An Angel Called Eternity

To Bet on Losing Dogs - Kætil IV: The Northern War

Kætil IV: The Northern War

The Eighteenth Day of the Seventh Moon, 873 AD.
River Isanar, The Frozen Trails, Scelopyrea.

Krakevasil, the last two moons had been fun.

Kætil couldn't help but smile as he put his sword through the groaning form of the wounded man beneath him. He was a reborn man now, tied to the power of his god as much as any druid was. He may not have been able to hear his god's voice, but he knew for a fact that he was indeed destined to stand by the Raven-God's side. He was better than the others. All the others. He was reborn.

Of course it wasn't only his newfound connection with the Raven-God thanks to his runic marks that was making him enjoy life a little more right now. No, not at all.

The war had begun in earnest, and he was at the forefront of every skirmish. Some he won, some he lost, but in all of them the foe followed them south. Sometimes they even set off before him and he needed to follow them instead, but that was no cause to complain. He'd much rather be the pursuer than the pursued, no matter how big the advantage arriving first and having time to prepare gave him and his boys was.

The last two months had seen him back on the frozen trails that ran parallel to the river Isanar, and given the amount of times he'd had to ford the river in full armour it was a miracle he hadn't almost drowned yet. The summer rains had mostly subsided, so there were far more suitable fords than there had been when the river had been a rush a few months back, not to mention the fact that they weren't transporting the gravely wounded this time so there was far more mobility in his little force.

He boasted of a few hundred men under his command, perhaps four-hundred, scattered along the western riverbanks. There were a few little islands and islets that they would have to take control of as well when they moved further south, carved out of the land by the passage of the winding river over the long centuries that the Isanar had nourished the northlands, but that would more be a job for parts of the actual army. As of right now his instructions were just to keep the enemy engaged and fight them along the river, instructions that he was more than happy to carry out.

A little bloodshed was good for the soul after all.

There was another reason he'd been rather more content recently, but that was of a more... private nature. To have found a woman who was not only touched by the Carrion-King, but also by greatness, was amazing by itself. Add onto that the fact that she was his equal with steel, that she had been willing to carve runes into his person to help him fulfil his great destiny, and that she seemed just as... intrigued by him? Well, how could he not be happy?

He'd need to tread lightly around father about this subject, and the rest of the druids as well. Their coupling was never going to be without complications due to their statuses, what with him being the son of the Great Jaerl and her being a prospective high-flyer in a mystic order, but the two of them were fine enough with keeping their unions a secret for now. Important conversations were for the southern folk and their strange ways, not a true man and woman of Scelopyrea. They'd do as they pleased, try to keep it under wraps, and talk it out when the war was over and won. Probably. Father wouldn't be pleased, he seemed to have rather oddly done a turnaround on Svaltha these last few months and been rather opposed to her presence, but this was one thing Kætil was unwilling to compromise on with his father. This time he would have his way, and some grumbling notwithstanding his father had mostly respected his decision. Kætil was glad of that; he had no wish to grow distant from his father, not with how well the man had treated him all through his life. His father was a good man, better than most, and he very much wished to have his father remain as a part of his life as he moved forwards onto new and exciting things.