Beyond a Darkened Shore(25)
He grunted in answer.
“Why?”
He was silent for so long I finally risked a glance at him. “You spared my brother’s life. I saw that you were young and beautiful, and I couldn’t bring myself to end your life.” His eyes burned into mine, and I couldn’t look away. I felt the spread of a flush born of surprise and something else . . . something that stirred within and filled me with warmth. “And then you bashed me over the head with a stone.”
His rumbling laughter vibrated through me as I broke his gaze and urged Sleipnir into a smooth canter.
I willed myself to stop blushing like a maiden.
7
The sun had dipped low on the horizon by the time Leif slowed Sleipnir to a walk. Though it disturbed me to admit it, there were many times when I’d been lulled by Sleipnir’s smooth gait, and had relaxed against Leif’s chest . . . only to awake each time with a start, forcing my spine as straight as a sword. Leif never commented on it, despite the obvious chance to mock me.
With his endurance at its limit, Sleipnir’s chest was heavily lathered with sweat. I leaned forward and patted his neck, whispering to him that we would soon stop. As though Godsent, a river snaked through the rock, beckoning us with its cool waters.
“We will make camp here, near the river,” Leif said.
I gazed out over the vast landscape, interspersed with boulders and thick copses of trees. Anything could be hiding just out of our sight, and the water was a prime location for dangerous creatures. Stopping briefly to refresh ourselves was one thing; making camp was another. We’d been lucky before. We might not be lucky again.
“We risk the notice of things better left alone if we sleep near the river,” I said, still warily scanning the area. “We should sleep with the rocks to our backs, so we’ll know what is lurking nearby.”
Leif scoffed and dismounted. He held out his arms to me to help me down, but I ignored him and dismounted on my own. Free of his burdens at last, Sleipnir shook himself and walked down to the water’s edge.
“éirinn has many dangers,” I said. “We’ll live longer if we’re cautious.”
His light eyebrows rose. “You think the northern lands are free from creatures who wish us harm?”
“It doesn’t matter. What matters are the creatures of this land.”
I was on the verge of throwing up my hands and telling him he could make camp wherever he damn well pleased, but instead of continuing to argue, he strode away from the shore, back toward several boulders at the foot of a hill. He started on a fire, his broad hands making quick work of the difficult task. I joined Sleipnir at the water’s edge to hide my satisfaction that he had listened to me for once.
The river water was once again cold and refreshing, and as I cleaned myself of the dust from our travels, it occurred to me that I would soon be required to bed down for the night. With a Northman.
Well, it wouldn’t be the first time I’d slept with my hand wrapped around my dagger.
“I’ll hunt us hare to eat tonight,” Leif said, coming up behind me with surprisingly light footsteps. He unstrapped my sword from his back and handed it to me. “So you won’t be unarmed,” he said in response to my questioning look.
“How will you catch anything without a weapon?” Not that a broadsword was particularly helpful in catching a hare, but it was better than bare hands.
He grinned, a flash of teeth really. “I have other means.”
Too tired to contemplate how he thought he would chase down and kill a hare with his bare hands, I nodded and made myself comfortable by the fire. We still had bread and cheese, so we wouldn’t starve tonight. I watched him as he followed the river farther south, struck by how agile he was despite his large size, like a lion instead of a man.
Sleipnir grazed on the long green grass by the river’s edge, and I relaxed against the cool stone. Alone with my thoughts, a sort of melancholy homesickness descended upon me. My mother and sisters were surely home by now, and a knife’s twist of pain began in my stomach. My absence would undoubtedly worry them, and though my regret over such a thing was palpable, I had to remind myself I had no other choice. Had they spoken to áthair? What would Máthair say when she learned what I’d done? I winced as I imagined her reaction—disgust? Fear? Worse was how my sisters might react. Would they tell them the truth? That I’d attacked our father and been exiled?
I forced such thoughts from my head. I knew I would do everything exactly the same if given another chance. My flesh still crawled with what the Morrigan had shown me. There could be no doubt it would come to pass, and if forming an alliance with my enemy was the only way to stop it, then I would make my bed beside him.
But my father . . . áthair’s anger and disappointment would be as terrible as dragon’s fire when he discovered that I had joined forces with our enemy. Even if I was successful in driving giants out of éirinn, I wasn’t sure that would change the way my father saw me: as a monster instead of a daughter. In my mind, I saw my family side by side, their blond hair, light eyes, and heart-shaped faces seeming to say that the possibility I was a changeling was not so difficult to believe after all.
“I leave for only a few minutes,” Leif said, returning with a brace of rabbits, “and you look as though you may cry. Did you think I had abandoned you?”