God's Eye (The Northwomen Sagas #1) (12 page)

“Brenna.” He cut him off. “Call her Brenna. And please,
brother
, do not put your thoughts into words you cannot recant.” He knew Leif’s misgivings, and he knew they had merit. They had merit, but no matter.

“I must. I see that you are happy. The G—Brenna smiles now, and I have known her long without ever seeing such a sight before. She is a worthy woman. Wed her if you will. None here would stop you. We will celebrate and wish you the grace and goodwill of the gods. But Vali, should your fealties cross, you must think of the risk. Of what you, or she, would do. Would you be sundered from her? Or would you abjure Jarl Snorri and swear an oath to Åke? If you would not, if you would have her renounce her oath, Åke will bring all he can down on Snorri and on you. You would take more from him than a shieldmaiden. Whatever you believe about her gifts, Åke believes her to be the source of his power. He would not rest until he saw your head on a pike at his door. And then he would enslave her, to be sure she never slipped away again.”

“You have said this all before. I know you are right. And I know, as do you by now, that it does not matter. I must have her. What follows will be as it will, as the gods wish it to be.”

Leif heaved a deep, frustrated sigh and squeezed Vali’s shoulders before he dropped his hands. “As you say. Perhaps the gods will ease the way of such a mating for the sagas as Brenna God’s-Eye and Vali Storm-Wolf.”

“We will make wedding offerings in the hope that it will be so.”

~oOo~

Marriage among their people was rarely a matter of love. Even among the poorest of freemen, it was normally a transaction between two men: a man ready to marry and the father of a woman likely to bear him children and keep his house well. Among the nobles, it was little different. Marriage was simply a financial arrangement between families.

But Brenna and Vali had no families, and they brought few material possessions with them but the clothes on their backs and the weapons in their hands. Vali had gold and silver, his portions from all his raids, buried at home, and he expected that Brenna did, too, but they had not discussed it, and Vali saw no need to. Their marriage would be one of love, and there was no other concern of consequence.

They were far away from home, and they were without family but the raiders and villagers who had become their clan. They had no bride price, no holding. Brenna, a shieldmaiden, and a slave before that, had not ever worn the kransen of a gentle maid. She had no women near her who knew their traditions but Astrid, who was nigh as rough and warlike as Brenna herself. Little about her preparations would be in keeping with the wedding traditions of their people.

Vali thought the gods would understand. To every extent they could, however, they meant to keep the gods’ ways.

For his part, he had no ancestral sword to offer, and knew she had none, either. They had only their own weapons of war. He need not cleave from his identity as son, because he had broken that tie long ago. But he bathed fully, thinking as he did so of the ritual cleansing away of his bachelorhood.

He thought of Brenna, being bathed by Astrid and Olga and the female servants, standing in the deep tub as they ran hot water over her fair skin, as they washed her long hair, as they cleaned every part of her, and he was glad that he had insisted upon being left to wash unattended, because he had to take himself in hand, spending his seed in the cooling water at his feet.

When he came into the main room of his quarters, he found a snowy-white tunic and new leather breeches tanned so dark they were nearly black, with boots and belt to match, arrayed over the bed he no longer used. He smiled, knowing well it was the work of Olga—she had either made them herself, or she had tasked someone else to do so, but he knew that it was she. Olga had been more fluttery and happy at the prospect of this wedding than had been the bride herself.

He dressed, marveling at the suppleness of the hide and the weighty softness of the finely-woven wool. As he closed the belt, a light knock came at the door.

“Enter,” he said, surprised when Olga opened the door and peeked in. “I thought you would be with Brenna.”

“I will go back. She has enough with her now. She is well. Too many at once make her…” The word failed her, so she made an angry face, and Vali laughed.

“Yes. I would think women’s fuss would make her…” he mimicked Olga’s angry face, and they both laughed. “But why are you with me? As you can see, I am able to dress myself. Thanks go to you, I believe, for the groom’s finery.”

She smiled. “A man should look his best on this day,
jah
? I was able to send for plenty good hide from Mirkandi.” Her grasp of their language had grown daily. By now, she was nearly perfectly fluent, though she kept a charming accent. “I come and see if I might weave your hair.”

Vali kept his sides shorn and usually kept the long hair in the middle tightly braided, in one or two plaits that started at his hairline and clung to his head until the hair was loose of it, then trailed down his back. Something he could do himself; a slave girl he’d favored when he was young had taught him. Except for what he shaved, he had not cut his hair since he’d left his father, and it fell, when loosed, nearly to his waist. It was dark and thick, as thick as the full head of most men.

He liked fuss no better than Brenna did, but he smiled at Olga. It was his wedding day, after all. “You will not festoon me with winter blossoms, I hope.”

“I think not,” she laughed. “It will be manly and fierce.”

He sat on a nearby chair. “Then weave away.”

~oOo~

Leif and Orm met Vali in the hall, where the men all awaited the wedding rites. They grinned at him, then led him into the midst of the group. Just as Vali was about to make a snide remark about their gaping faces, Orm, the oldest of them, spoke.

“I have known you long, Vali Storm-Wolf. You have a fierce heart and a good one. You are a great warrior, spoken of in stories even while you live. You have chosen for your mate a legend. We believe your match will please the gods. We have prepared the offerings to ensure that this is so.” Orm turned to the table and picked something up. When he faced Vali again, he had a new longsword, a stunningly beautiful weapon with a dark, intricately woven hilt, in his hands.

“You have no family who would bestow on you their sword, but you cannot be wed without the blessing of Thor, to make your union strong and fertile. So as the family you have, we make a new tradition. We offer you this sword, newly forged and blessed in sacrificial blood, so that your bride might pass it to the descendants of your union.”

Moved beyond expression, Vali took the sword in both hands and held it high, bowing his head.

He was ready to take his bride.

Although winter was setting in, there had not yet been snowfall or a hard frost, and their weddings were meant to be outside, in clear sight of the gods. And they were sturdy folk, so none balked, not even the servants unaccustomed to these rites.

The men went out to the grounds and waited, with Vali and Leif, who would preside over their binding, in the center. Behind them, servants held a goat, a sow, and a boar. They would be sacrificed at the beginning of the ritual, and their blood would be sprinkled over Vali and Brenna and the others, to honor the gods and seek their blessing over the marriage.

The women came out from the east door, all of them in white, and Brenna in the lead. Vali caught his breath. Olga had seen to it that she had a dress befitting a bride. Long and pure white shot with gold, it clung to her curves then flared to flow loosely around her legs. The sleeves draped down, over her hands. She was a vision fit for the gods.

More breathtaking than that was the bride’s crown she wore over her long, loose hair. It was tall and woven of straw and adorned with flora, exactly as their traditions would have it. That, Vali thought, must have been Astrid’s doing. He would not have thought her likely to have offered such a suggestion, but she must have.

As the women walked forward, Harald, the youngest surviving of their men, stepped in front of her, bearing high a gleaming sword with a golden hilt. Their clan had seen to it that Brenna, too, could make their traditions. The gods would be well pleased.

Brenna’s smile as she approached him was wide and bright. Vali took her hand and bent down to whisper, “I mean to see to it that you smile like that at least once every day for all the rest of your life.”

~oOo~

After a great, raucous feast in the hall, with all of the village in attendance as well, Vali and Brenna were sent up to their wedding bed. They were followed up, nearly chased, by most of their people. As their friends laughed and whooped and gibed behind them, Brenna tripped running up the stone stairs in her long dress, and Vali caught her and swept her up into his arms.

She laughed and threw her arms around him. He had never heard her laugh before. The sound was quiet and stilted, as if stiff from lack of use, but Vali thought it the most beautiful he’d ever heard.

They arrived at their room, which had been hers, and all their friends, their family, clustered eagerly at the door. Vali set his wife down and took her into his arms to kiss her. Their audience cheered with ribald humor. Then he took the flowered crown from Brenna’s head and tossed it out the door, into the crowd.

When he could close the door, he dropped the bar across it.

Then he took his wife to bed.

Brenna woke slowly, snug under the furs. She stretched and purred as Vali’s hand eased up her thigh and over her hip. He almost always woke her this way, his hand under her sleeping shift, smoothing over her skin as if he meant to polish her to a sheen.

“It’s nearly dawn, my love. We should rise.” He whispered the words at her ear and then drew his tongue along the lobe.

She knew he was right. The winter had come in with bluster and fury, and they’d already endured three long storms. The latest had taken many roofs down in the village, and the castle was full of suddenly homeless villagers and their animals. The day before had brought a reprieve—sun and more endurable temperatures—and they all meant to take the opportunity the gods had given them to make repairs as they could. Those who could read the signs said that this winter would continue harsh and bitter, so they would take their respite when they could.

But the thought of pushing away the furs and stepping out into the cold room made Brenna moan a protest and snuggle back, tightening her bond with her husband’s body. He always slept bare, and he was hard; he was always long and hard and hot when he woke. Brenna wiggled her hips against his length until he groaned and clutched his fingers into her thigh. The sounds of his pleasure—that her touch, her body, her nearness could elicit such sounds from him—that was a powerful feeling. A stirring feeling, which heated her blood and made her body yearn.

She opened her eyes; the room was still thick with dark. “We need not rise just yet.” As she spoke the words, she reached back, between them, and took him in her hand, sliding her loose fist along his shaft. His hips rocked, and he let out a long, earthy breath.

“You are a wanton, wife.”

“Which is as my husband prefers me.”

He shifted his arm under her so that he could wrap it across her chest. With his other hand, he picked up her leg and pulled it back to rest on his hip. “Indeed.”

Brenna loved this position more than any other she knew—lying on their sides, he behind her, she encompassed by him, he inside her, his hands free to touch every part of her and bring her multiple ecstasies at once. She felt never more thoroughly loved than like so. As he eased into her now, the path smoothed by her need of him, he groaned into her ear.

“You are always ready for me. Wanton.”

Chuckling at the end of the sigh with which she’d taken him in, she reached her arms over her head so that she could grab his braided hair. “And you for me.”

“Always, yes.” The arm across her chest moved, and his hand slid into the neckline of her shift. Further down, the hand that had held her thigh slid up and between her legs. As his body took full possession of hers, Brenna grunted and flexed back.

There was no feeling like this, this joining with another, becoming one. She had thought mating to be nothing better than animal urges, and she had thought the groaning and grunting and heaving to be proof of that. She’d been so very wrong.

The animal urge was there, the inexplicable and undeniable need to have his body inside her body, the way she felt impelled,
compelled
, to pull and bite and scratch as he took her, the way he groaned and growled and grunted and howled and roared—all of that was as animal as ever she’d thought.

What she hadn’t known, what she couldn’t possibly have known, was the depth of the pull. The expression of the need might have been animal, but the need itself came from somewhere deeper. It came from her very soul. Brenna knew her love for Vali, her need of him in every dimension, would transcend this world and be with her forever.

That
was what it was to be mated. Now she understood.

As he rocked into her, and she rocked back, as his fingers teased between the folds of her sex and made her whimper with building bliss, Vali’s other hand cupped her breast, and he caught her nipple in his fingers.

That hurt, sharply, and, surprised, Brenna jumped and stilled. “Oh!” She laid her hand over his, the soft linen between them, to stop him.

After two months together, Vali knew her well, and he, too, stilled. “They ache? Is it time for your blood?”

Brenna thought. She had bled only twice before she’d left her parents’ home. Upon the first time, her mother had told her to heed the moon to know when her blood would come, but the moon had never seemed to tell her the same thing twice. When she was raiding, sometimes she would go the whole season without blood.

She’d bled once since they’d been in Estland, just after she and Vali had come together, shortly before they were wed. She supposed she was due to do so again. He must have taken note of what her sore breasts then had foretold. It pleased her to think he’d paid such close attention.

“I think yes.” She sighed sadly at the thought of going days without waking like this, and without going to sleep in similar ways.

Vali buried his face against the side of her neck and took his hand from her breast, hooking it instead over her shoulder, holding her close. “Then I will take my fill of you now, before I am bereft.”

Brenna turned her head, and Vali answered her, covering her mouth with his, plunging into her with tongue and sex alike, driving her need with his own until they grunted together, their bodies tangled and heaving, Brenna’s hands gripping his hair, pulling fiercely, Vali’s fingers between her legs, rubbing and pinching, his body filling hers again and again, more deeply each time until she thought she could take no more.

Needing more breath that he could give her, Brenna tore her mouth away and sucked in a loud whoop of air. Vali growled deep in his chest, rumbling against her back, and his fingers, so hard and rough from years of battle, pressed down on the node of her pleasure. Brenna cried out again and again, feeling the coming of the loss and gain of everything, the feeling she knew as the peak of her ecstasy.

“Yes, shieldmaiden. Lose yourself to me.”

She did. Everything was sparks and light, and then, behind her, at her ear, Vali growled with his release and clutched her tight, and Brenna’s peak climbed still higher until she knew nothing but absolute bliss.

~oOo~

She opened her eyes to see Vali hovering over her, his expression a blend of concern and nascent amusement. “Are you well?”

“Yes. Of course. Why?” She lifted a hand and combed her fingers through his long, soft, thick beard.

“In that case, I’m well pleased with myself.” He grinned and kissed her hand. “You swooned.”

“I did?” She lifted up onto her elbows and looked around. The room was a bit brighter—and warmer; Vali had stoked the fire. And he was partially dressed. She must have swooned—and slept a little after that.

“Indeed. I should be careful not to exhaust you so at the dawn. We have much to do.” The amusement left his face, and he furrowed his brow at her. “You are well, though? Truly?”

“Perfectly well. And well sated.”

She smiled, and he returned the look and brushed a finger over her cheek. “Not yet a day without a smile like that. My mission is too easy, I think.

“Are you going to be smug and insufferable all day now?” Playfully, she pushed at his shoulders, and he sat back so that she could sit up. Her head swam lightly for a moment; he truly had rendered her senseless.

“Brenna?” He’d noticed. He noticed everything about her. All her life, those around her had made every effort not to look at her directly. Vali hardly looked away from her. His love for her was a heady potion. He had changed almost everything she understood about the world.

She turned the furs back and stood. “You
are
going to be smug and insufferable all day.”

He stood, too, and pulled her close. “I made you insensible. Count yourself fortunate I don’t announce it in the hall.”

Laughing, she punched him lightly in the belly and went to wash and dress.

~oOo~

Although it was warmer and brighter than it had been, it was nearing the heart of the winter, and the temperature was by no means balmy. Yet the work was difficult and physical, and by the time they broke for a midday meal, many cheeks were rosy more from effort than from cold.

Everyone sat at a bonfire in the center of the village, and the women served hot skause and bread and mead. Most of the women, that was. Since her time with her parents, Brenna had not cooked, and since her time as a slave, she had not served. Her effort on this day had been spent helping with the roofs—though much of her work had been herding playful children from trouble while the men chopped wood, hoisted rough beams, and laid the tiered wooden roofing.

Finding herself not hungry, Brenna nibbled at some bread and watched the others. The severe weather and the damage to the village had not seemed to dampen anyone’s spirits. Men and women sat around the fire, or milled nearby, chatting and laughing. Young men who had gobbled their meal while others were still being served now sparred in the snow. Children ran and squealed, fleeing Viger, who had become a monster, stomping and snarling after them.

Leif and Olga sat together, chatting. Olga had been teaching Leif the Estland language, and he had been a devoted student. He’d picked up enough that he could speak with the villagers without need of translation. Brenna was envious of his facility. She herself was hopeless with the language, try though she might to learn it. While Olga had become fully fluent in their language, and Leif competent in hers, while Vali and several others had learned enough to make their way, Brenna had picked up only a scant few words and phrases and was still relying on pantomime when she had no one near to serve as interpreter.

Vali had tried to help her, once, but the endeavor had nearly ended in blows between them—the only time they had, since they had come together, had a strenuous disagreement. Away from battle, Vali was an even-tempered, patient, and goodhearted soul. Brenna was discovering a softer nature in her heart as well. But she didn’t like to feel stupid, and on that day, she had.

She watched Vali now, speaking with Orm, standing amidst their friends and family. Even as she sat alone, Brenna felt the coziness of companionship. Since they had taken over the castle and built a community with the people here, she had felt every day a bit more normal. Even the raiders who had known her for years had begun to treat her differently—as someone more like them. People spoke to her, and not simply because they couldn’t avoid it. In the past few weeks, she had gradually realized that everyone simply called her Brenna now.

Never in her life had that been true before.

Taking a sip of her mead, she pulled a face. Normally, she liked the taste of the Estland mead, but this batch seemed off. No one else seemed bothered, so she took a curious sniff, but when her stomach rolled, she poured it out into the slush of the trodden snow.

Then she stood and went to join Vali and Orm’s conversation. Her husband smiled and held out his hand as she approached, and when she took it, he pulled her close and wrapped her in his arms, all without losing the beat of his words. That felt special to her—as if his love for her was so much a part of him now that it needed as little thought as breathing.