“
You may as well admit it,” Jorand said. “You’re a
good captain. You can make a new field dance and sing with a bountiful crop. And there’s no one I’d
rather have at my back in a tight spot, but you’re no
shipwright.” He grinned smugly. Jorand was fast be
coming a master woodworker. The fact that Bjorn
never would be in no way dimmed his captain’s worth in the young man’s eyes. “A man can’t be good at
everything.”
“And sometimes, he’s good at nothing,” Bjorn said
with disgust, his gaze following Rika’s swinging strides
back to the longhouse. She’d brought him water and
changed the bandage on his thigh. Then she scolded
him for standing too long, as though he were an errant
three-year-old. He sensed no tenderness in her con
cern, just irritation that he’d aggravate the wound and further slow his healing, making more work for her.
“
Well, we all have a knack for something,” Jorand
continued cheerfully as he rasped the adze over a long
piece of oak.
A knack? Was that what it took to make a woman
love a man? Bjorn treated her kindly. He kept his vow not to take her unwillingly, though only the gods knew what it cost him. Lying beside her in the darkness, lis
tening to the sweet sigh of her breathing, awash in her scent, brushing up against her softness, the ache of not
bedding her was fast becoming nightly torture. He even took a wound the Fates had meant for her
brother. How many different ways could he show her how he felt about her?
He’d done everything but come
right out and say it.
Bjorn plopped down on an upturned cask.
Was this love he felt? It was certainly a hopeless
burning that left the shallow lusts of his past pale by
comparison. More than simply bedding her, he wanted
Rika’s heart, her mind. He wanted to fill her as completely as she consumed him. He wanted
all
of her.
Inn matki munr
—the mighty passion. Bjorn had
heard of it, of course. The madness that could take a
man’s mind and turn it into a bowl of mush over a
woman. He just never expected it would happen to him.
He watched as Torvald, a respected
karl
and one of
his father’s oldest friends, stopped Rika and spoke a
few words to her. Her laughter floated down the steep path and grated on Bjorn’s ear. What had that old man
said to her?
Why doesn’t she laugh like that for me?
Torvald ambled toward him, down to the beach
where the ships were lined up in various stages of
completion. Some would be sturdy broad-breasted
knorrs,
destined to haul livestock and settlers to new
farmsteads in the Hebrides or the Faroes. Some would
become the lithe, shorter trade ships used to navigate
the shallow inland rivers, easily ported, yet strong
enough to survive white water and haul goods to far away Miklagard, the great city of the south.
And some would be
drakars,
the warships that left death in their wake and brought riches to the men bold enough to go viking in the shallow-drafting vessels. But Bjorn knew Gunnar didn’t intend the new
dragonships for raiding. No, the
jarl
would use the
drakars
for his personal war, his own dream of uniting
the fjords and carving out a kingdom for himself.
The world was changing, Gunnar had said, and perhaps he was right. The time might come when the fjords would need to unite to stay strong, but Gunnar
was not a strong leader. The way he had mismanaged and depleted Sognefjord had proven to Bjorn that his
brother was not the man to hold all Northmen in his
thrall. Such thinking was a violation of Bjorn’s oath of
fealty, but it niggled at his brain anyway, a disloyal thought as persistent in the daytime as the recurring
nightmare dogging his dreams in the dark.
Bjorn didn’t think the fjords needed a king.
The
Christians were ruled by kings, but Northmen had the
law. The
law
made them free. It settled disputes. It demanded justice, meting out prescribed punishment that suited the offense. From what little Bjorn had
heard of kings, the justice they dispensed was far from
even-handed. A bribe here, a favor there, and a king could elevate or destroy his subjects at his whim.
Bjorn could accept whatever fate dealt out for him.
He felt less sanguine about the will of a king, espe
cially if that king were his brother.
“Bjorn the Black,” Torvald said. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“And I’m looking for a reason to stop working, so I’m
glad to see you.” Bjorn clapped his hands to brush
off the sawdust. “No doubt Jorand will be happy to see
me elsewhere since I’m no good to him here. Walk
with me, Torvald. My leg is stiffening up.”
A sharp embankment rose to Bjorn’s right, the
sparkling water of the fjord rippling on his left. He
limped down the rocky beach, using his staff more as a
walking stick than a crutch. He carried it only because
Rika insisted. And besides, he didn’t want to fall in
public if the leg should give way again.
“Why did you seek me?” Bjorn asked.
The old man paused for a moment as if unsure how to begin. “I want to make a trade with you,” Torvald
said. “A young man like you can always find a use for
silver and I’ve a stash buried on my farm from back
when I went viking with your father. The hoard is big
as a head of cabbage and all finely worked. No hack
silver.”
“The
Sea-Snake
isn’t for sale,” Bjorn said. His ship
was his only possession worth that much, though why Torvald would even want her was a mystery. The old
man was still strong of limb, but his remaining days of
raiding were certainly few. Perhaps Torvald was seek
ing a battle death, like old Einar Blood-Eagle who had
ringed his neck with gold to tempt an attack. The ploy was successful, and the ancient warrior died with his sword singing. While Bjorn could appreciate the rea
soning, he didn’t want to see the
Snake
go down in a
reckless quest for Valhalla. “I won’t part with her.”
“
It’s not the
Sea-Snake
I’m after,” Torvald said. “It’s your skald. I’ve a mind to buy her.”
An echo of Rika’s laughter resounded in Bjorn’s
mind, and he glared at Torvald. “She’s not
for sale either.”
“I know the silver is at least ten times her
wergild,
were she a free woman,” Torvald said. “You needn’t worry for her. I’d treat her well.”
So that’s how it was. The old man wanted a young
body for his sagging bed. Bjorn’s eyes burned in their
sockets at the thought of Rika with another man.
“
No,” Bjorn said evenly, trying to keep his anger in
check for his dead father’s sake. But part of him won
dered why Harald had ever claimed this randy old goat
as a friend.
Torvald stopped walking but Bjorn plowed on.
“My holding,” Torvald called after him. “Would you take my land for her?”
Bjorn froze. Torvald’s land was some of the richest
in the fjord, fecund and level, easily worked. The old
man offered him his dearest dream. At least it had
been before Bjorn met that green-eyed, redheaded elf-
maiden disguised as a mortal.
“No,” he said forcefully and walked on.
“
She’s too good to be your bed-slave.” Torvald’s voice was edged with frustration.
Bjorn rounded on him, crowding up to stand eye to
eye with the lanky karl. “But not too good to be yours,
old man?”
Torvald made a noise of disgust and his pale face
reddened. “You mistake me. I don’t intend on taking
her to my bed. I would free her. She isn’t meant for
thralldom. Rika belongs to herself.”
“You’re right in that,” Bjorn admitted, a little of the steam of his anger dissipating.
The way Rika carried herself, the way she served without submission, there was no question of his actually owning her. In the legal sense, he supposed he did.
He could take her body if he chose; beat her for any
reason or no reason. A master could even kill his slave
and no punishment would fall on him. When he captured her in Hordaland, he might’ve taken power over
her body, but Bjorn wanted her heart. And that he’d
have to earn.
“I will not part with her.” Bjorn was adamant.
“
But you dishonor her.” Torvald's gray eyes blazed with smoldering fury and he balled his fists at his sides.
Bjorn frowned at the man. “What I do with my own is
none of your business. I don’t know why it should mat
ter to you, old man, but I do her no disservice. Rika is
yet a maiden.” He turned and stalked away, calling
back over his shoulder. “Ask her yourself if you wish,
but trouble me no more. I will not sell her to you.”
*
*
*
On the embankment above Bjorn and Torvald, Gunnar and Ornolf listened to the exchange below. Gun
nar shook his head and spat on the ground.
“
Hmph!” Gunnar said. “Makes you wonder just
who is thrall and who is master, doesn’t it?”
Ornolf looked down the beach after Bjorn. Gunnar thought he detected a combination of approval and sympathy in his uncle’s sharp eyes. “Your brother seems to have lost his heart.”
“Or his head. Torvald better not offer his land to me
in exchange for Astryd unless he’s prepared to take the
carping witch. I’d make that trade in a heartbeat,” Gun
nar said. “My
little
brother is a fool to waste time and
energy over so trivial a thing as a woman, and a thrall
at that.”
Rika’s refusal still stung, and Gunnar wasn’t one to forget
a slight. Part of him was mollified by the fact that the
infuriating woman had rebuffed his brother too, but
Gunnar was a strong-willed man. Opposition to his
will raised his hackles like the hair on a dog’s back.
Male or female, he was determined to dominate.
“
Speaking of women,” Ornolf said, passing a hand
over the back of his neck. “The Arab has a request.”
“
He isn’t trying to sever our trade agreement, is he?”
“
No, Farouk is more than pleased with our
goods. Furs and amber are considered quite exotic in
the south, and he can’t get enough walrus ivory.”
Gunnar chuckled. It amazed him how distance and
novelty made such ordinary things desirable. “It was a
good day for Sogna when you and father made that
first trip to Miklagard all those years ago, even if the
great city is halfway to
Niflheim
.”
“
Some have ventured farther,” Uncle Ornolf said. “
Sven Long-Bow of Birka claims to have seen a city of
marvels in the midst of a vast wasteland where a man
might find all the wealth of Midgard. He called the
place Baghdad. But he had to make a long journey on the back of a cursed camel to get there.” Ornolf’s lip
curled, showing how he detested any mode
of travel but by ship. “Constantinople—Miklagard, I
mean to say—boasts a fine port. It’s rich enough for
my blood. It was another good day for Sogna near a dozen years ago, when I met Farouk-Azziz there and struck a pact with him. Each time I return, you find yourself a richer man, nephew. This last trip doubled
your wealth in silver and brought Sogna much gold.”
“
So what does Farouk-Azziz want?”