Chapter 10

Agnarr's POV:

The sun had dipped below the horizon but I still lay awake by the dying embers of the fire, my sword by my side, as it always was each night. After I had stormed out of Magni's, dusk had already begun to fall upon us, so we had decided to make camp for the night. I had shone the heart to Loki, who afterwards had proceeded to simply leave it in the woods for the wolves. It was all that man deserved after all. The minute Arn had thrown him through the doorway, I'd recognized him immediately. So shepherding was what he'd been doing all these years, not that I cared. When I had seen those eyes...the eyes that had looked upon Loki's form...No I wouldn't think of it.

My thoughts turned back to Freyja.

Why do you have to be such a monster?!

I almost would've snickered humorlessly if it were not for the fact that it had made me so angry.

Believe me girl, you don't know what a monster looks like. I do. What would a young girl like you know about monsters anyway? The worst person you've probably ever encountered is your dear daddy who wouldn't give you the jewels you wanted.

I pushed myself up from under the fur blanket. I had to clear my thoughts or else I'd probably never get to sleep. Careful to take my sword with me, I trudged wearily down to the beach, picking up a stone and hurling it across the sea's surface.

"Monster? That impossible, unreasonable little..." I growled and kicked up the sand at my feet. A twig snapped and I immediately turned to face whoever it was, my hand already on the hilt of my sword. Loki was standing there, a somewhat bemused expression on his face. That didn't happen often, most of the time his face was just an expressionless mask, one he'd kept on ever since I'd known him. He hadn't spoken aloud since that day, just used hand gestures instead. No one could coax him out of it, even after Bjorn had died and Dagr had long been sent away.

"What is it?" He stepped closer and sat down upon the sand, silently drawing something in the sand, a girl by the looks of it. He then began gesturing with his hands:

Is she was this is all about?

"You read me like the ancient runes Loki."

But you like her.

"What makes you say that?"

Because you care about what she thinks.

"No I don't."

Yes you do.

"No I don't!"

Then why are you so angry?

"Because she has the nerve, no the audacity, to call an honorable man such a thing."

Loki was silent for a moment.

You never got so angry when Valdis called you such things.

Begrudgingly, I had to admit he had a point there, yet when Valdis said it I had never given it a moment's thought. She was tough, unsympathetic, the usual way many Northmen liked their women. That is until I met Freyja. There was something different about her, sure she had a fighting spirit, but unlike Valdis it was not harsh. She was...gentle, considerate, tender, compassionate, kind, selfless. Not to mention beautiful. And the fact that I had a gotten a woman of such a calm, quiet inner beauty to call me something so ghastly I felt almost...wounded. Wounded in a way that was different than the way it had occurred with Valdis. A way that cut me to the heart, as if someone had hacked it out with a dagger.

Loki was gesturing to me again.

You should apologize to her.

"Who's side are you on?!" I asked, feigning exasperation.

Loki cocked a half-smile.

Hers.

"Ha ha very funny."

Turning serious again I said "I'm not apologizing for keeping a promise I made to you Loki."

I know, but you could've at least taken it outside so she didn't have to see.

Though I would never admit it to anyone, not even to Loki himself, sometimes I thought he was almost smarter than I was. Almost. Loki was slow to act. He thought through things, studied people more closely before making a decision about them, sometimes as if they were his own little specimens. He was patient, slow to anger, quiet. People often assumed he was slow and more than a little dull, but in actuality he was quite intuitive, which had proven itself to be a strategic advantage on more than one occasion.

"Say if I did decide to apologize to her, which I'm not saying I will, what would you suggest I do?"

Show her you can be gentle, merciful on top of being fierce. Show her she can trust you not to hurt anybody else in front of her anymore, that you care about her feelings and what she has to say.

"Of course I do!" Truth be told, I had hated every word I'd said to her. That look on her face... An overwhelming wave of guilt washed over me. I hadn't acted honorably as I'd intended, instead I'd done just what Bjorn would've done. I'd acted just like the one man who I swore I would never be like. His cruelty, his lack of sympathy, his inconsideration. How I'd hated that man until the day he died for what he did. Now I had a chance to act differently, and by Odin I would take it if it was the last thing I did...

Freyja's POV:

The next day I set out into the woods with Kai. My leg still gave me pain, but I just had to get out of that house. The tension still hung thick in the air from what had happened yesterday. This time Magni had ordered Baldr to come with me, which I found irritated me further since the whole point was to escape the intense atmosphere in the first place. Yet, I also knew that no amount of arguing would change Magni's mind once it had been made up, so Baldr and I found ourselves trudging through the woods in an awkward silence.

A sense of frustration had begun to gnaw at me since yesterday. I had felt so helpless and weak, before a man who could order the same fate for me at the snap of his fingers.

So why didn't he?

I kept my thoughts to myself, but the frustration and anger only continued to build inside me. Baldr being here only made matters worse, it made me feel trapped, guarded, as if I couldn't breathe. I felt as if something inside me was about to snap.

How can he not understand! After everything I've been through I don't need to be treated more cruelly, I don't need to see more people die and I certainly don't need him! What an arrogant selfish...!

No, I shouldn't think such thoughts. It would only leave me feeling exhausted and more disgruntled than before. Besides, Christ forgave those who harmed him, so I must try to do the same.

"You look quite angry" Baldr mused.

"How could he could such a thing?! And in front of all of us nonetheless! Doesn't he understand that I've witnessed enough, not to mention that he just took a human life!"

Baldr didn't react to my outburst for a second, his eyebrows merely scrunching together as if he was contemplating how best to precede with this new line of conversation.

"The man hurt his brother."

"And that he gives him the right to hurt him back!"

Baldr snorted lightly "That's the way the world works."

"Then I wanna change the world." And with that, I began to stroll back towards the house.