Vanquishing the Viking (Curvy for Keeps Book 7) by Annabelle Winters

Author:Annabelle Winters [Winters, Annabelle]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Rainshine
Published: 2020-11-11T16:00:00+00:00

7

CITY OF LONDON

WENDRA

“London is wetter than the bottom of the sea!” I say with a smile as the rain pours off the brim of my hat. Some gets down my collar, but I care not. Soon I’ll be dry in my home, warm near my fire, safe with my secrets.

Not that anyone in this bustling, smoky city cares about another’s secrets. And not that my secrets are particularly interesting to anyone else. My life is not particularly interesting either, but I am alive and that is something. It is the only thing.

I get to the narrow three-story building where I rent a room at the top of the stairs. There are mice in the walls and spiders on the ceiling, but they are my friends now and I love them like children. I speak to them earnestly, and sometimes I believe they answer me.

I lift my dripping skirts off my muddy shoes as I climb up the wooden stairs. I am warmed by the time I enter my room, but I start the fire anyway. I like to look at the flames. Fire is the opposite of water, and I can no longer look at water without being taken back to that dark day when the goddess reminded me that my fate was not mine to command, that my destiny is to die alone and so any man who lingers in my path will be taken by the water, drowned in the deep, swallowed by the sea.

“I see you,” I whisper to the white mouse who sticks his nose from his hole. His whiskers twitch and he pulls back out of sight. I sigh and sit back on my little wooden stool and rub my hands together to dry them. I sigh again when I feel how rough my palms have become. I spend my days cleaning floors and scrubbing walls for the other tenants in the building. In return the landlord lets me stay in this room. It has been a year since I was rescued by fisherfolk and brought back to England. A year since I came to London and found work and a place to stay. It should have felt like the start of a new life, but somehow it feels temporary, like it is just something to do until . . . until I do not know what. I cannot even admit what I await. Admitting it would prove my madness. Better to smile at the walls and talk to the mice. What say, Mouse? What am I waiting for? The Vikings to storm the city, sail up the river, the ghost of Wolruff standing at the helm of his longship, my name on his lips?

I am about to cackle out a laugh but stop. “What is that?” I say, frowning at I hear shouts come through my narrow window. I rise and walk over as the shouts rise to a steady roar that reminds me of the ocean. I touch the thin scar on my neck and then squint through the glass.

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