Part 19 (1/2)
”I suppose.”
”Now, what think you of a match betwixt my daughter Tyra and your nephew Adam?”
” Tis not for me to say, Thorvald. It's what they want. I will say this: the sap of l.u.s.t is running high in both of them.”
The king clapped his hands gleefully. ”Perfect! Perfect! All according to plan.”
”What plan?” Tykir asked, wondering if the king had heard of the plan he and Ras.h.i.+d and Rafn and Bolthor had devised for Adam, but nay, that was impossible.
The king never answered him. Instead he ordered, ”Send that rascal Ras.h.i.+d to me. Do not tell him I am awake. Just say it is his turn to sit a spell with the king.”
”Why would you want the Arab here?”
”I have heard strange murmurings of a harem. A harem, indeed! There will be no harems at Stoneheim...
unless they belong to me.”
”So, tell me about your master, Ras.h.i.+d. What is he like?”
Ras.h.i.+d was honored to be taken into the king's confidence, especially since he was the only one the king had confided in.
”My master, Adam, is a good man. Honorable. But these last two years have been hard on him since he lost his sister. Before that, he was adventuresome, full of life and wit. Now, he is somber and reclusive. But methinks he is changing back to his old self, day by day.”
”Thanks to my daughter?”
Ras.h.i.+d was surprised that the king knew so much about the developing relations.h.i.+p between Tyra and Adam-and itwas developing, no matter how either of them protested. A person would have to be blind as well as deaf not to see that something was going on between those two.
”They fight the attraction mightily,” he told the king, ”but you know what they say, 'l.u.s.t is love's handmaiden.' ”
”Huh?” Then he waved a hand as if it mattered not. ”You will report back to me? You will be my eyes and ears? And you will keep my condition a secret?”
To all of these, Ras.h.i.+d nodded and replied, ”I swear on the feet of Allah!”
But what he thought was, Tyra and Adam were in way over their heads, and not just because l.u.s.t was in the air, but because the king was putting his finger to the wind.
”Now, my Arab friend, tell me how one goes about setting up a harem.”
Chapter Eleven.
Tyra awakened just after dawn the next morning, prepared to ride off again with her horsehesirs to patrol the borders. She would go in one direction, and Rafn with an equal number of men on horseback would go in another. Two of the twenty longs.h.i.+ps in the harbor would also be dispatched to inspect the coastal and river sh.o.r.elines. They were taking no chances of being caught unawares again.
The first thing she saw when she stepped outside her bedchamber was Adam leaning against the corridor wall, waiting for her. The second thing she saw was Warrior hissing and biting at Adam's boot. While the kitten had developed an attachment for her, she seemed to have developed an aversion to Adam. Vana would have a hissing fit if she saw the cat in the keep.
”You are not coming with me,” she a.s.serted before he could even speak. Still angry with him for his words and actions of the previous night, she began to walk away toward the steps that led to the great hall.
He fell into step beside her, then took her by the arm and drew her to a halt. Warrior trailed behind them. ”Not so fast, my bloodthirsty lady. Do not attempt to read my mind, for it is deep and hard to fathom.”
She stood still and faced him, waiting for him to elaborate.
”You are wearing metal, aren't you?”
”Of course, I am wearing a chain mailshert under my tunic. Do you object to that, too?”
He shook his head sadly. ”Nay. If you must ride like an Amazon warrior into danger, 'tis best that you are protected.” He hesitated, then reached behind him and handed her a silver-embossed s.h.i.+eld with a crest of writhing wolves. ”Here. Take this with you... for luck. It is mine.”
It was a fine piece of armory, but that was not why she was so stunned. It appeared she had jumped to the wrong conclusion. ”You did not come this morn to chastise me again for my warlike ways, did you?”
He shook his head.
”You did not come to insist that you accompany me, either, did you?”
He shook his head again, then smiled, but the smile did not quite meet his eyes. ”Actually, I probably would have... chastised and insisted... except that Dagma the dairymaid has chosen today to bring forth her first child, and it is a difficult delivery.”
Dagma was only fourteen years old, and her pregnancy was the result of a rape the previous winter by a pa.s.sing tradesman. The man had been executed Viking-style, but that did not help Dagma and her predicament.
Just then Tyra noticed the dark circles under Adam's eyes. ”You have been up all night with Dagma, haven't you?”
He nodded.
'Twould seem she had misjudged Adam in many regards. ”Will she be all right?”
” 'Tis hard to say. The girl has a child's slim hips, and the babe is overlarge. Moreover, she has been laboring for a full fifteen hours already, to no avail.” He shrugged. ”G.o.d willing, she will survive.”
Tyra could tell that Adam cared more than he was saying. ”I'm sorry you are set in the midst of this. I know you did not want to resume your medical practice, and here you are, not just treating my father, but everyone else as well. You do not have to help Dagma. Let the midwife care for her... or Father Efrid.”
”I must.”
She frowned her confusion.
”I promised Dagma I would stay with her to the end.”
”And your promises are solid as rock.”
”Even rocks can be broken, and I have not always lived up to my promises in the past, my lady. Do not
set me on a pedestal where I do not belong.”
Tyra recalled then what Ras.h.i.+d had told her about Adam and his dead sister, Adela. Her heart went out to Adam, but she knew his pride was great, and he would not appreciate any overt sign of her pity. ”Should you not be with Dagma now?” He nodded. ”The babe will not come for several hours yet, though the birthing ca.n.a.l has finally started to open.” ”So be it. I wish you well, physician.” ”And I wish you well, soldier.” They nodded at each other. Their conversation was presumably ended, but they both stood staring at one another. Finally he said, ”We are so different. You let blood, I stanch blood.” ”There is no future together for the likes of us,” she agreed, reading his inner meaning. But then she asked, ”Have you never killed anyone, Adam?” He stared at her for a long moment. ”I have.”
”More than once?”
He laughed grimly. ”Yea, Tyra, more than once, and I did not like it any more the second and third and fourth time than the first.”