Free Anna Markland - Viking Roots Medieval Romance Saga 02 by The Rover Defiant Page B

in the alcove, a warm orange glow dawned behind Sonja’s tightly closed eyes. The delicious heat flooding her body turned her bones to liquid. She vaguely heard Torstein’s voice. He was smoothing down her skirts, urging her to rise from the swinging bed, but she wanted to stay, cradled in his strong arms. On the morrow he’d be gone. “My heart is breaking, Torstein. Don’t go,” she whimpered.
    He pulled her to her feet. “I must, but I swear to you I will return a hero. Your parents will have no choice but to allow us to marry.”
    “I beg you not to be foolhardy,” she pleaded. “You will be killed.”
    Torstein pressed a finger to his lips when a scratching noise caught their attention. Her heart raced. If they were discovered, her father would make sure he was flogged and cast out of Rouen.
    A strange odor filled her nostrils. She recognized it, but from where? It wasn’t one of the usual kitchen smells. It smelled like—
    She and Torstein looked at each other and at the same time mouthed, “Ekaterina.”
    He took her hand and they crept out of their hiding place. The elderly nun was slicing food on a chopping board with a large carving knife.
    “She’s hard of hearing,” he whispered. “If we creep—”
    They came to an abrupt halt when Ekaterina turned to look at them, holding aloft a chunk of cheese. “ Tvorog! ” she exclaimed. “Da!”
    She thrust the stolen morsel into her mouth and downed it in one chew, hunching her shoulders in delight like a thieving servant raiding the kitchen.
    Sonja was torn between laughing hysterically and fleeing back to the room where Cathryn was entertaining her sister. She’d been gone overlong.
    Ekaterina put a finger to her lips. “Our seecret ,” she whispered with a wink.
    Torstein looked confused. Was the woman speaking of the cheese?
    “Not a vord about who cut ze cheese,” she said.
    The compulsion to laugh bubbled out of Sonja’s throat, but she sobered quickly when the ancient nun put down the knife and came to stand before them. She placed her gnarled hands over their joined ones and intoned what Sonja supposed was an incantation in some language she didn’t recognize. “ Everythink gut ,” she said, making the Christian sign over them. “Go now. I finish ze cheese.”
    Torstein’s eyes were smiling as he kissed Sonja’s hand then hastened away. She lifted her skirts and hastened to rejoin the others, her heart in her throat.

A PROPOSAL
    After a long, exhausting day the last thing Sonja wanted to do after supper was obey her father’s summons to his office. Her bed called, though she feared she’d get no sleep this night, her head filled with thoughts of Torstein going off to war. Her tingling body craved again the delicate touch of his fingers that had sent her careening into an abyss of bliss.
    She wanted to look her best for the departure of the army on the morrow, to give her beloved a fond memory to hold in his heart.
    She listened at the wooden door, hoping to glean a clue as to what her father wanted. Had word reached his ears of her relationship with Torstein?
    Hearing nothing, she held her breath, tapped lightly and entered.
    When she saw who had come to visit, her knees threatened to buckle. She wanted to flee, but her feet were rooted to the spot. Fisting the grey woolen skirt of her hangeroc , she mumbled incoherent words of greeting to Sven Yngre and his elderly mother.
    Both visitors were dressed in garb designed to impress. Sven wore brown leather leggings molded to his strong legs. If she got close enough to his boots she’d likely see her reflection in the polished leather. His tunic fell to mid-thigh, the fine black wool cinched at the waist with a wide belt fastened with a horn buckle.
    Not silver, like Torstein’s.
    He had trimmed his beard and tied back his long blonde hair with a thong. His fingernails were clean.
    His mother must have worked for many hours to fashion the elaborate gold braiding along the tunic’s