Page 54 of Viking Unchained

Glancing back over her shoulder, Finn stood in the same place, rather stunned. She wondered what he was thinking.

Thorfinn was thinking that the quicksand was getting deeper and more enticing. That he could be aroused by the mere touch of her lips was a sure indicator of his declining control. And, really, he needed to regain control of his life.

So, he made his own choice. He did not sit. Nor did he walk to the water, where an early morning haze would soon be melted away by the hot California sun. Instead, he went outside and headed in the other direction, away from the town center.

Coronado was a peninsula only a mile wide from the Pacific Ocean side to the San Diego Bay on the other. The North Island Naval Air Station occupied the whole entire north half of Coronado, and the Naval Amphibious Base, where the Navy SEALs trained, was on the south side. Then there were the town center and residential areas, where he was now.

Under the warm sun, its beaches were a great attraction to swimmers, bodysurfers, sand sculptors, and whale watchers, and wasn’t it a wonder that people here had the time or inclination to stand about doing such frivolous things? SEAL trainees could be seen jogging along the shores, chanting out songs.

Coronado was beautiful, and as different from the cold, mountainous terrain of his country and its thousands of fjords as night from day. Not that there was no beauty in the Norselands. Just a different kind of beauty.

As he walked the tree-lined roads he noticed all the keeps around him. Well, not keeps. Houses, they called them here, no matter the size. None of them had much land with them, no more than some of the cotters’ huts at Norstead, and not a bailey or drawbridge in sight. With good reason. The population of the world, according to Geek, had gone from 55 million to 6.5 billion in the past one thousand years, even with the birthing control devices. No room for everyone to have even one hide of property.

There was a similarity, Thorfinn noted. What many people did not realize was that Vikings were not vicious rapers and plunderers, as the monk historians portrayed them—leastways, not all of them—but just men wanting to find homes for their families. The rocky terrain of the Norselands had little tillable land and could not provide for them all.

Despite all the fine prattle in this country about equality, Thorfinn had learned that there were classes of society here, too. He and his brother Steven straddled the lines between karls, or wealthly landowners, and the higher jarls, which could be anything from all-kings to chieftains, comparable to English earls.

Below these two classes were the cotters and then thralls.

Whereas in America wealth seemed to be the primary divider among the classes. There were no kings.

Nor were there slaves, not anymore. And for a certainty, there were vast estates here for the very wealthy, including Torolf’s father, who owned a vineyard named Blue Dragon with his wife, Angela.

One glaring difference, it occurred to him, was that this was a peaceful place, whereas Norsemen were always fighting, if not with the Saxons or the Franks, then with each other. Even with huge gray military warships visible in the distance, even in the midst of a war with another country, people in America could walk about without fear of death. Children played freely, for the most part. There was the terrorist threat, but mostly it seemed far removed.

If he was stuck in this country, would he live in a house like these? Would Miklof be with him? Or other children? And what about Lydia?

Really, his life was in such flux. He did not even know what he could do for a living here. A military job, that was for certain, though Lydia might pray to the contrary. Fighting was all he knew. Of course, he knew how to run a large estate, as well, but what market was there here for a man to direct the activities of his cotters and housecarls?

In truth, he had no place in the world, and that scared him mightily.

Straightening, he resolved, I will make my own place.

On that resolution, he walked back to Lydia’s Silver Strand Studio. She was still teaching a class. He watched through a window in the door for a while as she and the other women, and two men, jumped and pranced about to the music. No pole dancing here, although Lydia did look fine in a red, skin-hugging garment, similar to the black one he had taken great joy in removing yesterday.

He decided to leave Lydia to her dancing and walk outside some more. This time he walked toward the town center, where the Hotel del Coronado could be seen. Torolf and Hilda had taken him for dinner there last month, and even they had to admit it resembled a white fairy-tale castle with its red-tiled roof.

He passed taverns where people ate and drank at outside tables, chatting merrily, many of them wearing what he had come to recognize as Navy uniforms.

Hilda had told him on that dining trip that there were more than seventy eateries in Coronado.

He had countered with, “Such excess! Just like you having twenty pairs of shoes. Torolf needs to rein you in, wench.”

To which Hilda had raised her middle finger at him. It had not been a compliment, if Torolf’s laughter had been any indication.

Along the way, several women gave him appraising glances, and he sensed they would welcome his advances. Curiously, he had no desire in that direction. In truth, Lydia more than satisfied all those needs.

Which could be dangerous, to be so reliant on one woman, but that was something he would worry over later.

There were glass-fronted clothes marts he passed, where bright clothing was displayed. Still other marts sold nothing but sherts, emblazoned with Coronado or Navy SEAL words. And there was the bank where Torolf had taken him to open an account, after selling several of the gold and silver coins he had carried with him. He still wore his gold armbands, which were portable wealth if he ever needed it, according to Torolf. A church, a school, food stalls, a toy mart. Who knew there were marts that sold naught but playthings for children? Noticing a set of miniature chain mail, gauntlets, and a wooden sword, he went in and purchased it for Lydia’s son, who hopefully was his son.

“Is this enough?” he asked the young man who placed his purchases in a parchment bag.

“Dude!” the young man exclaimed. “That’s three hundred dollars. The Sir Lancelot outfit costs only sixty.”

His confusion over money got the same reaction when he went into a medicinal mart to purchase condoms . . . five boxes. Apparently, hundred-dollar bills, of which he had many, were of considerable value. Also, it must be unusual for a man to buy five dozen condoms at once. Sweet Valkyries! A man had to be prepared, did he not?

He shrugged at the white-jacketed man and pocketed the remaining money. What a strange country, to use parchment for money!