Loki's Daughters (44 page)

Birgit tucked the wool blanket around her sister, who soon dozed from the dose of willow bark and lettuce Birgit gave her. Ronan lingered, Egil behind him, but soon it was obvious they could do nothing and were only in the way. They both sighed and turned toward the gaping door.

"Birgit, come out for a moment," he asked as they stepped out into the bright afternoon sun.

Resignation thinned her lips. She nodded and followed them.

 
"How much can you see?" he asked, leaving the door ajar so he could see Arienh where she lay.

She squared her shoulders, lifting her chin. Yet in her eyes, hidden beneath fierce Celtic pride, lurked deep humiliation. A curious frown wrinkled her brow and she held out her hand before her until it almost touched him, studying her fingertips as if she was not sure they were there. Again, she looked up, staring in that strange way of hers.

"I can see you, though poorly, for you are directly in front of me. Your brother stands to your side, but I cannot see him. There are other things which tell me he is there."

"But how can you weave, if you cannot see?"

"By touch. I memorize the patterns and count the rows."

"And the shooting?"

"She imitated her sister," Egil said. "I thought it strange at the time. I should have guessed."

Birgit nodded, and her lower lip thinned. "It was luck. You do not understand, do you?"

Nay, they did not. Ronan shook his head. "I confess, I do not understand you or your sister, at all."

"She did it all for me. They all did."

"But why, Birgit?"

It was as if she drew back, thrusting up a barrier of pride between them. "They were afraid for me. Many things have been said about men from the north, and we have seen so many evils, it was far easier to believe them, than to take a chance. We have always known Northmen had no compassion for the weak and helpless."

"The way you believe we eat children," Egil guessed. His voice held a bitter tone Ronan had never heard before.

 
What would Egil would do now? He had been infatuated with Birgit from the beginning, but how could he make a wife of a woman who could not see?

Birgit's gaze roamed far beyond them as if she studied the ash grove beyond the village green, and Ronan realized how few clues she gave to her blindness. "We never believed that," she said, "but there is so much more. We had no way of knowing."

Egil opened his mouth to speak, but Ronan shook his head. Birgit was of a mind to divulge everything now.

"I am glad it is done," she said. Ronan's heart lurched at the sad catch in Birgit's voice. "It is best this way. Arienh would not agree, but this time it is best taken from her hands. She would die before giving up.

"She was so young when our last brother was killed, and she became our father's son, so to speak. She has always taken care of me. Then, in one day, about three years ago, we lost all our men. In our grief and loss, we all would also have laid down and died, but Arienh would not let us."

"Because she will never give up."

Birgit sighed with a resigned nod. "Aye, and that is your doing. Since the day you saved her, she has never surrendered, for she learned one can never tell what the next moment will bring.

"Since then, she has bullied us to do what we must to survive. And when we would not, she did what needed to be done for us. She has plowed the fields, hunted down bees for their honey, trapped hares, whatever she must do, she has done. She was always the last into the cavern, always the one who saw those she loved fall to the Viking axe. It is a wonder she has not been killed." The sheen of tears danced in Birgit's eyes.

"We can take care of her now."

Birgit smiled, a sadly wise smile. "But that is my point. What I have lost is easy for others to understand, but Arienh has lost far more. I do not think even Arienh understands this. Wonderful though she is, she should never have had this burden. She should have had the life of a normal woman. But she has not. She accepted her task willingly, but in time, the task itself became who she is. And now you have come, and you take that from her. She fears her people no longer need her. We do, of course, but in different ways."

"But it is no longer necessary. I can take care of her now."

Birgit shook her head. "You do not hear me. I know you can take care of her. But necessity has made her who she is, and I do not think she knows how to be anything else. If you do not accept this, you cannot accept her."

"Do you suggest I submit to her will, then? Where we come from, men make the decisions."

"A Viking submit to a woman? I could not imagine it, even though you are not where you came from anymore. But you have come here with your minds set on what we need. You did not ask us. Just as you did not ask Arienh's consent to wed her."

Ronan frowned. "It was she who made the offer."

"But she had no other choice, for you held Elli's life in your hand. She could no more let her die than she could you, on the day you came here, and you know that. Nay, you forced her consent, no matter how you say it. And among Celts, only willingness makes a marriage valid."

There had been nothing forced about the passion between them. Yet had that alone made it a marriage? He glanced through the open door, yearning to take Arienh in his arms and hold her, tenderly soothing her pain, patiently loving her as she recovered. Keeping her safe from all the horrors, wiping away the pain of the past.

But what if she really did not want him at all, what if she never had? Had he let his dream so encompass him that he had blotted out all her wishes? Believed hers to be the same as his merely because he wanted it that way?

"I have been fooling myself, then," he said. "She has made it clear all along she does not find me good enough for her."

Birgit almost smiled. "Ah, Viking, you only hear her words. Listen to her heart instead."

She raised her clasped hands to her lips and continued. "It is true, we learned you are not like those monstrous marauders. It was hard for us to accept, but we learned you are men, worthy men, men to be admired. But then there was Liam. Arienh would have never let you take him from me, no matter what it cost her. But I am resigned to that now. You are right, he needs a man, not his mother. It is best for him, so I will let him go."

"Let him go?"
 
Ronan and Egil echoed each other. Their eyes met, exchanging confusion.

Birgit focused her pale, determined gaze on Ronan, almost as if she did not know Egil stood there. "Aye. I know I can trust Egil to foster him well. Arienh will not understand, but it is Liam's need that must be met. Nothing else matters. I want most of all that my son will become a worthy man."

Angry frustration boiled up in Egil's face, and he grabbed Birgit by her arms. "You expect me to take your child and not you? Nay, I will have you as well."

Even face to face with him, Birgit would not meet Egil's eyes. Her lids closed, fluttering. "I will be no man's wife."

"Why?"

"I have nothing to give." Birgit chewed at her lip and turned away. She stepped over the threshold and quietly shut the door behind her.

Through a horrible, strained moment, Egil watched the old oak door as if he expected it to open again and Birgit burst out of it, into his arms. Anguish deepened in his eyes.

Ronan touched Egil's arm, feeling his brother’s devastation. Now that Birgit's secret was out, Arienh might come around. But Birgit? What could anyone do about her eyes?

Birgit was right. From the beginning, Egil had pursued his love with the greatest gentleness, but he'd had no idea just how badly Birgit had been damaged. How could she live the life of a normal wife? What if she had more children? How would she manage them?

And if Egil did not marry her, then Arienh would never leave her sister.

They walked in silence, alone, following the path that led through the ash grove and the oak tree where Birgit had collided with the low-hanging branch.

"She never even saw it," Egil said, testing the sturdiness of the limb. "How did she manage to fool us for so long?"

"Because we did not expect it. Because she does not put herself in places where her secret would be betrayed. Because she weaves. Who would have thought anyone could weave so wonderfully if she could not see?"

Egil gave a mirthless laugh and nodded, as they turned back to the path toward the Bride's Well, their pace brutally slow.

"Or to hit the center of a target on her first shot? It must truly have been luck. But now I understand the look I saw on her face. She was afraid her shot was wild and her secret was about to be revealed." The slow shake of his head seemed laced with pain. "But Ronan, I still cannot imagine that they thought we might actually hurt her."

Ronan knew. "But how could they know that is not our way? They have never been anywhere but here. Every Northman they have ever seen has been a murderer, men like Hrolgar. What will you do now, brother?"

"I don't know. I just don't know. I cannot give her up."

Ronan understood. They were very much alike, he and Egil, brothers in many ways, even if they did not share the same blood.

And Egil would find a solution, just as he would.

With a clap to his brother's back, he encouraged Egil back to their tasks, and as they turned in the path, they heard the little brass bell Wynne used to announce supper.

The Northmen filled the cottage, murmuring quietly, eating in silence, and hanging about as if they expected something but had no notion what it might be. The gloom in the cottage hovered like a starving kestrel over an empty field.

Egil sat at the slab table, silently quaffing ale.

Wynne placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Mildread said it was an injury to her head, caused by the man who raped her. Her sight has faded slowly, but no one knows if she will go completely blind."

Ronan had already heard that. It didn't make the problem any simpler.

"You could find another woman, Egil," Tanni suggested. "There are plenty of others."

"No, there aren't." Egil's retort was as near to a snarl as Ronan had ever heard from his usually mellow brother.

From the corner where his bed was built into the wall, Gunnar rose slowly, edging his thinning legs over the side and forcing himself to his feet. He had been weak for several days, and the trip to the cavern earlier in the day had exhausted him. But Ronan knew his second father could not let his sons suffer without trying to comfort them. He shuffled painful steps through the throng of men, resting here or there with a hand to someone's shoulder, and finally reaching Egil at the table.

"Son, you are right, there is no other woman. Else you would not have chosen her in the first place."

Egil found a smile for his father. "Aye, father. I just do not know how to persuade her. You should rest."

"Time enough to rest in eternity. We cannot solve our problems by resting. We will solve it by working together, the way we always have. Have you noticed, that is the way these Celtic women do it, too?" With a slowness that betrayed the intense pain in his body, Gunnar eased himself down on the bench beside his son.

Ronan remembered the time when Gunnar had been as tall as Egil, and his bones bulky and strong. One of the many things he loved about Egil was his close resemblance to Gunnar. He had wished many times that he also shared it. But they shared so much else, it was of little real importance.

"We will find a way," Gunnar said. "You cannot doubt, any of you, that you have won their hearts. But there is something else that bothers me. The girl, Elli."