"Vows? You have not yet taken vows?" Little bells went off in Toste's head, and not the churchly kind that had been plaguing him of late. Ting-a-ling, ting-a-ling, ting-a-ling! these bells said, Not a nun! Not a nun! Not a nun!
She shook her head. "I haven't taken the final vows after ten and more years within these walls. If I do, Evergreen will go to my father. Some say I am the oldest living novice in all Britain." Her rosebud mouth drooped dolefully as she spoke.
Toste's lips twitched with mirth.
" 'Tis not funny."
"Yea, 'tis." He rubbed a palm over his mouth to wipe away signs of his amusement, probably to no avail. "Are you a virgin?" he asked suddenly.
"Of course," she replied, then added, "Your question passes the bounds of decency. It is none of your business."
"I was just thinking—"
"Some men shouldn't think. It strains their brains."
"Tsk tsk tsk!" Someone needed to teach this nun-wench her proper place: beneath a man. Mayhap later he would undertake the job. "What I was saying before you rudely interrupted was that you should be more worried about being the oldest virgin in all Britain, not the oldest novice." There! I got my jab in.
She swatted him on the face with the peacock feather.
He pretended great pain.
"I have noticed that you are an over-jestful man. Do you think everything in life is worthy of jest? Must you laugh at everything?"
"Life is hard, m'lady. Sometimes you must laugh, lest you break down and cry. That I will not do."
Just then, a five-legged piglet ran by, being chased by Sister George, the resident animal rescuer at the nunnery. The pig's gait was lopsided, like a drukkinn Viking after a long voyage. The nun's gait was equally lopsided, but only because she was attempting to lift her gunna to her knees with one hand as she ran and hold on to her flying veil with the other hand.
"Oink-oink!"
"Here, piggy, here, piggy!"
"Oink-oink!"
"Here, piggy, here, piggy!"
The pig probably thought he was destined to become a ham and was not about to stop. The nun was equally determined. They disappeared into an empty cow byre beyond the honey shed.
"This is one… um, unusual nunnery," Toste commented with a shake of his head.
"Yea, 'tis," Lady Esme agreed. "Unusual but wonderful, in its own way."
Toste wasn't so sure about that.
"But we were talking about life's hardship and the need to laugh betimes." Her face softened. "You miss your brother, don't you?"
"Desperately," he admitted. To his shame, he felt tears mist his eyes. When did I turn weepish? Next I will be sobbing. Once he was able to speak over the lump in his throat, he elaborated, "In truth, I am disoriented. My life seems totally off balance. I am like a ship that lists to one side, unable to go forward or backward, just in circles."
"Time heals, I have been told."
He shrugged. "Mayhap."
Just then, Bolthor limped up, aided by a long wooden staff. His thigh had been cut to the bone in the battle, and he had a deep gash in his neck where a Saxon had tried to slice his gullet but missed, thank the gods. Bolthor stared at him through his one good eye and asked, "What are you two doing down on your knees in the dirt? Praying?"
Toste looked at Esme, and she looked at him. Then they both burst out laughing. She had a lovely, dulcet-toned laugh.
"Nay, just talking," Toste said, rising gingerly to his feet, then extending a hand to Esme to help her up. She glanced at her dirty hand, then at his clean one, then seemed to dismiss the consequences and placed her palm in his. His much larger, callused hand engulfed her smaller one. To Toste's shock, he felt the contact of her skin on his in the most erotic fashion, like ripples of pleasure extending out from their briefly joined hands to all his extremities… and one special extremity in particular. Esme, who came only to his shoulder, was equally affected—he could tell by her heightened color and the trembling of her hand, still encased in his. She jerked her hand away as if burned, and made a great show of brushing dirt from her gunna.
Toste was well satisfied with his work this day. If he could rattle a nun's composure, then he had not lost his knack. Or an almost-nun, he reminded himself.
"What have you been doing?" Toste inquired of Bolthor, who did not appear to be in a good mood… though it was ofttimes hard to tell. He was a giant of a man, a berserker, with a black patch over one eye, and scars from numerous battles covering most of his skin. Even when he smiled, he appeared to be scowling.
"Nice of you to ask!" Bolthor snarled. "These nuns think I am a horse… not a warhorse, mind you, just a plain old farm horse." He took on a decidedly feminine tone and mimicked the nuns: " 'Bolthor, can you lift that wagon so we can fix the wheel? Bolthor, the bull won't come into the barn. Bolthor, that barrel of honey is too heavy for me to carry and you are so big and strong. Bolthor, could you do me a little favor… nay, 'tis not cleaning the garderobe today, just dig a little moat for me.' " He cocked his head at Toste, seeking sympathy, then remarked, "Hah! There is no such thing as a little moat."
"What would you rather be doing?" Esme asked Bolthor.
"Creating sagas. I am a skald."
"Really?"
Bolthor nodded vigorously. "Wouldst thou like to hear my latest?"
"Nay, nay, nay. Not right now," Toste said. I think I am going to throw up.
"Of course," Esme said, just to annoy him, he would wager.
Toste groaned.
Bolthor made that harrumphing sound he usually did before spouting his poems. Then the dream-expression came over his battle-scarred face. Too late to stop him now. "I call this one 'The Warrior and the Nun.' "
"Huh?" Esme said.
"Uh-oh!" Toste said.
"Once was a maid so fair
But for beauty she had no care.
She had no use for men,
For sex she had no yen.
So she entered a nunnery
And swore she would never marry.
But along came a man like no other.
He was a Viking who gave no quarter.
What wench can resist
Being kissed
By a bedsport enthusiast?
Soon the maid will have yearnings she had not ought
To discover the famed Viking S-Spot.
And now instead of wearing a hair shert over her breast
She swoons over one man's hairy chest."
Esme was inhaling and exhaling rapidly like a puff fish, too stunned to speak. That was the usual reaction of people upon hearing one of Bolthor's horrid sagas for the first time.
"Is he implying that I have sinful inclinations toward you?" Lady Esme asked him in a horrified undertone.
Toste grinned. "I hope so."
"Oaf!" she said, referring to him, not Bolthor.
"He called me a bedsport enthusiast. I'm the one who should be insulted."
"What did you think of my saga?" Bolthor asked Esme.
"It was fine," Toste said before Esme could say something offensive, like "Oaf!" Bolthor meant well, and he was a good friend, and Toste would not want to hurt his feelings unnecessarily.
Bolthor smiled widely. "I was not sure about using 'hairy chest' instead of 'manly chest.' Betimes we poets are faced with these difficult word choices," Bolthor explained.
"I think 'hairy' was an excellent choice," Esme said, obviously having found her voice. She looked at Toste and muttered, "Hairy oaf!"
But Toste could have kissed her for her sensitivity toward the gentle giant. Actually, he could kiss her for any reason.
"Next methinks I might try 'The Oldest Virgin in All Britain,' " Bolthor told her. He must have overheard the tail end of their conversation.
Esme just gurgled.
At that moment, Bolthor's eyes went wide. "What in the name of Odin is that?" His grin had evaporated as his attention was snagged on something off in the distance behind Toste and Esme. At first, Toste thought the verse mood might b
e coming on him again, but before he could voice a protest at that prospect, Bolthor tossed his staff aside, lunged forward and knocked them both to the ground. In that instant, as he and Esme lay on their backs with Bolthor's immense weight pressing down on them, they heard a whizzing sound pass over them.
"What was that?" Toste exclaimed, shoving Bolthor off him.
"An arrow," Bolthor said, already standing and gazing off into the distance where not a soul was visible. "I saw a bowman take aim at us from that stand of trees over there. He is gone now."
Thinking quickly, Toste picked up Esme by the waist and tossed her unceremoniously into the overhang of the bush. The cat screeched indignantly at the intrusion and darted out the back end of the bush, running away.
"Stay put!" he ordered Esme.
Fortunately, she burrowed farther inside the foliage and said not one word.
Toste and Bolthor rushed off to investigate, their pace slowed by Bolthor's crippled gait and Toste's throbbing head. By the time they reached the trees, the villain… or villains… were gone. They walked back slowly, discussing the happenstance. Attacked in a nunnery, of all things!
When they returned to the garden, Toste helped Esme out of the bush. She appeared shaken, but lifted her chin bravely as she whisked evergreen needles off her robe. Her veil was half on, half off. She threw it to the ground, where it nestled next to the discarded peacock feather.
"Dost think it was some Saxon warrior come to finish us off?" Toste asked Bolthor, even as he watched Esme compose herself.
"The arrow was meant for me," Esme said matter-of-factly.
"What?" he and Bolthor both exclaimed.
"I saw one of my father's men lurking about earlier today. I should have suspected he would try something like this." Her words were brave, but her ashen face and trembling hands betrayed her fear.
Toste quickly explained to Bolthor what Esme had told him about her father's desperation to gain her lands… by her religious vocation or by her death.
" 'Tis outrageous that a man would do such to his own blood," Bolthor said, squeezing one of Esme's hands in his.
"Do you want your dower lands? I mean, do you really want them? Enough to fight for them?" Toste asked Esme, a little irritated to see his friend comforting the lady.
Her face brightened. In fact, her eyes almost seemed to glow with a blue fire. "Yea, I want what belongs to me. With a passion."
Passion sounded good to Toste.
"I would give anything to get what is mine."
Oh, lady, you should not promise such to a man. "Anything" prompts way too many images.
He paused for several moments before announcing, "Then I will help you, m'lady. I will be your champion."
That certainly got the lady's attention. Her jaw dropped down practically to her chest, which he was beginning to notice had a decided prominence that even nunly garb could not hide. Observing the direction of his stare, she folded her arms over her breasts. "Thank you for your offer, but I have my own plan."
"We will both be your champions," Bolthor added. "We will be Lady Esme's knights."
"Nay! Definitely not!" she said. "I am in enough of a stew without adding two misguided Vikings to the broth."
Misguided? Who's misguided? "Mayhap you could write a saga about it," Toste suggested to Bolthor sarcastically.
"No sagas about my family dispute! Definitely not!" Lady Esme glared most charmingly at the two of them.
"Good idea, Toste," said Bolthor, who was unable to recognize sarcasm even when it smacked him in the face. Really, couldn't the thick-headed Bolthor see that he wanted to be the one and only champion for the lady?
"Is anybody listening to me? I told you I can handle this myself," Lady Esme screeched. "Violence is not the answer here, even though my father does not hesitate to follow that path. I must use my head and outwit my father. 'Tis the only way."
"You are not to worry, m'lady. Violence is the one thing we understand. We are Vikings," Toste said, as if that said it all.
Lady Esme muttered a very vivid expletive, which caused two sets of male eyebrows to rise in surprise. Almost immediately, she grumbled, "To confession again."
Yeah, right!…
As Lady Esme walked away, unaware of the seductive, totally unpious sway of her hips, Bolthor commented to Toste, "Nice arse." And Toste replied, "I hadn't noticed."
But then he kissed her…
"I have mixed feelings about the two Vikings," Esme told Mother Wilfreda.
The abbess raised her eyebrows in question as the two of them sipped small mugs of mead before retiring for the night. They sat before one of the two giant fireplaces in the great hall of the abbey. The pedestal tables had been removed following the evening meal, and now the various nuns sat about, mending threadbare habits, weaving at small looms, praying their beads, or in the case of those at the other hearth, listening raptly to Bolthor as he spun tales about famous Vikings performing extraordinary feats, like Ragnor Hairy-Breeks and Eric Blood-axe. The other Viking, Toste, sat listening as well, with his long legs propped on the hearth rail, but every so often he glanced toward Esme and gave her a disconcerting scrutiny, which invariably caused her to glance away, flustered.
"You've already told me that the Norsemen have offered to help you. What bothers you?" Mother Wilfreda asked, putting aside a lace altar cloth which she was attempting to repair along the edges.
"I want naught to do with them or any other of the male sex. What have men done for me but make my life miserable?"
"Oh, child, not all men are alike. Remember, our beloved Christ was a man. It is un-Christian of you to speak so."
Esme grinned. "Does that mean I will have to go to confession again?"
Mother Superior nodded. Then she grinned, too. "How many times did you go to confession today?"
"Just twice. It was a good day."
The elderly abbess shook her head at the hopelessness of trying to turn Esme into a holy nun. "Back to our discussion and why you distrust all men, including these Vikings."
"You have been my only family for a long time… and a good and faithful sister to my mother. But even when Mother was still alive, my brothers tormented me to the point of crying, and my father was more likely to swat me than hug me." Actually, she could not recall one single instance of affection from the Lord of Blackthorne. "I have survived thus far on my own, with your help. With a little extra effort, I might be able to make it to my twenty-fifth birthday."
"And attain freedom and independence from your father?"
Esme nodded. "Might is the key word, of course. I do not doubt that I could hide from my father and his men for another three months. You and I have discussed several possibilities. But the problem will be getting into King Edgar's court. I must present my petition for the return of the dower lands which my father has been holding for me. Father will be watching every road to Winchester, where Edgar is expected to keep Easter, three days past my twenty-fifth birthday. What nags me lately is whether I can leave my fate to chance."
"Not chance, child. God. You must pray for His help."
"I don't discount the power of prayer, Mother, but God helps those who help themselves."
"Or those who are not so prideful that they cannot ask others to help them," the abbess offered. "Like two strong Viking nobles with the ability to garner a bird of soldiers?"
"Precisely," Esme said.
"Then what is stopping you?"
"I do not know. These two Vikings are not at all like any men I've met afore. Not my father and brothers, who care only for their own welfare, or the few men, including priests, that I've met over the years here at the convent. Oh, do not glower at me so, Mother. I know that Father Alaric is not bad, but he is the exception. Toste and Bolthor are bloodthirsty warriors… well, leastways, they are warriors for hire, Jomsvikings."
"But that could mean they are good fighters for the right cause."
"Hmmmm." Did she dare trust them? What would she have to give
up in order to hire them and a troop of their followers? Control, for one thing. Esme did not like the idea of putting her future in the hands of others. Somehow, deep down inside, Esme suspected that she would have to relinquish more than control of her life path… especially to the one Viking, Toste.
And that prospect worried Esme the most. She was attracted to the man. Unbelievably, after years of cloistered virtue, suddenly her stomach fluttered whenever this man came near. Not that she would ever let him know of his effect on her. Hah! He already thought too much of himself.
He was more than pleasing to the eye… tall and well-built and clean, now that he was recovering from his injuries, with a shaven, well-sculpted face and an enticing cleft chin, dancing blue eyes and long, dark blond hair, which he vainly braided on the sides with amber beads. Not that I noticed all that much. When he grinned at her, which he did much too often, she felt her insides melt a tiny bit.
But the thing that drew her to him most was the affection he could not hide for his dead brother and for that horrid poet, Bolthor. How could she not be drawn to a man who loved his brother so, and who showed such loyalty to his friend, even praising his awful sagas?
Mother Wilfreda chuckled suddenly.
"What?"
"The wistful expression on your face betrays you, dear."
"I don't know what you mean," Esme said, but of course she did.
"There is naught wrong with woman-feelings for a man… as long as there is no bedding afore the wedding."
Esme felt her face heat with embarrassment. "I have no woman-feelings for any man."
"I may have been a nun these forty-some years, but I know this for certain. God meant for men and women to enjoy each other. There is good lust and there is bad lust."
"Good lust, eh? I like the sound of that," Toste said, coming up behind them, then sliding onto the bench next to Esme… way too close.
Esme sidled her bottom along the bench, away from him.