Anna Markland - Viking Roots Medieval Romance Saga 02 (9 page)

In the vanguard of the hundreds of warriors who’d made the long trek from Chartres to the front lines of the campaign, Bryk eased his weary body from Fisk’s saddle. He gritted his teeth when his feet sank in the mud in the mist-shrouded field. He would have preferred to complete the whole journey by longboat, but the lay of the land rendered it impossible. He’d been loath to leave the
Alexandria
in Chartres.

He once again gave thanks to Odin for the endurance and loyalty of the horse he’d captured when the Vikings had first arrived in the valley of the Seine. He came close to reminding Torstein he’d have to clean his boots later, but stopped in time. He had to cease treating his nephew like a thrall. He was getting better at remembering, but exhaustion had muddled his wits. “Come with me,” he grunted instead, catching sight of Rollo and Vilhelm ahead of them in the near distance. “Rollo’s gone to search out Richard of Burgundy before the light wanes. We’ll follow.”

Torstein handed the reins of both horses to a soldier.

As they slogged their way through the muck in search of the Burgundian’s tent, a Frankish soldier grabbed Bryk’s arm. He yanked it away, glaring at the youth as he reached for his sword. “You would be without your head, young Frank, if I had my axe with me.”

Torstein pinned the lad’s arms from behind, holding him fast.

The youth chuckled. “What’s wrong, brother, don’t you know me?”

Bryk narrowed his eyes, recognizing the voice rather than the man. “Javune?”

He nodded his appreciation that his nephew had immediately come to his aid—not that he needed the help.

Freed from Torstein’s grip, his brother-by-marriage opened his arms wide, his face split by a grin. “In the flesh.”

Bryk inspected Javune from head to toe. No wonder he had walked past the weather bronzed swaggering soldier with hair flowing past his shoulders. It was hard to believe this was the immature, tonsured monk he’d first met the previous year.

Javune shook Torstein’s hand heartily, bringing a welcome smile to his nephew’s lips. The lad had sulked and glowered throughout the journey from Rouen.

Javune might be his wife’s newly discovered twin brother, but Bryk didn’t feel comfortable embracing him, recalling his initial refusal to believe Cathryn was his sister. The young man seemed to sense his reluctance and instead offered his hand.

Bryk accepted, forcing a smile. “You’ve adapted to the military life, I see.”

Javune laughed, throwing back his head. “What you mean is, I’m not the same green lad you remember from Rouen,” he replied.

For a fleeting instant Bryk caught the first resemblance to his wife he’d ever noted, apart from the strawberry shaped birthmark both sported on their arses. But better to avoid thoughts of his wife’s lovely bottom. He scratched the itchy stubble under his chin. “
Ja
. Exactly.”

“Believe me, I am much more suited to the military life than I ever was to the religious. How is my sister?”

“She’s well,” Bryk growled, resuming his walk.

Torstein followed.

Guilt poked at Bryk. Cathryn would want her brother to know their news. “We have a son, Magnus Bernard.”

Javune kept up with the brisk pace. “Congratulations. It seems my good-hearted sister named him for our father.”

The hint of anger in the young man’s voice chafed. It was evident from the renewed scowl on Torstein’s face he’d noted it too. Bryk stopped and stood nose to nose with Javune. “It wasn’t your father’s fault he drowned in the Seine before your birth.”

Javune opened his mouth, but Bryk was in no mood to argue. “And I’m sure your grieving mother didn’t intend to die in childbirth.”

“No, but—”

“If anyone is to be condemned for you and your sister being abandoned on the doorstep of a convent, it’s your uncle, the Archbishop, and he has repented his sin. Your
White Christ
preaches the forgiveness of sins, yet you seem unwilling to forgive.”

Javune studied his feet. “You are right, of course. I have forgiven our uncle. The man who pretended to be my father and then shipped me off to a monastery when he managed to sire an heir—him I cannot forgive.”

Bryk strode off, too tired to argue further. “I learned a long time ago resentment gets you nowhere,” he shouted over his shoulder, nodding in Fisk’s direction. “See to my horse.”

Javune arched his brows, but turned away. Anger contorted Torstein’s face and Bryk regretted treating his brother-by-marriage like a thrall. Cathryn would not be pleased. He stopped. “Still pining for Kaia?” he shouted in an effort to make amends.

Javune returned to his side, his jaw clenched. “I love her. One day she will be mine, despite her father’s determination to keep us apart.”

He strode off to tend to the horse as Bryk and Torstein continued their progress.

“Not much hope of that,” Bryk declared, wondering anew when he looked at Torstein if mayhap his nephew was suffering some malady of the gut caused by the journey. “What’s wrong with you? You look like your best friend died.”

Torstein understood his uncle’s difficulty. Sometimes he too slipped back into the role he’d played since birth. Bryk was doing his best, probably for Cathryn’s sake as much as anything.

Javune’s words rekindled his flagging spirits, but reminded him of the dilemma of Sven. His friend’s obvious puzzlement at his hostile behavior had become more noticeable as the journey progressed. He regretted it, but the image of Sven abed with Sonja kept rising behind his eyes, filling him with burning anger.

Bryk’s opinion of the hopelessness of Javune’s love tore at him. Was his uncle aware of his feelings for Sonja and this was an attempt to forewarn him of the futility of it? He wished he could confide fully in Bryk, his only living blood relative, apart from Alfred who’d remained behind in Rouen with his burgeoning brood.

Alfred had proven he was a warrior at Chartres, but was still a farmer at heart. Now Hannelore was expecting their eleventh child, he’d turned his attention in earnest to finishing the house he was building on the land Rollo had granted him on the Seine.

Torstein envied him. What he wouldn’t give for a piece of good land, where he and Sonja could make a life, raise a family, establish roots. He often wondered why Bryk hadn’t built a house for Cathryn on the adjacent land. But his uncle sought what the Christians called an Eden, the perfect place to plant his orchards and build a dwelling of stone. It was as if the gods had promised such a place. The rich land by the Seine sat idle, apart from a few dozen apple trees they’d transplanted from the Archbishop’s garden when it became evident Cathryn was not lucky with plants.

Bryk entered the Duke of Burgundy’s tent. Torstein remained outside, looking up at the crescent moon, now visible in the black sky. Battle plans were being drawn up inside. The morrow would bring his opportunity to begin his march to glory.

Weeks of running battles followed. Heavy rains dampened the most enthusiastic warrior’s fervor. Water-laden canvas shelters failed to keep the men dry at night, but the Viking army slogged on in the mud, determined to drive the Bretons out of the valley.
At least it isn’t snow
became the oft heard jest.

Bryk was tired of war and sometimes despaired of finding the land he sought. They were gaining the upper hand, and he suspected the enemy’s numbers were dwindling. However, he grudgingly admitted the man who seemed to be their leader, a giant who rivaled Rollo in height and girth, was a shrewd strategist. Attacks were sudden and ferocious, and the Bretons disappeared into the surrounding countryside as quickly as they had emerged.

“These warriors we face are descendants of an ancient race,” Rollo reminded him and Vilhelm one night as they perched on campstools enjoying one of the rare dry evenings. “Celts, Welsh, Britons. They won’t give up easily. They’re as determined to hold on to their territory as we are to take it from them.”

Vilhelm agreed. “You’ve mentioned before that they are like us, a people who left their homelands in search of a better life.”

“Except many of their forebears fled invaders to Britain as long ago as Roman times,” his father reminded him.

The mention of Celts conjured a memory of Torstein’s mother. If Bryk were forced to pinpoint a defining moment when raiding and plundering ceased to appeal, it would probably be his dismay at his father’s nonchalant gift of a young Irish captive, a child, to Gunnar—of all people.

He supposed life with Gunnar was preferable to being sold in the slave markets of Constantinople, which was where Marian had likely ended up anyway after Ribe.

For the first time, it struck him full force that Torstein had lost his mother forever because of Rollo’s decision to sell her off. If Bryk’s mother had been taken from him in such a manner, hatred and resentment would have burned hotly in his heart.

He shook his head. Now he was thinking of slaves as people. Freeing Torstein had indeed disturbed a nest of vipers.

Vilhelm’s voice brought him back to the present. “Whatever was between Sven and Torstein seems to have been resolved,” he said.

It surprised him Rollo’s son had noticed the animosity between the two men. Better to divert his attention. “It hasn’t interfered with their success as a fighting team,” he replied with a shrug. “They’re effective in the
svinfylking
, often taking the point position in the boar snout formation.”

Vilhelm seemed to warm to the subject. “I’ve never seen warriors goad each other into such an intense battle frenzy.”

Bryk sometimes worried the two were frenzied to the point where they wouldn’t realize if they were wounded, but he kept the notion to himself. “They’ve perfected the tactic of protecting each other with their shields then spearing the man adjacent with a javelin instead of the man in front.”

Vilhelm laughed. “Those tapered shields they’ve fashioned give more protection to the legs, and every Viking warrior is now clamoring for one, including me.”

“And me!” Rollo declared.

“
Ja
,” Bryk replied, proud his nephew’s invention had come to Rollo’s attention. “Much to the dismay of the overworked armorers who assisted in its creation.”

Torstein pushed aside worries about the delirious fervor that overtook him and Sven before battle. Sometimes they’d returned from skirmishes with nicks and wounds they hadn’t realized they’d suffered, then shrugged them off and laughed.

Denying the existence of pain made an intolerable situation bearable.

He’d lost any fear of dying in battle, confident he’d earned a place in Odin’s Valhalla. Bryk had hinted at it. It was the closest his uncle had come to expressing the love Torstein increasingly sensed.

He’d also told him proudly the new shields had come to Rollo’s attention. Now everyone wanted one, which hadn’t made them popular with the armorers. It was a simple idea both he and Sven deemed obvious; make the shield long enough to protect the legs.

He made sure Sonja’s amulet stayed hidden under his mail shirt, consumed by an overwhelming fear it would be discovered when his body was prepared for the journey with the Valkyries. Then he wouldn’t be alive to champion and protect her. But going into battle without it was unthinkable. She was his talisman.

Rollo stood with legs braced, fists on wide hips, about to address the hundreds upon hundreds of Viking, Frankish and Burgundian warriors who’d survived the bloody conflicts of the past few sennights.

There wasn’t a man in the host who matched him in height or width.

Bryk recalled a bleak day when the bedraggled people of Møre had gathered to hear their chieftain speak of famine, of loss, and of the inevitability of having to seek a new land. Then he’d been relegated to the outer fringes of the meeting. Today he and his nephew stood in the front ranks beside Sven Yngre.

Not far behind them was Javune. Bryk hoped Cathryn would be pleased by the knowledge her brother was a courageous warrior.

Bryk was proud other commanders had commented on the prowess of the three men. He’d felt responsible for Sven since the early days of stealing horses in the valley of the Seine when the lad had narrowly escaped drowning. And of course, Torstein was his brother’s son.

“Rollo looks ten years younger than he did the day we left Norway,” his nephew said, apparently divining his thoughts.

“Victory is sweet for a man who refuses to lose,” Bryk responded. “It’s taken many bloody weeks but we’ve successfully driven the Bretons from the valley of the Orne.”

Vilhelm stood proudly at his father’s side.

“The boy resembles his sire more and more,” Sven observed.

Bryk shrugged. “He’s no longer a boy, any more than you are, and never forget he’ll be the Duke of the Norsemen some day. Rollo will make sure of it, and he isn’t getting any younger, despite appearances to the contrary.”

“Men of the North.” Rollo’s voice boomed, seemingly without much effort. A hush fell over the gathering.

“Still the same charm,” Bryk remarked, immediately regretting the sarcasm in his words. Would he ever cease blaming his former brother-by-marriage for his first wife’s death?

“Vikings, today we celebrate a great victory. With our Frankish and Burgundian allies we have secured the valley of the Orne.” Rollo stretched his arms wide. “Look around. As far as the eye can see and beyond, the land is free of Bretons.”

He looked directly at Duke Richard, seated on an elaborate carved chair beside him. “It is our territory, wrested from the enemy in fulfillment of our pledge as vassals of King Charles.”

Richard raised an eyebrow, but remained seated as loud cheering broke out.

Rollo’s stern gaze soon brought silence again. “Norsemen will protect this land in the name of King Charles.”

Bryk turned around slowly, his eyes roving over a thousand and one faces. The Vikings still had battle lust in their eyes, spears, axes and swords in hand. Their allies’ forces were spent, many of them incapable of remaining on their feet, obviously exhausted. “The Burgundian realizes he has no choice but to acquiesce,” he told his protégés. “We’d slaughter them in minutes if they objected to our taking this land.”

He inhaled deeply, a sense of peace washing over him. As they’d advanced, the flat land had become more undulating, the earth rich. “My Eden is close at hand,” he confided to Torstein. “I feel it in my bones.”

A maelstrom of conflicting emotions swirled in Torstein’s heart. He’d admitted inwardly weeks ago that he loved his
onkel
Bryk like a father and cherished the morsels of praise bestowed upon him. The congratulations had increased as battle fervor had taken hold.

He’d sensed Eden might be close. He’d seen it in his uncle’s eyes. He wanted to throw his arms around his neck and blurt out his joy. But this wasn’t the time or place for a first embrace, which he wanted to come from his uncle in any case.

He loved Sven like a brother. In the field they were as one warrior, instinctively aware of what was in the mind of the other. But he was sure Sven didn’t know what was in his heart. Jealousy burned within him whenever his comrade mentioned Sonja.

The last of the Bretons had fled more than a day ago, but a storm still raged in his veins, an urge to pursue the enemy to the shores of the Cotentin and then drive them into the sea.

He licked his fingertips absentmindedly, remembering the wet heat of Sonja’s most intimate place and how passionately she had responded to his touch. He prayed to Saint Catherine to whisper in his beloved’s ear. “Tell her not to worry about Sven,” he murmured under his breath.