CHAPTER 2
Lagertha unfolds her blanket. As the shieldmaiden settles in for the night, not only can she feel the presence of someone standing behind her, she can see his shadow obstructing her makeshift fire pit. From her seated position she slowly looks over her shoulder.
Her ex-husband stands over her with determined eyes. His expression is serious; eyes fixed, lips pressed. She could tell by his pulsating jaw that he was grinding his teeth. She could feel her stomach twisting in knots as she meets his steely reserve without a word.
Ragnar looks upon on his ex-wife. Her windswept tresses fall long past her shoulders; wild with the soft waves of unbraided hair. For the last few days he'd stolen plenty of glances from his side of the boat. He pondered how long it'd been since he'd seen her hair down. And remembers a time when that look was reserved only for him. Her hair had grown quite a bit since then.
Taking in the profile of her face, he notices her cheeks are flushed from the cold. He notices that her impossibly long eyelashes are cast in a downward glance before they flit upward to meet his gaze, and she did it in what looked like slow motion. For just a moment Ragnar indulges in the up close and personal sight of her. He would not allow his pride to rob this moment. Days earlier he'd heard the shaky, uneven sound of her voice through a slab of timber for what he believed would be the last time. So laying his eyes upon her once more, in this life… ..a miracle indeed, he thought.
Before words are exchanged Lagertha turns back around and closes her eyes. She feels an anxious flare in the pit stomach and takes note of her body's searing reminder of a reality she wanted to forget. Just die already huffed a small internal voice that she didn't quite recognize. Yet, in that moment she supposed a tiny part of her really did want to put both of them out of the misery.
"May I sit awhile?" Ragnar asks.
She had not responded before hearing Ragnar wince as he meets the floor, folding his legs in front of him.
On such a cold evening she couldn't help but wonder if he was deluded enough to come to her in search of warmth. At this point with Ragnar, she no longer feels sure what he was capable of. She did however know herself capable of throwing him overboard at the slightest suggestion of a cuddle.
For him, the best-case scenario would have been another fiery confrontation. But days after the raid and still no contact, he knew chances were good Lagertha is not enraged, and that's what worried him the most. Where are you? He begs to know silently. He'd always known how to manage her anger. It was her sadness he couldn't deal with.
"I want to talk to you". He started plainly.
Lagertha turns around to face the fire and looks him squarely in the eyes. She remains silent.
"Paris." He continues.
He takes several moments waiting for his ex to cut him off with a fury of words. But after studying her long enough, he knew she was different. Ragnar finds himself at liberty to speak freely to her, without interruption. Her fight was gone, and he didn't like it.
"We lost a lot over there." He watched his hands as he rubbed them together against the flame while hoping she'd grasped that he was not only speaking of casualties of war.
"And I am thankful to the gods that we prevailed. That Bjorn is safe..." He paused and turned to look into her discerning blue eyes "And… that you are here. With me."
At this, Ragnar detects the first discernible expression upon her beautiful face.
Agitation.
Just get on with it. He correctly read.
Ragnar feels his rambling attempt at an honest conversation failing. He wishes there was a sunstone of sorts for this kind of uncharted territory.
For years a silent treaty had predicated the pair's truce. Neither wished to revisit the circumstances surrounding their painful separation. They'd come to believe their paths had been fated, and it seemed useless to agonize over their circumstance. Instead, their exchanges were guided by ego and steeped in competition; playful dynamics that had been inherent in their relationship since the beginning. Still however genuine, the banter did nothing to assuage the underlying tension they felt in each other's company. Tension that was just as angst-ridden as it was sexual. Tension that led them to read between the lines of every sarcastic remark, and every jab and cheap shot. Nevertheless they continued this silent agreement because it was all either of them could do. It felt better to orbit each other in that shallow safe space than to feel it all over again. The hurt, the heartache, the things they wished to take back. They could not look back- not after losing two of their beloved children, and then later each other. During their four year absence they'd learned to accept this hard truth; some people can only live in your heart, if not in your life. Yet, in this moment pretending not to love each other seemed the hardest thing of all.
"Lagertha" Casting his eyes past her, searching for words. "You and I…we'd always envisioned taking these raids as a family. It's good to see it come to pass." He stops and looks in her eyes. "Despite all that's happened between us. I don't know what it's worth... but I am grateful."
He gently rests his hand on top of hers.
She looks at their hands as he begins to rub small circles in the side of hers.
He wanted more than anything to be her 'own sweet Ragnar'. It was someone he himself had not seen in years. He wasn't even sure if he still existed.
By the gods, he is trying to make amends, Lagertha mused privately.
She believed his sincerity. And she knew that apologies did not come easy for him, just as they didn't for her. She also guessed that Ragnar was taking his miraculous recovery as a godly sign. She wasn't sure, however, if his newfound sense of purpose had been born out of humility or invincibility. Whatever led him to reach out to her, she wasn't sure it even mattered.
For the past several days Lagertha had been living down the fact that her ex had heard her words to him as he lay, awake, inside that coffin. But truth be told, she didn't even mind. She'd felt he'd known it all along and she stood by every word. For her, they weren't just words, but beliefs. Beliefs that had been her coping mechanism in accepting her fate. So to be made the fool- yet again—by Ragnar should've sent her into a blind rage. But it did not.
The truth was, this was nothing new. She'd observed Ragnar's moral decline for some time. The hypocrisy in his criticism of her title-seeking, while he himself desperately wanted the recognition of conquering Paris. How else does one interpret a pagan king turning Christian then playing dead to get inside the city? All she wanted was her earldom back. Indeed, being shut out of the Paris plan had hurt. But she also felt his choice of Bjorn as a confidant was a fitting tribute to their son. She took pride in seeing him lead the charge.
"Lagertha, please. Talk to me." His voice cut through her thoughts. His handsome face wrought with anxiety. He couldn't stand the silence for another moment.
"I don't know what else to say. It seems you've heard it all." She shoots with raised eyebrows, but with a quiet, weary voice.
Her words singed his heart. But he was glad that it was she who brought it up.
Peering into her eyes he wanted his words to be clear. "I am always listening when you think I am not". He needed her to grasp his meaning.
Her eyes soften as he begins to rub circles into her palm. He calmed the urge to take her face into his hands and kiss her softly. Slowly.
'I never stopped loving you. Not for a moment' He reflected on those words from her, said from outside the coffin.
Imagining her face as she'd whispered those sweet words replaced the torture he'd felt in the confines. He hated hearing her heartbreak. But he also knew, without a doubt, that those words are what gave him the strength to continue to fight. To continue to live.
Lagertha let go of his hand to turn around and grab her sheepskin blanket. She drags it around the front of them and spreads it to cover both of their legs.
"After all this it would be a shame if you ended up freezing to death." She reaches behind them and pulls a smaller wool throw to cover his shoulders.
Ragnar became keenly aware of the times he took gestures like this for granted. The last time he'd been at death's door Lagertha never left his side. He'd suffered mortal wounds by Earl Haraldson's men but felt armored in her loving care. She'd nursed him to health with her own hands, he heard her tearful prayers, he listened to her encouraging words. In a short space of time he'd felt strong enough in body and mind to defeat the previous earl in combat. This time around, as the he'd shivered from fever and infection in Paris, Ragnar knew it would be a lie to say he didn't wish for her. The distance she kept was just another harsh reminder of all he'd lost. Indeed he'd gained young sons and a new marriage, but he'd come to realize he did not have a wife.
Ragnar nods in appreciation for the covers.
He takes it as a sign that he could stay for a while and welcomed the invitation. The two sit in a more comfortable silence as they warmed their hands. He was relieved things had been civil, but he could feel something was still off with her. As he noticed her hands outstretched to the flame; a ring on her pointer finger caught his eye. It was nothing that came from the Paris horde, but a masculine ring that appeared to be made of ivory or soapstone. He'd vaguely seen it before but couldn't place where.
"Well played." Lagertha sighs.
"Well played?"
"Your plan. For Paris." She shoot him a look from the corner of her eye, still facing the flame.
"We all had a part to play and you were fearless, shieldmaiden. I know where the boy gets it".
They both fall silent for a few moments, feeling like fish out of water amidst this sea of compliments.
"But yes. My plan was pretty fucking brilliant." Ragnar quips, purposely relieving her of an obligation to make nice. But just as her beautiful smile returned to her face, it faded just as quickly.
She meant it though. The baptism and coffin siege were just the type of risky schemes Ragnar would cook up at their farmhouse. The couple would dream of adventure and he was good for conceptualizing them. Paris was just the type of wild victory that would send them tearing at each other's clothes the night of any marginally successful raid. The bigger the success, the more passionate their lovemaking. The rush of adrenaline would take over and last them well into the night. So it seemed to her that Ragnar had been training for a victory such as this for most of his life. Just as she knew that Ragnar was beaming with pride at news of her earldom; an earldom she obtained in the most twisted fashion; she too could feel the same for him. Lagertha realized that her stomach was in knots not because she loved this man. But because she could not stop.
"What is it?" He asks, finally giving up on interpreting her mood.
"Nothing."
"Something is worrying you. I thought maybe it was me, but it seems I can not take all of the credit".
He was correct. She had grown weary but accustomed to the untrustworthiness of others, particularly the men in her life.
She'd come to realize that if she were ever to gain a solid foothold in this life, she would need to do it on her own. Despite their private regard for her, Ragnar, Sigvard and Kalf had each proven that they could not be trusted. It is a heartbreaking reality but she's learned to adjust. And now that her land and title had been usurped, once their boat hits the shore she would have no place to call home.
She would not be a subject under Kalf, and with another woman sleeping in her bed, she didn't feel at home in Kattegat.
"I need to figure out what I am going to do once we're back." She answers honestly.
"What is there to figure out?" Ragnar asks earnestly.
"I don't have a home."
Ragnar straightens up, and bottles his personal frustration with this topic. In his eyes Lagertha will always have a home in Kattegat. It is she who leaves her home time and time again. Accommodations are there for her when she wants them, and it was always his deep seeded wish that one day she would finally stop leaving.
"Your home is with your family. We are in Kattegat." He mindlessly watches her hands against the flame and realizes how he knows the ring. A searing burn hits the pit of his stomach.
"Who's ring is that?" He asked, more aggressively than he wanted.
Lagertha looks over her hand with fingers spread, twisting her hand both sides. He wasn't sure if she was modeling for him or stalling.
"This?" She spins the ring around using her thumb. "I got this from Kalf."
She subtly tries reading his expression, unsure if he expected follow up information.
He didn't need it. He remembered seeing what he now considered to be the gaudy piece of shit ring on Kalf's smallest finger. One of the many fixtures of opulence he'd noticed while taking in affluence of Lagertha's former compound during his last visit.
Aside from Floki, Norsemen typically did not wear rings. Ironically, style detail was something the pagan zealot shared in common with Christians.
"I thought you hated Kalf. Why are you wearing a ring that belongs to him?" He asked with a furrowed brow.
She pauses, assessing whether or not she owed him any kind of an explanation.
"I liked the ring, so he gave it to me."
"Consorting with your 'enemy'. That is interesting."
"As I said, I need to figure out what is next for me. In my situation it seems inconvenient to harbor enemies. Maybe it's better to seek friends."
Of course Ragnar knew nothing of her tryst with Kalf. And truthfully, she wasn't quite sure what to do with the usurping Earl yet.
But she could not deny that the taste for vengeance and the touch of his affections where alluring in equal measure.
She needed to learn what the gods had in store for her, and it seemed prudent to keep her options open for the time being. And although she and Ragnar were back on speaking terms, her relationship with Kalf was not something she was prepared to discuss with anyone.
Besides, she'd already shared some of her most intimate feelings with him. He would need to die again to hear more.
And it was just as well. Ragnar had heard enough about Kalf. He did not agree with her need to "seek friends", and he did not understand why a man's ring needed to be on her finger to encourage it.
He also did not trust Kalf. The king decided to make nice with him to use those boats for Paris, but they were not friends. He could never truly befriend someone who'd betrayed her. He prayed that Lagertha understood this.
Most of all, he did not understand her need to live away from Kattegat. It will always be her home.
Through gritted teeth, Ragnar wisely withheld his opinion on the matter to avoid upsetting her. All he really wanted to do was enjoy that comfortable silence and hold her hand.
"You will find your way. You always do" He sighs as he finds her hand once more.
To be cont'd….
END CH 2.
A/N: I am sincerely sorry for the long wait for this stubborn chapter. I plan to write one or two more chapters for this one. Feedback is always appreciated!