Viking Love Beyond Time (Time Travel Romance) (51 page)

******************

             
Alodie finished the last of the chicken and, rinsing her fingers, she cleaned her teeth thoroughly with the edge of the towel and put some mint in her mouth to chew.

             
Humming slightly she walked over to the fire and warmed her hands.  As she crouched down to watch the flames she heard the unmistakable grate of a key in the lock and the door swung open noiselessly   She jumped to her feet and turned, half expecting to see Kelda but instead saw the one figure on Earth she never wanted to see again, the huge figure of her bridegroom.

             
He was dressed, Viking fashion, in black fitted leather braeis with fur over
britches
and a fur jerkin.  His shoes were cross gartered to the knee and on his head he wore a winged helmet with a face guard which completely concealed his features.

             
He quietly shut the door.  Alodie was too numb with fright to move or speak - terrified, she backed up until her knees met the chair and she was forced to sit.

             
Herger reached up and rested his hands on an exposed beam - towering over her like some black bird of prey.

             
“So, my runaway bride, we meet again at last”

             
Alodie swallowed and wondered if she could make a dash for the door, then taking one look at him she decided not to even try, he could probably snap her in two like a twig, she had never seen anyone as large before, only Rorik had come close and she was not sure even he could match this man.  He stretched, and lowering his arms unfastened the laces of his jerkin and shrugged it from his shoulders, leaving him bare chested.  Alodie had to admit that he was a magnificent specimen, beautifully muscled without being muscle bound.  His shoulders were broad and his muscular chest, which was covered with thick dark hair, tapered to a narrow waist and lean hips.  The sheer strength and latent power of the man almost left her breathless and strangely using her psi gun never entered her head.   She licked her lips.  “S-stay away from me you deformed monster” she managed to croak.

             
He laughed and leaned over her, his eyes glinting though the sight bar in his helmet, he towered over her, he filled her whole vision.   With a scream Alodie tried to wriggle away but it would have been easier to escape a bear, then, nonchalantly, he began to loosen the laces of her nightrail, baring more and more of her golden body to his gaze and as he did so he began to hum a tune.  She put her hand on his arm and he paused, “Stop, Herger” she babbled in fear “I will make you a terrible wife, I am betrothed to Edric of Lamporth, a warrior of King Alfred, a high commander of the fyrd”

             
“and a man you cannot love” replied the Viking quietly.  Alodie was stunned.   Herger had been so right in his judgement - how did he know?

             
“I - I do love Edric” she stammered.

             
“Then I will have to kill him” said Herger simply “but I have it on the best authority that you love another”.  The laces on Alodie’s nightrail were now completely loose and her every movement revealed more of her body to the Norseman’s gaze.  “This same authority informs me that you love Rorik, a kinsman of Guthrum, and that you gave yourself to him frequently last August twelvemonth” he continued evenly.

             
Alodie felt sick - thoughts ran helter skelter across her terrified brain - what had he done to Rorik?  God, if this monster had hurt him she would.....what?  She hated Rorik didn’t she?
Stop fooling yourself Alodie Austen
she said to herself
you love him, love him more than life, but how does Herger know?  He must be bluffing, he must have heard the rumours and if you admit the truth he might kill Rorik. 
Her head shot into the air “T’is a wicked lie, I do not know the man”

             
Herger chuckled wickedly and standing up began to loosen the chin strap of his helmet.  Alodie began to panic, she struggled to tear her eyes away but she could not.

             
Unfastening the top catch of his helmet he removed it.  Long dark curly hair fell down almost to his shoulders and around his forehead was the ornamental
hlad
or battle ribbon worn by all Vikings when on campaign.  Piercing green eyes fringed with thick black lashes, Tom’s eyes, stared at Alodie from a face almost impossibly handsome.  Square cut jaw with a small cleft, chiselled nose with slightly flared nostrils, tanned skin, slightly weathered with the sea and sun, a face stamped into Alodie’s memory.  He smiled, showing a row of even white teeth.

             
Rorik, the man she adored, the man she hated, the father of her children, the man who had betrayed her, and now he stood there in front of the fire, smiling, his magnificent body beginning to take on a slight sheen of sweat from the heat.

             
Alodie felt torn, she did not know whether to throw herself into his arms or knife him.  Then the feelings which had been bubbling inside her rose to the surface and with them all thoughts of the love and desire she felt for this man took second place.  Young Swein’s words on the morning Luke had arrived back in Bredond had seared themselves into her brain.  Rorik had married Kristen after pursuing her for years.  He had married his heart’s desire and all he had wanted from Alodie Austen was a tumble, he had even betrayed her with fat Gwen.  He had left her pregnant, left her to Luke’s evil devices.  The bastard, she would almost have preferred to see Herger, he did at least love her.

             
With a scream she hurled herself from the chair and flew at him,  the assault was so unexpected that the Norse warlord only had time to partially block her blow and holding up his arm felt a red hot pain as her nails gouged his flesh.  He looked up, Alodie was standing there, waiting for him to make a move.  She had grabbed her eating knife and was pointing it at him.  “Come on you Viking pig” she hissed “let me see you try and take me!”

             
“Alodie, what is this?” asked Herger quietly, the deep scratches beginning to well blood which started to drip down his arm.  In his wildest dreams he could not have imagined the reunion with the love of his life being conducted like this.

             
“
What is this?
You ask
what is this?
  You animal!  How can you stand there and look me in the eye and ask
what is this
?
so innocently after all you have done!”  She had never been so overtaken with fury in the whole of her life, or thought for one moment that she could ever get so murderously angry.  A mental picture of him entwined round another woman (strange she could not give Kristen a face, she never had been able to, even in all her wildest imaginings) sprang into her mind and with a scream she lunged again.  She was a seasoned warrior but only had about a sixth of Herger’s strength.  He grabbed her wrist and squeezing it made her drop the knife.  She kicked out at him, her bare foot making contact with his right shin, but it was doubtful whether he even noticed, it would have been easier, she was sure, to fight a rabid wolf.  He grabbed her other wrist and pulled her toward him then, taking her in his arms as though she were a baby, he carried her to the bed, dropping her, still struggling, onto it.

             
Alodie was appalled, the strength of the man was unbelievable.  She tried to sit up but he pushed her back down and, unfastening one of the leather strips from his upper arm, he reached for her right hand.

             
“No you don’t you bastard!” she hissed, raking at his face with her fingernails.  He sighed deeply and continued with his task, her struggling not seeming to affect him in the slightest.  To Alodie’s horror he fastened her right wrist to the right bedpost then walking round the bed did the same with her left wrist, fastening it to the left bedpost.  She thrashed out with her feet but removing two more leather strips from his upper arms he calmly fastened her ankles in a similar manner.

             
Alodie was panic stricken, she was totally helpless, she began to writhe and squirm but as she did so her loosened nightrail fell open completely revealing to Herger breasts which had become even fuller since he had last caressed them and as she continued to toss and wriggle he was treated to glimpses of the golden ‘v’ of her pubic mound.

             
He took a deep breath. “Now Alodie” he said, slowly “we will talk about this, quietly” he walked over to the bath and picking up a cloth he placed it over the scratches on his arm, they had almost stopped bleeding.

             
“Quietly? Quietly!” she hissed “you take my virginity, leave me with the promise that you are to return in November.  The day you go that fat cow Gwen of Saltop informs me you have bedded her, this is borne out by the fact that you never come back for me!  Oh yes, I forgot to mention the best part you animal! You left me with child or as it turned out, children - last May I gave birth to twins! Twins mark you! Both of whom look like you.  I am forced to wed Luke who takes one look at your son and immediately takes to drink so hard that he goes out of his mind and tries to kill me, the children, Swein and Godgyth” she paused for breath, then laughed mirthlessly “then, oh and then the best part comes, I hear you have married the woman you have always loved.  She did not want to marry you apparently but you pressured her into it.  A year last November this love match took place,
Blot Monath
, the very month you were supposed to come and claim me.  Your forces invade Athelney, I am kidnapped in the middle of a blizzard THEN you have the gall to act surprised when I do not fall rapturously into your arms!”

             
The Viking frowned “I am married Alodie, to you, what are you talking about?”

             
Alodie strained to sit up.  “No, you are not Rorik, Herger is married to me, you are married to Kristen, a
‘mewling milksop’
according to young Swein, still she must had something I never had!”

             
Suddenly, it all slotted into place.  Herger laughed out loud, amused by the idea that Rorik’s Kristen had something Alodie did not have.  His laughter enraged her more.  She screamed in anger and hooking her fingers into claws strained at her bonds.  “Wriggle away, love” he laughed “the entertainment you give only grows more and more delightful with every move you make!” blushing to the roots of her hair Alodie froze and with a sigh of anguish flopped back.  Her hair had fallen across her face and, feeling foolish, she tried to blow it away.  Herger  sat on the bed and taking the golden tress drew it away from her face then kissing it laid it amongst the rest of her hair streaming out across the pillow.  The action made her stomach turn over - that flip it only gave when Rorik was there - the feeling she never thought she would have again.  But he was married - married to that Kristen woman, he had taken her from Edric who loved her, for a bit of bed sport until he was reunited with Kristen - she gritted her teeth.

             
“You will have to kill me first, Viking pig!” she hissed. 

             
Herger got to his feet and walking over to the window pushed the bar further across the shutters, Alodie could hear the wind screaming and howling outside and the plop of a log as it settled further into the fire.  He had his back to her, and despite herself Alodie began to feel herself aroused by the breadth of it and the play of his muscles as he moved, then he turned.  “Have you finished?” he asked quietly.  Alodie bit her lip and nodded.  Herger smiled and putting his arms above his head rested his hands on the low hanging beams.  “Rorik Ingvarssen is the half brother of Guthrum.  A moron of nineteen summers who is too weak even to pick up a sword.  He has buck teeth, thin shoulders, a stammer, he drools and dribbles constantly and his eyes look in different directions.  The last time I saw him.....” Herger hit a spot halfway up his upper arm “...he stood about this high and he was seventeen then. His wife, Kristen, is, thanks be to Odin, slightly less hideous but she is cursed with foul body odour and bad teeth.  Believe me my love, she has
nothing
you don’t have!”

             
A puzzled look crossed Alodie’s lovely features.  “I - I don’t understand” she whispered.

             
Herger smiled again “let me tell you a tale, my love.  I married the loveliest woman in the world.  I fell in love with her as she was being auctioned, fell in love with her beauty, her fearlessness, her proud bearing - it was as though a thunderbolt had struck me.  I paid a king’s ransom for her but at the wedding feast she sat next to Guthrum.   For a jest he told my lovely bride that I was a deformed monster and she fled.  I was heartbroken, I thought she had been killed, then word came to me that she was in
Winchester
.  Determined to woo her, I passed myself off as Rorik, Guthrum’s brother, and went to
Winchester
as a hostage.  On meeting her once again I fell even more deeply in love with her and I flatter myself that I succeeded in making her love me too.  I promised to return for her in
Blot Monath,
however, on the way back to Bredond Thor threw down a thunderbolt which killed one of my men outright, the man who had come to
Winchester
pretending to be Herger to be exact, threw me from my horse and under the hooves of Guthrum’s steed which, in panic, trampled my skull.  I lay in a death within life for months.  Apparently I was taken back to
Norway
where I was cared for by my mother but I knew nothing until I awoke in Seinshaven.  It was June before I opened my eyes.....”