A SCREAM ROSE TO HER LIPS.
Somehow, with the same lightning-fast reflexes that had saved her from falling off the wall, the invader guessed her intent and clapped a mighty hand over her mouth to stifle it.
“Quiet.” Speaking a halting Saxon tongue, he growled the word low into her ear as he tugged her back against his chest and drew her to her feet in front of him. “You do not want your men to fire upon you in their haste to kill me, do you?”
Her heart pounded so hard she felt dizzy and lightheaded with it. She would have fallen to her knees if not for one thick arm pressed to her waist and the other pinning her shoulders. Her impressions of him were disjointed, it had all happened so fast. He was big even for a barbarian. Broad in the chest, thick in the arms. But his hair was dark like a Saxon’s. It was his size and blue eyes that marked him for a Dane. That and his absurd manner of dress—the cross-gartered braies and the cut of the heavy fur cloak that swung carelessly down his back.
He moved with her now, this nameless wall of muscle, pushing her toward the most remote stretch of the parapets.
Unbidden, her hands reached to pull his fingers off her mouth. She dragged her feet and scratched him, desperate to be free. He would take her captive. Abuse her. Pass her along to his men. Her belly clenched and she thought she would be sick.
“Be still,” he commanded softly, swinging one leg over the castle wall as if he would kill them both by jumping to the beach. However, he paid no heed to her efforts to free herself. She would have never guessed he even noticed them if not for the quiet order in her ear.
Now, he lifted her in his arms to cradle her like a child while he clambered down a crumbled staircase that led to an outer bailey. She’d forgotten this passage off the wall even existed, but then it had been in disrepair ever since she’d arrived here as a girl. The Dane must be mad to tread his heavy foot upon such faulty stonework.
Praying fervently someone would notice them before he escaped the keep all together, Gwendolyn rubbed the back of her head along his arm while he climbed, hoping she could free some of her veil to float in the breeze like a silken flag. Perhaps the jewels and the color would catch someone’s attention as they descended onto the ground floor of the castle.
When that did not work, she twisted her head hard to one side. Escaping his confining hand, she screamed. Far better to risk one of Alchere’s archers shooting her in the leg than to submit peacefully to a heathen who would brutalize her.
“Son of a swine!” she shouted, her mind blank of better insults in the face of her fear. “Rot in Hades, you sheep-loving maggot!”
Too soon, he replaced his hand over her mouth and bent low to speak in her ear.
“There is no one.” The heavy accent of his homeland made his words difficult to distinguish even though he spoke a Saxon language for her sake. “The lord of the keep is too busy flexing his might on the southern side to spare a man for the north. He is a strong fighter and a stupid tactician.”
Was it true?
Sweet, merciful heaven, it must be. How else would this iron-fisted demon be able to breach the fortifications? Why did no one come when she’d called? The heathen moved quiet as a cat, even with her in his arms. Panic bubbled higher.
This time, she bit his hand to free her mouth.
“Danes within the walls!” she shrieked, her sole outburst before he wrenched her tighter, his fingers digging into her cheek as he clamped her lips once again. She tasted his blood on her tongue, and this time she could not move.
As he neared a small gate intended for wood carts and other supplies, Gwendolyn realized the watchtower was empty and other Danes were slipping in and out the entrance, shouldering expensive pieces of the chapel altar and heavy chests that spilled coins on the courtyard stones.
The heathen and his men robbed Alchere blind while her overlord thought he conducted negotiations with them.
And just like her worst fear, she would be part of the war spoils. A captive to the most fearsome man she’d ever seen.
WULF GEIRSSON HAD HARDLY thought anything could tempt him on the raid of a Wessex stronghold held by one of King Alfred’s strongest knights. He didn’t need more riches, after all. As the most successful Viking raider to sail on the coast of Britain, he had more wealth than he’d ever dreamed. He hadn’t even organized the attack on this keep today, but when his small band of men had spied the troop of Danes congregating on a nearby shore to plot the battle the night before, he hadn’t been able to resist the opportunity to thieve the raid from under their noses. He’d planned to simply flaunt his skill before his enemies and make off with the biggest prizes simply because he could, not because the riches tempted him.
But, enjoying the feel of the woman in his arms, he realized he could not have been more wrong. He’d been tempted when he’d least expected it.
The sweetly scented captive fighting tooth and nail against his hold was an unexpected boon. When he’d spied the audacious Saxon beauty climbing up to look out over the castle walls in the hour before battle, he’d been struck first by her dark, exotic look. Brown locks flowed in a glossy stream down her back, dark eyes lit with glints of gold as she narrowed them in the sunlight. Assessing the enemy?
He did not know what she’d sought on the ramparts when all the other women were surely locked safely in the castle’s innermost sanctum. This maid alone had not hidden in the face of a Norse raid, and that snagged his attention more thoroughly than any surface beauty. When was the last time he’d found a female so brazen? Maids who cowered throughout a raid held no appeal. He did not brutalize women.
But fire and spirit in a female? This intrigued him. He’d made up his mind he wanted her—that he would take her—even before she’d nearly fallen off the parapet. The fact that he had surely saved her pretty neck only made him more certain he’d been destined to have her.
Now, he sprinted away from the keep with the woman in his arms, ready to meet his men and depart before Alchere learned they’d been there. Before the other Danes who led the invading party discovered his men had taken their spoils while they wasted time with talk down on the beach.
“Only a little farther,” he assured the woman, feeling her shaking against him. Of course, she would be frightened now, no matter how bold she’d appeared earlier. “Our boats are hidden nearby, just through these trees.”
He could have set her on her feet, but he suspected she would not move quickly enough for his liking. He did, however, remove his hand from her mouth so that he could balance her weight more evenly in his arms.
“A curse upon you!” she screamed immediately, nearly deafening him as he reached the longship already packed with three quarters of his men. “You rank and craven boar! Reeking devil’s spawn!”
“By Thor’s beard, Wulf, can you not gag her?”
Wulf’s cousin, Erik, waited in the bow of the boat, his gaze darting in the direction of the other invaders on the shore close to Alchere’s keep.
“A lone, shrieking woman will hardly draw notice during a Norse raid.” In his experience, there were generally a handful of females in every town who screeched from the moment the longships were spotted until the last boat had taken its leave.
Wading through the shallows to the ship, Wulf debated handing her over to Erik while he boarded. There was no choice, really. If not for Wulf’s iron grip on her, the writhing maid would have flung herself into the sea or cracked her skull on the side of the ship in the attempt, so settling her on the deck without someone restraining her was not an option. Still, the thought of Erik’s hands on the captive sent a surge of possessiveness through him.
Resettling her in his arms, he was able to keep her cradled while replacing a hand over her mouth. Her screeching halted at the same time he paused at the side of the ship.
She looked less like a haughty noblewoman and more like a trapped animal. Trembling all over, her eyes wide with fright, she felt cold to the touch even though sweat beaded along her brow.
Strands of dark hair and golden ribbons trailed over her cheek, everything askew from her struggle. Pink color flamed along her creamy cheeks and neck. She weighed nothing at all, her skirts and cloak accounting for most of the bulk in his arms. But her strong will was evident in the way her elbow still rammed his chest and her hips twisted for freedom despite his superior strength. Many women fainted at the sight of a marauding army.
Not this one.
He could already imagine the feel of her surrender beneath him. And it would not be the momentary satisfaction he normally took from lying with a woman. A bold wench who climbed castle walls to look out on the battlefield would present a challenge that appealed to the tactician in him. He would enjoy this.
“We will not be at sea for long,” he confided, his words soft for her ears alone. Erik would think he’d lost his wits to comfort a captive. Indeed, he could not say for certain why he bothered. But something about the woman had enthralled him from the first. “This ship is built for speed and can take us where we are going quickly.”
“Hand her over, Wulf,” Erik bit out through gritted teeth. “We should make haste before Harold finds out his spoils have been stolen out from under his men.”
Cursing the need to let anyone save him touch her, Wulf deposited the woman in Erik’s arms while he lifted himself out of the surf and into the ship. Seawater clung to his braies, the cooling effect welcome after the way the nameless Saxon lass had set fire to him.
She screamed more insults about their mothers, their gods and their resemblance to various animals in the moments when no one had her mouth covered, but Wulf’s men were too well trained to comment on his unwillingness to gag her. The Danes who sailed with him were an elite force of men who’d worked together ever since he’d been old enough to command his own ship. These were the men who’d remained loyal to him when he’d been driven from his homeland by Harold Haaraldson.
Harold held Wulf responsible for his sister’s death. Truth be told, Wulf blamed himself, so he’d never protested the exile. But after a year of seafaring and raiding, never pausing in one place more than a week or two, Wulf knew he would have to face Harold’s wrath one day. Perhaps that had been part of the reason he’d tweaked the Danish king’s pride today by stealing away the wealth from his raid. Now a confrontation was inevitable.
“Give her to me,” Wulf commanded, unwilling to tie the lady to the ship and hoping he could subdue her instead. He would not allow her to jump overboard while they were out to sea. One woman’s death on his hands was enough.
“Get off me, you toad-licking lout!” the Saxon shouted, lunging toward the water as Erik passed her to him.
Both men were forced to reposition their footing, rocking the boat.
“She is trouble,” Erik warned. “And since when do we take captives?” He’d raised his voice over the woman’s shouts for help and curses upon the Danes.
A few of the men at the oars chuckled appreciatively as her oaths turned more colorful, involving swines’ asses and sheep dung. Though how one could sensibly follow the other, he was not certain.
“I will have this one.” He made the rules before the raid. Typically, they did not take prisoners without planning well for them in advance. They traveled leaner than most Vikings, so they could not provide for captives often. “Drop the oars in.”
By now all the men had returned. No head count was needed since every man had a seat at the oars save him. He took a turn to relieve Erik on longer journeys, but not this one. Not when he was eager to reach land with the woman. Her breasts rose and fell rapidly from her efforts, drawing his eye to linger on her shapely form.
With nary a splash, the ship slid from the shore and the woman made a keening cry.
“Curses will rain down upon you for this, heathens,” she warned all the men in the boat.
They paid her no heed, steering the craft away from the Wessex keep, out of the reach of Harold Haaraldson. His enemy would be furious when he realized he’d been thwarted in this raid.
Richard of Alchere, the captive’s overlord, would also be greedy for revenge. Would he know to seek Wulf? Or would he think his riches rested with Haaraldson? Nay, Alchere was not the smartest tactician, but the dead watchmen on the keep’s northern gate would tell the story of Wulf’s stealthy scheme. Wulf did not have much time before they would seek him.
Alchere would no doubt seek her, as well.
She was a prize fit for a lord, but he could not imagine she was Alchere’s wife. Wulf found the idea repugnant. She belonged to no one but him from this day forward.
He peered down at her now quieting in his arms though the fury had not left her eyes. Perhaps she had decided to save her strength for a future fight. She must know it would do her no good to gain her freedom only to find herself in the middle of an ocean.
She did not turn green from the motion of the hull slicing through the waves, the way he’d seen some men do. The Saxon mistress had at least some small affinity for the sea. A fortunate thing for a woman who would belong to a seafaring man.
“You have a plan for her now?” Erik asked from his spot at the oars.
The longship held places for twelve oarsmen on each side. This close to the coast, they did not raise the lone sail, preferring to maneuver quickly up the small rivers and estuaries off the sea.
“We’ll separate since Harold will be searching for me. You continue with the rest of the men west. We will lay low for a few days until Haaraldson’s temper passes.” A strand of the maid’s silken hair blew against his neck, a sweetly seductive caress.
“Assuming it ever passes. And what of Alchere? He will surely search for the woman.” This time Erik turned and he missed the downbeat of the rowing altogether. “You bring the wrath of too many at once—”
“Nay. We are faster because we are fewer. If other Danes see you, they will not see her because she will be with me.” The best part of the plan was that he would have her alone. Perhaps she would not fight so hard when she saw there was no one to contend with but him. “There is an abandoned church ruin in a cove around a small bend ahead. Drop me there with the woman while you take the men farther up the coast for a few days’ rest. ’Tis all I need to slake a sudden thirst, and when I finish, I will reward the men’s idle time with a voyage farther west.”
It was a time-honored bribe to seafaring men. The promise of sailing uncharted waters enticed them faster than gold. Besides, they would need to stay well out of Haaroldson’s grasp for a few weeks before they commenced raiding this stretch of shore again.
On his lap, the woman tipped her chin into the spray of the water, some of the tension easing from her shoulders. She had not looked toward him once since they left the shore, her gaze trained on the land as they rowed hard along the coast. He wanted to say something to reassure her, but to do so in front of his men would not be wise. They had been dutiful enough to indulge this fancy of his. They did not need to suffer any more of his personal affair.
“They will come looking for you,” Erik assured him.
“They will not find me.” He would make sure he had time to explore the soft curves of the creature in his arms first. Her every twitch and wriggle imprinted knowledge of her body in his brain, making him all the more hungry to have her.
“Your luck will run out, especially if you insist on besting Harold in raids. He will not rest until he has the revenge he’s sought all year.” Erik spoke a naked truth that wrenched him from his thoughts about the dark-haired captive.
A familiar storm brewed within him, at odds with the clear day. A year at sea had not made the clouds of the past dissipate.
It was true that Hedra Haaraldson—Harold’s sister—had taken her life because of Wulf.
“Hard to shore,” Wulf commanded, earning a grunt from one of his men and a rapid string of oaths from Erik.
He would not think of Hedra. Losing himself between the thighs of the vixen in his arms would banish all other thoughts from his head.
“We have not reached the lodging you wanted.” Despite obvious frustration, Erik pulled his oar up from the water so the rowers on the other side of the ship could steer the craft toward land.
“No. We can travel the rest of the way on foot. The fresh air will be more welcome than speaking of a past I cannot change.” He did not think the old ruins he recalled could be far off. But he could live off the land if necessary.
Besides, the thunder brewing in his head needed release. And the willful maiden who fumed silently in his arms seemed an obvious companion to ride out the storm.
IN THEIR TIME AT SEA, no man spared her a glance save the leader. Wulf, the other man had called him.
Of course, Gwendolyn thought, one of the stony-faced oarsmen might have stolen a glance her way while her gaze had been tipped out to sea. But their backs had been to her as they rowed the ship, and she’d never felt an untoward stare from anyone except the brooding Norseman who held her fast against his hard-muscled chest.
When he’d given the order to head toward shore, she’d sensed the dissension between him and the only other man who’d spoken on the voyage. It seemed her captor had earned the enmity of more than just her overlord. Someone named Harold would be searching for him.
And heaven help him if her in-laws ever found out she’d been taken. They hated the Danes enough without knowing their lost prize had come under the control of the race of men who’d killed their precious Gerald. They would stake their claim to her—and her fortune that King Alfred controlled until her next marriage—with all haste.
All of which should have cheered her. It meant she would not be ruled by this Dane for long. But it only served to hammer home that her life would never be her own. “Rescue” by any of those parties only meant that someone else would have power over her life.
Now, as they navigated around rocks and driftwood into a quiet cove, Gwendolyn tamped down her fears and wondered what happened next. Had she been taken to the middle of nowhere only to be abused by a ship full of marauders?
She’d dismissed the niggling fear dozens of time during the trip since a ship full of invaders would have surely been much happier to ravage a whole village full of women. And the leader had made it sound as if he would be alone with her.
By the saints.
The thought would terrify any woman. But she was not a maid ignorant of the ways of men. She knew that a man’s touch could bring wrenching pain. And that had been in the bed of her husband. What would it be like with a heathen with no legal tie to her?
While the oars lifted from the water, bringing the warship to a crawl and then a halt mere feet from land, the Norseman gave some command to his men. He spoke in the quick, harsh language of the Danes that bore some small resemblance to her Saxon tongue, but not enough for her to comprehend. She’d understood snippets of what he’d said back on the boat, but he’d been speaking more slowly then. Now, she guessed he said something about his thanks and a meeting, but nothing that gave her any clearer idea what he had in mind here.
Then, he stood and allowed her to do the same, apparently trusting her not to pitch herself overboard now that he’d taken her too far from home to swim back. She debated leaping into the sea anyhow, but with a whole ship full of men at the oars, she could hardly outpace them.
“We depart,” he announced in his accented version of her language, then waited.
“I do not understand.” She shook her head, confused. They had not reached a keep or even an encampment.
“You and I are remaining here.” He gestured to the sandy cliffs that rose up from the water and ended in patches of thicket and trees. “I will help you ashore.”
“No.” She edged back, pressing herself against the carved dragonhead at the ship’s bow. The beast’s fierce aspect seemed a fitting figurehead for the sword-wielding heathens who manned the craft.
He frowned, his thick, dark eyebrows swooping low over azure blue eyes. “How are you called, lady?”
Did he truly not guess her name? Indeed, she’d hoped that he had known of her identity prior to arrival at her keep. If he did not know of her and her wealth as an heiress, what reason could he possibly have for taking her? He’d risked his life and his men’s by entering Alchere’s stronghold.
“I am Gwendolyn of Wessex.”
“Very well, Gwendolyn of Wessex, if you will not come willingly, I will be forced to carry you again. I would point out there is no sense screaming since this stretch of your coast is uninhabited.”
“You’re serious.”
He intended for her to disembark here, in the middle of nowhere. He would allow her to choose whether she wished to be toted around like a bundle of hay by him again, or else swim like a dog through waist-high water.
Her father’s journal—still tied to her thigh—could be ruined. It had a leather sleeve of sorts, but she did not trust it to keep the water out of the pages. She wasn’t sure why the journal mattered now when she needed to think of her own neck, but she had so little that was hers alone. As a woman, all the properties and wealth she’d inherited would never really belong to her. They went to her husband. Or the sons she might one day bear.
“I do not wish to depart.” She put the notion out there, hoping perhaps his argumentative friend would use it as a reason to stand up for her. The other man had not seemed pleased that Wulf had taken her.
Would the man protect her?
She braved a look in that warrior’s direction, but the man kept his attention on his oars as did the whole cursed ship full of Danes. Was there not a single chivalrous soul among them? Not to mention a nosy one?
While her head was turned, the Norse leader jumped overboard with a splash. On him, the water did not rise much higher than his knees. And once he had his footing, he reached back for her. He swooped close and, like a hawk plucks a field mouse from the ground, he lifted her high in his arms and carried her toward the shore.
She yelped and flailed in his grasp only a moment before his grip tightened. Fear made her lightheaded.
“Put me down, you overgrown lout.” She could scarcely move once he determined it necessary to hold her tight. “I cannot breathe.”
“Talking requires breath,” he assured her, striding through the water and up onto the sandy shore.
He could have easily set her on her feet then. She would not soak her shoes now that they hit land. But the man built like an oak tree continued to hold her fast, his hands making themselves more familiar with her body than even her husband’s had as the Dane’s fingers cupped the side of her breast beneath one arm.
Heaven knew her spouse had only been interested in the most rudimentary of rutting, so he had not bothered to touch her anywhere but the most crucial of places. And wasn’t that an absurd thought to have now of all times? Panic must be causing her brain to think strange things.
“Honestly, I can walk,” she protested, unsettled as much by being left alone on the beach with the Viking leader as she was by her realization that she’d just compared her captor to her husband.
Not that it was completely off target.
She’d been at the utter mercy of each. She did not dare an escape attempt until she knew there was somewhere to go. She did not think for a moment she could outrun the foreigner. And she could not lose him in broad daylight. Especially not when he could still call back his friends in the longship.
“We can move faster this way. I will lower you when we reach the top of the rise.”
She followed his blue gaze to the hilltop covered in low trees and recalled the steep incline she’d seen from the ship. Dear Lord, the man had already charged up half of it. Leaving her with the rest of his climb to consider her next move as he held her fast to his chest.
“I can pay you to leave me alone,” she realized suddenly. If he had not known her identity, he could not know how much she was worth. “I am an heiress. My overlord will pay well for my safe return. You can barter with him the way your ruler bargains with King Alfred for peace in Wessex.”
“I have enough riches.” His thighs brushed her rump as he climbed, his strides long to climb the hill.
“No man believes that.” Although, now that she thought about it, her father had believed it. He had inherited such extensive lands from his father that just managing them well took much of his time. He’d never wished to acquire more. But since his death, she’d never met another soul—male or female—who thought that way.
“I will accept no price for you.” He glanced down at her then and his gaze stirred a prickle of warning along her skin. Her flesh fairly hummed with it.
Acute awareness traveled through her, a sudden hot warning that she must free herself from his grasp. There was too much intimacy about it. He held her so closely she could feel the warmth of his skin emanating through his tunic. And where his thighs brushed her rump, she could feel the dampness of his braies from his dive into the sea. His tunic and skin both held a scent of some spicy herb he must use to wash. Bergamot or perhaps it was some plant native to his region.
“Release me,” she demanded, arching away from him.
“Almost.” He climbed on, heedless of her struggle. “There is another rise after the first.”
She’d only succeeded in twisting the hem of her gown. A cool breeze fluttered up beneath it, teasing her legs and exposing her calves. Her cheeks burned and she counseled patience. She would simply wait until he set her down. For now, however, she distracted him by asking a question that occurred to her.
“You know my name, but I do not know yours.” She’d heard him called Wulf, of course, but what of a family name?
“Wulf Geirsson.” He turned his head to look upon her and she remembered how close they were. His straight blade of a nose hovered less than a hand’s span away. She watched his hard, sculpted mouth form the unusual name, the primitive sound bringing to mind the fierce beast that shared it.
“Why did you take only me, Wulf Geirsson?”
She feared the answer, yet it had to be asked. And she might never feel so bold with him as she did right now, absorbing the beat of his heart along the side of her chest. A man would not treat her violently after ensuring she did not get her shoes wet while disembarking, would he?
His foot slid in the sandy cliff face, but she never worried he would drop her. She could not imagine a warrior any stronger or more capable than this one. Righting his feet, he chose a more zagging path for the end of the climb.
“I did not intend to take you at first. But I have been forced to roam the sea all year long, with naught but raiding to relieve the boredom.”
“You have tired of defiling churches.” She did not hide the bite in her tone. She’d seen his men hefting the altarpiece to Alchere’s ornate chapel into their longship. But she could not see what his answer had to do with his reasons for taking her. Fear and frustration made her careless with her words.
“I do not defile churches. I merely tire of the endless raiding. When I spied you on the battlements of the keep, I knew I would pursue something besides gold or relics worth a fortune I do not need.”
“Have you found your conscience then?” Perhaps he would repent. But the dark look that turned his eyes from azure to sea-blue did not appear full of remorse for his deeds. If anything, he suddenly had the appearance of a man who wished to devour her whole.
She gulped. Why had she not learned to keep her comments to herself?
“Instead of gold, I have decided to pursue pleasure. And the first pleasure on my list is you.”