“You realize I’m not paying you if these raiders don’t show?” Cenric faced Hróarr, moving one of his pieces across the tafl board.
Typically, the board would be balanced on their laps, but they had placed it atop a barrel between them to make it easier if they had to rise suddenly.
Hróarr chuckled. “Seems fair.”
They spoke in Valdari, crouched under the eaves of a smithy, watching and waiting. The glowing coals in the smithy’s forge served for light.
The people of Leofton had panicked upon seeing Hróarr’s obviously Valdari ship, but Cenric had managed to calm them.
The headman of the town was an elder named Leofric with one eye and two teeth. His family had founded this fishing village, and he had been none too happy about another thirty or so men to feed, even if only for a few days. Like Brynn, he seemed skeptical that any raid was coming.
Cenric was not sure how he could have parted with Brynn on better terms, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he should have.
Vana had kissed Hróarr in front of everyone, standing on her toes to whisper lovers’ secrets in his ear before kissing him one last time.
Brynn had inclined her head to Cenric. “Return safely, lord,” she said. Her words had been all stiff formality and icy acceptance.
Cenric pressed a kiss to her forehead all the same, hoping they could sort this out when he returned home. For just a moment, Brynn softened. Her hands squeezed his forearms tight until he had to pull away.
When he withdrew, she took a shuddering breath, almost like she was fighting tears. She pulled herself together a moment later, standing straight and stoic.
Cenric left his wife standing on the riverbank, her face as hard and unreadable as a shield.
“Not sure what’s keeping them,” Hróarr muttered. He nudged one of his pieces across the board. He had chosen to play Valds, the dark pieces. “Must be the weather.”
Tafl was played on a checkered board with pale pieces, Hylds, and dark pieces, Valds. The Hylds started at the center of the board, surrounded on all four sides by the Valds. The Hylds won when their king piece reached the edge of the board, escaping. The Valds had no king piece, but they won by capturing the Hyld king.
It had started raining, so perhaps that was what had kept the Valdari raiders at bay. From where Cenric and Hróarr sat playing tafl, they could see the mouth of the river that opened into the sea. That would be the direction any raiders would likely come from.
Several of Hróarr’s men lay napping around them. Any attack would likely come at night, so they had spent last night and the night before watching and waiting.
Two nights of nothing. Two nights of sleeping on the hard ground when Cenric could have been in his own bed, lying next to his own wife. Here it was the third night and Cenric was ready to call this whole thing off if they didn’t see enemy ships soon.
If it turned out Cenric had left Brynn, had argued with her for no reason, he was never going to let Hróarr live it down. He didn’t believe his cousin would deliberately trick him, but it was infuriating all the same.
“How is Ovrek?” Perhaps Cenric should have used the Valdari king’s title, but that seemed like a Hyldish thing to do. Cenric tossed the bone dice, which came up with four marks. That meant he could move any of his pieces a total of four spaces. He paused, considering his next move on the board.
Hróarr’s pieces were converging to one side, trying to break through the formation Cenric had set up around his king piece.
“Good,” Hróarr replied. “Strong as an ox and healthy as a boar.”
“Aelgar is sickly.” Cenric looked pointedly up to Hróarr. “Some people think he won’t last the year.” Cenric was offering brutal honesty, signaling that he wanted honesty back.
Hróarr’s dark brows twitched.
“So, I will ask again.” Cenric placed one of his Hylds, not the king, in front of Hróarr’s advancing line. That was two spaces. He moved two others forward by one space each, ending his turn. “How is Ovrek?”
Hróarr inhaled a breath, studying the board. “He’s past fifty.” Hróarr tossed his dice before moving a few of his own pieces, advancing on Cenric’s line. “But I expect he has more than a few good years left.”
“Aelgar’s aldermen are loyal,” Cenric said.
“Ovrek’s jarls are learning to have a king,” Hróarr admitted. “But they are learning fast.”
What Hróarr meant was that Ovrek still struggled to unite his jarls. It was a hard thing for many of them who had been their own masters for as long as anyone could remember.
“Who would be king after Aelgar, do you think?” Hróarr asked the question offhandedly, not looking from the tafl board.
“Hard to say,” Cenric admitted. “I hear Alderman Torswald is powerful. Paega of Glasney could make a claim, but I doubt he has the ambition.” Cenric’s fist clenched at the thought of Brynn’s first husband.
