An Untamed Heart by Lauraine Snelling Read Free Book Online

hauling herself out of bed, slowly and carefully she’d stretched her hands over her head and turned from side to side. By the third time, she could feel the muscles relent, even to letting her exhale a big breath and drop forward, also slowly and with restraint. That was most assuredly not her normal way of preparing for the day. She’d groaned her clothes on and stumbled her way out of her room.
    “Mor said to go on out to the garden,” Mari said now when Ingeborg entered the kitchen. “They are raking.”
    Ingeborg muttered an answer and poured herself a cup of coffee, reflecting that the morning after plowing, her hand and arm had barely been able to lift the pot. Half a cup later, she dished up the mush, still warm in the pan sitting in the coals before the fire, poured cream on it, and sat down at the table.
    Mari turned back to washing and rinsing the dishes. She had finally grown tall enough that she no longer had to stand on the bench Far had built for growing children to work from.
    Ingeborg closed her eyes. After several days of on and off spring showers, the garden was finally dry enough to start planting. Today they’d sow all but the more sensitive crops that would not tolerate the heavy frosts that might still visit. Some years they’d even had a late snow. One could never trust the weather.
    Mari finished her chores and stopped next to Ingeborg. “Mor was really upset with you last week.”
    “I know.” Ingeborg said nothing, but she knew she’d done the best thing, whether Mor could ever bring herself to admit it or not. The men hadn’t had time to do the garden then, and who knew when they would. And they couldn’t afford to waste good weather when they got it. Besides, with warmer weather, perhaps the women would leave for the seter early. Just the thought made her stand up.
    When she got out the door, the sun greeted her with an extra benediction of warmth, while a slight breeze invited her to go see the lambs before grabbing a rake or hoe from where they leaned against the side of the house.
    Propping herself on the top rail, she automatically counted the lambs, paused, studied the pasture again, and recounted. Still short one. She opened the gate and crossed to the fold where the animals were penned at night. Had anyone counted them before shutting the gate last night? Empty. She walked behind the barn to find one ewe basking in the warmth from the wall, her lamb by her side. With a smile, she returned to the back yard, grateful that nothing had happened. Surely the dogs would have let the whole valley know if a predatorattacked during the night. And the ewe would have been bleating and running around looking for her baby.
    Losing lambs was always one of her big worries, since wool in the spring and fall and lambs for slaughter were two of their cash crops. With over twenty ewes they finally had more fleece than they could clean and spin into their own yarn, unless they wove more into rugs and blankets. Weaving was usually a winter occupation, as was spinning, other than what they accomplished up at the seter. While Ingeborg was adept at both, Gunlaug was the master and taught the older children during the summer. Cheese was Ingeborg’s specialty.
    “All is well?” Mor asked, leaning for a moment on her rake handle.
    “Ja. Just a bit of a scare when I saw we were short a lamb and a ewe. They were resting behind the barn. Not their usual place, but both seemed all right.”
    “Do you want to start marking rows for the potatoes? Berta is nearly finished cutting what we have left. We certainly don’t want a slack harvest like last year.”
    “Was Far able to buy more?”
    Hilde shook her head. “Everyone is short.”
    Digging with one’s fingers for the first new potatoes under the flourishing vines was Ingeborg’s favorite treasure hunt. The new potatoes were crisp and sweet. Sometimes she washed one and ate it raw, like an apple.
    She took the ball of twine rolled on a stick and laid