Éire’s Captive Moon (30 page)

Eir tilted her head, her small chin lifted in that defiance he had not yet been able to take from her. “With you taking a bride, then, will her own servants come with her?”

“Of course,” he replied, tugging the hood of her cloak from her head and untying the cord that held the undyed wool around her neck. “And you’ll be staying here, too.” Ignoring her stiffness, he pulled her into his arms. “I think I’ll need to finally build a separate space for the slaves, if the family is getting too big for all of us to live under this roof.”

The healer pushed away and stumbled out of his arms. “I’ll not be staying alone in one room with that—that man!” she spat, clenching her fists. “I won’t!”

Agnarr frowned and unconsciously reached for his knife’s hilt. “You are mine, Eir,” he said. “No one would dare touch you.” He knew that the monk and the medicine woman hated one another, but did it matter? Evidently she thought so. “I will have Magda sell him when we wed. She will not require a storyteller and you are here to care for any other needs she may have.”

Eir folded her arms over her chest and turned from him. “I would rather . . .” she began, before her voice faltered. Still not looking at him, she tried again. “I would serve someone else, when you are married. Another.”

Unacceptable. “You are mine.”

“I’ll leave! Now!”

He heard a strange sound in her voice, a tone he had never associated with his
leman
before. Desperation. His response was not planned. He reached for her, pulling her back against himself, his arms around her body and his face in her hair. She had washed it, apparently, while tending to the women, and it smelled of mint. She always smelled of mint. “No,” he heard himself growl into the pale silk of her hair. “You won’t. I’m keeping you.”

“I won’t be alone with that man,” she repeated, leaning against him.

Agnarr counted this as a victory and a rush of blood heated his body. That strange tenderness toward her flooded through him. “Now,” he said, turning her to face him.

She held still as if encased in ice. “Are you not needed in the bathing house?”

His obligations meant little to him in his need for her. “There is time.” He picked her up and took her to his bed, and tried hard not to think that by this time tomorrow he would be wed to Magda Elsdottir. He did not know what this woman was thinking, but he knew how she responded to him and that encouraged him to take longer, perhaps, than he should have to leave the longhouse.

But he did gather his wedding finery together at long last and opened the door. Cold air poured in as if it were liquid, flowing over his flushed skin and making a refreshing trail into the shady confines of the house. Eir was still on the bench bed, her hair spreading over the furs like moonbeams, even in the middle of the day. Her pale skin was exposed until the first frigid wash of air reached her. Then she slipped a slender arm under the heavy fur blanket and watched him with large, too-far-seeing eyes.

“I should not be here this night,” she offered.

He couldn’t seem to take his eyes from her, though his body was poised to leave. “Perhaps not. Where would you go?” It was winter, after all. He could not take his bride and find a quiet spot for the two of them tonight. Nor could he ask his family to leave the house unless he had a place to send them.

“I do not know. No one is birthing a child this night, nor are any wounded in need of my skills.”

“You are right,” he acknowledged. “My bride and I should be alone. I will find where my mother and brother are staying and you will go with them.”

His healer turned from him and faced the wall next to the bed. He turned, too, closing the door behind him.

The sun was weak, but it shone enough to make the hardened snow drifts sparkle against the houses in the village. Children were running in and out of the far gate, seeking anything that could be used as fuel. Their laughter carried far through the cold air. So did the conversations that came from small groups of people out to enjoy the sunlight. The men waved to him as he passed, some with knowing smiles, others with joking condolences about taking on a wife. Women beamed smiles to him, bright as the snow, and told him to hurry along.

“She’s been out of the bathing house for a long time, getting ready, Halvardson,” they chided good-naturedly, shooing him along with their aprons, tunics or wet washing. “And you’ll be wanting to shave that winter beard off your face. No bride wants that against her skin!”

Feminine laughter followed Agnarr as he crunched over snow and slogged through a few muddy places where snow had begun to thaw with the passage of many feet. Tracks in the paths led to the bathing house, to the house he knew to be Els’s. There were tracks to the well, to the gates, some more easily seen than others. He followed the ones that led to the bathing house, behind Els’s house and around past the cold forge of the smith.

Friends and family waited for him outside the bathhouse.

“Agnarr!” Bjørn called, a knowing grin on his face, his gray-blue eyes dancing underneath heavy blond brows. “We’ve been waiting for you.” Agnarr’s brother brandished a sharp knife for shaving. “All of us,” he added with a pointed glance at the other men in front of the bathhouse.

Tuirgeis and his newly adopted brother were there. The latter annoyed Agnarr, but he could not ask Kingson to leave. Els was there, his brother Erik and young Erik the Hardheaded, too. With himself, there would be six in the bathing house. He smiled at them all, but did not offer either excuse or apology for his tardiness. “It was good of you to come,” he said instead. “Let’s get out of the cold!”

“
Ja
!”
 

“Let’s!
 

“About time!” The men laughed, the air clouding visibly in front of their faces. They pushed open the fur-covered door and entered.

The bathhouse was a one-room structure. Agnarr entered first, seeing the full fire—the
nauthiz—
and the pile of hot stones the water—
uruz
—would be poured over to make steam. There were birch branches stacked near the buckets of water. They would have been softened earlier, making them more pliable to cleanse without pain.

All the men stripped and piled their clothing on the floor under the benches that lined the walls of the bathhouse. Agnarr also laid out his newest clothing: a heavily flanneled tunic made of red wool, bright yellow trousers, and an embroidered belt. He wore Thor’s talisman around his neck as always.

As the eldest, Els spoke in the traditional way. “You will be taking my daughter into your house, Agnarr Halvardson,” the elder intoned as he and the other men handed Agnarr soap and twigs to help scrub his “bachelorhood” away. “As a husband and father, you will have new obligations.”

“Tell me, Els. I am listening,” Agnarr said, in the manner he believed to be most respectful. It was customary. The wedding day traditions had many parts, and this was one of them.

The older man stroked his beard as he sat on the longest bench of the bathing house. Steam rose as someone poured melted snow onto the hot rocks. This hiss preceded Els’s next speech. “You will be obligated to care for my daughter. You will give her a warm home in winter, and good food in harvest. You will give her children and give them your name and protection, granting them a portion as your heirs.”

“I will,” Agnarr promised.

“Your duties as a father are to raise the children, teaching the boys the way of the sword and axe and spear. You will see to it that they can make a living, by farming or herding or in some craft. Until they are weaned, they remain my daughter’s children.”

The men tensed at this point, their hands stilled in the process of cleansing their skin with the branches. Agnarr himself paused to study Els’s thin face in the orange light of the fire. For a moment, all that could be heard was the crackling of the fire heating the stones and the heavy breathing of men in a hot place.

“I know this, Elder,” Agnarr said at last, maintaining his respectful tones, though his muscles were tense under his wet skin. “And her children will belong to my family. Agnarr’s sons and daughters.” Yes, he wanted sons and daughters.

Els nodded and the tension eased. “You paid the bride price last season. You are prepared with the dowry?”

“Yes, I am.” Agnarr had coin from his raiding that he had set aside for this final price for his wife. “And for the morning after,” he added, with a small smile. The men flashed grins back at him. It was tradition for the groom to pay the bride on the first morning of their marriage—a gift to symbolize their union, and to “recompense” her for sharing her body with him. The morning gift tradition went back so far that no one remembered when it was not given. Long ago, only virgins were so gifted, but now all women were gifted on the morning after they married.

Tuirgeis and Els’s brother, Erik, were also married, and the men bantered back and forth, offering “advice” to Agnarr. He listened, taking their ribbing with good humor, while washing his hair and using a comb to get it in the best order afterward. Young Erik trimmed the bottom for him. Agnarr laughed at the suggestions for how to coax a bride back to bed while he and the other men rinsed off with the water left in the buckets. They were all wishing, he knew, to roll around in the snow by this time. That meant it was time to get dressed and leave.

While he was donning his wedding finery, Agnarr beckoned to Tuirgeis. “Why did you bring him?” he asked, jerking his head toward the red-bearded former
trell
.

“I’m teaching him about our ways, Halvardson. He will need to learn all these things if he is to stay and live as a man among us. I have already heard from two fathers of maidens who wish to wed him.”

Agnarr didn’t even try to hide his surprise. “Already?” He glanced over his shoulder to where Kingson sat, brushing his skin with birch branches and talking quietly with Erik the Hardheaded.

“
Ja
. He will do well among us. See how easily he speaks to the young men. He is a gifted linguist and could be a trade master, if he applied himself.”

Agnarr shrugged and adjusted the sleeves on his tunic. “As you wish, of course. He’s part of your family.” Family, yes. He had a duty. “I wish to be alone this night, with my bride. I wondered if my brother could perhaps stay with your relatives?”

“Actually,” Tuirgeis said, flicking a look to Kingson, “my brother has need again of your healer.”

“Yes,” Agnarr said. “I had seen the seepage through the bandaging. Well, then. Perhaps she could stay with your family this night and my mother and brother could stay with Els. His house will be emptier this night than is usual.”

“I am sure Kingson will appreciate your Moonbeam Healer. He has great respect for her skill.”
 

Agnarr nodded absently. His family and slave seen to, he was now thinking to the wedding. “We’d best be going. The ceremony should be started soon if we’re to have time to feed the village!” Nerves thrummed through him for an unsettling moment. “Men! We must go. Kingson,” he went on, gesturing for the former slave to come to his side. “I understand that you are in need of my healer this night.”

The man’s green eyes went wide in surprise. His face was shadowed, but he stiffened almost defensively, Agnarr thought. “Need Charis?” he strangled out. “H-H-How . . .?”

“Charis?” Oh, her former name. Yes. Irritation churned below his stomach. How dare this man forget himself so? “Eir, you mean. You may
not
speak in your former language.”

“The
kvinn medisin
. How . . . did you know?”

Agnarr curled his lip in some disgust. “The bandaging was evidence enough.”

Kingson rubbed at his upper thigh and winced visibly in the dying light of the fire. “
Ja
. I bandaged it again, but she would want to see it.” Though he was in some pain, Kingson seemed to relax about the shoulders and neck. “I’d appreciate it if you would allow her to come see to it.”

Agnarr nodded, but didn’t answer further. It was time to start the ceremony. “Let’s be away. Magda Elsdottir will be waiting.”

Els himself led the way, followed by his brother, Erik, and then Agnarr passed through the heavy door. Tuirgeis put out the fire with a hissing splash of water. Kingson held the door for his new “brother”, and soon all six men were out in the refreshingly chill air. As they went through the village, they saw their friends and acquaintances gather as well, for the wedding would be held in the center of Balestrand, near the well, since the sun was shining. Els and Erik went to collect Magda and her friends while Agnarr returned to his home to settle arrangements.

The healer was still within the longhouse, her hair plaited again. She eyed him distantly. “You look ready to be wed,” she remarked after a long silence. “What am I to do?”

Her tone gave nothing away, and Agnarr wanted to curse her for being so impassive after all that had happened between them that day. Instead, he clenched his hands into fists and answered with equal apparent distance. “You will gather your surgery supplies and go to the home of Tuirgeis’s relatives.”

She frowned. “Is he hurt, Lord Tuirgeis?”

“No, Kingson’s wounds have reopened.”

“Oh!” Without another sound, she scrambled for her healing herbs and tools, wrapping them in cloth or tucking them into pouches that she tucked around her apron on a belt. She would have gone, but he put out a hand to stop her. “Wait. You will take a sleeping fur, too. You will not be returning tonight.”