut was red and raw, too deep to ever disappear. A shame that such a handsome man should be disfigured, because handsome he was.
Roeland had gone through a lot already. He’d had to flee his home with his fragile family and experience the death of his wife.
Tears welled in Alv’s eyes. He related. He’d lost his brother, then father, and missed them both terribly. If Roeland hadn’t killed Joar, he would still be alive, and Father wouldn’t have collapsed in grief.
“But he raped your sister, I know,” he whispered to the sleeping man, and sniffed. “And I’m sorry. He should never have done that.”
Stupid Joar! If only he’d kept his dick in his pants, they wouldn’t be in this situation, Alv taking care of Roeland instead of killing him, and Roeland likely poisoned and fighting for his life.
Ugh. Please don’t die.
It would be Alv’s fault if he did, since he brought him here and kept him prisoner. He was entirely responsible for Roeland’s wellbeing.
A knock on the door had goosebumps growing on his arms. Who could it be this time?
“Y-yes?” He stood from the fur mat, legs stiff and hurting.
A white-haired head peeked in. Gorm. The lines on his face had deepened with tiredness. “How is he doing?”
Alv drew a deep breath. “I don’t know. He’s sleeping.”
Gorm closed the door, knelt by Roeland’s side, and grabbed his wrist to check the pulse. He grunted. “Still the same. It’s alarming.”
“What can we do?”
“Not much. Make sure he drinks a lot to evacuate the poison.” Gorm glanced at the length of the sick man. “We should take his clothes off. They’re dirty, and he’ll be more comfortable without them.”
Alv’s heart pounded. Take Roeland’s clothes off? Despite the severity of his medical condition, Alv couldn’t help getting distracting thoughts.
“Come on, help me.” Gorm pulled at a shirt sleeve. “Where’s Hedin?”
“Um…” Though the small house was empty, Alv glanced around before assisting Gorm with the other sleeve. “I don’t know.” In fact, he hadn’t seen his slave since his anger outburst yesterday.
They undressed Roeland from top to toe, motions gentle, careful not to wake him. Though his ribs showed from the lack of food, his muscles were lean and firm.
“We can’t leave the cut on his cheek like this.” Gorm looked down to rummage in a medicine pouch.
Alv seized the occasion to gaze at the naked man. Nestled among black hair, Roeland’s limp penis had a strikingly purple color compared to his otherwise disease-induced paleness. What would it look like if he were healthy and aroused?
Blushing from the forbidden idea, Alv covered him with a sheet.
Gorm pulled a needle and a thread out of his pouch. “How did he get the cut?”
“I did it,” Alv admitted.
“Why?”
“He insulted me.”
“And so you scarred him?” The old, wise man’s limpid eyes scrutinized him. “I thought you were different, Alv. Have they forced you to follow their example?”
“Who, they?”
“The warriors.”
“They haven’t forced me.”
“They’ve influenced you.”
Alv grimaced. They expected him to be brutal. The whole community did. Mother, too. It wasn’t easy balancing the right and the wrong.
Gorm shook his head. “It’s not like you to do something like this. Did they make you torture him?”
“I didn’t torture him. I… He…” Alv fumbled, and hated himself for looking up an excuse. “He called me a savage. He insinuated I was going to hurt his sister. I had to punish him.”
“Hmm. Punish. A strong word in your mouth.”
“It was expected of me. If I didn’t do it, they would have called me a weakling. You’re aware that the entire village wants me to kill him in retaliation for Joar?”
“Yes, and I’ve heard that taking a life is the only way to avenge someone’s death. Well, as a medicine man, I have to oppose. We cure people, we don’t take their lives.”
Alv’s chest tightened. “I don’t want to kill.”
“I know. So you brought him to Eðni instead, and now you’re worried because he’s sick.” Again, his teacher’s intelligent, see-through gaze rested on him.
“Yes…”
“That’s good.” Gorm gave a slow nod. “I prefer to hear that. To think that you, my apprentice, intended to kill someone would do my heart great harm.”
A lump grew in Alv’s throat. “I—I just can’t do it.”
“You have to listen to your conscience. It’s your lead in life. It’s a stronger lead than your heart. A wiser lead than your mind.”
Alv swallowed and glanced at Roeland, whose long black eyelashes made a stark contrast to his ashen, sunken skin. “Is he going to survive?”
“It depends on the level of toxicity in his body.”
