That was why they fought, was it not? Not for greed or power, but for love.
Someone ran up to him and seized him by the arm. Blinking fiercely, he saw it was Norah. As before when he’d encountered her, she had her wee babe on her shoulder and she looked frantic.
“Wha’ is happening?” she barked at Quarrie. “Tell me.”
Surely she had heard, the foolish lass. “The Norse are attacking. Headed in for shore.”
“How many?”
“Four sails.”
“Where is Corban? I canna find him. I maun find him!”
Quarrie tried to rein in his impatience, wondering in that moment what he’d ever seen in the lass. She was bonny, aye. But she was not Hulda.
What if he’d wed with her and only met Hulda after? What would have become of his heart?
He told Norah as calmly as he could, “There is no’ time for that now.”
“Ye will no’ let him die, Quarrie MacMurtray. Do no’ let my man die!”
She loved Corban truly, Quarrie thought, and that took away any remaining sting. If any had endured the light that was Hulda.
“Get yer bairn safe awa’,” he told her shortly, and pressed on.
Down to the shore. Here would be their first line of defense, and every man there knew it. This was the attack they had dreaded all season. For which they’d prepared and drilled. Against which they’d prayed.
The longboats looked more threatening from down here at the water. And closer. Bigger thanFreyaand somehow finer. They no doubt belonged to some great jarl or warlord who had been raking the coast all season long.
Like a shoal of sharks, they were. And like sharks, not much could stand before them.
He must. He’d been born to do so. He must now step firmly into his father’s boots, stand as bravely as Da had ever done.
Even if the cost be the same.
“They are moving in,” said someone beside him. Borald had come down from the walls. He had drawn his sword and taken a shield from two lads handing them out. “No doubt about their intentions.”
“Nay,” Quarrie agreed.
“They are comin’ for us.”
Dread and doubt and certainty made a horrible soup in Quarrie’s gut. He could not fail.
“Form up!” he bellowed to his men, these that were his friends and neighbors, that he would have to watch die. He could not let himself think of that, only of the settlement at his back.
Let none through. That was what Da had said to him before his first battle against a Norse raiding party, when Quarrie had taken the place at Da’s side. And Quarrie had thought then,Aye, how hard is that? I need no’ let anyone past me.
It had been hard. He had killed his first opponents on that day and watched friends perish.
But no one had got past.
The same today. Only that.
The quartet of Norse boats drew closer. They would anchor offshore, where the water began to grow shallow, and come pouring over into the ocean, weapons raised and howling.
He lifted his voice. “A line! A line! Shoulder to shoulder.” He repeated Da’s words. “Let no one through. Ye ken for what we fight.”
They fought for love. But what of the other love in his heart?
