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Thorfinn was pretty sure no matter how many times he woke up in the nooks and crannies of abandoned houses in unfamiliar villages, it would never get less disconcerting.
…Some mornings were stranger than others, however.
The night before, after a fairly uneventful skirmish for control of a small English village, Thorfinn had snuck into what he thought was an empty house, its inhabitants killed in the fight that day. It was only when he had woken up in the morning that he had realized he wasn’t alone — Askeladd had been sleeping fitfully in one of the beds, bleeding all over the sheets from an infected-looking arrow wound in his left shoulder.
Thorfinn was painfully aware that this was the best chance the universe had ever given him to avenge his father. Askeladd was fast asleep in front of him, completely defenceless and weak with fever. And yet, instead of slitting his throat and being done with it, Thorfinn had cleaned the wound, changed his bandages, and now sat with a bucket of cold water, trying to work up the nerve to place a wet cloth on the forehead of the man who had ordered his father’s death.
It was stupid, wasn’t it? To sit by the bedside of the man he wanted to kill, and do his best to keep him alive instead. But nothing would matter if Thorfinn wasn’t the one to kill him in a fair, honourable fight. If this infection killed Askeladd — hell, if it weakened him in any way — Thorfinn would lose his chance to win a duel against the man who killed his father: Askeladd, at his very best.
It didn’t seem likely that Askeladd would die from this, but Thorfinn would not underestimate the danger of an infected wound. He’d seen firsthand how quick an infection like this could kill, once before, back in Iceland. A young man in their village had accidentally cut himself on a pair of dirty shears and he had died a week later. Now, years later, Thorfinn couldn’t remember the man’s name, but he had been a friend of Ylva’s, hadn’t he?
Ylva…
Thorfinn was caught off guard by the depth of the pain that gripped his heart at the thought of his sister, and by extension, his mother. All these years later, did they know he was alive? …Did they know his father wasn’t?
It felt like his chest was being crushed under the weight of the pain. Thorfinn took a deep, shuddering breath, gripping the hilt of his father’s dagger. He couldn’t think about his family back home. About the way Ylva’s eyes shone when she smiled, about how soft and gentle his mother’s hugs were. If he allowed himself to think about them, the temptation to run home crying would overwhelm him.
No. He couldn’t look back. Not after everything he’d done.
A tired grunt from Askeladd brought Thorfinn back to the present. The man had shifted a little in his sleep, brow furrowed and beaded with sweat. Thorfinn reached over and prodded his forehead with one finger, gauging the heat radiating from his skin. With a sigh, he reached for the bucket of cold water and picked up the cloth that was submerged within.
He could picture the tenderness with which his father had tended to his mother when her health was poor. She’d gotten fevers often, and Thors had sat dutifully by her bedside, dabbing gently at her forehead with a wet cloth. Obviously, Thorfinn had no intention of tending to Askeladd that tenderly. Without wringing the excess water out of the cloth, he dropped it right on top of the man’s face. The quiet sound of his breathing stopped, and then Askeladd sputtered and pawed at the cloth with tired, uncoordinated fingers. When he managed to tear it off, their eyes met, and for a moment they just stared at each other. Finally, Askeladd groaned and tossed the cloth unceremoniously back at Thorfinn. “The hell do you think you’re doing, kid?” he snapped. “Trying to drown me? You’re a terrible nursemaid.”
Thorfinn caught the cloth in a clenched fist. Water droplets ran between his fingers and fell to the floor, the illusion of holding a beating, dripping human heart in his hand. “I don’t care what you think, baldy,” he snapped.
“Of course not,” said Askeladd. He sat up a little in bed, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “Ugh. How long have I been out?”
“Not long enough,” grumbled Thorfinn, dropping the cloth back into the bucket and wiping his wet hand on his tunic. “I don’t know when you actually passed out, but it’s been about a day since the fight. I assume that’s when you got this wound?”
“Huh.” Askeladd pulled his shirt down to expose his wounded shoulder. The visible skin around the bandages was red and angry. “Did you do this?”
Thorfinn cocked an eyebrow. “Shoot you?”
“No, you stupid brat. These bandages look fresh. Did you change them?”
“Yeah. So what?”
“Easy, kid,” said Askeladd, raising his hands in mock surrender. “It’s not a bad job. A little tight, though. Once I’m on my feet again, I’ll show you how to tie a bandage properly.”
Anger prickled under Thorfinn’s skin. “Fuck off,” he spat. “I don’t want to know anything you’d teach me.”
This earned him a howl of laughter from Askeladd. “Fine. Have it your way,” he said, lying back down and folding an arm under his head. “Man, if I’d known how much of a hassle having you around would be, I would’ve charged double.”
Thorfinn rolled his eyes. “The hell are you on about, old man? You’re not making any sense.”
When he didn't immediately get a reply, Thorfinn glanced up. Somewhere behind the unfocused haze of fever in Askeladd’s eyes, there was an ice-cold glint of anxiety. Like he had said something he wasn’t supposed to.
Charged double? The fuck was that supposed to mean? No one had paid Askeladd to take Thorfinn with him. Hell, his band of ruffians had even tried to shake Thorfinn off on multiple occasions, packing up in the middle of the night and making Thorfinn chase them. The only reason Askeladd had taken him along in the first place was because he had refused to leave his father’s boat that day.
That day…
And then it hit him. On that day, when Thors had died and Thorfinn’s life had been torn open and turned inside out like the pelt of an animal, Askeladd’s band had been prepared. They had known Thors’s ship would be passing through; they’d had traps ready.
Why had Thorfinn never thought about that before? Askeladd was smart, sure, but not even he could predict the future like that. He’d known. Someone had prepared him. “What are you saying?” asked Thorfinn. His voice sounded far away, past the thunderous river of his own blood rushing in his ears. “Someone paid you to kill my father?”
Askeladd said nothing. His expression was passive, but his eyes looked like they did in battle, cautious and calculating.
Thorfinn’s body moved without thought or warning. Before he knew it, he had two fistfuls of the front of Askeladd’s shirt, shaking him. “Answer me, you bastard!” he howled. “Did someone pay you to kill my father? Yes or no?!”
The arm that had been tucked under Askeladd’s head darted out and grabbed a fistful of Thorfinn’s hair. Even in his weakened state, he was easily able to throw Thorfinn to the ground, dislodging the boy’s hands from his shirt. “It’s none of your business,” said Askeladd. “I’m the one who killed him, wasn’t I?”
“Fuck off!” snarled Thorfinn, getting back to his feet. His daggers were in his hands, instinct having taken over the moment his body hit the ground. “What do you mean it’s none of my business?! He was my father! Tell me who paid you off or I’ll slit your fucking throat!”
Askeladd’s expression was utterly unreadable. Thorfinn pictured throwing a dagger, pinning the man’s neck to the wall behind him, watching the colour drain from his face as he choked on his own blood. He thought about the feeling of the cloth dripping in his fist, imagining it was Askeladd’s heart.
Who could have possibly hated a man like Thors enough to want him dead? The thought that Askeladd knew and refused to tell him was almost enough to drive Thorfinn insane. But for whatever reason — spite? Amusement? — Askeladd clearly had no intention of saying anything. Thorfinn sheathed his daggers and turned around, heading toward the door. “…Fine. If you won’t tell me, someone else will.”
Now that got a reaction out of Askeladd. “Listen here, you little brat,” he growled. “You’re messing with something you don’t understand.”
It was Thorfinn’s turn not to respond as he opened the door. If Askeladd’s outburst was any indication, this was the right move. Someone in camp would tell him the truth. Whether it was out of pity, fear, or somewhere in between, someone would tell him.
Thorfinn would make sure of it.
Sitting up in bed and watching the door Thorfinn had just slammed shake on its hinges, Askeladd put his head in his hands.
He was not the type of man to let something slip out like that. Damn this fever, he thought. It was loosening his tongue. If Thorfinn hadn’t figured out that his father’s murder was a paid job by that point, he probably never would have. But now, the cat was out of the bag, and everything was fucked. Askeladd was sure someone in his little band of idiots would tell Thorfinn the information he wanted, and knowing Thorfinn, he would waste no time heading out to find Floki and challenge him to a duel.
And then… Thorfinn would die.
Askeladd didn’t know Floki well, but he had sized up the Jomsviking the moment they’d met. Floki could — and would — kill Thorfinn without hesitation. Honour between warriors? Askeladd had to laugh. The man who wanted one of his fellow Jomsvikings dead, but didn’t even have the balls to do it himself, so he’d had Askeladd do his dirty work for him? An honourable warrior? No. Floki was cut from the same filthy cloth as Askeladd was, and if he found out Thorfinn knew about his treachery, he would silence him as soon as possible.
Thorfinn was going to die. Askeladd had to do something.
He stood up, gripping the back of the chair for balance, and nearly tripped over the bucket of water beside the bed. Cold, clean water spilled out of it, seeping into the wooden floorboards. Askeladd stepped around it, eyeing the bundle of bloody, crumpled up bandages that had been tossed under the chair.
After decades at war, seeing the worst human nature had to offer, not much surprised Askeladd anymore. But waking up to find Thorfinn sitting by his bedside, fumbling his way through changing his bandages and tending to his fever… That had left Askeladd speechless. The first person to take care of him like that since his mother, and it was the kid who only wanted him in good health so he could kill him himself.
Askeladd gave a low, empty laugh. After everything he had done in his life, it was fitting. No one cared about him, not really. The only people who wanted him alive were the people who wanted to use him for their own purposes. That was how he had raised Thorfinn, after all, in whatever amalgamation of relationships he was to the boy. Mortal enemy, ally, mentor, leader, and of course, father figure. Fathers were violent, unloving things, the kind of creatures who raised their sons for war, like lambs to the slaughter. That was how he had raised Thorfinn, the way all men raised their sons.
…If only it could be that simple. The truth was, it seemed like Thors had been an exception. Askeladd had only met the man once, but seeing Thors rest a gentle hand on Thorfinn’s head that day had changed something deep inside Askeladd.
Those hands had been huge. He could have smacked tiny Thorfinn clean off the deck of the ship, had he wanted to. But Thors had held his son close in his last moments, and that had changed how Askeladd thought about fatherhood forever.
Maybe not all fathers were like his own. Maybe not all men were bloodthirsty animals with a singular desire for violence. Maybe if Thors hadn’t died, Thorfinn would have grown up into a kind man, instead of… whatever Askeladd had raised him to be.
Askeladd considered himself to be a sort of middle ground. A worse father for Thorfinn than Thors, to be sure, but better than Askeladd’s own father had been. Askeladd’s father hadn’t given a shit about him until he had discovered his son’s skill with the blade. And yes, that was how it had started with Askeladd and Thorfinn, too. Truly, men were exactly who their fathers had beaten them into, like blacksmiths using hammers to mold swords, blow by blow.
But somewhere in the last ten years, things had changed. Askeladd wasn’t sure when he had started to care for the brat; maybe it had been a slow, steady process, or maybe one day he had just woken up and realized he wanted Thorfinn to grow up and have a good life.
…As if he had any right to want that. He had been the one to drag Thorfinn into the hell that was war, after all. Killing Thors may not have been his idea, but it didn’t change the fact that he’d been the one to sever the kid from any hope of a happy childhood. He had to take responsibility for that. For Thorfinn’s life.
Askeladd dragged his weary body across the room, pulling on his coat before opening the door. The cold air scraped against his skin, over-sensitive from the fever, but he pushed onward. Outside, the camp was fairly quiet; the pillaging and celebrations had all but finished the night before, and now his men lounged around bonfires, drinking booze they’d nabbed from now-empty houses and licking their wounds. A couple of them waved to Askeladd as he trudged by. He nodded in acknowledgment, but said nothing as he scanned the area. Finally, after a few minutes, his eyes landed on Thorfinn. The kid was standing stiffly next to three of Askeladd’s men, all stretched out and warming themselves by the fire. He was too far away to hear their conversation, but the haunted look on Thorfinn’s face told Askeladd everything he needed to know.
They locked eyes, and then Thorfinn’s face contorted with fury. He pushed past the startled men, letting out a battle cry as he ran straight toward Askeladd.
If this had been any other day, Askeladd would have held his ground and then stepped back at the very last second, letting Thorfinn tackle the air and fall forward. But his fever made his mind hazy around the edges, his reflexes slow. Thorfinn was able to tackle him at full force, and Askeladd couldn’t hold back the cry of pain that tore itself from his throat as his injured shoulder collided with the ground. For a moment, spots danced at the edges of his vision. He could taste blood; he must’ve bitten his tongue when his head bounced off the ground. Pitiful.
Before Askeladd could think about how embarrassingly off his game he was, Thorfinn started to shake him by the collar of his coat. “You lied to me, you bastard!” the boy screamed, baring his teeth like a cornered animal. “All these— All these fucking years, and you’ve been lying! ”
“I never lied to you,” said Askeladd. “I’m the one who gave the order to kill your father, remember? He died because of me.”
Thorfinn shook his head wildly. “You’re wrong! You never would’ve even met my father if not for that… that traitor .”
“You don’t know that for certain. Maybe our paths would have crossed in battle at some point.” Askeladd gave the kid a bloody grin. “Maybe I was destined to be the one to kill him.”
His grin turned into a pained grimace as Thorfinn shook him again, slamming the back of his head into the snowy ground. “Shut up!” Thorfinn roared. “Shut the fuck up! You don’t… you— you’re…” He trailed off, chest heaving.
Askeladd took the opportunity to look away from Thorfinn’s manic eyes and take stock of his surroundings. At this point, a crowd of his men had gathered. A few were jeering as if they were watching a common fight between brigands. Others were whispering to themselves. The vast majority, however, were just staring in slack-jawed awe. Over the years, they had seen Askeladd indulge Thorfinn in many duels, and to the average onlooker, it looked like Thorfinn might have been about to beat Askeladd for the very first time.
But this wasn’t a duel, and Thorfinn wasn’t trying to win.
Askeladd needed to break up the crowd. A leader looking weak in front of his men was dangerous for morale and loyalty. But even more than that, Askeladd wasn’t sure what Thorfinn would do next. The boy seemed ready to explode at the slightest provocation. Whatever happened next needed to happen away from their prying eyes.
“We’ve got an audience, Thorfinn,” he said quietly. Thorfinn startled visibly, looking around as if he had forgotten where they were. “Why don’t you let me up and we can take a walk?”
Thorfinn glanced around again, still breathing heavily. Without saying a word, he jumped to his feet and dashed off. A couple of onlookers laughed, pointing and gesturing at him as he ran. Askeladd dragged himself to his feet as well, pasting on a cocky smile and hoping no one could tell how dizzy he was. “Gotta throw the kid a bone once in a while,” he said to the crowd, cracking his knuckles. “All right, party’s over, folks. Go home.”
A few people protested at the lack of real violence, but the majority of them just dispersed, heading back to their bonfires and horns of alcohol. Askeladd wiped the blood from his mouth before heading off in the direction Thorfinn had run in.
It didn’t take long for him to find the kid, who was crouched in the snow beside the small house they’d been in earlier. With his knees drawn up to his chest, he looked small — not that Thorfinn was ever anything more than a short little runt, but in that moment, he looked startlingly like the little boy whose life Askeladd had ruined on that day ten years ago.
“Thorfinn,” said Askeladd, and the boy looked up. “Come on. Let’s go.”
Without saying a word, Thorfinn stood up and headed towards the forested outskirts of the village. Askeladd followed. They walked in silence, the only sound being the crunching of their boots in the snow. Askeladd’s head was spinning from the fever, his injured shoulder aching, but he pushed onward. Thorfinn trudged beside him, head low, face obscured by his shaggy hair. All of his earlier vitriol was gone. He looked hollow. For once, Askeladd had no idea what to say.
Luckily, Thorfinn was the one to break the silence. “You’re bleeding,” he said finally.
Askeladd raised a hand to his mouth, anticipating it there, but the blood seeping through the fabric covering his shoulder caught his eye instead. “Ah,” he said. “Guess you’ll have to bandage it again, huh?”
Thorfinn scoffed, but it was lacking his usual fire. He didn’t respond, just kicked some snow in front of him as he walked.
“So,” said Askeladd. “I assume you were able to find someone who was there the day I took the job?”
“Yes.”
“So you know, then.”
Thorfinn nodded. “Floki. A Jomsviking,” he said, spitting out the man’s name like venom. “I met him once. He was the one who asked my father to come back to fight in the war. I guess that was a lie, too?”
“Yeah, he never actually intended for Thors to make it to England.”
Thorfinn took out his frustrations on another innocent pile of snow, which the breeze eagerly carried downwind. “You knew all this time, and you never told me,” he said after a moment. “Why?”
Askeladd shrugged, mostly with his good shoulder. “Wasn’t relevant.”
He took a few more steps before realizing Thorfinn wasn’t beside him anymore. Turning around, he found the boy standing with his fists clenched by his side, biting his lip. “How can you say that?” Thorfinn asked. “Do you really not give a fuck about your own life? One of these days, in one of our duels, I would have killed you, and it would have been for nothing, because you aren’t even the right person.”
“And you think Floki is.”
“Of course,” said Thorfinn. “He’s the reason my father is dead. I have to kill him.”
Askeladd crossed his arms. “Why?”
Thorfinn’s eyes widened. “Why…?” he echoed. “What do you mean, why?”
“I mean exactly what I said,” replied Askeladd. “Why do you have to kill him? And don’t say it’s because he was responsible for your father’s death. Really, why? Why do you have to kill him? What will that accomplish?”
Thorfinn opened his mouth, and then closed it again, looking lost for words. Askeladd knew this was his chance. “Can I tell you something, kid?” he said. “I’ve thought this for years, but I figured you wouldn’t listen when it was coming from the man you were trying to get revenge on. Hell, maybe you still won’t listen, but it’s worth a shot. Here goes: You’re young, so I get it, but you’ve been really stupid for a long time now.”
Thorfinn’s eye twitched, but he said nothing, letting Askeladd continue.
“Revenge isn’t going to bring your father back, you know that, right?” Askeladd went on. “You can kill me, you can kill Floki, but at the end of the day, what difference does it make? Your father’s not gonna be there to see it.”
“His honour needs to be protected, even if… even if he’s dead,” said Thorfinn. His voice had dropped to a low, wavering tone, barely more than a whimper. A far cry from the way he had been screaming earlier. “My… My father was a good man. He deserved so much better.”
“He was a good man,” Askeladd agreed. “I didn’t know him, but I imagine a man like that was a good father, too. So for what it’s worth, I think he would’ve wanted better for you than to waste your life chasing revenge. Especially when it comes to that Jomsviking bastard. He’s dangerous, Thorfinn. Trust me.”
Thorfinn was silent for a while, head low and brow furrowed as he — hopefully — considered Askeladd’s words. Finally he looked up. “You’re protecting me,” he said. Not a question.
“Now, why would I do that?”
“You’ve been protecting me all this time, haven’t you?” asked Thorfinn, ignoring Askeladd’s attempt to deflect. “And all these years, I’ve hated you. I’ve fantasized every day about killing you, and you… you’ve been…”
He trailed off, brown eyes filling with tears. The sight was enough to evoke a fight or flight response in Askeladd. He was usually confident in his ability to talk his way out of any situation, but somehow, the idea of Thorfinn in tears was more intimidating than any threat he’d ever heard from any enemy leader he’d ever fought. Askeladd took a deep breath, fighting through the nerves — this was it, his chance to stop his annoying kid from running headlong into surefire death. He wouldn't let it slip through his fingers.
“Hey, kid,” he said gently, placing his hands on Thorfinn’s shoulders. “I don’t blame you for hating me. If I was in your shoes, I’d probably hate me, too. You have every right to want me dead. Floki, too. But I hope you’ll consider what I said, Thorfinn. There’s more to life than revenge.”
He could feel Thorfinn trembling under his hands. “If I’m not trying to get revenge… what am I supposed to live for?” the boy asked. “What do I do?”
“Whatever you want,” Askeladd told him. “Be a knucklehead Viking like me if that’s what your heart desires. Go home and see your family. Become a farmer or some shit like that.” He couldn’t help cracking a grin at that last one. The image of the angry little firebrand in front of him tending a field was almost too odd to form in his mind. “It doesn’t matter, really. As long as you’re… ngh. As long… as…”
He trailed off, voice faltering. The dizziness, which had fallen out of Askeladd’s focus while tensions were high, was returning with a vengeance now that he was starting to relax. Everything around him seemed far too bright, the snow glowing impossibly white. Askeladd had passed out before, and this was how it always felt, right before it happened. He took a step back, not wanting to pull Thorfinn down with him — and closed his eyes as his legs buckled, collapsing into the snow.
His consciousness clung to him, and he was vaguely aware of Thorfinn calling his name. “S’okay,” mumbled Askeladd. “I’m fine. Head’s just spinning.”
A cold hand fumbled across his forehead, and Thorfinn huffed in frustration. “You’re burning up,” he said, and dragged Askeladd to his feet. “Come on, old man. We’re heading back.”
As they walked, Askeladd opened his eyes and glanced over at the kid half-carrying him back to the village. Thorfinn’s jaw was set, a look Askeladd was used to seeing on him. Usually, it came with eyes as hard and sharp as coal. Now, though, Thorfinn’s eyes were edged with concern, eyelashes prickly with tears that had frozen over in the cold wind.
Once they got back to the house, Thorfinn dumped Askeladd onto the bed and stepped away, wiping his eyes with the edge of one threadbare sleeve. Askeladd kicked off his boots and sighed as he lay back down.
“I should thank you,” he called over.
“Are you going to?”
“Nah.”
This earned him a glare from Thorfinn, but the kid came over and sat down beside his bed anyway. “Take off your shirt,” he said. “I gotta change your bandages.”
Askeladd did as he was told. The bandages wrapped around his shoulder were completely soaked with blood; Thorfinn clicked his tongue in frustration as he removed them, movements decisive but cautious. He used his teeth to tear off a sizable length of bandages from the roll and began to wrap them around the wound. He tied them noticeably looser this time, almost as if he’d listened to what Askeladd had told him before.
“You’re a good kid, Thorfinn,” he said.
“And you’re an idiot,” replied Thorfinn, sitting back and crossing his arms. “Walking around in the snow with a fever like that… You’re fucking stupid.”
Askeladd chuckled. “Well, maybe if you hadn’t run off like a little brat, I wouldn’t have had to chase you.”
“Fuck off,” grumbled Thorfinn.
“Hey, there’s the kid I know and tolerate.”
Askeladd wasn’t sure exactly when he had fallen back to sleep — everything was hazy. All he knew was that when he woke up, Thorfinn was still sitting in the chair beside his bed, head lolled back and snoring softly.
Good kid, thought Askeladd, smiling to himself. In that moment, there was no doubt in his mind that Thorfinn would grow up to be a good man, walking toward something better than violence, much like his father before him.
And as long as Thorfinn let him, Askeladd would be there to watch it happen.