Viking Heat (21 page)
Authors: Sandra Hill
When Brandr reentered the kitchen, he almost turned on his heel and went back to his other nightmare. Instead, he girded his loins and went forth.
Kelda was lying facedown on the kitchen table, gunna thrown up to her shoulders, and her big bare arse exposed. A big, bare arse that was turning black and blue. It was not a pretty sight. Examining said arse was Folki, the closest they had to a healer at Bear’s Lair. Folki, over seventy years if he was a day, had not been this close to a female arse in many a year, and was no doubt getting great pleasure from his prodding and poking.
Once Kelda saw Brandr, she began to wail. “Oh, Master, I hurt so bad. I must take to me pallet, mayhap with a cup or two of ale fer the pain. But who will do the cookin’?”
“Do not be worrying about that, Kelda. I will find someone to take your place.” At worry on her old face, he added, “Just ’til you are better.”
He watched grimly as Folki and one of the housecarls, both of them grinning, helped her to her feet and out into the hall where her bed closet was located. She would be deeply into the alehead afore noon.
Once they were gone, he surveyed the kitchen. “What a mess!” Then he looked at the bloody pieces of chicken still on the table and at the cauldron that Kelda had filled using her unwashed hands. The boiling would probably kill any “bugs” she might have transmitted, as it would any bug he had ever seen. But he, having no taste for insects, dead or alive, would not bepartaking of it tonight.
Something needed to be done to correct this mess. He glanced around the kitchen at all the expectant faces. “Who wants to be the cook?”
“Not me, not me, not me,” one and all said.
“Where is Arnora?” he asked. Arnora was the mother of his oldest brother Vidar, who had died during the Sigurdsson assault. Although having seen more than fifty winters, she handled household matters at Bear’s Lair. Poorly, but who was he to complain?
When Arnora arrived—reluctantly, he noted—he asked, “Can you take over the cooking duties for a while?”
“I heard what the thrall said about the kitchen . . .
and
about the way I keep the great hall so unclean. Let her do it.” With that, Arnora swanned out.
and
about the way I keep the great hall so unclean. Let her do it.” With that, Arnora swanned out.
Grunting his disgust, he turned to the closed door of the storage room. Could his life get any worse than this?
It was an offer she couldn’t refuse . . .Joy tried to hide it from him, but he could see that she had been crying when he stomped back into the storage room in the same angry manner in which he had left.
“Are you hurt?” he asked gruffly. “Not that you don’t deserve it.”
“Thanks a bunch for your sympathy. I’m hurt, all right, but most of the pain isn’t physical.”
Huh? That sounded like the usual woman trap of words, and he wasn’t about to be caught that way. “What are you blubbering about, thrall? My life is the one going down the privy.”
“One bright light in my dismal day.”
“Sarcasm ill-suits you, wench, and does not to help your thrall status.”
“Thrall, thrall, thrall! We’re back to that nonsense, are we?”
“We never left.”
“Then you’re a liar, because . . .”
“You dare . . . you
dare
to give insult when I hold your life in my hands!”
dare
to give insult when I hold your life in my hands!”
“You hold more than my life in your hands, if you only knew.”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
“First you will apologize to Kelda. She has taken to her bed, so great is her pain.”
“Apologize to that lazy slug? Hah! She was just looking for an excuse to get out of work.”
“Kelda has worked for me for many a year. She has proven her trustworthiness. Unlike some—”
“What a pity! I could mark those years in the grime built up on your tables, like rings on a tree.”
It is not really that bad. Is it?
“You will apologize.”
“You will apologize.”
“Will you have her apologize to me, too? After all, she threatened to cut out my tongue and stick it in my vagina and make me a boy.”
At first Brandr was startled.
Can she possibly mean . . . ?
He put a hand over his mouth so that she could not see his grin.
Can she possibly mean . . . ?
He put a hand over his mouth so that she could not see his grin.
But she saw. “It’s not funny. I don’t want to be the first sex change operation in history performed without an anesthetic. In fact, I’m happy with my present gender, thank you very much.”
“Sex change? What is that? Oh, please! Do not tell me that people change their sexes where you come from.”
“It’s called transgender surgery.”
The woman is a bloody font of wisdom on every subject in the world! She has a word for everything!
Even though she had to be jesting, he would have liked to ask her more. Later. For now, he had more important issues to resolve. “You and Kelda will both apologize.”
Even though she had to be jesting, he would have liked to ask her more. Later. For now, he had more important issues to resolve. “You and Kelda will both apologize.”
“Only if she goes first.”
He rolled his eyes.
’Tis like talking to a stone wall.
’Tis like talking to a stone wall.
“I’m going to need stitches for this cut.”
“Let me see.” He stepped forward, and even though she flinched at his closeness, she let him look.
“You smell.”
“Of course, I am aromatic. I have been sweating like a warhorse.”
“In that freezing cold?”
He shrugged.
Next she will say that her soldiers only work on sunny days.
“I must needs work myself and my men beyond their limits, lest we be unprepared next time there is an attack.”
Next she will say that her soldiers only work on sunny days.
“I must needs work myself and my men beyond their limits, lest we be unprepared next time there is an attack.”
“You expect another attack? I thought the Sigurdssons were wiped out.”
“There is always another enemy.” He looked her in the eye pointedly.
“Me?” she squawked. “If you’d let me explain—”
He put up a halting hand. “The time for words is long gone.” He shoved her face to the side, roughly, and lifted her hair. “The cut is not so bad, but it is deep. Yea, a few stitches would not go amiss. I will call for one of the seamstresses.”
“Oh, no! You’re the one who did it. You’re the one who will sew it up.”
“My hands are too big.”
“Lots of surgeons have big hands.”
“You would trust me with a knife near you again?”
“Yes, I trust you.”
“Why do you not say that about other things?”
Like swiving.
Like swiving.
“Dream on, big boy. It’s not going to happen now.”
“
It
will happen if I want it to.”
And I do.
It
will happen if I want it to.”
And I do.
“You lost your big chance when you attacked me with a knife.”
“I did not attack you. I merely removed your . . . weaponry.”
It was her turn to roll her eyes.
A short time later she was lying belly down on the table again, and Brandr was sewing up the wound, cursing under his breath, just as he had been cursing aloud at her demand that he wash his hands and the thread, and purify the needle over a candle flame.
“Have I told you that you have new duties?” he asked as casually as he was able.
“What duties?” Her body went rigid with apprehension, as it well should.
“You will be the new cook.”
“What?” She jerked, causing his hands to falter and the needle to jab her hard. Once she calmed down and he explained that she must take over until the cook was back on her feet, she asked, “What about Liv? I thought helping her was my job.”
“You will do both.” He finished stitching her cut and smacked her on the arse to indicate he was done.
“Brute!” she said, rubbing her bottom as she sat upright. “How do you figure I can do both?”
“I do not know. Bring her down to the kitchen with you. Work without sleep. Just do as I say.”
Instead of being affronted at that idea, Joy tapped her fingertips on the tabletop, deep in thought. “It would do Liv good to be among other people, friendly people, even if she doesn’t talk. Okay.”
“O-kay?”
“That means yes. I’ll do it.”
“Gods help me,” Brandr muttered as he left the storage room and made for the outdoors once again. In the mood he was in, he would soon be knocking a few Viking heads together. Hopefully, someone would knock his, too.
Chapter 13
It was a daunting task, and Joy didn’t know if she’d be able to pull it off, but for some reason she wanted to prove herself to Brandr.
Thus, Joy started by convincing Liv to come down to the kitchen with her, promising that all she would have to do was sit in a corner and watch. As a further enhancement, she promised Liv that she could take one of the puppies for her own pet, give it a name, even bring it up to her own bedroom if she would be responsible for its care, including cleaning up its messes. Liv picked the smallest of the litter, a skinny black dog with oversized white paws, which probably indicated it would eventually grow to the size of a small horse. She called it Fenrir after the son of the jester god Loki and a giantess named Angrbode.
Luckily, after their initial surprise, the kitchen staff ignored her as she played with her newfound pet. But then the old lady, Gran Olssen, crooked her fingers at Liv, inviting her to come sit by her. Liv’s eyes lit up at the sight of Gran Olssen. Apparently it was someone she had known in the pre-Sigurdsson days.
Lining everyone up, Joy examined their hands. “Okay, first thing we’re going to do is scrub our hands with soap and water. Those with long fingernails will trim them. Those with dirt under their fingernails will scrape it out. In the future, at all times, there will be clean water, soap, and drying cloths over on that bench. Anyone going to the privy must wash their hands afterward. Is that clear?”
“Every time?” the bread-making girl, who identified herself as Helgi, asked.
“Every time. Also, after handling meat, especially poultry. Now, first things first: we’re going to clean the cauldron and the kitchen table. Scrubbing won’t work on the table at this point, so I’ll need boiling water poured on it and then I’ll scrape a couple inches off the top with a sharp knife.”
Everyone was staring at her as if she was crazy.
To Brokk and Gandolf, the twin boys, she said, “Take that pot outside and dump the contents.”
“Nay!” Gran Olssen exclaimed. “Ye cannot waste good food.” At the expression on Joy’s face, she quickly added, “We have been eating Kelda’s broth for years. It will not kill us just this once more.”
“Okay, everyone gets a bowl of slop . . . uh, soup for an early lunch. In fact, two or three, if you want. Tell the others, too.”
Before she knew it, there were several dozen servants and a few of the soldiers who’d wandered in slurping up Kelda’s slop. Meanwhile, she used a sharp knife to begin working on the table.
When the cauldron was empty and scraped clean, thanks to a rasp she borrowed from Osmund, she started the world’s biggest pot of chicken noodle soup. With five chickens bubbling away and carrots, celery, and onions chopped, by Liv, no less—her puppy asleep at her feet—and ready to be added to the broth once the birds were cooked thoroughly and deboned, she asked Helgi, who had finished baking the day’s bread, if she knew how to make noodles. While Helgi followed her grandmother’s simple recipe of flour, eggs, and water, Joy told them all how, where she came from, chicken soup was considered the be-all and end-all cure for colds and other ailments. They just gawked at her. The dough was soon rolled out and drying, to be cut into thin strips.
There were no potatoes, but she managed to commandeer Ebba, Osmund’s wife, when she made the mistake of wandering into the kitchen, to begin peeling a huge pile of turnips, some of which she would cut into cubes and toss into the soup for a potato substitute, but most of which she intended to boil, then mash with butter. That should go well with the venison, which was already done and waiting to be sliced.
Gran Olssen was sticking a dozen defeathered and degutted fat pigeons onto the now-empty spit. How she’d managed to pluck and gut those little guys was amazing to Joy. The dead duck, stuffed with an odd combination of chestnuts and dried berries, was wrapped in wet leaves and put into the hot coals.
It would be a bare-bones meal tonight in terms of variety, but Joy was aiming for quality, not quantity. If she had time, she was going to try to make a bunch of apple dumplings, her grandmother’s recipe again, although she would have to substitute honey for sugar. Covered with fresh cream, the substitution shouldn’t matter.
Joy was working so hard that at first she didn’t notice the silence around her. She did a double take at the tall, imposing woman standing in the doorway. Her blonde hair, liberally mixed with gray, was braided tightly and pinned into a coronet atop her head. Her attire was the usual open-sided apron, except it had gold trim on the edges, over a robe of finest blue wool. Gold earrings dangled from chains looped over both ears, and another chain ran from one museum-quality shoulder brooch to the other, from one of which hung a ring of keys. She must be the chatelaine, or whatever they called it back then.
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