Viking Love Beyond Time (Time Travel Romance) (76 page)

             
Without thinking she reached out and tore a piece from the nearest ham.  It was sweet, and once her salivary glands had begun to work she realised how hungry she was.  She removed the ham from the hook, luckily it had been cooked and, almost wolflike, began to tear portions from it with her teeth.  As the meat went down it began to warm her and, sliding down the wall and resting on her haunches, she tried to work out her plan of campaign.

             
The first priority was the recovery of her bracelet.  The people who had locked her in here had probably recognised the anti-grav belt as belonging to their lord but they had obviously had no idea of what the bracelet was and would probably return it to her when asked.

             
She wiped her mouth and, hanging the half eaten ham back on its hook, looked round the room.  Curiously she opened one of the sacks, it seemed to be full of dried beans.  Screwing up her nose at their musty smell she retied the sack and tried the door again.

             
She could blow it to pieces of course with a low blast from Herger’s psi gun but it would now not suit her cover to appear magical.  She would have to be a victim of a shipwreck - with - yes, of course, amnesia.  She would get a job in the castle, find out the lie of the land, then, when the time was right, one night soon, free her father, blast her way out, steal a couple of horses and make for Seinshaven, get help and come back in time to save the children.  But how long did it take to cross the
North Sea
?  A week?  Ten days?  Two weeks?  She had absolutely no idea.

             
She bit the knuckle of her index finger - what a dilemma.  Closing her eyes she saw Nerissa toddling toward her with open arms and Thomas, taller at sixteen months than most children at two and a half years, terrifying her by picking up his father’s dagger, which was almost as long as him, the correct way, by the hilt, and to Herger’s amusement and Alodie’s horror stabbing at Nerissa’s rag doll and shouting
“Sla!!”

             
Herger had laughingly informed her she was fighting Tom’s Viking blood as, scolding, she retrieved the huge knife from her son’s grasp and returned it to its rightful owner with strict instructions to keep his weapons out of the children’s way in future.

             
Unbidden but uncontrollable, the tears began to flow freely down her cold cheeks onto her even colder and wetter boiler suit as she climbed back onto the
makeshift
bed, curled up into a tiny ball and, eventually, slept.

*******************

             
The early autumn wind banging against the door woke Alodie early the next morning, at least that was what, in her sleep benumbed state, she first thought.  It was only when she opened her eyes and shook her head she realised that the force which was drawing back the bar and pushing open the door was human not elemental.

             
Suddenly nervous, she drew her knees up to her chin and flattened herself against the wall - after what seemed like an eternity she heard shuffling footsteps and into the shed stumbled the most hideous human being she had ever seen.

             
He was only about three feet in height but was broader than he was long.  He was immense, and Alodie could not begin to guess his age which could be anywhere between twenty and sixty.  His bald head was covered with a scum of grey tufts of hair which contrasted oddly with his almost baby-like idiot face.  His arms were so long that his knuckles dragged along the floor and as he reached the bottom of the makeshift bed he grinned, showing a mouthful of slimy rotten teeth.  His red rimmed eyes were encrusted in dried yellow matter and at some time he had had an accident which had split his nose almost in two.  He was dressed in a long brown garment, shiny with dirt, and the stench of him, even from several feet away, made Alodie gag.

             
“A pretty manikin is he not?” snapped a voice from the doorway.  Alodie dragged her horrified gaze away from the nightmare vision at the bottom of the bed and focused on the figure standing in the door.  At first she thought it was a man, the figure being tall and possessed of a deep voice but as it entered the room she realised that it was female, dressed in a voluminous cloak and hood which shadowed her face.  “So milady Alodie, we meet again, and on my terms - what a delightful surprise” she announced.

             
“Do I know you?” asked Alodie, confused.  The woman laughed, a chilling, dark sound.

             
“Oh you most certainly do, my beauteous lady Alodie, but at the time of our last meeting I was a
fat
stammering spinster, since then I have become, shall we say, educated in the ways of the world.  I have been raped by a filthy outlaw, disowned by my parents, sold into slavery - shall I go on or can you guess who I am?”

             
“E - Emma?” gasped Alodie, feeling sick.

             
The figure threw back her hood, it was Emma, certainly, but a new Emma, she had lost at least thirty pounds and she had aged, how she had aged.  She looked at least forty five.  Her hair was coiled round her head and she was wearing a diaphanous gown which billowed around her body in the breeze, giving her an other worldly quality.

             
“Yes, Emma in the flesh, you witch” she hissed, “thanks to you I have suffered every indignity known to the human race - tell me you stinking whore, did you marry Luke?”

             
Alodie nodded.  “Yes, but he’s dead now”

             
Emma gasped “Dead?  Luke?” she gave a small cry and fell to her knees, then looked up, tears pouring down her cheeks, her eyes spitting fire at Alodie “of course he is - you no doubt killed him you evil bitch..............”

             
“No, he drank himself to death”

             
Emma climbed to her feet and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Drank himself to death?  Why?  Oh Jesu - you drove him to it!  What did you do? Brag to him about opening your legs for that Viking bastard Herger?”

             
“Oh, grow up Emma, do” snapped Alodie “you cannot blame me for the fact that Luke did not find you attractive”

             
With a scream of rage Emma flung herself at Alodie and pulled her from the bed by the hair.

             
The action was so fast and so unexpected that, for a second, Alodie was confused.  She landed on the floor with a thud which knocked the breath from her  body.  Screaming again Emma then hurled herself on top of Alodie and grabbing her hair with her hands began to bang her head on the floor.

             
“Don’t blame you, you evil witch?  Everywhere you go tragedy follows.  Who was it that summoned the Vikings the day you disappeared into the woods and I followed you?  Who was it that so bewitched Herger the sea king that he had me condemned to slavery under the evil eye of his mother, then ordered me to be thrown off a cliff?  But I fooled him, I fled and ended up here in Segensfjord - as first mistress then chief procurer for Olaf the Black!”   She drew back her fist and pounded Alodie in the face, smashing her lip against her bottom teeth.  She felt her mouth fill with blood which began to trickle down her throat, choking her.  Enough was enough - with a jerk of her hips, Alodie pushed Emma away and leaping to a standing position she kicked her in the face.  With a yelp of pain Emma toppled unceremoniously head over heels, landing in a dusty heap at the gargoyle’s feet.

             
“Think about it, you stupid bitch!” snapped Alodie “ever since I arrived in Bredond I have not even been in control of my own life, never mind anyone else’s!  Believe me, the Viking invasion was not my fault, nor was the fact that Luke preferred me to you!”

             
Alodie brushed some hair out of her eyes as Emma climbed unsteadily to her feet, bleeding, Alodie noticed with some satisfaction, from the nose and mouth.  “Luke was my heart’s blood!” sobbed Emma “I would have died for him!”

             
Alodie laughed hollowly.  “Believe me Emma he would have let you.  You ought to go down on your knees and thank God you did not marry him.  I had thirteen months of pure, unadulterated purgatory with that man, during which time he turned from a golden god into an alcohol bloated hulk.  He tried to kill me, your mother, my children and a Danish hostage aged ten.  You had a lucky escape, my dear.  By the way, Emma, your father is dead, I don’t know if you care or not but I miss him terribly, he could have been saved but Luke denied him the medicine which would have cured him.  He wanted to inherit Bredond”

             
“Oswy wasn’t my father” retorted Emma then she snapped her fingers and pointed at Alodie.  With a terrifying giggle the dwarf leaped toward her and with a single fluid movement he pinned her to the bed, his huge hands crushing her wrists into the hard wood.

             
Alodie screamed, the monster’s foetid breath was making her feel sick and the pressure of his body across hers was crushing the breath from her.  She heard Emma laugh.  “That’s right Alodie, wriggle, Stig likes girls who wriggle!”

             
To Alodie’s horror she felt the unmistakable evidence of the dwarf’s excitement on her leg.  “For the love of God, Emma, have mercy!” she sobbed.

             
Emma laughed.  “Mercy? Mercy? To you?  My God Alodie you have no idea how many nights I have lain awake praying to hear you say those very words and for it to happen now with Olaf away....” she crossed her arms and rubbed her shoulders with her hands, a seraphic grin on her features, and a glazed look in her eyes “.............it is almost............” her head snapped up.  The dwarf shifted his position and Alodie grimaced as a trickle of foul smelling drool fell onto her face.  “How did you get here anyway?” she said suddenly “dressed in those strange clothes and wearing Olaf’s magic belt?”

             
She is mentally deranged
thought Alodie suddenly
her hatred of me has turned her brain
“I’ll tell you” gasped Alodie “when you get this - this - thing off me”

             
“No madam!” replied Emma “you will tell me now with Stig on top of you and then I will walk out of here and leave you with him.  He usually likes twelve year olds or younger when he can get them, Olaf rewards him with a child now and then, but you, I am sure, will suit him” she prodded the dwarf in the back “she does suit you Stig, does she not? Look at her lovely hair - yes, good monster, you shall have her soon”

             
Stig nodded, vigorously, making grunting sounds and pushing Alodie further back onto the makeshift bed.  Glancing up, Alodie noticed her bracelet on  Emma’s wrist and could feel the shape of Herger’s in her pocket, now, if she could only get her hand to it.  “Well, Alodie, I am waiting” she continued “what are you doing here, where is Olaf and why were you wearing his magical belt?”

             
Alodie tossed the hair out of her eyes.  “I’ll die before I tell you anything, you bitch” snapped Alodie, writhing in the grip of the evil smelling dwarf.  Emma grinned, then turned to Stig.

             
“I give her to you Stig - now.  When you have finished with her, bring her up to the castle and I will talk to her, then you can have her again - for as long as you wish”.  The dwarf gibbered and rubbed his hands together.  Emma turned on her heel and walked toward the door.  As she reached it she turned.  “Oh, and Stig, she is a witch, but fear not...” she held up her arm “I have the secret of her powers here” the bracelet gleamed in the dull light.  “Enjoy yourself, Alodie, and as Stig breathes his perfumed breath into your nostrils remember that whatever you may suffer, I have suffered tenfold”.

             
With that she stalked out into the early morning light, slamming the door behind her.

             
Alodie winced and turned towards Stig.  The filthy dwarf was kneeling by the bed, piping with excitement, his long slimy tongue hanging from his slack lips.

             
Wincing again, Alodie reached for her pocket but before she could slip in her hand to get the bracelet, Stig’s filthy paw flashed out and gripped her wrist.  She yelped, she had thought Herger strong but with this creature it was as though she were being gripped by an iron vice.  Trying to grab her bracelet was hopeless and even if she managed that she would have to set it to ‘stun’ and get some space between them before she could fire, she would have to rely on her superior intellect, not her inferior strength.  She looked up at him in what she hoped was an artless and innocent manner.  “Why, Stig, do you like sweetmeats?” she said “I was about to look in my pocket for some”

             
“Ergh” grunted the manikin and released his hold on her wrist, then, to Alodie’s horror, he dived in her pocket and grabbed the bracelet.

             
“Oh, Jesus” she sobbed.

             
His brow wrinkled with confusion as instead of the sweets he had hoped for he pulled out a bracelet.  He sniffed at it.  “Weemeets?” he grunted “waar weemeets?”

             
“They - they must be in my other pocket, Stig, now just give me that bracelet, there’s a good - lad”