Pairing | Ivar x OC
Info | Viking Age AU
⁑ Warnings: NSFW, heavy ANGST, SMUT included, cursing, mentions of murder, blood, violence, crimes, torture, slavery, death. Caution is recommended: the following content may be triggering.
Author's Notes | A long chapter, as good as it is long, I hope. Haha... Words |4293 ⁑ Warnings: Mentions to death, blood, battle.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
During the days that passed since Hvitserk arrived, he observed his brother's behavior around. Huge pieces of wood were brought into the hall composing an enormous reproduction of Kattegat's map as if it was a huge hnefatafl board in the center of the hall Hvitserk observed the carpenters adjusting until it was a perfect miniature of the hometown he could remember - a bigger reproduction from the one he saw into Ivar's map hall, on that beautiful wooden table he was sure he would ask his carpenters to reproduce in Ringerike for his own battle plans. Ringerike, by the way, also attached to that big table after Hvitserk came, marked as an allied territory along with Vestfold and Kattegat - Ivar was really intending to come back after Kattegat was properly taken and their base established, and it was something to surprise Hvitserk once more about his little brother: he was thinking about his people instead of looking at himself only. Kattegat was his homeland, but those earls Hvitserk saw in every reunion before the war were counting on Ivar's return to reign and conduct them and this was his plan.
Kattegat wouldn't be an annex to his own lands, but something in between Ringerike and those Irish foreign lands Ivar was ruling now, a market route for their merchants. Something to make both of their kingdoms bigger and prosperous.
Ivar had changed. Hvitserk could see this. Maybe life had sculpted his little brother with the hard hits that caused him the scars Hvitserk had the chance to see sometimes during the time he spent along with Ivar's family in that castle.
A family...
It just made his heart more homesick!
To see Iliana walking around with her little Vali just brought Hvitserk's memories of his precious Hillevi. How would Frigga and the children be? Missing him, for sure. It was close the time to go home. Hvitserk could almost feel their warm embrace around his body.
Iliana, on the other hand, was mourning the closer departure: the day had come for them to go and she couldn't really hide the concerns into her eyes. Hvitserk observed how she had become closer to his brother the last days before their departure, trying to enjoy each and every second of Ivar's presence by her side before they were standing on those docks, preparing to leave.
The tight embrace she involved his brother with caused Hvitserk's heart to clench into his chest. He wanted to kill that man so many times, for so many reasons; and maybe there was the reason why the gods never allowed him to fulfill his desires and lay his little brother cold on earth: there was true love inside that woman's black eyes; real concerns upon his brother's safe return. And he couldn't deny Ivar's eyes were full of the same trust and love towards her that he could see towards him into her eyes now full of tears as his steps were bringing Ivar closer to the boat. She had changed him. If only Ubbe could see it with his own eyes...
