Chapter 21

Those That you Trust Most, Hurt You Most

T he change was coming and to stop it would see us swept away. I could feel it penetrate my bones as I listened to the long-drawn call of the Jarl’s horn to announce his arrival back on our shores.

High above two ravens cawed, inky quills sweeping seamlessly against the sky. Watching over us, taking their tales back to Odin.

Fear gripped me as I felt the baby inside me turn. What would my husband say when he saw me? He had been gone so long it felt as though I were a widow, spending my days as I pleased. Ruling in his absence. Would he long to see me?

So many questions that I did not have the answers to.

Soon, the Jarl’s longships lay like serpents anchored in the bay. On the prow carved in oak a serpent’s head, long tongue jutting between teeth like daggers. She spilled men onto the jetty and into the waiting crowd.

A perfect moment, where all the anger, all the resentment and all the mistrust were forgotten in that one perfect moment when they arrived home after months at sea. There was no talk of their concubines or conquests only their longing for their loved ones.

The sun was setting. The last rays of light shone behind them bathing them in an ethereal glow. I caught sight of my husband. His hair was longer and braided to his head. He was dressed in furs draped to the floor. He no longer looked like a Jarl but every inch a King.

I watched as he collected a parcel wrapped neatly and tied with string. Hoisting it over his shoulder, he began walking towards me, eyes fixed on the man at his side. I still have the gift from that parcel. A beautiful gown. The colour of Scots pine. I wore it the day I sent my husband to Valhalla.

I waited patiently. Hands trembling. Breathing raggedly. As I watched him walk towards me, it felt as though it were our wedding day all over again. At last, he turned, and I caught his eye. His face split into a smile. I could not speak but held out my hand to greet him. He ignored it and dropped the parcel.

‘My princess Olith, I have waited so long,’ he said as he swept me from my feet and into his arms. ‘And what is this?’ He placed me back on my feet, bending down to his knees to take in the curve of my gown. ‘My son!’ He kissed it. ‘Your father is home.’

‘We have missed you,’ I said, breathing heavily.

He kissed me again, as though he might die without me. His hands slipped around my waist and pulled me to him. I felt my cheeks blaze. I glanced around at the others, but no one seemed to notice, all locked in their own embraces.

‘I have something to show you,’ he said, excitedly leaping back over the stern. ‘Here it is.’ He produced a small wooden cage, holding it high for me to see inside. ‘It is not as beautiful as your Drest, but now we can hunt together.’

I peered in. My eyes were met by the most magnificent falcon. Black-beaded eyes stared back at me. She was snow-white with tiny black flecks as though she had been painted by the gods. She was almost double the size of Drest.

‘She is magnificent. Where did you find such a specimen?’

‘I traded for her in Iceland. I could not have left without her. Say you will teach me?’

‘Aye, I will.’

His wonderment is something that I will always miss. It was like that of a child. There was something so special about it. It always touched my heart, no matter how angry I was or how long he had been gone. In that moment, I realised how much I had missed him.

‘That settles it.’ He looked inside the cage again before taking me by the hand. ‘Come, we have much to celebrate.’

?

Inside the mead hall, I had taken my seat once again at my husband’s side. I could fade away into the background. The sounds of joy and excitement rattled about the rafters filling the whole hall. It had been empty for too long.

‘It is good to see this room overflowing with people again,’ I said, trying to angle myself to face him.

‘You have done your duty.’ He cast his eye across the room. ‘Our sacrifices have been favourable to the gods.’

I nodded. That was the very first time that I felt it. It washed over my skin. In all my years of prayer on my knees before the altar of God, I had never been saved. I was told that it had been God’s will when those men had come to our bed chamber at night. That I was blessed because He spared my sister, and they took me. That this evil had existed to test my strength. Looking around that hall, I could see those that were truly blessed. Those that lived their lives without fear. That loved. That slept soundly in their beds at night.

Eventually, I would do what their God could not. I would take my revenge. I would cut down the men that had haunted our bedchamber and I would send every one of them to Hel to be eaten by the dragon Nidhogg. He would grind their bones between his teeth on the shores of Niflheim for eternity. Even that was not long enough for what they had done.

‘I think you are forged from the steel of Mjollnir. Look at what you have done with our lands while I have been gone. Our herds are plentiful.’ He took a sip of the mead from his horn. ‘You even brew good ale. Perhaps I shall marry you all over again.’

‘Have you not done enough already?’ I rubbed my ever-growing belly. ‘Perhaps one wedding was enough? We have still not received the gods’ gift from our last wedding.’

Sigurd laughed. ‘Beneath those fine breasts and that gown, I think you are a Jarl at your heart.’

‘I think inside that thick head of yours you would like me to be so that you have an excuse to go off raiding again.’ I looked at him suspiciously. ‘Do not try and sweet talk me dear husband I want you here to see our child born.’ He held the ale horn to his mouth and nodded and I could see by the look on his face that my request was being dutifully ignored. ‘I do need to speak with you?’

‘Thorkell told me of your father’s visit–’

Before he could carry on, Ligach arrived carrying two bowls. ‘Jarl Sigurd.’ She gave one to me and one to Sigurd and refilled his ale horn, something I would come to regret her doing later.

‘Won’t you join us?’ I said, hoping that she would stay so that I might avoid talking to Sigurd about my father. ‘It would be no trouble.’

I felt his eyes upon me. ‘Thralls cannot sit with us to eat. She is not a free woman.’

‘And yet you say I am Jarl?’

‘No, I will not interrupt you.’ She disappeared into the crowd.

We sat in silence for a long while. I ate, although the broth tasted good it appeared it was not to my child’s satisfaction. Now the Jarl’s men had returned, Ligach would not be safe from them. I could not keep her safe from them. The slave girls did not have the same rights as the free women. There was only one move to be made.

‘Free her,’ I commanded. ‘You say that I am your equal. Show me.’ I placed the bowl down on the table before me.

Sigurd laughed. A hearty noise that infuriated me. I felt the anger creep up my throat.

‘You are unbreakable in spirit.’ He stared at me, chewing lazily on the sinewy meat. ‘Like a mare waiting to be tamed.’

It was not a no.

‘You heard my words.’ I folded my arms. ‘Let me free her.’

‘This is how it has always been done. We have always traded in thralls. Maybe you should leave the thinking to the men.’

‘Was she not my bride gift?’

He nodded and gave me a curious look. ‘She was.’

‘Then I claim her.’ I could hear the petulance in my voice, but I did not care. ‘I will not see her harmed. She is my sister, not my thrall. I say she is free.’

I felt my whole-body tremble. I look back and wonder if my courage came from the child growing in my belly because if I had spoken to my father in such a way he would have taken my head from my shoulders. I always was my husband’s weakness. I was lucky he was a kind man.

‘What will you have done with her?’

‘She will be free. I will have her as my handmaiden, of her own free will. Just like she has been all these months when you have been raiding, dear husband.’ I never could hide my irritation. ‘She can marry a Dane. Set roots here. I wish the same for my sister.’

I let out the breath I felt I had been holding. The words were out now.

‘Your sister? As well as the thrall.’

‘That is what I wish to discuss.’

‘The sister I almost married?’

‘My father intends her to marry another Dane, a man that has been raiding his borders. At first, he wished you to send men to fight with him but Thorkell refused. My father was not happy. He consulted with his priests and his monks and now he believes that only the marriage to my sister will bring about peace. We have been asked that we attend the wedding next week’s end.’

‘Your father is a wise man, with very pretty daughters.’

‘It is Jarl Finnleik.’

There was a long pause. My husband’s face showed no reaction.

‘I have heard the stories. I know what kind of a man he is, Sigurd.’

‘Then it will do you good to know that if we are all to live, it would be wise that your sister marries Jarl Finnleik and that your father thinks better than to betray him. Jarl Finnleik is not a man who will stand for it.’

‘Marry him?’ I blurted out. How had I let myself believe that my husband would stand by me, that it would be my word that he would follow? I was no more than a wife. My husband’s responsibility. Something to adorn his arm like the gold circlets from battle. ‘She cannot marry him. I will not allo–’

‘We will speak no more of it,’ he said. ‘Thorkell, ready the horses to leave at first light, I have spent no time with my wife. We will spend the day together and I shall show her the Jarldom.’

‘My fearless husband, frightened of a mere thorn in my father’s borders.’ I tried to goad him.

‘You speak the truth.’ He considered his thoughts. ‘There is little I am frightened of, but I would not go against him in combat. Ragnar is a dangerous man. A man without fear. A man with nothing to lose.’

Travelling with Sigurd would be the opportunity I needed to make him change his mind. He would help me bring Donada home, I was sure of it. We would travel to her wedding with his warlords to meet my father and we would take her right from under my father’s nose. With days stretching ahead of us, it would be all I would need.