“And then he laughed and laughed, an old man’s bloated laugh. I assume he laughed because she is of Einar’s blood, but still, I don’t understand it, not really. There is naught more, my lord.”
Rorik ate his porridge in thoughtful silence. Finally, he said, “You have done well, Kron. You will visit your family now?”
Kron’s wife and three babes all lived just beyond the salt marshes on a large farm owned by Kron’s parents.
“Aye, my lord, if it pleases you. When you act against Einar, you will have me fetched?”
“I will.”
Rorik turned to Mirana once Kron had left them. “The porridge is good.”
“Aye.”
“It is odd,” he said after a moment, staring off toward his men, who were eating their porridge or playing with the children or polishing their swords. “The king or this foreign advisor of his, Hormuze, will doubtless kill Einar, if they can, thus saving me from the risk of trying again. Ah, Mirana, I cannot allow it. You understand, do you not? It is I who must wipe his life’s blood on my hands. I must be the one to speed him to his coward’s death, and spill his blood in the earth. All those he butchered demand that I avenge them.”
She understood him very well. She nodded. She ate her last bite of porridge. “Do you yet have a plan?”
He shook his head.
“It doesn’t matter yet. You heard Kron say that the king and Hormuze wouldn’t move till the end of summer. Perhaps the old king will die before then. He is very old, Rorik. I met both the king and Hormuze earlier this year. They were both old. Very old. I disliked the king.”
Suddenly he grinned at her. “I’ve heard he’s wicked enough to outlive us all. In wickedness he is old, but not overly so in his years. A man overaged with guile and battles and treachery. But enough of him for the moment. Perhaps you and I could spend a little time learning about each other, about what it is like to have me for your husband. What say you?”
Her voice was firm and strong, her eyes on his mouth. “I would like that, Rorik.”
“Mirana,” he said, his voice low, warning. “Look not at me like that. It is early morning and there is much to be done. I must see to the fields and to hunting. Also when you and Entti stole one of my warships, you damaged it. I must see to its repairs.”
“I know, but it is not badly damaged, merely the one plank came loose when we pulled the boat ashore. Ah, look, there is Hafter going to Entti. I wonder what she will do to him.”
“Or he to her.”
“Do you believe Hafter is agile enough in his brain to outsmart her?”
“You females,” Rorik said, and stood. “None of you is to be trusted.” He grunted, then leaned down and kissed her mouth, and strode out of the longhouse, shouting for his men as he went.
Mirana stood still as a statue, staring down the winding path to the sea. Rorik stood on the end of the long wooden dock with a dozen of his men and a dozen more men she’d never seen before, laughing and talking, a line of bass held in his right hand, and in his left hand, he held a girl’s hand, a long graceful hand, and the girl was beautiful with her white-blond hair to her waist, thick and curling, nearly silver beneath the brilliant sun, and her slender body that was fully endowed, her breasts so full they strained against the soft linen tunic she wore.
She was laughing as she looked up at him. Behind her were an older man and woman, and one younger man. They all resembled each other, but then again, Mirana thought, they were Vikings and they were all blond and blue-eyed, tall and strong. Only she was the different one—like her Irish mother, short with hair as black as a lump of coal.
“Ah,” said Old Alna, at Mirana’s shoulder. “They’ve come. I wondered if they would visit this summer. That’s Rorik’s mother, Tora, and father, Harald, and his younger brother, Merrik. Aye, he has only your years, Mirana, but a great warrior he will be. His passions run strong, stronger than Lord Rorik’s, for he yet has to learn to control them. The girl is Sira—look how beautiful she’s become. Even more beautiful than before. Ah, a little princess, that one, proud and knows her own worth.”
“Who is she?”
“Rorik’s cousin, daughter of Dorn, brother of Rorik’s father. Her mother died birthing her, her father was killed on a raid to Kiev. Lord Rorik’s parents took her in. She must be all of eighteen summers now. That is your age, is it not? Ah, what a pretty she is.”
“She seems very fond of Rorik.”
Old Alna gave her a sideways look, then gave her now familiar scrappy shrug followed by an arcing spit that landed at the base of a yew bush. She patted Mirana’s arm as she said, “She thought to wed with Rorik after Inga died. She was there, wanting Rorik, quite willing to wed with him, aye, I think she even sought out his bed, but his grief held him apart, his grief and his rage and guilt, and he refused to have her. You must never doubt him, Mirana, for now he has you.”
“Aye,” Mirana said, “now he has me.” She turned away and walked down the path to greet her new relatives. She was aware of Old Alna’s rheumy eyes following her.
She saw Rorik suddenly pick the girl up in his arms, hug her tightly and whirl her about. The line of bass fell to the ground, to be picked up by his brother, who was laughing and shaking his head.
She watched Rorik kiss the girl on her laughing mouth. She kept walking down the path, feeling very much like an outsider. There was a smile on her mouth. It didn’t reach her eyes.
* * *
Mirana slowly walked inside the low timbered barn that stood just behind the longhouse. There was sufficient hay for the six cows, the two oxen, the two horses and three goats. Ploughshares were stacked neatly against one wall. There were iron blades for the ploughs and axes to chop wood and clear the fields. She’d escaped here, she knew it, freely admitted it to herself. She stood there in the middle of the dimly lit barn, simply staring at the hay spilling over the top of the wooden troughs. It was early summer, warm sunlit days, with enough rain to make the crops grow fully.
“You are wed to Rorik.”
Mirana looked up to see Sira, so beautiful in her fairness, her face framed in a fall of silver hair, that it hurt to look at her. She was alone. She must have followed me here, Mirana thought. “Aye,” Mirana said, “we were wed only yesterday.”
“I know. I had wished to make our yearly visit earlier this time, for I am old enough to be wed, but Rorik’s mother fell ill and thus . . .” She shrugged, but her eyes weren’t at all accepting. They were deep and hot with rage. She looked Mirana up and down, and the rage was momentarily banked. “You look like a foreign slave. I have never cared for dark-haired women. I have always believed they look coarse, overly used.”
Mirana walked back outside, Sira on her heels. She looked beyond her toward a splendid flock of goldeneyes, ducks who dove into the sea with more skill than any other bird. “I am pleased that Rorik’s family is here. They seem kind.”
Suddenly, without warning, Sira grabbed Mirana’s wrist and jerked her toward her, twisting viciously. She was stronger than she looked. Mirana was but inches from her face, and so surprised by the girl’s actions that she didn’t move.
“Listen to me, slut, you have somehow tricked Rorik into wedding with you. You are coarse and common and you parted your legs for him and now you carry his child and that is why he felt he had to marry you. But he will see what you are, he will realize that his parents—aye, his entire family—hate what you are, whose blood it is that flows through you, and he will send you away, very soon now. His parents were kind to you, for they were pleased that at last Rorik seems content with life, and they want him to be content, to find some peace, but at the same time they will never forget their grief for Inga and his babes, and nor will Rorik, not really, not in the depths of him. They won’t allow him to either, not until the man who butchered them is dead.
“Even though they wanted me for their new daughter, they were willing to accept you until they realized who you were—the black-haired witch who is blooded with
our enemy, aye, they know now who you are, they ask themselves if you knew about your brother’s deeds, if you approved of them. They will see to it that you are returned to your brother.”
She leaned closer, and her breath was hot and sweet on Mirana’s face. “Or perhaps Rorik will kill you. Perhaps I will kill you. But you will be gone, witch, soon you will be gone. Then Rorik will be mine as he should have been.”
Sira flung Mirana away from her, turned on her heel and walked back to the longhouse. She didn’t look back.
Mirana stood there rubbing her wrist. She realized quickly enough that Sira had spoken the truth, for when she returned to the longhouse, knowing it was her responsibility to see that a feast was properly prepared for her new family, she saw it on their faces when she came inside. There was coldness now where there had been warmth and acceptance before. There was now contempt and hatred where there had been smiles and kind words and welcome.
Rorik’s brother, Merrik, filled with passion, Old Alna had told her, looked on the edge of violence as he gazed at her. He stopped his talk with Gurd and stared at her, his look malignant. His hand went to the knife belted to his waist. Harald and Tora, Rorik’s parents, stopped speaking to Rorik when they saw her, and there was stillness on his mother’s face, utter frozen stillness. Harald’s face, so much like Rorik’s, lean and strong and expressive, was now empty of any feeling that she could see. He lowered his blue eyes—eyes the same vivid bright blue as Rorik’s—as if he couldn’t bear to look upon her.
She waited for Rorik to do something, anything, to stop this madness, this injustice, but he remained still and silent as his parents.
Entti came to her, and smiled. “I have seen to the preparations of the boar steaks and the hare and line of bass. We also will have a lot of beer and a bit of wine from the Rhine. There are vegetables aplenty—stewed onions and mushrooms, cabbage, and turnips that Utta—that sweet child and now your little sister—seasoned with cloudberries and a strange liquid she squeezes from the roots of this bush whose name I don’t know. She just smiled and wouldn’t tell me, said it was one of her mother’s secrets. Ah, and there is flatbread, hot and ready for thick goat cheese—”
It was too much. Mirana laid her hand on Entti’s arm. “Thank you, Entti. You are kind, but it won’t help.”
Entti cursed softly, saying, “It was Gurd who told them. He is angry with you, afraid that you will keep him from taking me. He rants on about how he is a man and you are naught but a woman and I am naught but a slave.”
Mirana said nothing. She was watching Rorik, who had turned away from her and was speaking low to his parents. His younger brother had joined them. Sira stood nearby, a wooden cup of mead in her hand. She was smiling as she stared into the cup.
Old Alna came to Mirana then and said, “We will begin to feed everyone shortly. Lord Rorik will give his chair to his father. And then—”
“Do what is normally done,” Mirana said. “I will sit by my husband,” she added. If he had changed his mind, then she would know it now.
She went to their sleeping chamber and changed into the gown and tunic she’d worn the previous day at her wedding. It was the only gown she had that was fine enough for a feast. She belted it at her waist. She combed her hair with the antler comb Rorik had given her. She fastened the beautiful brooches Rorik had given her to the tunic. She pinched her cheeks and changed into soft leather slippers. She drew a deep breath and walked out into the big hall again.
The air was filled with the tangy smell of the sea bass, wrapped and baking in oiled maple leaves. The boar steaks spat and sizzled atop the grating of the fire pit. The goat cheese, freshly made, smelled tart.
The men were drinking steadily, the women as well, though not as quickly for it was their job to serve the food, and they had to keep their wits about them to carry the heavy platters. Rorik sat beside his father. Sira sat on his other side and next to her, his mother, Tora. She wondered what was in his mother’s mind. Her stillness made Mirana uneasy. Old Alna had told Mirana that she was much like Tora. She didn’t see any likeness, not a bit. The remaining places at the table held his brother and all Harald’s men. There were no other women save Sira and his mother, Tora. All Rorik’s people sat together, away from Harald’s. She assumed this was simply the way of things. Rorik had granted his father and all his men the best places in the longhouse. Mirana smiled at the slaves and the wives who were serving with them. She picked up a tray of mutton and leeks and walked to the table. She took it to Rorik and held it out to him.
“My lord,” she said.
He looked at her then, though she knew he didn’t want to. In that moment she saw such pain in his eyes that she nearly gasped aloud. Instead, she said calmly, “Would you like some mutton? Entti prepared it.”
“Aye,” he said, no emotion in his voice, his eyes blank of feeling. “It looks excellent.”
She served him, saying nothing, then turned to his father. “My lord Harald,” she said, and offered him the platter.
Harald didn’t look at her. Indeed, he turned away from her completely and spoke to Merrik, his voice overloud. “You will go trading to Kiev soon now, boy. Press me not just at this time. Soon you will go, I promise you.”
Sira said loudly, “I wish some. Don’t just stand there gawking at me. Serve me.”
Mirana looked at the girl, then looked down at her wrist. There were purple bruises where Sira had gripped her so tightly, then twisted.
“Why do you just stand there? Do you not understand me? Are you witless? Serve me now.”
“I have learned from my husband,” Mirana said loud enough so that all would hear her, “that rudeness can be dealt with simply and practically, with no undue anger or insult.”
She dumped the platter of mutton and leeks on Sira’s head, turned on her heel, and walked out of the longhouse, paying no heed to the shrieks and wails of fury and outrage behind her. She thought she heard Amma laugh, but she couldn’t be certain. She did hear Kerzog bark loudly, and could easily imagine the huge mongrel trying to lick the mutton from Sira’s face.
That image made her smile.
18
IT WAS COLD and becoming colder still, the sky black with turbulent clouds, roiling and bursting against each other, harbinger of a violent storm to come. The wind was whipping the waves against the rocks below her, sending plumes of spray thirty feet upward only to crash downward again hard and fast, the sound of mad thunder. She felt the cold mist on her cheeks and stepped back from the cliff edge. She shivered and rubbed her arms but didn’t even think of returning to the longhouse and the pandemonium she’d left behind her.
She grinned suddenly, the picture of Sira shrieking like a witch, as leeks and mutton thick with gravy slithered off her head and face and onto her gown, ah, it was a vision that would probably stay with her until she died. Without a doubt, Mirana had made an enemy.
But Sira was already an enemy.
What would Rorik do?
She felt a shaft of pain slice through her belly. Her marriage of one day—surely a hopeful beginning—had collapsed into a pile of cold ashes.
She saw his pain again in her mind’s eye, unguarded in that instant, such pain she couldn’t comprehend. What would he do now? Would he send her away? Kill her?
“The little princess is still shrieking like a goat, with Rorik’s mother trying to calm her. There is laughter, but it is muffled behind hands. Kerzog holds no respect for her plight. He is trying to lick the gravy from her neck and face.”
Mirana turned to smile at Entti. “Kerzog is an excellent dog. You shouldn’t have come out here, Entti, though I’m glad you’re here. You know, I am the stranger here, not any of them. I am the outsider. No one owes me loyalty; no one owes me anything.”
“Don’t be a fool, Mirana. You are the mistress of Hawkfell Island. Rorik owes you loyalty as do all the people here. He swore his loyalty to you before all the people. Were it only Sira, the women would not hesitate to openly show you th
eir loyalty and affection. It is Rorik’s mother who holds them back. They respect her and don’t wish to hurt her. They don’t understand her hatred for you; they say she refused to let the pain fall away from her. She nurtured the pain, both she and Harald. Still, it doesn’t matter. You are the mistress here, none other, and soon his mother and father and that wretched Sira will be gone.”
“My being mistress here—I believe that is now in question.”
“Did Rorik really dump food on you?”
“Aye, I taunted him and he retaliated. Not on my head, but just on my lap. ’Tis better than striking someone, and I wanted to hit her, Entti, I wanted to hit her very much. But the leeks slogging down her face—it was a nice sight.”
Entti grinned. “Aye, it was.”
Mirana looked out to sea for a moment, then looked again at Entti, saying low, “Is Lord Rorik angry?”
Entti wrapped her cloak more closely around her. It was, actually, naught more than a ragged piece of wool, and Mirana frowned at it. Entti would have a real cloak on the morrow. She started to say something about that then closed her mouth. She had no idea if she would even be the mistress of Hawkfell Island on the morrow.
“I don’t know what he is. There is something going on here I don’t understand, Mirana. Oh, I know that Gurd told them all about you being Einar’s sister, but this hatred for you—it makes no sense to me. They don’t wish to give you a chance. And Lord Rorik—”
“They have reminded him of his pain and the horror of what happened. They have reminded him of his guilt. They have made me a part of it. I wonder now what he will do.”
Entti sucked in her breath. “You are being too understanding. Truly, you don’t believe he will send you away? By the gods, you are his wife!”