Chapter 1 #2
Haakon snorted at the plea but something in the way the woman said those words tugged at Ulf’s gut.
Her eyes were closed, she had not tried to disentangle herself from his friend’s hold.
Instead, she was biting her bottom lip in an effort not to cry.
Certainly not the attitude of a brazen assassin.
If he hadn’t felt the sting of her cut, he would have sworn she was incapable of inflicting harm on anyone, and his instinct rarely failed him.
“Wait,” he told Haakon.
Before they did anything, he wanted to understand who this woman was and why she had thought to attack him, most especially why she had apologized before stabbing him. That was not the normal behavior of an enemy. He was sure they had never met, so she could not be his enemy.
There had to be something more behind the attack than hatred toward him.
He straightened back up, his mind made up.
“Don’t take her to my grandfather just yet. If you and Gytha would help me, we’ll take her to my hut first.”
Ylva could barely feel her fingers, her hands, or indeed her arms. Every inch of her body felt numb. Because she had failed.
And Judith would now pay the price of her failure.
After her pathetic attempt at stabbing Ulf, Wolf’s grandson, everything had happened with soul-crushing inevitability.
The woman, Gytha, who appeared to be Saxon, like her, had bathed and bandaged Ulf’s wound with the help of an old healer.
While the women did that, the other Norseman, Haakon, had tied her hands behind her back with a rope and bound her feet to the chair where he’d placed her.
She was not going anywhere. Not that she wanted to.
Where would she go, even supposing the Norsemen agreed to free her? Back to Mildred? What for?
No one was dead, Ylva had failed in her mission, failed to save Judith.
There were still two days left, but it made no difference.
Two months would not be enough. She had observed the villagers over the last few days and quickly concluded that she would never have the strength or the audacity to overcome one of the Icelander’s impressive sons.
The three men were just too formidable, especially the one called Steinar.
Despair had made her cry herself to sleep the first two nights. How could she save Judith?
Then she had realized that Wolf had grandchildren too.
It would be just as efficient to kill one of them, she’d reasoned, and probably easier. Not that they were weaklings by any means, but she hoped a younger man would be less on his guard.
She could have killed Wolf’s only daughter, of course, or his wife, or even more easily, one of his young granddaughters, but it had seemed an even more vile proposition.
A man would at least have a chance to defend himself against her.
It had seemed fairer, somewhat. Besides, she was certain Mildred would not have been satisfied with a “mere” girl.
It was all warped thinking, of course, but Ylva had had to think of something to justify her actions. She didn’t have any choice. Someone had to die, so that Judith could live.
It would have to be Ulf.
“I want Wolf to suffer as I have suffered,” Mildred had snarled over and over again, while she gave her instructions.
“I don’t want him to die, I want him to have to live without someone he loves, just like I’m having to live without my father and brother.
I want him to wake up every day and miss them, to know that he could not save them. ”
Ylva had agreed that this would be a hundred times worse than dying himself.
But she didn’t agree that the Icelander deserved any punishment.
On the contrary. What he had done deserved praise.
He had rid the world of two foul men who thought it acceptable to sell other humans, children, sometimes even babies, for a profit and mistreat them in the process.
She should know, she who had spent twelve years under the trader’s roof.
She had often wondered if it would not have been better to be sold with the other poor souls the day she had been captured, instead of being used as the personal slave to the trader’s daughter.
No, perhaps not. As miserable and overworked as she had been, at least she had not been abused.
And there had been Judith. The two of them had found a way to bear their misery together.
The girl who had joined her a few days after her arrival in the house had replaced the family she had lost.
And now Judith was to die, because she had failed.
After a while, Haakon and Gytha took their leave, promising their friend they would not mention the incident to anyone just yet. The healer had left a while ago, which meant that Ylva found herself alone with Ulf.
“So, Saxon. What is your name?”
This was the last thing she had expected him to ask her. Her surprise was such that she didn’t think of lying and inventing herself a new identity. What would be the point? Her life was worth nothing now anyway, since she had failed Judith.
“Ylva.”
He made a face, as if the name had taken him by surprise.
Why was that? Did he know of her? Perhaps.
After all, his grandfather had been the one to rescue her and Judith after the trader’s death, so he might have mentioned her.
But she hadn’t told the Icelander her name that day, so she did not understand where he might have heard it.
Ulf straightened up. Lord, her mind must really have been addled by the prospect of what she had to do when she had decided that he would be easy prey. Even with the bandage around his middle, he looked stronger than any man had the right to be.
“Now, tell me why you apologized before stabbing me.”
Ylva blinked. Forget the question about her name, this was the most surprising thing he could have said. Shouldn’t he be asking why she had wanted to kill him, a stranger? It was what she would have done in his place. But since he was giving her the opportunity to apologize again, she took it.
“Because I was sorry. I still am. But you needed to die.”
He stared at her. “Are you saying that you need me dead but are loath to kill me?”
Yes, exactly.
And it was then that she realized.
To save Judith, Ulf did need to be dead. But that didn’t mean she had to kill him—or even that he had to die at all.