Breathless and crazed, I peer through the strands of hair shrouding my face at the chaos I created. Six men lay dead by my feet, and I wish I could kill six hundred more.
My composure slips, and I lift my face to the heavens and scream. I scream over and over again. I want to scream this pain away, but I know so much more faces me for the road is long.
I do not wish for war, but it’s all that seems to follow, and when I am winded by someone punching me in the back, it appears war follows me into victory.
I am quick to recover and spin before my attacker can drive his sword through my stomach. But when we lock eyes, I know I was right—to the six men I killed, there are six more to take their place. I left our campsite to avoid this mess.
The giant of a man does not care that I am a woman and punches me in the face. Blood instantly pours from my nose.
He dives for me, sending us both to the hard ground.
I blindly reach for a weapon, but my best guards have trained this man as he reads my moves and drives a blade through the back of my hand, impaling me to the ground. I inhale my scream because I will not give him the satisfaction.
“’Ello, my Queen,” he sneers inches from my face.
He pins me down with his heavy weight, so I cannot move. Fighting is futile. Now I must fight with my mind.
“What do you want?”
“I want many things, but most of all, I want to destroy you how you destroyed me.”
I don’t recognize him, but he’s clearly blaming whatever misfortunes on me instead of owning up to whatever he did. So typical of these weak men.
He furiously lifts my dress, and when I kick my legs, he punches me in the mouth. Instantly, I see stars as my head connects with the ground.
He crudely shoves two fingers into my womanhood, defiling me as I am restrained beneath him.
It does not matter if I am a queen or not; all men see women as their lower, and they can do with them as they please. This is a man’s world, something which I will die for changing because no woman should ever bow to any man.
He undoes his pants with one hand and spits into his palm when his cock is free. He removes his fingers from inside me, and as I reach for a fallen blade with my spare hand, he places his dagger against my throat. “I do not need you alive to finish.”
I do as I did when I was violated times before this and bide my time. When men are lost to their carnal lusts, that’s when they are at their weakest, and I will attack. I close my eyes and wait for the intrusion of pain, but I do not feel it.
Instead, I feel the drip…drip…dripping of warm blood coat my lips.
When I open my eyes, who I see standing feet away has my heart skipping a beat.
Surely, this is a dream…
Ulf the Bloody is before me, and he holds my attacker’s head in his hands with a ferocious grin.
“Milady, are you all right?” Aedan, my dear and trusted friend, asks as he crouches down beside me and shoves the headless corpse off me.
But I am not, and it has nothing to do with my injuries and everything to do with the man who still makes me forget my own name.
Ulf tosses the man’s head in the air and catches it, unaffected by the scene we both created. He knows better than to coddle me. He always knew me better than I knew myself.
Aedan yanks the blade out of my hand and gently helps me sit up.
I cannot speak. It feels as if I’ve forgotten how.
I cannot do anything but look at my Viking.
Ulf’s long blond hair is tied back in a braid with the sides shorn short. He wears silver beads throughout. His beard is long, but I notice he now has some silver nestled amongst the blond. His eyes still hold me captive as I attempt to decipher what thoughts he has. The large scar running down his left cheek reminds me of the times I ran my fingers across it, marveling at its beauty.
No matter how much time passes, I will always love this man.
“You are far from your kingdom, princess,” Ulf says, using my former title as a pet name because that is what I was when we first met.
