Page 100 of The Viking’s Captive

“Tyra is gone.”

Misery does not need company…

By that evening, Adam was drunker than he’d ever been in all his life. The ale-head that would follow on the morrow would surely bring excruciating pain and stomach upheavals, but he could not care now. All he knew was that he was suffering from fierce anger alongside fierce hurt, interspersed with a bit of humiliation. Dousing himself with ale was the only thing that helped, and even that only numbed him.

Perhaps he would drill a hole in his own head and let his brain seep out. It hardly seemed as if it would make a difference in terms of his intellect.

How could she? How could she?he kept asking himself. What had transpired between the two of them the night before had been amazing. Now he was wondering if he’d been the only one who thought so. No—he refused to believe that she had been pretending. Tyra had been just as affected as he had. Then why did she go?

As if it weren’t bad enough that she’d abandoned him so ignominiously … and, yes, it felt like abandonment … he’d found out this afternoon that Gunter and Egil had accompanied her on her longship to Byzantium. He swore that if either of those Viking peacocks dared to touch Tyra, he would kill them both. But then, he realized, Tyra could do whatever the hell she wanted. Hadn’t she proven that by renouncing her family ties while her father slept, and defying his own wishes regarding any child that would come of their coupling by taking the decision out of his hands, by removing her person?

Adam put his face in his hands. He was torturing himself with all these questions. He had to stop. A long-ship awaited in the harbor that would take him back to Britain on the morrow, if he wanted. That was what he should do. Put Tyra and this whole disaster of a forced visit to Stoneheim out of his mind.

“Adam, dost think you should be drinking so much?” Tykir asked, coming up and putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Yea, I do.”

“Well, then, mayhap I will join you,” Tykir conceded all too quickly. In Adam’s opinion, Tykir would be better off discovering his son Thork’s whereabouts. Adam had noticed him a short time ago tiptoeing out of the hall in a most suspicious fashion, with a half dozen youthlings tiptoeing after him.

Alinor, sitting on Tykir’s other side, swatted her husband with a slab of manchet bread. She was able to do so with her free hand even though she held her sleeping babe in the cradle of her other arm. “Dumb dolt! You are supposed to be helping Adam, not joining in his misery.”

“What? Drinking is a misery now?” Tykir said, grabbing his wife about the waist and pulling her onto his lap with a big kiss on the mouth. He was careful not to disturb his sleeping son in the process. “Drinking can be a man’s best friend when his woman-luck has run out.”

“Drink makes the wise man a fool,” Rashid opined. If Rashid did much more opining, Adam was going to sew up his mouth with some physician’s thread.

“You are so right, Rashid. Well, husband, who gave you that bit of lackwitted wisdom? ‘Drinking can be a man’s best friend.’ Rurik?” Alinor scoffed. Rurik was a close comrade of theirs who thought he knew everything about everything, especially women. “You are supposed to be giving Adam sound advice, not drivel.”

“Never give advice in a crowd,” Rashid said.

All of them looked at Rashid as if he’d lost his mind, but no one asked what he meant. No one cared. Really, Rashid was getting to be as pestsome as Bolthor.

Speaking of Bolthor, just then the skald stood. “I feel a saga coming on,” he announced.

Adam felt his stomach churn. “It had better not be another one about me,” he mumbled.

“This is a saga of Thorvald the King.”

Adam exhaled with relief, and the king, who was not speaking to Adam because of his failure to hold on to his daughter, puffed out his chest with pride. Thorvald had not yet learned that a Bolthor saga was nothing to be proud of.

“Thorvald was a mighty king,

In battle his sword did sing.

Alas, a mighty head wound did he gain

Which caused him much sleep pain.

His daughter, the princess soldier,

Brought her father a far-famed healer,

Who drilled a hole in the king’s head,

Thus bringing the man back to life.

The only trouble is now the king has a hole

Which many a randy Viking, high in the mead,