Page 51 of A Tale of Two Vikings

God, I have missed my brother and his warped sense of humor. With all the bad news lately, a bit of mirth is more than welcome.

“Isn’t that so, Alinor? You think I’m luscious, don’t you?” Tykir asked his wife, who had the good sense to ignore him. Tykir and Alinor had come from the Norselands to spend the yule season at Ravenshire this year, along with their four children, who were off somewhere being entertained by Eirik’s seventeen-year-old twins, Sarah and Sigrud.

“Of course, Eirik is only half Viking; so, he is only half luscious,” Tykir continued, ducking away when Eirik tried to swat him with an open palm.

“Show me yer legs, Al-i-nor. Awk, awk.”

“Tykir!” Alinor exclaimed with a laugh.

“Kiss my arse and call it pretty. Awk, awk.”

“Hey, I didn’t teach the lousy bird that one,” Tykir protested.

“Eirik did.” It was Eadyth speaking now, Eirik’s lady-wife. “And don’t call my pet lousy. He has no lice. And remember, Tykir, you are the one who gave me Abdul as a bride-gift at my wedding.”

“Who would have thought it would have lived this long?” Tykir said.

“Dumb lackwit Viking!” the bird said.

They all laughed then, but were soon cut short.

“M’lady…Eirik…you have got to come see this,” Wilfrid, the seneschal of Ravenshire, urged breathlessly as he rushed into the room. It was late afternoon, and Eirik had thought his friend and comrade would be in the great hall enjoying a cup of mulled ale by now. “A cart just pulled into the courtyard.”

Eirik did not immediately rise. He’d spent the entire day working on battle exercises with his men in the bitter cold, then helping to dig a dung cart out of a snowbank, followed by a bath, and, frankly, his forty-nine-year-old body couldn’t take much more. He was very content indeed to sit before the hearth fire with his feet propped up and a cup of mead in his hands, listening to his brother’s nonsense. Eirik was getting too old to keep going at this rate, but he had no sons to take over for him, other than his adopted son John who had work enough on his own estate at Hawks’ Lair. And none of his four daughters seemed about to bring any new male blood into the family.

“A cart?” Eadyth inquired indifferently. She did not rise, either. At forty and three, she was still a beautiful woman, even though her silver-blond hair was mostly silver these days. “’Tis probably those new candle molds and pottery jugs I ordered from Jorvik.” Eadyth was a successful beekeeper and merchant, renowned for her time-keeping wax candles, honey and mead. Not for the first time, or the hundredth, in the past eighteen years, Eirik told himself how fortunate he was to have her.

“The…the cart,” Wilfrid stammered. “It’s filled with barmy folks.”

“Uh-oh! Big trouble coming!” Abdul squawked.

Eirik and Eadyth immediately looked at Tykir and Alinor. They were equally ensconced in comfortable chairs before the fire, awaiting the bell announcing the evening meal. Their two-year-old son Selik slept soundly on Tykir’s lap. Tykir was forty-seven, and his bones probably ached as much as Eirik’s after their grueling day of work, though he would never admit to such weakness.

“What? Why are you looking at us?” Tykir said with mock offense. “Every time something goes awry you think I had something to do with it.”

“You usually do,” Eirik responded.

“Shhh,” Alinor cautioned. “Do not wake the child.”

“Uh-oh! Big trouble coming!” Abdul repeated.

“Did you order more gifts to be delivered here?” Eirik narrowed his eyes menacingly at his brother. Tykir was ever up to some deviltry or overindulgence. “Do you not think you are overdoing the Viking gift-giving custom?”

Tykir told his brother to do something vulgar, the whole while grinning at him. “Didn’t you like the leather boots with bells on them that I ordered for you from the Eastlands?”

“They are red, Tykir. Red. And I do not much relish jingling when I walk.”

“Really? Alinor has a garment that jingles, and I like it a lot.”

Alinor made a tsk-ing sound with her tongue.

“You could always wear the jingling boots and naught else. Eadyth would like that, I wager.”

His wife, the traitorous wench, said, “Hmmmm,” and winked at him.

“On the other hand, I did like the amber navel ornament you sent for Eadyth,” Eirik said, waggling his eyebrows at Tykir. His brother was a far-famed merchant in the Baltic amber trade.

“Will you two never stop teasing each other?” Alinor shook her head ruefully at the two brothers.