“Whyhaveyou returned, Mistress Hulda?”
At the sound of her name, her eyes came up and fastened to his. Incredible eyes they were, pale as water and surrounded by brown lashes. Nothing like the eyes of any of the women he’d been seeing in his dreams.
Only they were.
He could not explain it. If he tried, he would have to say there was a thread. A thread running from those women to this one. If he ventured to express that to anyone, they would call him mad.
“Master MacMurtray, mine is a young crew. Out for gain, as I say. To prove ourselves. I have not the might to battle you. So instead, I come to bargain.”
“To bargain,” he repeated stupidly.
“Ja. Have you influence here in this place?”
“My father was chief. I am chief after him.”
“So any agreements made between the two of us will hold strong.”
“Any agreements made between the two of us would have to benefit all my people. I live for them.”
At that, some emotion flickered in the pale eyes. “You are a selfless man. You gave yourself over to protect your faðir. Now you think of your people rather than your own desire.”
“That is so.” If he did think of his own desire, he would reach out and touch her. Try to recapture the feelings thathad swamped him when they’d kissed. Tell her how often he’d thought of her, almost without ceasing. What a miracle it seemed to be with her again.
“I have for you an offer that is—how would you put it?—of benefit to both of us.”
“Mutually beneficial. How can that be?”
“Let me explain. We are a young crew, as I say, and trying to prove ourselves. Most of us are younger sons. You are not a younger son?”
Quarrie shook his head.
“You do not know then what that means.”
But he did, instinctively, so it seemed. A younger son had to fight twice as hard for advantages.
“And I,” she went on, “am a woman. The wind, so to speak, blows not at our backs but in our faces.”
“I understand.”
“The season for viking is short.”
“Viking?”
“Raiding.” She seemed to grope for the word. “And it is a long way home. We would like a base here. Land. A safe harbor.”
“Eh?” He could not have heard that right. Aye, the Norse had taken over islands in the north, and there was said to be a sizeable settlement on the east coast of Britain, a place he’d never been. Not here. Not yet.
“Impossible,” he said.
“Why?”
“This is our land. Hard held for time out of mind. Fought for. Died for.”
“Just so. I suggest to you a cessation in the fighting. Perhaps even the dying.”
“I do not understand.”
She looked almost apologetic. “I explain it poorly. The language is unwieldy in my mouth. You are familiar with ahundr, ja? A—hound?”
