Unsurprisingly, the horse ignored the call and soon disappeared around the bend with Grendel.
Once everything had quietened, the Saxons turned to glare at Torsten who was still in on Fáfnir’s back. He expected insults for the way he and Aife had burst into the meadow, shattering their peace and causing their horse to bold away, but to his surprise, the man closest to the rocks smiled when he spotted Aife on the ground next to him.
“Look at that!” he told his friends. He was tall and had dark ginger hair cut in a very distinctive style, shaved very high at the back of the head. This, combined with his and his friend’s accent, caused Torsten to reassess his first impression. These men were not Saxons, like he had assumed, but Normans. “A Norsewomananda Norseman. Just our luck,” Ginger finished.
He didn’t seem overly affected by the loss of Tonnerre the horse, or worried about his friend’s injury. All he seemed interested in was having two Norse people unexpectedly brought to him. Torsten could not understand why that might be, and he didn’t like it one bit.
He nudged Fáfnir closer to the place where Aife was lying, still as a corpse. His heart picked up speed. Why was she not getting up? It had been a while since Grendel had sent her flying. Was she more hurt than he’d feared? He jumped down and made to go to her but the three men still able to move placed themselves in front of him, blocking his way.
“Ishe a Norseman, though?” the oldest one asked, taking in his dark eyes and hair that was most definitely not golden. “He doesn’t look it. Not blond enough.”
Torsten bristled. How dare the men question his identity, and what was it to them anyway?
“Of course I’m a Norseman, though why you should care is beyond me,” he growled in Norse. The best way to convince them was to talk his father’s language. Besides, he didn’t want to enter in a negotiation with them. He just wanted to get to Aife, and see that she was all right. “Now, out of my way!” he added in English.
He tried to elbow his way between the men, but the ginger-haired man, who appeared to lead this pack of obtuse men, moved forward.
“Not so fast, Norseman,” he said, pointing a short blade to his heart. “The woman is ours now, and so are you.”
Torsten cursed himself for being taken unawares. Too focused on Aife, he had not even seen the man draw the knife out. He stilled. No sense in getting injured straight away. “What do you want with us?”
Instead of answering, Ginger asked his companions. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking,mes amis?” Grunts answered him. Evidently, they were. “That’s right. I’m thinking that Ranulf will have no choice but to eat his foul words. He thinks that we Normans are pampered weaklings hiding behind King Guillaume’s authority and cannot fend for ourselves. He bet me only last night that I could never defeat a Norseman in single combat. Well, I’ll bring him this one on a plate, along with a pretty Norsewoman to take his pleasure with. After that he will never dare question my ability or my loyalty. I will finally be allowed my rightful place and be accepted into the clan.”
Whatever clan he was talking about wasn’t clear, but one thing was certain. The men were freshly arrived from Normandy, and eager to find recognition amongst the local Saxon lords by playing on their contempt for the Norse community. Torsten swallowed. There was nothing like havinga common enemy to unite two people. If Ginger wanted to prove his loyalty to this Ranulf by handing him a Norseman and woman, then they were in serious trouble.
He might be killed in some cruel ritual while Aife would be allowed to live, but only for as long as the man needed her for his amusement.
Before the three men joined forces to immobilize him, which he felt sure was coming, he threw a branch at Fáfnir’s rump. The animal had to flee before he could be captured also. Not only that, but with luck, his arrival in the village so shortly after a riderless Grendel would signal there was a problem and a search party would be sent. The slap had the desired effect—the surprised horse bolted off, narrowly missing stomping over one of the Normans.
In the next heartbeat, Torsten was seized by both arms and a second, longer blade dug into the base of his spine, preventing him from moving. Had he been alone, he would still have tried to disentangle himself, headbutted one of the men while kicking back at the one holding the knife, but he wasn’t alone, which was the problem. He had Aife to consider. He could not risk a debilitating injury now. If he was killed, or even only maimed, she would be alone to face the men when she woke up, and there were four of them, even if one seemed incapable of standing up at present. His fleeing horse had broken his ankle in his panic, at least that was what Torsten hoped.
If he wanted to protect Aife, he’d have to use his brains, not his fists, so he forced himself to stillness.
“Now, what say you we sample the woman’s charms before Ranulf gets his hands on her?” the man holding his right arm asked, nodding toward the unconscious Aife. “He’ll never know, will he, if we make sure not to damage her?”
“No,” Ginger decreed, to Torsten’s immense relief. “She’s senseless, in case you hadn’t noticed. What is the point of fucking someone who doesn’t even know what you’re doing?”
A jarring laugh answered this question. “She doesn’t need to know. This would be for me, not for her. Senseless or not, she still has a cunt, does she not? That’s enough for me.”
“You really are an animal!”
The man guffawed again. “That I am, and I’ve never heard any complaints. Well, not many anyway.”
The four men laughed as if that was the wittiest thing they’d ever heard for weeks. Torsten bunched his fingers into fists. Why did they have the misfortune of riding into this group of miscreants?
Just then Aife’s eyes fluttered open. Panic flooded his chest at the same time as relief. No! She couldn’t wake up now, while the men were debating whether to rape her or not. If they saw her come to, they would not hesitate. Her being senseless was the only reason Ginger had refused to let his friend touch her. Guessing that the men didn’t understand Norse, he shouted a warning to her.
“Whatever you do, Aife, don’t move. Pretend you’re still unconscious. The men are?—”
“Silence!” Ginger barked, punctuating the order with a jab of his dagger. This time the tip of the blade went all the way to his skin and he clearly felt the sting of the cut. Torsten wouldn’t be surprised if the man had drawn blood. “I don’t want to hear another word out of your mouth, Norseman.”
“Well, you will hear this: you’re not taking her to any of your?—”
Another jab, even more forceful. Another painful nick. “I’ll do what needs doing, andyouwill shut up, understood?”
Torsten looked at his chest. Blood had started to seep through the wool of his tunic. He didn’t let it worry him. Hispriority was protecting Aife from the men’s lust. “I will, if your men leave her alone.”
“They will. We only mean to hand her over to Ranulf. Now, how are we going to do this?” he asked no one in particular. “We’ve lost a horse and Girard’s ankle is likely broken. That means he will have to ride double with Enguerrand. The Norseman is too heavy to be bundled up behind one of us and the woman…”
