Book two of Blind Love
After being saved from the Saxons and brought back to the man she loves, Ailbe has grown far less naive. Still a gentle soul with a heart of gold, Ailbe begins to find the balance between compassion and subservience. She becom...
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When they landed, Ailbe wanted nothing more than to sleep. The entire trip had been a whirlwind and she needed a rest. However, sleeping was most certainly not an option for the young princess.
When she woke up, Ivar was gone and the shores of her home were drawing so close that she could hear the cheering of her small nephew and his dog who'd come to meet her.
"Morning Princess." Hvitserk grinned at her as she shot up quickly.
"Why didn't you wake me?" She gasped.
He gave a small shrug, and looked back at the crowds that waited for them in the small Celtic town. "It seemed like you'd need it."
At this she had to nod in agreement. She did need the sleep, especially to deal with her mother and the grand feast she would have surely prepared. But Ailbe didn't want a feast or a celebration. Just the fact she was alive was enough for her. In fact, she was sick of all the noise surrounding her. After the trauma of previous weeks, she yearned for nothing more than that quiet night of peacefulness she had enjoyed the first time she met Ivar. Out on the hillsides just the two of them.
She had not realised then how much he would come to matter to her, but something had always drawn her towards him. Perhaps he was just one of those people, though she'd often been told by Hvitserk that he didn't really have many friends so that concept was unlikely.
"What will you do when you get home?" He asked, looking out onto the beautiful Irish landscape.
"Hide from my mother." She answered flatly.
When they finally came ashore, Ailbe stayed behind everyone else. Her wounded arm and chest were hidden under thick furs, but cuts and injuries still littered her face. How would she seem? The stupid little blind girl, covered in bruises? No. She didn't wish to play the part of naive blind girl anymore. Soon she would be Queen, wife of Ivar The Boneless, and so that was the part she would play.
"Are you alright?" Hvitserk muttered to her as they got off the ship.
"I have to be." She answered as her feet hit the ground.
*****
Ailbe was silent on her walk back home, uncharacteristically so. Though she loved the company of her little nephew, things seemed so different now.
She wanted, in that moment, to be with Ivar. But she also knew that he was with her mother - who she was trying to avoid. Why would she avoid her mother? Well, the small matter of her mother gloating about her ineptitude, saying that she should've stayed at home instead of following these Vikings.
She couldn't take it, not now, not after everything she'd been through. Not after everything he'd done, that man who'd taken her. She knew that facing her mother would make her snap, and she didn't want that. Though she hardly ever lost her temper, her mother just brought something out in her.
"Aunt Ailbe?" The little boy beside her dragged her from her thoughts.
"Yes Brian?" She answered plainly, smiling as she heard his voice. Before everything, she'd spent most of her days with the children of her village. She surely would miss them when she leaved, as she loved her siblings and nephews dearly.
"What happened over there in England? You seem sad." He spoke with the sweetest voice and that childish innocence that could only endear her further.
Ailbe stopped, sitting down in the grass to talk to him as her hand held onto his. "The brave warriors fought the Saxons, just like we talked about before I left." She told him. "But while they were away, bad men came to attack us."
"Did people die?" He asked intrigued.
Ailbe had to push back tears at the memory, her heart pounding as she tried to stay strong. It wasn't his fault, she knew that, but his questions made her heart ache. "Yes, lots of good people died. And to stop other people from dying, I told them I'd go with them because I was a princess."
"Did it work?" He gasped.
She nodded, "That's why I'm sad, Brian, it's because of all the bad things the bad men did to me while I was trapped."
"But how did you get out?" He questioned.
At this, a smile formed upon her features as she reminisced. "Ivar saved me from the bad men and he killed them." She did the action of slicing their throats that made Brian laugh and clap cheerily.
"Does that mean you're like the stories? Like Clíodhna & Ciabhan?" He asked excitedly.
She smiled nodding, knowing that the young boy didn't yet understand the tragedy of the story of their Gods. "Yes." She answered. "And soon I might have to leave here and go very far away."
"But I don't want you to leave!" The little boy protested, hugging her tightly. "I'll miss you!"
Ailbe let small tears fall down her cheeks as she held the boy in her arms, scared that if she let go she may never hold him again. "I will always be here with you." She whispered. "Because you will always be in my heart. But just like how Clíodhna met Ciabhan and she went to live with the humans so that she could be with him, I am going to live with these Northmen so that I can be with Ivar."
Brian nodded, wiping tears from his cheek. "I understand." He said sweetly. "But I love you, Ailbe."
"I love you too little one." She kissed the top of his head, standing to walk home again.
