Heart's Ease (The Northwomen Sagas Book 2) (12 page)

His choice left Olga only two seating options: the bed or the floor at his feet. She chose the floor.

“You aren’t coming with me.” Leif stared at the fireplace as if there were flames to see dancing there.

Olga’s talk with Anton had been difficult at best. She had explained what was between her and Leif, and that he wanted the three of them to sail with him to his home. She’d explained that it would be a new start, that Leif was important in his world, and that they would not struggle.

Anton had called her a fool. What little deference he’d still had for her as his older sister and replacement mother had left his eyes and his attitude as she’d tried to talk. He’d seen a silly woman hoodwinked by a handsome, powerful man.

That much, she had no need to share with Leif. “Anton has no wish to ride the sea to a strange place. Estland is his home. If I had more time—”

Leif dismissed those words with a brusque wave of his hand. “The summer grows warm. Our ships could arrive at any moment.”

“I know. It is why I spoke to him today. But it was too soon. These weeks have not been enough to warm him to your people.”

“The ships will bring settlers. My people will be here, even when I am not.”

“But here is a world he knows. An earth he has farmed. Woods he has hunted.”

He sighed and slumped against the back of the chair. “The truth of it is that there is no time that would persuade him. I see it in his eyes. I will never have his trust.”

“You are likely right. I hoped. I hoped with all my heart, but he will not leave here.” She set her hand on his thigh.

Sitting forward, he picked up her hand and held it close. “Then let him stay. Come with me, Olga. He is a man. Kalju is a man as well. They are old enough to make their way on their own.”

“You brought them back to me. Would you so quickly take me from them again?”

“I would take you all with me, if that was your choice. All of you should make your own choice. I would have you choose me.”

“You could stay. You could choose me and stay.” She pulled her hand, but he wouldn’t let it go.

“I do not have the choice.”

“Why not? Brenna and Vali have chosen.”

He dropped her hand and stood abruptly. When he walked toward the door, Olga thought he meant to leave. But he stopped and stared at the bare stone wall for a moment swollen with tension. At last, he said, “It’s
because
of Brenna and Vali’s choices that I cannot stay.”

She had expected nothing at all like that for a reason. “I don’t understand.”

“In our world, they are both legends. Stories are told about them.”

“I have heard this before.”

He turned back to her. “Yes. Brenna is known as the God’s-Eye. She is thought to be…” he hesitated as if he searched for the right word.

They were speaking in the blended language that had become the habit of all who’d resided in the castle over the winter. He had two languages from which to choose a word.

“Otherworldly,” Olga supplied, in his tongue. “Because of her strange eye.”

“Yes.”

These giants and their gods. Leif had tried to explain it to her, but it all seemed absurdly complicated. “Here there is no other world. There is only this one, and Brenna’s eye is only unusual.”

“I know. Our world is not like yours. What I mean to tell you, however, is that Brenna is believed to be more than human, and she is sworn to my jarl.”

Olga knew this. “Åke.”

“Yes. He believes her to be his gift from our greatest god.”

“Odin.” Leif had told her the story of Odin’s eye, and thus of Brenna’s. He knew that she knew this, so Olga listened to his words and searched for the heart of his story now.

“Yes. Vali is sworn to another jarl. He is a powerful warrior and a legend, too. Åke sees him as a threat. And now, Vali has married his renowned shieldmaiden. When my jarl learns of that—and more, that they plan to settle here—he will be outraged. He might well see it as an act of war. I have cause to believe that the alliance that brought us all here under the colors of two jarls was broken while the ships were away. I already worry that blood will be shed when Åke learns that Brenna has married an enemy and that she means to stay.”

“Vali is no enemy.”

“Not to me. He is my good friend, and I have grown to love him as a brother here. He is a good man. But he is enemy to Åke if he is sworn to another who is not Åke’s ally. Åke will reel from the news that Brenna has bound herself to Vali. If I were to seek to leave him as well, even as his agent here, as I am now…” Leif stopped and then began again, his voice thick with regret. “He does not suffer disappointments. He would kill all I hold dear and take from me my reason to stay. He would kill you. He might well do it in front of me.”

Still sitting on the floor, Olga stared up at him, her jaw slack with shock. “You are loyal to such a man as this? You have cut down two princes here who were no worse.”

“You would have me kill him?”

Olga didn’t answer with words. She let her eyes say yes. If this jarl was so petty and cruel, then his power tilted the world from its balance.

But Leif shook his head. “He has not always been as he is now. He has always been hard, but he was reasonable and took good counsel. Power has changed him, and age as well. But he has been like a father to me, and he has loved me as one of his own sons. I swore an oath to a better man, but I swore. On that oath, I gave him my life and my sword. I did not swear on any conditions. I simply swore. My word is the most valuable thing I have.”

That made no sense to her. An oath sworn to a bad man was a bad oath. How could that be anything but true? “So valuable you would leave me behind to keep it. Even to a man such as your jarl.”

He came back and crouched at her side. “I would not leave you. Gods, I would not. Olga, please. My love, come with me.”

All this talk had changed nothing. She could not understand his fealty, and he could not understand why she wouldn’t leave her grown brothers.

No—that was wrong. She thought they both understood. Leif was loyal and self-sacrificing. As was she. Their love was doomed.

She brushed her hand through his soft, thick hair. “I love you. But I cannot leave any more than you can stay.”

He dropped his head. “I know.”

“What are we to do?”

Looking up at her, his eyes dark with sorrow, he smiled and caught her chin in his fingers. “We take the time we have left, and we love each other.”

It was all they could do. Her chest ached with the coming loss, but she found a smile as well. “I will never be sorry that we have known this love.”

“Nor I.”

He stood and helped her to her feet. Then he picked her up and carried her to bed.

Two days later—a mere two days—the raiders from the castle rode to the coast to meet Åke and his ships.

Only Åke. The ships had arrived under his flag alone.

Already bonds that had formed among those who had stayed behind, bonds forged in joy and friendship as well as hardship and battle, shook as those who had been sworn to Snorri wondered what had befallen their jarl that he had not made the journey. They cast suspicious eyes on Åke’s people, and men who had laughed together the night before now rested their hands on their weapons when they spoke.

Vali, leader of Snorri’s men, had spent these hours since the ships had been sighted exhorting them all to remember that they were friends and to leap to no judgments.

But Leif thought of Calder’s evasions in their last talks the summer before, his hints of a bigger plan, and he felt sure that Snorri was dead. If that was true, if Åke had moved to claim a holding far to the north of his own, and this holding across the sea as well, then his plans were indeed bigger. The large holdings of two jarls sat between Snorri’s northern lands and Åke’s in the south. If he had hemmed them in, then he had great plans. Epic plans.

Kingly plans.

As they approached the jarl’s camp, Brenna and Vali in the lead with him as always, what Leif saw was a raiding camp. He saw no signs of settlers. It would seem from this arrival that Åke had no intent to settle in Estland.

That made no sense. Why had they stayed at all, then?

There was so much he didn’t know. His choice to stay and hold the castle had pushed him from Åke’s inner circle. He had to get back in. Only from the inside could he hope to prevent disaster.

They dismounted at the head of the camp, and Åke and his eldest sons, Calder and Eivind, came to greet them.

Dressed in his finest leather and furs, a jeweled medallion on his chest, the jarl spread his arms wide and came to Leif.

“Leif Olavsson! It is good to see you! I have missed you as I might have missed a son of my own blood.”

Leif embraced his jarl as the father figure he’d once been to him, and he felt real warmth and affection returned. When Åke stepped back, clutching Leif’s shoulders, Leif made a respectful bow of his head.

“Jarl Åke. The winter was long. We’re glad to have you safely here.”

The jarl smiled and patted his shoulder briskly, then turned to Brenna.
“And Brenna God’s-Eye. My own great shieldmaiden. The ships carried home to us more stories of your exploits for the sagas. And you look very well. Odin’s presence has been strong with you this winter, I see.”

Åke touched her face then, and Leif saw Vali shift into battle-readiness. The difference was subtle, an overall tension in the man’s broad shoulders, and a frown on his brow, but Leif had spent the greater part of a year in close company with the Storm-Wolf, and he knew his body’s language. And more, he was especially alert for trouble in this event.

Brenna, on the other hand, took no offense at her jarl’s affectionate touch. She nodded and acknowledged him as she knew to do.

When Åke turned to Vali, Leif paid close heed. Still in his mien of readiness, Vali looked down on the shorter jarl.

“Vali Storm-Wolf. You are famed as well, and I am glad to see that your story continues.” Leif could hear insincerity in Åke’s tone—or perhaps he was seeing trouble everywhere, even where it was not.

Vali barely tipped his head. “Thank you, Jarl Åke, it does. I would know how fares my jarl, Snorri.”

And there it was. The trouble Leif knew was coming would arrive in Åke’s answer; he was sure of it.

Åke had not appreciated being called out so directly, and in the middle of the greeting. But he kept his noble bearing. “Snorri is drinking with the gods in Valhalla. I am sorry, friend.”

There was a long silence. Åke and Vali stared at each other. Brenna and Leif stared at them. Leif turned and met the eyes of his friend, Calder, and saw more cool remove than friendship.

So much had changed while he was here.

The jarl invited Brenna to his tent for a talk. When Vali stepped forward as well, Leif set his hand on his sword.

He heard his friends proclaim their marriage. He saw the surprise, and then the ice, in his jarl’s eyes at the news. He saw Calder take note of his sword hand and find his own sword as well.

Leif’s mind spun as it never had before. He needed to see, to understand. Would blood be shed right here? If so, at least they were away from the innocent villagers. At least Olga would be safe.

But Åke smiled. “Then good tidings are in order, and we shall drink to the lasting goodwill of the gods. And I welcome the great Storm-Wolf into my clan.”

Vali didn’t protest the jarl’s assumption that he would swear to him, and Leif felt a slight relief. As his two friends followed after the jarl, he let his hand fall from his sword. He had not been called to join them, which was unusual. Just as he worried that he was being cut out, though, Åke stopped and turned back. “Come, Leif. We seek your wisdom as well.”

His heart and belly churning with concern and confusion, Leif followed. At least he was still on the inside, where he might best see trouble—and might best dispel it.

~oOo~

“I see longhouses here.”
Åke sat astride the mount he had chosen and surveyed the rebuilding village.

They had broken camp at dawn the next morning and returned to the castle. Once he had made a cursory pass through the castle, Åke had declared that he wanted to see the village. They had seen the burned ruins of the coastal village already. Though there were plans in place to rebuild that as well, in smaller scale and better protected, everyone’s first focus on been on the inland village and the farmland.

Leif and Knut had escorted Åke and his sons, and now they all stood in the center of the town. It smelled strongly of fresh wood and tilled earth. A good, calm scent. But Leif knew no calm.

“Yes,” he answered. “The Estlanders prefer small huts, but we build for settlers, too, homes made in the way of home.”

Åke pulled on his long, white beard. “I hear that the Storm-Wolf builds here.”

Knut shot a glance in Leif’s direction. There had been talk, but Brenna and Vali had not confirmed their decision widely. There was no reason Knut should know, but Leif couldn’t decide whether that quick glance had been one of surprise or concern. He sought a thing to say.

“We all build. Helping any who seek the help. This is a place of good people, Åke. We made for you large holding and a strong settlement.”

One the jarl had yet shown little sign of wanting.

These hours back in Åke’s presence, after so many months away, had made in Leif a new understanding. All his life, he’d known a complicated and powerful man, harsh and cold in many ways but warm and open in others. A man who had shown him love and favor. He knew Åke’s ways to be severe, and he had seen the years change him, but Leif had known the man he’d loved, even as the warmth in him had dwindled.

He hadn’t been blind to Åke’s changing. He had simply honored his oath and remembered the man who had been, and he had borne in his own heart the consequences of his continuing loyalty to a man he agreed with less and less.

Brenna, too, was loyal to Åke—was trying to be even now—but Leif thought her loyalty came from a different place. She had offered herself to the jarl as a slave, and he had taken her on as such. When she had saved his wife and young children from the raiders who had killed Leif’s wife and unborn son, Åke had repaid that great debt by freeing her and handing her a sword and shield of her own. He had made her swear her fealty, holding her in thrall in another way.

But he had given her a home when she’d had none, and he had been honorable when he was indebted. Her fealty rested in that. Leif knew her better than most others, and he thought that she reconciled her loyalty with the man Åke had become by simply not seeing that there was any way to be jarl but his way. She closed her storied eyes to his failings and saw the man she wanted to see.

Leif had no such luxury. He saw Åke as he was. Now, with the clearer eyes of distance, he saw him truly.

And he was ashamed.

But it was not a matter of simply turning his back. The consequences to any action any of them took now would be profound. Vali was not willing to see beyond what he saw was right. He had taken a wife, and he had decided to settle here, knowing fully the danger in those choices, and he cared not, because he disdained Åke. Leif had tried again and again to talk with him about what they would face. But always he’d simply shrugged and said what would come would come.

What was coming was ruin. It was down to Leif, then, to be the one to turn the ship from the rocks. To try, at least.

Now Åke cast a searching look at him, and Leif returned it steadily.

“Do you build a longhouse, too, my friend?” Calder asked, his tone artificially light.

This was the moment when he settled his place inside Åke’s circle or locked himself out of it. “I help. As I say, we all help. But if you ask if I mean to stay, I do not. My home is Geitland.”

Åke smiled warmly and, with a nod, turned his mount back toward the castle.

~oOo~

Shortly after their return, Leif sought out Olga. He caught her coming down the back stairs and dragged her along the dark service corridor, not stopping until he had turned into the nook that sheltered her own door and had pushed her in and barred them inside.

“Leif! What of this?”

Rather than answer, he kissed her. He grabbed her arms and pulled her hard to his chest, and he slammed his mouth over hers and kissed her fiercely. Desperately. He tried to put every bit of feeling he had for her into that kiss. He tried to put years of love into that kiss.

When she overcame her shock and confusion and kissed him back, he released her arms and picked her up, holding her to him with her feet dangling against his legs. She threw her arms around him, and they fed each other’s souls in that kiss that would have to last them the rest of their lives.

Because it would be their last.

Olga finally pulled back, flushed and gasping, but Leif didn’t set her down. He couldn’t. Her fingers were in his hair, her lips on his cheek, above the line of his beard, and he couldn’t give up the feel of her.

“Something’s wrong,” she whispered.

Everything was wrong, but he did not yet quite understand how it would fall apart. “This is the last of us, my love. You must stay away from me as long as Åke is here, and I will leave with him. He is suspicious of everything here, and he did not come to settle. I don’t know his intentions, but they are not what they should be. I am a danger to you now. All the raiders are. I would that you would go to the village.”

She pushed back and looked him in the eyes. “You know that I can’t. I must manage the castle. Now, with so many new people, there is much to do—and if all of us who work here ran, would that not make your terrible jarl more dangerous?”