Iain and Tyr followed Winn inside. To Winn’s surprise, there were a handful of Englishmen standing in line behind a long plank table. One man sat before them, his dark head bent low over a ledger book. The man took receipts from those who waited in line, giving an occasional snort or grunt of acknowledgement as he scribbled furiously on the parchment.
Cormaic and Erich stood at the rear of the line. While Cormaic noticed Winn’s arrival, Erich did not. The older Norseman was too intent on watching the man seated behind the table.
“Him?” Winn asked as he joined them in line. There was no sense in berating Erich. Winn’s only hope was to keep them all alive while Erich satisfied the debt owed to him.
“Perhaps,” Erich muttered, his stare unwavering. Cormaic leaned over, speaking quietly to Winn.
“It must be him, but the bugger willna speak. Da needs to hear if his speech is queer before we do it.”
“Do what?” Winn asked, not really wanting to know the answer. He counted four Englishmen in line and one behind the table. The odds were fair, yet it was still a risk he did not wish to take, especially when they were closed in by the confines of the small dwelling.
“Why, have a wee talk with him, of course,” Cormaic said, uttering an undignified grunt.
The current customer at the table raised his voice, slapping an invoice down in front of the clerk. Red-faced and angry, the man threw up his arms in disgust.
“Ye know there are no worms in my hogsheads, ye bloody cuss!” he hollered. “I post my best share – ye have no need to cheat me!”
The dark-haired clerk stood up. Apparently, a simple snort was no longer an adequate response. As the man opened his mouth to speak, Winn felt Cormaic and Erich lean forward.
“Sturlss’n ha no need of yer stank tobacca’, now git ye gone – and ‘ust who da bloody hell are ye?”
The clerk spoke only the once sentence with a slurred voice before Erich went for him, grabbing the man by the collar and slamming him down on the table face first. The previous customer jumped obligingly out of the way, but several other Englishmen made as if they might be a nuisance.
Cormaic brandished his knife, a particularly long serrated one, pointing it at the other men. One by one he addressed them, looking like a hulking bear about to eat his dinner.
“Ye’ll abide for a moment, boys,” Cormaic advised them. “We have a bit of business and we’ll be on our way.” Iain and Tyr flanked Cormaic, standing tall and confident in the older Norseman’s shadow.
Winn circled the men and joined Erich, who was grinding the man’s face into the wood. The clerk screamed his indignation, slobbering a slew of threats, which only came out as an unintelligible mess as he protested his treatment.
“I’ll have yer name!” Erich growled. When the clerk did not answer, Erich picked his head up and slammed it back down, bringing a froth of blood from the man’s lips that splattered the ledger book.
“Tell him yer name,” Winn said, lowering his face close to the man to look him in the eye. If he was the man who beat Gwen, there was no hope to save him. The Norseman had lived peacefully the village for many years, but there was still the beast of a berserker in Erich that flared darkly in his eyes.
“Hayes, it is! William Hayes!” the clerk cried out. The name came out sounding like yillium aze, but it was clear to Erich, nonetheless.
The long table crashed to the floor, overturned by Erich as the clerk tried to scramble away. Although Hayes hit the floor on his knees and then scurried toward the open door, Erich took his time. Calm now, his face bereft of any hint of emotion, Erich unsheathed his knife and followed the crawling man as a lion might stalk his prey.
Erich threaded his fingers into the man’s hair and pulled his neck sharply back, placing his newly sharpened blade under his chin.
“Coward,” he whispered, his voice as steady as his knife. “Ye lifted yer hand to the wrong woman. A mistake ye shall not make again.”
Winn did not look away. It was his duty to bear witness, to tell Gwen she had been avenged, and he must look upon it as if it was done with his own hand. Blood surged as Erich sliced the man’s throat, a stream pulsing out onto the wide plank floor. Behind them, one of the Englishmen retched.
“Far vel,” Erich muttered, the farewell uttered in his thick Norse tongue. Erich let go and the man slumped to the floor, gurgling and clutching his throat as his skull hit the wood with a sickening crack. They watched him kick in his death throes until he choked and ceased to stir, and only then did Winn glance at the Englishmen who were left. They huddled together by a window, as far away from the dead clerk as they could manage to get in such a small space.
When the one with fresh vomit on his jacket made a move toward the door, Winn met the man’s gaze and shook his head.
“Stay and you will live,” Winn said. The flighty Englishman stepped quickly back with the others, cowering when Cormaic approached.
“Aye, ye shall live – fer now. Many thanks fer keeping quiet, friends. I should not wish ye to meet his fate,” Cormaic commented, tipping his head toward the dead clerk. The remaining Englishmen eagerly nodded, wordless in agreement with the beast of a Norseman. There was a collective sigh from the bunch when Winn and the men left.
John Basse had retreated a distance away, choosing to wait near the square. Keke explained John heard the scuffle and was none too eager to walk away when Keke made the suggestion. Winn thanked the young brave. It was better for them all if John Basse did not truly know what had occurred inside.
“Oh, good! Ye all seem hale and hearty. I take it ye honored my counsel and resolved yer business peaceably?” John asked. Cormaic thumped John on the shoulder as he passed by, eliciting a startled whoop from the Christian as the breath was forced from his chest.
Winn looked ahead at Erich, who was making his way in a decisive manner toward the tavern with the rest of their party. John grimaced as he rubbed his arm, following Winn as they left.
“Resolved?” Winn replied. “Yes, I suppose it is.”
CHAPTER 10
Maggie
the bucket splashed her skirts as she walked despite her attempt to keep it from smacking against her knee. Maggie knew she was not the most skilled worker in the village, yet she carried on with her tasks regardless of the snickers and teasing from the other women.
Across the courtyard, Ellie sat beneath a thatched overhang with those who knew how to weave. As Maggie passed by, Ellie smiled and quickly ducked her head back to her weaving. It was just one more task that everyone knew Maggie was completely inept at, and as such she was never invited to sit with the group. Gwen claimed it was out of respect, that the other women would not presume to ask the Chief’s wife to do such things. Maggie knew it was just Gwen’s way of softening the blow.
Truth was, there was nothing Maggie could do that would earn her their respect. She was painfully aware her only value surged in her blood, and most times, she did not understand why even that fact should make a difference. Yes, she was wife to Winn and mother to his children. Yet the twenty-first century woman inside her struggled with accepting her place.
As she set the bucket down inside the door of her longhouse, the men returned to the village. The playful banter coming from the weaving house immediately ceased and the women paused in their duties. It was not the usual greeting given to the men, but it was no simple day of hunting they had returned from, as every person left in the village was keenly aware.
Winn handed his horse off to one of the young boys. She noticed he did not speak to her uncle, or acknowledge the other men as he left them. Even across the span of the courtyard, she could see the distress etched into his face. Whatever had happened, she was sure he would tell her, but she counted each of the men even so. Yes, they had all returned.
He brushed her arm with his fingertips as he passed by, entering their longhouse without a word. She closed the door and followed him inside, unease washing through her.
“Winn?” she said soft
ly. He discarded his weapons into a pile by the fire, taking care to settle his father’s knife on the mantle. When he reached to shed his tunic she placed her hands over his, helping him untie the strings and pull it over his head. It was a gesture that often made him smile; his lack of response only served to frighten her further.
“What happened?” she asked.
He raised his eyes to hers.
“Gwen is avenged,” he replied. Maggie sighed as he looked away, focusing his gaze on the fire instead of her.
“And you’re home safe. All of you,” she said. He nodded.
“For now. For now, we are all safe,” he murmured. “Sit, wife. I would have your ear for a moment.”
She wanted to declare he could have any part of her he wished, but she could see it was not the time for such words. It tore at her to see him so pained, as if what he meant to tell her was something so terrible he could not bear to speak it.
“Your father is a man named Sturlsson,” he said. She nodded, not surprised. She knew he was a Sturlsson, but she did not know his first name. It did not matter to her, nor should it matter to Winn, and it was not worth causing her aunt or uncle stress by asking upon it.
“So why should I know this?” she said.
“He is the tobacco inspector for Elizabeth City. Agnarr Sturlsson is a powerful man, one who does the Governor’s bidding. He –”
“Wait…what did you say? Agnarr?” she interrupted. The events of the day prior rushed back. Sending the children off, hiding in the woods with Benjamin. Watching helplessly as Gwen was beaten.
Watching the way that man’s face looked when he stared into the woods where she hid, disgust and triumph seared into his sculpted features as if torturing women was just another day’s work.
“Yes.”
“You knew he was alive,” she whispered. She sat down, as the floor seemed to drop from beneath her feet.
“I did.”
“Why tell me now? Why am I suddenly worthy of the truth?” she asked, trying to keep her voice steady. She did not wish to rail at him, yet the sting of betrayal was too harsh.
“Because we must take a new path if we wish to see our children grow old,” he said, his voice low. “I cannot protect us here. If Sturlsson discovers you, he will bring the force of the English down upon this place.”
Winn turned his back to her, placing his hands upon the mantle. Across his thick back, his muscles surged tight, tense as he lowered his head. “What they did to the Blooded Ones…in the time of my father’s father…I will never let that happen to you. To you – or our children.”
“Tell me all of it,” she said. The sting of her jagged nails bit into her palms as she clutched her hands in her lap, trying her best to beat down the betrayal in her heart.
“Those of your kind,” he said quietly, “the women…they were fought over. Those of your blood have all the power – power to bend time, control the Bloodstone, to heal the dead…and to bear children who can do the same. As long as you can bear children, men like Sturlsson will hunt you.”
“And when I can no longer have children? What use am I then to someone like my father?” she whispered.
“You can bring life to the dead.”
“I cannot heal the dead. Only the newborns have that gift,” she said.
“It is not only the newborns who hold that power.”
She swallowed hard.
He turned to her, his pained blue eyes meeting hers.
“You can heal the dead,” he replied. “By giving your life.”
She knew the way it worked, but until that moment she had not considered the horror of what it meant. A few drops of blood from her infant son’s heel had saved Makedewa once; her own blood smeared on a Bloodstone had brought her to the past. Yet the magic was nearly a myth to her, spoken of only in whispers and guarded by the men she loved. The reality of what it truly meant to those who came before her was so much more.
“Sturlsson needs a Blooded One to travel through time, he is not powerful enough alone. He would use you to return to his time, and then he would take your life to save his father.”
“Our children…”
“All of our children are Blooded,” Winn said quietly. “Do you know how powerful a child would be, born from a Blooded man and woman?”
She shook her head, refusing to acknowledge the horror of what he implied as he kneeled down beside her. He gathered her fingers between his warm hands, lowering his head into her lap.
“It is your right to know this,” he said. “Yet, still, I would not tell it to you if there was no need.”
“Why keep it from me? I – I trust you with my life. Have you no trust in me?” she asked.
He pulled her into his arms, his lips pressed into her hair.
“I trust you with all I have, ntehem. The burden of fear is a heavy one,” he said. “It is only that I wished to carry it for you.”
Later she checked on the babe in his cradle at her bedside, and Winn reluctantly left her. Although she wished him to stay, she understood he had taken time away from his duties and she knew he needed to return to the men. He left her with a few tender kisses and a pledge to return soon, and she settled down to rest on their pallet.
Alone in her thoughts, it was then that she cried. She was not certain what drove the emotion, whether it was the worry over the danger her father presented or the numbing hum of grief that still plagued her over losing Rebecca, but it consumed her. Even when she clenched her eyes tightly shut, it haunted her. Her family would always be in jeopardy, forever hunted. Despite the magic in her blood, she was powerless in the face of the danger before them.
The door creaked, stirring her from her shallow sleep, and she smiled knowing her husband had returned. He knew her weakness, he called it her strength. She needed his arms around her to feel that certainty once more.
Expecting a gentle greeting, she was stunned when a hand gripped her wrist and jerked her painfully up off the pallet.
“What the –” she yelped as Makedewa dragged her to her feet. She stumbled over the loose bedding and struggled to right herself, trying to wrench her hand away from him without success.
“Quiet!” he hissed. Torn between relief at seeing him and confusion at his behavior, she could not hide her rising annoyance. Even knowing what a hothead he was, his behavior was strange even for him, and she tried to stem the suspicion rising in her gut. His face was shielded in the darkness of the longhouse so she could not see if he smiled or sneered, but from the way he twisted her wrist she suspected the latter. Even in the darkness, she could feel the menace in his touch and smell the reek of danger emanating from him.
“What are you doing? You’ll wake your son!” she whispered. He stilled at her words, and she stopped struggling against him when he moved closer to the cradle. She could see the outline of his face there as a sliver of moonlight shone down on him through the smoke-hole.
She saw no gentle loving gaze in his countenance, rather what laid there she was at loss to put words to. It was a stranger she stood next to, staring down at the infant as if he would smother the child in his sleep rather than claim him as his son.
“Come with me. Make no sound,” he demanded. When she opened her mouth, he shook her hard and then she felt the pierce of a blade against her side. She glanced down at the newborn in the cradle and then at her three sleeping children. None of them stirred, and for that she was grateful. Seeing their beloved uncle behave like a mad man would only frighten them.
He took her from the safety of the longhouse and she did not fight him. Whatever he had in mind, she knew he was as troubled as she was, and to see him so rankled and fearsome caused the sickness in her belly to surge stronger. When he pulled her down the path through the woods, she saw he was leading her toward the hill where Rebecca was buried. Perhaps he only wanted privacy, and the roguish way he was treating her was his way of asking. Makedewa had never been one to share his feelings without strong persuasion.
“Uncle?”
He jerked her around at the sound of Dagr’s voice. Dagr stood watching them at the end of the wood line, his eyes wide with confusion.
“Go back to sleep, Dagr. We’re just talking,” she said, her voice steady. Makedewa’s hand tightened on her upper arm.
“But Ma–”
“I said go!” she insisted.
Dagr rubbed his sleepy eyes with one curled fist and nodded.
“Aye, Mama. It’s good to see yer home, Uncle,” he said with a yawn. She let out her breath in a grateful rush as Dagr turned and went back toward the longhouse. Makedewa grunted something coarse and resumed pulling her along without haste.
She stumbled as they neared the grave and he released her wrist. Rubbing her bruised hand, she watched him walk a few paces away, then turn back to her. His eyes, always dark, were like burnt embers in an empty shell. Although things were far from pleasant in their relationship, she cared for him as a brother and it twisted her heart to see him in such pain.
“I’m glad you’re back. We were all worried about you,” she said. At her words he gave her his back, and she heard him utter a snort as she approached.
“Speak no lies to me, Red Woman. You worry for no one, save yourself.”
Despite her desire to comfort him, his accusation hurt her and she lashed out in return.
“Oh, do I? Is that why I have been caring for your son? Is that why I feed him from my own breast, as if he were my own? You’re not the only one who lost her! We all miss Rebecca–”
He was on her in the next moment, his fingers wrapped tightly around her throat. Her vision blurred as he squeezed.
“You know nothing of what I feel. I will not hear her name from your lips,” he growled. His grip loosened and she sputtered into a coughing fit as the air surged back into her lungs.
“I loved her, too,” she whispered. She dared to speak the words, knowing it would inflame him even more, but unable to keep the truth from tumbling past her lips. His face shattered then, his eyes glossy with unshed tears as his mouth fell slightly open.
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