Authors: Elizabeth Mayne
Lady of the Lake (26 page)
“Can you command the sun not to rise in the morning so that this night of ours might never end?” she challenged.
“I can command people, not Apollo. It’s Lughnasa Night. We must make haste if we are to enjoy each other’s finest fruits. Shall I turn my hourglass and make you a wager that you’ll be howling out my name before the last sands have run out?”
Tala lifted her chin and gave him a sultry smile.
“You may issue any challenge you feel up to declaring. I shall do my part to see that the sands run very, very slowly.”
“Ah!” Edon tapped her nose gently. “So I am to be utterly at the mercy of my Mercian witch for all eternity, am I? You will cast spells on hourglasses to slow the sands, will you? Take unfair advantage of me and my prowess in bed?”
“You spoke the words of your own spell, binding our spirits from this day forward until death do us part. I am yours through eternity.” Tala wound her arms around his neck. “You may have all the love I have in my heart. I wouldn’t have you any other way, my love and my Viking.”
“So be it.” Edon smiled as he sealed their bargain with a kiss. Then he turned over the hourglass and set out on the first of a lifetime of delights to come, one sweet, loving hour at a time.
* * * * *
This whole book evolved out of one snippit in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, wherein King Ella of Deria (York) slew Halfdan by throwing him in a pit full of snakes. In retaliation, Halfdan’s sons carved a blood eagle on Ella’s back. They cut his ribs free from his spine and spread his lungs on his back and watched the man die. This is, of course, too brutal for our day and age, but in my original notes Tala and Venn were King Ella’s children. That plot twist didn’t work.
Romancing history is what writing historical novelists do. I personally like the gory details. It’s safe so long as I’m in my twentieth-century bungalow, far removed from the reality of those times. I hope you enjoyed my take on existing legends. If you’d like information on upcoming books or what’s been published in the past, check out my home page. You can read reviews and send me e-mail at: http//www.NAinc.com/mayne
eISBN 978-14592-6814-2
LADY OF THE LAKE
Copyright © 1997 by M. Kaye Garcia
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All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
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