“You coward! What have you done with Mylan?” She slapped the villain’s face with all her strength, but he grabbed her hand and twisted her arm cruelly behind her back to force her down the steep flight of stairs.
“There is your husband, girl, bound with the other captives. Keep him alive if you can. I plan to demand a high ransom for his return, for him or his body, whichever I have!”
Celiese rushed to the young man’s side. His tunic was torn and bloody, but whether the blood was his own or that of his adversaries she could not tell. “Mylan!” She whispered a desperate vow: “I will save you, but you must help me, my dearest.”
Mylan opened his pain-filled eyes and hissed a venomous reply. “I’ll see you dead first, you traitorous bitch!”
Raktor gave a hearty chuckle as he approached. “Well, Celiese, your husband seems displeased with you for some reason.” As he drew back his foot to kick the helpless man, she dove between them, taking the
full force of his vicious blow in her ribs, and she fainted across Mylan’s lap, the excruciating pain too great to bear.
*
More than an hour elapsed before a forceful shove jarred Celiese to consciousness. They had all been taken aboard Raktor’s ship, where she lay wedged between Mylan and another prisoner she could not name. They had not thought to bind her hands and feet as they had the others. She tried to adjust her position to become more comfortable, but the pain that shot through her chest stopped her effort instantly. The sea had grown rough, the cloud cover low and dense, and a light rain splashed down upon the huddled group of captives, making their confinement all the more miserable.
Mylan was asleep or unconscious, Celiese could not tell which, but she moved slowly, just ahead of the pain, to untie his feet before she reached for his hands. Brawny members of crew were laughing amongst themselves, drunk with ale as well as with the ease of their surprise victory, and they paid no attention as she freed her husband and then drew him into her arms. As the storm worsened, heavy cascades of water washed over them as the graceful ship continued across the fjord toward Raktor’s land.
Lightning burned fierce arcs through the clouds, illuminating the red dragon emblazoned upon the white sail seconds before the icy waves again crashed down upon the ship, this time shearing off the mast and sending the heavy sail down upon the hapless prisoners. The next wave covered them with a sudden rush that carried away the debris. Mylan was swept from his bride’s arms, but she grabbed for the edge of his tunic with a desperate clutch and held on as they were hurled over the side of the ship into the storm-ravaged sea. Now fully awake, Mylan grabbed a length of the shattered mast and thrust it into Celiese’s hands to keep her afloat in the mounting waves. They drifted together, unseen in the mist as the ship sailed on, her crew straining at the oars to control the vessel through the giant swells of the storm.
Celiese clung to the wood until she was so cold her fingers could no longer grasp, but Mylan reached out to catch her as she slipped away. He drew her back and held her head above the bone-chilling sea until he could see nothing but the grim face of death hovering before his eyes.
*
Drenched by the rain, battered by the waves that had tossed her upon the rock-littered shore, Celiese had never been in such agonizing pain. She retched repeatedly, gagging again and again until all the salt water had poured from her shaking body. She crawled along the jagged shoreline until she found Mylan sprawled upon the sand, blood streaming from a slash above his left eyebrow. But his pulse was strong, and she was elated to find him alive. She pressed her palm against his forehead until the flow of blood had been stemmed, then lay down beside him and drew him close so they might share what little warmth their bodies still possessed. Exhausted by her ordeal, her sank into a deep, dreamless sleep, but even then she did not let her husband go.
The sun broke through the thick gray clouds by late afternoon, and she awoke to find Mylan’s amber gaze intent upon her. He was furious with her still, his anger undisguised. Bruised and sore, she pushed herself up slowly into a sitting position while she fought for a way to make him understand she was not his enemy.
“What did Raktor call you? You are most certainly not his daughter, Olgrethe.” Mylan was glad to see the young woman awaken, as he was filled with questions to which he intended to demand honest answers.
“I am Lady Celiese d’Loganville, a Frenchwoman of noble birth. The Torgvalds slaughtered my parents and took me captive five years ago.”
“A slave?” His finely shaped mouth curled into an accusing sneer. “Were you Raktor’s mistress?”
“No! You were my first and only lover!” She straightened her shoulders proudly, disgusted he would even suggest such a revolting alliance. She longed to make him understand her plight was every bit as desperate as his.
“Just as they did in your house, the Torgvalds and the band of rogues who run with them attacked my family before dawn. The fighting was so fierce the bodies of those who had fallen littered each passageway, their innocent blood splattered upon every wall. Raktor himself carried me screaming from my bed, and because he thought I’d be an amusing companion for his daughter, I alone survived that terrible night.”
Taking a deep breath hurt, and she winced before she continued, determined to relate the whole disgusting tale now that she had begun. “The Torgvalds camped at the mouth of the Seine for more than a month and used the river to raid ever deeper into my homeland. In the fall Raktor took me home as a present for Olgrethe, as if I were some exotic pet he had captured simply to provide entertainment for her.”
Shutting out those horrible memories, she continued in a soft, lilting voice, “I had been very gently raised, Mylan, and provided a suitable companion for Olgrethe. As I grew older, I avoided all contact with Raktor and his vile sons. Although the only time I ever felt truly safe in that accursed house was in the summer, when they took to the sea to pursue their bloody thievery. I have been no man’s mistress, for that term implies a knowledge of pleasure, and I did not even know such a possibility existed between a man and a woman until I married you.”
“Married me!” he scoffed contemptuously. He had listened with rapt attention to her story and found himself thoroughly confused, for she spoke with such obvious conviction he knew she was either exactly who she claimed to be or the most talented actress ever born.
He was inclined to believe the latter and snarled bitterly, “I have heard enough of your ridiculous lies. What did you hope to gain by telling me that pathetic tale? How can you expect me to believe you are French?”
He laced his fingers in Celiese’s tangled curls to draw her near. “Although I have no interest in setting foot upon the shores of France, I have seen enough of your countrymen to know they are dark, the women petite. You, however are tall and fair, obviously one of our own, most probably one of Raktor’s many bastards. Your blood is no more French than mine.”
She yanked her hair from his grasp as she hastened to argue. “You are the one speaking liesâ??for I know who I am! You may have seen French peasants, poor country folk brought here as slaves to work the farms, but you know nothing of the d’Loganvilles and how we look!”
Mylan was astonished by her show of spirit, for no woman, least of all a slave, had ever dared raise her voice to him. “You have more courage than the French king, for it is said Charles will soon give away a portion of his land as appeasement. Vikings cannot be defeated by so meager a defense as he is able to raise.”
“Never! The King of France would never be so weak. He would not give pirates so much as an inch of soil in the name of peace.” She found his arguments as ridiculous as he found hers, and could not believe they could possibly be true.
Mylan sat back and stared at the bedraggled young woman. She had fared no better than he on their perilous voyage, but he found her beauty not in the least diminished by her disheveled state, and it was with considerable difficulty that he returned to their present discussion. “The king will soon give the land to one of my countrymen, a Dane by the name of Hrolf, and whether or not you believe it will happen does not matter, for it surely will. Now as to your tale, if any of what you say were true, you would have warned me last night to save my family from the same gruesome fate yours suffered. Your silence shows clearly where your loyalty lies.”
She nearly screamed in frustration before she responded with an anguished plea, “Had I known he planned an attack, I would have told you when first we met. I would have warned you immediately and helped you in every way I could, but I knew nothing of his evil plot. I was never told what was planned, and I am as shocked as you are by what has happened.”
Realizing further argument would be pointless when she was being so obstinate, he rose slowly to his feet. After stretching to work off his stiffness, he looked down at her. “Can you rise, are you able to walk? We can prove nothing here, and I have wasted enough time listening to your endless lies.”