Maidensong (41 page)

“As the tree is ever green, may thy soul live forever refreshed,” Rika said as she laid her bough across
Helge’s body. The other mourners followed her exam
ple. “Behold thy soul’s boat, dear friend. May thy jour
ney between the worlds be swift.”

Rika nodded to Bjorn and he stepped forward with his torch to light the dry kindling beneath Helge’s body. The other pallbearers dropped their torches into
the coracle as well, to speed the burning. Bjorn untied
the craft and shoved it into the waves, where it bobbed and dipped, floating farther from the land. A
wind whipped over the sea and the flames roared upward, the licking fire assuring Helge’s soul of a speedy
passage.

“So now let us joyous be,” Rika said with tears
streaming down her cheeks. “For the soul blooms as
a fire flower. It takes wing as a bird. Our good friend
has gone and, if we too are worthy,
we shall meet her again in the Shining Lands, where there is no want of any good thing.” Rika wished she could believe the words coming out of her
mouth, but the deadness in her heart told her she did not. “So mote it be,” she whispered.

She watched the burning vessel
till
the last of its
blackened spars sank beneath the waves. When she
turned to go, Rika was stopped by a hand on her
shoulder. It was Bjorn’s friend, the little priest named
Dominic.

“May I add my poor prayer to your ceremony?” he asked respectfully.

Rika nodded, not sure what Helge would have made
of it, but she was intrigued enough to allow it.

Dominic bowed his head.

“Jesu, Lover of our souls,” he intoned. “We com
mend to your care the spirit of the woman Helge.
Judge her not by her deeds or her creed. None of us
will pass into Paradise by that measure. But with your own grace cover her and receive her, for all we poor
mortals can do is walk by the light we have received
and trust that the Judge of all the earth shall do
rightly.” Dominic raised his eyes and smiled. Then in
halting Norse he added, “So mote it be!”

Rika smiled back at him, her heart strangely lightened by his simple prayer. “So mote it be.”

As they walked back along the banks of the River Ly
cus to the home of Farouk-Azziz, Bjorn nudged Torvald in the ribs. “Did you see?”

“Ja,”
Torvald answered softly. “And we had better make our plans for tonight.”

Bjorn nodded.

Before the funeral party had left the harbor, on the distant swells of the Sea of Marmara, Bjorn and Tor
vald had recognized the shape and sail of the very ship
they’d hoped to see. The
Valkyrie
was returning to
Miklagard and would be tied up in the Golden Horn by nightfall.

Torvald left the house immediately after the ceremony
to meet the
Valkyrie
and forestall Ornolf. If the big balding Northman returned to the Arab’s house, the question of Rika’s conversion to Islam would be forced to a head and the noose around her would tighten all the more. Rika tried to accompany her father to the harbor, but Tariq stopped her at the big double doors.

“The master feels you should remain in seclusion for
a time,” Sultana’s eunuch said, “mourning being best
observed in privacy. He also requests you refrain from
riding as you have done of late. Since you are seeking
to acquaint yourself with our ways, I am surprised that
Al-Amin did not instruct you in the unseemly nature of
such behavior.”

By her side, Al-Amin bristled at this slighting remark on his mistress’s conduct.

“By the master’s orders, if you wish to go abroad in
the city, you will make use of a covered chair or a cart and driver in the future.” Tariq’s smile was oily and ingratiating. “I am considered a driver of exceptional
skill and my mistress wishes me to offer you my ser
vices in this regard.”

Rika thought she’d sooner mate with a snake.

Torvald hugged her briefly and whispered, “Don’t
despair. We’ll think of something.” His thin lips curved
into a shy smile as he added, “Daughter.”

He hadn’t dared call her that before.

Rika and Al-Amin retired to her chambers. She peeked from time to time from the window of the room that had become her prison and watched for some sign of Bjorn or her father.

Her father. How odd to think of Torvald like that
and yet he was. To honor Helge’s dying request, she’d
made peace with the old man.

Torvald had buried his face in his hands and wept. “
How can you forgive this old fool?
I’ll
never forgive
myself.”

“But I do,” Rika had assured him, wiping away tears of
her own. Helge had been right. That small hurt that
never quite went away was finally stilled. Magnus’s place in her heart had not dimmed one jot, but Rika
found that she also had room in it for this deeply repentant man as well.

The sun was already sinking when she saw Torvald return.

“Al-Amin, please go to the stables and see what my father has learned.”

“Mistress, I would not leave you alone.”

“I’ll bar the door and admit none but you,” she promised.

Rika paced and fretted until he returned. In furious
whispers, Al-Amin told her the plan that Bjorn had de
vised to get them all out of the house of Farouk-Azziz.

“But I do not like this, my lady,” he complained. “It is too risky.”

“Bjorn is right. We must go in stages,” she argued. “If we all tried to leave together it would surely cause
an uproar. There’s no other way to get us all out of this
house safely.”

Al-Amin stiffened into an erect posture. “Then I will stay behind, my lady.”

“No.” Rika’s eyes widened. “Farouk-Azziz will know
you have assisted in my escape.” From the time she’d
spent with the Arab, she knew he could be charming,
but beneath the polished exterior, a hardened core of
tempered steel was barely submerged. His wrath would be terrible.

“I would not leave you alone,” Al-Amin said. “How
can I trust your care to that barbarian?”

“That barbarian was entrusted with my safety for the long, weary journey here,” Rika assured him. She
thought of Bjorn leaping after her into Aeifor. No matter what, he’d see her free. Even if their plan failed
tonight, at least she’d die with him.

It was enough.

A short while later, she watched as Al-Amin and the little
priest led her horse to the big double doors.

“My mistress wishes me to sell it since she has dis
pleased the master by riding,” he explained to Tariq,
who continued to guard the entrance. “
If
you don’t let us pass immediately, the hostlers will have closed up
shop and the horse buyers will all be in their cups for the night.”

“And it takes two of you to sell a horse?”

Al-Amin rolled his eyes at the other eunuch. “I am
an accomplished rider as you well know, but
I’m
no
groom. The day I stop to shovel up horse manure in
the street is the day I curl up my toes.”

Tariq laughed and swung the doors open wide. Al-
Amin minced past Sultana’s eunuch with Dominic
leading the gelding after him.

“Two away,” Rika whispered. Three souls left.

*
  
*
  
*

Link boys cried in the streets, offering to light the
way for well-born traffic through the dark city for the
price of a small coin. Rika heard Torvald call to one of
the urchins in heavily accented Greek. She looked out
the window in time to see her father slip out the dou
ble doors. Tariq bolted them behind him. Even though
she stayed well in the shadows, she didn’t miss the direct glare the eunuch sent toward her window.

“
Three away,” she said softly.

*
  
*
  
*

 
“Rika, will you not eat?” Farouk entreated through her door.

“Not tonight.” She leaned against the portal, her heart hammering. “It is the custom of my people. I
must fast for my friend.” Despite Magnus’s teaching,
the lie came swiftly to her tongue. In the North, funer
als were as good an excuse as any for a people devoted
to food and drink. Feasting and drunken stupor were
more common than fasting to celebrate a life gone by. “
You must excuse me for a brief time.”

“Tariq tells me that Al-Amin has not returned,” Farouk
said. “Do you wish someone to attend you? Shall I
send one of the other eunuchs?”

“No,” she said. “I’m used to Al-Amin. He’ll be home
soon. Doubtless, he has had difficulty finding a buyer who will pay what the horse is worth, but I wanted to sell it immediately since I had
displeased you with it.”

“Thank you, my northern blossom. Your respect for
my wishes is commendable.” His voice was edged with
impatience. “But I want to share my new plans with
you this evening. Surely the servant’s death has already
occupied too much of your time. Can I not persuade
you to join me?”

A flicker of movement, a shadow wavered by the
crack at the bottom of the door. “Please honor my customs. Just for tonight,” she added placatingly. “I
couldn’t possibly be worthy company for you. And I wish to
give my full attention to your plans, but at another time, I beg you. Tomorrow, perhaps.”

“As you wish.” His tone told Rika that those words had not often passed his lips.

She pressed an ear against the door, holding her
breath, listening for his retreating footsteps. When she
was satisfied he was gone, she expelled all the air from
her lungs and wrapped her arms around herself to
still her tremors.

Rika propped a chair under the latch. Then she blew
out the lamp and sat in the gathering dark, waiting for the house to grow silent. Farouk-Azziz ordered music with his
nattmal,
and she squirmed through the squeals and twangs that his musicians produced. She
knew Al-Amin didn’t appreciate Norse songs, so it
didn’t surprise her that she found the Arab’s music just as incomprehensible.

She moved a chair to her window and positioned
herself to watch so she wouldn’t be seen. Tariq had been replaced by another of the eunuchs, but this
one looked no less formidable a guard. There had
always been someone at the big double doors, but to
day was the first time she’d been denied passage. Did
Farouk suspect something, or was he truly just con
cerned for her safety and reputation, as Tariq claimed?

The lamps went out in the master’s dining room and
a swaying candle lighted Farouk’s progress around the
veranda to his suite of rooms wrapped around the
stairwell. If only there was another staircase! The only
way from the third floor to the courtyard wound through the master’s apartments. Rika admitted to
herself that she’d been extremely lucky last night to
pass through them undetected. No doubt the Wailer’s
loud moaning had helped. Farouk-Azziz rarely asked
for the same woman two nights in a row, so Rika knew
she and her friends couldn’t count on that noisy dis
traction again.

Farouk’s many bed partners were nothing to her since she would never join their ranks. She wondered
how differently the Wailer’s sounds might affect a
woman who cared. Like the different perceptions about what made music, might the Wailer’s cries be
not a cause for amused indifference, but for despair?
The keeping of a concubine in the North was not unknown, but she never expected to encounter the situa
tion personally. Rika spared a moment to pity Sultana and the others. If any of them truly loved Farouk-Azziz
they must die nightly. How could a woman live like that?

The lamps in Farouk’s suite were extinguished. No sound but the nervous twitter of a few night birds and
the patter of the fountain came to her ears. Whoever
shared the master’s couch tonight was either less vocal
or less moved. She watched the empty courtyard, her body tensing, waiting for the signal to unbar her door.

The moon rose and trekked across the sky. Still there was no movement in the courtyard. Why had he not come? Bjorn had fought in battles. He’d led raids. No doubt he knew more about the timing of this sort
of thing, but waiting jangled her last fraz
zled nerve. She stopped knotting her fingers and
buried her face in her hands, near tears.