“Take heart, Kristen.” Thorolf grinned unconcernedly. “They may decide to use us to train them to fight the Danes.”
“And then let us go on our merry way, eh?”
“Of course.”
She snorted at that possibility, but Thorolf’s jesting did make her feel better. If they were to die, then they would die together, and fighting, not calmly accepting the Saxons’ torture. That was the Viking way, and though she was a Christian, she was a Norsewoman too.
She would have said as much if the wooden gate had not opened just then to admit two men on horseback.
Only one was worth watching, and watch him she did as he moved his great black steed slowly toward them. When he dismounted only a few feet away, she was amazed to see that he was nearly as tall as her father, which put him at a height above most of the young men with her. He was young himself and not slim for such a height, but powerful across the shoulders and wide chest. His sleeveless leather vest was almost like a short jacket and revealed a bush of dark hair on his chest running nearly to his neck, and arms that were thick and wrapped with steely muscle, the arms of a warrior. The belt wound tight about his waist showed that there was no fat on him.
The long legs were also thick and powerful, and tight within two different types of leggings, instead of the single garment the Vikings wore. The knee-length trousers that the Europeans called braies were tucked into a hoselike covering they called chausses and cross-gartered, his with leather thongs that were decorated with metal studs.
His face was well defined and impossibly handsome, the nose straight, the lips cleanly drawn and firm with a hint of cruelty above a square-cut jaw that was beardless, though dark with bristles. Hair of a rich, gleaming brown fell in waves to his shoulders and formed unruly curls about his wide brow and temples.
But it was his eyes, once seen, that held the viewer riveted. They were such a dark, crystallike green, and so filled with hate and anger as they passed over the chained men, that Kristen caught her breath when his gaze moved briefly over her, and did not release it until he snapped an order at one of the guards, and then walked away toward the large building and was gone from sight.
“I do not like the looks of that one,” Ivarr said beside her. “What did he say?”
Many others were asking the same thing, but Kristen shook her head dismally. “You tell them, Thorolf.”
“I do not think I have it right,” he replied evasively.
Kristen glared at him. The men had a right to know, but either Thorolf didn’t have the heart to tell them, or he didn’t believe what he had heard.
Kristen glanced at Ivarr, but could not meet his eyes. “His words were ‘In the morn, kill them.’”
Royce entered the hall to find the floor littered with his wounded men. He would speak to each one of them later, but right now he mounted the stairs at the end of the hall and went directly to his cousin’s chamber.
Alden was stretched out on his bed, covered to his neck with a thick quilt, and so pale that Royce groaned, thinking he was already dead. The crying women in the room confirmed it. Two maids Alden sometimes took to his bed were standing in the corner weeping. Meghan, Royce’s only sister, a child of merely eight winters, was sitting at a little table with her face bent over her arms, weeping into them. Darrelle, Alden’s sister, was kneeling at the bed, her face buried in the covers, great sobs racking her slim body.
Royce looked to the only woman in the room who wasn’t crying, Eartha the Healer. “Did he just die? Am I only a few moments too late?”
The old hag tossed back her stringy brown hair and grinned at him. “Dead? He may yet live. Do not kill him off before his time.”
Royce met this news with a mixture of relief and anger. It was the anger to which he reacted. “Out!” he bellowed at the noisy women. “Save your weeping until ’tis needed!”
Darrelle swung around on him, her face as blotchy red as her eyes, her small breasts heaving indignantly at what she considered an outrage. “He ismybrother!”
“Yea, but what good do you do him with your screaming? How can he sleep to conserve his strength with such noise as you make? He does not need your tears to know you care, Darrelle.”
Darrelle scrambled to her feet to face him, the top of her head coming no higher than his chest. She would have pounded on that chest if she had the nerve. Instead she craned her neck to glare up at him.
“You are heartless, Royce! I have always said ’twas so!”
“Have you, lady? Then ’twill come as no surprise to you if your words do not wound me. Go and repair the ravages to your face. You can return and sit with Alden as is your wont—if you can do so quietly.”
The two maids had already flown the room. Darrelle stalked out now. Eartha knew she wasn’t included in the order to leave, but took herself below with her basket of herbs anyway. Royce was left staring at his sister’s frightened little face, and his expression softened.
“I am not angry with you, midget, so do not look at me so,” Royce said gently, holding his arm out to her. “Why were you crying? Because you think Alden will die?”
Meghan ran toward him and threw her arms around his hips, for she was no taller than his waist. “Eartha said he might not, so I was only praying, but then Darrelle was crying and—”
“And our cousin is teaching you bad habits at an early age, midget. You were right to pray, for Alden needs your prayers so he will recover quickly. But do you think he would want you to cry, when you should be happy that he is still alive after facing our worst enemies?” He was loath to talk more of the overuse of tears to her, for she was a timid child who burst into them for the smallest reason. Instead he picked her up and dried the tears from her red cheeks. “’Tis bed for you, Meghan, and your prayers for Alden until you fall asleep. Go on, now.” He kissed her brow before he set her down.
“My thanks, Royce.” Alden spoke weakly from the bed as soon as Meghan closed the door behind her. “I do not know how much longer I could have pretended to be asleep. But every time I opened my eyes, Darrelle screamed at me to get well.”
Royce burst into laughter, pulling a chair up beside the bed. “Seldon, that foul excuse for a man, told me you had a gut wound. God’s breath, I did not expect to find you still alive, let alone able to talk!”
