The church door slowly swung inward. Her father's hand was on the wood, his fingers pale against the dark oak, she realized, and maybe for the first time ever.
He was using all his strength to push it, as though moving slowly enough might somehow change what was about to happen. His shoulders were rigid under his clothes, each breath visible as the fabric rose and fell against his chest.
Judith could see him breathing. Really see it. The way his chest expanded, the way his jaw clenched and unclenched. He was a king who had ruled for years, and in this moment he looked smaller than she had ever seen him.
The knife was pressed against her throat.
She had become very aware of the knife. Not in any abstract way, but in the way you become aware of your own skin when something is wrong with it. She could feel the edge of it, not the cutting part, but the precision.
The kind that meant if the man holding it made even the smallest adjustment, her blood would begin to flow.
Bjorn held it there with a calm hand. He was young—she could tell that much. Younger than her even.
His hand did not shake and it did not waver. It didn't seem like he was bothered by whatever he did, and was doing right now.
Judith's own hands were shaking. She could see them trembling at her sides, the small tremors running through her fingers like she was cold, though she was anything but cold. She wanted to clench her fists to stop the shaking, but she was terrified that any sudden movement would cause Bjorn's hand to slip. Or worse; that he might want it to slip.
She wanted to cry. She was sixteen years old, and she wanted to cry like a child, to sob until someone made this stop. But her throat was too tight. Her eyes stung and burned, but no tears came. Just a dry sensation that made her throat feel as though it was closing off.
Inside the church, her mother had fainted.
Her ladies-in-waiting had rushed to her, had loosened her gown and pressed cool cloths to her forehead. Judith had heard them calling for water, calling for the healer. She had heard her mother's attendants whispering prayers.
Her mother was still in there. Unconscious. Not present for any of this.
The thought made something twist inside Judith's chest.
Three more nobles lay dead on the consecrated ground of the church. She had known them. They didn't have the best relation with her father, she realized.
Her father had conceded. He had stepped back, lowered his eyes, and given the Northmen what they demanded. Because there was nothing else he could do. Not with a knife at his daughter's throat. Not with his son standing mere feet away with another blade pressed against a child's neck.
The princess had never been this close to death before. In her entire life, violence had been something distant, something that happened in stories told by old warriors, or on battlefields far from the city walls, or in the dark tales whispered by servants.
She had heard of death. She had mourned relatives she had never met who had fallen in distant wars. But she had never felt its actual presence before. She had never felt death waiting, patient and inevitable, just on the other side of a blade's edge.
Now she could feel it.
The group began to move forward through the doorway. Bjorn kept his hand steady as he guided her through. His grip on her shoulder was firm but not painful.
With enough pressure that she understood what was expected of her, but not so much that she had to be dragged.
As they emerged into daylight, the cold wind hit her face. It came down from the north, from where these men had sailed from. The wind smelled of salt and something else; something harsh and unfamiliar. It made her eyes water, and for a moment she thought perhaps she would finally cry, but it was just the wind.
She blinked, and the courtyard came into focus.
The walls of the city were lined with defenders. She could count them; archers with their bows held at ready, spearmen standing in rigid formation with their weapons held at precise angles, swordsmen with shields overlapping. Above the gates, she could see the royal banner snapping in that same cold wind.
Every single person on those walls was tense. She could see it in their eyes, which tracked the movement of Bjorn and Ragnar and the other Northmen outside the gate, she assumed.
She turned her head slightly and the knife followed the movement, maintaining its position against her throat.
Her brother was ahead and to the left.
He was only ten years old. He was small for his age, still had the soft features of a child, still had the gap between his front teeth where a new tooth was just beginning to come in. He was wearing his formal tunic, the one with the embroidered trim that their mother had ordered made for him last spring. It seemed wrong that he should be wearing such a fine thing while being held prisoner.
The man called Ragnar held him. One hand around the boy's shoulder and kept a knife visible at the Archbishop's throat, managing both captives easily.
Her brother's eyes were very wide. He was trying very hard not to cry. But the effort was visible, which meant it was failing. Tears were beginning to gather in his eyes, they did not fall yet, but were slowly gathering.
He had never done anything wrong. He had never harmed anyone. He spent his days studying his letters and his Latin, playing with wooden swords with the other boys of the court, learning the things a young prince was supposed to learn. The most frightening thing that had ever happened to him before this had probably been when he fell off his pony last summer.
Now a man with a knife was holding him, and her brother was learning what fear felt like in a way that would probably never leave him.
Judith's chest hurt when she looked at him.
They walked slowly toward the gates. Around them, the guards were beginning to move, positioning themselves, but none of them left their posts. They were waiting for an order. They were waiting to see what their king would do.
The Huskarls—the king's elite guard, the men who had sworn oaths to protect the royal family—were staring at her father. She could see them looking to him, their eyes searching his face, waiting for some signal, some command that would tell them what to do.
But her father wasn't looking at them. He kept his gaze fixed on the ground ahead of him as he walked, staring at nothing, staring at everything, staring at the weight of the choice he was being forced to make.
His face was completely blank, and angry. It was the face he wore in formal court, the face of the king— But Judith knew him well enough to see that he was not present in the same way he usually was. Something inside him had retreated somewhere else, somewhere safer.
He was humiliated. The realization hit her. Her father—who commanded armies, who made nobles kneel, who spoke and expected to be obeyed without question, who had the power to decide the fates of men—was walking through his own city with his hands essentially empty, unable to do anything but obey the men who held knives to his children's throats.
He was being forced to choose between his pride and his daughter's life. Between his honor and his son's safety.
And they all knew which choice he would make.
The guards knew it. The Huskarls knew it. The Northmen knew it. Even Judith knew it, and she hated that she knew it, because it meant she understood that her father loved her and her Brother more than he loved his kingdom.
They were approaching the gates now. The massive wooden doors that had stood closed and locked since the Northmen had arrived loomed in front of them. They were the boundary between the city and Silver Hair's men.
Her father stopped for just a moment. His left hand, which had been hanging at his side, came up and pressed against his chest, over his heart. She could see him gathering something—breath, or courage, or resignation. It was hard to tell which. His shoulders expanded as he took a deep breath. Then he lowered his hand and prepared to continue.
And Bjorn spoke, he must have been also watching.
"Don't do anything stupid that you will regret later." He spoke to him. "Tell your men to open the gate and to stand down. Do it, and do it now."
The king looked at the ground. The pause stretched out. Judith could count her own heartbeats in that silence. One. Two. Three. She could hear the blood rushing in her ears. Surely someone would do something. Surely the guards would rush forward. Surely her father would give an order to fight. Surely this could not be allowed to continue.
Then her father looked up. His eyes found Bjorn, and they were empty of any hope.
"Open the gate," he said. His voice was steady, but underneath it, she could hear what was being held back. Rage. Despair. The knowledge of his own powerlessness.
The Huskarls looked at each other. She watched confusion cross their faces, and then something worse. Disappointment. Anger. Shame.
Blood had been spilled inside the house of God. Their princess and their prince were being held hostage. The Archbishop—God's own representative on earth—had a knife at his throat, held by a heathen. And they were being ordered to stand down.
She could see the conflict on their faces. Some of them looked as though they wanted to speak, to argue, to refuse the order. But they didn't. They lowered their weapons. Slowly, reluctantly, like men accepting a defeat that would mark them for the rest of their lives.
One of the guards turned away, unable to watch anymore.
Her brother's eyes were filling with tears. They were streaming down his face now, his face going blotchy the way young children's faces do when they cry.
He was so small. He was so, so small. He had no experience with violence, no understanding of how to survive this kind of fear.
She could see the fear in him, but underneath that, she could see something else breaking—something fundamental in his mind that was being damaged by being forced to witness his own powerlessness, the powerlessness of everyone around him, the fact that the king himself could not save him.
"Father," her brother said. His voice was very small and very thin. It cracked on the word. He was looking directly at the king, searching his face for something. For reassurance, perhaps. For a sign that this was all going to be all right. For some indication that his father was still the powerful man he believed him to be.
Her father looked at his son. She could see him taking in the tears, the trembling shoulders, the way her brother's whole body was shaking. The small frame that suddenly looked even smaller in this moment, diminished and fragile. The king's jaw tightened.
"Don't worry," he said to his son. His voice was firmer now, and there was something underneath it, not quite hope, but determination. "I promise you. I will come get you. Both of you."
He turned to look at her. His eyes met hers for the first time since the knife had appeared at her throat. She could see the weight of that gaze, could see how much it cost him to look at her with the knowledge of what he was being forced to allow to happen.
"I promise you as well, Judith," he said. He used her name. He never used her name in public like this, only daughter. Always daughter. "I will bring you home."
Then he turned back to Bjorn. His voice became harder, more dangerous, and for a moment she saw the man her father was underneath the humiliation.
"I don't want even a single harm to come to any of them," he said. "Not a single mark. Otherwise, I will hunt your people to the ends of the world. Every last one of you. Oath or no oath. God will forgive me for it."
There was silence. Even the wind seemed to have stopped blowing.
Bjorn smiled slightly. She could see he was impressed by one delivered with such absolute certainty.
"We made a deal, king," Bjorn said. "When we make an oath, we keep it. Not just you Christians. We know what it means to swear an oath." He paused, and the smile widened slightly. "Your daughter and your son will be returned to you. When ransom is paid. Not before. Not after. When ransom is paid."
Her father's lip curled. She could see him wanting to respond, wanting to mock these men and their oaths, wanting to tell them exactly what he thought of their promises. But he held it back. Instead, he simply grimaced and turned away, unable to bear looking at Bjorn for another moment.
"Leave," he said. His voice was very quiet.
Bjorn moved. He kept one hand on her shoulder as he pulled her along, guiding her backward. His grip was firm and controlling. Ragnar did the same with her brother and the Archbishop, keeping both of them close, moving them away from the gate with their backs gradually being exposed to the defenders on the walls.
Judith's heart was pounding so hard she thought it might break through her ribs.
She could feel her father's eyes on her back as she walked away from him.
The thought was almost unbearable.
As the group drew closer to the waiting formation of northern warriors, the atmosphere shifted. She could feel it, could feel the attention of two hundred men turning toward them. The men began to move, shifting their stance, adjusting their shields. They straightened, preparing themselves. Their eyes sharpened.
Then, all at once, a roar erupted from them.
It wasn't a war cry exactly; though it was that too.
The sound of triumph and victory and dominance.
It was the sound of men who had won, who had taken what they wanted, who stood on the edge of getting everything they had come for. Their shields were struck with axes, with spears, with the flats of swords. The sound was deafening.
Her breath caught in her throat. Beside her, she could hear her brother making a small sound, a whimper that was almost entirely swallowed by the roar.
And then she realized they were looking at her.
All of them. They were all looking directly at her. Not at Ragnar, not at the Archbishop. Not at Bjorn, and not at her brother.
At her.
Their eyes tracked her movement with an intensity that scared her. Some were grinning, their mouths open wide, showing their teeth. Some had their eyes narrowed with interest. A few were staring at her, deciding what they think about what they see.
She felt exposed. She felt as though every piece of cloth, every barrier between her and the world, had been stripped away and she was standing before them with nothing but her own skin.
The looks on their faces were not gentle. They were not kind.
One of the men near her laughed. The sound was like gravel. He said something in his own language, and several of the others laughed with him.
The tone was different from the others. The tone suggested something private, something meant to be funny in a way that involved her, but not in any way she wanted to be involved in.
She couldn't understand the words. She didn't need to understand the words.
The meaning was clear in the way they were looking at her. Clear in the way some of them were elbowing each other. Clear in the way their eyes kept moving down her body and then back up to her face.
She was sixteen years old, and she suddenly understood, that being held by a knife to her throat was perhaps not the worst thing that could happen to her.
-x-X-x-
Bjorn sat on the beach with his back against a piece of driftwood, watching the sea. The tension that had been coiled inside his chest was finally beginning to ease now that he was back with his men.
Out here, away from the walls of Eoforwic, away from the enclosed space of the city and the knowledge of so many guards watching their every movement, he could breathe properly.
The mental side of this—the waiting, the negotiation, the precision required to take hostages without harming them while keeping them compliant—was harder than he had anticipated.
He finally looked down at his hands where his sword lay now. The blade felt like an extension of his own arm. He had left it here when they had gone into the city.
Without it at his side, he felt incomplete, off-balance, as though he were only half of himself.
The group had returned to the mouth of the river when the sun was at it's highest point.
The sea stretched out before them.
They would wait here for King Aella to bring what he had demanded, and that meant coming here, to the shore, where they controlled the territory.
Bjorn went and sat with Ragnar and Rollo, and the rest of his men. They were already talking, gathered in a loose circle, discussing strategies and possibilities. Their voices were low but animated.
When they saw him approaching, Rollo talked first.
"Are you sure their king cares enough for all of them?" Rollo asked. There was something like skepticism in his voice. "The hostages. Do you truly believe he will ransom them back all?"
Bjorn settled himself into the sand. "If he didn't care enough, we wouldn't have stepped outside the wall alive," he said. It was a simple truth. "We would have been killed the moment we tried to leave. The fact that we are here, that is proof enough that he cares. Perhaps he doesn't care about the bishop, or maybe he doesn't care about his children. But he surely cares about his Kingdom not being attacked by us."
He turned his attention to the scouts. "Arne. Thorstein. Are the scouts in their places?"
Both men nodded immediately.
"That's good," Bjorn said. It was important to have early warning if King Aella decided to try something foolish. Though he doubted the man would. He didn't think he will have the courage for immediate revenge. He had anger, but anger was not the same as strength.
The men kept talking about the possibilities of what might happen. What if the king decided not to pay? What if he tried to attack them at sea? What if he called on neighboring kings to help him? What if, what if, what if. The speculation went on and on.
Bjorn found it boring. All of it. The endless talk about things that might or might not happen was a waste of time.
He stood up, and went to talk with the hostages.
His men had established a loose camp on the beach; fires for cooking, guards positioned around the perimeter. The ships, their hulls dark and sturdy, were rocking slightly in the shallow water. The hostages were on one of the ships, under heavy guard.
As he approached, he could see them sitting on the deck. Judith was holding her brother close to her, his small body curled against her side.
The Archbishop was sitting a short distance away, his lips moving in what appeared to be continuous prayer. His hands were folded in his lap, and his eyes were closed. He was a man dealing with his fear and trauma through the only means available to him; by speaking to his God.
All guarded by Bjorn's huskarls.
He had thought carefully about this. He knew that Judith was an attractive young woman. He knew that his men were warriors, that some of them might be thinking thoughts that could compromise his negotiations with King Aella.
If he allowed anything to happen to the princess, if he broke his word, then no king in England would ever negotiate with him again. His reputation would be destroyed. He would find it very difficult to conduct any future negotiations. His word would become worthless.
So he had given explicit instructions to his huskarls. These hostages were to be treated with respect. Nothing was to happen to them. The princess especially was to be left alone. It was not kindness that motivated this decision, but necessity. A promise made was a promise that had to be kept, and Don Bjorn was a great young man.
He boarded the ship where the hostages were being kept. The deck was open, covered with supplies and equipment. The princess and her brother were in a sheltered area near the bow, and he walked toward them and sat down on his heels in front of Judith, so that his eyes were level with hers.
She looked at him. Her face was pale, exhausted, but her eyes were defiant. There was fear there too, he could see it, but she was trying to hide it. She was trying to project strength and courage and resistance.
She was failing, but the effort itself was admirable.
Bjorn made a big smile. He wanted to seem approachable, non-threatening. He wanted her to think that cooperation was in her best interest. "I hope you find our ships comfortable," he said. "This is the best treatment I can offer to a princess, unfortunately. I wish we could have provided better, but circumstances are what they are."
She didn't answer. She simply kept looking at him with that defiant expression, and at the same time, her body shifted slightly, positioning itself more firmly between him and her brother. She was trying to shield the boy, to protect him with her own body if it came to that.
Bjorn noticed this. The way her brother clung to her. The fact that even in her fear, she was trying to be brave for him.
His eyes down while his thoughts wandered to his brother that he no longer remembered neither his face nor his name. He immediately shacked the sadness away.
"Now we are going to play a game," Bjorn said. His tone was almost friendly, but there was an edge underneath it. "I am going to ask you questions, and you are going to answer them. If you don't answer, or if you lie to me, I will know. And when I know that you have lied, then you and your brother will..." He paused for a second thinking of a small punishment. "not eat anything until your father comes and saves you. If he comes, of course."
He paused, letting that sink in.
Judith's face went even paler. "He will come," she said. Her voice was hoarse, as though she hadn't spoken much in the past few hours. "My father will come."
"I really hope so," Bjorn said. "For your sake. Now, tell me about the neighboring kingdoms to Northumbria. As the princess, I believe you know about these matters. Am I wrong?"
She shook her head. She took a breath, and then she started speaking. "In the north, there is the Kingdom of Wessex—"
Bjorn started laughing. It was genuine laughter, not unkind. "I really thought you will be smarter than this." he said, clear disappointment on his face. "Do you think I would enter Eoforwic, do you think I would sail across an entire sea, without prior knowledge of all the kingdoms in this land? I know about your uncle. I know about your other uncle; the one who is currently on the run, hiding somewhere in East Anglia like a coward. I know about your family's alliances and conflicts. And most importantly, I know that Wessex is not in the north. No food for you or your brother it seems."
He stopped his laugh and looked at her coldly. His expression changed, became harder. "Now, I did say I won't harm you. I gave your father my word. But 'harm' is a very vague word, wouldn't you agree?"
He let that threat hang in the air between them for a moment.
"Now," he continued, "let me ask again. Where is the Kingdom of Wessex?"
Bjorn could see the color draining from her face. He could see her processing the threat, understanding what it meant. Her hands, which had been steady enough before, began to tremble.
Then she started answering. The questions came pouring out of her—about Wessex and King Ecbert, about Mercia and its internal conflicts, about East Anglia and its politics, about the relationships between the various kingdoms and how they related to each other. She spoke for hours, answering question after question, providing him with information about the political situation in England.
He asked her about Charlemagne and his descendants. He asked her about who ruled what in the Frankish Empire. He asked her about trade routes and alliances and which kingdoms might be potential allies or enemies to various powers.
She only knew what he already knew—just the names of the rulers and basic facts that any person in her position would know—but that was enough. It was useful information, and more than that, it was the information of someone who was being cooperative.
The sun was setting by the time they finished talking. The sky had turned orange and pink, and the light was beginning to fade. Judith looked exhausted. Her voice had become hoarse from speaking so much. Her brother had fallen asleep, his head resting against her shoulder.
The Archbishop continued to pray.
They entered into a long silence, Bjorn thinking and Judith looking at him waiting for him to ask his questions. But none came for a long moment, so she gathered her courage and asked her own. "Why are you attacking us? What have we done to you?"
Bjorn looks up briefly. "You pray don't you?"
"...What?" She was confused.
"When your bells ring and when your people kneel, you pray. Why?"
She answered with conviction. "Because we seek God's mercy. We ask for peace and for forgiveness."
"And do you always receive it?"
"That isn't for us to decide. What matters is that we have faith."
Bjorn nodded. "Faith it is." He added. "You ask with words. We on the other hand, we ask with arms. The difference is only in the way we ask."
She looked at him, clear rage in her face. "You call that asking? You think killing the innocent and the weak is the same as praying?"
Bjorn quietly answers this time. "In the end they are both done for the same reason. You pray because you want something; safety, favor, hope. We raid because we want something too, ressources and a future for our people. It is the same hunger, only carried by different hands."
"That's not the same. One seeks to give, the other to take." Judith asked, clearly shaken.
"And yet both hope to fill an empty place." He paused, then continued. "Tell me, Princess, when you pray, do you not wish for more than you have?"
Judith says nothing this time.
"We act because the world gives nothing freely. You kneel and ask your God to give you what you desire. I take up my sword and ask the world the same. The only difference is that the world is forced to listen to me."
Bjorn stood up, preparing to leave, when one of his men shouted from the perimeter of the camp.
"Ships incoming!"
Bjorn's head came up sharply. Ships? He raised his brows, considering. Ships from where? From which direction?
His men were already gathering and getting into formation on the sand. They were moving quickly, efficiently, picking up weapons and positioning themselves so they could see the approaching vessels and respond to whatever threat was coming.
The ships were coming from the sea, not from the river. That was significant. King Aella didn't have ships, the English didn't have a strong naval tradition. Their warfare was based on fighting on land.
They didn't have the culture of sea warfare that the Vikings had developed over centuries. That was why they couldn't defend themselves against a naval attack. That was why a relatively small force of Viking warriors could make a King of a kingdom powerless.
So if ships were coming from the sea, they were not coming from King Aella.
Bjorn simply waited, watching the horizon. The men around him were alert, ready for combat or talk, depending on what approached. All weapons were held at ready.
As the ships drew closer, drawing within a certain distance, Bjorn could see the prow of the lead vessel. He could see the carved dragon head that rose from the bow; the distinctive Viking ship design, the sign that these were northern warriors, not English defenders.
Bjorn recognized the design immediately. It was another Viking. Another raider.
'Four ships.' He counted.
Behind him, on the ship where the hostages were being held, Judith had gone rigid. She had heard the shout. She understood what it meant. More warriors. More complications.
Her hand tightened on her brother's shoulder, pulling him closer even though he was asleep, seeking what comfort there was to be found in holding onto the only family she had left.
Bjorn's eyes followed the ship's sail as it drew nearer. He knew that sigil. A slow smile formed; this would be interesting.