Chapter Three

“Naiad, (from Greek naiein, “to flow”), in Greek mythology, one of the nymphs of flowing water—springs, rivers, fountains, lakes. The Naiads, appropriately in their relation to freshwater, were represented as beautiful, lighthearted, and beneficent.” 
Britannica.com

In three strides, Erik dropped from the bank into the pool, catching the woman who was spluttering. Thankfully, the spring that the local people had been visiting all morning was shallow and not fast flowing.

Erik steadied her by the shoulders so she could get her feet under her. The wobbling rocks on the stream’s bottom added a challenge. “Are you hurt?” he asked in English, helping her slosh back to the bank where she’d crouched, holding what looked like a fertility doll.

Was she one of the brides who’d brought the other dolls? Her husband still with the warriors in Orkney? He’d thought she might be the Sinclair sister after seeing her walk with Bàs Sinclair and his wife on the path.

“I am sodden,” the woman said, her syllables snapping like little bolts of lightning.

Erik stood to his full height and lifted her onto the bank, following her out of the refreshing pool. She gazed down at her bodice and skirts that dripped spring water and tsked.

He squeezed the water from the edge of his tunic. There was no helping his dripping trousers, which would need to dry on his legs. “When I saw you in the forest the first time,” he said, “I’d thought you were from the race of wood fae, a dryad perhaps or the goddess Freya, but two of the three times I’ve seen you, you’re covered with water.” He stared into her large blue eyes where a couple droplets clung to her long lashes. “Perhaps you are actually a naiad, a water sprite.”

Her gently arched brows narrowed even though her lush lips seemed close to smiling. “I am neither, sir. Today you surprised me. I blame you for making me wet.”

I made her wet? Erik kept the lines of his face neutral.

Her cheeks flushed immediately upon her words. So…she realized how improper that sounded. Perhaps she was married then, to a man who made her wet with passion? The thought tightened his gut and his loins.

She threw out a hand toward his perch. “You were hiding in a tree.” Her tone was sharp with accusation.

“I was observing in a tree your…customs here in Scotia. Leaving bits and dolls by this sacred spring.” He leaned over the water, fishing out the wreath of purple and yellow flowers that had fallen from her head. Shaking off the water droplets, he handed it back to her.

When she took it, he saw a gold ring on one of her slender fingers, another indication she might be married. The Sinclair sister was unwed. “Where is your husband that he would leave you alone when you are obviously prone to drowning?”

“I am not prone to drowning.” She sniffed, placing the wreath back on her head, weaving a few curls around it to hold it in place.

“And your husband? Where is he?” He caught her hand, sliding his thumb over the gold band.

Snatching her hand back, she looked at him. “I…” She looked away and sniffed, blinking as if tears threatened, and her face pinched with sadness. “I have no husband. Now anyway.”

So, she was a widow, still mourning her dead husband. She hadn’t seemed sad, only thoughtful at the well. He studied her youthful beauty, the expressive movements of her smooth face. “You still wear a ring.”

She kissed the ring but answered him only with a terse tone. “I do not like being surprised by a stranger who’s been observing me.” Despite her slender appearance, she was a warrior, this woman, not some meek girl who swooned easily.

Erik had seen her beauty when she’d smiled with unguarded friendliness while greeting her neighbors. But the indignant flash of fire he saw in her gaze drew him even more. The woman had courage to stand up to him when others cringed under his gaze. He was scarred and battle-honed, obviously deadly. Usually, he didn’t mind frightening people, letting them assume he killed without much consideration. But he didn’t want this courageous woman to fear him.

He tried to smile. “I am Erik, Erik Halverson from Norway, here with my three friends to trade silver for your thick wool that repels water.”

His gaze slid down her wet front. The wool didn’t cling like her linen smock, but the woman’s sleek curves were still obvious. “I believe you’re dry under your costume since ’tis made from the soft wool we seek.” Unless she was wet between her legs from a carnal heat. Just the thought made his jack twitch, and he hoped it would behave. It was particularly unruly with his forced abstinence on mission.

Her head tilted to the side as she studied his face. “You don’t do that often, do you?”

For a moment, his gut tightened. Bed women? Was she asking him if he bed women often? “Do…what exactly?”

“Smile,” she said, showing her own teeth, and pointed at his mouth. “’Twas more like a snarling wolf maw.”

He relaxed his lips, clearing his throat. “I suppose I don’t have reason to smile often.”

She pulled her skirts out from her and then her bodice, as if seeing if her skin was wet, and tutted. “There is always a reason to smile.” She tipped her face to the sky. “Perhaps not the sky today, but the flowers and the fresh breezes, the birds.” She shrugged. “Happiness is a choice and finding things to smile over as well.”

“You are wise, Lady…?” he said.

“Hannah.”

The name caught his breath, his pulse giving a jolt. “Hannah Sinclair?” Hannah was a common name, and she lived with the Sinclairs. “Sister of the infamous Four Sinclair Horsemen?” Maybe the information from the Danish court was incorrect, and the sister had married, even if briefly. He waited, his entire body tight, including his fists that had curled at his sides.

“We are almost all Sinclairs here,” she replied with a shrug that ended with a shake of her head. “Cousins are thick in the streets of Girnigoe.”

“Hannah,” he said. “’Tis a…lovely name.” Had he ever said someone had a lovely name before?

“Hannah is a common name in Scotland.”

They began to walk down the heavily rooted path while Erik weighed his evidence for thinking she lied. The fact that he’d seen her walking with the girls into Girnigoe Castle, and her name was Hannah, both flagged her refusal as a lie. But Dowager-Queen Sophie had assured him the sister was a maiden, unmarried.

“Have you been attacked by pirates?” she asked suddenly. “Do they attack your ship for the silver you carry?”

“Nay.”

She touched a fingertip along her own cheek as if tracing his face. “Your scars. They mark you as a warrior, not a trader.” She didn’t tremble or glance around furtively. Only curiosity bent her brow.

“I’ve been called to defend the border between Sweden and Norway on occasion.”

“By Dowager-Queen Sophie or her son?”

Erik’s brows rose. The woman kept up with world politics. “Her son’s advisors and regents.”

Hannah looked off into the woods. “That’s right, the poor woman had all her power taken from her when her husband died.”

Oh, Sophie of Denmark still held a huge amount of power, which she wielded expertly, even over Erik. “Do not mourn for her,” he said, his familiar scowl back. “She is not hurting in any way.”

Hannah squeezed her skirts. “I must change before the festival,” she said, hurrying down the path.

Erik easily kept up, stepping behind Hannah when the path was too narrow. “I saw you leave a fertility doll at the well,” he said. “Do you wish for a child?”

She tripped on a high-reaching exposed root, and he caught her arm to keep her from tumbling down the steep trail. She adjusted her balance, letting him assist her. “That is not something I talk about with strangers.”

“I’m not a stranger,” he said, stepping downhill. If she fell again, he’d be in a better position to stop her. “I saved you from the spring. In some kingdoms, you would owe me your life for that.”

She snorted. Even that noise enticed him, or perhaps it was the relaxed courage she showed around him. Women usually scurried out from under his gaze unless they were brazen and came to his bed. Hannah, on the other hand, didn’t seem afraid of him.

“You want a child.”

“I have no husband,” she said. “I don’t have a way to become with child. Not honorably anyway.”

“Perhaps that’s why you hid the doll until everyone left.”

She stared hard at him. “You were spying on me,” she said with a look very much like the scalding one she’d given him when she’d leveled an arrow at his chest. “Not just observing our customs.”

“I thought that was clear.”

She blinked, anger reddening her cheeks. She glanced back up the slope. “You waited in the tree until I was alone.” She backed up.

He exhaled, showing his palms, although he had half a dozen weapons on him. “I mean you no harm, Hannah. I followed the procession up here to see the sacred spring and stayed when I saw you coming up the path, hiding in the tree so as not to disturb you, and I waited.”

“Why?”

What could he say that wouldn’t make him sound like a poacher of women? Why had he waited until she was alone to lower from the tree? “To apologize,” he said, although his friends would laugh. Erik Halverson never apologized and never surrendered.

She tipped her head to one side. “Go ahead.”

He frowned. “I apologize for frightening you the other day at your cabin. ’Twas not my intent.”

“You were intent on taking down a stag for the Harvest Festival,” she said, repeating the explanation he’d given. She tried to step around him to continue down the path, but he blocked her way.

“Aye, like I said.”

She tipped her head, studying him. “You were hunting a stag with your sword.” She indicated the long double-edged sword sheathed at his side. “And without a horse.” She shook her head. “Do you just run down a stag, leaping upon its back to slice him with your sword?” She drew a line with her finger across her throat.

Even with all the chaos of being soaked and nearly naked, with a squirrel clutching her head and the cabin on fire, the woman had realized his explanation was flimsy at best. He met her challenging eyes. “I was exploring.”

They stared at each other for a long moment, Erik directly in her path. Erik was known for keeping his secrets, not letting people in, and yet he felt like she was sliding under his layers of armor, nimbly seeking truth.

“I accept your apology,” she said brusquely, and he stepped to the side. She gave a wry grin and continued her quick march down the path.

They walked in silence for several minutes. The sun broke through the clouds and canopy of leaves to land on her hair like sundrops. Despite falling into the spring, she moved with grace, holding her wet skirts out from her legs so they wouldn’t drag in the dirt. Gathering them, she squeezed the wool and shook it.

“So,” he said, “you aren’t the sister of the Four Sinclair Horsemen?”

She didn’t answer.

“And you want a child but don’t have a husband and want to retain your honor. Perhaps, you wish to become with child through the Holy Spirit.”

Hannah stopped and turned to him again, her mouth open, aghast at his sacrilege. Erik found that he liked saying things that made her stop and stare at him, especially if her mouth opened. “I…” she stammered, “I wish no such thing. ’Twould be inappropriate, devilish even.”

“Would it be better to wish to get with child with a man out of marriage?”

She put her hands on her slim hips, almost like the wee girl yesterday named Libby. “You are practically a stranger, Erik Halverson, and yet you ask me the most personal, outrageous things. When you attack people with wildly inappropriate questions—”

“I have insulted you,” he said and tried to look sorry for it.

“Me, God…” She threw an arm out to the woods. “Anyone listening. We are all insulted.”

“There is no one listening,” he said and then realized how threatening that could sound. But Hannah seemed without care that she was alone in the woods with a strange man who could easily abscond with her.

She poked his chest with one finger, the nail clean and nicely filed. “That doesn’t make your words any less rude.” She crossed her arms again, scowling at him. “God and I are insulted and angry.”

“You speak for God?” His brow rose.

“Are you trying to anger me?”

He almost smiled at her wide eyes that looked innocent when he suspected she carried a blade on her and was tempted to stab him.

“I apologize again,” he said, wondering what Nial would say if he could hear him. Two apologies in one day from the man who never gave in. “For insulting you and God.”

“Hmph,” she said. “Very well.” She flapped her hand at him and started walking again. “People will dislike you regardless of the quality of your silver, Master Halverson, if you ask outrageous things. A better tactic is to ask mild questions first and then move forward with your quest for information if you must. When you push hard, people become obstinate, but if you acquiesce, they listen. Like I did back there on the trail.”

He glanced the way they’d walked. “You acquiesced?”

“Yes,” she said. “You wouldn’t step out of my path until I accepted your apology. ’Tis basic human strategy.”

“Another word for acquiesce is surrender,” he said. “Which I do not.”

She looked sideways at him as she shook her damp skirts again, letting the wind catch the soggy wool. “Call it what you want, but taking a step back instead of stubbornly forcing people and happenings around you works better in many situations.” She stopped again. “Do you know the tale about the wind making a wager with the sun?”

The woman was intriguing, clever, and brave. Even if he’d heard the tale, he’d have said he hadn’t just to hear her retell it. “Nay.”

She spoke as she began to walk again. “The wind made a wager with the sun one day that he was stronger, because he was blustery and forceful while the sun merely sat in the sky. The sun looked down at a man walking on a road while wearing a jacket. The sun said, “I wager that I can get that jacket off the man while you cannot. The wind laughed.”

She flipped her hand, smiling at him. “As wind can do in my tale as much as a sun can talk and wager.”

“Of course,” Erik said, enthralled by the musical quality of her voice and the expressive way her hands moved while she told the tale. The glint of her old wedding ring made him wonder how much she mourned her lost husband.

“The wind said,” she continued, “I will have his jacket off in no time. And he huffed and blew huge gusts at the man, trying with all his might to tug the jacket off. But the man held tighter, never letting go, as he bent his head into the wind and continued his journey. Finally, the wind gave up. He said, you, Sun, will not be able to get his jacket off, either. But the sun smiled—”

“As a sun can do in a tale,” he added.

“Of course.” She smiled, although she looked ahead as they continued to walk, holding out her skirts that dragged through the tall grass.

“So, the sun began to shine brightly on the man, its rays heating him. And…the man took off his jacket.”

She turned a bright smile on Erik, and he nearly tripped over a hummock at the beauty in her features. Hannah was lovely, but when she smiled, really smiled, she rivaled a goddess with her wide blue eyes filled with laughter.

“The sun won the wager,” she said, “because he didn’t force the man to take off his jacket. He warmed him, and the man did what the sun wanted him to do.”

The day had brightened overhead, and he steadied her arm as she stepped over a narrow creek that cut through the grass and wildflowers. She didn’t pull away. “So you see,” she said, “victory is not always won with force.”

“An interesting notion.” He inclined his head to her.

“When you are a sometimes-warrior,” she said, casting a glance at him although her face remained straight ahead, “you should remember that. And as a trader of goods, you must be more subtle in your confrontations.”

“Acquiesce?”

“When ’tis called for.”

They’d reached the moor that led down to the village that sprawled before Girnigoe Castle on the sea. Erik had the overwhelming desire to see Hannah again, listen to her tales, and maybe catch one of her bright smiles.

He cleared his throat. “There is a festival outside the village today?”

“Yes,” she said. “Lunastain, our harvest festival.” A gust of wind blew, and she reached up to hold her flower wreath on her head. “There will be competitions of strength and agility and then we will have fires and feasting when the sun goes down.”

Erik had already planned to go, trying to learn everything he could about the target of his mission. “I will attend.” Maybe Bàs Sinclair would drink heavily and foolishly recount how he’d do anything for his sister, who Erik still must locate if this woman wasn’t she.

…

Erik Halverson is the one.

Hannah paced across the floor of her bedchamber. The man was ruggedly handsome with just the right number of scars to show he battled but often won. Although, she hadn’t yet seen him without his tunic. Perhaps, he would take it off while competing that afternoon. Either way, Hannah had seen the man’s muscles straining within his sleeves, and he’d lifted her out of the water like she weighed nothing. And the way he’d looked at her, his deep blue eyes meeting her gaze without glancing away, it caught her breath.

“Hannah…’tis a lovely name,” she repeated his words from their walk. And he’d waited in a tree to catch her alone. He said it was to apologize, but he could have waited to see her in the village or at the festival.

She pressed a hand against her lower than usual neckline and felt her heart thumping with giddy excitement. I’ll seduce him. Tonight, at the festival. She would have a chance of getting with child. There would be no evidence for months after Erik was safely back in Norway without a way for her vengeful brothers to find and kill him.

“He’s the one,” she whispered, lifting her breasts in the bodice so that they swelled a bit over the edge. She didn’t have an overly full bosom, but there was enough to rise above a tightened set of stays.

Just the thought of Erik touching her breasts made them feel fuller, and the sensation of warmth spread in her abdomen and lower until she shifted against the heat blooming in the crux of her legs. She pressed there through her skirts for a moment, trying to rid herself of the ache.

Hannah examined the blue, laced bodice in the polished glass. She’d embroidered it with flowers and birds with white thread. The motif ran along the curved bottom of the bodice too, accentuating the rise of each hip and the deep V in front that pointed down into the layers of blue skirts. She’d spent extra time on her hair, replacing the soggy wreath with a new one that Libby and Trix had made for her. The two girls seemed to want Hannah to find a suitor, making Hannah wonder if their adopted mother, Cait, had said something to them about pitying their aunt.

“I’m done being pitied,” Hannah said to her reflection. All her life she’d been expected to stay quiet and out of the way, like a mouse that no one was to notice. But her father was no more, and her brothers were married. It was her time to shine and be noticed. Starting today. And if she became with child and people whispered about her, so be it. At least they wouldn’t think she was a meek mouse anymore. It was now or never at nearly twenty-nine years old.

Hannah dabbed a bit of red-hued beeswax on her lips but didn’t bother to add it to her already blushing cheeks. She grabbed up her bow and quiver of arrows from the bed. She’d been practicing with Ella and Shana and planned to compete in the contest. It gave her a perfect reason for being out in the fields where the warriors were competing. She’d be sure to happen upon Erik there.

Hurrying down the steps, she strode through the archway into the great hall of Girnigoe Castle. Kára stood wearing the trousers she used to wear on Orkney Isle when she was the leader of her people. “Thank you, Osk,” Kára said to her tall, thin brother who was holding Kára’s two-year-old son, Adam. “He’ll have more fun with you today, especially with me taking care of the girls.” She smiled down at the two infants in the large basket at her feet.

“We’ll have fun, won’t we?” Osk said, tossing the boy slightly in his arms. The child laughed.

Osk turned to see Hannah and stopped, his eyes widening along with his grin. “Good day, Lady Hannah,” he said. “You look…quite fetching.” He glanced around as if he thought Bàs might be near, but the rest of the hall was empty. He met Hannah’s gaze, his brow rising. “Very fetching.”

Kára smiled at her. “What a lovely gown on you. I haven’t seen it before.”

That was because Hannah hadn’t had a reason before to wear something that might attract a man. She smiled back. “It was my mother’s. I adjusted it to my taller height.” She pointed to the wide darker blue ribbon sewn around the bottom of the skirt.

“And the embroidery?” Kára asked, rocking the basket a bit with one foot as the bairns began to make soft waking noises.

“I’ve been working on it a little at a time,” Hannah said, smoothing her fingers over the stitches along her low neckline.

She noticed Osk followed her fingers. With Adam on his hip, he offered Hannah his open arm. “May I escort you out to the target field?” He nodded to her bow.

Hannah looked at the bairns in the basket. “I should help Kára with Alice and Astrid.”

“Oh, go ahead,” Kára said, using muscle to lift the basket, carrying it to the hearth where a cheery fire flickered. “These two need to nurse before we go out.”

Hannah lifted the front of her skirt and took Osk’s free arm. “Well then, thank you, Master Osk.” With wee Adam in one arm and her on the other, they looked like a young couple stepping out to enjoy the festival. She could almost imagine Erik there on her arm, their first bairn in his other.

Her smile faltered. I merely need his seed. She blushed thinking it and pushed the happy family image from her mind. She didn’t have time for courting and wedding.

The August air was warm, and the sun beamed down, casting cloud shadows that raced across the moor above the village. The men who’d returned from Orkney and those of Clans Sutherland, Gunn, and Oliphant gathered in small groups near the various competitions. There was archery, sparring with weapons, caber toss, dagger throwing, and stone tossing. Hannah scanned the groups, seeing Bàs among the warriors. His large arm gestures, along with the shaking heads and occasional laughter, showed he was telling tales of the battles on Orkney to take Robert Stewart into custody for King James of Scotland. She didn’t see Erik Halverson nor his Norwegian friends.

“Lady Hannah,” Kenneth Sutherland, Ella’s father, greeted her. His gaze shifted to Osk. “And Masters Adam and Osk.”

Osk’s gaze was on Bàs. “I think Adam and I will go listen to some tales of my homeland.”

Osk carried the unbreeched lad away on his arm, and Hannah turned back to Kenneth. “Are you helping organize the games today?” she asked.

“Aye. With so many Sinclair men still on Orkney, I volunteered to help.”

“So kind of you.” She smiled broadly at the older man in spectacles. After Ella left the Sutherlands to marry Cain, Ella’s younger brother became the chief, with Kenneth advising him every step of the way.

“Could I ask ye, milady, if ye could help with the awards?” Kenneth said. “The winner of each competition receives a silver penny and a blue ribbon they can tie around their upper arm. Instead of me fastening the ribbon on…” He waved one of the bright blue ribbons. “’Twould be more festive if a bonny lass did the honors.”

She smiled and gave a little nod. “I can tie.”

His brows rose high over his spectacles. “And a kiss for the winner will make it extra special.”

Hannah laughed. “Will they want a kiss from you, Master Kenneth?”

His kind face crinkled with humor. “Not likely, but from ye…I’m sure to get more men signing up to compete.”

She smiled broadly at his flattery and gave a small nod. “Very well,” she said, wondering if Aunt Merida had implied to Kenneth that Hannah needed some male attention. The two spent a suspiciously large amount of time together.

Kenneth clapped his hands together. “Thank ye, Lady Hannah.” The loud crack made several people turn his way, and he looked out toward them.

“Lady Hannah Sinclair will give the winner of each competition a silver penny, a blue ribbon, and a kiss!”

A small volley of cheers rose, and Hannah felt the heat wash up her neck to her cheeks. Bloody hell. What have I done? Erik would find out very quickly that she’d lied earlier, that she wasn’t a widow from town. She glanced out at the field, back toward the village below, and her breath caught.

A murmur replaced the cheers as people turned to watch four men striding up the hill, four broad, tall men with blond hair. Men who did not look anything like simple silver traders. Not with muscles to rival her brothers’ and intentional pigment marks on two of their faces, swords at their sides. These weren’t traders.

They were warriors, and Erik Halverson led their advance.