A Ballot of the Wolf and Merc | Ubbe Ragnarsson FanFic

Lets Hurt Together

The prattle Lagertha incited when her and the varagain where absolute out of earshot of any of the sons, hers included, was painful to say the least. Overly concerned like a broody hen Eleri never asked to be cared for. Lagertha sensible like any woman given way to maternal instincts. Wanting the young woman to let down her walls and share the pain in hopes of having some knowledged to share with the female.

Snapping a twig with vengeance over the fraying knee of her trousers, Eleri sneered at the echo of the Queen's voice in her head.

'We are all women, together we stand stronger,' Lagertha had even tried warming the normally business like interactions they had with lukewarm grog. Talking almost to herself as Eleri only stood in the Queen's alcove with her head hung low dreading the words that came out each time.

Twig snapped into four different pieces now Eleri couldn't break the wood any further and through down the waste to the sodden summer moss that clung to life around the shaded bases of a few grand fir trees. Slogging out to the nowhere in Kattegat's neighboring forest didn't settle the irked varagain. After such a trying out reach from the Queen, one Eleri never even asked for, she huffed and kicked a lump of dirt into tinier bits.

'When I was your age, I was so madly in love with Ragnar,' without a doubt shrouded in solitude Lagertha tried to liken Eleri to her youth with Ragnar. No amount of grog, warm or cold, would have let Eleri process anything the Queen said about the viking reflect upon her with Ubbe, 'He even looks a lot like his father, when I knew him when we were young.' Lagertha's tone having kindred a softness Eleri didn't know the shieldmaiden had with anyone but her one son.

Stomping down a line of trees, Eleri blind to where she was wandering, she tightened her fists hearing Lagertha's voice repeat in her head from earlier.

'Men, vikings, they are difficult,' she'd continued on even when all Eleri had done was hold the full cup of cooling liquid staring down mindlessly into the knots in the rough hewn floorboards. Lagertha came over to the bench and sat next to the young woman silent at first then she'd started up again, 'Women have an obligations in our society, just these men do. The Gods make that clearly with how they made us. While men only have one way to bring themselves glory to Valhalla, we are blessed with more than just the need to fight to earn our spot amongst the Gods.'

Eleri's snort murmured amongst the trees when she stopped in a clearing of deciduous trees, "Bearing children! Tff!" Craning her head back Eleri looked up at the afternoon sun filtering through the branches of leafy trees and limbs of evergreens. Leaving the temperature below the canopy nearly twenty degrees cooler than out in the open would be. Thankful if one is out during the day but when the sun set the tree cover did nothing but make for a chilly night alone if one was caught outside after dark.

'We are given the gift of creating life, as much as I've dreamt about taking my home village back before this point, none of it compares to how empty it would be without the love of my life,' not sure what side Lagertha spoke from, it had become clear the stance she held stronger in Ubbe's favor than Eleri's own.

The faintness of feeling Lagertha's hand on Eleri's shoulder tingled even as she wandered further away from Kattegat.

'Bjorn is my world, I love my son. I love my daughter still after all this time. Children, being a mother, it is something I would not have traded even if it meant taking back my city sooner or Ragnar never leaving. Everything I've done up until now was for my son.' Eleri had looked at her with a hidden disgust, had she really spoke as though the woman she sat with should throw away her own beliefs to give children to her step son?

Sudden spur of tears trickled down Eleri's face. Belated for sure since she'd done nothing but stare blankly at Lagertha back within the Longhouse. Now alone in the forest. Disorientated from north or south. No east of west. Isolated in a still unfamiliar terrain she'd been blind to for months.