Viking's Prize

Dedication

For Chaise.

Other
e-books by

Tanya
Anne Crosby

THE IMPOSTOR PRINCE

THE
IMPOSTORS KISS

LION
HEART

HAPPILY
EVER AFTER

ON
BENDED KNEE

PERFECT
IN MY SIGHT

LYON’S
GIFT

THE
MACKINNON’S BRIDE

KISSED

ONCE
UPON A KISS

VIKING’S
PRIZE

SAGEBRUSH
BRIDE

ANGEL
OF FIRE

CHAPTER
1

Alarik Trygvason knew full well the risk he took
by navigating so far up the river Seine, but the French Count deserved this
retribution. Never again would the spineless bastard plot to ambush his camp!
Of that Alarik would make certain.

It was also the last time he would trust a filthy
Franskmann!

He should have realized the ruse the instant the
French king had offered him native soil in exchange for peace between them.
Above all, he should have perceived the true reason Count Phillipe had sent a
squat little balding man with the generous gift of French wine.

But he’d been too hungry, too mesmerized by the
lush green beauty of French soil. Too enthralled at the prospect of holding a
meager parcel of it.

Like vipers they’d slithered into his sleeping
camp. And like vipers they had attacked. He’d lost full half his men before any
could clear their heads of wine or sleep. Sotted as they’d been, they were
ill-prepared to fend off the strike, though thanks to the count’s little
balding man, Alarik’s eyes were now open wide; he knew precisely who to thank
for the night’s unexpected call.

Phillipe of Brouillard.

His eyes narrowed vengefully.

The deceiving fool had thought his plan
infallible. Doubtless he’d believed that if he rid himself of Alarik, he would
deliver King Robert from the terms of this agreement. But Phillipe had turned
over the wrong stone—chosen the wrong man with whom to match wits and
might.

Tonight he would pay the price.

H
is gaze fixed upon the horizon, his expression hard as unyielding
steel. His features were well chiseled like that of his namesake’s, the hawk,
and his pewter gray eyes had been likened to the silver of his sword,
Dragvendil, for they could slice into the heart of a man with the ease of a
fine gilt-edged blade.

The single turret appeared first, standing
sentinel alone, its battlements a hungry mouth open to the heavens, jagged teeth
exposed and ready to devour the concealing vapors.

Gracefully, with little more sound than the
lifting and parting of skin-wrapped paddles from the black water, the drakken
prows slid onward toward shore.

Like a mantle of misty white, the impenetrable fog
cloaked his men from the fortress’s view, though Alarik spied the guard atop
the stone tower at once, and a prickle raced down his spine as he waited for
the man to sound the alarm.

Nothing, but a tumble of thunder, an approval from
the heavens.

His men took heart. “Thor! ’Tis Thor! He is with
us!” his men declared.

Their victory was predestined.

Alarik, no longer cleaving to the old gods,
allowed his men their enthusiasm, but did not share in their triumph. He
acknowledged their belief with a deferential nod, but would not accept that a
mere rumble of thunder would predetermine the outcome of this battle. Their
superior warrior’s skill alone, hard earned by the sweat and blood of their
bodies, would give them the victory they sought tonight. That and naught else.

The wind picked up, feathering the haze away,
leaving them completely exposed to the watchman’s view...

Still nothing but silence.

With a calmness that belied the occasion, Alarik
listened and waited, his head tilted skyward with no emotion evident in the
intense silver of his stare. He eyed the sentry intently for some sign that the
alarm had already been sounded... that he’d missed it somehow, but there was
nothing.

His eyes never left the turret.

All the while, the current brought them closer.

Closer…

With a flick of his hand he motioned for his men
to cease their rowing. Their forward momentum alone would complete their glide
to shore, and he needed the silence to better determine their position.

The oars were abandoned, but the night air
remained undisturbed, the whispering wind the only sound to reach his ears.
Incredibly, there were no shouts of ‘To arms! To arms!’ to be heard from
within—despite the fact that Alarik was certain the guard had spied their
approach. With an absent gesture, he stroked the hilt of his double-edged
sword, considering the goal, assessing their options with narrowed eyes.

“A trap, jarl?”

By now, every man aboard the three warships had
spied the lone figure atop the tower, but it was Sigurd Thorgoodson, Alarik’s
most loyal warrior, who came forward to voice the concern.

“Nei,” Alarik said, his gaze returning to the
figure above. The silhouette grew slowly clearer as they neared.

“They could not have known we would come.”

None of the count’s bumbling mercenaries had lived
to carry the tale. Truth was, he had no inkling why the witless guard did not
alert the castle.

Brouillard’s thick masonry walls were a deterrent
to most in this day when castles were built of timber and so much easier to
infiltrate, but Alarik knew this one’s damning secret and his lips twisted with
ill-concealed contempt as he thought of the man whose blood he sought to spill
this night.

Coward.

Only an incompetent, craven bastard would have
such an escape portal. And there was only one thing Alarik despised more than a
coward: a traitor.

Count Phillipe was both.

Never mind, for while the latter had decreed the
count’s fate, the former now sealed it.

Concealed by the dense trees and bush of the
forest beyond lay the means to breach the mist-enshrouded monstrosity—a
hidden passage that backed deep into the sheltering woods. He grinned at the
thought of it, a slow, merciless smile that swept winter into the silver of his
eyes. For that bit of knowledge he could also thank the little balding man, for
by it Alarik would return the count’s favor tenfold this night.

His grip tightened about Dragvendil’s hilt as he
thought of the portal, for It was fitting the hidden passage should be the
count’s very downfall this eve.

He had no qualms whatsoever about catching the
count unawares. As declared by Phillipe’s own Christian God, It was fitting to
take an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth... a life for a life. Just as the
count had dealt with him, so would he be dealt with himself.

The chill wind rose, swirling the remaining fog in
its wake, obscuring the figure upon the turret momentarily before dissipating
into the ominous heavens.