Page 98 of Viking Warriors: Vol. 1-3

I told myself to no longer think; to set aside what I’d been before, to set aside the past. There would be only now, and the kisses of a man who was both strong and vulnerable. Weren’t we the same? Selfish. Cruel. Hurting. Yet needing to be loved. He was my enemy, and he was myself.

And yet, I was compelled to speak my mind. I broke the kiss, saying, “Give your promise—to release me from thraldom, so that my child will be born free.”

“You need fear nothing.”

I wished it to be true—to be sure that his feelings for me were stronger than his desire for revenge. Eldberg had destroyed everything I’d cared for. Such a thing could not be easily forgiven, but I wanted to set aside that anger. It had eaten at me for too long.

He reached for both my hands. “I wish to be whole again and take you to wife.”

His expression—always so mocking—was no longer so. I’d witnessed him in every mood, but never this—so intense, so sure.

He turned my palm, bringing it to his lips. “If I enslave you, it shall be through love.”

The words were enough, and I pushed down the furs, bearing myself to him. “Touch me, my lord.” It was a demand but softly made.

Gently, he obeyed, trailing his fingers across my breasts, across the full-roundedness of my stomach, hard with the babe, until he fingered between my curls, slipping his finger where he knew I would be wet.

No other command was necessary. He brought himself naked to me, and I embraced the body I’d come to know so well—the tight curve of his buttocks and powerfully muscled thighs, the firm contours of his back.

As he moved within me, the expression in his eyes stilled my breath—for it was as if he were searching for my soul, thirsty for more than the oblivion of shuddering surrender.

It was a yearning that haunted us both.

16

Eirik

November 1st, 960AD

He became aware of voices and clattering somewhere, far off. All was dark, for he wasn’t ready to open his eyes, but he stretched his fingertips, rubbing at the weave of the cloth upon which he lay.

He tried shifting a little, reaching out for Elswyth, but his arms were heavy and wouldn’t obey, as if only his mind had woken and not his body. Not yet.

If only he could move, he’d find her. She would be there, next to him. He wanted to kiss her. His wife. To draw her close, his fingers tangled in her golden hair.

“Elswyth.” His lips moved to form the word, but his mouth was too dry to make the sound. He tried again, to no avail.

Someone squeezed his hand, and a feminine voice asked, “Are you awake?”

Of course he was. He could hear her—Helka.

He returned the pressure of his sister’s touch.

“Thank the gods!”

His hand received a sharper squeeze and was lifted to his sister’s cheek. Had she been crying? What was the matter?

A man was allowed to sleep late on the day after his wedding, surely. He couldn’t remember getting to bed, but it wasn’t the first time another had carried him. If a man couldn’t get drunk on the day he married the woman he loved, when could he?

Though his throat was parched, his head was free of the ache that usually accompanied a surfeit of mead.

“Drink this.”

A cup touched his lips, wetting them, and Eirik swallowed gratefully. He wanted to open his eyes, but it was so difficult.

“What do you remember?” Helka’s lips pressed to his forehead.

Eirik fought to recall. The wedding feast, and Elswyth looking beautiful in her crimson gown, her diadem not of hammered gold but of meadow flowers. And the room hung gloriously with boughs of blooms. Bride and groom, they’d paraded, then been carried from one end of the hall to the other, passed above the heads of their guests. How loudly everyone had cheered.