Page 9 of Kept By the Viking (Forgotten Sons #1)

Jerking the ties free, she bent her head, aware she let the Viking goad her. She shut her eyes and lifted the pouch to her nose, all the better to block out the man beside her. Breathing in the contents tickled her senses.

“This is...soap. It smells of...honey—” her eyes opened wide “—and you.”

A flush spread up her cheeks. She’d caught his scent when he’d lain on top of her. Was it only this morning she’d climbed into his bed box, bartering for safe passage home?

He studied her as if entertained by the talent of her nose. “Very good. The soap was milled with honey.”

“Made by a woman.” She hesitated. “Your wife, perhaps?”

Why did her voice strain over the last word? His answer shouldn’t matter, yet the wait was like holding on to thin threads on a loom.

Hard eyes searched her, the firelight catching the gold tips of Rurik’s brown lashes. “I have no wife.”

She retied the soap pouch and set it down, shaken at her gladness in hearing Rurik was unmarried.

Facing the campfire, a breeze blew strands of hair across her eyes.

The men passed around a flask of wine, laughing and talking.

She didn’t know what to do with this ease sitting amongst Vikings.

Never had she mixed with coarse soldiers, much less pagans.

King Rudolph forbade large numbers of foreign warriors inside the gates of Paris.

Visiting leaders entered with a modest honor guard, their remaining fighters staying on the banks of the Seine by colorful tents.

Those men had gathered around fires, their bold eyes marking her as she studied them from the safety of her litter when crossing the Paris bridge.

Being with the Forgotten Sons broke her comfortable boundaries. The Viking leader knew it. Each time he looked at her was a dare.

“We could go to the river now. I’ll share my soap,” Rurik said in good humor. “I thought you would prefer less light?—”

“Because you will watch me,” she snapped.

“Because I will protect you.” His predator’s gleam was back.

“Watch, protect, possess. It is all the same with you.” She gripped her cloak tightly under her chin. What if it had been Rurik brazenly tracing her exit from Paris?

“I wouldn’t want you hurt before I return you safely to your master.

” His voice was steel and silk. The Viking was dangerous, coming at her again for information.

She had her doubts about the beggar woman cheating him out of three deniers for yarrow.

But the alternative—a fierce Northman showing goodwill to an old beggar? —was too much to grasp.

Resting an arm on his upraised knee, he laughed easily. “You will tell me what I want to know soon enough. How else can I see you safely home?”

“Take me to the gates of Paris. I will find my way from there.”

“And leave you unguarded?” Mocking humor threaded his voice...the predator having fun with his prey.

“I have lived all my life in Paris.” She leaned close, her words rushing together. “The only thing we fear is Vikings not staying on their side of the Epte River.”

“Yet you asked a Viking to save you.”

“It is only because—” She stopped short.

“Because what?” he prompted softly.

Rurik was a wolf circling. Twilight blackened trees behind him, the dark silhouettes a reminder: night was coming.

Though they sat calmly in the grass, threats came at her like unseen arrows from all sides.

She’d almost spilled her secrets. If the Viking knew who she was, it’d be disaster.

She hugged herself and sat back against the rock she shared with him.

Take first. Ask later. It was his way. She would do well to remember that.

“I’m a patient man.” His gaze dropped from her eyes to her mouth. “You will tell me everything. Who you are, why you were at the Saxon’s outpost, and who waits for you in Paris.”

Everything . The word echoed in her mind. He said it confidently, as if women poured out their deepest thoughts to him all the time. Forceful one moment, gentle the next, Rurik of Birka baffled her.

“Then you wait for nothing,” she said, giving him a Gallic shrug.

“I have a feeling someone will pay for your return.”

“Is that what concerns you, Viking? Claiming a reward?” She glared at Rurik, wanting him to deny his lust for gold. “Fine. Take me to the back of my master’s house in Paris. I promise there will be a small reward for my safe return.”

“Such assurance,” he scoffed. “A slave spending her master’s wealth.” His gaze ranged over her hair. “Nor do you look like a woman who labors in the back of anyone’s house.”

“Rurik. Safira.” Gunnar cut in, raising an ampoule of wine. “Want a drink?”

She shook her head. She needed to keep a clear mind. Rurik waved off the wine, gathering the small pouches. In the clean-up, a pouch fell out of his saddle bag. She reached for the untied bag, and pieces of amber tumbled across her palm.

“Stop.” His fist closed fast over her hand.

She tried to pull away, but long fingers held strong. “You don’t want me to see these?”

Fire lit half of Rurik’s face. He was stone-like and mute, unmoving save a tic in his jaw. This was an unexpected turn. For all her goading, she loathed disturbing the beast. Rurik’s snaps and snarls were manageable, even his confusing gentle side. Not this remote silence.

“I think you do not.” Her voice was barely above a whisper.

A lull fell over the camp. The men’s heads turned one by one to her, their scrutiny boring holes in her profile.

She was the outsider, a fact none would let her forget.

The Viking trapped her hand in his grip, the same as he had that morning.

This time, a whisper as old as time warned her, there was wisdom in yielding.

“I cannot give them back, if you do not let go.”

Rurik’s eyes narrowed and his big hand released her. “Take your fill.”

Smooth amber rolled onto her lap. Rurik reordered his leather bag to murmured conversations filling the camp.

Bjorn’s scrutiny bounced between Rurik and her as she held both pieces up to the firelight.

Shades of gold and honeyed-brown shined through polished stones with half-done sketches.

The amber was noteworthy. The artwork was not.

“Pretty. They’d be worth more if they were finished.” She squinted at the half-done image, trying to figure out what the picture was meant to be.

Rurik snatched the stones. “That’s enough.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you. The artwork is fair, but unfinished carvings rarely fetch a good price.”

He dropped the pieces in the bag. “I’ll never sell them.”

“Why not?”

“Because I won’t.” He jammed the pouch in his saddle bag. “Not everything has a price.”

A low laugh escaped her. “Everything and everyone has a price.”

“Spoken like one who knows?”

“Women especially.” Bitterness tinged her words.

If he meant to goad her, it wouldn’t work. She’d long ago accepted a certain truth—a woman, free or slave, was currency.

Rurik’s mouth slanted at her wisdom, and he passed over a hudfat . “As a thrall, you would be familiar with this.”

Her fingers dug into the Viking sleeping fur, the one she would share with him to pay for her passage home.

“Not. Yet,” she said, passing it back.

He laughed at the hudfat dumped in his lap. Her brows knit at a single, vexing fact. Rurik had not forced himself on her. She was as comfortable sitting on the grass with him as she would be sitting at home. Safe. At ease...some of the time. And she’d touched his belongings.

One last pouch lay forgotten on the ground. She picked it up, and the contents moved like tiny pebbles inside. “You left this one in the grass.”

“Aren’t you going to see what’s in it? Tell me if I traded well or not?”

She slipped two fingers into the opening and sniffed. “Peppercorns.”

“Half are worthless. I need to toss out the bad pods.”

“You cook? This I would want to see.”

His crooked smile made him boyish. “As a last measure if no one else can. Erik is the best with food.”

Her spine rested against the rock. “You are unusual for a leader of warriors. Your word is final, yet you serve your men as if you all stand equal.”

If he answered, she didn’t hear him. She upended the pouch, drawn to the shriveled pods in her palm.

Half were red and the other half were black peppercorns, all worth their weight in gold.

A spiced lemon aroma wafted from the red-brown pieces.

No. Those red pods were worth more than their weight in gold.

“You traded well, Viking.” Hand under her nose, she breathed in the spices. “Red peppercorns. They are tantalizing, no?”

“They’re rotten. I should’ve dumped them long ago.”

She gasped. “These are not rotten.”

“Peppercorns should be black. Those pods are obviously bad.”

“No!” Her fist curled protectively over the uncracked spices. “You must listen to me. Red peppercorns are?—”

“Rurik,” Erik’s voice rose in the camp. “Take a look. Our provisions.”

The dark-haired Viking upended a leather bag. A lumpy apple bounced past her feet. Blackened beets and slimy, worm-covered meat tumbled after it.

Thorvald picked up molded bread, his face twisting. “The Saxon wench gave us bad food.”

Erik emptied the second bag. Mashed berries, gouged spring plums, and rotten cheese dropped onto the grass, bringing an awful, pungent odor. Thorvald kicked a bad onion into the fire. “Sothram’s wife got revenge on us after all.”

“We could ride back,” Erik suggested. “Get fresh provisions...and then we burn Sothram’s hall to the ground.”

Safira hugged herself, warding off an unholy shiver. Murmurs of agreement circled the camp. This was how they lived. Violence and vengeance were their watchwords.

Rurik shook his head. “We’ve made too much ground. We need to reach Rouen by the first of Midsumarblot.”

“A point you have made often, but we need food.” Bjorn took measure of Rurik, his mouth a firm line. “Revenge on the Saxon makes sense.”

Rurik rose to full height. “So does getting to Rouen. The ermine will fetch the best price on the first day of the feast.”