“The men are still of an uncertain mood. I think it’s best that they not see you again tonight. They spoke of stripping you naked to see how you’re made.”
“Why would they want to do that?”
“Well, I told them I’d lied. I admitted that it wasn’t really five times or three times because you were so massive you hurt me badly, but you were gentle and kind to me and didn’t take me again as you wanted to. As I was walking out of the longhouse, I heard Rorik say it wouldn’t matter if they stripped you naked because that meant nothing. He said different men gained different size when they wanted a woman. What they began with wasn’t all that important.”
“Chessa,” he said slowly as he walked down the wooden rungs of the ladder, “you told them that I had a huge member?”
“It’s surely the truth. I looked at you and nearly fainte
d. And that’s what I told them, Cleve. Can we go to the warship now? All that talk of separate times and length and breadth. It’s left me wondering what all this mating is supposed to be about.”
He plowed his hands through his hair, a habit, she was learning, whenever he was unnerved. “I failed you, but tonight, Chessa, tonight I won’t. All right, I want no more fighting. We’ll go to the damned warship. I might as well show you that I’m no hero, that I’m just a man and have the endurance of any other man, no more. Please, Chessa, tell me you didn’t compare my sex to that huge oak trunk over there.”
“There were no oak trees in the longhouse.” She looked disappointed.
“Thank the gods for that. I don’t want to know what you compared me to. Doubtless I’ll hear it from the men tomorrow. Come along now and learn you’re married to a man, a simple man who doesn’t have an oak tree attached to him.”
“That’s splendid,” she said, and tucked her hand through his arm. “It’s a beautiful night, isn’t it? I love the smell of the salt water, the sound of the waves hitting against the rocks. The rocking of the warship will be very nice.”
He looked at her as if she were mad. He grabbed her hand and together they ran through the palisade gates. Old Olgar looked after them, shaking his head, grinning in the bright moonlight, his two remaining teeth glittering.
“Just look at him hauling her out of here,” Hafter said to Gunleik. “He’s taking her away because he doesn’t trust that we won’t be listening, that we won’t be looking through the bearskin covering to see what he’s doing, to see how big he is. He’s a sneak, this damned man I thought was a good friend. What should we do?”
Rorik said, “Leave them be, Hafter. If Chessa is barely able to walk on the morrow, then we’ll flatten him.”
“Aye,” Gunleik said. “I felt the same about Rorik when I realized he was husband to my sweet Mirana. I would have killed him if he’d hurt her.”
“Sweet?” Rorik said, choking. “Mirana? Sweet?”
“Be quiet, boy,” Gunleik said. “You’re the luckiest bastard alive.”
Hafter, who wasn’t paying any attention, said, “Very well, we’ll wait until tomorrow to see if Chessa can walk or not. Aye, that will suit. Now, where’s Entti? I will show her just how it’s done and it will be she on the morrow to give fodder to Laren’s tale.”
“Amaze her with your breadth, Hafter,” Rorik said, clapped his friend on the back, bade Gunleik good night, and went in search of his own wife. He wondered how much she’d had to do with this. He smiled remembering some of her more outrageous mischief, each time making him more furious than the last, each time making him laugh harder than the last, like the trousers she’d made for him with too much wool in the front. The trousers looked ridiculous with the bagging groin until he was fully aroused. He hadn’t realized what she’d done until it dawned on him that the women were looking at his crotch every time they saw him, and giggling.
They’d been lucky over the years they’d been wedded. There’d been two raids by landless Danes and they’d lost only two men and one boy in the fighting and gained two warships. There’d been enough game to hunt, the rain had kept the crops plentiful. They had two fine boys and a little girl. He wondered, as he walked back to the longhouse, whistling, if perhaps she wouldn’t become pregnant with another babe by morning. He would try his damnedest. Five times. Five separate times. It was a goal now, despite everything.
“By all the gods, I don’t believe this.” Cleve sat back on his heels and just stared down at his wife. “This is the god’s punishment for my finally agreeing to marry you. How many times did everyone ask you if you’d begun your monthly flow? More times than I can remember. It’s too much.”
“My stomach hurts, Cleve.”
He just shook his head, plowed his fingers through his thick hair, freeing it from the leather tie at the back of his neck. Then he really looked down at her, saw her pallor in the faint light coming into the small cargo space from the moon, the tensing of her mouth.
He cursed softly, then eased down beside her. “Shall I go ask Mirana if she has something for the cramping?”
“She’ll be with Rorik having a splendid time. I just pray there won’t be any attacks tonight, for all the men are so busy with their wives they’d never hear a thing.”
“I’ll hear it,” Cleve said and sighed deeply. “I’ll hear every damned thing. You want me to rub your belly?”
“No, just hold me.”
The following morning, Chessa felt tired, for she’d not slept well. There were faint purple smudges beneath her eyes. As for Cleve, he’d not slept all that well either, because he saw her pain, hated it, and tried to distract her from it. When they left the warship after dawn, he said, “Do you always have such cramping?”
She ducked her head down, watching the narrow winding path upward to the summit of the island. A plover raced across the path.
“Don’t be embarrassed,” he said, more irritated with her than he could say. “By the gods, you were carrying on to everyone about my man’s size and the number of times I took you on our wedding night.”
“This is different,” she said. “Nay, it isn’t always bad. Perhaps it was because of our wedding night. You might have pulled something loose, do you think?”