Zarabeth chuckled. “I should have cursed you also. Walrus hunting! ’Twas not well done of you.”
“I was but twelve years old, Zarabeth.”
“Aye, but were you so beautiful even then, Magnus?”
“When you birth my sons, perhaps one of them will be in my image, and then you will know.”
Zarabeth was silent. He continued to do this to her, to speak so bluntly that it robbed her of her wits.
“What bothers you, sweeting?”
“You and the effect you have on me. It’s strange and it confuses me and makes me stupid.”
He stroked his fingertips over her jaw. “I would make you happy, not stupid.”
“Would you bear with both?”
“I will manage to bear with all you ever show me.” He leaned down to quickly kiss her. He didn’t try to part her lips, just kissed her warmly and lightly.
“I’m afraid,” she said, looking up at him, at his mouth, damp from their touching, firm and gentle. “You come from a land I’ve only heard about, a land where all the people are strangers to me, a land where the weather is harsh during the winter and there is little sun for many months.”
Magnus had considered taking her on board the Sea Wind, but he quickly changed his mind. It wasn’t at all chilly here in the open, and she felt safe here, with him, a man she’d known for only two days, the man she would marry. He smiled at her and sought to reassure her. “They will be strangers only until you smile at them and tell them hello. My kin will love you, as will Harald Fairhair himself, our king. He comes from the Vestfold, you know, though at present he has no royal residence there. But he is a cousin to my father, and thus of my kin, and he will come to visit and he will approve of you, you will see.”
“I have heard of Harald Fairhair. I have heard he is ruthless and he seeks to subdue no matter the cost. It is said he rarely shows mercy.”
“Aye, and he is greedy and wants more and then more after that.” Magnus shrugged. “He wants every chieftain, every earl in Norway, to bend to his will and obey his every dictum. He is a man and he is a Viking. There is no limit to his appetites, and his power grows by the year, and he falters not, though he is near my father in age. He has conquered an entire country and brought it to heel. He searches for more, as do most men of my country.” He grinned then, shaking his head. “The men in my country—if they feel at all crowded by their neighbors or persecuted by their king, then they simply leave to find new lands. We all cherish our freedom and we allow no one to curtail it.”
“And does he wish to have your lands and those of your father? Will you wish someday to leave your home?”
“Not as yet, but it would not surprise me to have him levy taxes on us that would break our backs. Then, of course, we would have to fight him, king or no. Distant kin or no. Or we would leave.”
She saw that he was perfectly serious. He would enjoy the fighting, she guessed, and he would be as brutal as he had to be and feel no regret. Nor would he flinch at the thought of leaving his home bound for a distant land. He would always do what had to be done. It pleased her, this certain knowledge of him.
“It’s also true that during five months of the winter there is little sun and snow covers the ground. We will spend much time in the longhouse, but you won’t fret with inactivity. Skalds visit in the winter months and sing songs to amuse everyone. They tell sagas that have been handed down for hundreds of years, and invent new ones to make the master of the farmstead feel like a king with all their flattery. We play games and dance and drink until our heads pound. And when you are not in my bed, or playing, or dancing, you will be sewing, spinning, cooking, directing all the house jarls and the thralls. Do you know how to make butter, Zarabeth? And buttermilk?”
“Butter?” she repeated, bemused yet again with the sudden shift in his talk.
“Aye. I remember my mother lifting and dropping and shaking the churn—such a size it was, but then again, my mother is a woman of great strength—until she had separated out all the yellow butterfat. Ah, but the buttermilk that’s left is sweet and wondrous to drink. Children always fight for the first mug fresh from the churn.”
“I make butter,” she said. “But my churn is small and requires no great strength to shake it.”
His fingers were wrapped about her upper arms. “Life isn’t easy at home, Zarabeth, but I cannot think you would seek to doze away with boredom. I will protect you and love you and give you as many children as Frey blesses us with. I would like to kiss you again, sweeting. Your mouth is soft and draws me from reason itself.”
Without hesitation, she stood on her tiptoes and pursed her lips, her eyes closing.
He looked at her lovely face, a face that was already very dear to him. “After I kiss you, I should like to cup your breasts in my hands, like this.” He kissed her, burying her startled cry with his mouth, and his hands opened and he held her breasts in his palms.
“Magnus,” she said, and pulled back. “Oh, truly, nay, you cannot.”
“Your breathing is harsh,” he said, and grinned down at her. “Your words make little sense now. Do you like my hands on you? Ah, ’tis but the beginning, sweeting. Think of me suckling at your breast as will our sons and daughters. And when I part your thighs, I’ll come between them and part them wider, and then, Zarabeth, I’ll cover you.”
She pressed her palm against his mouth. She felt flushed and excited and she knew neither was right, not that she cared overly. “You speak so baldly, I don’t know what to do.”
“It excites you.”
“It makes me stupid and fluttery, for I know not how to answer you.”
“Then do not try. You will learn my ways. I will try to remember to speak thus to you whilst I take you. And you will learn to tell me what pleases you even as I tell you how to hold me and touch me.”