Not only was he shocked but his precious manpart was shocked, too. Why else would blue veins be standing out on it as if it were going to explode? “Why?” he asked her, once he pulled his gaping jaw off the floor. That has to be the dumbest thing I have ever said.
“Because I am rather shy… and this is my first time… and, well, I would feel better if I could explore your body first… and… oh, I suppose it was a bad idea.”
“Nay, nay, I didn’t say that. But you don’t have to restrain me to explore my body, dearling.” I wonder if I am in a drunken stupor and imagining all this.
“Oh, you say that now, but if I touch you in the wrong way—or the right way—you might be tempted to… never mind.”
Tempted? I am so tempted, lady, that my thickening is about to explode. “Nay, we will do it your way,” he said quickly afore she changed her mind. He made his way toward the pallet in the corner and was disconcerted, but only for a moment, to see soft cloth strips hanging from each of the four bedposts. She had been prepared for his yielding. Ah, well, he would make her yield much more by morning. He lay down and submitted each of his limbs for her to tie, which she did with surprisingly strong and secure knots.
Then she stepped back from the pallet and said, “Do not be angry, Toste.”
“Why should I be angry?” Understanding came to him of a sudden. A trick! He had been tricked. He fought mightily against his restraints, to no avail. “Can I assume there will be no tupping tonight?”
She nodded.
“Do not do this, Esme. You have no idea what the consequences will be. I have killed men for much less.”
“You forced me to it. Agree to my plan, give your word of honor, and I will release you right now.”
He told her to do something vulgar to herself.
She winced but did not back down. When he continued to glower at her, she walked closer, tied a thin strip across his mouth to prevent his yelling, and pulled a fur pelt up over his body against the chill which was sure to fill the hut in the coming hours.
“I will check on you in the morning,” she said after covering herself with a cloak and slipping her feet into leather shoes. To her credit, her expression was filled with sadness. Then she left. Just like that. She left.
Silence filled the hut, and Toste shook his mead-fuzzy head. He could not believe what had just happened. A part of him admired Esme for her daring in pulling off such a trick. But a bigger part of him was blood-boiling angry.
Toste started to laugh behind his gag and couldn’t stop. Not even when tears rolled from his eyes. Esme had won this battle, but she’d best beware. This war was far from over.
* * *
Chapter Ten
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Brother, where art thou?…
Vagn was dreaming. He knew he must be dreaming. And yet the picture behind his eyelids was so vivid.
He was lying on a bed. Correction: His brother Toste was lying on a bed. And he was spread-eagled, bare-arse naked, tied to the bed posts.
Is someone trying to make my brother wed, just as Gorm restrained me in hopes of a forced marriage to his daughter Helga?
Do people wed in the Other World?
He would be worried about Toste and whatever torture was about to be inflicted on him, except that his brother was laughing uproariously at his predicament. And Vagn saw a woman’s form in the shadows. Was there ever a man’s predicament in which a woman wasn’t involved? It was the same black-haired witch he’d seen before, the one who turned his brother hard with lust.
It was all so confusing. First he’d seen images of his brother being picked at by black crows. Then he’d thought his brother kissed a nun. Now he seemed to be involved in bondage, and laughing about it. What could it mean? One thing was for sure: Valhalla, or heaven, for that matter, was not all it was cracked up to be… if that was indeed where Toste resided now.