This definitely got Haakon’s attention.
While he’d writhed on his bed alone, dreaming of sliding his cock into Gytha’s hot mouth, Arne had actually done it? Had he slept with her also? His friend was right to be nervous, because Haakon wasn’t sure how to react to the news. He wasn’t even sure why her name had been the one popping into his head when Arne had mentioned a woman he was interested in. But it had. It had exploded in his mind. And now he needed to hear more.
“You did?” The two words barely made it past his clenched teeth.
“Yes. Once the banquet was over, we went into the woods together and, well, you know… I hadn’t planned anything, in fact I had already decided to go home but Edita had other ideas. I’ll admit I didn’t resist her invitation. You know that, like you, I’ve been interested in her from the moment she arrived.”
Edita.
Not Gytha.
It took a moment for the word to sink in Haakon’s mind. He stared into the distance, emotions whirling inside him. Then finally, relief eclipsed everything else. Arne had not slept with Gytha. Even better, he had slept with Edita. If this was true, and she had really pounced on his friend, then it meant she was no longer interested in him. He might well be free of the woman. At last.
He let out a laugh.
“You’re not mad?” Arne seemed relieved by his reaction.
“No, I’m not mad, don’t worry. Edita was never mine.” Thank the gods, she had not been. Smiling broadly, Haakon shook his head. “You two are free to do what you want. I wish you all the best.”
Never had truer words been spoken. He did wish his friend all the best. With a woman like Edita, he would need it. But Arne’s misfortune might well be the best thing that had happened to him in the last few weeks.
“Thank you. I didn’t want this to turn into a problem between us. I know when she arrived you?—”
“Don’t worry about it,” Haakon cut in. True, when she had arrived in the village, he had thought something could happen between them but that had been before he got to know her, and seen how unbearable she was. His friends Aife and Moon had warned him about her, and it had not taken him long to see they were right to be wary of their cousin. “Really.”
His unexpected lack of anger caused Arne to narrow his gaze. Then his eyes sparkled. “Ah, I see. You don’t care what we did because you’ve got your eye on someone else, you devil, as the Saxons would say!”
Instantly, Haakon’s thoughts flew back to Gytha. He made a face which told his friend all he needed to know. A slap on the shoulder almost sent him flying off the bench.
“I should have known! The reeve’s daughter! You do have a thing for Saxons, do you not?”
He’d had once, but he no longer did.
So why had he found it impossible to look away from Gytha during the wedding banquet and then the ceremony? Why had he spent the night fantasizing about her performing the lewdest acts?
“Go back to Edita and leave me alone. I, too, overindulged in Eirik’s mead, if you must know,” he grumbled, seizing on the ready excuse.
As soon as Arne had left, chuckling to himself, Haakon decided to go see if he could find Gytha. He knew she and her father had slept in Wolf’s hut after the wedding and would only go back home today. As it was not too late, she might still be here. Why he wanted to see her, though, he wasn’t sure.
He knocked on the door, deciding he could always pretend he wanted to discuss Osberga’s disappearance.
Merewen was the one who opened to him. She was alone in the hut, which gave him the courage to admit he had come to see Gytha. Unlike Arne, the woman would never mock him for the interest he was showing in the reeve’s daughter.
“Sorry, but you just missed her. She’s gone to the river to freshen up.”
The river.
That innocuous word created all sorts of inappropriate images in his mind. Was she having a wash then? Would he find her swimming in the water, or stretched out naked in the sunshine like a seductivehuldra, one of those beautiful creatures intent on luring him into to forest to have her way with him?
Should he wait here until she came back?
“Thank you,” he told Merewen, already heading toward the river. “I’ll go find her.”
Gytha was not naked,or swimming in the water, or even wet. Haakon forced himself not to be disappointed and instead tried to understand what she was doing.
She was sitting on a stone, with what appeared to be an enormous needle in her hand, much like the day he had seen her in the forest. Except that this time she didn’t seem busy sewingor embroidering. There weren’t any garments on her lap or at her feet. Why then, was she holding a needle? And why did she appear lost in deep concentration?
He would have spoken out as he approached but, remembering how he had startled her the last time he’d found her in nature, and been accused of being a dangerous criminal, he thought it best to make his presence known before he opened his mouth. When she saw him appear from behind her with exaggerated slow movements, the corner of her lips lifted. She had acknowledged the allusion to their last meeting and was fighting a smile.
