Being in the wrong place at the wrong time was all it took for Adelasia's whole life to turn upside down. After being captured by the heathens raiding her city and taken all the way to the cold North, the youngest Ragnarsson takes an interest in her...
With her cheeks still sticky and red from the tears she had cried already, Alasia had locked herself in a small cell she had found days ago upon exploring the castle. She guessed it had belonged to a monk or a nobleman who liked to do physical penance, because the room was terribly small. There was barely enough space for the pew in front of the cross and the cabinet next to it. With her eyebrows knitted together in concentration, she had ripped open the doors of the cupboard, only to reveal a wide scale of canes and whips.
The sight of them had sent her an unwilling trip down her own memory lane, suddenly remembering the time she had walked in on her older brother Mercuccio doing physical penance in her Chapelle. Feeling like she had intruded on a very personal moment, with her brother shirtless and whipping himself in fervent prayer, she had fled from the Chapelle to read her book elsewhere. Later, he had found her seated under one of the apple trees and silently, he had taken a seat next to her, the two of them lost in their own thoughts. After a while, he had explained, telling her that the guilt and shame of his sin were too great to bear emotionally and thus he had resorted to changing that emotional bearing of sin into physical pain, of which the Lord could relieve him. She had nodded her head that she understood, but it was only now that she really did.
Her mother's words were on endless repeat in her mind, reminding her of how she failed as a daughter and a Christian, of how bad of a sinner she actually was. Letting out a shaky sigh, she grabbed one of the canes, her fingers trailing over the mean narrow end. Only a second later she had made her decision, easing up the laces of her dress so that her back would be exposed as she lowered herself to her knees in front of the cross. Grabbing the cane in a tight hold, she lashed out at herself the moment she heard her mother's icy voice in her head again and letting out a loud cry at the sudden sharp pain that spread across her back, she pushed her mouth into the fabric of her sleeve, muffling the sound somewhat.
New tears sprung into her eyes and with a trembling hand, she lashed out again. This time prepared for the pain to come, she bit onto the sleeve of her dress to keep herself from crying out. Rising her eyes to the cross with a crying Jesus Christ nailed against it, she let out a shaky sigh. "Forgive my sins, oh Lord," she prayed softly, her words barely audible. "Forgive me the shame I have brought upon my family and the graceless words I have spoken against them."
Suddenly feeling the rosary around her neck burning like a hot stamp being pushed against her shoulders, she gave it such a hard tug that it gave a protesting sound before breaking altogether. The beads fell from her neck, some slipping in her dress, but most rolling all over the ground. She watched as it fell apart, much like she was doing herself, a hollow ache in her body. It had been her most prized possession, her only link to her family, a gift from her father, but now she wanted nothing more than for the rosary to disappear.
