Bonnie awakened to the sound of soft melodic humming. The harmonious droning had the resonance of an evocative lullaby. Her eyes opened. She lay on a mattress larger than Klaus' custom made California King. Four golden columns stood at each corner of the bed. A sheer ivory veil canopy curtain obscured the room at large from view, offering her only shadows and shapes as clues of her whereabouts. Just beyond the shroud a silhouette of a woman's body shifted upon a chaise lounge. She cradled something in her arms as she rocked back and forth.
A familiarness about the woman drew Bonnie from the bed. She parted the covering and slid from the mattress. Heated ivory marble met her bare feet. Glancing down, she then realized her state of dress or…undress? She wore a lace nightie fashioned beyond even Coco de Mer capabilities. The change in tunes, tore her attention from her style of dress back to the woman only to have her gaze collide with someone she'd never expected to see again. At least not while she still dwelled among the living.
"Aslaug?"
The ginger haired woman lifted her enamored gaze from the bundle in her arms to look at her. A brilliant smile lit her face. "Hello, Supreme. It gladdens my heart to see you again."
Bonnie cast her gaze to the balcony windows. A cloudless ultra-blue sky which matched Hvitserk's mystical energy in hue greeted her gaze. A gentle breeze swayed the parted curtains at the row of opened balcony doors. Warm comforting familial sorcery swirled about her, wrapping itself all around her as if welcoming her home. The feeling reminded her of when she took trips to her grams house as a little girl. Tears stung the ducts of her eyes as she returned her gaze back to Aslaug.
"Is this…,"
The beautiful seer dipped her head. "Nirvana, and this is your bed chamber. It's part of your personal quarters in-,"
"The Hall of Eternity," she finished, moving closer to take the seat next to her. Her gaze fell to the squirming bundle in her arms. "Why am I here, Aslaug?"
"For a moment of respite." Aslaug's mouth folded into a sad smile that more than highlighted the fragmented joy within her eyes. "A sanctuary of sorts."
"Sanctuary?" Bonnie questioned, turning the meaning over in her mind.
There was no such place! Where the hell could she go that her mind wouldn't follow? That replays from the day's fuck show wouldn't taunt her on a loop. There was no refuge on earth or beyond the veil that would spare her even a moment of the fuckery which had spun about her in the last twenty-four hours. From the death of her husband, to watching her mate savagely slaughter her former shield maidens she'd come to love as younger sisters, and then having the shitty nightmare of a rising conclude in her own murder. By a lunatic, no less. A lunatic who should've been strapped to a cot a long time ago, and force fed Lithium four times a day.
"This impending Solstice cycle will not be one of ease for you. The Darkness exploits a deceiver to annul your authority." The former queen's eyes shimmered as she held her gaze. "Your conviction will be tested, heart weighed, honor questioned and your title will be challenged. You mustn't lose your way. For these are nothing more than distractions meant to mislead you from your path. Yet if you persevere and not misremember what I once revealed to you, then the serpent in your midst efforts will not prevail."
Her gaze narrowed as she leaned in a bit. "You mean Margrethe."
Aslaug opened her mouth and the bundle in her arms released a wail. Her brows bunched as her gaze darted to the seer's arms to take a closer look. She reached out to rearrange the soft blankets in Aslaug's arms. A beautiful golden brown baby with the largest aquamarine eyes she'd ever seen stared back at her.
"Bonnie, all will be well as long as you have Faith," Aslaug's gaze skimmed her face. She then leaned forward to place the baby in her arms. "All you need is Faith."
Bonnie glanced down. Her arms were empty and Aslaug palms rested on her stomach. Understanding burst her mind wide, her breath caught. She placed her hands on her belly over Aslaug's. Her disbelieving stare darted back to her would be mother-in-law. A smile graced the seer's face as they shared a meaningful stare.
Bonnie shot upright. Her hands cradled her stomach. She gasped, dragging air in and out of her deprived lungs. A dull ache echoed a memory of excruciating agony off the cavity wall of her chest. Her eyes darted about to assess her surroundings. The familiar furnishings and décor of her keep met her assessing gaze. Along with a face that had once been more familiar to the place than even she.
"Rollo?" Bonnie rasped, remaining tense and on guard.
She eyed the Duke of Normandy who in return did the same with an unblinking focus. He sat across from her bed in her favorite wing chair like he had a Goddess given right to be there.
"Supreme, when Ivar informed me he had managed to capture you I refused to believe his claim. Not without casting my sight upon you myself," he said in a soft voice that hinted at astonishment. "Why would you allow yourself to be struck down by an ambitious slave who means to claim your title?"
"I didn't allow anything," she said, sensing for her sorcery. "Margrethe caught me off guard with a tainted blade."
"Margrethe?" His brows buckled. "Ivar acquainted her to me as Freydis. She is to be his wife the eve on the morrow."
She laughed to herself. "Of course she is, I'd be shocked if Ivar does anything other than what he expects is the unexpected." Boneless the typical, all fire and vengeance. She swung her legs around to sit on the side of the bed. "He means to repay the debt I accumulated when I married Halfdan and thought to bear his child."
Rollo's eyes flared. "You carry?"
A baby with huge aqua eyes touched her mind. A smile touched her lips as she stroked the rounded bulge at her lower abdomen.
"Yes, and my daughter comes before any pettiness Ivar means to exact. If he wishes to marry Freydis then I wish him well," she said, swaying a bit as she stood.
Rollo shot from his seat to steady her. "Ivar's vengeance goes beyond pettiness, Supreme. He, Harald, the false Supreme and Lord Hvitserk are deciding your fate as we speak."
"My fate," she demanded as she willed her world to stop spinning.
"Hvitserk and the false Supreme wants nothing more than to dismember you and bury pieces of you around Midgard. Ivar means to keep you shackled within your keep until he ponders a judgement fitting of your betrayal, while Harald is arguing to have you released into his custody."
"All because I dared to put the sons and daughters under my dominion first and marry Halfdan?" she released another humorless laugh. "Well let's go. If they mean to decide my fate then they'll do so to my face like the conquerors I taught them to be instead of the coward bitches I no longer recognize."
Rollo considered her for a moment before leading her from the sleeping chambers through the living area and out of her keep.
Two warriors stood guard at her door. One of the warriors being Thomas who promptly dipped his head to her. "Supreme."
"King Ivar says the prisoner is not to leave her keep," the other warrior she didn't recognize barked at Rollo, while placing his hand on the hilt of his sword.
Fifty-eleven Frankish soldiers she didn't realize was about surrounded the bold warrior stupid enough to level an implied threat to a Duke who held the influencing power of a king. Rollo not running him a bit of attention placed a hand to her lower back and guided her towards the long house. Several minutes later they entered the hall. Ivar sat upon the elevated podium near Lagertha's throne. Freydis perched next to him her hand cradled in both of his. Hvitserk sat on a stool with a shieldmaiden draped over his lap, while a pissed off Harald stood among them with his arms folded across his chest.
When they entered flanked by Rollo's soldiers, Ivar's bellowing halted mid-bark. He turned three different shades of red as his sockets damn near regurgitated his eyes. Freydis cuddled closer into his side. While Hvitserk just stared at Bonnie as if she were no more than a stranger. When Harald's grief stricken stare discovered hers an image of Halfdan dying in her arms burst her mind wide. Her entire field of vision looked as if someone had shoved her head under water. She dropped her gaze to hide the pain hell bent on gushing from her eyes. Losing her husband so soon after only realizing she didn't wanna live without him blew her to pieces.
Rollo leaned down to place his mouth next to her ear. "Say it's your mind to return with me to Frankia and we can forego this confrontation."
"Thank you, Rollo, but it's not my mind to return with you to Frankia," she said loud enough for the hall to hear. "I've never ran from anything in my life and I refuse to run now." Her gaze moved from Rollo to sweep over Harald, Hvitserk, and Ivar. "I honored a vow. Took a stand…defended a land and people I've come to think of as my home and family. In this I failed…in this I failed magnificently!" A laugh lacking in humor fell from her lips as she slapped her hands together. "So I'm more than prepared to suffer whatever sentence you may think to level." She raised a finger. "Under one condition."
"You have no leave to make demands you treacherous bitc-,"
Bonnie snatched a concealed dagger from her waistline at her back. She hurled it at Hvitserk and it entered the wooden cup of the shieldmaiden on his lap. Had the female warrior lifted the tumbler higher the blade would've entered his neck.
"Finish that sentence and the next one opens your throat, Lord Hvitserk," she said, skewering him with a glare better than the blade she hurled could. "Hmph, let's see you try and get your drank on when you have another smile just south of your mouth?"
"You allowed Lagertha to kill my mother! Hvitserk has the right of it, your treachery will afford you no demands," Ivar attempted to co-sign with Hvitserk.
Bonnie shook her head. She'd warned Aslaug of deciding upon this path. "I don't give a damn about whatever issues you have with me, Ivar! Force my hand and I'll give this entire slice of land back to the sea. Think it's a game?" She stalked forward to loom over him. "Then I dare you to play with it!"
"What is your condition?" Harald asked in a quiet voice.
Her gaze swung to meet his. "Allow me to give birth to a healthy baby in peace and you have my vow I'll accept any judgment you think to level against me."
"A babe!" Freydis screeched, before lunging at her. Ivar snatched his now betrothed back, as if he were doing his former betrothed some great solid. Bonnie, however, merely stared at the deranged blonde while wishing the bitch would. "No! She killed my baby! It's only just for the same fate to meet hers."
"No harm will come to this babe!" Harald rasped in his hoarse smokers voice.
"This is something I must insist as well," Rollo said from behind her.
Hvitserk released a sneering laugh overran with every bit of the disgust he felt for her. Yet he held his tongue.
She placed her hand over her baby bump, praying they didn't call her bluff. At the moment she didn't have enough magic to light a candle let alone bring down an entire island. Yet she'd kill everyone in that hall with her bare hands or die fifty-eleven times trying before she allowed them to put her child's life at risk. Her glare collided with Ivar's. Something in her soul snatching glare must've conveyed a strong warning of her homicidal intent.
"I accept your vow," Ivar said, holding her gaze even as his new betrothed fell to pieces in his arms. His decision snatched more mocking laughter from Hvitserk. "No harm will come to you while you carry. Once you give birth, however, you shall be made to answer for your betrayal."
"I knew your affections for her would hinder us from exacting our vengeance." Hvitserk shoved the shieldmaiden from his lap to climb to his feet. "This is just as well. For I no longer have a care of what end she meets. Dismember her, imprison her, or banish her, the choice is yours brother. In my mind and heart," he lifted his shoulders and allowed them to drop, "she is already dead." With that he spun on his heel and stumbled from the hall.
Her heart flinched. She wondered if he'd be so dismissive if he knew the baby belonged to he and Ivar. That the perfect life growing inside of her existed because of an act of love committed between them. She tore her gaze back to Ivar who now regarded her with narrowed eyes.
"If this is all, then I'll leave you to…" she waved a hand at Freydis who still sobbed in his arms as if she had a mind to weep forth an ocean. "Whatever the hell this is." She spun around to head toward the doors which led from the hall.
"There is something. The Supreme and I will wed the next rising's eve," he paused to run an assessing gaze over her face. When she ran his ass not even a wrinkled brow of a reaction he continued. "Every citizen of Kattegat will be expected to attend."
Her heart twisted in her chest, but she ignored the ache to perfect her best zero fucks to offer persona. "What time should I be on the cliff which overlooks the harbor? That is where you plan to marry your supreme, right?"
"N-no," he said, while staring at her as if she'd violated something sacred. "We shall enter matrimony here in the great hall just before second meal."
"Fine, I'll be here. Are we done?" She questioned, feeling completely empty and lost among the many turns and bends which littered her path.
He watched her a moment with a guarded stare, before dipping his head once in a nod. Not waiting for anymore bullshit to fly from his way, she spun on her heel and sought her leave. As she exited the hall followed by Thomas and the other warrior, instead of turning in the direction of her keep she walked the path that would lead her into the forest to her blessed cove.
"Halt!" The other warrior yelled at her back. Running him no attention she continued. "Halt or I'll-,"
Bonnie spun on him, pissed way beyond the borders of pissivity. An intense burn that rivaled the fires blazing in Helheim scorched her sockets. "Or you'll what?" Her bellow shook the ground they stood upon. "You'll cut me down, so what I'll live again…bind me in chains, there are no bindings that can hold me…torture me until I beg for the peaceful emptiness of death," her shoulders rose and dropped, "there's no torture greater than the torment I already suffer with every single grain of sand that slips through an hour glass."
"I—I-King Ivar has ordered you remain confined to your-," the young over eager warrior attempted.
She waved a hand. "Leave, I have no need of you. Thomas is more than efficient enough to guard me, unless," her gaze strayed to the warrior she'd come to know well over the last six years, "Are you of the same mind about my confinement as your brother in arms."
"You've save my life many times in England. You even spared my life this day on the battlefield." His gaze held hers. "No, my mind isn't likened to Gram's."
Bonnie inclined her head to Ivar's favored personal warrior, and then flicked her gaze back to the one he referred to as Gram. "If you follow us I will hobble you. Oh, and tell Ivar not to send me another one of you. Thomas is more than capable enough to guard me until I give birth."
Bonnie spun on her heel and continued toward the forest. Near thirty minutes later she stood in front of her cove alone. Thomas had opted to wait at the top of the embankment to give her a moment of privacy. A moment to catch her breath and absorb everything which had transpired over the last twenty-four. That morning she'd been in her husband's arms. He'd song to her as he stroked her belly. Surrounding her, and the baby with an unselfish love she didn't deserve. Now he was just…gone. A tear trickled down her cheek…
"Oop, you've gone and done it now. If I were you two I'd make haste. The last place in Kattegat you want to discover yourself when the moon rises is in the forest. The dead arrives and thrives here under the eve light."
Harald and Halfdan glanced up at the waning sun. Halfdan, then returned a serious gaze to her. "Then perhaps you should come with us."
"Who's to say I'm not among my element," she offered him a wicked grin. "Who's to say I'm not dead as well?"
Harald took a step back from the water as if he were truly considering her claim as a legitimate possibility. The wolves howled again, and Harald was halfway up the embankment by the time the yowling stopped.
Halfdan slowly backed away from the cove. "If you're a spirit, I care not. You have relieved me of my heart and now I'd rather be dead with you than live without you. For now that I know you exist in my world living without you is a fate far worse than death."
"Halfdan, let us make haste! Something stalks us from just beyond the overbrush," Harald yelled, from the top of the embankment.
Agitation and fear waged a battle on Halfdan's face. "Will I see you again?"
"Oh, you'll see me again Halfdan the Black," she said, allowing herself to float in place.
"Halfdan!" Harald bellowed.
"When?" Halfdan persisted, ignoring Harald.
She grinned. "Perhaps sooner than you think. Now go before Fenrir's descendants make a meal of your brother. I'd hate for them to get indigestion because there fare was disagreeable."
"Until we meet again, My Forever Life!" Halfdan said, before dipping his head in a bow to her, and then turning to race up the embankment.
"You pilfered his heart the first moment he cast his gaze upon you." Harald's raspy hoarse voice tore her from her memories. He stood next to her staring out at the sparkling heated waters of the cove. "He said that woman there has become my entire life. I will conquer the world and give it to her. All she has to do is but ask for it."
"I didn't deserve him," she said, allowing her eyes to slip closed. "For the longest time I refused to see him. I refused to see the heart he attempted to shove in my face at every encounter we shared. I've wasted so much time loving wrong and wanting things which were wrong for me. Goddess, I might as well had been beating my head against a brick wall with the expectation of making the damn thing move." She laughed even as more tears fell down her face. "Yet the very love I needed stood before me all along…he'd stood before me all along."
He turned to eyeball her profile. "Will you really allow Ivar to level a judgement against you after the babe is born?"
"I've given him my divine vow. If Ivar stands by his word and allows me to give birth to a healthy baby in peace, then he can do whatever the hell he wants to me," She shrugged as she continued to stare at the falling water. "I don't give a damn about myself. All I care about is the well-being of my little girl. As long as she makes it into the world safe, sound, and without stress, I'm good with whatever comes next. My faith is in the Goddess of all."
"You believe your babe to be a girl?" Wonderment lit his face, before grief dimmed it once more. "Astrid fell in battle this rising. So did my babe along with her. This child you carry is the only family I have left on Midgard and-,"
"I'm sorry, Harald. Though we've had our differences, I wouldn't wish what I'm suffering through right now on even…," she cut her eyes at him, then swept her gaze up and down the length of him, "well you, but you should know Halfdan wasn't my baby's father. He knew this before he died."
He sputtered a bit. "B-But Ironside claimed-,"
"Halfdan led everyone to believe I carried for him, but from the moment he discovered my pregnancy he knew who my baby's fathers were," she cast her gaze back out to the steady flowing waters of the cove.
"Fathers? You mean—Iva—and Hvits-," Harald wheezed in a hoarse whisper as he pointed back towards the direction of Kattegat. A thousand question marks swirled in his gaze. "How is this possible?"
"By supernatural means," she uttered, placing a hand to her small bump. "It happened during the first parlay for peace."
"Ivar and Hvitserk should be informed." Harald turned to start up the embankment. "Perhaps, he'll forgo leveling a judgement against you when the babe is-,"
Bonnie grabbed him before he could hurry back to Kattegat to spill tea for one and all. "No! I no longer trust Hvitserk or Ivar. This rising has shown me things about each of them to which I've spent years turning a blind eye." Flashes of memories from the battle filled her mind's sight. "Hvitserk butchered my shieldmaidens, for no other reason than to gut me. He even went after Guthrum, someone I've always seen as a son.
And Ivar…Ivar gave a disciple of my sworn enemy the means by which to incapacitate me. Then the sick bastard entertains plots of dismembering me only to bury pieces of me in various places around Midgard. How could I ever subject my child to men such as them?" A sob ripped from the agony tormented depths of her. Followed by another and another until hysteria crept in and bitch slapped her into a fit that nearly shook her apart by the joints. "You can't tell them, Harald! Swear to me you'll never tell 'em!"
Confusion layered in fear snatched Harald's face. Looking as if he didn't know what else to do he pulled her into his arms. "I swear, I swear, they'll never learn as such from me. It's just as Ironside spoke. You carry my brother's babe. Do not misremember what we vowed to Halfdan this rising. We're to have a care for the other."
Through running eyes and nose she laughed at the absurdity of their predicament. "Yeah, but we can't stand each other. What the hell was Halfdan thinking to make us swear such a vow?"
"Perhaps he knew when this rising met its end all we'd have was the other." His chest vibrated against her cheek. "It would seem Ivar has betrayed us both. With the support of Rollo and his soldiers, he's named himself king of Kattegat."
"You had to have seen this coming, Harald," she said, drying the watery mess on her face with her hands.
He shrugged. "Yes, I wagered he would break his word, but I assumed this would give me cause to slay him, while also laying claim to his throne in England." Her brows buckled as she snorted at his delusional ambitions. "Yet it appears the gods' favor lie with Ivar rather than me."
When Ivar finished pissing on the former queen's throne he staggered over and reclaimed his seat between his soon to be wife and his unfortunate ally Harald. Hvitserk indulged in merriment with two shieldmaidens as he sought comfort at the bottom of his cups. And who could fault him, hmm? After seeing Bonnie ripen while carrying another's babe he could also use a distraction of sorts. Yet no other woman enflamed his lusts in the way the betrayer of his heart so thoroughly did.
His gaze moved to Freydis. The true Supreme or so she claimed. Yet he sensed nothing truly divine about his former slave now betrothed. In verity, he sensed nothing mystical about her at all. Not like his lov—Bonnie. The sorcery which swirled about her launched his manstand and forced thrills to overwhelm his senses. This reason among many is why he'd accepted her vow. It presented him with an excuse to keep her within reach.
Though Bonnie betrayed his family, he couldn't bring himself to see her harmed or to release her from his heart. He needed her about, for she ordered his thoughts, steadied his hands, and sharpened his wits. She made him better than he ever thought he'd be. Just as he needed his iron crutch to stand, he needed her to be. To exist. He knew not where Hvitserk discovered the animosity and perseverance to hate so faultlessly one whom he'd once claimed to love without condition.
Ivar's stare swept from his brother to his betrothed. She sat beside him stiff. Anger and pain marred her expression. She was justified to demand vengeance for their babe. Yet justice was what he intended to deny her. He'd offer her anything she thought to reach for during their life together, but Bonnie's head would not be one of those things.
"When time comes for you to level judgement against our Supreme-," Harald began.
"She is not your Supreme!" Freydis shrieked, leaning forward to thrust her glare upon Harald. "I am! Have you misremembered whose blade failed her this rising? The dark woman is nothing more than a witch who grapples for significance. Something you all offered her without attestation. I should smite the bloody lot of you," she railed jabbing a finger to the raucous horde who failed to heed note to her displeasure.
"Calm yourself, My Beloved," Ivar said, wrapping an arm around her shoulder. "Soon enough they will be made to honor and respect you as their Supreme."
"Her!" Harald's eyes nigh divorced his skull as the contents of his chalice sloshed over its rim. "She has the stench of a Christian. I've even heard it spoken that she's no more than English filth you enslaved in York and later freed because she had a tongue for pander."
He arched a brow as his palm itched for the splintered handle of his ax. "You go too far, Harald. Our new Supreme will either know your respect or you shall soon come to know the halls of Valhalla."
"Very well, King Ivar," his name galloped from Harald's lips astride a sneer. His ever growing wayward ally snatched his sword from the sheath at his side. "Allow me to run her through. If she meets her end and lives once more then I'll offer her the respect which is befitting of our true Supreme."
Hvitserk's laughter bellowed throughout the hall as he raised his battle ax high. "King Harald has the right of it. I shall name her Supreme when her heart meats the edge of my blade and still continues to pound despite the slight."
"You both are faithless! Neither of you ever asked these things of Bonnie, you just accepted her for who she claimed to be," he roared outrage they would dare question the word of his betrothed.
"I questioned her even when you all hadn't the mind to," Harald jabbed his thumb in his chest. "I even ran her through, watched as she took her last breath and do you know what happened next?"
His eyes slitted for he'd heard the tale many times afore. Freydis sought shelter behind his back upon hearing they meant to put her claims to the test with a trial by death.
"She rose from death to thrive once more. Just as I'm told she did this day," Rollo said as he strolled further into the hall.
"Nothing more than trickery aided by her witchery," Freydis insisted from the shelter his back provided her.
A smirk ensnared his uncle's mouth as he continued. "There shouldn't be any question of who is our Most High. Not after the acts we've seen her commit."
Not favoring the reverence being offered to their former mate, Hvitserk waved a dismissive hand and turned back to his shieldmaidens.
"You have no say in this, Rollo." He skewered his uncle with a glare. "Our gods are no longer any concern of yours." His gaze moved to Harald. "If she truly is our Supreme then how were we victorious this rising, hmm? Would she not strike us all down if she had the power to do so?"
He cast his stare about the hall attempting to stir everyone within. A few who weren't acquainted with Bonnie lifted their voices in agreement, while many others observed with caution.
"Ugk!" Harald snorted his contempt. "You know well why we proved ourselves triumphant this rising! Were it not for the Frankish soldiers who'd aligned with us we would be the ones made to abide the bitter savor of defeat."
"There is no cause for you all to quarrel among yourselves. For it is simple. You should offer both women an opportunity to prove themselves as Supreme of our people," Rollo said once again entering into affairs which no longer accepted him. "Whomever sorcery is greater shall be the undisputed Most High of our people."
To Ivar's blossoming unease many warriors in the hall expressed their support of the notion. He had no other leave than to lend his accord to the interfering plan. "Very well, next rising we shall gather here so Freydis may claim her rightful title." She whimpered her protests into his back, but he ignored her show of spinelessness and continued. "And once she does, you all shall honor her as such." Silently, he hoped his betrothed prepared well and indeed proved herself to be who she claimed.