Kristen made a sound that came out very much like a giggle. “And did he mind it, your taking him away from the fun of seeing the ship loaded?”
“What do you think?”
Kristen smiled, knowing very well he wouldn’t have minded at all.
Her mother did not act like other mothers, nor did she look like other mothers. Besides the raven hair from her Celtic heritage, and her warm gray eyes, she looked much too young to have full-grown children. Although she was nearly two score years, she looked much younger than that.
Brenna Haardrad was a very beautiful woman and Kristen was most fortunate to have inherited her mother’s features, though her height, tawny-blond hair, and aqua eyes she had solely from her father. She could at least thank God she wasn’t as tall as her father and brothers. Brenna had often done so, although here in the North, Kristen’s unusual height was not the problem it might have been elsewhere, for the Norsemen were either as tall as or taller than she. In Brenna’s own land, though, it would be a definite disadvantage, for Kristen would be as tall as some men, but taller than most.
“Surely you were not waiting on me just to ask me impertinent questions,” Brenna said now.
Kristen looked down at her feet. “I was hoping you might have a few words with Father now that he is in such a good mood, and ask him—”
“If you can sail with your brother?” Brenna finished for her, shaking her head. “Why is this voyage so important to you, Kristen?”
“I want to find a husband.” There, she had said what she couldn’t say earnestly to her father.
“And you do not think you can find one here at home?”
Kristen gazed into the gentle gray eyes. “There is no one I love here, Mother—not the way you love Father.”
“And you have considered everyone you know?”
“Yes.”
“You are telling me you cannot accept Sheldon?”
Kristen had not meant to let her parents know of her decision so soon, but she nodded her head. “I love him, but in the same way I love my brothers.”
“Then what you want is to wed a stranger?”
“Youwed a stranger, Mother.”
“But your father and I knew each other a long while before we finally admitted our love and wed.”
“I do not think it will take me so long to know when I am in love.”
Brenna sighed. “Aye, I have armed you well with the knowledge I did not have myself when I first met your father. Very well, love, I will speak to Garrick tonight, but do not hope for him to change his mind. I am of a like mind in not wanting you to go off with your brother.”
“But, Mother—”
“Let me finish. If Selig returns in time, I believe your father can be persuaded to take you south to look for a husband.”
“And if summer is nearly over when he returns?”
“Then it will wait until spring. If I am to lose you to a man farther south, then I would rather it wait until spring…unless you are eager to have a man now?”
Kristen shook her head. This was not exactly what she had in mind. She wanted to be away now, away from the threat Dirk posed, but she couldn’t tell her mother about that, either, for Brenna was likely to go after Dirk herself.
“But I will be a year older,” Kristen pointed out, hoping that would sway her mother.
Brenna smiled at her daughter, for Kristen did not realize how truly desirable she was. “Your age will not matter, love, believe me. They will fight over you when they know you are looking for a husband, just as they have done here. Another year will make no difference.”
Kristen said no more about it. They sat down before the open door that let in the warm breeze and the only daylight. The large stone house built by her great-grandfather had no windows, in order to keep out the bitter cold of winter. Kristen was helping Brenna work a large tapestry, for her mother had no patience to do it alone.
Impulsively, Kristen asked, “What would you do, Mother, if you wanted to sail on that ship?”
Brenna laughed, thinking the matter settled. “I would steal away on it and hide in the cargo well for a day or so, until it would be far away from here.”
