Laren looked out over the assembly of people, most of whom she’d known all her life, and said, “I am home again. I see you there, Mimeric, do you still play the lute like one of the Christian angels? And you, Dorsun, do you still shoot your bow as far as before? I remember you nicked the wing of a bird some four years ago, and the bird was in flight. Ah, and Edell, you have gained flesh, my old friend. I remember that you liked overmuch the honeyed bread the cooks gave you when no one was looking. All you had to do was smile at them, and they gave you whatever you wanted.”
She paused then and waited. Merrik watched the people’s faces change from disbelief to uncertainty to astonishment. There was a deep rumble then bursting calls of “Laren! Laren!”
Rollo allowed the fiftysome people to continue in their calling and yelling for some more minutes. Then he raised his hand. The hall was instantly silent again.
“My nephew Taby is not here. He was but a babe when he was abducted and all know that a babe, even well tended and protected, cannot always survive. But do not fall into grief. There has been too much pain already.” Rollo turned to Merrik, and drew him forward. “This is Laren’s husband, Merrik Haraldsson of Norway, cousin to King Harald Fairhair. I have known of him now for some time. Now he is here, for I bade him come and take his place.”
Merrik grinned down at her, saying quietly, “I am a distant cousin, ’tis not all fabrication. Of course, many in Norway are distant cousins to just about everyone else.”
“Here is the man who will rule if my son William Longsword dies before he produces an heir. Welcome Merrik Haraldsson!”
It was baldly said, no easing into it, no smooth explanation or justification, just Rollo booming out his announcement in his smooth deep voice. Even Laren sucked in her breath, and she’d known what he was going to do. The shock was clear on every face in the huge outer hall.
“Good,” Merrik said to her with relish. “Now I am the one who is the threat, not you.”
“I don’t like this,” she said again, and not for the first time since the preceding evening when Merrik had given his plan to Rollo. “It is not your place, Merrik, to throw yourself into such danger. Look at everyone. They don’t know what to do. It is a shock beyond what they’ve ever known. Where are Helga and Ferlain?”
She’d argued with him endlessly and he’d listened and nodded, but never wavered. Now he only smiled at her, still staring out at all the faces staring back at him in blank consternation. “They will show themselves in due course. As for the others, I will play the valiant hero, and show them as much ruthlessness as they are used to seeing in Rollo, and show them that I seethe with honor, so much honor that I can barely hold up my head with the surfeit. Perhaps Rollo will come to admire me so very much, he will beg me to remain in Normandy and rule beside him, then beside William. What do you think?”
“I think you are mad.”
“Mad, am I? Do you not believe I can be an heir to Normandy to everyone’s satisfaction? Do you not believe me skilled enough to persuade all the people to believe in me?”
“Aye, you know that you can. In that, you are mad.”
“Will this madness continue in our children, do you think?”
She stared up at him, for the moment, all else forgotten. “I don’t know of such things,” she said.
“You have not had your woman’s bleeding since I first came to you.”
She turned as pale as the white of her undershift.
At that moment, Rollo, smiling, turned to Merrik and held out his hand. “My lord Merrik, come forward, and greet my people. Perhaps they will be yours someday.”
At that moment, Laren swayed, her eyes bewildered and wide on her husband’s face, even as she said, “I am not well.” He caught her and lifted her into his arms.
There was again pandemonium, and Rollo, scared to his toes, leapt to his feet and shouted, “By the gods, what is wrong with her?”
Merrik said loudly, “She has but fainted, sire. She isn’t ill. She is carrying my heir.” He lifted her high in his arms and his voice rang out deep and strong in the huge chamber, “Aye, she carries the son who just might rule Normandy one day.”
Helga said quietly to her sister, the wide smile on her face never slipping, “Perhaps she will not carry anything for very long. Perhaps she is like you, Ferlain, and her womb is diseased.”
“She has our father’s hair—a girl shouldn’t have hair that color, ’tis sinful, all that miserable red.”
“Our father looked very handsome in his red hair,” Helga said. “A pity he killed that faithless wife of his and ran away. But then I have always wondered if he did kill her. She died so quickly, you know, and there didn’t seem to be violence. Aye, such a pity that our father believed he would be blamed and disappeared. More a pity that the bitch gave birth to Laren and Taby before she succumbed.”
Ferlain felt the cold of the grave, a cold so profound that it numbed the body and the mind. She thought of her eight dead babes, aye, they were in cold graves, every one of them, naught but scattered tiny bones now. She stared at her
sister, who had now turned and was saying to her husband, Fromm, “So, husband, what do you think of this Merrik Haraldsson?”
Fromm puffed out his chest, a habit he’d learned from Otta, only when Fromm did it, it was annoying. He said, “It is obvious he is cunning. He has taken advantage of Rollo’s advancing years, showing Rollo only what the old man wants to see, saying only what he wants to hear, doing only—”
“Aye, I know,” Helga said, not bothering to hide her irritation. “I think him handsome. He wears his youth splendidly, does he not?”
“Do not give me your smooth spite, Helga.” Fromm turned from her to his brother-in-law. “Cardle, I will speak to you once Rollo dismisses us.”
Helga laughed now, overhearing her husband speak to Cardle. By all the gods, why would he want to speak to that pitiful fool? Ask his advice on how to kill Merrik? Laren?