Come Back to Me (28 page)

"Easy… You were floating perfectly well until you thought to worry about it. The water will hold you up if you just let it."

"Don't go off and leave me like that again."

His mouth twitched at the corners. "All right, I won't. Ready?"

No, she wasn't, but there didn't seem to be much choice. She was on her back again, blinking at the sky, and she felt the moment when his hands withdrew. But this time she continued to float and after a while she even enjoyed it.

"Good," Dragon said with satisfaction. "Now we'll try it the other way."

"Other? But this is perfectly fine."

"You can't get anywhere lying on your back." His smile turned devilish. "Well, actually you can but perhaps this isn't the time to dwell on that. Take a deep breath."

"Why?"

Because her face was about to go straight into the water, that was why. When she came up sputtering, he was unrepentant. "Try again," he said.

"I don't want to." She too could be stubborn.

His sighed was rebuke enough. She filled her lungs, stuck her face in the damn water, and kept it there even when he took hold of her legs and stretched them out behind her. Amazingly, she did not sink.

While the sun kissed the western treetops, Rycca swam for the first time. She took only a few strokes to be sure but the delight she felt was great all the same.

"I did it! I actually swam!"

He stood, hands on his hips, the water lapping at his navel, and grinned. "You and the fish."

"You are a wonderful teacher."

The compliment surprised him. She could be such a bristly little thing, when she wasn't melting in his arms, and he knew he had forced her to do something against her will. He would have expected more stubborn opposition yet she behaved gracefully. It seemed she was relaxing just a little.

The sun was slanting below the western hills and a cooling breeze riffled the water. Inclined though Dragon was to linger there, when he saw his wife shiver he changed his mind.

They swam just a little longer, she too excited by the newness of it to notice the cold until it threatened to settle in her bones. Then, laughing, she went into his arms and stood obediently as he enveloped her in a length of linen and dried her briskly. When she was dressed again and somewhat warmer, she observed him as he pulled on clean trousers but did not bother with a tunic.

"Do you not feel the cold?" she asked, gathering up the linen, soap, and his discarded clothes.

"It is summer, sweetheart. There is no cold."

"Then I can scarcely imagine what winter must be like."

He touched a finger to the tip of her nose. "Don't be concerned. You will be wrapped in furs and snug by the fire." Drawing a little closer, he lowered his head near to hers. "The winter nights are very long. We will have to find some way to occupy ourselves."

He imagined her then, not wrapped in furs but lying upon them, her glorious skin rosy-hued in the light of glowing braziers and himself with naught to do through winter's night other than savor her. Truly, a man could ask for little more in this world and maybe in the next.

Yet even as they were climbing back up the hill, Dragon was reminded of his duties. Magnus met them near the crest, on the same side as the pond. He smiled apologetically to Rycca as he addressed his jarl.

"My lord, I am sorry to disturb you. The ship from Gaul you have been expecting has just put in."

"Any word on their cargo?"

"I did not speak to the captain directly but all appears in order."

"Good, then I will go at once." He turned to Rycca. "My dear, forgive me, I have been waiting months for this. Magnus, see my lady back. Oh, and, Rycca, tell Magda the captain and his men will be joining us at table. It is Paulo. Tell her that, she will know what he likes."

And he was gone, with the heady eagerness of a boy, hurrying off to whatever it was the ship had brought. She was left on the side of the hill with Magnus.

With her husband's most trusted lieutenant, Rycca reminded herself. Even so, she did not take the hand he offered, pretending not to notice it, but went up and over the hill alone, aware of him following along a few paces behind her yet disinclined to acknowledge his presence.

On the same side as the pond. That was where she had seen him first. Not coming over the crest of the hill as he would have had to were he just arriving from the town. But already there as though, perhaps, he had arrived a little sooner and lingered.

To watch them? The thought chilled her far more than had the cool water. Yet she realized how easily she might be doing the man a disservice by her suspicions. Distracted by Dragon—and when was she not?—she might easily have missed Magnus's appearance. He could be entirely innocent.

"Is something wrong, my lady?" he asked as, lengthening his stride, he came beside her.

She answered pleasantly yet held fast to her caution. "No, not at all. I am merely preoccupied."

"Of course, so much is new to you."

"Yes, it is, but everyone has been very kind."

"That is good to hear. If you have any problems, I would be happy to help in any way I can."

Lies.

The awareness rippled through Rycca as it always did, a darkling shadow that left her feeling vaguely ill. She darted a quick glance at Magnus and picked up her pace.

He looked utterly sincere, a man unblemished by the merest hint of deception or, indeed, of any complexity of character. His skin was smooth, his eyes untroubled. Perhaps that was why he looked so young, as though the world had not touched him as it had all others.

There was some fundamental wrongness in that but Rycca could not grasp it. She knew only that she was glad to see the town appear and gladder still when she was once more within the fortress walls.

She found Magda in the kitchens and told her the news. That set off a flurry of activity that quickly made Rycca forget all else.

RYCCA WOKE EARLIER THE NEXT DAY BUT only because she had set her mind to do so. Left to its own devices, her traitorous body would have remained sunk in languid sleep. Ignoring its protests, she bathed, dressed, and left the lodge. It was midmorning and everywhere she looked, people were busy with their tasks. She thought to seek out Magda but before she could do so, her attention was caught by a circle of men standing in front of the great hall.

She approached them cautiously, drawn by the excited rise of their voices but wary all the same. Far too much of her life had been spent avoiding men and their cruelties for her to go among them easily. Yet she had little choice for they were all much too big for her to see over them.

Slowly, she drew nearer, craning her neck. Whatever they were watching had them well pleased for they were cheering and shouting encouragement. The circle moved, expanding and contracting with the rhythm inside it. A space opened up between two warriors and suddenly she was able to see through to—

Dragon. Her husband… stripped bare to the waist his burnished skin stretched taut over powerful muscles, wielding a mighty sword as he—her stomach clenched— took on all comers. Man after man stepped up, exchanged blows that looked to her shocked eyes as though meant to kill, and yielded, good-naturedly, grudgingly, reluctantly but yielded all the same. Comments flew, advice to the combatants, speculation about the weapon, and still they came, man after man, testing the strength and skill of their jarl. And still he fought, on and on, never hesitating or seeming to weaken. Indeed, he gave every appearance of enjoying himself thoroughly.

She would never understand men, and that one in particular. They made a game of violence, as though terror and pain were not a single misstep away and lives did not hang in the balance. A deadly game played out with astounding skill, for even as she watched, the circle emptied of all save Dragon. No further man stepped up to challenge him.

He stood, the sword held straight in front of him, rock steady despite all his exertions, and turned fully around the ring of men. When still none stepped out, Dragon laughed and lowered his weapon.

"Damn those Moors, they make a fine sword."

"They do indeed," said Magnus. He separated himself from the circle and nodded to Dragon admiringly. "No wonder you were willing to wait so long for it."

"I would wait longer still to learn the secret of how they do it but they guard that well." Dragon lifted the weapon again and studied the edge of the blade. "Something to do with the folding of the metal, so I've heard."

"Secrets can be gotten at," Magnus said. He too eyed the weapon, covetously, Rycca thought. "You paid a king's ransom. For that, you might have bribed the right smithy."

Dragon laughed and clapped his lieutenant on the back. "Always the direct approach, isn't that right,
Magnus? Never mind that the Moors would come down on us in a fury, bar our drakars from their ports, and chop off the heads of any Viking so unfortunate as to appear before them."

"Then we would make war against them, lord. Are we not mighty enough?"

"Are we? They are many, we are few, yet we do well together when we respect their laws and ways. For me, that is enough."

Magnus said nothing more, but Rycca, watching him, saw the quick flash of derision that moved behind his eyes and knew her husband had missed it.

For he had, just then, seen her instead.

The smile he gave her held nothing of the deadly warrior and all the glee of a boy. "Rycca, come and see this! It is a sword from the Moors in Spain. They have a rare hand for the working of steel."

The circle parted. Men looked at her with guarded curiosity but were careful to move far enough away that none so much as brushed against her accidentally. She clamped down hard on her unease, pinned a smile to her lips, and stepped forward to greet her husband.

"So it seems, and you wield it well."

"It's impossible not to, for it is lighter than most such weapons and perfectly balanced." Without warning, he held it out to her. "Here, try it yourself."

She felt, not merely heard, the men gasp and knew how their thoughts must run. This was not done. A weapon of such worth was for men and only then for the very strongest among them. Yet he put it in the slender hands of an alien woman, one they had never glimpsed before the preceding day, who spoke only a smattering of their language, and who, rumor whispered, had not even wanted to wed their jarl.