Page 32 of Her Viking Warrior (Forgotten Sons #2)

Chapter

Eighteen

T he hall was nearly empty. Lady Gerda was gone but Frida and two young maids scrubbed sand across tables.

Slender ankles showed under Frida’s forest green hems trimmed with yellow stitching.

Silver earrings danced from pretty earlobes visible because ivory combs held loops of hair at her nape.

He’d seen Odell’s younger daughter, but this was the first time he noticed her.

Plump breasts strained her bodice. Soft skin and clean fingernails graced her hands. No scars, no cuts from striving on behalf of others.

Frida straightened and smoothed her apron like a woman who knew she’d been watched. Her hands splayed as Ilsa’s often did, regal and high-born, but the comparison ended there. Her smile was bold but inexperienced. Her cheeks were round with youth but not the bloom of ripe womanhood.

Life had not tested the contents of her heart.

“Bjorn.” Her voice was fluid and pretty, and utterly lacking the smoky purr his ears had come to crave.

“Lady.” His footsteps stalled by the firepit.

Did Frida know about the thralls her sister hid?

He searched the younger woman’s face. Her smile was…empty, and her willful nature was more petulant than bold. Frida would not defy her mother and father. Not like Ilsa.

Frida touched an earthen pitcher left on the table. “Would you like to sit with me and share some ale?”

His brothers sat in the shadowed half of the hall.

Erik was sliding a whetstone down the length of his sword.

Gunnar and Thorvald were polishing axe heads to a shine worthy of glass.

Thorfinn was gone because he led the first watch.

Near the jarl’s seat, Helge fussed with pelts.

He should drink ale with a pretty, willing woman and not care about one haughty huntress.

To do anything else was kicking a hornet’s nest.

Frida followed his sight line to the jarl’s seat and back. “I could serve you in the jarl’s seat. You could test the chair, and see if you like it.”

Fire’s light touched calculating spring-green eyes.

“Nothing would displease me more,” he said.

“You’ve no taste for power?” Her brows arched. “You are rare among men.”

He warmed his hands over the fire, a low laugh rumbling. “Another woman said the same thing.”

“My sister?”

“Does it matter?”

“It does if you hope for her attentions.”

Frida’s attention was on his arms stretched over the fire. Muscles strained his sleeves. Bulk earned from fighting, building, living hard. Women could be funny about such things.

Her gaze was liquid and sensual above the flames. “Ilsa has vowed that she’ll never marry again. Even if she did hope to marry, no jarl would want her.”

Spoken like a jealous sister. Fingers splayed over the fire, he came to Ilsa’s defense.

“Your sister is a beautiful woman. High-born and wise. Jarl’s will want her.”

“She’s barren”

He ’d assumed as much but never pried. Frida sauntered around the fire pit, her hems swaying and provocative.

“You didn’t know?” she asked. The maid was at his side, a pitying smile on her face. “I thought you might’ve guessed.” She was stroking a line on his arm. Up and down. Up and down. “Ten years married, yet no children. It caused no end of trouble between her and Halfdan.”

“Trouble that belonged to them, I’m sure. Not a nosy sister telling tales she has no business repeating.”

Frida jerked back as though scalded. “I—I…”

“Rest your conniving mind. I’m not looking for a wife. Or a jarl’s seat.” Head shaking, he added, “You’re a pretty one, Frida, but a spiteful tongue makes you ugly.”

“How dare you!”

“I dare because you needed to hear it.” He started to turn, then stopped. “Here’s some advice. Treat your sister well. If not out of love, then do it out of loyalty because the day will come when you’ll need each other.”

Frida gaped at him like a caught fish, stunned at his rebuke. Odell and his scheming household . If it hadn’t been clear that Bjorn didn’t want the jarl’s seat, the message would certainly ring loud now.

He strode out of the hall into the jarl’s private rooms. A stripling youth guarded the entrance to Egil’s chamber; the orphan Bodolf had taken into his care.

Soapstone lamps showed red-gold whiskers sprouting off his chin.

He couldn’t have been more than fourteen years, close to Gunnar’s age when they’d left Birka.

“Step aside,” Bjorn said. “I need to see the jarl.”

“He is asleep.” The boy’s voice cracked. “He cannot be disturbed.”

“Except when there’s trouble.”

The boy’s blue eyes rounded. “I didn’t hear the lur horn.”

“This is different trouble. Go rouse Bodolf and bring him here.”

The boy’s Adam’s apple bobbled in his skinny neck. “Bodolf told me I can’t leave until I’m relieved at sunrise. Not even to take a piss.”

He couldn’t help but grin. “Bodolf taught me the same lesson when I was a boy. Stay true to your watch. Never leave. Listen to his wisdom and you’ll make a fine warrior.”

“But you want me to make an exception.” Frowning, the boy was mulish. “I won’t do it.”

He sighed and cupped the boy’s shoulder. “You don’t know me?—”

“I know who you are. You’re Jarl Egil’s hrisungr .”

“I’m also his hersir. ”

The boy shrugged off Bjorn’s hand. “Only ‘til Jul , which means you have limited authority. It also means whoever shows bravery in the coming battles could win the jarl’s seat.”

“Ambition is good,” he said, amused. “You’re showing your worth. Now prove to me how quickly you can rouse Bodolf for a council meeting with me and the jarl.”

Ruddy brows thundered over youthful eyes. Bjorn’s patience was running thin. He added iron to his warning, “Don’t make me pick you up and set you aside.”

“I’ll go,” he mumbled, scowling as he stepped aside.

The boy jogged through the feast hall, his feet slapping the ground with sloppy footfalls.

Was he just as stubborn and awkward at that age?

Possibly. Except, he’d been dodging Birka’s drunken warriors who’d tried to pound their fists into his head.

Those bored men had had nothing better to do than go whoring or harass the settlement’s fatherless boys for sport.

The red-haired boy lived under Bodolf’s care and would soon have his chance to prove himself.

Battle’s forge had a way of separating gold from dross.

A test of combat was one matter. Courage of the heart was another.

He stared at the door’s wood grain, a fist raised to pound on it. Bile ate his belly. The iron coil twisting inside was hard and unforgiving. He had no room for tender emotions—especially a son’s love for his father.

Inches from the door, and he couldn’t move.

Was Ilsa right? Was he a coward?

Tightening his fist, he had to do something. Strength welled up and he knocked. When he did, he couldn’t be sure what he wanted more—the truth about Ilsa or for his father to acknowledge him.

A sleepy voice called from within, “Enter.”

The wily huntress… Ilsa goaded me into this.

Grabbing a soapstone lamp off a shelf, he pushed open the door and walked into his father’s sleeping chamber. Bear pelts hushed his footfalls. Furs were everywhere. A shocked Egil pushed himself upright in a bed strewn with red, yellow, and blue stitched blankets.

Bjorn lit two bowl lamps suspended from the ceiling and dragged a chair to the bedside.

A brown wool tunic tented the jarl’s once-powerful frame.

Red-rimmed ice-blue eyes burned above pallid cheeks.

The old Viking’s breath rasped oddly. Bjorn rested his hands on his thighs and faced facts. Egil would soon sup in Valhalla.

The smallest crack broke inside him. He stiffened, fighting it.

Proud Egil faced his equally proud son. Tension was gathering, enough to make Bjorn’s ears ring. Neither was giving an inch.

Flames cast dancing shadows on the walls. Bjorn was stony. Egil sighed and his great paws fretted with the blanket before he pulled a pelt over his legs. His father’s fragility, it was enough. Bjorn shifted on the chair, the crack splitting wider through his heart.

“What brings you in here?” Egil asked. “I’m sure it’s not to stare at me.”

Had he been staring long?

“It’s Ilsa.” Spare words, but they were all he could manage.

His father’s brows shot to his hairline. “You are long past needing my advice on the fair sex.”

They shared weak smiles over that.

“I’m not seeking fatherly wisdom,” he said dryly.

“Good. Because I don’t have any to give.” He looked Bjorn up and down, adding gruffly, “What I do have, you don’t want anyway.”

Bear-paw hands, the knuckles scarred, rested on the fur. Egil wasn’t giving up on his treasured Vellefold. That much was clear. Blunt and sturdy, that was the father he remembered. Seeing those qualities alive and well after all this time battered him.

His heart howled Want me! for a second time in one night.

“You’re the same. Vellefold first, as always,” he said bitterly. “At least you’re clear on what’s important to you.”

The old man’s face pinched white.

“It’s what a leader does. He makes the hard decisions. Even—even the decisions that hurt the most.” A wet, raspy cough followed.

Egil coughed and coughed into his balled fist. The bed shook and strands of unkempt hair fell over the old man’s cheeks.

Bjorn’s vision narrowed. He almost felt pity for the old man, hiding behind his jarldom.

The coughing done, Egil flopped back against his pillows. “A smart leader knows when he’s erred.” His watery eyes were half shut. “If I were a smart leader, I would’ve kept you by my side.”

Bjorn dug the heels of his hands into his thighs. Shock coursed his veins. Fenrir, the wolf of lore, could be roaring, shaking the world, splitting mountains. Such was the quake within Bjorn.

Yet, all was still in the chamber. Soapstone lamps flickered dimly. And father and son waited, wary.

Deep lines furrowed on Egil’s brow. In them were stories of love and mourning and regret.

“Have you come to gloat? Or get revenge?” Egil’s weary stare met Bjorn’s. “I suppose I deserve it.”