Chapter Four: Growing Pains

While Aslaug drank, Björn invested into Kattegat wholeheartedly. Rúna helped Floki build the trading boats, which Björn and Ubbe would head together until Kattegat earned such a reputation that people traveled to the town itself to trade. Boat building made her surefooted, balancing on various planks as they worked.

Ivar improved his balance, too. Floki was constructing new braces for him nearly monthly during a particularly fast growth spurt. The boy's legs grew straight as an arrow thanks to Floki's ministrations, allowing him to stand properly with his feet flat. Ivar's feet no longer turned inward toward each other, giving him the ability to stand unaided even when Rúna stepped away from him.

He outgrew his cart, preferring to crawl instead, much to Queen Aslaug's chagrin. Crawling gave Ivar more independence, using his upper body strength to pull his bound legs behind him. The binds were constructed by Helga, involving several ties that held his shins together. Ivar could crawl with his legs unbound, though a persistent stiffness in the left knee made it difficult.

The town grew, too, sprawling to include far-off vendors come to peddle their wares. Spices, various livestock, silks, medicines…thanks to Björn and Ubbe, Kattegat became a bustling hub of activity more often than not. This allowed Kattegat to still reap the benefits of raiding through trade, though Björn refused to take any raiding parties from the town until his brothers were old enough—and skilled enough—to help defend the town.

And reap the benefits Kattegat did. Rúna loved walking through the hub of it all, first pulling Ivar behind her in his cart and then walking alongside him when he began crawling regularly. Rúna kept pace beside him as they wandered among the stalls; should Ivar see something that interested him, he would tug at her skirts to signal for her to stop.

It was from the ever-growing market that Ivar bought Rúna a cloth doll. They were eight at the time, and despite her dresses and the detailed braiding Helga dressed her hair in, Ivar honestly often forgot Rúna was a girl. He and his brothers were her closest friends, though he knew she sometimes played and worked with Floki's neighbors. So much of their group playing time was spent running (with Ivar on Ubbe's back), shooting arrows, fishing…Rúna fit in so well with the sons of Ragnar that Ivar never considered Rúna might like other things.

Until the day that Rúna circled them back by the same stall four times during one of their afternoon wanderings. On the third passing, Ivar realized the stall had a woman selling cloth dolls with yarn hair and painted faces. On the fourth passing, he noticed Rúna gazing at the dolls. Finally, on the fifth passing, Ivar reached out to tug her skirt.

"Put me on my feet, Rúna. I want to see." She reached down to him, hands locking around each other's wrists as Rúna hauled his weight upward. Rúna wrapped his arm behind his back to help keep him steady. When his legs were bound, Ivar couldn't place his own feet and had much more difficulty balancing his weight. "Which one do you want, Rúna?"

"What?" She asked, face flushing nearly as red as her hair. "What do you mean?"

Ivar gestured with his free hand. "The dolls! Which one do you want?"

Rúna had never dreamed of actually owning one of the dolls. She wouldn't ask Floki and Helga for such an extravagance, especially when they had given her so much already in her two years of living with them. She couldn't ask Ivar for such a thing, either. When she shook her head, Ivar tugged at the end of one of her braids. "I have coins."

Ivar may forget that Rúna was a girl, but she often forgot he was a prince. Aslaug always gave her sons spending money, though Ivar tended to hold onto his while his brothers were prone to impulse spending. She knew he could buy the doll for her, but still she blushed and stammered out excuses, causing Ivar to sigh deeply.

Before she could stop him, Ivar motioned to a doll on the side with red yarn hair not at all unlike Rúna's own. The transaction happened so quickly that Rúna was helpless to stop it. Ivar was pressing the doll into her hand and sinking onto his knees away from her before she could say a word.

"Ivar," she scolded as they moved away from the stall. Her cheeks still felt like they were afire. "You should not have done that."

"Why not?" Ivar challenged, crawling along beside her. "Are you not my friend, Rúna? I have coins and I can spend them how I like, no?"

She couldn't form any arguments, not any that would make it through the lump in her throat. Instead, she fell silent beside him, staring into the sweet face of her new little doll. Ivar took the lead, carving a new path for the two through the bustling market.

While the younger boys grew, Björn's mother, Lagertha, extended the protection of her earldom to the booming town. Ubbe, Hvitserk, Sigurd, and Ivar grew strong together, training in the woods nearly every day though Kattegat had stood unrivaled for years and years. True to his word, Ubbe trained Rúna as well. She was quick on her feet and strong from her years of helping Ivar. Though still small in stature, Ubbe, Hvitserk, Sigurd, and Ivar molded her into a miniature shieldmaiden.

Rúna remained Ivar's companion, learning to ride the waves of his often volatile moods—not to mention those of Queen Aslaug's. Given a choice, Rúna would have picked Ivar's company over the queen's any day. The queen had a quick temper and a quicker tongue, not at all above reminding Rúna that she was to thank for her life in Kattegat with Floki and Helga.

The sons of Ragnar Lothbrok grew tall and strong in his absence, even Ivar despite his crippled legs, but one thing they did not outgrow was their tendency to fight with one another.

Rúna found him in the forest, not far from where Sigurd had said they left him. Even if she hadn't seen the telltale ruts in the grass his body had made, all she need do was follow the sound of his frustrated grunts.

"Ivar!" She shouted, coming into the clearing and laying eyes on what the boy was doing. Stone raised high, he dropped it over his legs, calling out in pain when it made contact. His bound legs writhed beneath the stone.

Before he could lift it again, Rúna gathered her skirts and ran to him. He was quick, but she was quicker this time, plucking the stone from his lap and chucking it away from him. This, of course, elicited a furious scream from Ivar. Gloved hands lashing out, he made to grab at her skirts.

She danced away before his fingers could find purchase. "What are you doing?"

It was hedging her bets, staying just out of arm's reach. Ivar could very well flip himself, and she knew how quickly he could crawl when he had a mind to do it. Even at just fourteen, his shoulders were that of a man grown, their broadness due entirely to constant use. He only screamed again, though, pulling at his hair since he could not pull at her.

"Sigurd made you mad again, did he? What are you going to do about it? Surely not threaten to cut off your legs again. You've said that for years, Ivar, and not yet done it."

Blue flames all but sparked from the boy's eyes at his glare. His hands slid from his hair, rubbing over his tearstained face. "I hate him. My mother should have left me in the forest."

"You're in the forest now. Shall I leave you?"

He was all but shaking with rage when he threw himself back, hard, colliding with the ground in a solid thump. Rúna sighed, gathering her skirts and laying beside him in the grass. The pair was quiet for a long time, staring up at the fleeting clouds in the sky. Eventually, when her own heartbeat had calmed, Rúna reached out and took his hand.

Ivar wore arm braces, not because of any deficiency in that area of his body, but rather to protect his hands and forearms when he crawled. These, too, had been designed by Floki. Rúna had sewn the thick, boiled leather that covered his fingers herself. It was rigid beneath her touch, though Ivar did not resist her.

She gave his hand a gentle squeeze, one that he did not return. He didn't like to be looked at when he was upset, she knew, so though she heard his shaky breaths and felt a slight tremor in his palm, she kept her eyes skyward as she began to speak.

"Sigurd likes to make fun of me, too, you know. If I argue with him about anything, he reminds me I would have been nothing but a prostitute had Helga not come to the shack that day."

A beat passed, Ivar's hand now gripping her own tightly, before a response came. "He tells you that?"

Acid dripped from his words, burning bright with his anger. Rúna was sure to keep her tone light. "He isn't wrong. I would have been a prostitute had I stayed, but yet, here I am."

Only now did she let her head roll against the ground. "Ivar," she said softly, "am I a prostitute?"

He didn't turn his own head, keeping his bright blue eyes trained on the steely gray sky above them. His brow was still rigid, but a smirk was playing at his lips now. "You must be a terrible one, never having lain with a man."

Rúna rolled her eyes, though he wasn't looking at her. She soldiered on with what she wanted to say, ignoring his teasing. "That was good fortune on my part. The gods saw fit to favor me and send Helga. Floki's taught us that the gods show their favor in odd ways, sometimes. Your legs are a sign of the gods' favor, too."

Here, Ivar gave a hard, bitter laugh. Rúna had said similar things to him before, as had Aslaug and Floki, though the way Ivar received the words varied wildly. Sometimes it angered him. Sometimes he refused to listen. Sometimes it bolstered him.

"Oh, yes, the gods favor me so well. They gave all my brother's whole, hale bodies but decided to make my legs twisted and weak."

Sighing, Rúna rolled herself onto her stomach. Her face eclipsed Ivar's view, replacing a solid gray sky with gray eyes set in an oval face, flaming red braid falling over her shoulder to tickle his cheek. "You are stronger than your brothers, Ivar, and it's because of your crawling. Though you may never run through the forest after each other the way they do, will Ubbe ever throw an axe as far as you can? Will Sigurd ever send an arrow sailing the way you can? Hvitserk falls flat on his back every time you hit him with the flat side of your sword. None of your brothers can do any of that."

He glared up at her, looking for all the world like the petulant six-year-old she met years ago rather than the fourteen-year-old he now was.

"Besides," Rúna continued, voice dropping to a soft whisper, "they don't know what we know, do they?"

The two of them had a secret, one that made them both smile despite Ivar's dark mood. Floki had released them from daily lessons long ago, leaving their days open to other activities—usually training with Ivar's brothers, hunting, helping Floki with his boats, and spending time with Queen Aslaug. But the pair's favorite activity was training Ivar to walk.

His legs had straightened with age and Floki's braces, despite the times Ivar had broken them in the past. Bearing weight on them was painful, but not so much so that Ivar could not stand it. He had walked before, with the aid of Rúna or by holding onto furniture, but that was not the pair's goal.

No, Ivar walking unassisted. That was their goal.

"Imagine their faces when poor little Ivar the cripple is walking!" He laughed now, reaching up to tug Rúna's braid.

"They won't know what to do with themselves." She smiled back at him, but pulled away, righting herself and drawing his legs into her lap. "But if you broke anything with that stone, it would delay it all."

Ivar huffed but didn't resist as Rúna probed at his thighs. She was certain there would be deep bruising all across his legs from hips to knees, but she felt no cracks or swelling through his clothing. A quick peek at his face revealed ruddy stains along his cheeks, though she was unsure if his high coloring was the aftermath of the outburst or embarrassment. "Are you going to tell me what happened? And do you think you'll be able to get back into town on your own?"

"No." He gave no indication which question he was responding to until he pushed himself up. Bending forward, Ivar started to undo the ties that kept his leg braces bound together. His practiced fingers were quick, unthreading the strings in a matter of seconds. Rúna crouched before him, helping him settle his weight on her back.

Ivar was heavy, bigger than her as he was, but so long as he held the weight of his upper body erect, Rúna could manage to carry him. It wasn't unusual throughout their childhood for her to carry him quite far at times. Now, as she adjusted her grip on his thighs, she heard his breath hitch.

"I'm sorry."

"Not your fault. Sigurd's." Rúna felt Ivar's chin rest atop her head, his sigh against her back. I suppose Sigurd dropped that stone on your legs, huh, Ivar? she thought, though she knew better to say such a tease out loud when Ivar was in such a black mood. "I hit more targets than him. Axe throwing. Sigurd got mad and said I only won because Hvitserk placed the stump for me to sit on too close. He said the only way a cripple boy will ever win anything is with someone else's pity."

"And then?" Here, Ivar dipped his head, burying his mouth and speaking against her hair. His breath was hot along her scalp, making her skin prick with goosebumps.

"I hit Sigurd with my axe," Ivar confessed into her hair. "But not with the blade! I turned it before I struck him. It was only the handle."

That explained Sigurd's forehead, split and bloodied beneath his bangs when he had run to get Rúna. The blood had run down his face, reddening his serpent eye in the process. Coupled with the sinister anger on his face, it had made Rúna feel like a small girl again, scared as she was. "Where were Hvitserk and Ubbe in all this?"

"Hvitserk saw it happen. He can't carry me himself right now, with his arm still hurt." Just a handful of days ago, Hvitserk had dislocated his shoulder while wrestling with some other boys in town. One could hear his scream across the market when Björn had popped Hvitserk's shoulder back into its joint. "He went to get Ubbe from the docks. But you have always been faster than Hvitserk, Rúna."

It was midsummer, just like the year the two had met. With all the men home in Kattegat rather than raiding, the town was preparing for a feast and the summer blót. They had much to thank Frey for that year, Rúna knew. Their summer harvests had been plentiful; honoring Frey with a blót was bound to ensure the prosperity endure through the fall months.

"You should thank the gods, then, that I am faster than Hvitserk. By the time he got to you, you wouldn't have any legs to speak of, crippled or no." Ivar gave no response other than to chuck her under the chin, the gesture reminding Rúna of King Ragnar all those years ago.

To get back to Kattegat, Rúna had to carry Ivar through the forest and down a small hill. She tried to keep her breathing even, knowing well he could feel it. There was no need to make him feel guilty and insecure about his need to be carried on top of all else. She needed have worried, though; Ivar slackened against her back just on the edge of town, sleep claiming him. Though she had felt no broken bones, he must have hurt himself considerably enough for exhaustion to overtake him.

Of course, Ubbe and Hvitserk did not appear until she had reached Kattegat. With Ivar asleep, Rúna had no shame in her panting breaths. Ubbe was tall, his blonde hair bright enough to catch her eye. Rúna stopped walking, instead watching as Ubbe ran to her, his short braid bouncing along the back of his head. Hvitserk ran, too, helping move Ivar from Rúna's back to Ubbe's when they reached her.

"Rúna," Ubbe began to scold her. Ivar didn't stir at all from Hvitserk's clumsy jostling, face slack and content against his brother's shoulder. "You will end up hurting yourself, carrying him like that. He's outgrown you."

"He couldn't crawl," she argued. "When I found him, he was dropping big stones on his legs."

Ubbe cut his eyes at Hvitserk, but the younger boy held up his good hand in a show of innocence. "I could not carry him, and you know Sigurd will not. Ivar would not have allowed it, anyway, he was so angry. He was already hurting himself before I left."

"Did he break anything?" Ubbe asked, shifting his shoulders to adjust Ivar's weight.

"Not that I could feel."

"We should check again, to be sure. Come, Hvitserk. We will take him to Floki's first, so we can see how angry Mother will be with all of us."

The walk to Floki's cabin was sullenly quiet, now that Ubbe reminded them they would all be answering to Aslaug. Rúna let them in silently, knowing neither Floki nor Helga would be home; like Ubbe, they were helping prepare for the blót. Ubbe laid Ivar in Rúna's bed before fully unlacing his braces, which stretched from just below the knee nearly to Ivar's ankles.

Rúna didn't follow them into the room, an add-on Floki had built for her the first year she lived with him and Helga, instead going to the hearth. Helga always had a good supply of medicinal plants and herbs lining the shelf set above the hearth, and Rúna had learned how to make medicines and concoctions from her. This knowledge had come in handy time and again throughout the years when Ivar got hurt away from the great hall.

"Lay your head, Little Ivar." Hvitserk's voice drifted from the room over while Rúna quickly ground a few herbs together. He was the only one allowed to still call Ivar by his childhood nickname—not that lack of permission ever stopped Sigurd from using it mockingly. Unlike Sigurd, Hvitserk always used the name with affection. "It's only me and Ubbe."

Though Rúna had come to the hearth rather than into her bedroom for privacy's sake, she knew what she would see were she in there. Ivar's legs were nothing new to her; she had seen them all through their childhood, when Floki would measure his bare legs for new braces and when Helga would force them into a quick bath when they got dirty playing. Rúna knew Ivar's legs were mostly straight now, save for one spot along the right leg, below the knee—an imperfect healing from a particularly severe break.

She knew his legs were long, but thin, with not much muscle or fat at all to cushion the bones. King Ragnar had named his son the Boneless at birth, but his bones were the most prominent feature of his bare legs. Ivar's feet, interestingly, were more padded than his legs, though those, too, were long and thin.

Most likely, given Ivar's stunt with the rocks, his legs would be mottled with bruises and cuts. Rúna sweetened the medicinal drink with honey, knowing it would do little to reduce the bitterness. She was stirring the honey to mix it in when Ubbe poked his head out of the doorway.

"Rúna, do you have any spare cloth?" His face, long with a strong jaw and the dusting of a growing beard, was not overly worried looking. Rúna sighed with relief, fetching some linen scraps from her and Helga's sewing.

"How bad is it?" Ubbe shrugged, and Rúna didn't have to guess why. Injuries the others—and Ivar himself—considered mild were all but mortal wounds in the eyes of Queen Aslaug.

"Only a few cuts, but plenty of bruises. Neither Hvitserk nor I could feel any breaks, either. What's that?" Ubbe tried to stick his finger into the cup she held, to taste the drink, but Rúna pulled it away.

"I've already poured as much honey into this as I dare," she warned, making Ubbe scrunch his face and shake his head.

"You had better give it to him once he's patched up. Less of a chance he'll spit it out on you than on one of us." Rúna giggled, for Ubbe told it true. When it came to taking medicine of any kind, Ivar might as well still be a child. "I will call you in when he's ready."

True to Ubbe's word, Rúna had to clap her hand over Ivar's mouth after he took a mouthful of the medicine. Hvitserk tried to choke out his chuckles from the corner, while Ivar and Rúna glared at one another. "Swallow it."

She felt his lips purse petulantly under her hand, but Ivar made a big show of swallowing the bitter medicine. "If I die before morning, it is Rúna's doing."

"You must not be too terribly hurt if you're making accusations," she shot back. "Perhaps we've shown you too much sympathy."

Ivar merely glared again before taking a fistful of Rúna's bedding and rolling himself into it. "Ubbe, tell Mother I am eating with Floki and Helga this evening."

Still a child at times, indeed, Rúna thought, shaking her head. Ivar was asleep again immediately. The three of them left Ivar napping in her bed. Rúna pulled the curtain closed behind them, to muffle their voices from Ivar's hearing.

"Sigurd will not come home tonight, either, I would guess." Ubbe took a seat at the table, toying idly with a carving knife Floki had left there.

"He will stay with Björn and Torvi," Hvitserk agreed, stealing a chunk of bread from a loaf above the hearth. He was never so bothered with Ivar and Sigurd's fighting as Ubbe was. "I don't see how we can hide any of it from Mother."

"She would find out anyway," Rúna pointed out, righting the herbs she had disrupted along the shelf. "You know how bruises bother Ivar almost as much as broken bones. He will not crawl until they begin to heal, I'm sure."

Ubbe sighed, running a hand down his face. "No way to avoid it. Stay here with him, would you, Rúna? Hvitserk and I have some confessing to do."

"Gods be with you." Rúna sent the brothers off with a sour twist of her expression. "Better the two of you than me."

Plans to putter around and clean while Ivar slept were nearly immediately dashed by a soft knocking at the door. Sigurd stood outside, staring resolutely at his feet. He must have been lurking about, knowing they wouldn't dare take Ivar to Queen Aslaug until they had assessed the damage themselves.

Sigurd's hair was matted with blood around the cut Ivar had given him, bruise already darkening and spreading to encompass his eye. "How bad is it?"

"Nothing is broken. Just cuts and bruises…not so much different from you." Rúna stepped aside, letting Sigurd come into the house. She bid him to sit at the table Ubbe and Hvitserk had just vacated, gathering supplies to clean and dress his wound. "Why do you push him so?"

"You know why." Sigurd tried to jerk his head away from the sting of her cleaning, but Rúna took his jaw in her hand.

Siggy. It always came back to Siggy, how Aslaug and Ivar had laughed at her death. Rúna knew better than to believe that was the only thing, but it was what Sigurd always used to justify the animosity between him and Ivar.

It was more than Siggy. It was Harbard, Ragnar disappearing, Aslaug with her drinking and her favoritism. Siggy was just the beginning of it.

Rúna sighed, releasing her hold on his face. "Sigurd."

"No," he shook his head, braids swishing around his face. "Don't make your excuses for him."

"They are not excuses! Its his life, every day." Sigurd threw his hands up, exasperation plain on his face.

"If he hates waking up every day as a cripple, he knows what to do about it."

When Ivar got angry, he clenched his hands, sometimes drawing blood. He screamed, he cried, he got physical with himself and with others. Ivar's anger was loud, but Rúna's was not. Rather, she fixed her gaze on Sigurd as the anger burned within her. She was sure that her face was red as her hair, skin prickling hot beneath her clothes.

"Get out, Sigurd." She said it quietly, not bothering to raise her voice. Sigurd opened his mouth to argue, but she raised her hand. He flinched away from her, though she had no intentions to hit him. Still, the older boy didn't move.

Rúna opened the door for him, motioning for him to leave. "You have no right to say things like that about him."

"Why? Because it is true? Our father knew it, when he left him in the woods to die!"

Sigurd stood over her, so tall he had to dip his head to meet her eye. They stood framed in the doorway, glaring at one another. "But he did not die. The gods didn't take him then, did they, Sigurd?"

She pushed against him. Bigger though he was, it wasn't hard for Rúna to knock him over the threshold. "You don't get to make that choice! Ivar doesn't make that choice! When you are a god, Sigurd, you can tell me how your brother should kill himself."

Unlike when they were children, Rúna no longer feared Sigurd's serpentine stare. Though his unusual eyes blazed at her, mouth set in a scowl, she was not too frightened to return his gaze. She slammed the image of him standing there seething, pressing her back to the closed door.

Only then did she realize how she was shaking.

It was hours later when Rúna went to her room to rouse Ivar. He was already awake, though, laying on his back and spinning her old cloth doll by the arms between his hands. The doll had seen better days, there was no denying. The yarn hair had grown ratty over the years, and most of the painted face had faded away. Still, though, Rúna kept the doll in her bed.

She slept with it every night, even now.

"I did not know you still had this," Ivar said softly. He was painted gold from the light of the sunset beyond the window. Rúna felt herself blush as she stepped forward, sitting next to Ivar on her bed.

"You bought her for me, remember?" He nodded, giving the doll a final spin before tucking it back under the pillow where he had found it. Rúna scooted along the length of the bed when Ivar pushed himself up, giving him room to move his legs over the edge. She was pleased to note that he didn't wince too harshly when he pushed at his left leg with his hand. "Do you want me to carry you again?"

"I will walk." She didn't expect he would want to crawl on the fresh injuries, but she hadn't anticipated walking, either. Rúna tried to hide her surprise from her face as she stood up. Ivar grunted as he forced himself to his feet, cheeks draining of color. She was just going to ask him if he was sure when he flung his arm over her shoulders.

Rúna always walked on his left side—his stiffer side—when she assisted him in walking. This way, most of his weight was on the left leg; though rigid, he had more balance this way than carrying his weight to the right. A step with the right foot, followed by dragging the left behind. It wasn't a perfect walk by any means, that evening, what with his injuries and his grunting at every movement, but it got him across the room all the same.

"Thank you," Ivar all but breathed the words before they passed through the curtain partition into the next room. He was prideful, she knew all too well, and saying those words likely hurt him as much as his legs did.

She squeezed his hand where it rested on her shoulder in response.

There was more to Ivar than his brothers realized, she knew. Parts of him only Rúna, Floki, and Aslaug truly saw.

How she wished Sigurd could see him this way, though, so he might understand that Ivar was not all bad.

A/N: Thank you Lovebuggy for the kind review! This chapter, I wanted to explore the brothers' dynamic a little as well as Ivar's more vulnerable side. We see it sometimes in the show, and it's always been intriguing to me how a character that strives to embody ruthlessness can also be so emotionally raw. Hopefully I have captured that in this chapter!

I've been having so much fun writing and researching this story. I highly recommend Freyia Norling on YouTube. I have been watching a lot of her videos to learn about Norse culture as well as tons of academic articles. I know Vikings is not always accurate in itself, but I still want to add realistic details pulled from both the show and research to the story!

I hope y'all continue to enjoy. I already have ideas to explore the blót mentioned in this chapter soon, because the festivities and traditions have always been a favorite part of the show for me. :)