“Not this time,” he called back. “Turn around,” he warned her as he rushed out of the bath to the stream behind it. He did not look to see if she had, only ran past her, through his embarrassment, into a pool that only came to his knees. He whooped from the cold as he sank down into it, and ducked his hair under, scrubbing at his scalp.
When he stopped splashing, he heard Adisa laughing behind him. “I thought all you could do was frown,” she said.
“I am called Ragnvald the Serious,” he replied, his back still to her. True enough—Solvi’s men had called him that sometimes, and not as a compliment. Adisa’s laugh took away the sting of the words, though. She had more reason to frown than he.
“Who are you really?” she asked. The pool he sat in did not feel at all cold anymore, now that he had grown used to it. It had been warmed by the sun all day.
“Ragnvald Eysteinsson,” he said. “My father was Eystein Ivarsson. My grandfather Ivar was king of Sogn.”
“I did not know Eystein Glumra had sons,” she said. That was what his father had been called, Eystein Glumra—Eystein the Noisy, who could tell a tale, but turn none of his boasting into truth.
“So there is one thing he did not boast of,” said Ragnvald. “That is good to know.” He stood.
“Does Ragnvald the Serious want a towel?” she asked.
Ragnvald flipped his hair back, and bent over to splash more water on his face. Flecks of dried blood stuck to his hands.
“Not yet. I’m going back in the bathhouse.” As he stood, he saw out of the corner of his eye that she turned away from his nakedness.
The fire had burned down, and the only heat left was what had soaked into the planks. Ragnvald sat and absorbed the last of that heat before steeling himself to go back outside, and face a long night’s waiting. The sooner he could move Adisa on to the ting, the better. The peace that prevailed there would keep her safe, and then she would no longer be his problem.
“Adisa,” he called. “I will take that towel now.”
She did not respond. He found a towel placed outside the door, and Adisa nowhere in sight. He wrapped it around his waist and gathered up his clothes, too soiled for him to consider wearing now. Her husband or some of the dead must have left clothes that he could wear until these were cleaned.
As he walked toward the hall, he heard a cry from the child. It seemed a good sign, that her fear had passed enough that she would risk a noise. Then she cried again, a fearful, helpless cry. A warning.
Ragnvald pulled his sword from the pile of clothes. At least he never went far without that. He dropped the clothes and then, after another moment, dropped the towel as well. The only part of him it defended was his dignity, and that poorly. Perhaps a naked man with a sword would surprise whoever had caused the girl to cry and make them easier to kill.
He did not hear another sound, not from the child or Adisa. It might be nothing. Adisa might laugh when she saw him. He still held the point of his sword up. Every corner he turned, he feared he might see her as he had first come upon her, cruelly raped by a raider. He did not think her spirit would survive another attack, even if her body did.
He circled the main barn, rounding each corner slowly. If he had time enough for this, then he should have taken the time to put on his trousers. Clothes would hardly defend him, but he felt far more vulnerable without them. Too late to go back, though. He moved on to the hall, and on the west side found Adisa sitting on the ground against the hall’s outer wall, a man fallen over her lap, a pool of blood spreading from his cut throat. She held her daughter to her side with one tense arm, and held up her bloody dagger with the other.
“I dare you,” she was crying. “I will serve you the same.”
Ragnvald followed her sight line and saw another man waiting in the shadows of a smaller outbuilding. He was alone, Ragnvald decided. If more than two of them had come, this one would not be so hesitant. Ragnvald charged at him, crossing the courtyard between them. The man hesitated, made a noise somewhere between a laugh and a shout. Ragnvald’s face heated, and he gave chase as the man sprinted away. Ragnvald caught up with him at the fence that separated Adisa’s inner yard from the outer field, and slashed his throat so he toppled backward over it.
He waited to make sure his man was dead. He considered trying to take some article of the man’s clothes to cover his nakedness, but it seemed like too much effort, and Adisa still sat with a man’s body pinning her to the ground.
When he returned to the side of the hall, she had shifted him off her somewhat, and lowered her arm. She still held her daughter close to her. The girl’s eyes were round and white as new cheeses, though she squirmed a little in her mother’s grip. As Ragnvald pulled the man off her, and away, into the shadows where his fellow had hidden, Adisa jumped up and tore off her overdress, screaming wordlessly.
Ragnvald rushed back and pulled her daughter away from her. “Adisa,” he said, trying to cut through her shrieking, then more forcefully, “Adisa.” He grabbed her by the wrists and shook them to make her drop her dagger, then put his arms around her, holding on to her firmly until she stopped screaming. She breathed shallowly and felt stiff as wood in his arms. He had only meant to stop her hurting herself or anyone else, but now he thought she must be worried that he had turned into another attacker.
“You are safe,” he said. “Think of your daughter. You must be strong for her. You were strong today.” He said other things, reassurances, until her breathing slowed. Then she pinched where he had her hand pinned to him, digging her nails in hard enough to leave a swollen red bruise.
“Let me go,” she ordered him. He released her, and she backed away from him, then seemed to see him for the first time, and looked up and down at him. “Why are you naked?”
“The bath,” he said. He turned half away from her.
“The bath,” she said. “I need a bath. Will you help me make a fire?”
He gave an abrupt laugh. “If I can borrow some clothes first.”
*
Ragnvald and Adisa left for the ting assembly the next morning. He and Adisa traded off the child for the food pack, as she grew too heavy, or wanted her mother. They found camping sites far enough off the path to risk sleeping all at once, with no one standing watch. Ragnvald needed the sleep as a drowning man needed air, and Adisa seemed the same on that first night.
The second night she was more inclined to talking after their evening meal, when the fire burned down the embers and Adisa’s daughter slept, openmouthed, between them. The child was almost as warm as the fire had been, resting against Ragnvald’s chest. He thought they might form a nice picture here, man and woman, with child between them, tree branches overhead. Like the first mortals, fresh carved by the gods.
“You are young, Ragnvald,” said Adisa quietly. “How old are you?”
“Twenty summers,” said Ragnvald. Old enough to be counted a man, young enough to be considered a young one.
“Not so young, then. I have twenty-three,” she said. “Did you think me older?”