He was big. Very big.
Panic rose like bile in the
back of her throat.
The
rending, the tearing, the burning. Oh God, no
...
She pulled the blanket to her
chin.
“Seems stout enough,” he
said, giving the bed
stead a good shake
before he slid in beside her.
When he reached for her, she stiffened. Why
did pain have to follow the teasing pleasure he’d given her?
He kissed her again, this
time with more urgency.
The full length of
his erect phallus brushed her thigh.
Merciful Mary, I’ll be impaled.
Her breath came in short
gasps. Her skin still shiv
ered, yearning
for his touch. The pleasure would be short-lived now, she
suspected. Jorand was so much
bigger
than—Brenna wouldn’t let herself even think
of
him,
that
Other,
the nameless beast at Clonmac
noise.
But a dark corner of her heart carried the terror of it. And soon
the horror would start afresh, and this time Brenna herself would
suffer the brutal, grinding
rutting.
“No!” She lashed out with her fists at
him.
Jorand pulled back, stunned.
“What’s wrong?”
“I can’t do this.” Brenna
sat up, her knees under her
chin with the
blanket clutched tightly in her hands. “An’ ye force me, I’ll
scream.”
“A scream from you at this
point is only likely to in
crease my
reputation, princess.” His chuckle faded as he
realized she was in earnest. “What is this
foolishness?”
“ ‘Tis not foolishness.
‘Tis the way things are. I’ll not bed you willingly, Northman,
husband or no.”
When he started to reach
for her, she straight-armed
him. “If ye
take me by force, ye’d best sleep lightly or
ye’ll wake with a dirk in your ribs. Before God Almighty, I
swear it.”
Even in the dim light,
Brenna saw his eyes harden.
A muscle
twitched in his cheek.
“If I wouldn’t let your
sister be taken unwilling,
what makes you
think I’d do it to you?”
He was right. The injustice
of her accusation stung,
but she wouldn’t
back down.
“I’ve said me piece,”
Brenna said, fighting to keep
her voice
from trembling. Her insides roiled with
fear and a nameless confusion. Surely this was what
she wanted. “What’s it to be?”
Wordlessly, he rolled off
the bed and stepped into
his leggings.
Then her husband grabbed one of the blankets and jerked it off
her.
“Enjoy your marriage bed,
princess. I’ll trouble
you no more.” His
voice held the bitterness of rejec
tion.
He stomped to the far side of the fire and stretched out on the
ground.
Brenna sighed. She slid
down under the thin linens,
now shivering
with cold instead of fear. Her body re
belled, still clamoring for release.
The merrymaking outside
their hut continued to blaze in raucous glory. Huddled in the bed,
Brenna
realized her first night as a wife
would be long.
And lonely.
Brenna was surprised to
find herself in the glade. She in
haled
deeply, drinking in the moist green scent of the river
Shannon. A light breeze soughed through the stand
of aspen on the bank, the trees huddled like a trio of skinny
spinsters dipping their toes in the water. Brenna stretched
out on a flat, gray-speckled boulder and let her
feet dangle
in the rushing current.
Sunlight filtered through the trees,
kissing her cheeks with small patches of warmth. She
closed
her eyes and let the peace of this
secluded place sink into
her
bones.
A jaunty whistled tune made
her eyes pop open and she
sat up, looking
for the source of the sound.
It was only old Murtaugh,
the abbey’s sexton. With his
stooped spine
and leathery, wrinkled neck, he reminded
Brenna of an ancient tortoise. Murtaugh was the only
man
within the walls of the cloister who
hadn’t taken a vow of
celibacy, though at
his advanced age, Brenna scarcely
thought
it worth the trouble.
“
God be wi’ye, Sister,”
Murtaugh said, struggling un
der the
weight of a coarse sack on his bent back.
Brenna tucked her bare feet
up under her tunic, embarrassed to have been caught enjoying
herself so freely. She was about to return his greeting with a
pious sentiment of her own, when she noticed the sack rolling and
bunching.
Muffled cries reached Brenna’s
ears.
“
What is it ye’ve got there?”
“
Och, ‘tis only a wee
litter o kittens born in the abbey
last night. The tabby what whelped ‘em crept out and
left
‘em mewlin’ and starvin’, poor
things,” he said with a shake
of his
grizzled head.
When he set the bag down
and opened it, the kittens bleated their hungry lament all the
louder. The old man
reached in with a
gnarled hand and stroked a little calico.
“
There’s naught to spare
for ‘em, so ‘tis up to me to take
care
of ‘em.” Murtaugh’s voice was throaty and rasping.
“
And if there’s naught to spare, how can
ye do that?”
The old man closed up the
sack and tied a strap around
the opening,
cinching it tight. “Why, the only way to ease
their sufferin’ is to drown ‘em, o’course.”
Murtaugh heaved up the
sack, swung it over his head,
and loosed
it into the air.
Before the bag of kittens
hit the water, Brenna heard a
distinctively different sound escape from it. Another
cry
mingled with the terrified meowing.
With a sharp pang in
her chest, Brenna
recognized the cry of a human baby.
“
No!”
She staggered into the
water, flailing after the disap
pearing
sack. Her foot slipped and she fell headlong, water
shooting up her nose. She fought to regain her
footing, but
suddenly felt a surprisingly
strong grip on the base of her
neck.
Murtaugh’s bony,
liver-spotted hands clasped around her throat. The old man’s
croaking voice carried down
to her through
the water, distorted and wavering.
“
The only thing for it
is to drown ‘em,” Murtaugh kept
repeating as he forced her head deeper beneath the
surface.
No, this was all wrong.
Murtaugh was her friend. She
writhed and
struggled, her lungs threatening to burst out
of her chest. The water was too full of sediment to see
anything clearly. Her last precious breath exploded from
her
lips in a blur of bubbles. Pinpoints
of light burst in her
brain. The need to
breathe was growing unbearable. She
felt
her mind spiraling, floating away with the current,
leaving her body behind.
Brenna could stand no more. She inhaled.
The rush of oxygen into her lungs was sweeter
than honeyed fruit. Brenna’s body jerked as she woke. She breathed
again, testing the air to make sure this wasn’t more of the dream.
A hint of smoke reached her nostrils as she eased into a sitting
position.
The nightmares were getting worse. Brenna
shook her head, trying to clear the hysteria of the dream from her
mind. She clapped her hands over her ears. She could still hear the
child’s cry. Brenna closed her eyes and bit her lower lip till it
throbbed.
When she opened her eyes and cautiously
lowered her hands, all she heard was the steady drip of light rain
through the smoke hole, pattering on the stones of the fire ring. A
lark trilled. During the night, the pinewood blaze had died and
left only a whiff of fragrance as a reminder of its passing.
Through the smoke hole, the sky was a pearly gray expanse that
betokened approaching dawn.
On the other side of the fire pit, she made
out the sleeping form of her husband. Jorand was stretched out on
his side, facing away from her, as though even looking at her by
chance was distasteful to him.
She watched his back expand
with each breath.
Her
chest ached, remembering the fierce look in his eyes. She
knew he had a right to be angry, but she couldn’t have done
anything else. If she’d let him take her last night, the growing
tenderness she felt for him would have been destroyed
forever.
She wouldn’t blame him if he hated her for
her refusal. But she was willing to suffer his loathing if only
she was not forced to hate him.
Brenna shivered, then slipped out of bed and
put on her tunic. She tried to run a horn comb through her wild
tresses, but soon gave it up as hopeless.
The cock crowed.
They’d be coming soon, the early morning
well-wishers and nosy matrons intent on inspecting the marriage bed
for signs of consummation. In a panic, she glanced back at her
bridal bower. The blankets were neat, the linens barely disturbed.
She’d slept huddled miserably on her side of the broad bed without
venturing over the center line even once.
Brenna climbed back into the bed, pulling the
linens from their tucked corners and balling the blankets at the
foot. When she eased off and inspected it this time, the bed gave
the definite impression that a rousing tussle had taken place.
But the linens were clean. No virginal blood
was shed. Her shame would become grist for the good-wives’ wagging
tongues and her new husband would be sniggered at and despised by
all for a cuckold.
Her Northman made no sign of waking while she
rustled around. Perhaps she could settle the problem without his
knowledge.
She searched Jorand’s pile of discarded
clothing for the horn-handled dagger he always carried and breathed
a sigh of relief when she found it. She climbed into the bed again
and smoothed back the sheets. Then she unwound the cloth binding
her hand. All she needed was a few drops. If she could reopen the
wound—
A hand reached from behind her, clamping her
wrist in a firm grip. She whirled to face him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Her
husband’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“I—” The fury in his face closed off her
throat. She’d defrauded him on their wedding night. How could she
admit she was about to falsify evidence of purity lost?
His fingers tightened on her wrist till she
dropped the blade.
“You’re hurting me,” she whimpered.
“That’s the least of your worries considering
the hurt you were about to do yourself.” He released her and picked
up the dagger. Then he shoved it into its sheath and tossed it back
onto his pile of clothing. As Brenna watched, the fire ebbed from
his eyes and he sank wearily down on the mattress, turning from
her.
“I know you can’t bear me, Brenna,” he said
softly. “But you don’t need to do away with yourself to escape me.
I’ll not trouble you again.”
Brenna’s breath caught in her throat and she
reached out, meaning to touch him on the shoulder, but drew her
hand back instead.
Maybe ‘tis better this
way
. If Jorand thought she didn’t fancy
him, perhaps she’d never have to tell him the real reason behind
her refusal. She’d told the tale to no one but her father and it
was like being eviscerated alive to speak the words even that once.
She didn’t think she could do it again.
“I thank ye,” Brenna said, her voice small
and quavering. She eased down to sit beside him, careful to avoid
touching him.
His shoulders slumped and he leaned forward
to rest his weight on his elbows, his hands on the back of his
head. The urge to give in, to grant him the comfort of her body
was strong, however painful it might be to her. Her heart ached for
him and she suddenly knew this was the man she could have loved all
her life. If only...
And
she knew with equal certainty she couldn’t let a lie hang
between them.
“Ye are mistook on two counts,” she said in a
whisper. “I wasn’t after doing away with meself. Only the Lord God
Almighty can decide when ‘tis time for me to leave this world. To
take upon meself that which is His alone,” she shuddered at the
presumption, “ ‘twould have been a mortal sin. Did Father Michael
not explain such things afore ye were christened?”
“Guess the priest missed some of the finer
points of your faith,” he said, still studying the stone pavers
between his feet with complete absorption. “What else am I wrong
about?”
“ ‘Tis not ye I cannot bear, Jorand,” she
said. “ ‘Tis meself.”
His gaze slid sideways toward her, a puzzled
frown knotting his brows. “I don’t understand you, Brenna. But I
want to.”
Jorand flopped back on the bed, an arm draped
over his eyes. “I thought and thought last night before I finally
fell asleep. I had plenty of time to do it. That floor isn’t as
soft as it looks, you know.”