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‘Lesson?’ She froze in mid-scrub.
‘I would hardly want anyone else trying my wife’s mouth before me.’
Her cheeks glowed bright pink and her brow lowered. ‘I doubt you will have any cause to be concerned. I’ve managed thus far without a teacher.’
He ran a hand down her back. She jumped like a startled animal. Silently he cursed whoever had made her like this and he was willing to wager that her family had something to do with it. But he’d never been one to shrink from a challenge. He wanted to unlock the passion he’d briefly glimpsed in her eyes the night they first met.
‘But you have one now.’ He captured her hand and raised it to his lips. ‘You’re my wife and will be afforded all the privileges that title brings, but I expect loyalty from you.’
His wife. Lessons? Privileges? Sayrid’s entire body thrummed from his casual touch. Her mouth tingled from the earlier kiss. She dampened the feelings down. His words had another meaning.
‘Loyalty must be earned.’
A flame flickered in his eyes. ‘My sentiments entirely.’
Sayrid forced her shoulders back. She might be attracted to him, but he touched her like this only to make his public mark on her. If she forgot that, she was doomed. Both her father and stepmother had hammered the idea into her brain that no man could desire a woman like her. She hated that suddenly she wanted to believe differently. ‘You wrong me if you think I don’t know why you married me and it wasn’t for any hidden charms. You wouldn’t have looked twice at me if I hadn’t held the land you coveted.’
His thumb traced a lazy pattern on her skin. ‘When we first met, I had no idea that you owned land and I’d have kissed you then.’
She snatched her hand away. ‘When we first met, you wanted to marry someone else.’
‘I married you. And you possess land which I desire. Sometimes the gods smile on mortals like me.’ The light in his eyes did strange things to her insides, pinning her to the ground, making her want to sway towards him and try his mouth again.
Standing there, staring at him for the rest of her life was an impossibility.
‘Shall we go to the feast? Hopefully the skald will be on better form today. Maybe he will recite something other than the Tryfling saga,’ she said, and tried to get her numb legs moving. ‘I have had my fill of shield maidens and their exploits.’
He blinked and she wondered what he’d been thinking about. ‘Yes, yes, of course. The skald will sing something different.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Far! Far! Is that your new wife? My new mother?’ A young girl, about six years old, dashed forward and wrapped her arms about Hrolf’s legs.
Sayrid stared at the girl in astonishment. Her new mother? There was something otherworldly in her beauty with honey-golden hair and dark eyes tipped up like a cat’s. Something tightened in her gut. The girl had called Hrolf father and she was about the same age as Sayrid had been when her own father remarried.
Sayrid scowled. How many times had she promised her heart that she’d never marry a man with a child, particularly a little girl? She’d be useless as a mother of girls. What did she know about weaving, sewing and cooking? How many times had her stepmother told her the simple truth of her unnatural destiny? She had decided never to put it to the test, never to allow her stepmother a chance to proclaim that she had told her so.
Her greed for gold and ships had blinded her to the truth. She had never thought to question why Hrolf was desperate for marriage. It made so much sense. Blodvin with her honeyed manner would have seemed a natural choice for someone who needed a mother for their girl.
She plucked at the overly tight bodice of her apron dress and tried to concentrate on Hrolf instead of on the golden-haired child hugging his legs. Sayrid knew that she’d never have dared do that to her father at that age.
‘We…we…ought to talk,’ she began, wondering how to explain about her stepmother and why she never wanted to be one. ‘Hrolf…I’m many things, but a mother to a little girl isn’t one of them. Your daughter will require a very different sort of mother.’
The words came out as a hoarse whisper. However Hrolf gave no indication he’d heard. Instead he knelt down to get his head level with the girl’s.
‘Yes, Inga. Sayrid has married me and you are going to live in her home. It will be your home now. Forever and ever.’
‘Truly? I have a mother again? And no more ships which make me sick to my stomach?’ The little girl looked solemnly up at Hrolf. ‘I hate it when the waves crash over the ship’s side and my tummy pains me.’
