Ivar rolled over in bed to lay on his back, and cradled his head in his intertwined fingers. He stared up in frustration at the darkness above him, and wondered how long he had been laying there unable to sleep. Or, more importantly, how much longer he would need to lay there until the first rays of sunlight rose over the horizon and it was an acceptable time to get up.
He had a feeling that it was going to be a long wait.
He rolled over again, onto his stomach this time, but no matter what position he chose, he couldn't get comfortable. The problem wasn't the bed; it had been perfectly adequate for the past few nights. Nor was it his body, as was often the reason for his sleeplessness when he was himself. He had no pain at all, there was no discomfort of any kind keeping him from drifting off. There was no reason why he shouldn't be able to switch off his thoughts and sleep.
Yet, he could not.
Ivar had never been good at sleep, not for as long as he could remember. It always seemed that even on those nights when pain did not keep him awake, that there was something better that he could be spending his time on. As a baby and a young child, his mother had told him once, he had been the same. At first, it had been the breaks in his infant legs that had kept him from sleep; she had told him how he would frequently wake the whole house with his screams. They had all slept together in one room then, his brothers sharing a bed and Ivar close by in his crib. But even after the wanderer Harbard had eased some of his pain, he had persisted in his wakefulness.
There were nights when he would lay awake reliving the day before, often struggling to extinguish a white-hot rage over some little thing that somebody had said or done. Other nights, he found that he could not switch off the plans and ideas that washed through his mind like the tides ebbing and flowing unrepentantly.
Other nights were simply bad ones, where the pain in his legs refused to subside in rest as it usually did, and cruelly held him back from the sleep that would allow him to escape from it.
Those were the nights that he hated the most; the ones where no matter how he lay, or what he did, no matter how exhausted he might be, or how loudly his body cried out and begged for sleep, he simply could not give it what it needed. Those were the nights that lasted the longest, and the ones that he dreaded the most.
It was one of those nights, he was almost certain, that Sigurd was suffering through right now.
He tried not to care. He told himself that he shouldn't care. After all, his brother had almost certainly never lay awake at night thinking about Ivar's pain, but for some reason he couldn't stop thinking about it, feeling guilty about it. It was that, that was preventing him from sleeping.
He was being ridiculous. He had no reason to feel guilty; no matter what Sigurd might say or think, it was not his fault. But yet, it was his body, and apparently something inside of him believed that the sleepless night should have been his, and had decided to even the score.
He let out a frustrated sigh, rolled over again, and threw off the furs that covered him in the bed. Instantly, he went from too warm to too cold. He reached for them again, pulled them back over him, covering only half of his body. Rather than reaching an equilibrium, he found himself both too hot and too cold at the same time.
Angry now; with himself, with Sigurd, with the ridiculous situation that they found themselves in, with everything, he kicked off the covers a final time, and sat up. There was only one thing that he could do on nights like this, when no matter what he tried, sleep would not come, and that was to accept it. He needed to give up on sleep for the time being, embrace wakefulness, get out of bed, and do something else. Then, perhaps, if he was lucky, he might be able to return to bed later, and get a small amount of rest.
He sat very still for a moment, stilling even his breathing as he listened to the sounds of the house around him. He heard nothing; no hum of conversation from another room, no quiet footsteps of somebody moving around. There was only silence, so complete that it almost appeared to take on a life of its own.
The house felt different when everybody else was asleep, in those few hours after the last of the servants had finished their work, when the earliest risers had not yet begun. There was something nice, something that he had always enjoyed, about solitude, about knowing that he was the only one experiencing that moment in the middle of the night. There was not only a silence, but a stillness too, that seemed to settle over the place, and it was something that Ivar always found himself reluctant to disturb.
Of course tonight, he doubted that he truly was the only one awake.
When he had listened to the silence for long enough to convince himself that nobody else was up and walking around the house, Ivar swung his legs over the side of the bed and touched the soles of his bare feet to the cold floor. His feet jerked back at the unexpected chill, and he waited a moment, preparing himself, before he tried again, this time carefully touching his toes, then the balls of his feet, and finally his heels on the cold floor.
He rolled his feet back and forth, getting used to the temperature that seemed colder the more pressure he applied. After a moment, it began to feel unexpectedly good. Finally, when he was ready, he got to his feet, pulling himself up to Sigurd's full height.
He took a step, savouring the feeling of the ground beneath his bare feet in a way that he had never been able before. Briefly, he considered pulling on a pair of boots, but dismissed the idea. The sound that they would make as he moved around the house would feel almost disrespectful to the silence.
He pushed open the bedroom door and glanced in both directions to ensure that nobody else was around, before he turned, and headed to his usual destination. He moved slowly, trailing the wall with a hand as he went. This part of the house was in almost complete darkness; no candles or lamps were left burning when there was nobody around to attend them. Although Ivar knew his way around almost instinctively when he was on the ground, it felt very different on foot.
As he rounded the corner, the way suddenly became lighter. Light flooded from underneath and around the door of his - currently Sigurd's - room. He hesitated there for a moment. So, he had been right. Of course he had been right; he knew his body well enough to know that if things had been as bad that day as Sigurd had told him, sleep would not come easily that night.
He listened outside the door, but he could hear nothing to indicate that Sigurd was awake, and had not simply left the oil lamp burning then fallen asleep. Still he knew instinctively that his brother was awake in there. Awake, laying in bed, wishing that he could sleep, but not able.
He tried not to care, but he still could not help but feel responsible. It may not be his fault but Sigurd was inhabiting his body, after all, and it was his pain that was keeping his brother from sleeping. At the very least, he needed to let him know that he wasn't the only one awake.
Slowly and carefully, Ivar reached for the door. He pushed it open just a crack, and peered inside. He found himself staring directly at Sigurd.
His brother was laying in bed, on his back, with his head turned to look in the direction of the door. He looked exhausted, pained, and thoroughly fed up. He stared listlessly at Ivar for a moment, then scowled. "What do you want?"
Ivar cringed internally at the volume of his brother's voice. He slipped inside the door and pushed it closed behind him before he replied in a whisper. "I thought you might be awake."
Sigurd narrowed his eyes, then pushed himself up on his elbows. "Oh? What made you think that?" he asked. His voice dripped with sarcasm and he glared accusingly at his legs.
Ivar shrugged, and took a step closer. "A lucky guess," he said. "I suppose this is something else that you think I should have warned you about?"
Sigurd gave him a barely perceptible shake of his head. "No, it's probably best that you didn't," he said. "Or I would have gone to bed expecting not to sleep, and then I would have blamed you for putting the idea in my head."
That was an unexpected response. Sigurd was right, of course. That was almost certainly what would have happened, but Ivar had not expected that level of self-awareness from his brother. Perhaps he had been using his time not sleeping to think, and that was no bad thing.
Ivar nodded, then raised a hand and made a beckoning gesture with his fingers.
Sigurd looked at him uncomprehendingly. "What?"
"Come with me," Ivar told him in a whisper. "I'll show you where I go when I can't sleep."
Interested, but clearly cautious, Sigurd frowned. "What do you mean? Where do you go?"
He wasn't listening. Ivar rolled his eyes. "I said I'll show you," he repeated.
Sigurd hesitated. He glanced up at the chain that hung above the bed as though he was calculating how much it would take out of him to reach for it. Ivar recognised the feeling. There were days when getting up simply meant getting out of bed, but there were others when it became a laborious sequence of near-impossible tasks that he needed to convince himself to perform, starting with reaching up and grabbing hold of that chain.
"Ivar, unless it is somewhere amazing, I don't want to move," Sigurd told him after a moment. He frowned and shook his head. "No, actually I don't want to move even if it is amazing. It still probably wouldn't be worth it. Can't you just tell me?"
That was fair, but Ivar knew from experience that even on days like this, it was always worth it not to lay awake through the night. He was, however, beginning to regret making the offer. After all, what would be the point in sharing something like that with Sigurd?
"Fine," he said. "Stay here then. It makes no difference to me." He shook his head dismissively, then turned to leave.
He reached the door before he heard Sigurd move. "Okay, wait," his brother told him. Ivar paused, then turned to see Sigurd reaching for the chain that hung above the bed. Moving more slowly than he had two days earlier when Ivar had watched him perform the manoeuvre four times, he used it to pull himself into a sitting position, then grabbed his covers and threw them clear of his legs.
That done, he winced, apparently in anticipation of the pain he expected to feel, then took hold of one leg and slowly lifted it to hang over the side of the bed. He looked up at Ivar, checking that he was still there, then repeated the movement with the other leg.
He moved with a confidence now that he had lacked before. Despite the slowness and hesitancy to his movements today, Ivar could see the confidence beneath. He appeared more sure of every action, and more trusting of Ivar's body, and what it could and could not do. He moved as though he had being doing it… not all his life, but at least for more than a few days.
Sigurd slid himself off the edge of the bed and slowly down to the floor, allowing his feet to slide out in front of him as he dropped, so as not to bend his knees under him. When he landed, he remained where he was for a moment, his face frozen in a grimace as he rode out the pain from the movement. Finally, he took a deep breath as it abated, then looked up at Ivar and nodded. "This had better be at least a little interesting, '' he said.
Ivar didn't reply, because he honestly had no idea what Sigurd would be interested in. The truth was, he didn't actually know his brother that well. The only things that he knew for certain that he enjoyed were music, and insulting Ivar. But then, he had never told him that it would be interesting, only that it would be better than lying awake in bed, and as most things were better than that, he was reasonably confident that he would be right.
He turned back, opened the door, walked through, and held it for Sigurd to follow him.
Ivar walked the short distance to the hall ahead of Sigurd, his hand still trailing the wall, until he reached the hall where his mother and father's thrones sat, empty and awaiting an occupant. The embers of a fire still glowed in the hall, providing both warmth and a little light. Ivar stopped several steps into the room, and waited for Sigurd to catch up to him.
Sigurd frowned in confusion when he found Ivar waiting, not continuing on his way to wherever he was going. Ivar held out a hand, palm up, as though displaying the room in all its glory to an audience.
Sigurd continued to frown. He looked around expectantly, as though he was waiting for something to happen, or for whatever Ivar was doing to reveal itself. When it did not, he scowled, looking particularly unimpressed. "You must be joking. This is where you go when you can't sleep? Just to another part of the house? Ivar, we were here all day, playing tafl right over there." He pointed to the place where they had sat during their games.
Ivar nodded. He looked around the room with a smile.
"I can't believe you dragged me out of bed for this," Sigurd shook his head in disbelief. "I can't believe I was stupid enough to fall for it."
"I hardly dragged you. In fact I seem to remember telling you to stay in bed, if that was what you wanted," Ivar reminded him.
"Yes, and it appears I made the wrong choice," Sigurd told him. He sighed and moved himself over to sit on the furs that carpeted the floor around the two thrones on their elevated platform. "Why would you come here? What is the point?"
Ivar smiled to himself. "I do not come here to this room," he said. "I come here." He indicated his father's throne with a performative wave of his hand, and waited to see Sigurd's reaction.
Sigurd turned to look at Ragnar's chair, and then looked back to Ivar with an expression dawning on horror. "What are you talking about?"
"I come out here, and I sit in our father's throne. That is what I am talking about," Ivar told him. "It is a good place to think."
Sigurd glanced uncertainly back at the chair again. "A place to think about what?"
"All kinds of things," Ivar told him. Most of which he had no intention of sharing with his brother. He thought about the things that he would say to his father if he ever returned, and if he could work up the guts to tell him how he really felt. He dreamed about going out into the world, finding Ragnar Lothbrok, and dragging him home to Kattegat. The things he thought about were things that he might one day tell Ragnar himself, if he ever saw him again, but not Sigurd. Never Sigurd. Sigurd, he was certain, would sense weakness in the idea that he wanted to speak to their father, and he would use that against him.
"What do you think about?" Sigurd persisted.
He supposed he was going to have to give him something, or he wasn't going to let it go. He shrugged. "Sometimes I like to think about the things that I will do when I am the ruler of Kattegat," he said.
Sigurd stared at him. Slowly, the corners of his lips curved into a smile, which spread until he laughed out loud. "When you are the ruler? You think that you are going to be king?"
"Of course. Why would I not? Because I am a cripple?"
"No, because…" Sigurd began, then hesitated. "Well, yes. But not only because of that. You are the youngest of five sons. You can become king either by inheriting, if people think that you are worthy, or by killing the existing king. Think about it. Even if Ragnar is already dead, the crown would pass to Björn, not to you. Do you really think that you could fight Björn and win?"
Ivar shook his head. "Of course I couldn't," he admitted. And neither would he want to. "But Björn will never be king, not while mother rules in Ragnar's place. She would never allow it."
Sigurd shook his head. "She doesn't get to decide. But okay then, even if she did somehow prevent Björn from taking the throne, it would be Ubbe that it fell to next. Just because you are her favourite, that doesn't mean that she gets to change the law in your favour. If you want to be king, you will either have to kill one of your brothers, or you will need to hope that we all die on our own without leaving any sons. Or that we all decide to leave, but I have no intention of going anywhere."
Ivar rolled his eyes. "Stop taking it so seriously, it is only a daydream," he told him. "It is a throne, so what else would I think about while sitting on it if not being king?"
Sigurd moved himself back a little and rested his elbow on the first step that led up to the thrones. He shrugged. "I suppose that's fair," he conceded. "But what are you doing sitting up there anyway? You know mother has forbidden anybody from sitting in father's throne. It has been empty ever since he left, waiting for him."
"No." Ivar smirked. "It has not."
Sigurd turned to glance at the chair again. "Mother would be angry if she knew."
He doubted that. Upset, maybe, but not angry. "Perhaps," he agreed. "But you see, what she does not know cannot hurt her."
Sigurd shook his head. "I always thought that you were a little bit crazy, Ivar. Everything you have said tonight only proves it."
He wasn't crazy. There were times when he might have attacked his brother for a comment like that, but not tonight. Tonight, he didn't care. "I think we all know that father is never coming back," he said. As much as he wished that he would, with every passing year the possibility grew ever more remote. "I don't know if he is dead, or if he simply doesn't want us anymore, but if he had any desire to be here, he would be here. Agreed?"
Sigurd gave one further glance to the chair, and then shrugged something that looked like reluctant agreement.
"So then, what is the point in leaving a chair empty for somebody who will never return to use it, hm?"
"Respect?" Sigurd suggested.
Respect? Ivar shook his head. "The same respect that he showed us, when he left without saying a word?" There were times when he hated Ragnar for that, but at the same time he could not help but love his father, and there were times that he hated that he loved him. "If he ever comes back, the chair is still waiting for him, I do not take anything away from it by sitting in it. Anyway, I think that he would be happy to know that his son has been keeping it warm for him. Wouldn't you agree?"
"Honestly?" Sigurd shrugged, "I have no idea. I barely remember him, and you must remember even less. But I do know mother, and if she knew that you were…"
"But she doesn't know. Nobody knows but me. And now you. So of course if she were to somehow find out, I would know exactly how."
In the darkness of the dimly lit room, he caught the flash of anger in Sigurd's eyes. "I am not planning to run off and tell her, if that is what you are implying." He paused, then shook his head. "Do you honestly think that she would listen to me if I did? Have you even tried to speak to her while looking like me?"
He had a point. And the answer to Sigurd's question was no, he hadn't tried to speak to his mother. He had deliberately avoided trying to do so, because he knew exactly what would happen if he did, and he didn't want that. He didn't want to feel dismissed and ignored by her.
"You haven't, have you?" Sigurd asked him, looking at him with interest now. He smirked triumphantly, as though he had won an argument that Ivar hadn't even realised they were having. "Try it tomorrow. I dare you. Try to tell her something that 'Ivar' did wrong, and see whether or not she believes you. Or better yet, just try to talk to her. Tell her about your day, or try to ask about hers. But make sure you let me know when you are going to do it, because I want to be there to watch."
He considered it. Sigurd was right of course; he knew exactly the response he would get. He had come to rely on it over the years, the fact that his mother would always side with him, that she had no real interest in her other sons. In the past he had both revelled in it, and resented it in equal measure. Still, he was almost tempted to try it, because he simply could not imagine his mother rejecting him. Some small part of him was convinced, despite all evidence to the contrary, that if he were to go to her, she would somehow sense her favourite son's presence within Sigurd's body and react accordingly.
He had no intention of trying it while Sigurd was there to watch, though. He shook his head. "I know," he told him. "I don't need to try it, I already know."
"Then why would you think that she would listen to a single word I said, even if I was crazy enough to tell her about this?"
Ivar didn't reply. He didn't really think that Sigurd would tell their mother anyway. If he had thought that, he would never have brought him here. He was far more likely to tell somebody else. One of their brothers, or even the servant girl that he was sharing with them. If that happened, the secret would be out, and there would be no way to control it.
The truth was, he didn't much care if his mother knew. She might be unhappy with him for a moment, but she would forgive him. What he could not stand, was the idea of everybody knowing. This was his, and he wanted it to stay that way.
Which made him wonder what exactly he had been thinking when he had told Sigurd of all people.
Luckily, there was a way to fix it. He couldn't take it back, his brother would never believe that he had been lying, but there was something else that he could do. He indicated the chair with a wave of his hand. "Go ahead," he said. "Try it out."
Sigurd looked at him, turned to look at the throne, and then back to Ivar again. He shook his head. "You're not serious."
"Of course I am serious," Ivar assured him. He climbed the two steps to the raised platform where the two thrones lay. He patted the arm of Ragnar's chair affectionately, as though it was an old friend. "Come on," he told him. "Up." He waited for a moment, and then stepped to the side and sank into the other chair, the one that was reserved for their mother.
From where he sat at the bottom of the two steps, Sigurd half-turned to look up at the throne. He frowned as though weighing up his options.
Ivar slouched in his chair and watched him. "Let's be honest brother," he told him. "This is the only chance you are ever going to have to try it out, so you might as well take advantage of it." He smiled encouragingly. "You will not believe how comfortable it is…"
Sigurd eyed him suspiciously. "I know what you are doing," he told him.
Ivar shrugged, trying to feign disinterest. He smiled, trying to make himself look as innocent as he was able, an expression that he usually reserved for his mother. "All I am doing is offering you the chance to try it out," he said. "I thought you might enjoy it. But if you don't want to, then don't. I don't care either way"
Sigurd narrowed his eyes, then slowly shook his head. "No," he said. "No, that's not it." He placed his hands on the step behind him and effortlessly lifted himself up onto the first step, then repeated the motion to bring himself onto the platform, directly in front of Ragnar's throne. He turned to glance up at it again. "You want me to sit on there so that you can threaten me. You will say that if I ever tell anybody you do this, you can tell them that I did it too.
Oh. He had known that Sigurd was suspicious, but he genuinely hadn't expected his brother to figure out exactly what he was thinking.
"Don't look so shocked," Sigurd told him. "I'm not an idiot. Anyway, didn't you just spend half the day teaching me to play hnefatafl? You told me that I needed to consider what my opponent was planning, not simply react to what he was doing, and then I needed to surprise him. Well, that is what you were planning, isn't it?"
Ivar opened his mouth to respond, but couldn't think of anything to say. He closed it again, frustrated with himself for being so transparent. "I wasn't going to actually threaten you," he said eventually. "I find threats are more effective when they are implied."
Sigurd smiled as he rolled his eyes. He hesitated for a moment, then reached backward with both hands, placing them on the seat of the throne. He lifted himself up onto the seat. Again, just like earlier when he had got out of bed, he moved slowly in deference to the pain in his legs, but he moved as though he had been doing it for years. Ivar couldn't help but feel proud, both of his brother, and of himself as the teacher.
Sigurd shuffled himself back in the chair, rested an elbow on one of the arms, and placed his chin in his hand. He smirked, as though he had just claimed a victory.
Well, if he had, Ivar didn't see how. "Why did you do that?" he asked him.
"That is the part where I surprise my opponent," Sigurd told him. "But also, because you are right. This may be the only chance I get to sit here, and I did want to know how it felt. I wasn't actually planning to tell anybody about this, so your threat didn't bother me." He reached down with his free hand, and pushed his legs into a more comfortable-looking position.
"And?" Ivar asked him. "How does it feet?"
Sigurd didn't reply right away. Instead, he spent a moment gazing out over the hall, perhaps imagining the gathered townsfolk there, staring up at him admiringly, the way that Ivar had imagined it from time to time when he had allowed his mind to go on flights of fancy. Or perhaps Sigurd had a fantasy of his own.
"Uncomfortable," Sigurd said finally. He adjusted his position a little and frowned. "For a padded chair, it is very hard. You told me it was comfortable."
Ivar laughed, pleased to be able to claim at least one victory tonight. He shook his head. "Actually, all I said was that you wouldn't believe how comfortable it was. And it appears that you did not."
Sigurd frowned, then smiled. "I suppose that's true," he admitted. He turned his attention back to the room, looking once again out over the area before him. "The room looks different from up here," he said.
Ivar nodded. He was right. It was probably the fact that the thrones were raised to elevate their occupants above everybody else in the room. "I suppose everything looks different from the top," he told him.
Sigurd nodded. He raised a hand to his mouth to cover a wide yawn, then turned to Ivar. "Do you really think that father will never come back?" he asked.
Honestly, he had no idea. "I hope he does, but I am certainly not expecting it to happen."
"And what you said earlier, about you becoming the ruler of Kattegat," Sigurd began.
Ivar rolled his eyes. "It was a joke, of course," he said. "After all, I am just a lowly cripple. I know that I would never be able to…"
"Come off it, Ivar," Sigurd interrupted. "You and I both know that you are far more than that." He shrugged. "Right now, you are not even a cripple at all."
Ivar frowned thoughtfully. Sigurd was right, of course, but that was a temporary state of affairs, not something that he could allow himself to rely on. Besides, the fact that he was, was so ingrained into his identity that he didn't think that he would ever be able to separate it from his sense of self. He sighed. "Of course I am. Even if we were to stay like this for the rest of our lives, I would never be able to escape from that."
Sigurd visibly tensed at the suggestion of any kind of permanence to their predicament, but he didn't protest or complain. Instead, he sighed too. "That isn't who you are though, Ivar," he said. "It is a part of you, yes, but sometimes you act as though it is the only thing about you that matters."
Sigurd was right, but that was all that it was; an act that he put on. Things that he said because they were what people expected him to say, or what he knew other people were thinking. Only sometimes, it wasn't an act. Sometimes it really did feel as though his legs were the only thing about him that mattered; the only thing that people saw when they looked at him. That was why he wanted to walk, so that people would see him as a man, rather than whatever they saw instead.
"You meant it though, didn't you?" Sigurd asked him. "About being king. You really think it is going to happen."
Ivar shrugged. All his life he had been told by this mother that he was going to do great things, but she had always been vague about the specifics. So, why couldn't that be one of them? "Maybe," he said. "But maybe not. Just like everybody else, I will have to wait and see what the spinners have in store for me."
Sigurd continued to watch him, staring deeply, almost as though he were trying to look through him and see what was happening inside his head. Ivar didn't like it; it felt uncomfortable.
"I am wondering though," Sigurd said, "if that is your fate, how far will you go to achieve it?"
Ivar scowled. "Stop trying to analyse me," he told him. "One afternoon playing tafl, and a lucky guess about my motivations does not make you a mind reader, Sigurd. But one thing is certain, if that is what you mean, I have no intention of fighting or killing any of my brothers. The throne is not worth such a high price. I love them too much."
Sigurd raised an eyebrow. "Even me?"
He hesitated, feeling as though he had somehow walked into a trap. "Even you," he confirmed. "Some of the time."
Sigurd laughed, then moved slightly in his chair. His back stiffened suddenly and his breath caught just slightly. He winced, but quickly covered the expression.
It occurred to Ivar that that was the first time he had seen Sigurd do that since he had brought him here. That meant that either the pain was improving, or that his brother was getting better at covering it up. Ivar doubted it was that; he might be a quick learner when it came to moving around, but that was different. "It's getting better, isn't it?" he asked.
Sigurd looked at Ivar with an uncomprehending frown.
Ivar pointed to his legs. "It hurt just then, I saw it. But this is the first time you have done that in a while. Earlier in the day, it was almost constant.
Sigurd looked thoughtful for a moment. "I suppose so," he said. "But it isn't better, only better than it was."
That was what he had meant. Better meant not worse, not the same. It did not mean completely healed, because to Ivar, there was no such thing. He decided not to push the point. After all, it didn't really matter.
"What I still don't understand," Sigurd said, "is what I did wrong to make this happen. You told me I might have done too much the day before, and that is why the pain is so much worse today, but if doing too much makes me… you… me, feel like this, why was it not so much worse that first day after we got back from the woods?"
Ivar shrugged. "It isn't doing too much, it's… I don't know, doing the wrong things, I suppose. Maybe just resting a little too much weight on my legs as you moved, or bending wrong, or… It could be anything, but whatever it was, you will have done it without even realising. And whatever it was, it wouldn't always have made this happen. I told you, it's unpredictable. You do know what unpredictable means, don't you?"
"Yes." Sigurd glared at him. "Of course I know what it means."
"Well then."
Sigurd frowned, looking thoughtful. "So, you're telling me that there are days when you just wake up feeling like this for no reason?"
There was always a reason, he was sure of it. It was just that sometimes he either did not know what the reason was, or it was something beyond his control. It didn't seem worth the effort of explaining that, though, so Ivar shrugged. "Sometimes. Just like sometimes I can slip when I'm getting down from a chair and break a bone, but other times I can take as many punches as you want to throw at me before Ubbe pulls us apart, and be fine."
"You broke a bone getting down from a chair?"
Ivar nodded. "Once. In my left foot. I slipped, hit the ground wrong. The funny thing was, I actually heard it snap before I even felt it."
When Sigurd didn't reply, Ivar glanced across at him. His brother looked as though he was going to throw up. "Ivar, there is nothing funny about that," he said after a moment.
Ivar shrugged. He hadn't meant that kind of funny. "Maybe not," he said.
"I don't…" Sigurd trailed off then shook his head. "How do you live like that?"
"That is how everybody lives," Ivar told him. "None of us know what is going to happen to us."
Sigurd looked unconvinced. He shook his head. "I can't be…" he began, and then stopped. He took a breath. "Do you ever think that maybe the gods have forgotten about us?" he asked. "Maybe they did this to us after a few drinks, and then woke up and didn't remember. Maybe nobody has any idea of what is happening to us, and we will stay like this forever."
The truth was, yes. The thought had crossed his mind. Or if not that they had been forgotten, perhaps that there had never been any intention of switching them back. He did not understand why, but he had thought about it. Of course, by now there were very few scenarios which he had not thought of.
He shook his head. "No," he said. "I have not thought about that, because that is ridiculous. Imagine how much ale it would take to make a god forget! Now, I think it is time that we returned to our beds. As somebody who is often awake through the night, I know that when your mind turns in directions such as that, it is time to sleep. Or at least to try again."
For a moment, he thought Sigurd was going to argue with him, but the flash of irritation in his eyes disappeared as he covered his mouth with a hand in an attempt to disguise another large yawn. "Fine. But this is the only time I am ever going to allow myself to be sent to bed by my little brother," he said. "And I'm only going along with it because I was already thinking that I should go back to bed."
Ivar rolled his eyes as Sigurd carefully edged himself forward and lowered himself to the ground. He took the stairs equally carefully, as though convinced that the smallest bump might shatter a bone. He was in no real danger; the whites of his eyes barely showed a hint of blue.
Sigurd reached the floor, turned, and began to make his way back to the bedroom. Ivar watched him go for a moment, and when he was sure that he was alone, stood, moved to the other throne, and sat down.