‘Mor as in big or Mor as in Sarah?’ she asked to keep her mind away from the way the mist had shrouded the few scrubby trees which suddenly punctuated the landscape.
He stopped so suddenly that she nearly bumped into him. ‘Of course, you know Gaelic. I forgot that you spoke to me in Gaelic when we first met. How did you learn it?’
‘My nurse when I was little was a Gael.’ Dagmar looped a strand of damp hair about her ear. ‘It was her name. Mor like Sarah.’
His brows drew together in a fierce frown. He cursed loud and long. ‘One of the captured women, forced to work for the Northmen, but all the while longing to be free.’
She concentrated on a tuft of dead grass. He made it seem as though it was somehow wrong to have had a nurse. ‘Thralls exist. Even the Picts and the Gaels have them. Estates could not function without workers. If you know of a better way, do tell me. My mother had other duties and both her mother and my father’s mother were dead, long before I was born. Someone had to look after me when I was little.’
She waited with a thumping heart. She did not doubt that if he could, the Gael would abandon her here. She had to be grateful that his desire for payment from her father was greater than his loathing of the people from the north.
‘Even so, the Northmen have captured too many of our women. My aunt disappeared before I was born. She never returned. There were rumours about my grandfather selling her, but I know the truth.’
‘Just as you supposedly knew the truth about my hair and tattoos?’
‘That is different.’
Dagmar regarded the ground and wished she had never said anything. The Gael obviously despised her and her kind. At least her mother had never sunk so low as to become a snatcher of women. ‘And you’re certain it was Northmen.’
‘From Dubh Linn, from the Black Pool, according to my mother. They came in their ships and took her.’
‘We have been at war with the Northmen from the Black Pool for as long as I can remember. My mother despised them and what they did to women,’ Dagmar said fiercely.
‘What happened to your nurse?’
‘My nurse was a second mother to me. Mor in the north tongue means mother and she truly was kind and loving. I revere her memory.’ Dagmar hated how her voice caught. Mor had been one of the few people to show tenderness to her, drying her eyes when she failed at her lessons.
‘How convenient.’
Ignoring the Gael and his ill humour, she went and knelt beside the dog, holding out her hand and softly called her name. Mor the dog sniffed her outstretched palm and then gave it a tentative lick with a rough tongue. ‘Mor, I mean you no harm. I’m grateful for your nose which has led us thus far and I pray to Thor and Freyja that you lead us to safety.’
Mor cocked her head to one side and gave a small woof with a wag of her tail.
‘She approves of you,’ the Gael said with a frown.
‘As someone from the north, I’m honoured not to be considered imperious.’
‘It takes time for her to fully trust someone.’
Dagmar attempted a smile. ‘Like her master.’
He gestured towards the thickening mist. The bog in front of them looked particularly treacherous. The gesture revealed the breadth of his shoulders and the power in his arms. ‘Shall we get going?’
Dagmar gave the dog one last pat. ‘You’ll get us through, won’t you? You won’t allow the elves who lurk in such places to capture me.’
‘There are no such things as elves.’
‘Says the man who believed a woman could have snakes for hair.’
Mor woofed in response and started off, picking her way through the oozing mud and pools with complete assurance.
Dagmar concentrated on following the dog and ignoring the Gael. He was a temporary irritation. She would get rid of him as soon as she no longer required his dog.
He stopped abruptly and she banged into him.
‘What happened to your nurse after you finished with her?’ the Gael asked, breaking the uneasy silence that had sprung up between them.
‘Do you truly want to know?’
‘Yes. I’ve no idea what happened to my aunt. I made enquiries, but discovered only silence. I’ve accepted that I will never know. Maybe your nurse’s fate is hers. Maybe she did find some measure of happiness.’
Dagmar gave a careful shrug. How much to tell? She had learned that lesson long ago that no one needed her life story, particularly about things which had happened before the divorce, the bloody battle between her mother and her father’s chosen champion and then their terrifying flight off her father’s lands through the dark forest.
Her mother hated her talking about it and had once slapped her face when she discovered Dagmar clinging on to the small carved doll Mor had slipped her as they’d parted. The slap had startled her mother and she was instantly sorry, hugging Dagmar and weeping in a dreadful way that she’d never heard before or since. But Dagmar had learned her lesson—she never mentioned her nurse after that and she threw the doll away before her mother spied it again.
‘I’ve no idea,’ she confessed. ‘My Mor was one of the people I left behind when my mother and I departed my father’s lands. I presume she looked after my half-brother. She was a good woman who loved babies. For years, I used to recite her stories in order to get to sleep at night.’
Her throat closed. She could hardly explain how much that woman had meant to her, not to this man. He would only laugh at her. He wouldn’t understand that until the divorce, her mother had been so distracted with the demands of the running the estates and settling disputes, she’d had little time for wiping Dagmar’s tears when she skinned her knee or when her threads tangled or when she woke from bad dreams.
‘No, I’ve no idea what happened to my nurse,’ she reiterated instead. ‘If my mother knew, she kept it to herself.’
‘You’ll soon find out, if you are bothered. Perhaps she will have remained with your father’s family. Perhaps you can do the decent thing and prevail on your father to return her to her kin. She may have a home with my people if her kin have vanished.’
‘I am bothered and it is always best to see what a person desires before making decisions for them,’ she said. ‘You have given me a good reason to look forward to getting to Colbhasa. I thank you for that kindness.’
The Gael grunted.
‘My father must have given you a reason for bringing me back. You must have some idea,’ she said to keep her mind away from the potential reunion with Mor and the fact that she desperately wanted to see her again. She wanted to believe that Mor had been well treated and rewarded for staying with her father. Her mother had forbidden any talk of her previous life when they left the compound on Bjorgvinfjord.
Your life before must be as nothing, keep your face turned to the future.
‘You must ask him when we arrive on Colbhasa. He failed to inform me of the specific reasons, but he is eager to see you and the sort of woman you have become. It was part of the message he sent.’
‘May I hear the precise message?’ She pulled her cloak tighter about her shoulders. ‘I was rude earlier and I apologise. My only excuse was that the battle was about to begin.’