For some unaccountable reason, she blushed. It was nothing to her how she looked, shouldn’t have been anyway, since it usually wasn’t, but she knew she likely had never looked worse. Enough of her hair had come loose from her braids that it was straggled around her face and stuck in places from her sweat. The dust of the road coated her and had been smeared the few times she had tried to wipe her face on her arms. She had smelled her stench long enough that she no longer smelled it, but he undoubtedly did, and that mortified her the most.
Ravaged, with dark circles beneath his eyes, he still looked magnificent. She had wilted to drab and knew it. Thathewanted her to know it showed what she could expect from this newest exchange between them.
She decided not to play his game this time. “Just kill me and be done with it.”
He didn’t know any woman of his acquaintance with that kind of spunk—besides his mother and sister. He was surprised, though he didn’t show it. He smiled at her instead.
She really wished he wouldn’t do that. It made him so much more handsome—and frightening.
“Nay, no death for you,” he said. “No ransom either. Just endless torment such as you gave to me.”
“Yours was not endless,” she dared to point out.
“Three days in your pitwasendless, lady.’Tis a shame I have nothing like it to offer you.”
Her mouth was suddenly dry, but she found the nerve to ask, “What do you mean to do with me?”
“Besides enslave you?”
The sharply drawn breath escaped her. “You cannot enslave me.”
“I already have.”
“But my brother will come for me,” she said frantically. “He will pay whatever man-price you are worth.”
“I am no Saxon, nor do I accept their wergild price for damages. A Viking will have revenge. You should know that—Viking.”
But he lived in Wessex. His sister was wed to a Saxon lord. He had to obey their laws. Shehadto believe this could be settled and ended by the paying of fines, or she would have no hope to sustain her.
A slave? He could not do it. She had not been captured in battle, she had been stolen from her own home. Ransom he could demand. Wergild he could demand. Her life he could take, though Ragnar would see he died for it. But enslavement, when her own kin lived not so many leagues away?
Though her emotions were now in turmoil, she tried to sound reasonable. “My brother will never let you keep me. You must consider a price for when he comes.”
“Must I?”
He was smiling again, but the sudden pullon her braid proved his anger was back. He had merely clenched his fist around her braid. She doubted he realized it tugged against her scalp.
“Your brother is not at issue,” he added. “If he does come, I will have to kill him. And whose fault will that ultimately be?”
She closed her eyes. He was going to make her cry yet. He was likely determined to see it. It was choking her to deny him that.
“Have I found something that matters to you?” His voice was softer yet.
“Aye,” she said in a mere whisper.
“How much will you beg me to spare his life?”
She stiffened and met his eyes again. “My brother is no weakling. He can see to himself.”
“So you will not beg?”
“Nay.”
“Then you have some pride? Good. Crushing it will be one of my priorities. You will make it challenging for me, will you not?”
She wished she knew the strategies of his game. Or were there any besides terrifying her?
“Not if I can help it,” she replied cautiously.
