The Viking's Woman (18 page)

He longed to rise and strike her in fury. He didn’t believe that she wanted bloodshed; she wanted him to suffer for being what he was, a Viking. She never seemed to grant him a drop of his Irish blood, yet it didn’t matter. He
was
a Viking, and she had offended him deeply. She must imagine that there was nothing he could do. If he rose in anger, there would be bloodshed, for his men would rise behind him. She had spun such an aching tale, every Englishman must remember the raid that came long before their time and rally together in vengeance and hatred.

She had dared much, for the king, Eric could see, was furious.

For the moment, though, she had little to fear. The room remained silent; all eyes remained upon her. Her hair was a cascading shower of red-gold fire about her, and as she paused before them all, using the drama of the silence, she was achingly beautiful and magnificent, a woman for whom a man might readily die.

Well, she intended him to die, Eric thought dryly. He simply did not intend to oblige her.

She began to move again and to speak softly, and Eric, watching her narrow-eyed and pensive from his place beside the king, wondered how she dared defy Alfred again, when she had already suffered so for offending him. But she so smoothly changed her tale! No matter what his anger, Alfred would wait. He would not incite the men in the hall. She was clever. Dangerously clever, for while the men still sat, mesmerized by the startling beauty of the girl and the curious innocence that touched her tale, she carried her story onward. She spoke of Alfred’s grandfather, and of his fathers and brothers. In wondrous, flowing words she described the greatest challenge of his career, when he had met the Dane, Guthrum. The year was 878. The Danes held Northumbria, had murdered Edmund of East Anglia, and they pressed hard against Alfred of Wessex. Despite all odds, the Saxon king refused to accept defeat, and the fighting forces held out in the island fastnesses of the fenlands. The Welsh of Cornwall were in league with the Danes, and the situation was desperate. But Alfred’s cry went out, and the Saxon thanes of Devon came, ready to trust their fate to the great leadership of Alfred of Wessex, the one man who determined to hold an independent
piece of England. The Battle of Ethandune was fought, and it was not the Saxons who were forced to seek terms but the Danish invaders. Guthrum vowed to leave Wessex for the land of Danelaw in the north. He was baptized to the Christian faith, but alas, Viking word was easily broken, and now Guthrum threatened the Saxons again.

Rhiannon fell silent. She raised her arms slowly and reached toward the sky, rising like a young deer upon her toes until she posed in a graceful line.

Then she dropped dramatically to the earth again, and her head fell as she paused once more. Then she raised her chin and her eyes to them all and her cry came out.

“Hail Alfred, King of Wessex!”

The fire brightened, and the hall was visible once again. There was silence, and then thunderous applause, and then a score of men were raising their leather tankards to the king.

And then silence fell again.

Her performance had been so provocative, so seductive, that they had all forgotten the birth of it, as well as the insult she had heaped upon the Norse. All of Eric’s men, the Irish and the Norse and the men of mixed nationalities like himself, all of them applauded her like sheep, enchanted.

But then memory slowly returned to the men, their applause faded, and Eric, leaning back in his chair at the king’s side, knew that they looked to him.

By all honor he was bound to challenge her, to punish her in some way, to meet her anger. But if he were to strike the girl who had just so eloquently praised the great King of Wessex, men who had condemned
her this very day for her refusal to obey her guardian, the king would now rise wildly to her defense. She had cast him into a very dangerous and precarious situation, and he swore in silence that she would someday pay for her cunning.

She remained upon the ground, elegantly draped in her clothing, still beautiful in her pose. But her eyes were on his, and he saw the silver glint to them, the feline gleam. She knew exactly the import of what she had done, and she was sweetly savoring her triumph over him.

He sat still in the silence, and then he rose very slowly. He towered over the assembly in size and majesty in his crimson mantle with the banner of the wolf boldly emblazoned upon it.

He pushed away from the table and walked toward her. There was not a whisper of sound to be heard in the room. As she saw him come, wariness replaced the triumph in her eyes. She rose with swift and agile ease, but Eric saw then that she was not so calm as she pretended to be, for against the fine white line of her throat her pulse beat with the speed of hummingbird wings, and her breasts rose and fell rapidly with each breath she sought.

He paused before her, smiled slowly, and then bowed very low.

It was not what she had expected, She had been certain that he would lose his temper, demand some redress, and the king could not seek it for him now because she had said nothing that was not true. The first raid of note had been at Lindesfarne, and it had been Norwegians who’d savaged the sacred home of St. Cuthbert. None could deny it, and those who were
reminded of it now had to see this new treaty as an unholy alliance.

His smile deepened, though she saw the clenched muscles in his jaw and the curl of his lips. His eyes captured hers, and where she had set out to hypnotize, she was caught in return, for she could do nothing but return his blue gaze. No chemist’s powder touched the fire, but the room seemed to dim, and it was if they—and they alone—were caught in a curious, bold, glowing blaze; heat and light flowed between them. The air itself seemed to crackle, as with the portent of a storm, as if lightning flashed above and beyond them. Seconds passed—it might well have been eons, for she could not tear her eyes from the deadly aqua power of his. Her head fell back and she longed to defy him, and she swore that she would not cringe before him. A charged silence remained between them; the fire snapped and rose and danced upon the walls and within her very being. It was not the fire, she realized, but the power he emitted. His arms were bare beneath the flow of his mantle, and they glistened bronze, rippling with a play of muscle with each nuance of movement, with each breath he drew. She felt the warrior’s majesty of him, the burning determination of sinew and brawn and savage confidence. And she felt, too, a different power—that of his mind—and in those fleeting seconds she knew that she had set out to battle not a fool but a man who would ever think and judge and carefully weigh his options. If he determined that he would have revenge, then it would be so. Once his mind was set, it would not be changed, and he would be forever ready to parry her every thrust.

His eyes remained fixed upon hers, and she did not falter or fail. He stared upon her, then spoke to the king.

“Truly, Alfred, you have offered me the fairest gem of Saxony. She puts the seneschals of my mother’s country to shame, and likewise does she make fools of the skalds of Norway, for no man can tell a tale with so musical a voice and so lithe and beautiful a show of dance and movement.”

He reached for her hand. Too late she thought that it might have been wise to withdraw, and she felt her slender fingers enveloped within the massive size and strength of his hold. Yet though he held her firmly, he turned her hand over and rubbed the callused tip of his thumb slowly over the center of her palm. She could not draw her eyes from his.

Rhiannon was vaguely aware that the king had risen. Tension continued to crackle on the air, taut and tangible, like a swirling mist, like the fiery heat that eclipsed them together, away from all the others.

“Indeed she is wondrous,” Eric continued. “I would have jumped to my feet, longing to battle my own forebears, were they not ghosts now to ride the wind. I tell you, Alfred of Wessex, I was seduced. The fair lady here, this breath of beauty with which you welcome me to your shore, is indeed so exquisite that I am bewitched.”

Suddenly, so fiercely that she nearly cried out, his fingers tightened upon hers. His eyes blazed with a true ice-fire, with all the savage windswept cold of the north, then he turned fleetly from her to the king, still holding tight to her hand.

“Good Alfred, I am so enamored that I would not
wait another moment to claim my bride. Let the seeds of discord of the past be cast onto the rocks, where they cannot fester and grow. Let us forget anything that has come before, and seal this alliance between us here and now. I would not dishonor your house, yet I would not live another night without this precious morsel of peace and goodwill away from my side!”

Her blood seemed swiftly to freeze, and she could not find breath even to protest. She had had her triumph, aye! She had savored her moments of victory, but he had taken them and twisted them heinously from her.

Alfred was frowning. A roar went up around the table; Viking laughter sounded, and with it the thunder sound of English approval.

“No!” she whispered.

It couldn’t be done; it would not be decent or proper. Surely there could be no Mass celebrated now. The hour grew late and the moon was full; there was even a portent of thunder on the air. In the morning the men would ride away. She would have her reprieve.

Alfred was still frowning. Alswitha was whispering in his ear, and Rhiannon was certain that the queen warned him he would be sanctioning a heathen practice, no Christian nuptials.

“No!” she whispered again, and she worked diligently to free her hand from his grasp. It was not to be done. He had her with a touch of iron, implacable and unyielding. Despite herself, she shivered with fear. When he touched her, it would be with no tenderness. She had crossed him again and again, and she
knew full well that any man might have despised her for the scene that he had come upon. Yet he seemed a Viking in truth, a man who would not heed propriety or care but would fight his way to what he craved, and claim it brutally … then discard it.

The king hesitated.

“It cannot be done!” Father Paul rose from the side of the table. “It cannot be done here and now—”

“We shall move to the church, where God always abides, is that not true, Father?” Eric demanded. “The banns have been cried to the people, and the betrothal is valid. It was my choice that we delay, but now I demand my rights.” He slammed his fist hard against his breast and fell dramatically upon his knee, still holding tight to Rhiannon. He bowed his head, but she saw his eyes and knew that there was no humility to the gesture, just pure, driven fury.

“Before God I ride for the great and noble Saxon king, Alfred of Wessex. I face death eagerly for his pleasure, but since this night I have seen the beauty of my betrothed, I would make her my wife before I ride!”

The Norwegian host began to slam their tankards against the table. Many of them were drunk, and their Irish comrades were also.

Many a good Saxon was drunk, too, Rhiannon thought sourly.

And it was her doom. The clamor rose and she saw the king’s features and knew that he weighed his choices of action. Tomorrow they rode to expel Gunthrum. He could not afford to risk the camaraderie and goodwill of all his forces. The wedding had been delayed at the Irish prince’s request, but the king
discerned that Eric had now chosen the only possible means of true peace among the warriors. Rhiannon had shamed them all; the prince of Dubhlain had magnanimously agreed to accept the bride, anyway, and when she had sought to subtly injure him, he had spoken of his desire.

None but those closest to him could have seen the fleet workings of his mind. Nor could any but those closest to him realize the extent of his wrath, for his control was so great, his rage so calculated and cold. None but those closest to him …

And Rhiannon.

The noise in the hall grew until it became a cacophony, crashing all around her. At last the king spoke. “So be it! The wedding shall take place immediately.”

A roar went up, and Rollo stood, lifting his ale high. “A wedding. We eat and we drink and we feast while the bride is prepared!”

Light played upon the king’s face. He was not pleased about the hasty ceremony, but he was compelled to follow through with it.

Rhiannon suddenly felt that her fingers were about to shatter and break. She saw that the Viking was staring at her again, and that he watched her with a wintry warning. While the shouts went on, he whispered, and she heard his every word clearly.

“No more trouble, lady. No further dissent. Do you truly care so little for men that you long for their deaths in mass carnage?”

“Nay!”

He lifted an arm to encompass the hall. “They are bred to war. The Irish here, the English, the Norse. All too easily hearts and minds can change, and in this
society each insult must be avenged. I have done what was necessary. You will now play out the end of this drama you have spun.”

She tugged again on her fingers, but she could not free herself. She saw that a number of women were coming, and that she seemed destined to be gowned for her wedding despite the events that had greeted Eric of Dubhlain’s arrival at Wareham.

She thought of the warning pressure of his fingers upon hers, and a weakness pervaded her. He oft seemed created of bronze and steel; she did not think that any man could best him in a test of arms, surely no woman. His hatred for her was great, and his anger was staggering.

“You do not want to do this!” she charged him swiftly. “I know that you cannot want to marry me! Stop this from happening—you can do so!” His jaw remained locked, his eyes stayed cold and hard upon her, and she desperately goaded him. “What of—what of your fears that I bear another man’s child? Physicians
can
be mistaken. Perhaps I did betray you. Stop this thing now and I will go to the holy sisters and—”

“And pray for my death in battle, no doubt. Lady, it matters not. I have forgotten nothing. I have no fears regarding you.”

“But you saw me in the woods.”

“And you are a fool to remind me,” he told her with words so soft and chilling that they seemed to bring a cold finger to draw along the length of her spine. “I always said, my lady, that I would handle things within my own house. I can easily discern what a physician must seek. And if you have deceived the
house of Wessex and carry a child, then you must carry that child to term.” His eyes brightened and his voice deepened dramatically, and she did not know if he taunted her or spoke seriously. “You have displayed to me this evening your great and abiding knowledge of the Norwegian people. Ah, or is it the Viking you truly understand? No matter, I will tell you of the people who stay behind. You do not care to recognize my Irish blood. Nay, lady, nor do you deem me Christian. So I must think as a pagan, as a Viking. And often, when an unwanted child is born in the north, it is a matter easily settled. The child is merely cast into the snow and the ice, and the gods of Hel come to claim their own.”