The Temperate Warrior Read online

  Æsa couldn’t help but enjoy how he’d drawn his conclusion, the memory of him belaboring the point last night behind the longhouse flooding her brain. Her mind was like a sea sponge, absorbed with so many splendid thoughts. The feel of his strong hands taking hold of her body, pleasuring her. The sound of his sultry voice, whispering behind her ear as he demanded obedience, and the sweet torment of his velvety hard shaft penetrating her, over and over again. How could she ever tire of this man? He was the best thing that had ever come into her life and she thanked the gods for bringing him to her.

  It was hard to believe she would soon be his wife.

  Gustaf gazed into her eyes, his smile matching hers. “When will you learn that we are both connected here,” he said, laying his hand across her heart, “and here,” tapping his long thick finger at her temple.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled herself against his strong body. “Perhaps, if you covered my mouth and whispered the command in my ear, I might listen.”

  His hearty laughter vibrated through her entire being. “Even then you failed,” he proclaimed, swatting her backside. He reached up behind his head and gripped her wrists, pulling them down to his lips. He kissed the top of each hand and laid his forehead against hers. “I must admit, I enjoy when you fall short of obeying me.”

  “Is that so?”

  “More than you know, woman.” He took a deep breath as if to will his wanton thoughts away and stepped backward. “Have you tended to your morning ablutions?”

  “Nay.”

  “Come, I shall guard you as you do.” He took her hand and began to lead her out the back door.

  “Why the need to accompany me?”

  She heard him sigh as he tugged her outside. “Because it makes me feel better to know you are safe. Now, be quick about it.”

  “Or else?” she baited, adding an extra shimmy to her hips as she sauntered to the stream.

  He glared at her mildly. “Test not my patience lest you desire to feel the burn of my limited temperance on your backside.”

  ****

  Gustaf watched the alluring sway of her hips as she disappeared behind a bush. And what a lovely backside ‘tis.

  Drawing in another deep breath, he tried to calm the enormous longing he felt for her. She was a woman who could effortlessly stir him into a whirlwind of need and lust. He had to find a way to fight the temptation of ripping off her clothes and sinking deep inside her. She’d barely bat her eyes at him and he was possessed by her spell. He was a weak man for falling prey to her whims…and he loved every second he spent enthralled by her charm.

  But it was distracting him and, right now, he needed to be more alert than ever.

  “My lord,” Jørgen called, as he came up from behind.

  “Are we ready?” Gustaf asked.

  “The men await your command on the langskip. No sign of the others.”

  Gustaf understood Jørgen’s cryptic message pertaining to the unwanted guests and only nodded. “What is this?”

  Jørgen handed him a long woolen cloak. “Diðrik said you might need it. ’Twas his wife’s.”

  Gustaf inspected the garment, the large hood catching his eye. It had a cavernous cover, perfect for hiding Æsa’s fiery hair. He hated to conceal her beauty in such a rudimentary fashion, but it was for the best. If the vagrants were keeping a close surveillance on a redheaded female, then perhaps he could slip her passed their attention by veiling the one thing they’d be looking for.

  The fact that they held such a keen interest in Æsa ate at his heart. If he’d not been convinced by Jørgen to turn the longship around and come for her, they might have succeeded in whatever it was they conspired to do. Every muscle in his body tightened at the thought.

  “What is it, m’lord?” Jørgen asked, feeling his pain.

  Gustaf’s teeth clenched as he confided in his friend. “What if we had not returned when we did? What if—”

  Jørgen’s hand upon his shoulder stopped him from finishing. “It does the mind no good to think of the possibilities. We are here. And she is safe.”

  Jørgen’s wise words brought him comfort and he was thankful for his optimism. He smiled, reminding himself that she was indeed out of harm’s way with his protection. “I have asked Æsa to be my wife,” he confessed in haste, looking to Jørgen for counsel, if not his blessing.

  “‘Tis a good match, m’lord.”

  Gustaf agreed and crossed his arms to his chest, silently affirming his feelings toward her.

  “Her level of punctuality suits you.”

  Jørgen’s sarcasm roused a hearty laugh and he eventually felt the need to call her. When she didn’t respond, his heart sank instantly, the cold hand of dread wrapping around his throat.

  Gustaf bolted toward the stream and called her name again, the sound of his pounding heart in his ears. Jørgen was hot on his heels as they burst through the shrubbery, finding Æsa staring into the water.

  “Æsa,” Gustaf said in exasperation, whipping her around. “Why did you not answer me?”

  Her face was white, ashen in color like she’d seen a ghost; her eyes were wide with fear as she continued to stare into the water. As his heartbeat settled, he took great pains to quiet his voice. “What happened, Æsa? What has frightened you?”

  He shook her hard when she did not answer. “Æsa, speak!”

  Finally, she tore her gaze from the water and her frozen stare fell on him. “Are you certain you killed Ragnar?”

  Her question took Gustaf by complete surprise, confounded by her bizarre inquiry. He looked to Jørgen first, seeing that his friend’s befuddlement matched his own, and back toward Æsa. She gawked at him with alarming eyes. Her breathing so shallow, she’d soon pass out.

  He looked at her earnestly, squeezing her arms in a soothing manner before he testified the harrowing truth. “Ragnar is dead.” Images of the man gutted and dangling from his insides flashed in his mind. He cringed at hearing the man’s scream, but immediately blocked it out as soon as the shriek echoed in his ears. He swallowed hard, keeping the gruesome details to himself. “No man could survive. He is dead. I assure you.”

  She extended a shaky finger toward the water’s edge, her bottom lip quivering as she spoke. “His ring…there. ’Tis his.”

  Gustaf looked at the ground, but the first light of dawn had yet to break, making it difficult to see what she was referring to. Squinting his eyes, a glint of something shiny caught his attention. Tucked amid the soft mud of the stream’s rim was a silver ring. He squatted and picked it up, washing it off in the water until it became recognizable to him. It was encrusted with a pagan motif of intertwining beasts and one large ruby. Though he wished he hadn’t remembered, he vaguely recalled the ring on Ragnar’s finger as he hung stock-still in death. But how did it travel from Ragnar’s hand to this place? And how was it possible that Æsa would be the one to find it?

  Unless it was planted with that very purpose in mind.

  Gustaf jumped to his feet and searched into the surrounding landscape, his right hand readied on the hilt of his sword at his left. Jørgen did the same, as if he, too, had concluded that someone intended for her to find it.

  “If Ragnar is dead, how did his ring get here?” Æsa asked, her voice meek and strained. “Did you take it from him?”

  Gustaf abhorred her accusation. “I took naught from him but his life.”

  “Then how—”

  “I know not,” Gustaf interrupted her harshly, his heart in his throat. He pitched the ring back into the mud and threw the cloak over Æsa’s head, righting it until every strand of red hair was tucked into the hood. He clasped her hand in his and tugged her down the hill to his longship, his temperance gone. He would not play games with these vagrants. Whoever toyed with him and his beloved would surely die.

  ****

  Ásmundr came out of his hiding place and stooped to pick up his father’s ring, sliding it back on his right hand. Twisting it around his finger
, he smiled with unremorseful gratification.

  “You are a cruel man, m’lord,” Grimr said with praise.

  “I have only just begun, my friend.”

  “What do we do now?” Grimr asked, his apprehension registering in his voice.

  Ásmundr gave him a sideways glance. “Why we follow them, of course.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Gustaf gripped the steerboard of his ship, white knuckling the wood with a vengeance. Having Æsa safely aboard his longship gave him a temporary sense of relief, but it did little to ease his afflicted soul.

  Whoever was playing mind games with him, made it personal. They’d targeted the one precious thing in his life, the woman he’d die to protect. If they thought they could get to her easily and without a fight, they were sorely mistaken.

  With his steely gaze onward, he continued to navigate his ship east toward Skíringssalr. His men rowed with as much determination in their backs and arms as he had in his racing heart. If he could get to familiar land, he’d have a better chance of keeping Æsa secure and gaining the upper hand. Right now, he felt like a pawn; his every move calculated by his foes before he made it. He wasn’t used to being the prey, nor did he care for the way he was forced on the defensive. Before this was over, they would pay.

  Further out to sea, Gustaf gave the order to erect the mast and rig the sail. His men worked in unison, each man performing their task as if it’d been ingrained in them since birth. Within moments, the longship caught a strong, advantageous wind. The square woolen fabric billowed from the gust of ocean air, the ropes creaking and stretching under pressure. Gustaf’s longship skated through the water at about three knots.

  For the first time since he’d departed the shores of Skúvoy, he breathed a little easier. The brisk salty air blew his hair in all directions and almost whipped his wolf-skin cloak off his shoulders, reminding him of his Æsa. She hadn’t much meat on her bones and the woolen cloak Diðrik had given her was more for disguise than warmth.

  Gustaf walked across the planks where Æsa sat in silence, a few wild strands of hair escaping her hood. He tucked them back into place and pulled the cloak tighter at her chin, shielding her from the brunt of the breeze. Still concerned about her warmth, he removed his own wolf-skin cloak and wrapped it around her shoulders.

  She barely acknowledged him and the abnormality of her silence was deafening. He turned her face in his direction, forcing her to look at him. “Are you all right?”

  Tears welled up in her eyes and he could feel her body tremble, though he suspected it had nothing to do with the chill in the wind. “How did Ragnar’s ring…” She lost all gumption to finish her question, the pain of her past rearing like a volatile stallion.

  It brought him great discomfort to imagine what she’d endured under Ragnar’s control. Like pine needles in his breeches, the thought caused him to fidget; the notion of that bastard hurting one hair on his Æsa’s head infuriated him.

  “I know not how or why,” he muttered solemnly. If anyone knew Ragnar or those he kept company with, it was her. That very concept prompted a whole new range of emotions within him, from torrid jealousy to fuming rage.

  He tamped them all down and unclenched the fists he realized he’d clamped together, and sat beside her. “You know Ragnar better than anyone.” The taste of that statement was bitter on his tongue, yet he continued. “Was there anyone close to him who would want to avenge him? A brother? A son?”

  Æsa flinched and drew her eyes away from him as though he’d struck her. “He had a son…Ásmundr.” She tensed and bit her lip.

  Though he loathed to know about the men from her past, he encouraged her to speak. “You can tell me. Nothing you say will change how I feel about you, Æsa. Please, let me help you.”

  She closed her eyes and hugged herself, a tear skimming down her cheek. “He had a son, but they hated each other. Ásmundr admitted to me once that he wanted to kill his father. I doubt he would bother to avenge him. All he cared about was getting his hands on his father’s hoard of buried silver.”

  “What silver?” Gustaf asked flippantly.

  “The silver that—” Æsa stopped herself and gazed at him sympathetically.

  “The silver paid to those who killed my father,” Gustaf finished for her.

  “Aye.”

  Gustaf filled his lungs with a deep breath and took hold of her hands. “Now Ásmundr can obtain what he wants with his father out of the way. I did the man a favor, I suppose.”

  She stared at his thumb brushing along the top of her hand. “He is dead.”

  “Ásmundr?”

  She nodded, refusing to look at him. “Ragnar had him killed.”

  Gustaf’s stomach grew nauseous with each twist and turn of this convoluted story, knowing his Æsa might have played some part in it. Truth be told, he would have rather her end the tale right now with Ásmundr dead and no real reason for how Ragnar’s ring came to be, putting them back to the beginning.

  As trying as this was, he reminded himself that her past was precedent to their relationship, and anything that happened between her and another man would have to be overlooked. It was not easy to imagine another man in love with her, or not be envious. This time he couldn’t bring himself to ask.

  …Until he looked up and saw Æsa crying, her silent sobs wracking her entire body. Moved with pity, he pulled her into his arms and held her close, trying to comfort her, though he didn’t know what for. Was she this deeply saddened by Ásmundr’s death? Had she once loved him?

  As if she could read his mind, she confessed her feelings. “I hated Ásmundr. I hated what he did to me and how it pleased him to see his father walk in on us.”

  Gustaf’s blood scorched through his veins, his arms tensing around her in a desperate need to protect her. “He forced himself on you?”

  She buried her face in his neck and sobbed. “I fought him as best I could, but he was too strong. I pleaded with him to stop, but—”

  He could bear no more. He shushed and rocked her, holding her sobbing body to his chest, glad she could not see his face. The fury he could feel flaming his neck and prickling his scalp was probably boiling out his pores. His teeth felt like they would crumble under the force of his clenched jaw and his fists itched to pommel something in the ground. Someone. Someone like a yellow-bellied snake named Ásmundr.

  Odin’s teeth, he wished the bastard was still alive so he could hunt him down, castrate him on the spot, and stuff his balls down his throat. No matter how good it would make him feel, the two men who’d brutally defiled his Æsa were already food for worms. And it didn’t explain who could possibly be after her now.

  He raised his head to the heavens and let the strong winds blow through his hair, cooling his face, his temper. Gentling his hands, he took her head in his palms. “Do you know where the silver is buried?”

  She trembled in his grasp. “I do, but I was not to know its whereabouts. I overheard Ragnar speak of it.”

  Realization struck him like a battle-ax to the head. “Then someone else knew you eavesdropped, Æsa. Think.”

  “Ásmundr was the only one who knew of my offense. Unless…”

  “Unless what?”

  “Unless he told someone before his father had him killed.”

  Gustaf held his irritation in check. “You are certain Ásmundr is dead?”

  Æsa nodded emphatically. “The mercenary Ragnar paid to kill him returned a few moons later, claiming he’d slit his throat and burned the body. As proof, he brought back Ásmundr’s burnt head in a basket. I did not see his face, but Ragnar was…very pleased.”

  By the look on Æsa’s face, Gustaf knew Ragnar had probably commemorated the death of his son with a celebratory—

  He couldn’t finish that thought. It sickened him to the point of vomiting over the side of the boat.

  “My lord,” Jørgen interrupted. “We have stragglers afloat.”

  Gustaf stood and walked toward the rear of the shi
p, his curiosity rising like the pressure in his arteries. Could this day get any worse?

  Trailing far behind, a single longship struggled to keep up. Æsa joined him, her eyes glued to the mysterious vessel following them. Weary and wind-blown, she grasped the stern. “Who are they?”

  “I suspect the person whom Ásmundr shared your secret with before he died. Clearly, you are in search of the buried silver and they are hoping you will lead them to it.”

  “But I am not,” she stated plainly.

  “No harm in letting them think otherwise.” Gustaf felt the tides turn in his favor. For the nonce, he could revel in their foolishness. He almost enjoyed their idiotic plan to tag along the raging bear like newborn ducks—as if he wouldn’t notice.

  “Where is the silver?” Snorri asked, prying into the conversation.

  An awkward silence hushed across the hull of the ship, every man looking between him and Æsa. Gustaf didn’t want to know where the blood money was buried, nor did he want to even think about the price Harold ‘the Fairhair’ had issued for his father’s life. Gustaf’s pride for his father’s name and what he’d died for cut the discussion short.

  “I care not where ‘tis hidden,” he said sternly. “Our only thoughts should be on how to lead them into an ambush.”

  “You are going to kill them?” Æsa asked as if appalled by the thought.

  “If these men are anything like Ragnar and Ásmundr…I can assure you they will not stop until they have what they want.”

  He noted how pale and lifeless she looked, his words about the two men who’d inflicted pain on her for pleasure no doubt lingering in her mind. He reached for her and pulled her into his arms. Gazing into her eyes, he saw a glimpse of her hideous past. The fear, the agony, and the shame she felt all those years threatened to erupt before him and he’d be damned if he let them destroy the woman she’d become.

  “As long as my heart beats, my dearest Æsa, they will not get to you.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Gustaf wasted no time leaping from his longship into the shallow waters of Skíringssalr’s shoreline, just west of the abandoned trading port along Oslofjord. Arms extended, he helped Æsa from the side, carrying her through the knee-high water to the dry land of its beach. Turning back, he assisted his men in unloading the few chests of belongings they brought with them until the entire ship was bare. Each man was now donned with their leather armor and conical helmets, and a round, colorful shield strapped to their back.