Mastered by the Berserkers (Berserker Brides #8) - Lee Savino Page 0,6

the taller warrior.

Fenrir sat on a rock so he no longer loomed over me. “Why do so many of the orphan girls bear names for trees and flowers?”

Finally, an easy question. “Some girls came to the abbey as babes, with no names. The nuns named them. Sister Theresa named the first few for herbs, and the others followed convention.”

Fenrir nodded, his face solemn as if I’d spoken a great secret. His gravitas encouraged me to sit on a nearby rock and explain further. “In the case of Rosalind and her sister, Rosalind had a name, and Aspen did not. She was too young.”

“And your name is Juliet,” Jarl butted in.

“Yes.” I became very absorbed in picking a few flowers, the last blooms of mountain rue.

“So you knew your family,” Jarl persisted.

“No. I was still too young. But I was old enough to be delivered with a name.” I tossed the yellow flowers aside.

“Why did—” Jarl started to ask, and Fenrir cut him off with a mere shake of his dark head. Jarl subsided into silence with a muted snarl.

Strangely, it did not feel wrong to sit here in the morning light in the company of these Berserkers. Fenrir leaned down and snapped off a long stemmed daisy. He presented it to me and I took it, bringing it to my lips to hide my smile. I could feel Jarl tensing up, ready to explode.

“Fenrir,” I said. “That means “wolf.”

The ‘wolf’ in question dipped his head. I hesitated. These warriors, impossibly, were also wolves. And they had a third form, a monstrous shape I’d seen only a few times and at a distance, lurking in the woods. I wanted to ask after the Berserker curse, but couldn’t bring myself to. If the friar were here, he’d decry these men as demons.

I shouldn’t be curious. I should cross myself and try to pray.

Instead, I felt no fear, no dread of demons or hellfire. Only curiosity and the desire to run my hands through Fenrir’s long hair.

“Jarl’s mother chose his name against his father’s wishes,” Fenrir said. His voice was light, teasing, and he gave a rare smile. “Perhaps, if you ask nicely, he will tell you why.”

“Why?” I asked Jarl, who was glaring at Fenrir. The long-haired man laughed softly.

Jarl cleared his throat. “She thought I would become a jarl. An earl,” he translated the word into my tongue. “A lord among men.”

“Were you an earl’s son, then?” I asked, confused.

Jarl cursed and Fenrir laughed outright.

“You are wise, little mother,” Fenrir told me. Giddiness spread through me at his soft praise and heated gaze.

“Juliet,” a girl’s voice called, and I cursed under my breath. Meadow and Fern stood in the door of the lodge. Meadow shaded her eyes, looking for me. I jumped to my feet before they could see me seated and conversing with these men.

“I must go.” Once again, I reached for the buckets but Fenrir beat me to it. I drew back before our hands could touch.

“Are you frightened of us?” he asked, lifting both buckets.

“No,” I said without thinking. And it was true. I knew then they would not hurt me. I’d always known.

Fenrir’s eyes lit in triumph. I stood facing them, scrubbing my hands over my dress. Something between us had shifted, and I knew not what. Or perhaps I didn’t want to know.

“Go then, little mother.” Fenrir handed me the buckets and nodded for me to return to the lodge. “Tell the unmated spaewives to prepare for a feast in a few day’s time. Later, we will bring you the day’s meal.”

“Very well. Thank you. And...don't call me that.” I hurried off, wondering if I’d made a fool of myself.

Fenrir

I watched the little nun hurry across the fields. She met her friends, two unmated spaewives younger than her. They embraced her and went back inside the lodge.

“She’s coming into heat,” Jarl muttered. “She hopes to hide it. But I caught the scent.”

“She can’t hide from us.”

Down at the lodge, a throng of young girls tromped out, led by an older one. Juliet had a little one balanced on her hip. She did not glance at us as she ushered the girls along toward a flower-filled meadow in the other direction.

I crouched and touched the flowers Juliet had plucked and discarded. “She will resist, brother,” I said.

Jarl’s lip curled. “Easily overcome.”

“And what about the Alphas’ decree?”

“What about them?” he shrugged. “The Alphas say what they must, but when they found a spaewife they wanted for themselves, they