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Laren heard a laugh. She turned slightly and saw that Letta was sniggering behind her hand. She saw Merrik’s large hand extended toward her. Slowly, she placed her hand into his and followed him out of the outer chamber.
He released her hand the moment they were within the sleeping chamber. He didn’t look at her at all, just began to strip off his clothes. He said as he pulled his tunic over his head, his voice muffled, “What are you, Laren, a merchant’s daughter? An innkeeper’s niece? I know you weren’t a slave before two years ago. You’re too proud, and you were a virgin, something you wouldn’t have been beyond your childhood otherwise.”
She said nothing.
When he was naked, he turned to see her sitting on the side of the box bed, fully clothed, her hands in her lap. She was staring at him, at his flat belly, furred with soft blo
nd hair, then downward. Her face was flushed, her lips slightly parted.
“Stop looking at me,” he said, utterly infuriated with her for testing him so. “Have you no sense? Do you so quickly forget what I did to you last night? Take off your clothes and go to sleep. You must still be too sore for me to have you again.”
Still she didn’t move. His sex began to swell, he could no more prevent it any more than he could the rising of the sun.
“You want more of the pain you endured last night?”
She shook her head, still silent.
“Then cease looking at me, damn you! I played my part in front of Erik, but now I wish only to sleep.” His sex was jutting forward, hard and ready. His heart pounded; he ached with need for her, damn her.
She’d been looking at his face, but when she gasped, he knew she was staring at him again. He said nothing more, merely eased down onto the bed.
The chamber was dark now for she’d doused the oil lamp. He heard the rustle of her clothes, but didn’t move.
“Your story is passing strange. Is it more than just a simple tale, I wonder?”
“That’s all it is, Merrik, a simple tale.” She could practically hear him thinking in the darkness, gnawing on questions about her and Taby. She sought to distract him, saying, “Letta told me that she didn’t mind that I was your whore because you could use me. I guess she meant you could practice on me, but I don’t believe you need practice. Well, perhaps you could have benefited from practice last night, but I don’t really know.” Ah, she heard him suck in his breath. She’d gotten her distraction all right. She hoped he wouldn’t strangle her. She continued, her voice mocking, “I fancied myself as some sort of target and your coming at me as a mighty sword. You didn’t miss the target, but it wasn’t a clean kill either, speaking as the target, of course. I suppose swords don’t mind so long as it is a kill for them. In any case, she is pleased that I will give you the use of my body until you and she are wedded.”
“She is more a child than Taby.” He was infuriated with himself that he’d spoken thusly to Laren. What he would do with Letta was his affair and no other’s. “On occasion,” he added, “most women are like children.” He rolled onto his back, staring up into the darkness. He said after a long moment, battling with himself to just keep quiet and ignore her baiting words, but he found he couldn’t, “I don’t like your insulting comparison. What nonsense is this—you a target and I a sword? What do you mean, I need more practice?”
“I mean that I asked Sarla about how a man and a woman mated. She assured me it didn’t hurt after the first time and even the first time it wasn’t bad if the man was gentle and experienced. It was pleasant for a while, she said, then she became very silent and said no more. Thus, perhaps you do need practice, Merrik. At least for that first time.”
He felt roiling anger at her, but more at himself. He’d been a clod. “Do you still hurt?”
“Aye.”
“I won’t practice on you again until you are completely healed and ready for me and ask me nicely. Now, you will cease your damned insults. Aye, they are insults, you just cloak them in your gentle guile.”
“I told you, Merrik, that last night would be the only time. It is a pity that I won’t ever know if mating can be pleasurable, but I won’t allow myself to become more interested in you, as a man, that is.”
“Then why were you staring at me, your eyes as bright as a child’s staring at honeyed apple slices? I showed interest only because my man’s body is like that. It responds when a woman stares, even you. There is nothing I can do to stop it. Not that I want to come inside you again, the gods know I don’t.” He stopped himself. He was making little sense, blatantly lying both to himself and to her. He was burying himself in a hole that would send him to the bottom of the fjord if he didn’t shut his damned mouth.
She said nothing. Absolutely nothing at all, and he waited and waited, unwilling to say more. Then he heard her breath even into sleep. He wanted to strangle her. By all the gods, practice! He’d learned well to pleasure women, his father had seen to that, as had the wonderful Gunnvor when he’d been but twelve years old, when she’d taken him in hand, literally. Surely it wasn’t his fault that he’d wanted her so badly he’d been forced to come into her before it was wise. Surely.
All awoke the next morning to a flood of rain. Tempers flared quickly at the enforced inactivity, men yelled at each other, fights broke out, children fought and shrieked with as great enthusiasm as the men. Even the animals were surly, a small goat biting one of Thoragasson’s men on his ankle. It was Cleve who suggested to Merrik that Laren continue the story. “Aye,” he said, grinning at the man he trusted with his life, “let her weave her magic around them. It will keep heads on shoulders, and hands from around throats.”
“It will do nothing about the goat,” Merrik said, but agreed.
And so it was still before noonday, when everyone had finally fallen silent, that Laren began again.
“ . . . Rolf wandered deeper and deeper into the forest. The thick canopy of trees kept the sun from warming him. He knew he was searching for a beast to kill him, but none appeared. Aye, there were lynxes and rabbits, even braces of pheasants that lurched into the air when he came upon them suddenly, but nothing larger than a fox.
“The third day of his wandering, he came to the edge of a small meadow. It was the most beautiful meadow he’d ever seen and he knew he’d never seen it before, and he wondered at that, for he’d grown up here, hunted in this forest. Yet here was this beautiful meadow, carpeted with flowers of all colors, and the sun warmed his face and his body. Suddenly, as he stood there, wondering perhaps if his wits were failing him, he saw on the far side of the meadow a beautiful creature that looked like a small horse. It didn’t move, just stood there, sniffing the soft morning air, its thick white tail swishing. But somehow, Rolf knew the animal wasn’t the least afraid of him.
“The creature was ducking its head up and down, as if inviting Rolf to come closer. Rolf slowly walked toward the animal. He realized as he drew closer that it wasn’t a horse at all, or any other kind of animal he’d ever seen before. It turned to face him fully now, and he saw a horn growing upward in the middle of its forehead. And the horn was gold.
“He walked to the creature and slowly reached out his hand.
“The creature snorted, then stretched out his beautiful white head and laid his muzzle in Rolf’s palm.
