Sandra Hill - [Vikings I 01] (37 page)

“Will you quit then?” she asked hopefully.

“Yea, I will, but not until my duty is completed.”

“How long?”

He shrugged uncertainly. “I know not. I promise it will be as soon as possible.”

“Then where will we live? What will you do?”

“Trading is what I do best,” he said tentatively, “but where we settle will be determined by safety.” Thork’s first choice would be to stay on his grandfather’s lands, but chances were Eric would hound him there. In truth, to him it really did not matter where he lived, as long as Ruby and the boys were with him.

Thork hugged Ruby closely to his side as they sat down under a tree on a carpet of new-fallen leaves, and Ruby told him of the first time she and Jack had made love in
such a crisp bed. Thork nuzzled her neck, trying to halt her words, not wanting to hear of her love for another man, even if he only existed in her mind.

“Then we shall make love here, sweetling. I will erase the old memories for you.”

Ruby said nothing, but he could see the pain in her eyes. She would never forget this Jack, the imaginary husband. Before she surrendered to his imploring hands, Ruby asked sweetly, “Do you think I could start up a small lingerie business? You could sell the sets on your trading voyages.”

Lord, the witch had a habit of asking irrelevant questions at the most inopportune times. Thork’s chest shook with suppressed laughter.

“What? Why are you laughing at me?” Ruby asked, shoving him in the chest.

“I cannot believe you want me to become a trader in women’s undergarments. Next it will be condoms.”

Affronted, Ruby asked, “Don’t you think there would be a market for lingerie? And, no, I wouldn’t sell condoms.”

“You are serious, are you not?”

“Sewing and making lingerie is what I do best,” Ruby explained. “You have already said you don’t want more children. What would I do all day? Besides, if you’re too embarrassed to sell women’s underthings, I could come with you and do the trading.”

Now that was a thought to boggle the mind. Ruby on his trading voyages! Thor’s balls! He would accomplish naught but making love until his staff wore itself out from overuse. He smiled down at his enticing wife. Ruby’s tunic and chemise hung off one shoulder from his persistent efforts. He reached out a hand and touched the creamy skin.

“Well?” Ruby persisted.

Huskily, he agreed, “If ’tis what you want, wench, I
will let you put some women’s lingerie among my trading goods.” Lord, he probably would have agreed to lace his boots at that point.

Then the crunch of autumn leaves under their nude bodies and whispered love words wiped out all thought of business.

Later, back in their chamber where they laughingly picked crumbled leaves from some very intimate places on each other’s bodies, Thork began to have second thoughts. Ruby talked excitedly about plans for her lingerie business. And she wasn’t talking about a few sets of undergarments sewn together in her spare time. She spoke of a separate building for cutting and producing the lingerie, hiring a half dozen women to help her, then expanding later. Thor’s blood! She would fill a ship with her lingerie alone.

“Ruby, this is not what I had in mind when I agreed to trade some of your lingerie products,” Thork said.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I enjoy being married to you. It pleases me immensely to imagine you waiting for me in our own home each night when I return from my business dealings or when I arrive home after a voyage. I picture Eirik and Tykir at your side. My heart fills at the thought. How would you have time for all those things if you were busy running your own business affairs?”

Thork expected Ruby to be pleased with the soft words he had taken such pains to form. Instead, she lashed out, “You male chauvinist pig! I can’t believe this! It’s Jack all over again!”

“Jack, Jack, Jack! I am sick of the man’s name.”

Ruby glared at him and ran from the room.

Thork did not understand. Most women would be pleased that a man cherished them so well that they would not have to drudge. He decided to seek his grandfather’s advice, but that was not necessary. Dar rushed toward
him, telling him, “Come quickly.” He pulled Thork into a private chamber.

Dar was extremely agitated, and he clutched a small parcel in his hand tightly. His fingers shook.

“What is it?” Thork asked, worried by the intensity of his grandfather’s fear.

“’Tis Ivar!” he choked out. “He kidnapped Eirik and asks for ransom.” He handed Thork the linen-wrapped package. “Oh, Thork, I would spare you this pain if I could.”

Thork’s heart hammered loudly as he unrolled the cloth. A small finger fell out. A thousand explosions went off in his head, and he had to hold on to a chair for support. Closing his eyes tightly on the pain, he whispered, “Do not tell Ruby. It would kill her. Whatever you do, she must not know.”

Ruby was in an absolute rage. It wasn’t so much the lingerie business. Even though she’d stormed away from Thork, she was sure they could work all that out somehow, but now Thork came to their chamber and told her coldly that he was going to Jomsborg immediately, that he’d been summoned for some mission. Worst of all, he wouldn’t take her with him. She must go back to Northumbria with Dar.

“No! I want to go with you,” she cried, while Thork hastily threw his clothing and personal belongings in his leather bag. “Please,” she begged, seeing the unbending look on Thork’s face. “I’m sorry I argued about the lingerie company. Don’t leave me, not now. I can’t bear it again.”

Thork turned and took her by both shoulders, forcing her to look him in the eyes. They were a cold, desolate blue which frightened Ruby.

“I love you, sweetling. Remember that. Always.”

He kissed her with an odd desperation and held her
tightly for a long moment. When he pulled back, he scrutinized her face, as if memorizing its features. And Ruby could swear she saw tears in his harsh, warrior’s eyes. What was happening here? And why so quickly?

“Go with Dar back to Northumbria,” he told her implacably. “Wait for me there with Tykir.” He choked on the last words.

Then he really frightened her when he added, “And, Ruby, something else. Pray for…me.”

On those ominous words, he left her standing open-mouthed in their chamber. Once she realized he was actually going, Ruby ran after him, down the steps and out to the bailey. He and several dozen men sat on horses talking to Hrolf while half of the armed men they’d brought with them were heading toward the ships.

“I will dispatch two hundred men as soon as you send word of your whereabouts,” Hrolf promised. “May God and Odin go with you.”

Thork turned to Dar. “You will return to Northumbria immediately?” At his nod, Thork went on, “’Tis unwise to leave your lands so unprotected. I will send word as soon as possible. Godspeed, Grandfather.”

Thork saw her then, standing in the background with tears streaming down her face, reeling under the shock of disbelief that he was abandoning her. A muscle flickered beside the thin line of his tight lips as he maneuvered his horse through the people toward her. He leaned down and lithely pulled her up in front of him on the saddle.

“We will meet again, sweetling. I love you.”

I love you, too, Thork
, Ruby thought, but the words clogged in her throat as he kissed her briefly, then set her down and rode off.

Hrolf and Poppa looked on her with pity, but would disclose nothing when she hugged them tightly before boarding one of Dar’s three ships the next day. They told
her she would always be welcome in Normandy.

The two-week trip back to Jorvik was horrible. Ruby lay on her back most of the time, racked with seasickness in the troubled waters. Despite her protests and wild weeping, Dar’s hard face turned away from her when she demanded explanations for Thork’s hasty actions. Back in Northumbria finally, she fell into Aud’s welcoming arms on a sob and kissed Tykir until he pulled away in childlike embarrassment.

For weeks, Ruby alternately pitied herself and raged at Thork for his actions, meanwhile waiting desolately for word from him. When it finally came, the message was for Dar, not her. Dar closeted himself in a chamber with Olaf, who’d delivered the missive. When Olaf left, he took one hundred men with him, leaving Dar with only a hundred to guard his keep. Still, Dar wouldn’t answer her questions about Thork’s whereabouts.

“He will let you know when the time is right.”

Finally Ruby buried herself in work. She talked Dar into giving her one of the wool sheds for her lingerie business. Enlisting the help of six village women, Ruby was aided by Ella, who turned out to be a born administrator, bullying the women into extra work, making them laugh while they did it. They cut the bolts of silk and laces brought to them by Aud, who insisted on being a partner in the enterprise.

Within weeks, the business was a resounding success. Making the lingerie in all sizes, Ruby sent her first fifty sets into Jorvik one day with Dar. He delivered them to a merchant who agreed to sell them on consignment. They sold out in two days, thus launching Ruby’s lingerie company.

Ruby purchased extra materials with the profits, hired six more women, and built a large hearth so they could work during the winter months.

Ella turned into a blooming entrepreneur, planning how
much money she could save over what period of time, how she could buy her freedom and perhaps get a small house in the village. Her dreams transformed her into a new person.

“’Tis amazing!” Aud said as they sat down to dinner one night. “At first, I only gave you the fabrics and encouraged your work to ease your mind over Thork. Now it appears I will be a wealthy merchant. What think you of that, Dar?”

“Huh? Oh, yea,” he answered distractedly. There had been no word from Thork since that first message, and he worried constantly.

Ruby was torn between anger over Dar and Aud cutting her off from their great mystery and concern for whatever was troubling them. She thought she had a way to make them feel better. “Dar, Aud, I have some news that should make you happy.”

They both looked at her as if nothing could cheer them up, and Ruby wondered once again what they hid from her.

She smiled at them both and disclosed softly, “I’m pregnant!”

A stunned silence greeted her words.

Their failure to respond hurt Ruby. “What? You’re not pleased to have a new baby here?”

“Oh, nay, ’tis not so!” Aud declared and jumped up belatedly. She hugged Ruby warmly.

“Yea, ’twill be wonderful to have…another great-grandchild,” Dar choked out and left the hall abruptly.

Puzzled, Ruby turned to Aud.

“Do not mind him. He has much to think on these days. But what about Thork? I thought he did not want more children.”

“He doesn’t. I’m not sure how it happened. He was always so cautious,” Ruby said, trying to think when he might have been careless. Was it their wedding night, with
the honey, or was it the day in the autumn leaves? She hoped it was the latter. Then it would seem almost like Jack’s child, too.

“I’m sure Thork will be pleased once he gets used to the idea,” Ruby went on. “I hope it’s a girl, with blond hair and blue eyes.”

Despite Ruby’s happiness over her pregnancy, she worried about Dar, who was growing increasingly morose. Several days later, Ruby went looking for him to force an explanation. He wasn’t in the chamber where he worked on manor business. She was about to leave and look in the stables when she noticed a small, linen-wrapped package lying on a piece of parchment.

Ruby had seen Thork clutching such a parcel the day he left her in Normandy. Ruby’s ears began to buzz and her pulse raced wildly as she walked woodenly toward it, sensing somehow that all her questions were about to be answered. Slowly she unwrapped the layers.

Gagging, Ruby stared at the small finger, its skin dried up and beginning to deteriorate. She rocked from side to side in shock, a keening wail beginning low in her throat.

Why would anyone save such a morbid thing? Could it be Thork’s finger that his brother Eric had cut off years ago? No, that would be bare bone by now. This was more recent.

Ruby’s keening grew louder and the ringing in her ears reached deafening proportions as she continued to rock back and forth. She reached shakily for the stiff parchment and read the horrifying words:

Ruby screamed over and over and over, then fell unconscious to the floor. She awakened hours later in her bed, surrounded by Dar, Aud and Ella.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked Dar accusingly.

“Thork did not want you to know. He said you would blame yourself.”

“It
is
my fault. He warned me over and over about the danger to his family, but I wouldn’t let things stand. I insisted he leave Tykir with you, and Eirik at Athelstan’s court. It’s all my fault.”

“Then we are just as much to blame for wanting Tykir here with us,” Aud asserted. “Nay, ’twas the right decision. Thork could not live his entire life looking over his shoulder. These are dangerous times. All Vikings live with the possibility of death every day. We cannot stop living because we fear dying.”

“Haven’t you had any news from Thork since that note?” Ruby questioned fearfully.

Dar shifted his eyes, and Aud exclaimed, “Dar! Have you heard something and not told me?”

He shrugged forlornly. “I did not want to worry you. Two days past, ’twas word in Jorvik of a fierce battle that took place weeks ago.” He inhaled sharply before continuing, “’Tis said that Ivar won and many Jomsvikings died, along with hundreds of other fighting men. Fifty Jomsvikings were captured and are to be executed.”

Oh my God oh my God oh my God!
Ruby clamped a hand over her mouth in horror, not wanting to hear more, yet needing to know the truth.

“I know naught of Thork or Eirik. Nor Selik and Olaf,” Dar choked out.