Lord of Raven's Peak - Catherine Coulter [105]
Deglin suddenly looked austere, and it sat strangely on him since he was so drunk he could scarcely stand. “She is a slave. Erik could have raped her until his manhood rotted off. It was his right.”
Oleg just shrugged. “It matters not, for Merrik believes she didn’t kill Erik; most of the people believe her for she is Rollo’s niece and thus a lie wouldn’t be in her nature.”
“Ha! She killed Erik because she knew she had Merrik. Erik would never have set aside Sarla, so she had no choice but to kill the man who stood master of Malverne before Merrik. Aye, she wanted Malverne and now she’s won.”
“But she was unconscious. She’d knocked herself out hitting her head against a rock. I myself saw the lump on the back of her head.”
“Aye, she was unconscious, but that was after she’d struck Erik. She was running, panicked and heedless, to escape her crime.”
“I have wondered,” Oleg said thoughtfully, staring into the dregs of his ale at the bottom of the cup. “Aye, I have wondered if perhaps Erik was struck down so that Laren would be blamed for it, that she was the object of the hatred, not Erik. What do you think, Deglin?” With those words, Oleg looked directly into Deglin’s eyes. The man looked at once feverish and pale, deathly pale.
“Some dislike her, don’t trust her,” Oleg continued. “You, Deglin, hate her above all others. Did she not take what was yours? You have been skald here for five long summers. And now you are nothing. Aye, she stripped you of what belonged to you. Did she not also abuse you, make you feel less the man? Did she not make Merrik burn you when she accidentally fell into the fire?”
“Aye,” Deglin shouted, pounding his fists to his skinny thighs. “Aye, she did. I’ll tell all of it now. I have protected Merrik with my silence. But now I will speak the truth. It is time the bitch got her comeuppance, her punishment for her crime. No more protecting this family. I owe them nothing.” He drew himself up, straightened his thin shoulders. There was a pleased glitter in his eyes. There was no drunken slur to his words now, no clumsy movements. It was as if he’d suddenly become miraculously sober. “I saw her strike down Erik. Then she saw what she’d done and she ran. Aye, she knocked herself unconscious, but she killed Erik nonetheless. I swear to it. I saw it all happen. It wasn’t to protect herself from his rape, for she wanted him, and after she’d had him, when he was sated and lulled, she struck him on his head, killing him. Aye, I saw it all, I saw her murder Erik and I will swear to it.”
At that moment, Laren appeared, her face pale as the raw wool on the loom. “Why do you lie, Deglin? Why?”
“You faithless bitch!” Deglin yelled and bounded to his feet. “You have ruined everything! I had prestige and respect until Merrik found you in the slave ring. You stole everything that was mine, everything! You killed Erik. I saw you kill him, strike him hard with that rock, when he was still on top of you, his sex still between your legs, his reason still swamped with his lust. Aye, you killed him after you whored for him just as you do for his brother. You killed him because you wanted Malverne. Will you kill Merrik as well?”
She just stared at him. The violence of his hatred was numbing. She wanted to tell him that the two of them could have both told stories, that there were surely enough people to listen to both of them. Instead, all that came from her mouth was, “Why do you hate me so much?”
“I should have killed you when I saw you lying there, aye, I should have—” Deglin rushed at her, his hands outstretched, curved inward, as if already digging into her throat.
Oleg rose slowly, hurling