Strian was unprepared to see Gressa step out on a branch and balance while moving towards the branches of a neighboring tree. She leaped and grasped the limb of the nearby tree before scampering through the fir needles and branches. He watched her in awe of her graceful movement through the trees. He remembered she had enjoyed climbing trees when they were younger, but this was a skill she had learned from the Welsh archers. Strian had no choice but to climb down before he could chase after her once more.
“Squirrel,” Strian called up to the tree he was sure Gressa rested in. “I was trying to apologize.”
“Don’t want to hear it,” came a voice two trees behind the one Strian stood beneath.
“Well then, I suppose I’ll be talking to myself. I’m angry but not at you. I’m angry at fate for stealing ten years from us, for creating one obstacle after another than makes you feel you have to protect me. I’m angry that fate stole that time and forced you to have a life that didn’t include me. Every time something comes up that reminds me of what I had taken from me, I lash out. But it’s not you I blame or accuse. It’s fate. I couldn’t blame you if you moved on after ten years of thinking you would never see me again. I wouldn’t want you to be alone when you still have so much of your life to live.”
“But isn’t that exactly what you planned for yourself? To remain alone. Why shouldn’t I want the same for you, for you to move one? The real difference is I don’t keep accusing you.”
“Because you’re here with me. There’s nothing I can hide when you can see it for yourself.”
“If hiding my past were my true motivation, then why would I agree to you coming to Wales with me? Why would I bring you to a place only to leave you for another man?”
“Everything you say is reasonable. I just have a great deal of anger and bitterness to overcome. Fate has no mercy, and I begrudge it for what it’s taken from us.”
Gressa swung down from the branches where she hid. Strian reached up and caught her as she dropped from the last one. She cupped his cheeks as she rubbed her nose against his.
“I understand. I’m hurt each time you have so little faith in me, but I’m angry and bitter with fate, too. If it were a person, I would run it through with my sword before hacking it to bits. I wish we could both release those feelings once and for all, but it will take time. But you can’t blame me every time you’re heartsore. I’m on your side.”
“I know. We have come a long way in our reconciliation in a very short amount of time. There are things from our time apart that we must learn about one another, and things that come out may hurt us, but I won’t live a life without you ever again.” Strian kissed her deeply as she opened to him, her mouth warm satin that his tongue caressed. She sucked lightly, hinting at what she enjoyed doing with his length in her mouth rather than his tongue.
“Take me home, Strian.”
Gressa had barely gotten out the words before the hair on her arms stuck straight up. She shoved all her weight against Strian, catching him off guard and off-balance seconds before an arrow embedded in the ground where he had been standing. Gressa whipped her bow off her shoulder and knocked an arrow. She scanned the trees and found her target. She shot off three arrows in quick succession as an arrow flew past her, aimed only at Strian. Her third arrow found a home before a body tumbled from the branches. Gressa did not take the time to see if she recognized her first victim. She launched another series of arrows where she believed their attackers hid. She used her instincts and her experience to find her targets, one after another body falling from the trees until the arrows flying towards her and Strian ceased. Only after waiting several minutes did Gressa look towards Strian, relieved to see him unharmed, then her eyes swung to the bodies that did not move beneath trees close to where she had been hiding herself. She stepped forward with caution and an arrow at the ready. She toed the shoulder of the first man and recognized him as a man who trained with her, but she did not know well. The next body made her heart squeeze as though in a vice. The unseeing eyes seemed to look beyond her until she pressed the lids closed. She murmured a prayer to her gods regardless of whether the man accepted them.
“Who was he to you?” Strian wondered. He was careful not to accuse but to inquire.
“He was a lot like Ivar in many ways. He was the closest thing to a father I had in Wales. He trained all the archers. When he discovered my skills with a bow and arrow, he took me under his wing, allowing me to train with the men. He encouraged me to continue training even when the men scoffed at me, convinced I could never be equal to them. And now I have killed him.”
“Before he killed you,” Strian’s hushed tones still felt as though he screamed in Gressa’s ears. “He was shooting at us just as the others were or he would have stopped them.”
Gressa shook her head as she looked up at Strian.
“None of them were aiming at me. They were trying to kill you not me. I feel sad for the death of one of my only true friends, yet I cannot overlook that he was willing to murder my husband. They had to have heard us, seen us. They all knew who you were to me. They intended to take me alive to Grímr and Rhys, but they would have killed you had I not had my bow.”
Strian opened his arms, and she leaned against his solid frame, using it to hold her up. Exhaustion threatened to overcome her as her two worlds crashed together once more, always necessitating she save Strian’s life.
“We should return home. Let me take care of you after you protected me. Again. I’ll run you a hot bath and prepare something for you to eat.”
Gressa shook her head against his chest before leaning back.
“We can’t. They were too close to the homestead again. We have to find out who else is nearby, how many are close to our people.”
It was the first time since returning to the Trondelag that Gressa called the tribe her people. Neither of them missed it, and Strian looked into the distance as he weighed their options. He wanted to carry her home, kicking and screaming if necessary, but he had to honor her right as a shield maiden to defend their tribe.
“You know we are more likely to be captured than to discover anything we can report back.”
“You’re probably right,” Gressa answered as she swung the bow back onto her shoulder after it slid down her arm while Strian embraced her. “But we have a duty.”
“But we would be wiser to go back and gather the others to come with us.”
“True, but they will have disappeared by then.”
“Who?” Strian scanned the trees again, but nothing unusual seemed to lurk in the branches.
“They’re not here, but when the men don’t return, others will come searching for them. Those are the men I want to find. I think I know who they will send, and if I’m right, we can learn more than any of our spies ever could.”
Strian nodded, refusing to question her knowledge of people she believed she belonged to not so long ago. They slipped further into the trees as they traveled in silence, their footsteps as soft as a forest animal’s.
