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“Surely you had already thought of this before you came to me. You are not stupid, Laren.”
A cormorant flew low, its thick dark wing a brief shadow over her face, then gone. She said as she looked after it, “I wanted you, and I didn’t want to think about a future that had no more texture than those clouds yon. I wanted to know what it was like, this joining between a man and a woman. You are a beautiful man and you have been more kind to me than not. Aye, I wanted you to show me what it was like.”
“You are blunt and it pleases me. I haven’t liked the deception between us. No, don’t disagree with me. I understand why you refused to tell me about you and Taby. There was much at stake, too much. You are like the slave who was captured by Rolf the Viking, in your skald’s tale. I will keep my word always, Laren. Do you trust me completely now?”
“Aye, I do. I must, but I’m afraid, Merrik.”
“There is no reason now.” He fell silent, just looking down at her hand held in his. He looked down at her silently for a long moment. Then he began to rub his hands rhythmically up and down her arms. “Do you want me to discover if this Prince Askhold still needs a wife?”
She stood on her tiptoes and kissed his mouth. He was so surprised he simply didn’t move, didn’t respond. She smiled up at him. “I would wish him thrice wed, all three of his wives malleable sheep who will give him more children than he can count, more children than a sultan in Miklagard, all of them female. There can be nothing more wondrous than kissing you, Merrik.”
“Then you give your loyalty to me? You will wed me?”
“Aye.”
“And if I wish to keep Taby with me, as my son?”
He was testing her, but it was only right. She’d tested him enough. Now it could only be the truth, nothing else. “I must return his birthright to him. He must be trained by Rollo to be the future ruler of Normandy, to be the heir, if something happens to William. You know well, as do I, that death is over your shoulder every moment of every day. The future of Normandy is important. There must be heirs. As for myself, surely what I choose to do isn’t all that important.”
“It is to me.” He kissed her then, lifting her until her feet dangled above the wooden pier, and drew her close. He kissed her until she was frantic with need, until she was arching against him, pressing and pressing even more.
He said even as he laug
hed against her warm mouth, “Do you promise that once I have meat back on your bones, you will not become fat?”
Her laughter rang out and she kissed his mouth, his nose, his cheek, her hands cupping around his head, her fingers smoothing his thick eyebrows. “I swear,” she said between kisses. “Since I am such a good cook, do you promise your belly won’t stick out over your belt?”
“I swear it. Now, do not worry about Taby. All will be well, it is my vow to you.”
She believed him. He was a man like her uncle —strong and intelligent, a man of honor, a man to trust, a man to embrace in all ways. She remembered her father, Hallad, the same way, yet he had killed her mother and fled. She flinched at the memory, as she always did.
“Do not worry about my people not accepting you. We will find out who killed my brother and all will be well.”
And she believed him again.
“You are the niece of Duke Rollo,” he said, shaking his head in wonder even as he said the words again.
“Aye, but I was also a slave.”
“You were doubtless a much better niece than a slave.”
“And now I will be a wife,” she said with a good deal of relish. “It is strange, Merrik. But I think it will be enjoyable, with you as my husband.”
“Under my tutelage you will make an excellent wife, despite your illustrious blood. Were you unpleasant, Laren, when you were Rollo’s niece? Were you spoiled and capricious? Could you have given Letta lessons in pettiness?”
She punched his arm, then immediately began to caress where she had hit him. He grinned down at her.
“Nay, all my time was spent with Taby, for he was my son as surely as he was my brother.”
She wanted to kiss him right now, right here, in the middle of the longhouse, standing near the fire pit, with all his people here, doubtless looking at them, looking, nay, staring, at her, the niece of the mighty Duke Rollo of Normandy. Did they truly believe her?
“Will you continue to be my skald?”
“I brim with new tales, even now, at this very moment, and all of them are about you, my lord, and your splendid body and your beautiful eyes.”
“You once told me that all Vikings looked alike, that we were boring with our fair hair and blue eyes.”
“I was wrong. Your eyes are unique, the blue is softer than the blue of a robin’s wing yet as bright as the sun-drenched sky in mid-morning, as—”
