Fated - [Bjorn Ironside]

~5~

It was grating at times. Over the past days, Eldyn and Ragnar had not spoken about her origin. Every now and again, a knowing glance from the man would be thrown her way, but she realized that Ragnar's hunger for revenge took most of his focus away from her.

She was thankful for that. Even though Ragnar, as far as she was aware, kept his promise, it still brought her on edge.

Eldyn kept Ragnar's knowledge a secret to Athelstan. For as far as she was aware, Ragnar meant it to be a known secret between the two of them alone. For what purpose? She never knew what Ragnar's reasons were—only that they were self-serving.

The girl sat in the corner of the house, staring at the bow leaning against the wall. Her long, earthen locks sprawled across her features, but her bright, crystalline eyes contrasted like the heavens in Athelstan's stories about his god—that within the sacred skies and halls above lies true bliss and life everlasting. Would her father be there? Was heaven all so different from Valhalla? Was he at peace—or was he within entropy?

The same evening her and Ragnar spoke, Bjorn had come along and noticed the bow within her arms. The son of Ragnar took it upon himself to take the bow from Eldyn.

She was a slave—he thought—what use was a bow to her?

However, it was much to Bjorn's surprise that when he ripped the weapon from her hands, it was not long before he ended up flipped with his head slammed into the ground and the bow tossed to the side.

Dizzily, he stared up to find her staring down at him. Her eyes were glistening, like a fresh mist over a glade, but her face was alight and pink. She looked as if she was about to cry, and within those tears was a fury that even Bjorn had never seen on anyone, let alone Eldyn.

"Never touch my bow again!" She had screamed at him in the Saxon tongue. She felt the deafening rumble of her jaw muscles clenching in her ears. "Or I will take it upon myself to use it on you, Bjorn."

All of the homestead had heard her outrage, but none interfered. It was something that they understood to be an unyielding tension between the two children. They knew how Bjorn singled out Eldyn in his apathy, a behavior that his parents continuously aimed to correct, but they never could get him to calm himself around her.

It was as if Eldyn was a trigger for Bjorn's anger. Why? Nobody quite understands it. Not even Athelstan.

Perhaps not even Bjorn himself.

Ever since that day, Eldyn kept to herself. For every time that bow was taken from her hands, it felt as if she was losing her father again. A wound that re-opens, again and again while the blood remains poisoned and sickened, never to flow pure.

Today, Eldyn abstained from helping on the farm that morning. As of late, her mind was far too busy with thoughts of the past and hypotheses of the future. For no tapestry was woven that could tell the tales of the tragedy she had endured, and no prophecy would foretell of such an unknown future. Alone in the corner she sat, away from prying eyes, save for Lagertha or Athelstan.