Fourth Day, Fourth Chapter

Chapter 18

We weren't attacked during the night. I got up the next day with cold feet and cold nose. I went out covering with the fur that covered the bed and went looking for Eric with a little very hot milk and bread crumbs. The fires were still burning strong and the men slept around. Next to the lift door was Helgi, who led a group of men digging a moat around the fence.

The Vikings ignored me and continued lifting frozen mud at my step. Rulf threw me a shovel of filthy mud to the feet. The second-in-command of Halvar didn't even look at me. I kept looking at Eric among men full of dirt and blood and didn't see it. It was assumed that while Helgi was in charge, he would be resting, but I had woken up alone at home. I turned and looked between the men that were around the campfire. Buried under a pile of furs beside the campfire Eric slept, his hand on the hilt of the sword and the face covered by the head of a gray wolf. I sat beside him and sipped hot milk. I heard the men talking about the bad feeling they have about the signals coming from the forest: birds coming out in flocks and silence among wolves. Apparently they were almost convinced that the rest of Harald men were hiding in the outskirts of the village, waiting for the moment to attack and massacre us. I was looking at Eric, watching him breathing, how he swallow, his mild snoring... made me smile. Suddenly he opened his eyes wide and leaned over me just as arrows began to rain. Eric got up and lifted me by the elbow, and the furs that had been covering him remained nailed on earth with two arrows going through them.

"To the house, go home! Fast!" I ran like smoke and oakum. Just as I was running near our well I heard an arrow whistling. I went inside and closed the door securing it. I heard hammering arrows in the woods to my house and prayed that anyone could set the fire. Eric had told me the night before we had been lucky that Harald's ships hadn't arrived before its port and also Rothgar hadn't worsened in the summer or early fall. As had been the circumstances we could be thankful that Harald had to wait until this time to attack the village, with the snow it was harder to burn villages and herd the horses. About fifteen minutes after the first attack, the infantry attack began. I heard warriors attack, and to fight mine. I locked the door with the table but no enemy came to my house were very busy trying to kill Halvar warriors. I didn't want to look, but I knew that to look or not look it wouldn't change the outcome, but I didn't want to see blood running from my new neighbors.

I heard a horn sounding about an hour after the rain of arrows, and then the enemy began to retreat. I saw mine run after them, some on horseback, but returned a few seconds.

"They are getting lost among the trees, Helgi!" shouted a Viking who had been guarding the place that was close to my house.

"Don't go after them, don't hunt them!" shouted Eric "Retract to the village, finish the injured and reassure the palisade. Come on!" Our Vikings attacked the enemies hadn't yet nestled in the woods. They didn't pursue them beyond a hundred meters from the fence. Then they went and secured the scene as Eric had told them to do. Eric came a minute to home and make sure I was okay and then left. I went to see the animals as soon as Eric let me do it. The town was in good condition: as they had been defeated, they hadn't time to loot anything and being winter, torches and arrows hadn't been able to set the fire and destroy everything, but there was almost less than a dozen really damaged house, with ceiling walls and burned. I was going over my house when a gasp caught my attention: the wounded needed assistance. I saw Eric, Helgi, Wulfric and a group of fifteen men, who weren't working ensuring our defensive weaknesses, start doing a body count and help the wounded.

Eric didn't pay much attention to me and I didn't blame him. Around mid-morning he asked me to make something to eat for him, Helgi and Wulfric (the second man accompanying Halvar the day he found me).

I went for a walk through the town and picked up a dead hen because of an arrow and three chickens. I made a broth with the hen and roasted the chickens (I had to throw one's head because it was crushed).

I was scared to dead when I saw that the men at my table ate with their hands full of mud and blood stains. I ate a little chicken breast and left the rest to them (I consider that they have earned it). For a while I kept silent, listening to what they said.

"…plus the ones we killed in the forest" Wulfric said "they make a total of one hundred and twelve enemies."

"And I think nearly fifty of them escaped."

"Yup" Eric mused between bites "that's close the number Olaf the lookout told us. Although I wonder why Harald hasn't sent all the men of his village. How many are they?"

"I think they are almost three hundred" Helgi said "Almost five hundred warriors if you count the lads that are between fifteen and eighteen and the older who are between fifty and sixty."

"He hasn't sent all the men he had. He only sent a few" Wulfric reasoned.

"Maybe he was afraid of losing everything. I guess that he wouldn't leave his village without a single warrior in order to send them here. And less of all at this time of the year."

"Harald has sinned of impatience" Eric commented "He should have waited until the spring. In spring and summer is when real damage is done."

"Will you call the ships?" I asked "It's safe now, right?"

"I don't know" he said after a pause "Harald isn't as stupid as what he has shown. It gives me a bad feeling" I got the creeps. Helgi was in the line of thought of Eric, while Wulfric thought he should call the ships now that the sea was calm. He wanted to see his wife and young children and he was as afraid of the sea as he was from the enemies. The four boats had left with three men in each ship and the women to the oar. If the sea got violent the women unaccustomed to the sea, wouldn't resist. His daughter in law was pregnant...

"Will you wait until tomorrow, then?" Helgi asked.

"It is a waste of time. There is still day, we still have time to send smoke signals and boats depart from Black Harbor this afternoon and arrive tonight" Wulfric said.

"We shouldn't rush."

"It isn't rush, Harald doesn't have enough men, and we are more. Although if they come, we would defeat them."

"It is absurd to risk" he commented "They are safe there while here..."

"Here they would be safe too."

"Don't be impatient, Wulfric. You'll hug your wife tomorrow" Eric said.

"It's easy for you to have your concubine at home" Eric gave him a killer look and Helgi also stiffened. Wulfric held his gaze and I heard his train of thoughts running through his mind quickly, all of a sudden the train stopped and he regained sanity "Sorry, sorry. Your children... your children and your father."

"Yes, my whole family."

"We're all concerned" Helgi comforted.

"But..." insisted Wulfric "We could bring them back. It's a beautiful and splendid day at the sea, perfect for sailing."

"Yeah, I guess so" Eric said "It don't make sense to delay their return anymore. Although Harald could rejoin all his warriors and attack, has suffered a major defeat and we are still greater in number" Eric got up and I did with him. I went trotting trying to make his long strides.

"You think it's a good idea? I mean," I avoided a horse poop "I also look forward to hug the kids, but I don't want them to be here if there is a shower of arrows as the one of this morning, again."

"I don't think that will happen again."

"But you said Harald's men are far more than those who came, you said..."

"Go home. Do you mind to warm up water for me to clean up?"

"No, of course not" I know when Eric want to end a conversation. It's just as sharp as ever. I turned crestfallen and a little worried. I went back and got two buckets of water and put them in the fire to warm. Wulfric and Helgi were sitting at my table, talking. I cleaned the leftovers and threw them to the pigs and chickens. When I came back from the barn I found Eric and the other two Vikings talking about the strategies to be followed in case something went wrong. They were going to let the boats ready to shelter women and children in the caves of the cliffs if they came by surprise. I took the basin and placed it behind the curtain of wool. I left several buckets, a bucket with fresh water, the soap and the brewage they used as shampoo which was produced from the pitch. It left the beautiful hair, but it smell. Eric came in with all things in his mind.

"Do you want me to take the water in the basin used by the children?" He didn't answer "Eric?"

"Hmm? Ok. Ok." I did what I had offered him and returned to his side. He got rid of the wolf fur he worn over the wool tunic, then followed the tunic and finally began to quarrel with his mail. He was going over in his mind the men he had killed. He wondered how many of them had a family that would be waiting for them to come back. How many have a daughter like Audr who would stay by the fire waiting for her father to return. How many would have a woman who was biting her nails. He thought of the families who mourn to see that their men hadn't returned. I helped him take off his coat of mail and other things. I rested my forehead on his bare back. My vampire has a similar scent, but not at all the same. Eric the Viking smelled of sea salt, the leather of the saddle, sweat, cold, snow, blood and metal chainmail and steel of his sword. I stroked his back with the tip of my nose and kissed him. I stood in front of him and looked into his eyes. I stroked the long strands of blond hair, shoulders, arms and collarbones. I lowered my hands down his chest, feeling his abs, tangling my fingers in the hair coming down from his lower abdomen to the crotch. I reached under his wool trousers and stroked. The soft skin of his penis was getting smoother as it was hardening. His gasps fanned my hair and bangs tickled my forehead. He kept his hands at his sides, fallen down, although he was dying to correspond to my attentions. He wanted to raise my skirt and touch me, but he had his hands dirty with mud and blood and I looked like a nymph. I put my other hand the one wasn't busy down on his chest and clenched muscles. We didn't take our eyes from each other. I dug my nails in his chest when he moaned softly. I kept stroking up and down, enjoying his gasps and groans, enjoying his thoughts. I could stroke him just as he wanted me to it. I licked my lip and Eric cum in my hand. He leaned his forehead against mine and we stayed like that for a while, until somebody knocked on the door.

"Eric!" Eric pulled himself together, I took the hand from his pants and he put something on top to open the door. The boy on the other side seemed to realize the he had interrupted something "We are raising the fence again and Helgi wants to know if..."

"I'm going" He looked at me and smiled "The signals are already in the sky, you will soon have the kids here, woman."