Storm Maiden (29 page)

“Will you help me?” Breaca’s voice was
pleading. “If nothing else, Dag is friends with Rorig. You could
find out from him whether Rorig craves me.”

Briefly, Fiona considered discussing the
matter with Dag. If Rorig did care for Breaca and she sought him
merely as a protector... Fiona shook her head. This was witless.
Why should she care what happened to Rorig? Let Breaca break his
heart.

“Men like you to touch them,” she told
Breaca. “To caress their private parts, to put your mouth on
them.”

Breaca’s eyes widened.

“If the man is clean, ‘tis not unpleasant,”
Fiona added. “Take him to the bathing shed. It makes a good place
for a midday tryst.”

Breaca’s startled look faded, and she nodded
calculatingly. A stab of guilt went through Fiona. Had she ever
plotted to win Dag’s favor by pleasuring his body? Nay, she had
always
wanted
to do it. From the first time she had beheld
the man, she could not resist touching him. As she had told Breaca,
things between her and Dag had never been planned. They had merely
happened
.

But where could her passion for the Viking
lead her? She had vowed to return to Eire, and her feelings for Dag
only complicated her plan. Even if he cared enough for her to free
her as his thrall, he would seek to bind her to him with marriage.
And there was the matter of children. As often as they lay
together, his seed would surely take hold in her womb. What would
she do then? She could scarcely travel to Eire with a child, nor
could she bear to leave behind a babe of her body. She might end up
trapped at Engvakkirsted forever.

Fiona sighed. She should never have lain
with Dag. It was that irrevocable act that had bound her to the
Norseman. “Your plan is faulty,” she told Breaca as they neared the
first stand of berry bushes, lush with gleaming purple fruits.
“When you entice a Viking man, you risk becoming entrapped
yourself. ‘Tis better to endure hardship and retain the freedom of
your will.”

Breaca’s blue eyes met Fiona’s with a look
of incredulity, and she shook her head. “Fiona of the
Deasunachta—you are ever a fool.”

“We will eat bread this winter even if it’s
a long one,” Breaca said as she loaded another sheaf of rye in the
cart at the edge of the field. Seeing Fiona’s weary look, she
added, “Here the snow piles higher and stays on the ground much
longer than in Eire. Steadings that don’t have adequate provisions
have been known to starve.”

“If bringing in the grain harvest is so
important, why don’t all the men work in the fields?” Fiona cast a
hostile glance toward the nearby grove of trees where Brodir and
several of the other men lounged on the ground, drinking ale and
doing nothing more strenuous than polishing weapons and exchanging
stories.

“Many warriors think it demeaning to work in
the fields. They believe such tasks should be done only by slaves
and women.”

“Why does Sigurd allow such laziness?”

“ ‘Tis not Sigurd who condones it, but the
jarl,” Breaca answered. “He’s a man of old ideas. To his mind,
being a warrior is enough. He would like the men to go
aviking
and capture more slaves to do the work. But he
couldn’t convince Sigurd to take the
Storm Maiden
out again
this season.”

“Why not?”

Breaca shrugged. “Sigurd said the ship
needed some repairs to the hull. In truth, I think he is loathe to
leave Mina.”

Fiona nodded. Mina’s situation had not
improved. All feared that she would not make it the last two months
until the babe was due to be born.

“If Brodir and the other warriors refuse to
do their share of the work, Dag more than makes up for them,”
Breaca commented. “He toils from morn to eve, doing the work of two
men at least. I vow, if I were the jarl’s nephew, I would find ways
to shirk the more difficult jobs. Dag seeks them out. Chopping
firewood, cutting grain, replacing the rushes in the longhouse—he
seems to favor the most backbreaking, miserable sort of labor.”

Fiona shaded her eyes to look out at the
stubble-filled field, easily picking out Dag’s tall figure from
among the crew of thralls who worked their way across the field,
harvesting the last of the rye with huge, curved scythes. She, too,
had marked the way Dag drove himself. There was something desperate
in it, something restless and frustrated. He was clearly troubled,
although Fiona wasn’t certain about the source of his discontent.
She’d learned enough of his language to communicate simple things,
but they still did not talk much. For all that she surrendered each
night to the evocative language of his lovemaking, she had little
idea of what went on in his mind. Did he fear the future as she
did?

Sighing, Fiona looked down and examined her
work-roughened hands. She understood some of Dag’s need to work. It
made the time go faster and kept her from thinking about how
trapped she was, how far from fulfilling her vow.

“How late in the year is it possible to
sail?” she asked Breaca.

‘ “Til a month after butchering. Then the
seas become stormy and treacherous.” She gave Fiona a probing look.
“I told you Sigurd will not take the ship out again this
season.”

Fiona sighed. Summer hastened by. In two
months it would be Samhain, what the priests called All Hallows’
Eve. A wave of homesickness passed through her. In the Old Ways,
that night was considered the end of the year, when the spirits
walked the earth and the barrier between the spirit world and the
physical world grew weak. Most of the Irish counted it among the
major festivals of the year.

“When you lived in Eire, did your people
celebrate Sam- hain?” she asked Breaca.

“I remember them building bonfires to ward
away the spirits.”

Fiona nodded. “When I was little, my mother
always dressed my brothers and me in costumes so the spirits would
not recognize us and steal our souls.”

“You had brothers?” Breaca asked. “What
happened to them?”

“My two older brothers both died of a fever
when I was five winters.”

“Your father must have been sorely grieved
to lose his heirs.”

“Aye, he was... but not enough to take a
concubine. Although my mother could bear no children after me, my
father still kept to her bed. He loved her dearly.” Pain lanced
through Fiona.

“How else did you celebrate Samhain?” Breaca
asked.

“We also built bonfires high in the hills.
Late at night, the more daring youths would sneak out of the
palisade to dance and make revelry in the firelight.”

“Did you go?”

“Never. My father wouldn’t let us. Last
year, Duvessa and I tried to join the celebration. My father caught
us leaving the women’s house and had an older woman keep watch over
us for the rest of the night. We vowed that next year we would go
if we had to hide in the forest the day before.” Fiona sighed,
thinking of how rebellious and irresponsible she’d been.

“The Vikings don’t really have an autumn
festival,” Breaca said. “Some steadings hold a sacrifice to Thor or
Odin, but Knorri doesn’t believe in it. He thinks the only way to
honor the gods is through valor in battle. There will be a special
feast, though, when the butchering is done. The men will gorge
themselves on fresh meat and the skald, Tyrker, will arouse their
blood lust with tales of battle and heroes. Then they start
planning raids.” Breaca grimaced. “It begins harmlessly—a few
cattle or horses stolen, a byre or shed burned. But inevitably
someone is killed or a woman raped. Then the injured clan swears
vengeance and what was once a cattle raid turns to murder and
destruction.”

Fiona nodded. The tradition of raiding, of
blood feuds and vengeance, sounded uncomfortably familiar. The
Irish practiced a similar sort of warfare. The priests and holy men
tried to teach tolerance and reason, but when Irish tempers ran
hot, innocent blood was still shed for the sake of warriors’ glory.
It was an unpleasant similarity between the Irish and Norse way of
life, Fiona thought grimly.

The two women looked up as Dag approached
them, carrying his scythe. Perspiration streamed down his bare
chest and his face was flushed with exertion. Mina had cut Dag’s
hair recently, and it hung in reddish-gold waves to his shoulders.
His coppery mustache had also been neatly trimmed, and his fair
skin was glazed ruddy tan by the sun and wind, sharply defining the
muscles of his shoulders, chest, and arms.

Fiona watched him carefully place the scythe
on top of the full cart, then wipe his hand over his sweat-soaked
features. He looked at her and smiled, his teeth white against his
bronzed skin. The sight of him made Fiona’s heart do a familiar
flip-flop. As hard as she fought to keep her emotions aloof from
the passion he aroused in her body, she was less than successful.
Looking at him now, glorying in his masculine beauty, she wondered
how she would ever leave him to return to Eire.

“I vow I smell like a stallion under
harness,” Dag said. “I must visit the bathing hut before I enter
Mina’s newly cleaned longhouse. Would you like to join me, Fiona?”
His smile widened.

Fiona hesitated, guessing that bathing was
only part of his plan. She both dreaded and reveled in their
lovemaking. With each tender kiss and enticing caress, her resolve
to leave him crumbled a little further. Did he plot to imprison her
with love, to use affection to trap her in his northern homeland
forever?

“Fiona?”

She looked at Dag and, unwillingly, returned
his smile. “
Ja,”
she answered, using the Norse words.”I will
come.”

Before they bathed, Dag took her to the
steam room, which Fiona had only discovered a few weeks before. In
the small enclosed area, big enough for only two people to stand or
sit, Dag poured water on the hot rocks and the soothing steam
wafted over them. Fiona sat back on the bench and sighed. The heat
and moisture relaxed her sore muscles while the vapory atmosphere
reminded her of the mists of Eire.

Sitting beside her, Dag leaned back and
closed his eyes, apparently content to do nothing for a time. Fiona
closed her own eyes and let her mind wander to thoughts of her
homeland. What was Siobhan doing? And Duvessa and the other women?
Did they still live? Had they fled Dunsheauna and made their home
in another settlement? Had there been anything left to salvage
after the fires died?

Fiona frowned. In time, other chieftains
would surely claim her father’s land and anything left of value. If
it took too long for her to return to Eire, there would be nothing
left. Dunsheauna, her surviving kin, even her father’s name might
disappear and be forgotten.

She felt Dag’s hand rubbing her shoulder,
then his fingers moved to her nape as he eased the sore muscles
there. Fiona sighed. She did not want to relax and be content.

“Fiona.” Dag spoke her name in his deep,
heavily accented voice. “What are you thinking?”

She opened her eyes to meet his gaze. The
hunger she felt for him made her want to melt into his arms.
Instead, she said, “I was thinking of my homeland, of Eire.”

His blue eyes grew bleak, and Fiona
immediately felt guilty. Anger followed swiftly on regret. She
couldn’t help that it hurt him to speak of her homeland. Her vow to
her father had to come before her feelings for him—didn’t it?

Ja,
Dag thought grimly. It was well
she reminded him that they both had responsibilities to others. So
easily when he was with her he forgot she was a foreign slave,
forgot everything except how beautiful she was, how desirable.

He looked away; his fingers stilled on her
neck. Bringing her to the bathing shed had been a mistake. They
might join their bodies in splendid ecstasy, but it did nothing to
resolve their problems.

He stood. Beside him, he heard her slight
intake of breath. He glanced down at her. She looked troubled,
mayhap even disappointed. She had expected him to couple with her;
she
wanted
him to couple with her. Dag struggled for
control. His body ached for hers as well, but this time he wouldn’t
give in to his need.

He left the sauna area and went out into the
main bathing room and sluiced cold water over his face and body.
Wiping water from his eyes, he glanced over his shoulder. She had
not followed him or tried to entice him into lovemaking.
Resignation settled hard in his gut. She knew as well as he that
the differences between them were too great, too irresolvable.

There was a sharp rattling at the door.
“Dag, Fiona, come quickly. ‘Tis Mina... the babe... it comes!”

Breaca sounded breathless from running. Dag
moved toward the sauna, but Fiona had already heard and come out
into the bathing room. She gave him a worried look and began
fumbling for her clothes. Dag grabbed his own garments. Fiona
finished dressing first and dashed from the bathing hut. He caught
up with her and asked, “Do you know what to do?”

“I hope so.”

Dag’s stomach twisted at Fiona’s words. If
something happened to the babe or Mina, Brodir would use the
tragedy to turn the others against Fiona.

When they reached the longhouse, Fiona
stopped to catch her breath. Dag gave her arm a gentle squeeze,
then watched her go into Mina and Sigurd’s bedcloset. Sigurd stood
by the doorway, his face stony and expressionless.

Dag found it hard to meet his brother’s
eyes. Women often died in childbirth or during miscarriage. What
would he say if Sigurd lost his wife?

* * *

Gazing at the pale, exhausted-looking woman
in the bed, Fiona’s mind raced. It was too soon for the babe to be
born. If possible, she must halt Mina’s labor.

“Fetch Mina’s herbs,” she told Breaca. When
she had left, Fiona approached the bed. “Has your water broken?”
she asked.

Mina shook her head.
“Nei,
but the
pains come often.”