Page 98 of The Last Viking

“’Twould certainly be true to the tradition of my fellow Norsemen, who have no trouble melding into the societies of the countries they settle. ’Tis why no separate Viking culture has lasted through the centuries, I warrant.”

“Believe me, Rolf, I’ve thought about ways you might be able to conform to modern society. A ‘Last Viking,’ so to speak.”

He grinned. “Lust Viking?”

“You silly fool! I said ‘Last Viking,’ not ‘Lust Viking,’” she remarked dryly, “though it would be an appropriate appellation in your case.”

“Last or lust. It matters not. If I had no obligations to the past, I would stay, Merry-Death, do not doubt that. And I’d manage to adapt. For you, I could do anything.”

“But would it be what you really wanted? I’m not even sure anymore that it’s what I want. Think about it. You in a three-piece suit, carrying an electronic organizer. You mowing the lawn and jogging off extra pounds on a Stairmaster. You playing golf or speeding about the ocean in a powerboat. You buying insurance and growing old.”

Rolf had rented a sailboat the day before to take her and Thea out for an afternoon on the ocean. If ever Meredith had doubted his expertise with boats, or his love of the open waves, she knew better now. He wasn’t a man who’d accept being landlocked for long.

She sighed deeply. “As much as I yearn for you to stay, I just can’t picture you in any modern role.”

He sighed, too. “’Twas the same when I tried to imagine you in my time. You cracking ice off a fjord stream in the midst of winter to tote water into my farmstead. You taking on the subservient role of women in my society. You waiting idly at home whilst I go off a-Viking or trading. You cooking over a hearth. You growing old far too young under the strain of a harsh life.”

Meredith knew he painted a deliberately bleak picture. He failed to mention cold winter nights when they’d be bundled together under the bed furs. Or the fact that he would take great joy in introducing her to the beauty of his land. Not to mention the fact that she could go on trading voyages with him. And what if…oh, what if she were able to bear his children in another lifetime?

She exhaled wearily. It was useless to dream of the impossible.

“The bottom line is, you can’t stay,” Meredith said firmly, hoping to put an end to the discussion. “You would start to hate yourself for what you’d consider a dishonorable choice—reneging on your father’s mission, letting hundreds of people die in a famine that you might be able to stop. As ridiculous as the notion is that a restored relic could halt an act of nature, I can’t argue the point. After all, a talisman belt and a mystical occurrence in the sky caused you to travel through time.”

“I have to go back,” he agreed.

“And the alternative—my traveling in time with you—is equally impossible. I accept that now.”

He patted her hand comfortingly. “The celestial fates decreed my adventure, and I feel certain they designed the time portal for me, and me alone.”

“You don’t have to convince me anymore, Rolf. When you asked what I’d do if I were able to travel back with you and then you died, I asked myself whether I would want to live in the tenth century without you. The answer was ‘no.’ Bad enough being abandoned in the twentieth century!”

He flinched at the word abandon. “Then you’re reconciled to my departure?” he asked.

She nodded.

“’Tis as a noted philosopher once said. ’Tis better to have experienced the joy of love, despite the pain of parting.” He paused and tilted his head in concentration. “I think ’twas Will-son, the neighbor on Home Improvement who spoke the words. Or was it Ernie on Sesame Street? I misremember now.”

She frowned, and then burst out giggling. “Oh, you dolt! That was Tennyson, and the exact quote is: ‘ ’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’”

“Tennis-son, Will-son, Ernie”—Rolf waved a hand dismissively—“they are all great thinkers, like the skalds of my time.” Then his eyes twinkled mischievously at her as he trailed a forefinger from the center of her chin down her neck, over her breastbone, skimming the silk fabric of her teddy till his fingertip pressed into her navel. “Have I shown you the famous Viking X-spot?”

Had he ever! “About five times. Or was that the equally famous Viking Y and Z spots?”

“Which are not to be confused with that age-old S-spot, of course,” he reminded her.

She grinned sadly at him, finding it harder and harder to banter when her heart was breaking. “I must say I’m rather partial to X.”

“Ah, well, ’twould seem a Viking’s job is ne’er done.” He sighed as if vastly overburdened. Then, jiggling his eyebrows at her, he boasted, “Did I e’er explain how a Norseman practices his alphabet?”

Meredith laughed then. But inside she was crying.

By the following week, Geirolf’s longship, Fierce Dragon, was completed, and the major portion of the Trondheim Venture vessel had been finished, as well. Oh, the school project had many weeks of finishing work to be done, but Mike and the students could handle that type of labor themselves. They’d even contracted with a skilled sailing expert from Annapolis, Maryland, to captain the vessel in August, when it would be launched for the voyage to Norway.

But he wouldn’t be here then. Tomorrow, the Demon Moon would appear again, and he would be gone.

He should have been elated that the day had arrived at last. Instead, he was dying inside at the prospect. Unbelievably, this time and place—mostly, this woman, Merry-Death—had become his home. But he was trying his best to hide his inner turmoil from Merry-Death. He didn’t want to spoil their remaining time together.

Leaning on a braced elbow in their bed furs, he watched his wife sleep. Four times this night he’d made love to her with feverish desperation, and he would wake her soon to cleave onto her one last time. Though he would never admit as much to Merry-Death, he’d coupled more times with her these past weeks than he ever had with any one woman, and still ’twas not enough.