Page 112 of The Bewitched Viking

Egbert and Hebert gaped at her with horror and disgust.

“Pregnant? How can we sell…uh, betroth…you to an English nobleman with a heathen whelp in your belly?” Egbert stormed, pulling madly at his mop of red curls.

“And do you say the babe will be a troll?” a terrified Hebert squealed.

“Now you have ruined everything,” Egbert wailed.

“Nay, this is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I am not barren after all.”

“No man will want her now,” Hebert told Egbert.

“’Tis true. ’Tis true. And the Viking would surely come after us for vengeance if he finds out about this,” Egbert told Hebert. “If we were to rid her of the babe, or fob it off on some cotter after wedding her to another, that vengeful monster would follow us to the ends of the earth. I know he would.”

“Forget about the Viking. I would rip your eyes out with my own fingernails if you dared take my babe from me,” Alinor said vehemently, only slightly surprised at how protective she was feeling already toward the seed growing inside her.

“We wipe our hands of you then, ungrateful wench,” Hebert spat out. “Never did you appreciate all our efforts on your behalf. Now find your own fate. We care not if it be in a Viking midden or hell.”

With that, the two stomped off, already concocting new brainless schemes, leaving Alinor standing in the middle of the busy city. Alone.

She hooted with laughter then, drawing a few curious looks from passersby, but she did not care. For the first time in her life, she was free. She could go to Graycote and be an independent woman. Or she could find herself a husband of her own picking. Or—and her heart skipped a beat—she could make her way back to Dragonstead and wait for Tykir to return.

She did not even hesitate.

Dragonstead it would be.

Rurik was ambling along Coppergate, enjoying the sights, including a Saxon maid with a pair of swishing hips that would make a Norseman blush. Well, some Norsemen. Not him, of course. He was too much a man of the world.

Beast was temporarily sheltered at Gyda’s house. He was headed toward the king’s garth, where he intended to pay his respects to Eric Bloodaxe, then make his way north to Scotland and a certain mischievous witch. But then he stopped in his tracks when another bloody witch caught his attention.

Lady Alinor! What is she doing here? She is supposed to be off in the Baltic skipping along the beaches, collecting amber with Tykir. Could she perchance be in two places at once, being a witch and all?

Nay, Rurik decided, having long ago accepted that Alinor wasn’t a real witch. Just witchly.

She was jabbering away at a tall Norseman with long blond hair and a huge, finely groomed beard. A mercenary, by the looks of him. In fact, Rurik seemed to recall seeing him one time at King Haakon’s Vik court on Oslo-fjord. And, oh, holy Thor! Was the woman daft? Now she was jabbing the big Viking in the chest with a finger to make some point whilst she talked his ear off.

Amazingly, the man didn’t lop off her head, as any sane man would. Instead, he listened intently and his face got paler and paler at whatever news she was imparting.

Meeting up with her will mean trouble for me, I wager. Should I pretend I haven’t seen her and escape? No one will even know. While he pondered his decision, Rurik moved closer, his curiosity getting the better of him.

“I have a child?” the man was asking. “For the love of Freyja! Tell me more, Lady Alinor.”

“Yea, Toste, you have a child. His name is Thibaud, and he has seen only four winters. Good thing I overheard the craftsman over there address you by name, or you might never know the glad tidings.”

“A son?” Toste said with wonder. “A son?”

Alinor smiled indulgently, apparently no longer angry with the man. “Yea, and a beautiful boy he is, too.”

“I have thought of Rachelle many times these past years since we were together in Rouen. But she was married, or so I thought.” He shrugged. “And you say the boy lives in Hedeby with his mother? Why, I was in the market town just last year. How could I have missed seeing her?”

No doubt he’d spent his time in an ale house, or visiting the loose women who sold their favors there. That was Rurik’s opinion. Leastways, ’twas how he spent his days there.

“I do not think Rachelle goes about much, Toste. You see, before her husband divorced her, he performed a brutal mutilation on her.” Alinor explained, and Toste’s face grew red with rage.

“That matters not to me,” he asserted. “I will go to her and my son forthwith, and make right all she has suffered for being with me. And I will take revenge on her former husband, Arnaud, as well. That I forswear.”

Well, there’s naught here for me to do, Rurik thought, and was about to creep away, unnoticed.

“Rurik! Is that you?” he heard a male voice call from behind him.