Stealing the Valkyrie

Homecoming

Edithe remained perfectly still as she sat amongst the endless sobs of her people. She was numb to their despair and tears would be nothing but wasted energy to her now. With her hands bound and a Viking heathen watching her every move she had little else to do but wait, spending the entire night in a trance until one word snapped her awake.

"Ragnar," someone called and Edithe's heart jumped.

Everyone in Briton knew that name. It was the name which struck fear into anyone's heart. It was the name of the bogeyman. A warning mothers would use to stop curious children from wandering too far, "Ragnar waits in the cave, Ragnar hides in the tide, Ragnar eats naughty children."

Edithe's breathe caught in her throat as her gaze slowly travelled to find the man whose fame was only surpassed by his brutality. He had markings etched around the sides of his head and his hair trailed down his back in a long plait. When his gaze met hers he smiled, his eyes filled with the cunningness of a fox right before it sneaks into the hen house.

She was so transfixed by how he watched her that she hardly even noticed Rollo or the way he began to push through the slaves to grasp her chin and pull her eyes to him with a stern expression. She didn't know what he said but she recognised the reprimand in his tone and pulled her face away from him.

What more could he do to her? He had killed her family and taken her as his slave. Obedience would serve her no purpose except making him happy and she had no intention of doing that. If he disliked the way she looked at Ragnar then she would only look at him more.

Although when she glanced towards Ragnar again she instantly regretted it. She might have hated Rollo but the stories of Ragnar hadn't just frightened children, they'd frightened her.

When the sun was barely at his peak the heathens began to move out, gathering the slaves like cattle and herding them into two long lines. Edithe managed to linger at the back, quietly saying goodbye to a place which had once held so many happy memories but now lay in complete desolation.

She wondered if her sister was safe, if people would come and give her family the burial they deserved. But more than anything, and maybe selfishly, she wondered if she would ever see this place again. Hope still found shelter in her heart and perhaps that was a childish thing but she clung to the idea that someone would rescue her, or that somehow this would all turn out to be the stuff of nightmares.

But Edithe wasn't waking up, instead, her weary legs were marching steadily on and as the longboats began to come into view she had no choice but to accept the truth. Nobody was coming to save her. She was leaving her homeland forever and even worse she was leaving it as a slave.

This single thought was enough to make her run, blind panic carrying her feet anywhere they would take her. It wasn't surprising that her escape was over as quickly as it had begun. Nor was it surprising that her capturer was once again Rollo and his laughter filled her ears as he scooped her up, shouting foreign words to his men who all laughed along with him.

Edithe struggled tirelessly against him. "Let me walk," she demanded, feeling disheartened without the words to tell him that she wanted to say a proper goodbye to her homeland. To feel the rich soil of her childhood under her feet one last time.

Although, she thought sadly, there was little doubt he would care for sentimentality even if he could understand her. All a man like Rollo could ever understand was cruelty and for as long as she lived she'd never forget the way he'd killed her brother or how much he'd seemed to enjoy it.

With little effort he carried her into the water, the light waves catching her skirts and from there he handed her to a man who was already in the boat before climbing in behind her. With a knife pulled from his belt he sliced open the bindings at her wrists and remained silently towering over her, his bare chest glistening in the sunlight and his eyes just daring her to try her luck with running again.