“Really?” Now, that was interesting news. Helga must be playing her seduction game again… trying to pretend interest in Finn to make Vagn jealous. Not that he was jealous.
“On the other hand, she may have changed her mind about me. Five years can make an old maid less picky.” Finn waggled his eyebrows at Vagn, enjoying his discomfort far too much.
“Helga is not an old maid,” Vagn surprised himself by saying. “She is a woman who is alone by choice.” Oh, gods, stop my blathering tongue afore it runs away on me.
“Hmmmm.” Finn resumed his combing and snipping.
Vagn decided it was a useless cause trying to converse with Finn. He turned and was about to don his dry clothes and leave the bathhouse when Finn called out to him. “Have no worry, Vagn. Helga is not to my taste anyhow. I ne’er did relish cold women in my bed furs.”
Hah! If Finn and the other men in this keep only knew! Helga was hot as sin. The question was: How can I avoid the flame? I ever was a man attracted by a good sinner.
A hard nut to crack… but beware of flying shell…
“Ooooh, Vagn, could you please help me?”
Uh-oh! Vagn had been walking by the storage room, heading toward the great hall and the midday repast, when Helga called out to him. Once again, she’d caught him unawares. “Help you with what?” His voice sounded more churlish than he’d intended, but, by thunder, the woman had him walking on hot coals these days, so leery was he of being in her presence. But he prided himself on being a hard nut to crack in the games women played with men. He’d never lost yet.
“I can’t reach the candles on the top shelf.” She was standing at the bottom of a ladder which was braced against a set of built-in wooden shelves that went all the way to the ceiling. Well, that appeared a reasonable request. No harm in lending a hand. So he climbed the ladder for her all the way to the top, not even becoming alarmed at the way she gaped at his buttocks in his tautened braies. He did have a good arse. “Which ones do you want? There are many different sizes.” They were all the same length but of different widths. He held three out to her.
She pointed to the narrowest and said, “I suspect that one is too small.” Then she pointed to the second largest and said, “That one might be all right… but, nay, I think I will try the big one. What do you think?”
Big one? “Uh, Helga, exactly what do you want this candle for?”
“Practice.”
Don’t ask, Vagn. Do…not… ask. “Practice?”
“Yea. Rona says I should practice tupping with a candle.” She looked pointedly at his groin, which was indeed blooming into a big candle, and said, “Which one do you think is the right size?”
So shocked was Vagn that he lost his hold on the ladder. His foot slipped. And he toppled to the floor, flat on his back, staring up at a smirking Helga.
“Are you all right?” she asked sweetly.
“Nay, I am not all right,” he grumbled, getting to his feet.
She took the big candle which he still clutched in his hand and sashayed away, saucy as you please, having accomplished another of her goals in this seduction game of hers.
Vagn planned to wring this Rona person’s neck, but first he was going to wring Helga’s neck.
What to do during the winter doldrums?…
The betting was fast and furious at Briarstead in the early weeks of December. Would there be a yule wedding or not?
It was the most outlandish situation Vagn had ever found himself in. And there had been more than a few.
On first hearing of the wagers, Vagn vowed, “It will be a hot day in Niflheim afore I wed… and certainly not when forced to the bridal tent.”
Helga, equally indignant over the wagering, vowed, “I will melt all my embroidery needles and take up cooking, a job I abhor, afore I will wed, and certainly not to a loathsome lout like Vagn. Though I wouldn’t mind… well, never mind.”