I never asked for shelter in this frozen village. I came seeking refuge from the storm, not a fiery shieldmaiden's daughter who looks at me like I'm both salvation and damnation.

Astrid translates my words to her father, but her eyes speak a language all their own. Defiant. Wary. Hungry in ways she doesn't yet understand.

But I'm a Northman with nothing to offer, and she's an innocent.

Until the night I can no longer deny what she's become to me. Until she realizes that some debts can only be paid in pleasure, surrender, and the kind of claiming that marks a woman as thoroughly taken.