Surrender To the Highlander

He raised his arm, signaling the men to pause. He watched as several rode off ahead and behind, taking up positions meant to guard their party from any surprises approaching them on the road. Rurik slid off his horse and handed the reins to one of the other men so that he could assist the women from theirs. He reached up to lift her from her place on the horse’s back when she shook her head.

One thing he’d learned early in life was that some wanted or needed to make every situation more difficult than need be and that there was no way to change their predisposition to such an attitude. Margriet— Sister Margriet—seemed one of those very people. Rurik stepped back and crossed his arms over his chest, watching her antics as she tried to dismount on her own.

’Twas clear that her legs would not obey her commands to move. She shifted on top of the horse and he allowed her to try until her actions caused her mount to sidestep nervously. Rurik stepped closer, took hold of the reins and brought the horse under control.

Gunnar’s daughter had a stubborn streak. ’Twas clear from the way she struggled to move legs that were clearly not going to move on their own. Although she glanced at her companion once or twice, she would not look at him. Stubborn and prideful.

Neither attributes were what he would expect in a true woman of God. Mayhap that was why Gunnar had exiled her here…? Had he hoped the good sisters would work or pray or beat it out of her? From what he remembered of Gunnar’s daughter, and it was not much due to his age and interest in the pursuit of the fairer sex at the time, her mother had died soon after her birth or the birth of a sibling, and then she was gone.

Thinking back, the struggle for control of the Orkneys exploded about that same time and, with the uncertainty of loyalties and outcomes, Gunnar had been wise to send her south. Now with Caithness awarded to a Scottish earl’s control and Erengisl of Sweden firmly in place as Earl of the Orkneys, her father thought the timing good to bring her home. More likely than not, with an eye to marrying her off.

Hah! Watching her nearly topple to the ground and still not ask for help, Rurik suspected her father would be as surprised as he about Margriet’s vocation to religious life. He reached out as soon as he knew she would land on her arse in the dirt and took hold of her waist. Lifting her off the horse was no more trouble for him than if he was lifting a child. Lifting her was not the problem.

Letting go of her became the problem when he felt the narrowness of her waist and the flare of her hips in his grasp.

No, he thought a moment later, the true trouble was when she struggled against his hold and his hands slipped up high enough to feel the weight of her breasts against them. Margriet noticed; the flaring of her pale eyes revealed it, as did the way she stilled a moment later.

The best thing—well, the most polite thing—would be to release her immediately, but in that moment he did not want to be polite. His body reacted and his blood heated and surged through him, making him want to do that which his ancestors were known for— he wanted to take and pillage.

By Odin’s Seed, he understood the legends of old! His body understood them and stood ready. And when she placed her hands on his shoulders, he nearly forgot everything.

“My thanks for your assistance, sir.”

Her voice broke in to the maelstrom in his head and brought a halt to his wild thoughts. It did nothing for the heat that raged in his blood.

Rurik nodded and lowered Margriet to the ground. He felt the shakiness of her stance and waited a minute more for her to steady herself. Some distance was truly needed and he turned to help the younger woman. Unfortunately Magnus robbed him of his excuse to move from Margriet’s side.

Standing this close, he heard her labored breathing as she tried to take a step. Her stubbornness won out again, for she stumbled against him as her legs gave out.

“Thor’s Breath, la… Sister, let me help you,” he said as he grabbed her shoulders and held her still.

She lifted her head and nodded in agreement, but anger flashed in her eyes at his aid. He released her after a few minutes and placed his arm under her hand so he could walk at her side.

“My thanks, sir,” she said as she lifted her hand from his a few paces later.

Rurik watched as she waddled away from him, still unsteady but moving apurpose. He turned to find the men watching him with as much interest as he watched the woman. Not a good thing.

He nodded at one of the men to follow the women as they made their way off the path, obviously in need of privacy after several hours on the road. Never one to disregard or to ignore his own weaknesses, for they could be the death of him and those to whom he pledged loyalty, he considered why he reacted this way to a nun.

First, he did not expect Gunnar’s daughter to be as old as she was—from his father’s missives he thought her still a young lass.

Second, he did not expect her to be a nun—for the daughter of a man held in such high esteem and with such wealth as he knew Gunnar to have was a marriage prize and not a gift to the church. The sight of her in the religious habit stunned him.

But more than that, he never expected her to be the strong, organized, willful and beautiful woman that she was. From the first moment of resistance to her eventual surrender, Margriet proved herself a proud Daughter of the North. ’Twas obvious from their initial encounter to the last order she gave before she left it, that she ruled the convent. He counted at least fifty nuns and lay people living there and, from youngest bairn to oldest man, they all appeared well-fed and kept. Not an easy task for even the most experienced of stewards, let alone a nun.

Rurik swallowed against the tightness in his throat as he realized the basis for his weakness. Although he’d met her as a nun, his body and his senses saw only the woman under the garb. And the attraction he felt and the desire that filled his blood could only be dangerous.

As his eyes sought her figure as she disappeared behind some bushes, Rurik knew this was one weakness he could not afford.

Chapter Four

Elspeth’s soft snore simply reminded Margriet that she was not asleep. Turning to her side away from the woman next to her, she barely stifled a groan as the hard ground revealed another place injured by the hours on horseback. Her hip spasmed and she tried to stretch her leg to ease it. Tempted though she was to try to walk some of the cramping away, the loud snore just outside the small tent spoke of the impossibility of doing just that. When her back joined in with its own aches, Margriet decided to try.

Since the tent was meant to give them a small measure of privacy, it stood only a few feet tall and two paces wide. Trying not to disturb Elspeth, she crawled out from under the blankets they shared and shimmied to the flap of the tent. Since they slept in their clothes, dressing was not a problem, but her hair would be.

Margriet suspected that her vanity over her hair would unravel her disguise, especially since the men and their leader had seen it when she panicked and ran from the convent with it uncovered. Women taking their vows cut off their hair before donning the veils and the presence of hers raised a suspicion about her truthfulness. And that was dangerous. After she braided and wrapped her hair, she reached into her bag and took out a woolen shawl. Draping it over her head, she peeked outside.

The man guarding the tent slept so close that she would have to step over him to get out. His loud snore, now alternating with Elspeth’s gentler one, covered her movements. Her back and hips and legs screamed in pain as she crept over him and took a faltering step away…and into the one called Sven. Luckily, he grabbed her hands and helped her to stand up before she landed on the ground.

“Sister, are you well?” he asked in a soft voice. He glanced at the tent and then back to her. “It is the middle of the night and you should rest while you can.”

At least he seemed to understand how inexperienced and uncomfortable she was on this journey. Not like the brute that led their group. He drove them on and on with a single-mindedness that shocked her. She was used to being in charge and the change in her circumstances was most likely the cause for her troubled state of mind. It was also the condition that kept thoughts tumbling around inside her mind and kept any hope of sleep at bay.

Sven cleared his throat, catching her attention, or rather her inattention, and she nodded her head.

“I need to walk a bit to work out some of the stiffness in my legs, if that is permitted?” she whispered back, trying to assume a meekness she did not feel. Men, she’d learned, liked women to act as though they had not a thought or plan in their heads.

Sven glanced across the camp and then back again. Their leader, Rurik, slept sitting up, wrapped in a dark cloak with his back against a tree. If Sven had not looked in that direction, Margriet certainly would never have spied him there.

Probably his intention.

When Sven held out his hand, she suspected Rurik had given some unseen signal granting his permission. Margriet leaned on Sven’s muscular arm as she let him guide her away from the tent. At first, they said nothing, but as they walked a short distance from the sleeping men, she could not contain her curiosity.

“Your leader does not seem happy about taking me back to Kirkvaw,” she began.

Sven snorted and then answered. “Rurik is not happy about going back to Kirkvaw.”

“What do you mean, sir? Will he not be rewarded for carrying out this task for my father?”

“Aye, he will be rewarded, but not by your father.” Sven leaned in closer as though to share some confidence with her, but his disclosure was halted by a voice from the dark.

“Sven, you should not speak of such personal matters with Gunnar’s daughter.”

Margriet jumped at both the softness and the menace in his voice. Sven merely smiled and nodded at Rurik…and walked away as though silently ordered to do so.

Leaving Margriet in the company of the one person she would rather avoid.

He held out his arm and she placed her hand there. Without a word, he led her in a circle around their camp. Each step seemed easier than the last and finally the cramping in her back and hips ceased. Rurik did not stop guiding her until she drew to a halt when they passed her tent for the third time.

“My thanks, sir,” she offered quietly as they stood next to the sleeping guard. She wondered why he did not rouse or reprimand the man for sleeping through her “escape.” He must read thoughts, for he answered the question she did not speak aloud.

“He is there for your comfort, not your safety. If I thought there was true danger in this area, none would sleep.”

“My comfort?”

“Aye. If you have need of anything, you should tell him.” ’Twas then she noticed that the man did not sleep, but watched her and Rurik from his place on the ground. But the tone of his voice drew her gaze back up to Rurik’s face.

The moon’s light was bright that night, making it easy to see his expression, but that did not make it easy to understand it. Margriet would be willing to swear that he jested, but nothing she’d seen so far in his company spoke of a temperament familiar with anything less than complete seriousness.