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Lord of Fire,Lady of Ice(31)

By:Michelle M. Pillow


Edwyn stepped forward and closed the lifeless eyes. He kept his hand over the ealdorman’s face for a moment and said a brief prayer.

“The priest,” Della began as the man drew his hand away.

“Has come and gone,” Edwyn assured her.

Della cried harder, gripping her father’s overtunic as she hugged him close. She felt so alone and didn’t know what she was going to do.



“Della,” Brant whispered, unable to resist holding her. He pulled her forcibly off the dead body and into his chest. She was so small, so fragile, as she trembled in his arms. To his surprise, she didn’t pull away from his touch. Her words of contentment to the ealdorman had come so easily from her and the sleek feel of her hand as it covered his callused one had been so gentle and soft. He held on to that moment, when all her anger toward him was gone.

A soft lock of her herb-scented hair brushed his jaw and Brant ached with a craving he could not name. It was more than the passion of the flesh—though he did have that aplenty. She touched him willingly, her eyes worried and scared, and it was clear she didn’t know the effect she had on him. Her innocence only tortured him more.

As the brave woman, who had fought and aggravated him at every turn, was reduced to tears, he felt a large part of his anger toward her fade until all that remained was the sorrowful regret for the things he had done to her.

“All will be well, Della.” Brant didn’t know if she heard him. “I will take care of you. I will take care of everything.”





Chapter Six




A sennight had passed in a devastating blur since the death of Della’s father. Brant had left her alone to grieve, choosing to sleep in his own chamber and leaving her to hers. He reminded her a few times that he slept nearby, lest she needed anything. Della had to admit she appreciated her husband’s help. He made all the funeral arrangements, had taken care of the wedding guests turned funeral guests, and had given her the space she needed to recover from the shock.

Della hadn’t gone to the hall too often since the tragedy. She went to the funeral and to the solemn meal after, sitting frozen before the prying eyes of those gathered. Aside from the first night when Brant held her, she hadn’t cried again.

Della had actually been shocked to find that it had been Brant who held her and not Edwyn. She hadn’t heard his words, but for the soothing sound of his low murmuring voice. For a moment, when her sobs subsided, she looked up into his concerned blue gaze and she became aware of his body pressed tightly against hers.

Although his eyes were kind, his face was that of a pagan Viking and she recoiled from him in horror. He didn’t resist as she pushed him away. Only after running all the way back to her own bedchamber, and having left her husband a safe distance behind her, did she realize that she’d overreacted. But he didn’t mention it, so neither did she.

Brant had been kind enough to make excuses for her absence and even remembered to have food sent to her chamber. Della smiled wryly every time she thought of it. She hated to admit it, but his kindness did much in thawing her heart toward him. He wasn’t behaving as she imagined a barbarian should behave.

In light of the mortality of life, she looked at her marriage in a new way. She still didn’t like her Viking husband, or the fact that she had been forced to marry him. But she was an adult and it was time for her to let go of the childish dreams of how she wanted things to be. She was married and it was time to make the best of it.

The nightmare of her mother’s death would never leave her, nor would the hatred she felt for her husband’s people because of it. So she came up with what she felt was an ingenious plan. Della decided she would fund her husband in his travels. Perhaps he could even take a mistress with him and only come back if the manor was in trouble and he was needed. Many noblemen campaigned away from home and wife. Della smiled sadly at the idea. She’d never really wanted to be married, but with this new plan it might not be so bad. It might even be like it had been before, when her father was away on campaigns and she was in complete charge of the keep. Of course there was still the consummation to deal with and Brant’s help to stop the raiding would be nice.

It was early morning and Della doubted anyone would be stirring in the castle. She always awoke before the sun rose along the horizon. The remainder of their guests had thankfully left the eve before. She didn’t like so many visitors and hadn’t been introduced to half of them, not that she really cared. The endless line of nobles had blended together in her head until she could no longer pick them apart in her mind’s eye. She’d already determined she didn’t wish to meet Brant’s friends. To her thinking, the less their lives intermingled the better.