Red Axe, Black Sun

Prologue - House of Cards

In the House of Cards you needed a good hand. For the first time this evening, however, Skadi noticed that the young man whose game she watched had a bad hand. Not that his cards were bad, no. As far as she knew, two red Thanes and a black Jarl was something that could be built upon. It was only that the young man’s actual hand was in a bad state and didn’t belong to him anymore.

He had introduced himself as Bram shortly before, when he and his four battle brothers arrived at the tavern. 

They were anything but when his cards scattered away, blood trailing over the desk like spilt candle wax. The axe that stuck in place where his hand had been, belonged to his comrade, Gorm.  And for all Skadi knew, she was the reason for it.

The argument they got into when she revealed her tattoos to them took a turn for the worse. Gorm War-Anvil and Sifnar Red-Shoal smashed the table out of the way and made sure Bram and Haefnir wouldn’t live through the night. 

She could feel the House of Cards going silent and all eyes staring at her. 

Their bloody handiwork on their former friends done, Gorm and Sifnar turned to her, their blades dripping.

Gorm stepped in front of her and grabbed her.  No one of the bystanders dared to intervene. His companion kept them at bay like a wolf defending its prey. Skadi got dragged outside into the scourging storm.

“Not a good idea to show this around here,” Gorm said.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Skadi said.

“Oh sure,” he said. “My… friends used to work for the Cairn-breaker. Probably a bounty on a girl wearing something like this. Dead, not alive. They would have slaughtered you right there without batting an eye.”

“Like you just did to your friends?” Skadi asked.

Gorm grunted.

“You’re welcome,” Sifnar said taking her in between them and trudging out into the night. She wasn’t in the right state to object and nothing good would come if she stayed here.  

As she looked back, she could see the last companion, Magnus, visibly torn between the sides his friends had chosen. He was the only one of the five who wasn’t involved in the argument, the only one who didn’t understand.

The wind outside made Skadi’s dress flutter, giving Magnus one last glimpse of her tattoo.

Skadi knew it wouldn’t make much sense to him.

It was the depiction of a huge dragon across her back, she herself had only been able to see in mirroring glass. There were faces, too, faces that were burned into her skin from memory by the few survivors of her home.

Names had been added later in different rune-handwritings as soon as their identities became known.     

Skadi remembered shedding tears for every one of them. They weren’t from pain, they were from loss and hatred.

The faces weren’t burned in her skin only, also in her mind. Those were the faces that had taken everything from her, her future, her past, her present.

The small ones, the goons that were still around after it happened and that were easy to trace, were already crossed out. She remembered each ones death, brought about by violence at her behest.After years of wandering and searching, only two faces remained untouched. Two big ones, the kingpins who had the wealth or connections to withdraw to the south, had escaped retribution. Skadi felt relief that after all this time and distance, one of the faces had been recognized.

Behind her, Magnus averted his gaze while Bram and Haefnir choked on their own blood. Out of the five companions sent, two were dead, two were fled, and only one would return to the army camp. Magnus turned and ran.