New Release -- The Viking and the Pictish Princess: The Rose and the Sword by Lindsay Townsend

 

Eithne’s cruel father sold her mother into slavery and gave her away. Despised by her siblings as a bastard, beautiful Eithne has lost everything, including her name.

Now called Bindweed, the illegitimate daughter of King Giric has made a life for herself on Maiden Isle as a respected wise-woman. She is determined to hold fast to that position and her little home, no matter what—or who—may come to try to steal it.

But when a fleeing Norseman appears dripping from the loch to seek shelter on Maiden Isle, Bindweed traps him – is he friend or foe? What is his purpose here on her isle? When ruthless raiding Gaels invade, Bindweed and Olaf must unite and fight together, if they plan to survive.

Can The Viking and a Pictish Princess work together to save the last people of the Black Broch before a harsh winter and more devastating raids destroy them?

EXCERPT

The lone figure rose silently from the loch. Emerging from the grey shimmer of a winter morning with water sheeting off his body, he glided over the submerged boulders onto the shore of her island. Bindweed scrambled into a holly tree and dropped to the parched ground. She gritted her teeth against the shout surging up her dry throat, old fears from the past made real.

Viking!

He was big, this invader, big as a king stag of the forest, tanned, barrel chested and with arms thicker than her legs. His black hair, dark as December pinecones, matted itself to his skull in long streamers of shadow and eyes, the colour of storm clouds, were quick and piercing.

“Black Norse,” Bindweed muttered, not daring to stir as that fierce grey gaze swept over her hiding place. His thick gold collar and armlets flashed when he strode by, arrogant as a lord. He moved with the swift, quiet grace of a warrior, the low winter sun illuminating his leather tunic and trews, the long dagger strapped to one thigh, his sword on the other.

Spy or assassin, Bindweed wondered, watching his retreating back. He made for her cave-house as if he had walked the path a hundred times, though she doubted he sought her skill in herb-lore. Still, she did not stir.

The first snare on the trail he avoided with a snort of humour, the second, set below a seeming bed of innocent pine needles, swallowed him whole. Bindweed was out of the holly and sprinting before the Viking had stopped his bellow of surprise. A quick jerk of the rope hidden by ivy had the nets and timber unravelling and the trap closed. She quickly pinned it down, panting hard as she rolled the lock-stone in place.