Page 103 of The Caged Viking

“My marriage was not so bad…while it lasted.” Hauk couldn’t believe he’d said that, after all these sennights of rancor. Mayhap he just wanted to disagree with Ingolf, to be contrary.

“‘While it lasted,’ you say. See. That must be the key. Short marriages. Ha, ha, ha.”

They’d just arrived at the wider, cleared space of the back courtyard. Going up to Thorkel, Hauk grinned.

“What?” Thorkel sniped. He’d no doubt been the target of many jests from the men as they worked.

Despite the cold, Thorkel was wearing only a tunic over his braies, the exercise of shoveling no doubt heating him up. But that did not account for the pink dots coloring his face and neck and collarbones. “I am just admiring your sex flush,” Hauk said.

The pink turned to rose. Thorkel knew what a sex flush was, Hauk having explained it with great glee once Kirstin had introduced him to the subject.

“I assume you will be wanting to take a nap after all this activity,” Hauk continued, his lips twitching with suppressed mirth.

Thorkel told him to do something to his male organs that was physically impossible.

Ingolf was enjoying their exchange, adding, “If you get tired of your new bride, I have a daughter or two that would make an excellent second wife.”

“Thank you, but nay thank you. My wife would have my balls for dinner if I even considered such,” Thorkel said. “In truth, I am pleased with my current wife.” He waggled his eyebrows at Hauk then and was about to walk away when he stopped dead in his tracks, staring off toward the fjord. “What in the gods’ name is that?”

Hauk and Ingolf turned to see what had caught Thorkel’s attention.

Even though the sun was overhead, there was still only a dim light, and it was hard to see clearly at a distance. Even so, it appeared to be a person, or creature, of some kind, covered with a blue cloak, lined with white. From its hood hung long wet strands of gray hair, or animal fur. Most unusual, though, was its gait. The creature trudged slowly along the path as if dragging a great weight, its head bent forward. In its one hand was a bunch of vines and in the other a strange light.

As it got closer, the men in the courtyard backed up.

“Mayhap it is a troll, sent by Loki as a yule visitor,” Thorkel mused. “’Tis just the kind of thing the jester god would do.”

Hauk and Ingolf looked at him as if he’d lost some brains during his long night of sex.

“Nay, I think it is a witch,” said Ingolf. “I saw one at the Trondheim Althing five years past. She was an old crone who escaped afore King Olaf could burn her at the stake. Apparently, she had put a curse on the king’s cock that made it make a right turn, halfway up.”

Hauk and Thorkel looked at Ingolf with horror, then turned to watch the approaching apparition.

A strange tingling arose on the back of Hauk’s neck, which slingshotted to all his extremities, raising all the fine hairs of his body on the way.

“Nay, ’Tis not a troll or a witch,” Hauk said with a mix of shock and anger. “‘Tis my wife.”

* * *

Not the reception she expected…

Kirstin trudged up to Hauk, who was standing with Thorkel and some other man, the three of them just gaping at her.

“Hauk!” she called out. “Help me get this cloak off. It’s killing me.”

Hauk blinked with confusion at her demand, then stepped up and behind her to remove the cloak off her shoulder. He staggered and almost dropped the garment, surprised at its weight. No wonder! All the items she’d pinned inside the cloak, not to mention a partial soaking in the pond, must have made the blasted thing weigh at least twenty pounds.

She clicked off her flashlight and tucked it back inside her gown. Then she handed the grapevines, which had somehow fallen out of their Ziplock bag, to Thorkel, who regarded them as if they might be snakes.

Finally, she looked at Hauk and smiled. “Hi,” she said shyly.

He raised his eyebrows, then glanced at her wet hair and the sopping cloak he still held. “Where have you been?”

She thought he meant where had she been that she’d gotten wet and told him, “I fell in the pond?”

“Pond? What pond?” He waved a hand dismissively then, as if it didn’t matter. Which it didn’t.

She sneezed. This was not the way she’d pictured their reunion. The kisses, and hugs, and declarations of love she’d expected were blatantly missing.