Page 54 of Lord of Fire and Ice

While Brandr Ulfson had offered to ease her body’s complaints, he’d never offered a word of affection to her.

And she would want his affection.

Katla wasn’t ready to be so needy, so in another’s power. It would almost be a reversal if she chose Brandr. She could easily become his thrall in all but name.

She lay back in the long grass and folded her hands over her abdomen. If she couldn’t think her way out of this tangle, at least she’d find some rest.

But the sun popped from behind a cloud and wouldn’t let her keep her eyes closed. In the sudden warmth of the shaft of sunlight, the high meadow came alive with the drowsy hum of bees.

Katla enjoyed watching the busy little insects as they flitted from one patch of sweet clover to the next, their dangling hind legs yellow with pollen. They were so orderly and industrious, but their short lives were preordained by the will of their queen. They seemed to have no thought for themselves, often laboring to the point of starvation. They lived for the good of the hive and their queen’s plan that—

Katla leaped to her feet. Of course!

Finn had planned this all from the beginning. He’d laid the groundwork with Gormson’s match long before he wangled a way to force Katla into another marriage. When Brandr Ulfson fell into his lap, he’d been able to set his scheme in motion. Even when she demanded a choice from three possible suitors, he’d manipulated everything to assure the choice that benefited him most would be hers as well.

“That two-faced troll,” she said with vehemence. How could he call himself her brother if he used her thus?

Finn had arranged for her to pick from a strapping fellow in his prime, a man nearing his dotage, or a thrall. He’d neatly arranged matters for her to have no choice at all, really.

Finn was far cleverer than she’d credited him.

She’d blundered right into his trap, like a bear lured by the smell of honey.

She wasn’t sure whether to be proud of her brother for his meticulous planning or furious with him for having outmaneuvered her.

Katla scrambled to her feet and headed back down the long hill. Either way, she was determined to have the last word.

Chapter 19

Word that Katla would announce her choice at the night meal spread through the household, and soon all tongues were wagging about only one thing.

Who would be their new lord?

Brandr sensed the restive anticipation in the crowd that gathered that evening. They milled and shuffled like a herd of cattle on the verge of stampede, wondering which way to jump.

Though he tried to deny it to himself, his gut was jumping too. He experienced a bit of the same increase in sensory acuity a man feels before a battle. The smells in the crowded longhouse were sharper. Wool, leather, roast meat and spices, and the whiff of too many bodies enclosed in a limited space blended into a single pungent scent. The colors of the tunics were brighter. Even the grain in the wood of the tables leaped out with stark definition.

Every muscle in his body was tensed and ready, as if he were about to engage in the fight of his life.

When Katla arrived, he was acutely aware of her, down to the last dark hair that had escaped her starched headdress. When he leaned over her to serve her, her unique scent—warm woman and cedar—crowded his senses. The curve of her breasts heated his blood, but he kept his face unreadable, the stony, battle-hardened look that had been the last sight on earth for countless Saracens and Bulgars.

Finn had the good sense to place Albrikt Gormson and Otto Sturlson at opposite ends of the head table, neither of them enjoying a favored place at Katla’s side.

It irritated Brandr that the seating arrangement pleased him. Why should he care if she did marry? If she had a husband, perhaps she’d tire of bedeviling him and free him.

For a moment, he wondered what would happen if she should choose him as her husband. The idea was ludicrous, and he was angry with himself for entertaining the thought. The woman had enslaved him. She’d used him. Then she’d slapped him, the worst of all possible insults.

But she still made his belly clench each time he heard her voice, and his chest ached at the sight of her.

After most of the meal was finished, Finn stood and shouted for quiet. “As you know, my sister has promised to choose her next husband this night. Since this is a decision that touches all our lives, there’s no point in waiting longer. Tell us, Katla. Who will you have?”

Katla stood. Brandr was behind her, so he couldn’t see her face, but he thought she trembled a bit. That wasn’t the least like her.

“I had hoped to do this privately,” she said softly to Finn.

“Nonsense,” Otto Sturlson bellowed from his end of the table. “You may as well announce your decision in public. ’Tis not as if everyone wouldn’t know your choice within a few heartbeats, in any case. Even the trees have ears here.”

Good-natured laughter from everyone in the hall greeted this. Brandr had to agree with him. Nothing passed in Katla’s household without examination by the whole lot.