Chapter 14
Brida and Aethelflaed watched the Vikings from the wings, while I stayed in the dressing room with Gisela and Mildrith. None of the other girls knew what had happened that day. I sat in a corner, scowling at the wall as I fretted about talking to Skorpa. Gisela glanced at me sympathetically a couple of times and eventually, Mildrith asked me if I was okay.
"It's nothing," I muttered.
"Is it Skorpa? You're usually in each other's pockets before the shows, but—"
"He's pissed off with me. I had a pregnancy test—"
Mildrith gasped.
"It's negative," I said quickly. "But I didn't tell him until after I got the result, and Uhtred was with me when I did it." It seemed like a plausible explanation for Skorpa being angry.
"Then he's being an idiot," Mildrith said. "You and Uhtred are friends."
"Yeah, well. We'll sort it out later."
The Vikings' show seemed endless that night. The main performance eventually came to an end, and they stomped down the stairs to the dressing room. Then ten minutes later they went back up for their encore. After that, we all headed out into the club to meet some of the audience. I saw him from a distance, but I couldn't get away from the clamouring Pagan Rock fans until another hour had gone by. Then, finally, I went to look for him, but he was nowhere to be found. I spotted Uhtred at the bar and went over to him.
"Have you seen Skorpa?" I asked him.
He pointed upwards. "On the balcony."
Relieved, I set off up to the mezzanine above the dancefloor. There were booths up there with couches and low tables, similar to the set up in Nottingham. I found Skorpa sitting in one alone, a pint of beer on the table in front of him. I sat down next to him.
"I shouldn't have yelled at you," he said before I could speak.
"It doesn't matter. I get why you were mad. I'm sorry I didn't tell you right away."
"Why didn't you?"
"I didn't want to upset you. I didn't know how you'd feel about it after what you told me about Emilie. I didn't go running to Uhtred; that was accidental. I went into town to get a test and bumped into him. People kept recognising us and I was worried I'd be seen buying the test and it would end up on Twitter or something, so I told him and he went to buy it for me. Then when I went to my room in the motel, it was full of people watching us on You Tube. I just wanted to get it done and find out."
He nodded. "I thought you were on the pill."
"I am. But I was sick a week before we first got together, remember? I thought that might have affected it. It's probably just the different routine, eating shit food, and all the excitement and everything screwing up my body."
"Would you have told me?" he asked.
"If it was positive, I would have. I wouldn't have 'got rid of it' as you put it. Not until we decided together what we wanted to do."
He smiled and slid his arm around me. "For the record, I would have want to know, whatever the result. I'm sorry I was such a dick."
"I get it." I kissed his cheek, then blinked at the flash of a camera. "Shit. That'll be on Twitter in the next couple of minutes, then."
Skorpa grinned. "It might do me some good. You, not so much." He withdrew his arm from around me. "Do you want a drink?"
"Yes, please."
He got up and went to the bar, leaving me at the table. Immediately, a girl and a guy came up. "Hi, Skade. Could we get your picture, please?"
"Sure. Didn't you just get one, though?"
The girl giggled. "Are you and Skorpa together?"
"Ah, we're just messing around. Do you want to sit down here and get a selfie?"
"Yes!" The guy was quick to slide into the booth and sit practically on my lap. After a couple of pictures with each of them, they left me alone. Skorpa returned with a pint of cider.
"Thanks, I'm ready for this." I gulped half of it. "So, a couple more days and we'll be in London."
"Looking forward to the finale?" Skorpa grinned. "There's a lot of talk about the new song."
"I know. I saw the show was sold out."
We stayed where we were talking for a while, and later Uhtred and Sihtric joined us. Eventually, the music stopped and the lights came on. We went back to the motel and split up to go to our rooms.
I woke the next morning in the same position I'd been in the night I got drunk—with Skorpa moulded to my back and his arms around me. He was still sleeping and I lay still, thinking about the next couple of days. What would happen after the London show? Would this be over? We hadn't talked about whether we would see each other again. Brida had said Ragnar was already making plans to stay in England to be with her, and Aethelflaed intended to spend a couple of weeks in Denmark with Erik while they decided what they wanted to do. Skorpa hadn't mentioned what he wanted.
When we started sleeping together, I hadn't expected to want to continue things after the tour. It had been fun and exciting—our first time right after he tattooed me, and ever since, unable to keep our hands off each other, but was there any more to it? How did I really feel about him?
He stirred then, and rather than do what he usually did, which was to start kissing and touching me all over again, he drew away from me and got up. A couple of minutes later, he was in the shower. When he emerged, he had a towel wrapped around him and he didn't look at me as he started getting dressed. I got up and went to take my turn in the shower. Perhaps he had been thinking about what would happen after London, too. It seemed like he was putting some distance between us, and I assumed from that he intended to go back to Denmark. I didn't want to think about saying goodbye to him, but it wasn't as if we were in love with each other. It was just fun and sex, right?
The last couple of days of the tour flew by, and suddenly we were at the Astoria. A few more hours, and it would all be over. As Brida headed out onto the stage, followed by the other girls, the crowd's cheering and stamping filled the venue. My pulse quickened with excitement as I waited in the wings for the introduction to our first song. Then I jogged out there and grabbed the mic.
"Hello, London!"
The cheer that came back was deafening.
"We're Pagan Rock! Hope you enjoy the show!"
More applauding. Then I began to sing. The response to each song was the best we'd had so far, and the power of social media had clearly done us a lot of favours. When I introduced each member of the band, the applause grew louder still, and for most of the show we were repeatedly blinded by camera flashes. Six official photographers were set up in front of the stage, one wearing a shirt with the Kerrang! logo on it. When we took our final bow and left the stage, the crowd began to chant: "More! More!"
Reluctantly, we returned to the dressing room. It was over. I collapsed into a chair in the corner and wiped my sweaty face on a towel. It came away with streaks of eyeliner on it.
"That was amazing," Brida said. "I wish we could go back out there."
"Wait until we're headlining and we can do encores." Gisela grinned. "We'll have our own support band."
"You're so lucky, Skade. At least you get another song," Mildrith reminded me.
"I'm gonna get changed." I got up again and went into the small bathroom to have a quick wash and reapply my eye makeup. It would be about an hour and a half before I went back on stage with the Vikings and I couldn't wait.
By the time the Vikings were into their second song, I was ready in another outfit—a short leather skirt and a strappy top to show off both my tattoos. Brida and Aethelflaed were already up in the wings watching the band, and I went to join them. As usual, Ragnar was nearest to us and Brida snapped away with her camera phone. She must have had thousands of pictures of Ragnar by now.
I took a few photos of the band, and a few of Skorpa. As usual, he wore leather trousers that looked like he'd poured himself into them, and a black shirt, partly unfastened with the sleeves rolled up. Every so often he swung the mic stand around, making Uhtred and Sihtric dodge and the audience roar. When they finished their last song and left the stage to thunderous applause, Brida, Aethelflaed and I followed them down to the dressing rooms.
"Skade." Skorpa grabbed me outside the door. "You ready?"
"Yes."
"When we go back out, be ready in the wings. I'll introduce the song and tell you when to join me. Aethelwold!" He spotted our roadie and pointed up the stairs. "Keyboards."
"On it." Aethelwold jogged up the stairs to the stage. He was greeted with more excitement from the crowd.
"I need some water. See you in a few minutes." Skorpa left me and disappeared into the Vikings' dressing room.
I waited in the corridor until the band emerged again, then followed them up the stairs. The other girls came out, too, intending to watch the duet from the wings. Uhtred and Sihtric, not needed for the moment, stayed off the stage.
The cheering and stamping of the crowd became louder as the band took up their positions, then settled as Skorpa lifted his hands and lowered them. He took his mic off its stand. "We have something special for you tonight," he began. "Some of you might have heard I wrote a new song with Skade. We're gonna—"
His voice was drowned out by more applause, and he stopped, grinning, until they quietened again.
"We're gonna sing it for you right now. Come on out, Skade!"
As I walked onto the stage, Skorpa put his mic back on its stand and grabbed his acoustic guitar, which stood by Erik's drumkit. Mildrith's keyboards were set up in the position Uhtred usually occupied, with a mic ready for me to use.
"This is 'Let it Go,'" Skorpa announced, and Erik and Ragnar began to play the into. After four bars, I started to play the piano part, and Skorpa joined in with the guitar. Then I sang:
"Love that once hung on the wall
Used to mean something
But now it means nothing
The echoes are gone in the hall
But I still remember
The pain of December…"