Page 42 of The Bewitched Viking

“Nay, I am not jesting.” Rachelle cocked her head in puzzlement. “Do you not find Tykir exceedingly handsome?”

Alinor was about to say nay but chose the route of honesty instead. “Well, not exceedingly handsome. He is not charming, though. Leastways, not to me. He tries to prick me into a temper at every turn.”

“Yea, he is a charmer, for a certainty.” Rachelle nodded her head, as if Alinor had agreed with her. “Beware when he stops the teasing and turns the tables suddenly to give you compliments or sweet caresses or soft words.” Rachelle stopped in the midst of her short walk between the storage shelf and table, and her eyes went dreamy with some remembrance. Was she calling to mind Tykir, or Thibaud’s father?

“I am not so porridge-brained as to be taken in by the slick words of a man like Tykir Thorksson.”

Rachelle grinned, unconvinced. “Do not be offended by my words of surrendering to the woman-lust, Alinor. I am a perfect example of how not to handle the pretty words of a man in heat.”

“Oh, oh…you have said so many things I do not know where to begin discrediting them. Woman-lust? Hah! There is no such thing. I should know. I have been wedded and widowed three times in the past ten years. When it comes to lust, men have the sole rights. With their overblown egos, most of them consider women honored just to get a poke from their sorry danglers.”

“Danglers?” Rachelle choked out.

“Yea, those appendages that dangle from men in a most ludicrous manner,” Alinor explained, and continued with her tirade. “I’ve yet to meet the woman who brags that she needs five spouses to satisfy her bed needs, as that Viking lord did outside earlier.”

Rachelle laughed. “Ah, you have much to learn, my lady. Much. Methinks you are in for a sorry awakening if the right man comes along. Pray God it is not Tykir, because there is no future there, I fear.”

“I have no need of Tykir or any other man,” Alinor asserted stormily. “Why are women so weak that they feel the necessity for a man in their lives to give them strength?”

Rachelle’s eyes went wide before she set the trenchers on the table. “Mayhap you are right,” she admitted shakily, putting the fingertips of one hand to her disfigured nose, then glancing over to her son, who was still playing with his wooden animals. All laughter was gone now. “I stand as physical testimony to where woman-lust can lead a weak woman.”

The sad expression on Rachelle’s face shamed Alinor.

Putting the ladle aside, Alinor went to Rachelle and laid a hand on her forearm. “Forgive me if I gave insult. It is not my place to judge anyone. In truth, I have been speaking my mind, unbridled, from an early age, living as I did with the two biggest lackwits in all Britain. It mattered not how many times they whipped me for my impertinence. I always thought I knew best.” She shrugged, with a wry grin. “I still do.”

Rachelle smiled weakly. “I am deserving of judgment, though. You see, I was married at the time. Thibaud is the result of an adulterous affair.”

Alinor tried to contain her surprise. For herself, she could never understand a woman willingly parting her legs for bedsport, but she knew there were women of little virtue who did such to attain some goal, whether it be coin or status or marriage. Rachelle seemed to fit none of those categories.

“My husband, Arnaud, was a cruel man, subject to unreasonable bouts of temper at the least provocation. Even though he was a merchant in Frankland with much property, he made me continue to work at my jewelry craft, even after we were wed. He was so tightfisted with his coin that his household nigh starved to death for lack of food.”

That didn’t sound so different from her brothers. Or other men of higher station who treated their women as mere chattel.

“I was so lonely. Oh, I know that smacks of a poor excuse for breaking the Lord’s commandment, but Toste the Tall was a Northman of such merry temperament that he melted my foolish young heart with a single smile.”

That sounded way too close a description of another Viking with a roguish disposition. “And where did you get the opportunity to meet this Viking? Did he come to your keep in Frankland or your husband’s trading stall?”

Rachelle shook her head. “Arnaud had taken me to Rouen for the christening ceremony of the new Duke of Normandy’s first son, assuming there would be numerous business opportunities there. As you know, the Northmen have been in control of Normandy for many years now, starting with Hrolf, the first duke. Toste was a mercenary in the employ of the visiting King Haakon from Norway.”

“Tykir’s uncle, Haakon the Good?”

Rachelle nodded.

“Was it a momentary…uh, lapse with this Viking? Or something more?”

“Something more…leastways, on my part. I could not have committed adultery lest I loved the man…or thought I did.”

“And Toste?”

Rachelle rolled her shoulders with reservation. “I know not. He professed to have deep feelings for me, but that may have been the bedlust speaking. All I know is that I was happier with him those few days than ever I have been before or after.”

“Did your husband find the two of you together?”

“Nay, but he suspicioned that something was amiss. Mayhap it was a long look that passed betwixt us in the great hall. Or mayhap some talk amongst the servants. In any case, one day he announced without warning that we were leaving for home, despite riches to be gained whilst trading with all the dignitaries.”

“And you never had a chance to speak with Toste again?”

Rachelle shook her head sadly.