Sandra Hill - [Vikings I 04] (19 page)

“Disasters? Like what?” Adam scoffed.

“Manparts curving, seagulls dying, twins a-birthing, wine souring, bowels fluxing, storms brewing, even geese shitting on hapless travelers—”

“What hapless travelers?” Adam asked, clearly confused by Tykir’s recitation of her supposed ill-doings.

Tykir and Bolthor looked at each other, turned red-faced, and refused to respond.

Adam hooted with laughter. “God’s blood! ’Twould seem I have much to catch up on. Mayhap I will go to Dragonstead with you, after all, Tykir. Have you committed all these happenstances to sagas, Bolthor?”

Bolthor beamed at Adam. “Yea, I have. Most of them, leastways. I intend to recite all winter long at Dragonstead.”

“I cannot wait.” Adam beamed innocently as he spoke.

Everyone else groaned under their breaths.

“Now let me see, Tykir.” A mischievous grin crept over Adam’s lips. “You have told me the wench—I mean, witch—is not for me because she is too old, too talksome and too magical. Is there aught else I should fear afore taking her off your hands?”

“Who said I wanted you to take Lady Alinor off my hands?” Tykir snapped.

“You did,” Alinor declared, baffled by his change of mood.

“I did not. I said that Anlaf must take responsibility for you now. I never said Adam should take on that irksome duty.”

“What’s the difference?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” he answered enigmatically. “Being a woman, ’twould be hard for you to fathom the deeper workings of a man’s mind.”

“Did it take you a long time to think up that nonsense?”

He cast her a sheepish sideways glance. “Nay. It just came to me. An inspiration.”

She rolled her eyes heavenward.

“Well, if you do not want her…” Adam began, studying the two of them with lips twitching with mirth. The thick-headed Tykir obviously failed to see the teasing that underlay Adam’s words. “I guess I could be her protector…for a while.”

“Please, Adam! Spare us your whims. You would be her protector only till the next winsome maid strolls by…not that Lady Alinor is winsome. I mean…I did not mean…” Tykir slanted an apologetic look at Alinor, as if she did not already know how little appeal she held for him. Tykir let out a whoosh of exasperation. “Face the
truth, Adam. You would not like the freckles that cover her from head to toe,” Tykir blurted out, and seemed surprised at his own words.

She gasped. The dolt!

But wasn’t it odd how Tykir was trying to deflect Adam’s interest away from her? Here was a perfect opportunity for him to be rid of her, and what did he do? Sabotage his own plan to relinquish responsibility for her.

She reached over for his hand and had to pry the fingers apart before lacing it with hers. And, oh, how good it felt to press her flesh against his! He was her anchor in this sea of danger. He would save her. She knew he would. “Do not mind the lout,” she told Adam. “He is my own personal guardian angel, but he fights his fates mightily.”

“Tykir…an angel?” Adam shook his head with disbelief. But then he homed in on Tykir’s words. “How do you know she is covered with freckles
from head to toe?”
Adam asked, chuckling.

“Because he saw her naked, back in Jorvik,” Rurik explained. He’d just returned from the privy, apparently satisfied with the shape of his beloved staff if his swagger was any indication. He dropped down into his seat next to Adam. “And he has not been the same since. Smitten he is with whatever it was he saw.”

“I am
not
smitten,” Tykir said with consternation, as if that would be the most horrible thing in the world. Well, it would be, of course. She did not want him smitten. Still, he was a brute for saying so with such vehemence.

“As I recall, ’twas the raspberry belly button that got his attention when first he saw her naked. And he cannot get that image from his mind now,” Bolthor interjected, tapping his chin with a forefinger thoughtfully. “Nay, ’twas a raspberry birthmark on her belly.”

“Raspberry nipples,” Tykir corrected.

Oh, the humiliation of such talk! Alinor pulled her hand out of its clasp with the lout and buried her face in her hands.

“This is the story of ‘Tykir the Great and the Raspberry Feast,’” Bolthor began.

“Tykir the
Great?”
Adam questioned.

“Shut up,” Tykir retorted.

And Bolthor shared his latest creation:

A long silence ensued. Finally curiosity gave way, and Alinor peered up between her fingertips.

All four men were grinning.

And staring at her chest.

Tykir felt as if his feet were planted in quicksand and his upper body were being assailed by buffeting winds. He was being pulled in a dozen directions at once, but somewhere along the way he’d lost his inner life-compass.

How could he have thought this mission for Anlaf would be a simple matter? He must be as lackwitted as Alinor always said.

He wanted to be rid of her.

And he did not.

He wanted to trust her fate to the fairness of a Norse Thing.

He feared what that fate might be.

He swore the whole misadventure was her fault for hurling a curse in the first place.

Yet guilt nagged at him like an aching tooth.

The most alarming revelation had come to him moments ago when Adam had offered to take responsibility for the
witch. Oh, he knew the scamp had been half-jesting, but he was the one who’d reacted like a green youthling. For the first time in his life, he’d tasted the bile of jealousy, and that scared him mightily.

At what point had he stopped noticing the ungodly color of her hair or the overabundance of skin splotches? In truth, the witch was starting to look good to him. Yea, to his horror, he was developing a taste for coppery hair and freckles. Other women, even some comely ones at Anlaf’s court, appeared pale in comparison.

Tykir was going mad. His life was unraveling, thread by thread. In the midst of this royal assembly, he fought the compulsion to pull at his hair and roar like a wild bull.
That is it,
he concluded,
I have gone berserk.

He needed to get away and think. Alone. Once he was home at Dragonstead, his mind would become clear once again. He would remember why it was essential that he shield his emotions because, for the life of him, he couldn’t stop the ice around his heart from melting now. Much more of this and he would be as vulnerable as a wingless bird.

Besides that, his thigh wound was throbbing with more pain than he’d experienced since the Battle of Brunanburh, when it had been inflicted. He feared he was doing irreparable harm to his leg, hobbling around on it when the limb needed to be elevated and the scarred skin packed with hot poultices. His sister Rain would flail him alive with angry words if she saw how he’d abused her good work in saving his leg fifteen years earlier.

“Tykir,” Alinor said softly with a little sigh of sympathy.

Sympathy now? Aaarrgh!
He glanced up to see her staring at his thigh, where he was unconsciously kneading it.

Before he had a chance to rebuff her, she swatted his
hand aside, laid his cloak over his lap and began to massage the sore muscles underneath herself. At first he was too shocked at the boldness of the wench. But then he could only melt as her expert ministrations brought blessed relief. It was as if her flexing fingers imparted heat to his tortured flesh.

“You must, indeed, be a witch,” he murmured, but there was admiration, not condemnation, in his voice.

She shrugged and smiled shyly at him.

Shyness? From the boldest wench in all England?
His heart lurched and expanded with a most disarming fullness.

Fortunately, their attention was diverted by the banging of the lawspeaker’s staff on the floor at the head of the room.

“Hear one, hear all,” Styrr the Wise called out in a surprisingly strong voice for one of his age. “Peace be to you, freemen of Trondelag. Come ye to judge your fellows according to the ancient laws laid down by good Norsemen through the ages.”

“Hear! Hear!” the crowd roared.

“Remember our gods and their great esteem for wisdom. Remember how Odin sacrificed one eye to drink from the well of knowledge.”

Many nodded at that reminder of their High-God’s reverence for law and order.

“But I am remiss. Many of you follow the Christian religion, as well. Dost your God-book not say, ‘The tongue of the just is as choice silver’?”

“Amen!” some of the men responded loudly.

“It is the custom that all men differ in opinions. But the goal of all is justice, and in this Thing, justice will prevail.”

A loud clamor of assent rang through the assembly.

“All freemen will have a vote. No army will there be enforcing the decisions of the Thing…not Anlaf’s, nor any other’s. Order depends entirely on the willing acceptance of those in judgment, which will be shown by the
vapnatak,
or weapon clatter.”

Hundreds of men rattled their swords against shields to demonstrate the method by which votes would be cast.

“This, too, I pronounce. The decisions of the Thing shall be final and accepted by one and all, in peace…”

Again, the assembly voiced their agreement with shouts of “Yea!” or yipping yells.

“…unless the need arise for verdict by combat.”

The assent this time was a wild cheer.

Alinor stopped massaging his thigh and snickered. “As if a bloody nose proves anything.”

“Or a dead body,” he added with a grin.

“I hope they don’t expect me to wrestle Anlaf to prove my innocence.” ’Twas her feeble attempt at humor, he supposed.

Damn, but he was developing a fondness for her sharp tongue…and her brave front in the face of what had to be the most frightening ordeal of her life. “Nay, they would expect you to have a champion fighting in your stead.”

He immediately wished he could snatch the words back. Too late! He braced himself for trouble.

Her trembling lips stilled, then spread into a wide smile, just before she slipped her hand in his.

Trouble…I am in big trouble.

Alinor listened carefully as the lawspeaker enumerated all the various crimes and their respective punishments, as dictated by Thing ritual. Adam sat at her side.

Tykir, Rurik and Bolthor had taken their seats in the
half-circle of chieftains. Those of his hird who remained at Anlaf’s court—about seventy men—sat behind them, awaiting the Thing.

Apparently, Things handled a wide variety of disputes: murder, robbery, land ownership, divorce, rape, grazing and hunting rights, even such mundane conflicts as the wooing of bees or collection of firewood.

The lawspeaker would enumerate the punishment for whatever the crime. In some cases, the punishment was death or banishment. Sometimes the punishment involved the “eye for an eye” mentality. For example, the rape of one man’s wife could result in the rape of the rapist’s wife or daughter, or both. Most often, though, elaborate wergilds were levied, involving the payment of silver, wool, cows or other items of equivalent value.

“The wergild in the case of woman-theft demands the payment of bride-money,” the lawspeaker was explaining. “For a farmer’s daughter in prime with a maidenhead, fresh and strong and without blemish, the wergild would be thirty marten skins…and they must be winter pelts with no arrow holes. If the daughter be of a chieftain, however, there would be treble bride money paid, equal to up to ten quarter marks of silver.”

“And what would the wergild be for a Saxon lady?” Alinor asked Adam in an undertone. “A widow, thrice over, who is
past
her prime and
with
blemish, but still fresh and strong.”

“Thrice?” Adam exclaimed, then immediately ducked his head when he saw Tykir frown at them for conversing while the lawspeaker was still speaking. In a lower voice, he informed her, “A widow, even of high station, would bring less than the virgin farmer’s daughter. Unless she carries vast estates, that is.”

Alinor made a snorting sound of disgust. Actually, she
had expected no less. Even her brothers did not place all that much value on her when bartering her in the marriage mart.

“Shhh,” Adam cautioned then.

The lawspeaker was detailing the various punishments that could be levied for witchcraft, and they were gruesome, indeed. Flaying the skin off the back. Death by sword drink. (She assumed that meant a sword through the heart or lungs, which caused blood to gurgle up through the throat.) Skewering the head on a pole.
Nice image, that!
Burning at the stake. Splitting the witch in half at the buttocks to search for the hidden tail. And something called the Spear Death, whereby twenty spears were planted in the ground and the witch was thrown onto the points of the lances, where she would lay till death overcame her, or she succumbed to the pecking of vultures.

“A bloodthirsty bunch, these Norsemen are.” Alinor murmured the words in a jesting way, but inside, she quivered with fright.

Adam patted her hand, and she could have kissed him with thanks.

Finally, it was time for the Thing to hear Alinor’s case.

“What crime has been committed here?” the lawspeaker asked.

“Witchcraft,” Analf answered, “by Lady Alinor of Graycote.”

“Deception. Failure to honor a commission. Betrayal. Theft,” Tykir answered at the same time, “by King Anlaf.”

Anlaf glared at him, and Tykir glared back.

Alinor was not about to sit back and let them do all the accusing. She stood, to the shock of those surrounding her, especially Adam, who was tugging on her gunna, trying to force her back to her seat. She dodged his grasp and
announced her complaints. “Kidnapping. Torture. Starvation. Seasickness. Assault by constant sexual looks. Improper touching.”

Her complaints were met with hoots of laughter and congratulatory shouts directed at Tykir. Tykir, on the other hand, appeared as if he’d swallowed a barrel of
gammelost.

“Improper touching? That is the best type,” one man pronounced, clapping his knee with glee.

“Can you show us how to give a sexual look?” another man made mock of Tykir, the whole time contorting his face into a ridiculous moon-eyed expression.

Adam managed to pull her back to the bench and told her with a short laugh, “Women aren’t supposed to address the Thing, unless given specific permission to do so.”

“Oh, now you tell me! I suppose my outburst will count against me in the voting.”

“I don’t know about that. Laughter is always a good sign.”

“Proceed,” the lawspeaker said, pointing his staff at Anlaf to go first. Easing himself tiredly into a nearby chair, the lawspeaker shook his head slowly from side to side, as if he knew this was going to be an impossible case.

Analf took a pose of arrogance, with wide shoulders thrown back and thumbs looped in his ornate belt, then commenced giving his distorted version of the events at St. Beatrice’s Abbey last year. He claimed that he and his men had merely stopped for food and drink and to rest their horses when the witch had placed her infamous curse on his manparts.

Alinor started to rise again to give the correct version of the encounter, but Adam placed a cautioning hand on her forearm.

“I but wish to tell the truth. The king is lying.”

“You will get your chance later.”

“Why would the woman curse you if you were doing no harm?” asked one burly Viking with gray-streaked black hair and piercing blue eyes.

Anlaf shrugged. “Mayhap she is a man-hater. Or an enemy of all Norsemen, as many Saxons tend to be. Why else would they recite that foolish prayer to their One-God? ‘Oh, Lord, from the fury of the Northmen please protect us.’”

Several men preened, as if engendering fury were a good thing.

“King Anlaf!” Father Caedmon spoke up. “You have taken baptismal vows yourself.”

“That I own,” Anlaf said, waving a hand dismissively. It was obvious his conversion to Christianity was in name only.

Next, Anlaf detailed the affliction he’d sustained as a result of her supposed curse—the notorious crooked manpart. By the time he was done describing the curvature, the horrific pain, the inability to bury his bent sword into the straight sheaths of his wives and mistresses and the blow to his pride, the majority of the men in the great hall were cringing and tutting with commiseration. Alinor, on the other hand, felt like throwing up the meager contents of her breakfast—gruel with a side of gruel.

Then, the men all oohed and aahed on viewing the new—
better than ever, to hear Anlaf tell it
—manpart. Alinor tried not to look, except for a quick peek through her fingers, which she held to her eyes. Her stomach roiled again. “As far as I can see, it’s just an ugly old thing. And purplish, for the love of heaven! Certainly nothing to make such a fuss about.”

Adam was bent over, quaking with silent laughter.

“Excuse me for a moment,” Tykir said and stood abruptly, interrupting Anlaf’s discourse on his remarkable organ, which didn’t please Anlaf very much because he was right in the middle of expounding on something called “staying power,” or was it “staying up power”?

Men took their manparts entirely too seriously, in Alinor’s opinion, and she told Adam so in no uncertain terms, which caused him to sputter with continuing laughter. “Oh, oh, oh…I do not believe this.”

That was just before Tykir stomped—or as close to a stomp as he could manage with his limp—over to their bench, where he snarled in her ear. “Shut your teeth, you foolish wench, or I may not be able to save your head.” To Adam, he just shook his head and muttered, “Fool!”

Before she could ask if, indeed, he intended to save her head, he was stomping/limping back to his judgment seat.

Next Anlaf brought forth his witnesses. His healer, Father Caedmon, a witch expert (though how the old hag gained that expertise was never explained) and finally, three wives and two mistresses, who attested to the severity of his affliction and the pain and deprivation he had suffered, not to mention their own unsatisfied state for many months. That latter was almost laughable to Alinor, but she did not dare show her amusement in the face of the unending glower Tykir sent her way.

Next, Anlaf called on some of Tykir’s men, who reported, reluctantly, on the dead seagulls, the shower of goose dung, the bowel fluxes, crab lice, soured wine, sheep familiars and, worst of all, the potion that almost killed Tykir.

The mouths of some of the hardened Vikings were hanging open with amazement. More than a few looked as if they were barely holding back belly-quaking mirth, at Tykir’s expense.

It was the strangest experience of her life…a wildly preposterous trial in a wild land of wild, wild men. Bolthor was mouthing some words to himself, no doubt composing a new saga, “Tykir the Great and the Wild Thing.”