Page 36 of Kept By the Viking (Forgotten Sons #1)

Bloodshot eyes widened. The blade he chewed twitched faster.

Sharp. Controlled. These were Erik of Birka’s watchwords.

She’d seen it in the precise fire rings he made, the routines when he cooked for his band of brothers, and the darker, violent edge that haunted him.

Of all the Sons, life had been harshest to dark-haired Erik.

She felt it in her bones...his near black eyes flashing like a wounded creature in rare moments, a primal beast in others.

“Change troubles you,” she said quietly. “More than the others, I think. But I do not fault you for that. Of all the Forgotten Sons, I’d say you value loyalty the most. You are their fiercest defender.”

His head cocked. “What makes you say that?”

“The night we camped near Abbod village. You were the first to question me about the spice trade and to doubt my learning Norse in a kitchen.”

“That makes me smart. Not loyal.”

She stepped into the open road, her face basking in the sun.

Pleasant noises of Rouen’s market carried on a breeze.

Laughter and conversation. She needed this to ease the tense ribbon inside her from Rurik’s leaving.

And she liked the Forgotten Sons, each one talented in his own right.

Knowing them was a key to knowing Rurik.

Eyes closed, she felt sunshine pour over her. “Tell me. When you learned Rurik came here to claim a holding, who was the first of the Sons to say he’d stay with Rurik? Was it you?”

“It was.”

Open-eyed, she faced Erik, fighting to contain her smile.

The dark-haired Viking fought a smile too. “Don’t let that go to your head.”

She laughed loud, startling two boys passing them with a herd of goats. Three giggling girls ran barefoot between the jarl’s hall and the weaver’s shed where Astrid’s voice carried from open doors.

“I would guess Bjorn was next and the others followed,” she said, quite pleased with herself.

Erik’s grin was grudging. “I’ll have to watch my step around you.” He tossed aside the blade of grass and notched his head at the village below. “I have to see the blacksmith about a hinge for Wandrille Abbey’s door. Why don’t you walk with me and tell me about these insights of yours?”

She spun around, her plain skirt flaring around her legs.

They walked to the village, the smell of charred wood heavy in the air.

Flames licked two blackened boats sinking in the Seine.

The people of Rouen must’ve cut free the jarl’s boats and let the river claim them.

It was the only way to save the other boats moored nearby.

Erik tucked both hands behind his back. “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“Your insights. What are they?” he asked.

They walked along the river lane, passing a matron haggling over a glass bead necklace.

The woman in the stall had to be the glassmaker Astrid spoke of.

She was pretty, a breeze teasing her butter-blonde hair.

Her cornflower-blue gaze snagged with Erik’s.

His step hitched, and Safira smiled behind her fingers.

Rouen might prove to have treasures for each Forgotten Son.

“Do you want to know what I think of all the Sons? Or just you?” Safira stopped to examine an ivory comb at the next stall.

“Start with me.” Jet-black eyes searched her.

Loneliness. Isolation. Bleak, poisonous rage lurked in their depths.

She set the comb down. He deserved her full attention. “I think you are an artist forced to live by the sword. You have a keen mind and a deeply wounded soul...if Vikings even believe in a soul.”

“We don’t. We believe a man or woman is born with luck.”

Nodding quietly, she digested his words. “I believe you are the most savage of all the Sons.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’re not a seeress, but you read people well. I’ll give you that.” He grimaced at noisy matrons gathering and tipped his head at the road. “Where did you learn this skill?”

Tucking her hands behind her back, she matched Erik’s meander. “Savta. My grandmother. She taught me about knowing the goods and the people who wish to buy them.”

“Your grandmother is a spice trader?” He was fishing for the truth about her. The dark-eyed son had likely sewed together bits of conversations past.

She stared at the toes of her boots as they walked. Rurik had warned her to keep quiet about this. To admit she was the daughter of a spice merchant was all but giving up her identity. Did Rurik count Erik as dangerous?

“No,” she said. “My father is.”

There. The truth was out, and she was sure Erik would guard it well.

Erik’s gaze cut sideways. “A spice merchant’s daughter. It’s a far step down to be companion to a Viking.”

Ivar’s forge was in the distance. The blacksmith pulled a flaming sword from hot coals. He doused it in a barrel with a searing hiss of vapors spiraling around his bulk.

“You soften the blow for me, Erik. Don’t you mean fylgikonur ?”

“Rurik taught you a new Viking word.” Erik’s graveled voice hinted at no emotion.

He stopped ten paces from the blacksmith’s forge, the harsh mask he usually wore fading. Hair cut short and eyes blacker than night, Erik stood out amongst Vikings. More viper than wolf, his past was a tight-fisted secret. She knew it in her bones.

Erik untied a leather purse knotted to his belt. “Put out your hand.”

She did, and he dropped coins into her palm. “What goes on between you and Rurik is for the two of you to decide. But—” his dark eyes pierced her “—I know he can be...single-minded in going after something he wants.”

Her skin pebbled. Last night with Rurik. Being the focus of his single-mindedness wasn’t at all bad. In the glare of daylight, it wasn’t all good either.

“What are you saying to me?”

“I’m saying if you want to leave, I won’t stand in your way.” Erik retied the pouch. “I ask only that you wait for Rurik’s return before you make your decision.”

That was all the help she’d get from Erik. His veiled words were a boon. Much more than she expected. The money was too. Sunlight shined on coins from Hedeby, Wessex, and Paris.

“You’re giving me money to escape?”

Erik smiled, a show of warmth that curved nicely at the corners of his mouth. “I would never do that. Rurik asked me to give you coin to spend in the market. Never said how much.”

Her hand closed over the shiny pieces. She didn’t own a leather purse in which to hold them.

“The day is yours to do as you see fit,” he said. “I’m off to see Ivar about a new hinge.”

“You do not require me at your side?”

“Stay within eyesight of me. You’ll be safe.” With a curt nod, Erik turned and hailed the blacksmith.

The sun beat down on her head, less cheery than before.

Could the truth be any plainer? What went on with Rurik was no different than what went on at home.

Someone else dictated her coming and going.

Here in Rouen, Rurik controlled the purse strings.

At home, it was her mother. Here Rurik had a say in her status.

At home, such details were negotiated by her mother.

When they journeyed to Rouen, she’d felt free.

Wandering through the market, a fist full of coins, she was no less free today.

“Did you tire of smoothing the wrinkles from Rurik’s tunic?”

Her head snapped up. Vlad lounged against the side of a fur trader’s stall. A bear pelt with jaws splayed wide hung over his head. How fitting. Vlad’s mouth split with what he surely counted as a smile. It gave her awful shivers.

“I am waiting for the glass smoother to heat up.”

He bit into a pear, the juice spraying his beard. He chewed the fruit slowly. Facing him was like seeing a cruel, future version of Rurik...if he followed his father’s path. Both were low-born Vikings. Both led a small band of men. Both sought fame, vying for a higher place in life.

“I’m surprised you know what a glass smoother is.” Vlad’s stare moseyed over her from head to hem. “I’m equally surprised to find a highborn woman tending to my son’s needs.”

A hot roil sickened her belly. “I must be on my way.”

She darted across the road and stopped at the first stall. The comb seller. Safira squeezed the coins in hand, the metal edges biting her skin. The young woman minding the stall conversed with a matron shepherding a gaggle of children.

A pear core rolled past her hem.

Vlad was a shadow at her back. “You’re not losing me that easily.” His voice was a husky version of Rurik’s.

A hand closed over her elbow. Fingers pinched her, intent on keeping her in place. She checked the blacksmith’s forge. She should’ve gone straight to Erik’s side. Vlad’s gaze flicked to the dark-haired warrior deep in conversation with Ivar over a newly crafted sword.

“If Erik looks this way, you will smile and give him a reassuring nod.”

She tried to jerk her arm away, but his grip was firm. “What do you want?”

“What do I want?” he mused. “Land. Wealth. To feast in Valhalla as a famed warrior.” His attempt humor sounded like a dry rasp. “Not much, really.”

He guided her to the river, his steps deceptively casual.

His profile was a rigid line against blue sky.

This close, she’d put his age somewhere in the middle of his fourth decade.

If Rurik was nearing thirty, the father had to have had the son at a young age.

Sixteen? Or seventeen? He wore his grey-streaked blond hair like the jarl’s, a single thick band four fingers wide, a braid starting above his forehead and trailing down his skull to his back.

Sun shined on the side of his freshly shaved head.

Children scampered by, their wooden swords clacking in mock battle. Vlad’s hooded stare followed them.

“Rurik practiced with a real sword.”

“You gave him his sword?”

Vlad squinted at the river, releasing his hold on her. “No. He used mine. Until he raised it against me.”

“He was eleven.”

“My son told you the story?”