As Sure as the Dawn(175)

“She’s mine!”

“I know she’s yours, Rolf, but would you have her trampled?”

A muscle jerked in Rolf’s face as Rizpah took the weeping girl by the hand and walked back through the crowd of men. Not one of them said a word or tried to stop her.

“I want her back!”

She took the Hermunduri girl inside the longhouse, Caleb trailing behind them. Speaking softly to the girl, she tried to calm her fears, wondering what she was going to do if Rolf came, determined to drag her away. She held the girl and stroked her back. The Hermunduri smelled strongly of dirt and nervous sweat. Vermin were crawling in her matted hair.

Freyja returned, her basket full of herbs. “Anomia told me what you did. You had no right to interfere.” She looked at the Hermunduri and wondered how many Chatti would die so Rolf could keep her. The young fool!

Rizpah sensed no rebuke. “I know I didn’t, but I couldn’t stand by and watch the way they were tormenting her.”

Freyja had been amazed when she heard. Not a single Chatti woman she knew would have dared interfere as Rizpah had done. Even Anomia knew to stay out of such matters. Marta said the men were shouting and fighting when Rizpah marched down the street and into the midst of them. “She parted them like reeds in the swamp, Mama. She just walked right through them and took the girl away from Rolf. No one’s ever taken anything from him before.”

Anomia had been livid. Freyja couldn’t remember ever seeing the young woman so angry.

“The girl belongs to Rolf by right of conquest, Rizpah. You must understand.”

“By conquest. You say that so easily.”

“It’s not easy. It’s life.”

“The way it was when Atretes was taken and put in chains?”

Freyja paled. “What good do you think you do reminding me of that?”

“This girl is someone’s daughter, just as Atretes was your son.”

“Rolf built a house for her.”

“And so all he needs do now is drag her into it and rape her, and she’ll be his wife?”

Freyja turned her back on her, not wanting Rizpah to see how distressed she was. She didn’t approve of what some of the men did, but she understood reality. She took the herbs from her basket and laid them upon the counter. She could still hear the girl’s weeping, and it pierced her heart. “You don’t understand our ways.”

“I understand well enough. Your ways are no different from those of Rome.”

Furious, Freyja turned. “Over the past ten years, we’ve lost many of our people. To Rome. To the Hermunduri. Some of the men take this way to find wives. Lana is Cherusci, and Helda from the Suebi.”

“I wonder if you’d feel the same if Marta had been taken when she was this girl’s age.”

Freyja turned her back again. Hermun would never have let it happen. She tied the herbs carefully though her hands trembled.

“Where does it stop, Lady Freyja?”

Rizpah’s words filled her with discomfort. She hung the herbs upside down to dry.

“Her family will want her back, and that will mean more Chatti will die.”

Freyja looked at Rizpah and realized she was concerned with far more than the girl’s situation. Rizpah was troubled by the ramifications of Rolf’s act just as she herself was. “There’s nothing you can do. Rolf wants her. He has no intention of taking her back. If he let her go and she returned, no man among her own people would want her now. She’s defiled.”

“Rolf didn’t force himself upon her.”

“How do you know that?”

“Helana told me.”

“Helana?”

“That’s her name.”

Freyja was amazed she had gained the girl’s trust so quickly. “It wouldn’t matter. She’s been with him for several days.”

Rizpah rocked the girl back and forth, murmuring words of comfort. Her eyes filled with tears as she looked at Freyja. “At least allow me to bathe her and give her something decent to wear before I give her back to that young wolf.”

Freyja was moved by pity. The Hermunduri was young. “Use larkspur. Save some sprigs for her hair. It’ll kill the lice and mites on her. As you’ve been holding her, I suggest you put sprigs in your hair as well.”

While Rizpah took care of the girl, Freyja prepared a salve of arnica and thyme. “Rub this into the raw skin around her wrists and neck. I’ll tell Rolf you’re going to bring her to him before nightfall.” She went to the door. Pausing there, she looked back at Rizpah. “Lana and Helda accepted their situation. She will, too.”

Rizpah learned all she could about the girl during the little time allowed her.