Page 125 of A Tale of Two Vikings

“Of course I do,” Vagn said more forcefully.

“Have you told her?” Again she looked at each of them separately.

“Not in words,” Toste said.

“You thick-headed fool. In what? Signs from the heavens?”

“There is no need to be sarcastic,” Toste snapped back.

“I must have told Helga that I love her.” Vagn was rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “I mean, I think I did. Didn’t I? Surely, even if I didn’t, she knows.” He looked up and inquired of Alinor, “Doesn’t she?”

“Words should not be necessary,” Toste argued.

“Believe me, words are necessary.”

“I can’t believe I didn’t say it. I felt it. Why didn’t Helga feel it?”

“Vagn, three words. I…love…you. That is what she needs to hear. Enough with this feeling the sentiment.”

Alinor rose to return to the keep, her mission accomplished…she hoped. One never knew with thick-headed Vikings. “And, by the by, Bolthor is in the great hall regaling one and all, with a saga entitled ‘Dog and Candle Sex and Vikings.’”

Toste and Vagn bolted to their feet and rushed ahead of her back to the castle, both of them muttering something about adding skald soup to the yuletide menu.

Alinor whisked her hands together and grinned with satisfaction. A meddling woman’s work was never done.

When a man loves a woman…

Vagn was wasting no time.

He entered the great hall, which was overflowing with people though it was not yet midday. At first, he was disoriented by the dimness after the bright sunlight outside and by the amount of mead he’d already drunk on an empty stomach. But then he spotted Helga at one of the upper tables sitting with her father and some of the Briarstead soldiers, including Finn Finehair. Is that coxcomb everywhere?

Slowly he moved through the aisle created by the trestle tables. He knew the moment that she saw him. She smiled reflexively, then immediately wiped the mirth from her face, not wanting to give him any encouragement, no doubt.

When he arrived at the table, breathless—whether from excitement, or fear, or too much mead, he did not know—he told her right off, “Stand up, Helga.”

“What?” she squawked.

He loved it when she squawked. It meant he’d done something particularly outrageous. Everyone in the surrounding area was staring at him. He probably looked wild…or something. Mayhap there was straw sticking out of his ears. He saw Toste on the far side of the hall give him the victory sign that only they understood. And in his head, his brother said, You can do it, Vagn. Sweep her off her feet.

Without ado, he shoved a cloth-wrapped parcel in front of her. “This is for you.” Betimes Vagn forgot to be smooth.

She stared at the package, then slowly unwrapped it. Inside was the silk fabric with the heart embroidery which he’d purchased from her. He’d had it made into a fine gown—he hoped a wedding gown.

He could see that Helga was touched. She ran her fingertips over it slowly, and her eyes clouded over. But then she stood and said, “Have you lost your mind, Vagn?”

“Yea, I have. Over you.”

“You are embarrassing me.”

You haven’t seen anything yet. He licked his lips and took both her hands in his. “Helga, I love you.”

People all around them heard and smiled at him. Helga, on the other hand, lowered her head and murmured, “Don’t do this to me, Vagn. I cannot take this kind of jest.”

“I love you. Why is that a jest?”

“You do not love me.”

“Yea, I do.”