Garrick was duly chastened and smiled despite himself, then leaned over and kissed her on the brow. “’Tis easy to disremember when no other Viking son shows the respect due his mother.”
“A truth that breaks many a mother’s heart, I’ll wager. But you are half Christian, Garrick, and though few know it, I raised you differently.” She put aside her sewing and looked up at him finally, a gleam twinkling in her eyes. “You seek your brother? He took the cattle to pasture.”
“When?”
“Before the snow fell.”
“Then he will be delayed,” Garrick said with irritation.
“He had goods he wanted me to trade. Did he make mention of them to you?”
“Nay, Hugh bid me tell you wait on his return. He wants to sail north with you, to hunt the great white bear before you go east.”
“’Tis too late to sail north.”
Heloise clucked her tongue. “You are too eager to leave, Garrick, just like—” She stopped and he raised a brow, but she shook her head. “You know that even one fur of the white bear will make your waiting worthwhile. Are you concerned with profit, or do you just want to be gone?”
“If I leave in midsummer, I will not return this winter,” he replied.
“You need not sail as far east as you did before, Garrick. Hedeby is a fine trading center.”
“Bulgar is better,” he returned gruffly. “I will wait only as long as it takes my ship to be readied.” He started to leave, then stopped suddenly and looked about the hall.
“She is gone, Garrick,” Heloise said.
He looked back at her. “Who?”
“The one you were just looking for. She ran from the hall with tears in her eyes before you entered. Why does she cry when she sees you?”
Garrick stiffened. “She does not cry! She swore she never cries!”
“Why should this upset you?”
“Becauseallthings that she swears to are false!” he said heatedly.
“In your own stubborn opinion. I happen to believe that what Brenna claims to have occurred when she was gone is true—all of it.”
“Do you indeed, mistress?” he sneered. “Then let me enlighten you. She swore she killed Cedric Borgsen, yet I have seen Cedric with my own eyes and he is very much alive.”
“How did you see him?” Heloise gasped. “You crossed the fjord?”
“I did. I had to see for myself proof of what she claimed. And I did—proof of her lies.”
Heloise wrinkled her brow in thought. “She assumed Cedric was dead, that is all.”
“You are kind, mother,” Garrick said disdainfully.
“Brenna does not deserve your trust.”
“Would that you would trust her, Garrick, and believe in her,” Heloise said with genuine sorrow. “We will lose her soon, and I for one will be sorry.”
“Truly, I never had her to lose,” he replied bitterly and walked away.
In the ensuing weeks, Brenna passed her days no differently than she had before, except that she had more energy. She felt a compulsion to fill each waking moment with strenuous activity. She tried not to think of her changing body and the life it was nurturing. She tried even harder not to think of Garrick and the last time she had seen him, with Morna by his side. She wanted only to be exhausted each night when she crawled into her lonely bed.
She waited eagerly for news of Anselm’s health, but none came. The warming sun quickly melted the last snow that had fallen, so the ship that would take her home must be ready to sail. Spring came and went, yet still no one came to tell her to prepare.
Finally she could wait no longer for news to come to her. She was very late in her weekly payments to Anselm, for she had dreaded going to his settlement and perhaps encountering Garrick again. The furs she owed gave her a reason to venture from her seclusion now, but it also meant that she would risk revealing her condition to Garrick’s family. She chose to take that risk, for she had to know why she was being forgotten.
