For The Sake of Revenge

Chater 7: Promises are Kept

*A/N: I won't be making any chapter warnings as they are already in the tags. *

We had gone to the feast; I had changed out of my dress and Ivar had changed into clothes that looked and smelled respectable. The feast I imagined was far less simple than what it was.

This was extravaganza at it's finest.

The wild boar was stuffed and steaming, a relatively small amount of vegetables were sautéed and seasoned, but set furthest from the red meats, ale was in heavy barrels (where did they get the ale anyway?). The people were loud, and the great hall was so full that people were piling in several bonfires outside.

I never noticed how large their numbers were.

They were more than just a hundred or two. How could I have not noticed such a large mass? They were an entire legion of men. That is 5,000 according to the ancient Romans.

How could I mistake 5,000 people for a mere one hundred? I wanted to smack myself silly.

Something about this place really did lower my intelligence.

"I have never noticed how many there are," I breathed. I looked up at Ivar, who was also watching the men as he passed by, coming to sit up at the head of his table.

"There were not this many at first. But Bjorn's army just arrived," Ivar explained.

"Was he not away in the Middle East?" I was astonished. Ivar looked down at me in amusement.

"I forget that you understand us," he chuckled without humor. "Serve us," he commanded, "Fill our horns with ale."

I blinked at him; he still didn't answer my question. I looked around and saw everyone else serving themselves perfectly fine.

I turned back to him--

"Brother," A deep voice spoke in Norwegian, certainly not Erik's. I whipped around. There stood a man, even taller than Ivar, built like a bull with a bald head but the bushiest beard I have ever seen. He had one long scar running from his eyebrow down to his cheekbone, barely dodging his bright blue eyes. He was handsome in the light way that Ivar was in a dark way. He was also significantly older, in his middle age.

"Bjorn," Ivar told him, a smile coming over his face, something between respect and mischief. "I thought you would never come, how was Arabia? We never got to talk about it before we left, what with all this," Ivar was surprisingly pleasant.

"Hot, just like their food. They had no ale. But they had good spirits," Bjorn smiled showing Ivar a set of straight white teeth with his smile.

"I know about the weather there," Ivar admitted, never looking at me. I turned and began to walk away. A large hand stopped me.

"And who is this?" Bjorn asked, looking down at me as a hawk would its prey.

"My slave," Ivar said, his voice taking on a clipped edge.

"She looks like their women in Arabia. She is also fat, you keep your slaves well-fed it seems, brother," Bjorn commented, studying my face. My jaw dropped. Did he just call me fat? I thought they liked fat, something to do with fertility. Ivar himself said it. Ivar was the most intelligent man I know, and that is saying something (not really counting Stephen Hawkings, Neil DeGrass, and those people). That alone gave me no reason to think he is lying. That and his brutal honesty that I found myself subjected to every now and then.

"How can you be sure?" Ivar was getting testy with Bjorn.

"This one is Arabic, I know it," Bjorn dismissed. He let go of my arm. "Bring me ale," he commanded.