Melt The Ice In My Heart | Vikings

Meeting New Faces

"True..." The handsome, but lovely man wanted to talk about something important, I knew that, but it would end the same way as me and Rollo had ended up as. He was married, they both were and I didn't want to be such woman that is known for breaking love contracts. Over the time I had grown closer to Ragnar, I had to admit that and I knew something was special between us, like our faith was bounded, but the gods had made the decision between me and Aslaug and I seemed not worthy to live a love life.

"Why don't we go back to Athelstan?"

~~~

"Mhuh, great idea." Ragnar softly murmured as he smiled at me and then chose the path to where our group had gathered. When we arrived and opened the doors to sneak a peek inside, our Northmen were about to finish of a priest that happened to be still alive. I didn't know what Athelstan felt at that moment, but I think I knew what Ragnar felt; embarrassed because of the behavior of King Horik and his men towards groups who weren't like us. They thought this was our way, our reason that we went to England, but I knew Ragnar wanted to settle down here, build a place to stay, not torture people, and I couldn't help but agree with him.

Athelstan in the meantime looked like he was about to start a riot and intervened the torture by standing in front of them all before he turned around, whispered some prayers to the priest and killing the priest himself out of mercy. It was better this way, well, that was not what King Horik thought. For them the feast was ruined and Ragnar had already retreated himself from the church, wanting to go back to camp. He was silence along the way and in the camp in Wessex, I saw in the corner of my eye that Floki gave Athelstan the Bible the monk he killed earlier was holding. It seemed as if Floki didn't believe that Athelstan had renounced his faith.

After that being said, Floki mockingly surprised him with the skeletal hand of some sort of saint and I shook my head, making Floki leave him again so that he could rejoin his fellow men. Meanwhile I could also spot Ragnar who was speaking to King Horik, probably about if we were to live in England, we could all have food as the earth is fertile enough for farming. But of course King Horik expresses his doubts about the Saxons allowing us to live there, though, I could understand it, it was a wild guess we were taking. At the moment I did not feel like joining the group and was quietly sitting against a stone somewhere outside of camp to guard it a bit.

Everyone had their own things to do and it was quite fun down there. It was not too cold, nor too warm, the temperature was just right. While I sat down I was sharpening my knife for a while and suddenly spotted a person with red on a horse with another large group following him in the distance, which made me curious. I stood up and from where I was standing the people were pretty small, but I could guess they came from King Ecbert. The man who seemed a bishop asked Ragnar how long we were intended to stay, to which he replied that it depended on what King Ecbert is willing to offer them to leave or to stay. Ragnar then said that he wanted to make peace with King Ecbert.

King Horik probably noticed that the general was scouting the numbers of our fighters, so before they finally left, Horik killed the general, much to Floki's amusement and Ragnar's dismay. I could see the disgust in his face expression from this far.

~~~

"I want you to accompany me."

"What?" I questioned while being lost in my thoughts because I had no idea what Ragnar was talking about.

"King Horik, Athelstan, Floki, me and you will tomorrow arrive at the gates of Wessex."

"To do what exactly?"

"To negotiate with King Ecbert about the land. If we are aloud to stay, we can farm here and grow healthy crops." I knew this was his dream and I wouldn't say no to an adventure so I nodded, showing him I will follow him further into the kingdom, how risky it may sound.

~~~

With the five of us we sat on our horses across the big gates of Wessex. We waited a bit till a few of their warriors located themselves on the opposite side on their horses as well and I sighed, not knowing what the plan was. Yet it didn't take long before I realized what we were going to do, exchanging people. Ragnar and another man were about to walk, but Ragnar stopped and pulled my horse along.

"We will give you two hostages." Ragnar began. "Me, Ragnar, and her, Njorun."

It looked like I had no choice, but to follow him and I swallowed before I felt my brave side burning up again. We were asked to follow one single man so we did and in the meantime I examined my surroundings. The sight was pretty and the people were also happy here. Ragnar was kinda shocked when two guards with spears joined us and made a little jump to keep up with our guide. The trip was not that super long and we stopped a couple of times to see beautiful statues that decorated the hallways.

"Who made all of these things?"

"Nobody knows. Some say a race of giants once lived on this island."

"Giants?" Ragnar looked up, breaking his eye contact with the statue.

"Yes, but let's continue! The Sire is waiting for both of you."

~~~

I still don't have any inspiration for this fic because my story won't fit in the real serie anymore, so feedback or story ideas are still welcome! 🖤🤍