Vikings Imagines

Captive

A/N
I'm so excited to be back! Swipe for the song that I listened to while writing this. If you want to listen to it while reading, start after the time lapse! I hope you love it.

P

*****

"It's been six months, Ivar. What more do you want?" I stare into his icy blue eyes as I break our comfortable silence.

He looks up at me from his maps and pawns, a small smile cracking across his face. He leans back into the old wooden chair, it's creaking echoing against the brick walls. The sun pours through the barred windows and down on to the table before him, the rays bouncing from the wood and parchment and on to Ivar. He glows almost angelically in the golden light, and I feel my cheeks at the sight of his beauty. Beauty I should not recognize, nor appreciate.

"Now what would cause you to ask such a question, hmm?" He folds his arms over his chest and gives a playful smile. "Are you bored of me already?"

"Am I bored of the Northman who invaded my home, took me hostage, and keeps me as his pet?" I fire back, failing to hold back my own smile.

By all accounts, I should be as angry as my statement would leave one to believe, but as the time had passed I had become more acquainted with my captor and an unlikely kinship had formed between us. He was cunning and fearsome to be sure. He had used his wit to overthrow York, chase my father from his home and abandon his daughter, lay siege to what should have been a formidable fortress, and yet... I had grown to like him. Behind Ivar The Boneless, scourge of Northumbria, Wessex, and England laid Ivar, the man with a boyish charm who liked for me to read to him, play games with him, and tell him about the lands and people in which he had so violently claimed for his own.

Upon my capture he had taken me as his own hostage, keeping me locked away safely near him. I watched for weeks as he argued back and forth over my wellbeing, and while I couldn't understand the language, I could understand the fight. They wanted to use me as a show of force. Send my head back to my father and his men as a sign of their victory and unwillingness to bed, a way to show the power of the heathens. Ivar, being the brilliant and acute strategist he is, decided I would be better used alive. As the weeks turned into months Ivar slowly started visiting me. Whether out of boredom or curiosity, his gestures started becoming softer and more thoughtful. He brought me books and items he found while rummaging the grounds, clean clothes, asked me to read to him from the transcripts kept in my fathers libraries, and even once confided in me about his growing disdain for his older brothers. We began talking about his people, his home, and his family. He told me the tales of his gods, and the stories of his famous father's victories. Being roughly the same age, we unknowingly began to gravitate to one another until the lines were muddied and our friendship hung in uncharted territory for an English Lady and a ravenous Viking.

"What a mouthy pet you are." He says cooly, his eyes narrowing before he leans back to bask in the warm golden sun. I take a moment to examine his Northman regalia and how different it really was to the men of England. Beautifully crafted leather armor covered his broad chest and shoulders, chain mail beneath it. An axe laid neatly in his belt next to his sword, like all his people seem to do. I shake away the curiously and focus back on my intent, clearing my throat as I lean forward.

"Oh come on, I'm serious Ivar. Do you plan on keeping your men here forever? Keeping me here forever?" I avoid his gaze as I fiddle with the worn edge of the parchment in front of me, aware that I may be pushing a boundary. As much as we liked one another, he and I were still enemies by all accounts.