Page 14 of Viking in Love
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
H ide-and-go-seek, medieval style…
Women! Who could figure them out? Their minds were like mazes designed to confuse the average man.
It was after midnight. Where could she have disappeared to? And why, for God’s sake? All he had done was spell out exactly what they both knew already.
After she had slammed the bedchamber door on him, he had pulled on a pair of breeches and rushed after her. But she had not gone to her bedchamber. Nor to the kitchens or even out on the ramparts. Well, he was done chasing her. When she had settled down and become biddable, he would talk some sense into her.
For now, he had to do something about all that honey still covering his cock and seeping through the wool of his breeches. He was standing in front of the washstand, using a cloth dipped in the cold water from the pitcher and bowl. And wasn’t that a shock to his overheated enthusiasm?
There was a soft knock on the door.
“Come in,” he said, relieved that she had come back, despite his rancor over her behavior.
But it was not Breanne. It was Geoff.
“What are you doing here?”
“Greetings to you, too, Caedmon.”
“What are you doing here this time of night? What has happened?”
“We just got word at Heatherby that Dunstan and his entourage are overnighting at St. George’s monastery and will arrive in the morn.”
“Arrive where? Heatherby? Or Larkspur?” Bloody damn hell! What next?
Geoff shrugged. “Methinks he will visit both Larkspur and Heatherby, but I am not sure which will come first.”
“How many in his company?”
“Two dozen, more or less.”
“That is all I need.” He was scrubbing at his genitals with vigor.
“What in the name of St. Cuthbert are you doing?”
“Washing the honey off my cock.” He winced at the coldness of the water.
“Dare I ask why you have honey on your cock?”
“You may ask, but I will not answer.”
“If you are able to lick your own cock, I am going to be very upset.”
“Why?”
“Because I always wanted to do that.”
Caedmon laughed, despite the seriousness of the impending situation.
Geoff sat down on the edge of the bed, then immediately shot back up. Wiping a hand across his arse, he said, “There is honey on your bed linens.”
As if he did not already know that!
“I saw Lady Breanne on my way up here.”
I hope you tripped her. “Oh? What is she doing up at this time of night? Building a new Roman wall?”
“Going to the bathing house. Come to think on it, she smelled like honey, too.” Geoff glanced from Caedmon’s honey-coated cock to the bed, then back to Caedmon’s heated face. “Please tell me you have not been swiving a princess.”
Only about twenty times. “And if I was?”
“That, my friend, is a sure path to matrimony.”
“Not with us. We have an agreement.” Or we HAD an agreement.
Geoff arched his brows.
He declined to answer. Finally clean, he tossed the rag in the bowl of dirty water and pulled up his breeches. “Let us go find some ale.”
Geoff nodded. “Ale would be welcome, but I must needs return tonight. I just wanted you to have fair warning. Be prepared.”
Once they were seated at the back of his great hall, where most everyone was asleep on benches and in bed closets, he turned to his friend, “How are the two princesses doing?”
Geoff rolled his eyes. “They have become great friends with Sybil, and the three of them are turning the estate upside down in plans for the marriage ceremony and feast.”
“I have not heard from Wulf. Have you?”
Geoff shook his head. “But then, I did not expect to. You know how Wulf is when on a mission.”
“I can only assume that no news is good news. Are you not fearful that Dunstan may put a stop to your wedding?”
“We held a handfast ritual as a safeguard, and, of course, consummated the union.” He grinned at him to show it had been a satisfying consummation. “But just in case, I should be there when they arrive.”
The first thing Caedmon did after seeing Geoff off, promising he would come for his wedding, was to wake Henry. “Take fifty of the hirdsmen and patrol the northern borders. In fact, erect some temporary quarters for them there. And do not return until you have word from me that it is safe.”
Henry did not need to be told that Dunstan would take one look at the hundred and twenty-five and more soldiers residing here and force a goodly number of them to return with him to Winchester to join the royal troops.
“I will be out shortly to see them off.”
Henry scurried off. He might be old, but he knew what to do in an emergency, without any fuss and bother.
Gerard must have been alerted by the sudden activity and was pulling up his breeches as Caedmon approached. “What is amiss, m’lord?”
Caedmon explained briefly and said, “We will need to make provision for sleeping quarters for the archbishop and of any nobility traveling with them, in the event they stay overnight, God forbid! Henry will take care of the guardsmen who accompany him. Make sure there are clean bed linens. Including mine.
“Also, check to see what shape the chapel is in. I will send out huntsmen for more game, and fishermen for fresh fish.”
“What about the children?”
Caedmon pondered the problem of ten children, mostly illegitimate, running about under the priest’s judgmental nose. “Lady Breanne will take care of them.”
Gerard raised his bushy eyebrows.
“I will leave it to you to make that chore known to her. Mayhap you could teach her that whistling trick.”
After that, Caedmon went searching for Amicia. Finally, he found her in one of the bed closets with Dafydd, the Welsh stable hand. It was a sight he would not want to see ever again. Amicia was as tall as he was, and some might say just as muscular. Dafydd came about chest high on both of them and gave proof that the size of the boot had naught to do with the size of the cock, by huffing and puffing like a stallion as he plowed a squealing Amicia good and well.
Caedmon turned his back until they were done. Then he told Amicia, “Come. You have much work to do. Archbishop Dunstan and his group are on their way.”
With no embarrassment at all, Amicia stood and adjusted her gown. Dafydd was splatted out on his back, already half asleep.
Caedmon nudged him with his boot.
“Wh-what?” Dafydd sat up.
“Two dozen of the king’s men, including Archbishop Dunstan, will be here on the morrow. Make sure there is enough feed in the stables and that the stalls are mucked out.”
Grumbling something about bothersome holy men, Dafydd rose and tugged up his breeches, which had been bunched at his ankles. Before he stomped off, he gave Amicia a lustsome wink.
Now that she had tasted Dafydd’s “charms,” Amicia seemed to be uninterested in the stable hand, and so she ignored his wink. “Dunstan? Fer goodness sake! I need to go find a few of the kitchen maids so we kin get started on the bread making. The monks and their minions are allus picky about their bread bein’ fresh.”
Caedmon nodded, and while they walked side by side, he told her that fish and game would be forthcoming, hopefully by noon.
And not to worry about making the meals fancy, as Ingrith had been teaching her. “We do not want them to get too comfortable here with fine fare and soft beds.”
“So I should put out some of that maggoty venison that has been in the scullery since God was a child.”
And end up in a pillory. “I would not go that far.”
She grinned at him.
“I mean it, Amicia. Toss out the bad meat.”
“No one ever lets me have fun.”
“Seems to me you were having plenty of fun a short time ago.”
She smirked. “Yea, I was. Everyone knows that Dafydd has a manroot the size of a cucumber.”
Everyone except me! He choked as air went down the wrong throat passage. Way too much detail!
By the time he had everything set in motion that he could in preparation for Dunstan’s visit, Caedmon decided he would try to get some sleep, even if it was only a few hours until dawn.
But then he remembered some unfinished business. Red-haired witchy business.
First he checked his bedchamber. Empty, as he had expected. Then hers. Also empty. But wait, a pillow and some bed linens were missing. He stood in the corridor, tapping his thinned lips thoughtfully. Where would she go to sleep where she thought he would never find her?
“Aha!”
A short time later, opening the chapel door quietly, he saw her lying on a bench, the linen cloth wrapped around her like a shroud, her hands folded together under her cheek, as if in prayer. He was going to give her plenty cause to pray.
Without warning, he went up to her, lifted her high, then tossed her over his shoulder. With her squawking like a chicken facing the cook’s axe, he walked through the hall and up the stairs to his bedchamber. Tossing her on the bed, which still had honey on it—on the side where she would be sleeping, not he—Caedmon walked over to the door and locked it, pocketing the key.
She had a full-blown screaming tantrum while he removed his garments, and she tried to escape her shroud. The more she squirmed, the more she tangled the sheet.
“This is not funny.” She glared at him.
“I beg to differ.”
“And put some clothes on. You are not sticking that thing in me again.”
He glanced downward and saw that he was, in fact, aroused. Nothing new in that. He was always at the ready around her.
“I will stick this thing in you again, if I want to, but methinks I will wait until you beg me this time.”
“When pigs dance!”
“I went to a fair one time where they had a dancing pig.”
She had managed to get out of the linen and was adjusting her bed rail, which was by now half off one shoulder.
He walked over, grabbed the neckline and yanked until it was torn right down the middle.
She gasped. “Why did you do that?”
“Because you annoy me.” And, truth to tell, all your blathering is annoying me, too.
He crawled up onto his side of the bed, facing away from her, and pulled a linen sheet up over his body to the waist. There was no fire, but it was not overly cold tonight.
“This side of the bed is sticky,” she observed.
“I know.” If she keeps on talking, I am going to stick a wad of linen in her mouth…or something else. Hmmm.
“Change sides with me.”
Are you barmy? “Nay!”
“Well, if you think I am going to beg, you are more demented than usual.” He heard rustling noises and assumed she was laying her bed linen over the top of the damp spots. She cursed once, then twice.
What now? “A problem?” he inquired without turning over to see for himself.
“’Tis too wet. And sticky.” Without glancing her way, he could tell that she was now standing. “It seeps through everything.” When he said nothing more, she finally asked, “Where shall I sleep?”
With a long sigh of exasperation, he turned over and lifted the sheet next to him.
Muttering her disgust, she started to climb up.
“Take off that bed rail afore you strangle yourself.”
“If I do, you are not to touch me.”
He rolled his eyes. Right now, the only touching that appeals is you, naked, over my knees, arse pointed northward, being paddled with my palm. Much as that image appealed, he decided to save it for another day. “Breanne, Archbishop Dunstan and his cohorts are on their way here. Geoff came to give me the news. I have spent the last three hours making arrangements. I need sleep now.”
“You lout! Why did you not tell me that to begin with?”
Mayhap I was too blistering angry with you. Mayhap I had more important things on my mind. Mayhap your wagging tongue put me off. He shrugged and bided his time while she worked her way around the honey spots and under the linen.
He gave her only a second to relax and let her defenses down. Then he rolled over on top of her.
“You promised not to touch me.”
“I did not.”
“Well, do not.”
He was already working her hair out of its damp braid and adjusting his body so that his cock was right where he wanted it to be. It felt as if there was moisture where his staff was resting, but just to make sure, he tested her female channel with a finger. “You are wet for me,” he hooted out with a joyous laugh, holding said finger up for her to see.
“Nay, I am not. ’Tis just dampness from my bath.”
“You took your bath hours ago.”
“How do you know that?”
“My spies told me.” He put his finger into his mouth to taste, then declared, with deliberate irksome glee, “Woman dew. Wet for me.”
“That is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen.”
“Really? When I think of disgusting, I think of…” He told her about a form of bedplay that was, in fact, more disgusting.
She clicked her jaw shut when she realized she was gaping. “You said you needed to sleep.”
“I do, and the best way to insure a good sleep is to tup first.” Before she had a chance to protest, he lifted her hips and plunged inside.
He had not intended to do that. Really, he had not. He was just going to tease her. So, now what do I do? “Shall I stop?” Oh, please, say nay. Be amenable for once. He rubbed his chest hairs across her nipples. Just once.
“Do not dare.”
He smiled, but then he recalled something. With a grunt for his self-inflicted pain, he withdrew from her.
“What are you doing?” She tried to pull him back by tugging on his buttocks, but he remained rigid outside her body.
“I recalled that I told you just moments ago that I would not swive you again until you begged. Are you ready to beg?”
“Hah!”
Betimes drawing a battle line was not a good decision. He was having second thoughts, but his pride would not allow him to give in. Putting his back to her, he said, “Sleep well, m’lady witch.”
“You cannot fool me,” she said, smacking him on the back. “You will not be able to rest, now that you are aroused, until you are sated.”
“I can always pleasure myself…unless you are ready to beg.”
“Not a chance!” Then, “How dost one pleasure oneself?”
He began to laugh and could not stop, even when she battered his shoulders with her small fists.
“If you will not tell me, I will ask Amicia.”
“Good. Perchance you will then give me a demonstration later.”
“How would I…I mean…never mind.”
Amazingly, he did fall asleep, only to awaken near dawn with a sleeping princess snuggled up against his back…her knees behind his knees, her mons behind his buttocks, her breasts against his back. She would hate herself for crossing the line.
If he were chivalrous, he would slip out of bed and let her sleep, unaware of how, even in sleep, she sought his body. That is what he should do, but, never having been chivalrous to any great extent, he instead put a hand over her hand which was cradling his ballocks and spoke over his shoulder.
“Ooooooh, Bre-aaaaanne!”
He was not entirely loathsome…
Breanne was impressed.
Just as she had come to the conclusion that Caedmon was a stubborn, lackwitted, lazy, loathsome troll of a man, albeit an accomplished lover, she got to see him in a new light. From the instant he had embarrassed her in bed by proving that she had been the one who could not keep her hands off of him, he had changed before her eyes. He was now an efficient, in-control, no-nonsense master of Larkspur, a warrior at heart.
He had Hugh at his side everywhere he went, whilst Breanne took charge of the other children, gladly, especially since there was an air of fear about the place. Archbishop Dunstan was a powerful man, some said even more influential than the king. If he was not pleased, Larkspur could suffer. And Breanne could not help but feel she and her sisters were responsible for this dire situation.
She had the children looking clean and well groomed after a battle at the bathing house early this morn. The three terrors…Kendrick, Oslac, and Joanna…were particularly difficult. You would think she had asked them to peel off a layer of skin, when all she had insisted on was a good scrubbing.
Putting two fingers in her mouth, she let loose with a most unfeminine whistle, and, amazingly, the children all lined up in order of height. It was a trick Gerard had taught her. Unfortunately, she had not yet mastered the trick of keeping them in place, and they soon began to scatter.
“Wait!” she shouted.
In an attempt to evade Dunstan’s scrutiny, she was about to lead them all on an “adventure” outside the castle grounds, down by the river. But first she stopped in the kitchen to put bread, cheese, oat cakes, and apples in a leather bag. Amicia and her helpers were all in a tizzy, dressing the deer one of the hunters had brought in, along with two ducks and a brace of rabbits. Another man handed the cook a string of fish.
“I could use yer sister now,” Amicia remarked to Breanne.
“I would offer to help, but Caedmon asked me to take care of the children. Make them presentable. Keep them out of the way.”
Amicia nodded. “Wish we could all go hide fer a sennight or so. I hear the God-man hates wimmen.”
On that happy note, Breanne went through the open corridor to the great hall, where her group awaited her. Her heart swelled seeing how nice they looked with their grubby faces washed and their hair slicked down. Every one of them, except Piers, was scowling with discomfort at the new garments they had been forced to wear.
“No grumpiness today,” she said cheerily. “We are going to have a good time.”
Kendrick said something that sounded like “Bugger good times.”
“I wanna go swimming,” Joanna demanded. “And catch some frogs and roast the legs. Yum!”
Yecch!
“Las’ time, ye made the fire too big, and Gerard whopped yer bottom,” Angus said gleefully. “Ye could not sit down fer a whole day.”
Joanna stuck her tongue out at Angus.
Piers was hunkered down on his little haunches watching a spider. She took his hand quickly before he decided to put the creature in his mouth.
Oslac broke wind apurpose, just to show her who was really in charge.
Beth and Mina blushed with mortification. If they could disown their brothers, they surely would.
Alfred and Aidan were making buzzing noises. Apparently rumors were rife this morn about honey and swiving, as evidenced by sticky bed linens. Not that the twins knew what swiving was, but they clearly understood it was a forbidden subject, and therefore of interest.
With a whooshy exhale of disgust, she led the little varmints out to the upper bailey, not unlike a goose with its goslings, then stopped dead in her tracks. It was too late. Archbishop Dunstan and his entourage had already arrived. With the outer door shut behind them, she pressed up against the castle wall with the children and, using hand signals, tried to sidle away. Unfortunately, one of Dunstan’s soldiers was eyeing them suspiciously. As if a woman and nine children could do them harm!
Caedmon, Henry, and some of the higher-ranking hirdsmen were bowing from the waist at Archbishop Dunstan as he dismounted. The horses were being led off to the stables. She had to admit, Caedmon looked godly handsome in a blue tunic with a gold link belt over black breeches tucked into knee-high polished boots. His dark hair had been trimmed and combed off his face.
“Welcome to Larkspur, Your Grace,” Caedmon said, leaning forward to kiss the priest’s ring.
I am not noticing the pull of fabric over his firm buttocks. Really. I am surely not that wanton. Well, mayhap a wee bit wanton. Aaarrgh!
The archbishop made the sign of the cross with two raised fingers over Caedmon. “May the Lord bless and keep you.”
Bless all of us, Lord. We are in deep trouble here.
The white-haired and white-bearded Dunstan had to be in his fifties. He was dressed in a simple cowled robe, but the fabric was of softest wool with an under-robe, or vestment, of finest Irish lace, peeking out at the wrists and neck and ankles, and the rope belt was threaded with strands of silver. A large gold crucifix hung from a heavy chain around his neck, and on his fingers were several rings.
A monk in tonsured haircut and coarser robe carried the elaborate, pointed headdress known as a mitre, which would be worn during official duties. Yet another priest placed a jewel-encrusted crosier in the archbishop’s right hand, the crooked shepherd-like staff being a symbol of his office.
The stern-faced archbishop’s eyes darted here and there, taking everything in. No doubt he would be able to report back to the king the exact condition of the keep right down to the number of soldiers and sheep for shearing. She could swear his rheumy eyes went wide on noticing the twining larkspur carvings she had made in the eaves of the pigsty. He probably thought they were some pagan symbols.
“Wouldst like to break your fast, Your Eminence?” Caedmon inquired. “I have set my cook to prepare a meal for you.”
Dunstan shook his head. “First we will say Mass in thanksgiving for our safe journey through this primitive land.”
Breanne could only be thankful that Caedmon had the foresight to set the housemaids to cleaning the small chapel this morn.
“The bathhouse is ready, if need be, and a private bedchamber for you,” Caedmon added.
Once again, Dunstan shook his head. “Mass first.”
No thanks for Caedmon’s thoughtfulness, just a judgmental haughtiness, as if any consideration was his due.
They were all walking up the step to the double doors leading into the great hall when the archbishop noticed her and the children, still propping up the wall. The children had the good sense not to misbehave, for once. “ Who are they?” he demanded of Caedmon.
Caedmon did not even look her way. The grimness of his expression was telling to Breanne. He knew he was walking a fine line here. One misstep and he could lose all. “Those are my children,” he said, “along with Hugh here, my oldest.” He put a hand on Hugh’s shoulder.
“And the woman?” It was clear as a bell the disdain Dunstan held for women. His eagle eyes took her measure from head to toe. “Those fine garments are not of a housemaid.”
“This is Breanne of Stoneheim, daughter of King Thorvald.”
She bowed to the archbishop but, not sure of the protocol, did not dare try to kiss his ring.
“Stoneheim?”
“In the Norselands,” Caedmon elaborated, with obvious reluctance.
“A heathen Viking!” Dunstan’s nostrils flared with outrage. If she were closer, he might have tried to smite her with his staff.
“I believe she has been baptized,” Caedmon said before she could speak up and probably say something objectionable. He frowned at her in warning not to disagree with what he had said. What he did not know was that her father and all her sisters practiced both the Norse and Christian religions.
Something seemed to occur to Dunstan then. “Are you sister to Lady Havenshire?”
Oh, gods! Here it comes! “Yea, I am.”
“Is she here?” His eagle eyes scanned the surroundings.
Breanne shook her head.
“Where is she?”
She shrugged. “Back in the Norselands, I believe.”
Dunstan pointed a bony finger at her and said, “I will speak to you after Mass, and you will tell me the truth, or suffer the consequences. Do you understand me, wench?”
How could she not understand him? He was practically spitting his displeasure.
Caedmon hung back as the group went inside toward the chapel, which could be entered both from the inside of the keep, or through an exterior door. “You did well,” he told her in an undertone.
“You jest. I did terribly. My voice shook, and my eyes probably belied my lack of honesty.”
“I will make sure to be with you any time you speak with the archbishop,” he promised. “Do not fear. This will soon be over, and we can resume our bargain.”
“Whaaat?” she screeched. “How can you think of that at a time like this?”
“Breanne, Breanne, Breanne! I think of that all the time.”
To emphasize his words, the rogue cupped her buttock and squeezed before anyone could notice.
Except for his children, who began to make bzzzzing noises.