Vikings of Asgard Chapter 33 Judgement
Don punishes his family to keep the peace
Don tried to keep the irritation out of his voice. “Are these silks and jewels necessary?”
“They most certainly are,” Kim said, stepping back from adjusting one of the jade pins and putting her hands on her hips. “Part of making your judgment stick without being challenged is looking like someone whose judgments can’t be challenged. I’ll start training your girls to properly dress you every morning from now on.”
“I don’t want to look like a pimp.”
“No. You’ll look like a rich, powerful noble whose word can mean death. That’s what you are now, so you need to look that part. If you had, Elisabeth would never have tried throwing her weight around.”
He let out a deep sigh. “You have a point.” He looked at his wrist and the ruby cufflinks. Him wearing pounds of silver, gold, gems and even cufflinks, and they belonged to him, was hard to believe. Who would have thought that ruby cufflinks would have been part of the treasure that those porters had been carrying to Egypt? They differed from modern ones, and a female Nubian slave had pulled these from the pile and shown them to Kim as they were getting ready. Two thumbnail-size rubies mounted on a short gold post. Apparently, they were for holding shirts together instead of buttons, but worked as cufflinks too.
He raised his eyes to her. “Ok, I can see your point of looking impressive for when I pass judgment, but do I really need to be there when you talk to the women before?”
“Neither Maria or me have enough weight to make them take us seriously if you are not there. Me, they consider a whore. Maria is just a pregnant girl that didn’t know enough to stay away from a ganger. For them to even listen to what either of us say, you have to be there to back us up, even if you don’t say anything. You being there forces them to listen. Though you should keep quiet and let us handle it. Some of what we have to say they would take very differently if a man, any man, tried telling them that.”
“Well, if we are going to do this, we need to get going. The time you gave them was five minutes ago.”
“Let them wait, and stew on things. I am going to put the finishing touches on my outfit.”
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