“Her name is Brenna, not Irish. And you know
nothing about her.”
“I know that little Irish
whore has no knowledge of
our ways and
doesn’t understand a thing I say to her,” Solveig said with
vehemence, hands fisted at her slender waist. “At least I would
have picked
someone who’d be useful for
more than occasionally
warming your bed
when I’m indisposed.”
She paced away from him, then wheeled back,
cocking her head in question. “Is she good at warming your
bed?”
“Solveig, that’s enough.”
He clamped his lips together. Bedding Brenna was definitely not
some
thing he was prepared to discuss with
her.
“It’s all right. You can
tell me everything. I want to
hear about
it.” Solveig floated toward him, pale eyes
gleaming, a feline hardness sparking in their icy depths. “Is
she soft and willing? Does she lay there like a lump, or does she
know what she wants? And how to get it?”
She reached out a
long-fingered hand and slid it
up under
his shirt, raking his chest with her nails. His
skin shivered under her touch.
“Does she please you as
much as I do?” She kissed
him, her lips
hard on his, demanding a response. Jo
rand
felt her nipples, pebble hard, as she melded
her
self against him.
“No, of course not,” Solveig answered her own
question. “She doesn’t know you like I do.” Her hands fluttered
over his groin.
It wasn’t a seduction. It
was an assault. She did know his body. Solveig had always known
where to
touch, when to caress and when to
hurt, how to drive
him to a
berserkr
frenzy of lust.
He fought to maintain
control, but his
body roused to her anyway.
A throaty chuckle escaped
her lips. She slid a hand
down his trews
and grazed his erection, sending a
painful
ache along the hardened shaft.
“It’s been a long time.
Still, it’s nice to know some
things
haven’t changed,” she all but purred.
Jorand yanked her hand out
of his breeches, grasped her by the shoulders and held her at
arm’s
length.
Ja,
she was still beautiful, still
made his blood
run hot, but in her eyes
all he saw was lust and tri
umph. She’d
help him, he knew, if he wanted power
or
land or command of a host of men. His success
would increase her stature. Lovemaking with Solveig
had always been a mirror of their marriage,
rough
and fiery, sating their body’s
appetites, but ultimately
selfish. Both of
them used the other for their own ends.
When Brenna was in his
arms, he reveled in the feel
of her, the
little sounds she made when she lost her
self in him, but mostly he loved looking into her soft
gray eyes and seeing the way she trusted him. It
made him want to be as fine a man as she thought him.
Solveig saw him as he was.
Brenna saw the man he
could be.
Which did he want?
“You’re wrong, Solveig,” he said quietly as
he turned and strode to the door. A walk in the cold rain was just
what he needed. “Some things have changed.”
“Come out of there, ye wee
foul reminder of original
sin,” Brenna
said, as she yanked the stubborn root of
a
cankerwort. She grunted with effort and suddenly the plant released
its hold on the earth, sending her reeling backward to land on her
bottom with a thud.
She scrambled to her feet,
beating dust off the back
of her skirt
with one hand, and surveyed the rows of
turnips with satisfaction. Only thriving plants now swayed in
the breeze, the promise of a good harvest
with not a single foxtail or thistle left to be sifted
out.
She shoved her hair back out of her
eyes, leaving a
grimy smudge of dirt on
her forehead, and picked up
the watering
bucket.
After Father Armaugh gave
her absolution for her
sins, he let Brenna
claim sanctuary in his tiny church.
She
didn’t have to return to Solveig’s house to suffer
watching Jorand reunite with his first wife.
Despite
Jorand’s protest, the priest
allowed Brenna to stay
. Then Armaugh did
the next
best thing for her.
He put her to work.
From before matins till well after vespers,
Brenna scrubbed the stone flooring of the nave, polished the altar,
trimmed the candles in the apse behind the chancel and swept the
walkways to and from the church door. After she’d made the small
house of worship sparkle like a jewel, she tackled the overgrown
garden with the vehemence of Samson slaying the Philistines. Only
her choice of weapon differed—a hoe instead of the jawbone of an
ass.
The labor was blessedly numbing. Throughout
the day, she managed to keep thoughts of Jorand at bay. But at
night, until she sank into exhausted sleep, visions of her husband
with Solveig danced salaciously before her eyes.
Her dreams were no comfort either.
Jorand had come to the church a few times,
looking for her. She huddled behind the sturdy oak door, listening
at the crack.
“If ye wish to worship, ye are always welcome
in the House of God, my son,” Father Armaugh had told him. “But if
ye are after troubling Brenna, then I’ll ask ye kindly to be taking
your leave. She has no wish to see ye. The lass is at peace and
I’ll not be having ye disturb her.”
Part of her wanted Jorand to batter down the
door and disturb her anyway. But if he intended to take her back to
Solveig’s home, it was just as well he left each time without
her.
“
Ave amicus!”
An unfamiliar voice called out to her over the
churchyard fence, interrupting her thoughts.
Hail, friend,
the voice had
said.
Brenna looked up from her watering to see a
fresh-faced Norse woman about her own age with a wreath of coppery
curls circling her head like a fiery halo. The woman leaned on the
fence separating them and smiled. It was an easy, open expression.
Her wide mouth was creased with tiny lines at the corners, lips
that were accustomed to smiling. There was no trace of guile in the
woman’s face.
Brenna’s own mouth turned up in response.
“Hello, friend,” Brenna answered back in the
crisp liturgical Latin Father Michael had taught her. “I’m called
Brenna of Donegal. Who are you?”
“Oh, you do know Latin. I’m so glad!” The
woman’s smile widened further. “He said you were educated. I was
afraid we wouldn’t be able to speak with each other.”
“Who said I was educated?”
“Jorand, of course.” The young woman
sauntered down to the gate and let herself into the churchyard. “He
told me all about you. My name is Rika Magnusdottir.”
“Rika,” Brenna repeated, the Latin leeching
away her usual lilting accent. “He has told me of you as well.
You’re his friend Bjorn’s wife, yes?”
“That’s right.” She took the empty bucket
from Brenna’s hand and linked elbows with her. “Jorand has talked
so much about you, I feel I know you already.”
So Jorand still thought of her often enough
to warrant a mention to his friends. The small candle of hope
kindled in her chest, but she pinched off the wick before it could
burst into full flame. Her carefully constructed peace depended
upon maintaining no expectation beyond the passing of each day. She
couldn’t bear to hope.
“I thought you and your
husband were confined to
your fjord,”
Brenna said. She immediately regretted her words. The woman might
take offense at the reminder of her husband’s brush with Norse
justice.
“So we were,” Rika
acknowledged with a nod and no trace of resentment. “But Bjorn’s
three years of
punishment are ended and he
had an itch to travel
once more. We came
to trade in Dublin and to see Jo
rand as
well. We’d never met his wife, you see, and then to learn once we
reached Dublin that he had
two.” Rika’s
face crumpled into a grimace. “It was a
complete shock, given what I know of Jorand. A bit of
a surprise for him and Solveig, too, for us to
show up
suddenly on their threshold. Still
in all, Solveig has been a gracious hostess.”
Brenna had nothing to say.
“But after Jorand told us
of you, I wanted to meet
you, too,” Rika
rattled on quickly. “In fact, we barely
missed you when we arrived earlier in the week.
Though I gather it was just as well to let the
three of
you have a moment to yourselves
before house-guests descended.”
Rika was looking at her
intently, as if she willed
Brenna to read
more into her words. Bjorn and Rika
had
arrived on the heels of the same rainstorm she escaped into on
Father Armaugh’s skinny arm. So Jorand and his first wife weren’t
the only residents of the little wattle-and-daub longhouse. She’d
been torturing herself with images of her husband and
Solveig alone together. Perhaps her imagination
wasn’t the truth of what was actually happening. The weight
on
Brenna’s heart eased a bit.
“Let’s go have a seat
somewhere and get to know
each other
better, shall we?” Rika suggested. “Does
the priest keep any mead on hand?”
“Mead, no,” Brenna said, her lip curving
again impishly. Brother Armaugh had left for the market before Rika
arrived. Since he did most of his evangelizing while buying
provisions, she knew he’d be gone most of the afternoon. “But I do
know where he stores the wine.”
“
In
vino Veritas,”
Rika quoted. “Shall we see if we can discover a
little truth together?”
Brenna couldn’t have said why she felt so
instantly comfortable with Rika. Perhaps it was the other woman’s
frank friendliness, so different from the mistrustful glares she’d
received from the other women of Dublin, even some of the ones who
came to worship in Armaugh’s church. Or maybe it was because Rika’s
glorious red hair reminded her of Moira, her dear sister and
trusted confidant. But Brenna suspected she felt an instant
connection with Rika because they were linked to the same man whom
they both cared for in vastly different ways— Jorand.
She led Rika into the small stone church and
was surprised when the Norse woman genuflected and crossed
herself.
“You are Christian?”
“
Ja,”
Rika said simply. Brenna noticed for the first
time that a silver cross dangled from one of Rika’s two brooches.
“Our own Father Dominic drives a hard bargain. I had no choice but
to convert. At first, it was just so he would marry Bjorn and me,
but now ...” she glanced shyly at Brenna, “now, it’s
personal.”
“Jorand had to take the sign of the cross
before me Da would see us wed as well,” Brenna confided. It felt
good to talk about Jorand.
“Did he? Oh, I’m so glad. When we saw him
last, Jorand still followed Thor. He was adamant against the
Kristr. He must love you well.”
“Or loved what marrying me
gained him.”
His freedom to leave
Donegal,
Brenna reminded
herself.
The two women tiptoed through the nave to the
sacristy, a cell off the chancel where the sacred vessels and
vestments were stored. Brenna found a bottle of
as-yet-unconsecrated wine and two obviously unholy drinking horns,
then went back out through the church.
They settled themselves in a shady alcove in
the yard and poured out the wine.
“What shall we drink to?” Rika asked as the
ruby-colored liquid splashed into her horn. “I know. How about
men?”
Brenna shrugged noncommittally and filled her
own drinking vessel.
“To men, then,” Rika went on. “May they never
know as much about women as they think they do.”
For the first time since she learned of
Solveig’s existence, a giggle escaped Brenna’s lips. She touched
the rim of her horn to Rika’s, then let the wine slide down her
throat, cool and smooth. The vintage had a definite bite and an
aftertaste of the oak cask it had been aged in.
“My thanks,” Rika said as she tipped back her
horn. “I was that dry.”
“Weeding is thirsty work as well.”
“Jorand told us what happened,” Rika said,
her expression suddenly serious. “His loss of memory, the way you
found him, everything. He told us the harm Kolgrim did as
well.”
Brenna felt a flash of
warmth in her cheeks. The shame of her sister’s rape and the story
of the lost
child weren’t topics she was
prepared to discuss with
a stranger, even
one as pleasant as Rika. How could
Jorand
spread her secrets like they were so many bar
ley seeds to be broadcast about?
“Did he?”
“But don’t worry. Jorand
will get the Skellig
Michael Codex back
for you. I can certainly see why
you’d
want to return such a treasure to your old abbey.”