Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
“Come on,” Liv said, linking their arms together with easy affection. “I’ll walk with ye. There’s somethin’ I want tae show ye.”
By the time she left the kitchens, the afternoon sun was sinking toward the western hills, painting the sky in shades of amber and blood.
Autumn light slanted through the narrow windows, turning the stone corridors gold.
Somewhere deeper in the castle, she could hear the distant sounds of men’s voices raised in challenge, the clash of steel on steel.
“Where are we goin’?” Claricia asked as the sounds of fighting grew louder.
“Ye’ll see.” Liv’s smile was cryptic.
They emerged onto a covered walkway overlooking the training yard, and Claricia’s breath caught in her throat.
The space below was alive with controlled violence.
A dozen warriors moved through combat drills in the fading light, their movements fluid and deadly despite the blunted practice weapons.
Sweat gleamed on bare arms and torsos. Breath misted in the cooling air.
The clash of steel rang out like church bells calling the faithful to prayer, except this was a different kind of devotion—the worship of strength, skill, survival.
Aksel stood at the edge of the yard, his voice carrying across the space as he bellowed corrections and insults in equal measure. “Ye call that a block, Finn? Me grandmother moves faster, and she’s been in Valhalla these last ten years!”
But Claricia barely heard him. Because in the center of it all, stripped to the waist and gleaming with sweat in the amber light, was Erik.
She stopped breathing.
She’d seen men train before—had grown up watching her father’s warriors practice in the yard at Kintail, their movements predictable and practiced.
But she’d never seen anyone move the way Erik Thorsen moved.
Never seen violence transformed into something so devastatingly graceful it bordered on art.
He was sparring with Magnus, both of them using real steel now, and the clash of their blades sang out like thunder rolling across the mountains.
Erik’s body was all lean muscle and lethal grace, every strike precise, every parry economical.
No wasted motion. No hesitation. Just pure, devastating efficiency wrapped in flesh and bone and ink, like watching a wolf hunt—beautiful and terrible and impossible to look away from.
So many tattoos...
She’d glimpsed hints of his tattoos before—shadows beneath his collar, darkness peeking from his sleeves when he’d reached for something.
But now, with his torso bare and the dying sun gilding his skin like molten gold, she could see the full glory of them, and it stole what little breath remained in her lungs.
A massive raven spread its wings across his shoulders, so detailed she could make out individual feathers, each one rendered with an artist’s precision that spoke of hours under the needle.
The bird’s eyes seemed to follow movement, seemed almost alive in the shifting light, watching everything with the same predatory focus Erik himself possessed.
Norse knotwork spiraled down his arms in intricate patterns that shifted and flowed with every flex of muscle beneath skin, hypnotic as waves on water, beautiful as anything she’d ever tried to paint.
And there, directly over his heart, was a large tree—ancient and gnarled, its roots reaching down toward his ribs like fingers seeking earth, its branches spreading toward his collarbone like an offering to sky.
“The tree over his heart,” Claricia heard herself whisper, unable to look away. “What does it mean?”
Liv followed her gaze, her expression softening.
“The World Tree. Yggdrasil, they call it in the old tongue. Connects all nine realms—heaven, earth, underworld. Everything bound together by its roots and branches.” She paused, then added quietly, “He got that one after our parents died. Said it reminded him that even when things fall apart, somethin’ holds it all together. ”
The explanation settled over Claricia like a weight. This wasn’t just decoration, wasn’t just savage markings meant to frighten enemies. These were stories, memories, pieces of a history she didn’t understand but could feel the importance of nonetheless.
This was what he’d hidden beneath those fine clothes and that iron control—proof that no matter how well he spoke her language, no matter how Scottish he claimed to be, he would always be marked by something other.
By gods she didn’t believe in, by stories written in symbols she couldn’t read, by a history that had nothing to do with her people or her faith.
The ink on his skin was a declaration, a reminder that Erik Thorsen might rule these lands but he carried his true home on his flesh.
Magnus said something that made Erik laugh—a real laugh, deep and genuine and completely unguarded—and the sound went through Claricia like a blade between the ribs. Sharp. Unexpected. Leaving her breathless in its wake.
She’d never heard him laugh before. Not like that. Not with such unrestrained joy, the kind of laughter that transformed his whole face, softening the hard edges and making him look younger, less burdened by whatever darkness he carried.
He’s bonnie when he laughs.
She hated herself for noticing, hated herself more for caring.
Then Erik pivoted with the grace of a dancer, catching Magnus’s blade on his own with a sharp clang that echoed off the stone walls.
He used the momentum to sweep the bigger man’s feet out from under him with brutal elegance—one moment Magnus was upright, the next he was on his back in the dirt with Erik’s blade at his throat, the move so smooth it seemed choreographed rather than spontaneous.
The watching warriors erupted in cheers and catcalls that could probably be heard in the next county, their voices rising in appreciation of their jarl’s skill.
“That’s what ye get fer droppin’ yer guard!” Aksel roared, clearly delighted by his laird’s victory. “Even fer half a bloody second! How many times dae I have tae tell ye idgits—”
Erik reached down to help Magnus up. The casual display of strength as he hauled the larger man to his feet, the easy confidence in every line of his body, the raw masculinity of him sent heat flooding through her despite every logical reason she had to resist it.
Her mouth had gone dry as summer dust. Her pulse hammered in her throat like a caged bird trying to escape. And lower, in places she shouldn’t be thinking about, warmth bloomed like summer roses opening to the sun—unwanted, undeniable, absolutely mortifying in its intensity.
I’ve gone daft, I cannae want him... he killed Logan... he’s the enemy...
She gripped the stone railing until her knuckles went white.
“Magnificent, isnae he?”
Claricia jumped, having completely forgotten Liv was standing beside her. The younger woman’s eyes were knowing, far too knowing, and her smile held a hint of mischief that made Claricia’s cheeks burn hot enough to set her hair aflame.
“I dinnae—”
“Och, dinnae even try tae deny it.” Liv’s voice was gentle, not mocking, though the amusement in her tone was impossible to miss. “Half the lasses in the village have been moonin’ over him since he was sixteen. The other half are too smart tae let themselves get caught in that particular trap.”
“I’m nae moonin’,” Claricia protested weakly, knowing even as the words left her mouth that they were a lie. A pathetic, transparent lie that fooled absolutely no one.
“Aye, and I’m the Queen of England.” Liv leaned against the stone railing, watching her cousin with obvious affection.
“He daesnae ken how good he looks when he fights. Thinks it’s just trainin’, just work.
But there’s a reason they call him the Wolf of Skye.
When he moves like that...” She shook her head, her expression caught somewhere between pride and exasperation.
“It’s like watchin’ somethin’ wild barely contained in human skin. ”
That was exactly it, Claricia realized with a jolt that felt like lightning striking too close.
That was what made her pulse race and her breath catch and her body betray every principle she’d tried to cling to.
Erik fought like something feral—beautiful and deadly and utterly untamed, a predator playing at civilization but never quite managing to hide what he truly was.
Every movement spoke of violence held in check by will alone, of power that could be unleashed at a moment’s notice, of danger wrapped in golden skin and marked with ancient symbols.
“What happened tae his parents?” The question escaped before she could stop it, slipping past the defenses she’d tried to maintain.
Liv’s expression shuttered immediately, warmth replaced by something guarded and deeply sad, shadows moving behind her eyes like ghosts.
“’Tis… nae me story tae tell.” She straightened, her posture going rigid in a way that suggested old pain, old wounds that had never quite healed.
“If ye want tae ken about that, ye’ll have tae ask Erik himself.
Though I’ll warn ye—he daesnae speak of it.
Nae ever. Nae even tae me, and I was there when. ..” She trailed off, shaking her head.
Before Claricia could press further—before she could ask what Liv meant by that cryptic warning—Erik’s head snapped up. His eyes found hers across the training yard with the unerring accuracy of a hunting hawk sighting prey, cutting through the distance between them like it didn’t exist.
Och... I could just let him... eat me up!