Chapter 38
Hey everyone! Thank for all the great reviews last chapter and I'm so glad to hear that people are enjoying this story! Thank you to all of my guest reviewers! Sorry I can't reply to you because that's how it's set up but thank you all the same! Please REVIEW and let me know what you think of this chapter! God Bless :)
Warning: This chapter will contain elements that may be triggering for some of you. Viewer discretion advised.
-Vegter999
Freyja's POV:
The next morning I awoke feeling a pounding headache, most likely from all the crying I'd done late into the night. I hadn't bothered to change into my nightdress, but instead I simply slept in Agnarr's mother's dress.
I slowly sat up, sniffling.
I gazed listlessly at the wall, as if it would provide me with what to say when I faced Agnarr. Naturally, it didn't.
"Well Lord, what do I do now?" I murmured.
Trust in me my child.
A knock at the door came.
"Come in" I called, monotonously. Hulda quietly entered the room, shutting the door behind her. She took one look at me and asked, concerned "My Frauen is everything alright?"
"Yes of course. I would like to change dresses please."
"Of course Frauen" Hulda pulled out a fresh dress from the wardrobe and helped me into it before I sat down and let her brush through my hair. She then plaited it into a simple braid down my back.
"Thank you Hulda that'll be all" I said. She nodded and exited the room. I stood up and made my way to the door, taking a deep breath and placing my palm flat against the oak.
"I'm gonna have to face him sometime" I said to myself. Then before I could talk myself out of it I pushed open the door and made my way down the hall to the center of the house. I stopped when I spotted Agnarr sharpening his sword, his back to me. My heart pounded and adrenaline coursed through my body as nervousness overtook me. What could I possibly say to him now that I had lost his trust, probably forever?
"Agnarr?" I said, softly. He stiffened and turned around, standing up from the stool he had been seated upon.
"Can we talk?" I asked.
"We don't have anything to talk about" he replied, his eyes which were normally so soft and tender around me had hardened. His guard was now up and he would probably never let it down with me again. The thought made my heart ache.
"I would like to be able to explain."
"Explain what?! That you lied to me?!"
"I was going to tell you" I replied, as calmly as possible, feeling tears prickle in my eyes.
"Really and when was that?! When we met?! When we kissed?! When you MARRIED ME?!"
"I trusted you Freyja!"
Tears ran down my cheeks as I could only gaze at him.
"For a moment I thought you were different, but I was wrong. Your no better than Valdis."
He made to walk away but I grabbed his hand and then wrapped my arms around his waist, pressing my cheek into his back.
"Please don't say such things. I love you."
He paused for a moment, as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing, but then he unwound my arms from around him and said with his back still to me: "You don't lie to people you love."
He then strode out the door, leaving my heart shattered into a million pieces.
Fresh tears rode down my face and my heart felt as if it was being squeezed and it became hard to breathe.
Without thinking I turned and fled through the front door out onto the street.
I slowed my pace and trudged down the street, my head down and not really thinking about where I was going.
"Move it fat boy!" I heard all of a sudden.
I looked up to see a group of men shoving another against the wall of a house. He looked to be about twenty years of age and had a large protruding stomach and a round chubby face.
The man was grabbed by the collar and one of the group surrounding him punched him in the eye. I gasped in shock and looked around. Why was no one doing anything? The man felt to the ground and several of the group began kicking him while he tried desperately to shield himself.
I couldn't stand by and watch any longer.
I raced over and called at the top of my lungs: "Stop it!"
They turned around and I squeezed past them, standing in front of the defenseless man.
"What do you think you're doing?!" I practically shouted.
"Forgive me Frauen but this is no business of yours" one of them practically sneered back.
"Well I've made it my business. Now leave him alone."
"His Father is a thief and his mother is a servant."
"I don't care who his parents are! You have no right to treat him this way! Now leave and if I ever hear of you picking on him again, you will answer to my husband for it!"
They gazed at me angrily but didn't argue back and one by one they left.
I gazed down at the man and offered him my hand. He gazed at it and after a moment he took it.
"Are you alright?" It was clear that he was not as I spotted a black eye quickly forming where they had punched him.
He only nodded.
"My name's Freyja" I said, smiling, hoping to put him at ease.
"I know. My mother and I caught a glimpse of you at your wedding before we were forced to leave that is."
"Why were you forced to leave?"
"My mother and I aren't exactly welcome in polite society."
"Why not?"
His eyes filled with pain.
"You should leave. If they see you with me they'll laugh at you too."
"No I'm not leaving until I know your ok. Why don't you come to the house with me and I'll give you a meal to take home for you and your mother. I insist."
He looked like he wanted to argue, but he shut his mouth and simply nodded.
"Come" I said.
He silently followed me to the house. People stopped to gaze at us and whispered, but I didn't care. Let them gossip, let them laugh.
I turned to him as he kept stride with me.
"I don't know your name."
"It's Knut."
"Where do you live Knut?"
"On a farm on the hill outside the town. My mother works washing clothes for the owners wife."
"Are you always picked on like that?"
"I'm used to it Frauen."
"It must be tough to deal with. I'm sorry you have to go through such things."
We arrived at the house and I called for Hulda.
"Please make this young man a meal fit for two and wrap it so he can take it home with him."
"Of course Frauen."
When she left, I gestured to the bench.
"Please sit."
He did as he was instructed and gazed around the house while I sat on the bench opposite him.
"I've never been in a place like this before. In a Jarl's house I mean."
I smiled.
"Well now you can say you have and make all your friends jealous."
He looked down.
"I don't have any friends Frauen."
"Well consider me one, so now you do."
Before he could answer Agnarr came into the room. He took one look at Knut and his eyes widened.
"What are you doing in my house?!"
"Agnarr it's alright I invited him" I said.
"Why? He's the son of a thief."
He turned to Knut.
"Get out!"
"Agnarr!" I snapped, gasping at his rudeness.
"People like you have no business bothering men and women of honor! You know your place and that's away from actual decent people!" he said to Knut.
Knut looked as if he was about to cry.
"I told you!" he cried at me, before dashing out of the house.
"Knut wait come back!" I called, but it was too late. He was already gone.
I turned to Agnarr, anger boiling inside me.
"What makes you think you can treat someone like that!"
"What makes you think you can bring people like him in here?!"
"People like him?! Need I remind you that I was a slave!"
"Did I know that when I brought you here?! No! Why? Because you lied to me!"
"What is that supposed to mean?!"
"Exactly what it says." He turned and then practically stomped away.
###
I avoided Agnarr the rest of the day and largely kept to my chambers. I decided I would go see Knut tomorrow and apologize for Agnarr's behavior. I prayed and prayed.
"Lord, please help Knut. Help him to feel loved for he is your child as I am your child. Also I pray for Agnarr, though I know he no longer feels anything for me and would've never had me if he knew I was a slave, I pray that you will change his heart. For the sake of my people, change his heart Lord and stop the raid. I rely on you now and forever. Amen"
###
The next day I set out as the day was dawning and Agnarr wasn't up yet. I didn't want to have to explain where I was going. I hoped Knut and his mother would forgive the early arrival. The stable boy saddled Snowflake and soon I was trotting through the street of the town and then out into farm lands. Knut has said his house was on the hill just outside town and I easily spotted the farmstead. I pulled Snowflake to a halt and headed towards one of the tenant houses. I knocked on the door. At first I heard shuffling inside and then a woman came to the door, her face covered in tear stains.
"Forgive me are you Knut's mother?"
"Yes, she said, but I'm not up to receiving visitors at this time."
"I understand. Please tell him that the Frauen stopped by to see him."
"Your the Frauen?"
I nodded.
"Of course, how I could I forget. I saw you at the wedding. Please come in."
I entered the house, which was a much smaller version of Agnarr's longhouse, with a earthen floor in the middle and raised benches on either side.
"Is Knut here? I would like to apologize for my husbands behavior."
Her eyes welled with fresh tears.
"I'm afraid Knut isn't here Frauen. He hung himself last night. We found him a few hours ago."
Sympathy overwhelmed me.
"Oh I'm so sorry I didn't know. He seemed like a very kind boy."
"He was. Always helpful, always looking for a friend."
"I told him he could be my friend."
"Yes, he came home yesterday and said you were the only person who'd ever been kind to him, who ever stood up for him. The boys always made fun of him for his weight, and because of his Father. Please sit." She gestured to a stool and I sat down while she took the one opposite me.
"The men who were bullying him yesterday, they said his Father was a thief."
Her eyes filled with pain.
"It's the truth Frauen. Many years ago my husband got caught stealing large sums of money from the Jarls family and they were going to exile him but he fled with what he had stolen, leaving Knut and I to bear the shame on our family honor. We haven't seen or heard from him since."
"I'm so sorry."
Her eyes welled with tears.
"Now he's gone...my little boy... he's...he's gone" she choked up.
I reached over and placed my hand over hers.
"If there is anything I can do to help, anything at all, please let me know."
She gazed at me through her tears.
"Thank you for being kind to him. It meant the world to him."
"I'm glad."
"My Frauen may I ask something of you?"
"Yes of course."
"Will you be there for his funeral?"
"I can do more than that. I can arrange for a funeral pyre in town that way you don't have to worry about it and we could give him the honor he deserves."
"Oh thank you Frauen! I am so grateful. He always loved being by the sea, perhaps we could do it there by the water."
"Absolutely. I'll let some of our manservants know and they'll set about building it. I can also arrange for them to come pick up your sons body and bring it to town to the pyre. I will accompany them and you."
"You are truly a gift from above Frauen."
"I will see you tomorrow then."
Tomorrow was also the day the men would set off on the raid. It was clear that I was nothing to Agnarr anymore and that he was set upon raiding my land. Now I just had to focus on doing what good I could and for now it was helping this poor mother and her son.
Knut's mother bid me farewell and quietly shut the door behind her. I mounted Snowflake and rode for home.