from?” she asks.
Pressing my lips together, I sink my teeth into my bottom lip and shrug a shoulder. I could lie, I could tell her that women are these powerful beings in my world, but I won’t.
“We’ve come a long way,” I mutter. “We aren’t exactly ruling the world, but I’ll tell you one thing, we are running it.”
Hillevi laughs softly. “Believe it or not, it is much of the same here. You don’t see it, but look a bit deeper and you will.”
“Seeress,” Aaric’s voice booms from behind us.
She stands slowly, turning her head slightly and tilting it back to look up at him. Without a word to him, she slowly shifts past and never says a single word. He watches her for a moment, grunts then sinks down in the seat next to me again.
“Did you find out whatever it was you needed?” I ask, hoping that he’ll tell me something, anything.
Aaric’s gaze is focused on his brother for a moment before he turns his head and looks down at me. “I did,” he says.
“And?”
He frowns, his eyes searching mine. “All will be well, víf.”
I want to roll my eyes at his response, but I don’t. I have to think about what Seeress said. This is a different time, a different world. I have to earn my place here next to him, I have to earn his ear and I will.
I vow it.
Aaric will fall in love with me. He will value not only me but my opinion and advice as well.
Chapter Twenty-Four
AARIC
I avoid my brother and any serious conversation with Liv for the next few days. I busy myself with ensuring that the ships will be ready for travel and that my men are ready for battle. My evenings are for filling my wife with my seed, as are my mornings.
“We are ready?” Gunnar asks.
“We are.” I nod. “It will not be easy to take her, to do what we need to do to her, but it must be done. She will suffer greatly, but if she can remove the demon, then we can have Fiske back. If not, the only other option is the Blood Eagle.”
Gunnar doesn’t say anything for a moment as he stands next to me watching the men and women load the ships. He has something on the tip of his tongue to say. I decide to wait him out quietly, instead of asking him what he wishes to say.
“Runa thinks that this will work?”
I clear my throat. “She does.”
“He will not like this and she frightens me.”
Nodding my head a couple of times, I let out a grunt. “I agree. She is terrifying if she is the one who summoned the demon into my brother.”
“He does not love her, he will thank you, eventually,” Gunnar says.
Inhaling a deep breath, I let it out with a grunt. “She will try to harm Liv. Runa has already warned me. If this happens, or if she attempts to harm me, you will protect my víf.”
It is not a question for my man, it is a demand of my friend, of my brother. Gunnar clears his throat, moving his head up and down as he continues to watch the boats being loaded with equipment.
“You know that I will.” We don’t say anything else, not for a long moment. “Is she with child, yet?” he asks.
“I have been afraid to ask Runa or the seeress. If she is, I will not want to take her on the journey. If she is not, I will not want to go on the journey at all. This needs to happen, Isolda needs to be away from my people. I cannot believe that I brought her into my world, that I brought her into my bed for the length of time that I did.”
Gunnar lifts his hand, clapping it down on my shoulder, squeezing me before he says anything right away.
“You did not know. We never know who we bring as our thralls when we raid. You are stronger than Fiske, not only in body, but in mind. It is why she never could get to you.”
“Aaric,” a soft sweet voice calls from behind me.
Gunnar grunts, turning away, he stomps off almost angrily. Sylvi slips her hand in my arm and rests her cheek against my bicep. I don’t look down at her, my gaze still very much focused on the ships being loaded.
“What is this?” I ask when she doesn’t say anything immediately.
“I do not wish to marry my handsome