“My mother was going to find work. I… I can work.” I gasped. Her soft hand cradled mine and she bent low enough that she could look up into my eyes. I had been through the works. I couldn’t find the energy to lift my head and face the world or any further judgement.
“I have work for you. If you will take it. In exchange, you could stay under my roof while repairing yours. It could be reserved for you, so no one takes it while you are fixing it up.”
I laughed and almost lost control of my tears. Something in the distance pinned the smile in place and made me forget my worries momentarily. It was the men from the boat. One chopped wood, while the other harassed him.
“Ah, Thorne and Thane. Have you met Alexavier? The youngest of Trysta and Ulfr?”
I tilted my head toward the sound of her voice, but I couldn’t stop looking at the muscular axe-wielding man across the way.
“No matter,” she said when I didn’t respond. “You will. As for the work, I need someone to look after my children. My mother is back at the homeland. I made her stay with my youngest daughter until it was certain that things would go as promised. You never know how agreements play out, not until it is all said and done. I had thought it best she stayed behind… until things were certain.”
Her eyes snapped about. Wisdom and wonder swirled in their brown depths. I wasn’t sure what threat she thought was out there walking the forest or paths, but I did know one thing… I had no experience with children. None. Dom and Cairn didn’t have any other children. Dom hated children, to be honest, which is likely why they were kept at bay.
“So, will you do it?”
“Hm? Wha -yeah. Sure, I can watch Osanna and…” I was nodding and piecing things together still in my head when she grabbed my shoulders and forced me to be silent and still.
“This is not the time for an ‘I will figure it out’. You either oath to see my children safely through this, or you refuse the task,” Zaphori stressed. She was a bear when it came to her children. Which was part of the reason why I trusted her so easily.
“I give you my word. I will keep them both safe,” I promised.
Her smile returned instantly. “Good, that is good news,” she whispered before giving my shoulder a squeeze.
The sound of an axe drew my attention back to Thorne. Each downward stroke flexed the muscles of his arms and chest. Even Zaphori sighed dreamily before hurrying me into the house.
She rummaged around in a trunk until she found a thick skillet. Moments later, little Osanna returned with a few eggs. Zaphori stroked her daughter’s hair and collected them carefully from her.
“When will you leave?” I asked her once the eggs were sizzling in the skillet. She handed me a half loaf of bread, not committing to an answer right away. Rather than pry, I began to tear it into chunks.
“After the sun has reached its midpoint,” she quietly replied. Her low tone made me glance back to the table. Did her children even know she was leaving?
“They will be fine,” she assured me. “It is Einar, he will be busy repairing and setting up his blacksmith shop in the village.”
I took comfort in the notion that her brooding husband wouldn’t be watching me from the shadows all the day long. Not that the knowledge made me feel any better about the evenings, or the fact that no one had ever left a milk cow to my care, let alone a child. Cairn had been a healer, I’d seen her rub tinctures and prepare tonics for the wee ones, as she called them, but that was the extent of my experience with the young.
Zaphori’s hand kept patting my shoulder, but the uncertainty only festered in my gut.
“How… how long?” I managed.
“Only long enough to get there and back. A few months voyage there and back, nothing more.” She smiled as if my question somehow equated consent and scooped me up in a firm side hug before scampering off to the back room.
***
Osanna ventured toward the area where the yard met the dirt path carefully holding her apron so that it formed a pouch. Minutes bled into hours while she spread her treasures into a grid of sorts. The various stones were arranged so they marked the corners of her squares before she set to hopping up and down the length of her layout.
Sven sat beside me on the stoop of the shack, scraping a dagger down the length of a tree limb. He moved his hand methodically, his head bent in the expected position, but the boy’s gaze was raised to his sister. He scowled until I was certain that he was insulted by having been left with us. I, on the other hand, felt guilty sitting around while everyone else was rushing about to put everything together while the light was still favorable.
Zaphori had said that I should tend to Osanna. Being in doors so long had caused a great deal of pent up energy and mischief. A few moments after we had taken to the yard, Einar stomped past. Rather than greet me or his son, he slammed the door and began to crudely bark at Zaphori. I couldn’t help but wonder if our timely dismissal hadn’t secretly been for the girl’s safety.
“I told you, woman, you’re not goin’ on no serpent ride. It ain’t right. Who’s gonna watch the children? Hm? If your Ma wanted to come, then she should have been loaded onto the boat with the rest of the waste you insisted on brin—" His words, for all their gusto, ended with the crisp sound of flesh connecting with flesh.
It was a loud, solid sound that carried me from the porch stoop before I realized what it was that I had heard. Little Sven twisted about and began to scramble, but I grabbed his arm and jerked him back toward me. The trio of men across the way paused their conversation, hands still animated in the air, and stared at us in confusion. Heat flooded my face. I hoped they didn’t think I had struck the child. I let loose of his arm and he flew up the steps. The door was ripped open before he could touch it, his father rudely bumping his way past him.
Chapter Three
Call Em Out
Thane
“Ya big fuckin baby,” I intended to bellow, but Thorne’s elbow clipped my gut and it came much more lowered and strangled than I would have preferred. I glowered at the bastard and started for our front door.
“She’s looking for someone to collect piss pots so she can work them hides,” he warned. The piece of cattail jutting out the side of his mouth rolled, as it often did when he was thinking.
I grumbled and started back the way I had come.
The door across the way opened. This time it was Einar’s woman, Zaphori, who stepped out. The new woman, Zhenni, and the children trailed after her. Each of them loaded to the chin with travel packs and blankets. A sudden neighborly impulse sent my chin up in silent greeting.
Around the circle, I noticed a few others bidding their loved ones farewell.
“They wanted to be certain things were still amicable before risking the elderly, expecting, and infants,” Alexavier rattled. His eyes were bloodshot and heavy. I knew that look well… he had suffered through a gossiping session. The door squeaked open behind him, all but verifying my guess.
“Thane, love, be a good son and gather for me.”
I closed my eyes and cursed everything that ever was or would be. Gather for her.
Rubbing the bridge of my nose, I reached out with the other hand and took the large bucket from our mother a little more roughly than I intended and headed for the circle, weaving around the other villagers. A small line of girls passed, their heads bowed and deep in their whispers. Heavy steps landed behind me. From the laughter that still clung to his occasional breath, I already knew it was Alexavier.
The minute the path opened, I crossed the clearing and nearly flung the damn bucket toward the first slave I saw. He made an easy target, the tremble in his hands and way he constantly surveyed his surroundings told me he was new. New enough not to argue. He didn’t know me from any of the other shitheads around here. So, when the bucket hit him square in the chest, he wrapped his arms and nodded like I had just given him a second chance at life.
“Go about, door to door and collect.” The breeze blew, carryi
ng the ammonia odor until the slave was waving himself off. I guessed some things went without explanation.
“You can’t fucking do that.” Alexavier chuckled. His eyes shifted from the scurrying slave and back to me. When he noticed my dead panned expression, he shook his head and laughed on a sigh.
In the distance, near some tall Saxon looking buildings, I saw Einar slip into the door of an ale house. All interest lost in the procession of travelers, I gravitated toward the man, oblivious to the fact that Alexavier was still behind me.
It turned out he had good taste. The building was brick, solid, and intimidating in a way that had nothing to do with its size or condition. The moment my palm kissed the door, a resignation took over. I’ve been shocked, who hasn’t when they touch something after dragging their feet. But this wasn’t the same. In fact, it was quite the opposite. My eyes felt heavy and I feared they might look as haggard as Alexavier’s. Instantly drained, I began to gravitate toward the barkeep.
He was a good man and slid the ales across the top of the shoddy bar before we could be bothered to waste our breath ordering them. I gave a nod to the leather faced elder and hauled the mug without hesitation. We saddled a pair of stools that groaned beneath our weight. In three swallows, I had the ale gone. While the old man filled mine again, Alex noisily slurped at his first taste.
The ale and hours came one after another. Eventually the villagers began to trickle in andloud bawdy laughter competed with exaggerated tales of hunting and rutting. Alexavier had finally managed to see the bottom of his mug twice.
Something brushed my leg, and a blanket of flesh sprawled against my side. Fingers trailed my jaw line and tried to steer my face in the direction of minty breath. I seized a handful of flesh and shook it, trying my best to wedge her between my thighs so I could hold her captive between myself and Alexavier.
She went willingly enough, her hips rolled, lodging a slender ass against me while her hands roamed a top Alexavier’s legs. He hopped from the stool, smashing the tavern woman against me in the process, and making a disgusted sounding scoff on his way past.
It didn’t take long before Alexavier’s tales began to spin. He really did have the best memory when it came to recanting our travels, so maybe it was for the best that he always told them.
The blond slithering against me protruded her lower lip dramatically. I had to stop myself from making the exact same sound as my brother had earlier. I couldn’t stand pouty, whiney women. Yes, it was our job to protect the village women, but that didn’t mean they had to be simpering and helpless. Of course, I knew this woman was likely not the quick-to-tears type, but it was a turn off all the same. I liked a woman that barked back.
The rhythmic knead and squeeze of my hand stopped, and I patted her ass in what was about to be a dismissive swat. Before I could slide my hand away, however, Einar flopped down on Alexavier’s vacated seat and stared pointedly at us. A subtle twitch, surely undetected by anyone but myself, announced the girl’s instinctual shift toward me.
I had to be imagining it, but for a moment, I swore I smelled fear on the girl.
“Get the fuck off my woman,” Einar slurred.
I blinked and cocked my head back. Bellowing with laughter, I reached around the woman and offered my mug up. Rather than click his own to it, however, Einar reached out and slapped my mug away. A ruddy hue flooded his features and his glossy green eyes narrowed angrily. “I said get the fuck off her!” he raged before grabbing the woman’s arm and nearly jerking her into his lap.
I myself was a few ales in the bucket at that point and refused to release my hold on her.
We looked like two children fighting over a prize rather than the warriors that we both were. Instead of ridiculing the prick for having made such a claim when everyone knew Zaphori to be his woman, my half-spent ass entertained his drunken escapades.
“Ya drunk bastard, you don’t even know her name.” I laughed again, setting the mug on the counter. The barkeep’s head was bowed, but his aged brows remained frozen with frustration.
“Know her name… Her name’s Adira and she’s mine!” he growled. He tugged on Adira’s arm once more, and that was all it took. Something clicked in me so fast I didn’t know it had. I threw my hand straight out and stepped behind it. Einar’s nose crunched beneath my knuckles, bringing everyone in the ale house to a sudden and very silent stillness.
“That right there, boy, that’s what me gran’father called a rabbit punch,” the old man proudly sang. His smile reached both ears. He may have even hummed a tune when he wiped up the ale Einar had caused me to slop.
Once the men realized the show was over, they hopped right back into their conversations. The chair screeched when I slid my weight from it. Adira twirled around to face me. She appeared ready to follow, until I tsked and used my finger to wave to Einar.
“See to your man, Adira.” I chuckled, barely able to hold myself up straight.
I had no business with her, but regardless, it had been the principle of Einar’s approach that upset me. She wasn’t mine, nor would she ever be.
Her mouth hung open and she looked from me to the barkeep as if he might convince me to stay.
Instead, he bid me goodbye. “Name’s Gunnar. Ye come by any time, and I’ll have a drink waiting for you.” He winked like we were the oldest of friends.
“An honor to meet you. I’m known as Thane.”
Alexavier tugged my shoulder. “Thane the Vain,” he playfully muttered.
“I shall remember you and your business, friend.” I called after Gunnar before stumbling off toward home.
Alexavier
Thane would have stayed in that ale house all night if it had been up to him. Thank the Gods for that dumbass Einar. I laughed, recalling how he had laid in a heap at my brother’s feet. He had it coming. For a million reasons, but mostly because of his lack of honor. Zaphori gave him the world, and all he had to offer in return was grief.
I spat, but it still didn’t take away the distaste. We might have wasted an afternoon away, but it was our first semi-free afternoon since the eternity we spent cooped up on ship. Einar was known for watching his woman labor and putting babes in her. A disgrace and burden. To his family. To all of us. How the man wasn’t divorced yet, was beyond me. The day the meeting was called to confront him for his cowardly, slothen ways, I would smile and give sacrifice.
I lingered, forcing myself to walk slower so Thane could keep up. He had developed a pattern—two steps forward, one to the side. It worked out well until he ventured too close to the neighbor’s coop. He startled their rooster, who in turn gave a deafening premature morning greeting which sent Thane sprawling past me. He was so fucking drunk, he thought someone had tripped him in the process of it all. Whirling around, he glared, confrontation-style, into the darkness.
It took everything in me not to lose it. My ribs ached with concealed laughter, and my eyes were burning by the time he resigned to righting his tunic.
“Who the fuck puts a hen house that close to the path anyhow he grumbled before attempting a side kick toward the structure.
“Hey! Alright. Okay, yanno… why don’t you get some sleep and I’ll set some traps, so we have breakfast in the morning? They can’t say we did nothing then!” I gave it my best, he would either wake half the village trying to get in the house and continue his fun, or he would scheme along.
After a considerable silence, he dramatically nodded his head, as if it had been I who were responsible for the delay. I stayed long enough to make sure he didn’t break his neck getting through the door before continuing the path.
I was eager to see the terrain. If Thane wasn’t so sauced, he would have beat me to it. He’s the hunter. No one around can track like him. It was all father bragged about, back when he was of a mind to go to the ale houses.
Galena’s outlying forest did not disappoint. The trees were tall and full, the kind the Saxons often painted on their canvas. It would surely drive Thane crazy
when the leaves fell in such a thick blanket. I could almost hear those leaves beneath my feet. Fall was my favorite season, and I loved being outdoors when it was still fair enough to be cozied by a fire. Nothing in life compared, as far as I was concerned.
Light began to pierce the shadows, thinning them into a breath of fog that lingered over the distant lake. I’d never seen anything like it, especially when the dawn began to kiss its way across the surface of the water. I stole a sharp breath with the realization that I had lost track of time and quickly set to laying out the ropes and fashioning my knots. Even after I had them, I couldn’t help a farewell glance to the horizon and the water.
It wasn’t as majestic now, but it was still exquisite, in a way that only nature could be. Someday I would find a woman. One who would savor all of that with me, one who gave conversation as easily as caresses. She was out there, I could feel it.
The smile such thoughts brought, carried me to the edge of the yard. I hadn’t noticed the rhythmic sound of Thorne’s chopping until a piece of wood splintered off and shot in front of my legs. I jumped aside with a startled laugh and a glare that was full of accusation. He didn’t really notice, though, he was staring past me. When his gaze only intensified, I couldn’t help but find the source of his enchantment.
Across the yard, Zhenni and the children scurried about picking up pieces of bark and thick twigs. I winced and absently glanced back toward the ale house.
“I suppose our neighbor didn’t make it home?” he asked. It wasn’t really a question, he was back to chopping before I could answer. The axe came down with a vicious crack, and a slew of loud, angry quacks erupted. We both nearly came out of our skin.
The children had apparently taken the wood inside, leaving Zhenni to feed the chicken. My jaw went slack as I watched the ducks chase her about the yard.
Between Mortals and Makers Page 2
