Maidensong (22 page)

 
Her pulse jumped under his steady gaze and she
suddenly wished for a safe haven herself. If she let him
look at her like that, soon he’d see that he wouldn’t
have to take her. She’d give herself willingly. If not for
her bargain...

 
“
There’ll be no taking today,” she said firmly. “The
merchants here look like they expect silver in exchange for their goods, not steel.”

 
“True,” he said, nodding at the guards who roamed
the streets in this home of a thousand souls. “Even the
shopkeepers are armed. Birka has a good market. But
if you don’t find what you need here, we have a stop
yet at Uppsala before we make for the mouth of the
Dvina.”

 
“Uppsala?”

 
“
Ja,
Gunnar was very particular about it.” Bjorn
said. “He was concerned for your religious sensibilities since you’ll be so far from Odin’s temple in Miklagard.
He was sure you’d want to see the sacred grove once more since you’re not likely to see it again.”

 
It wasn’t her faith Gunnar was concerned about.
He wanted one last chance to remind her of the conse
quences to her brother if she violated her agreement.

 
“
I was never one for Odin,” she said. “I’d be just as pleased not to go to Uppsala.”

 
“As you like,” he said flatly. His frown told her he
thought her eager to get to Miklagard and her new
husband.

 
They passed a silversmith and watched while he poured the molten metal. Fascinated, Rika noticed that he was making both a hammer pendant and a
Christian cross on the same stone mold. She fingered
the jewelry that was already finished, letting the silver
slide over her palm, cool and smooth.

 
“You make amulets for both Thor and
Kristr?”
she asked.

 
“
Ja,”
the craftsman said. “In Birka, people worship
Red Thor and the White Christ, as they choose. Old
gods or new, we get along.” A wry smile crossed the
smith’s face. “And I sell to both of them. Which can I
sell to you?”

 
“
I used to wear a hammer,” Rika said, still missing
the smooth, glowing amber. “But it seems Thor has de
serted me, so I’ll wear no god’s emblem now. Good day.”

 
Bjorn looked at her sharply as they walked on down
the main street. “Lost your faith, have you?”

 
“
Misplaced it, I think,” she said. “The gods of As
gard are all I know. I was weaned on their adventures,
but lately they all seem distant.”

 
“When have the gods ever taken much interest in us, anyway, unless it suited their own purpose?” Bjorn said. “None of them have much use for a second son or a fatherless girl.”

 
“You’re right,” she said. “But I used to feel that,
well, that someone was watching out for me, making
sure I was safe. I used to believe that someone was
Thor.”

 
“I’d think you’d still feel that way.” He didn’t bother
to disguise the bitterness in his voice. “After
all,
you’re
about to become the wife of a very wealthy man. What
more could you want?”

 
You! You stupid, stupid man!
almost tumbled out of
her mouth. Instead, she bit her lip and lengthened her
stride. He matched her pace easily. They spoke no
more till they rounded the next corner and Rika saw a
building whose shape was foreign to her, spiky staves jutting at angles and a tall spire.

 
“
What’s that?” she asked.

 
“
It must be the Christ’s church,” Bjorn said. “They’d just started building it ten years ago when Uncle Ornolf and I came through here. A little priest came
from the south and won some converts so they erected
this building to celebrate. Even Hergeir, the city prefect, defected to the Christ.”

 
“
Do you know much about their religion?” she asked.

 
“
Not much,” he said, his eyes taking on a hazy qual
ity. “My first raid was on a monastery. All I know about
Christians is that they die easily. They seem to care
fiercely about their fancy books and silver chalices, but
they aren’t willing to kill to keep them. What do you
know of their faith?”

 
“Only
what Magnus told me,” she said. “He spoke at length with a priest who’d come to convert the Danish
king. Magnus said their Christ was a powerful skald.
He told stories to teach his followers.”

 
“
Did he also say that their Christ died?”

“Yes, like poor Baldur,” she said, thinking of the
hapless son of Odin whose death by poison would herald the beginning of
Ragnarok,
the epic battle that signals the end of the world. “But Christians believe their
Christ came back to life and lives forever.”

 
“
Not even the gods do that.” Bjorn’s gaze followed the tall spire to the cross on the church’s top. “It’s
strange, isn’t it? Those who worship Thor wear his
hammer, the symbol of his strength, while the Chris
tians wear a cross, symbol of their God’s weakness.”

 
“
Magnus said they saw it as strength because it meant their forgiveness,” she said.

 
“Forgiveness?” Bjorn scoffed. “A man has to bear
the weight of his own actions, good or bad. Only a
weakling expects to be forgiven.”

 
“Yet I seem to remember you asking me to forgive you,” she said. “For Magnus.”

 
Bjorn’s dark gaze held hers. “When it comes to you, I am
weak,” he admitted. “And I remember you telling me
you would never forgive me.”

 
Many times since her fa
ther’s death, she’d heard his voice in her head, admon
ishing, prompting, gently laughing, but now there was
only silence. What would Magnus want her to do?
She could only follow her feelings. This was something she needed to do, both for Bjorn and for herself.

 
“I was wrong. From my
heart, Bjorn, I want to forgive you.” She reached out
and touched his arm, his skin warm under her palm.
His tight muscles relaxed as she felt some of the tension drain out of him. “But can you forgive me?”

 
“For what
?” He covered her hand with his
own ever so gently, as if simply to touch her was a gift.

 
She barely breathed.

 
“Can you forgive me for marrying the Arab?”

 
“
I can if you repent of it now,” Bjorn said urgently.

 
“It’s too late,”
she said, sadness crack
ling her voice. No matter what, she couldn’t risk both
Bjorn and Ketil coming to harm for her sake. His
warmth stole up her arm and almost made her knees
buckle. It had been a mistake to touch him. She tugged her hand away gently. “I can’t repent of
my agreement with Gunnar. But I do still want your
forgiveness.”

 
They stood frozen on the square before the Christ’s
church, merchants and shoppers bustling around
them. Bjorn couldn’t believe she would make such a
request.

 
She was asking for the impossible. How could he forgive her for ripping his heart from his chest and
stomping on it? Her sea-green eyes held a beseeching look of such intensity, he had to look away. “You shall have to remain wanting.”

 
In accordance with Rika’s wishes, they didn’t sail to
Uppsala
,
but made straight for the mouth of
the Dvina at the far corner of the Baltic Sea. Ornolf had left his light riverboat there in the care of a local tribe of Slavs. The cargo from the
Sea-Snake
was off
loaded and repacked for the smaller vessel.

 
The
Valkyrie
was a trim, high-riding craft, perfect
for navigating shallow waterways and
built to
be hoisted onto a wagon for portage. A square sail could
be run up when the wind was favorable and there were four oar ports for when it was not. It was small enough
to be manageable with just four men, yet roomy enough to accommodate their cargo and the two women in comfort. Ornolf’s pride in the
Valkyrie
was
evident each time he laid a large-knuckled hand on the
vessel.

 
Bjorn stood looking his last at the
Sea-Snake.
Two dozen backs bent and flexed in rhythm as the bulk of his crew returned to Sogna. When they were out far
enough, they shipped the oars and rigged the mast. A
fair wind billowed her sail and she lifted, surging into
the waves like a sleek porpoise. Bjorn followed the
Sea-Snake’s
progress with his eyes. He’d never see her again.

 
“Bjorn?” Rika stood beside him.

 
“
What? Are we not speeding to your bridegroom fast enough for your taste?” he said, not tearing his eyes away from his receding ship.

 
“No, it’s not that.” Her tone flared briefly at his
surliness, then softened. “I just wondered what was
wrong. You look so . . . Are you well?”

 
“I’m fine,” he said curtly. “Anything else?”

 
“
I was also wondering about that.” She pointed to a tall rune stone propped on the bluff overlooking the mouth of the river.

 
“A memorial of some kind,” Bjorn said. “I can’t read runes, so I’ve no idea what it says.”

 
“But I can,” she said, smiling. “There’s just one
word in the inscription that has me puzzled.”

 
Bjorn sighed as he glanced once more at the
Sea-
Snake
bounding out of his life, then turned back to
gaze up at the stone
stele.
He’d always been inquisitive
about rune stones, but since he couldn’t decipher the characters, the carvings were nothing more to him than unusual patterns.

 
“Let’s go see if we can solve your mystery,” he said,
knowing that the outline of the
Sea-Snake,
sparkles of spray capturing the sunlight in tiny prisms around her,
would be forever burned on his mind.

*
  
*
  
*

 
As Rika and Bjorn climbed the little rise together,
she cast sideways glances at him. His face was pale
and strained. He looked like a man who expected to be
drowned in a bog in the morning.

 
At the top of the hill, they came to the stone. A ser
pent pattern writhed over the rock. Along the Snake’s
body, runic letters were carved in slashing strokes.
Rika wrinkled her forehead as she concentrated on the
lettering.

 
“What does it say?” Bjorn asked.

 
She touched the words as she voiced them. “Far-
Bjorn and Edmundr set up this stone for their brother,
Roald. He fared like a man after gold. Roald went far
into Aeifor and so gave food to the eagles.” Her finger
tips lingered on a group of slashes. “What does
Aeifor
mean?”

 
“Always fierce,” Bjorn said.

 
“
Roald went far into always fierce? That doesn’t make any sense.”

 
“It does if you’ve been down the Dnieper,” he said, the corners of his mouth tugging downward. “The Dv
ina is a pretty tame river, easy currents and shallow
banks. We’ll make good time
till
we come to the head
waters and have to portage. After we travel overland
to Kiev, we start down the Dnieper. And that river is another thing entirely.”

 
“How do you mean?”

 
“There are five cataracts between Kiev and the
Black Sea. And the largest one is Aeifor.” Bjorn shook
his head. “More white water than I’ve ever seen and rapids that end in a fall five times higher than a man’s head. If this Roald went into it, I think he did not come out.”