bastard. Not the wife of someone incapable of loving and protecting her as she deserved. It was only that memory of how he had failed in the past that had given him strength to ignore the darkness within him that urged him to take her away with him, to leave her to her peaceful life without him.
When his ship had set sail, he’d known that he was entering some of the darkest days of his life. The years away from her had been black; he had no reason to believe that the ones ahead of him would be any better.
The soft crunch of dry twigs alerted Gunnar to his friend’s presence behind him just before Magnus spoke. ‘What do you see?’
Gunnar opened his eyes and tried to shake thoughts of Kadlin away. If he wanted to live, he couldn’t afford distractions. That was the very reason he needed to get rid of that bloody lock of hair; it was a distraction. Nodding to the small break in the trees, he spoke softly. ‘I saw a Saxon. Just there.’ They were both silent, waiting for another movement. After a few minutes, they were rewarded as the figure of a man darted across the opening.
Magnus grumbled in disgust. ‘They should come fight us like men instead of hiding in the trees.’
‘They already tried that and realised they couldn’t win,’ Gunnar muttered as he scanned the treeline, looking for more. Earlier in the week, he and his men had come across a ragtag group of Saxon men. There had been a fight, and when it had become apparent that his men were the stronger warriors, the Saxons had scattered. His men had found some of them, but the rest had escaped and had regrouped and followed them. He didn’t like their cowardice in hiding and his blood pumped furiously at the thought of crushing them. ‘They won’t approach. They’re waiting. We’ll have to root them out.’
Magnus nodded his agreement. ‘There are at least two score. If they met with others, there could be more.’
‘I’ll take some men and ride in behind them. Drive them out into the open.’
‘Why not wait them out? We can handle them.’
Gunnar shook his head, the need to fight outweighing his patience. ‘Nay, we’ll fight them now.’ He turned to go back to camp. They needed to strike fast.
‘Wait, brother,’ Magnus said as he put a hand on his arm. ‘Let us wait. We don’t know how many men are hiding. We don’t need to fight now.’ He paused and when Gunnar seemed unmoved by his logic, he added, ‘It could be suicide.’
‘I know,’ Gunnar replied and kept walking the path back to camp. It could be suicide, but not in the way Magnus suspected. He’d never risk the lives of his men. He intended to go alone, to figure out what they were dealing with before leading his men in. He’d gained a reputation for recklessness, but every chance he’d ever taken had paid off. It was why the men under his command had quadrupled in size. They wanted the treasures and accolades those fighting beneath his command had accumulated over the years.
The truth was that he no longer cared if he lived or died. He could have stopped fighting. Eirik had offered him numerous opportunities to take over command posts. He could have become a jarl in this new land in his own right by now, commanding the battle from afar at times. And while that idea had originally held some allure, it had come too late. He’d learned that Kadlin was married to someone else now.
The night he had come face to face with her husband was the night he realised that some part of him had still held out hope. It wasn’t until that moment that he knew he had lost her for ever. And nothing seemed to matter any more. That shouldn’t matter. She’d already been lost to him, but the thought of her touching another was like a knife blade taken to his already shredded heart.
Though he tried to stop it, the memory of that night came back sharp and crisp. The meeting had happened during the first snowstorm of his first winter here. New arrivals from home had only recently joined them so the hall was crowded. Somehow, through the din of multiple conversations and revelry happening around him, her name came to him.
Kadlin.
It took his eyes only moments to identify the one who had spoken it. A man on the other side of the fire had been regaling anyone who would listen about the beauty of his new wife. Gunnar’s heart had stopped for one endless moment when the newcomer described her long blonde hair. Before he’d even realised what he was doing, Gunnar had found himself standing in front of the fool who had only smiled up at him.
‘You have married, Kadlin, eldest child of Jarl Leif?’
The fool had barely managed to offer an acknowledgement before slumping to the floor, knocked cold by Gunnar’s fist. He’d wanted the man to stand and fight him. Blood had pumped through his body, urging him to kill the man for daring to lay any claim to her, but he turned and left the hall instead.
The vision of her with someone else only made the pain in his chest so great that it escaped in a cry of rage that echoed in the sudden silence of the hall. No one was brave enough to approach him. Even Magnus and Eirik only hung back, waiting to see if any of the man’s friends were foolish enough to chase him. Not one of them did. Though he was looking for a fight, he couldn’t blame them. He must have looked like a madman. He was a madman.
Any flickering hope he’d carried within him that he might one day claim her had died out that night. He’d been a fool to let it persist as long as it had. There was nothing left of him. Death was the only cure for the excruciating pain. He’d let out one last bellow of rage and then hung his head as the snow fell around him, collecting on his hair and shoulders. His father had been right. A warrior is all that he was ever meant to be. So a warrior he would be. From that moment onward, his entire life became the fight and nothing else mattered. He had pushed Kadlin from his mind as much as he could and waited for death to claim him.
It hadn’t helped that he knew losing her had been his own fault, somehow. Gritting his teeth to stifle the cry of rage that the memory brought with it, he rammed his left fist into the base of a fir tree and watched the bark splinter beneath the impact. He cradled the hand against his chest and threw his head back to take a deep breath as he savoured the momentary numbness before the pain exploded in his hand. The tree was a poor substitute for the crunch of bone a Saxon nose would have provided—he knew he should have waited for the upcoming battle to vent his anger—but the pressure in his chest had been too great to carry into a fight. There was an aching relief to be found as the pain shifted from his chest to his hand. Blowing out through the pain and then sucking in a deep, wrenching breath, he made his way to his men and forced Kadlin out of his mind.
Motioning a boy over to wrap his hand, he gathered them all to go over the plan for battle. In moments, he was mounted, leading the small group to their location behind the Saxons. He knew the forests in this land so well now that he rode on instinct, knowing the best place to attack, knowing exactly where they would be hidden even if he didn’t know how many there were.
The scream came from nowhere and then it was all around him at once. The Saxons had been circling them, preparing an ambush. His horse, though well trained, reared in surprise just as a spear broke free from the trees. It landed in the beast’s chest, making him scream in pain and lose his balance. Gunnar was unable to jump free as the horse fell backwards. Pain exploded in his legs and head when they landed, then everything went numb and quiet. A strange peace crept over him as he watched the Saxons flood out of the forest to surround his own men. He smiled because he knew that they had given themselves away prematurely and Magnus would surely crush them with his larger group of warriors.
Blackness pulled at him, but it didn’t take his smile. It might not have happened with a sword in his hand or a sword in his belly, but he was dying in battle, a welcomed relief. He closed his eyes and waited
