The clanging of the bell rang harshly in their ears, a discordant cry that filled with panic as the shrill noise echoed further out into the fields.
Asvoria gritted her teeth. "Damn it," she muttered, tightening her grip around the axe's haft.
Though the farmer had lost his life, he had been brave - and in death, had achieved his only goal. The farmer might never see the fruits of his final act, but others may have a chance to run or fight back which they owed to him.
Passing the village bell, Svea nearly reached for it. She wished to confirm what her eyes already told her: it had been cast from a poor man's metal, cracked and thinning from years of wear. The wooden frame that held it splintered with every toll; had she not known better, Svea might have believed the rain itself had conspired to break it.
Farms dotted the edge of the village, amongst them stood a modest blacksmith's house.
Children screamed while the men scrambled for tools or half-sharpened blades, anything they could find to defend their homes, their families.
"Shield Wall!" Asvoria shouted.
Two lines formed, each with warriors locking shields to build their wall. Asvoria's stormy eyes peered between the narrow gaps, the shadows of the shields striping her face - like clouds daring to cage the sun.
She braced her stance as the villagers charged, their makeshift weapons clanging uselessly against seasoned wood. Only a handful of lucky strikes managed to splinter the planks at all.
There aren't enough of us to separate archers; they're trapped within the wall with the rest of us. Svea's thoughts raced behind her own line.
These people. . . they're not warriors. Are these truly the same ones who killed our friends?
"Forward!" commanded Asvoria, driving the word through as she followed it. Her wall advanced with her, shields pressed tight, each footstep mirrored by the next.
Traditionally, the Shield Wall would have been used as they gathered information on their opponents. Now, however, they believed they were dealing with enemies who had killed a group that had been far more prepared for battle than they were, larger in number too.
Behind them, one of the vikings caught sight of an oncoming plow. With a smirk, he thrust his arm through the gap, grabbing the wooden handle then yanking it forward.
The farmer who wielded it stumbled in shock, falling straight against the wall. In that instant, the Northmen surged through, axes and swords rising like the very tides that had brought them.
Gripping her shields until her hand began to lighten in color from the tight grip, Svea glanced through the shields as the ones in her group continued to wait on her orders.
We could herd the attackers between both shield walls, then attack them. It would be easy to take them all out this way. Or we could begin the assault on the village. . . see if there are any real warriors among them, perhaps even things worth taking. Could one of our own still be alive here as a prisoner?
"Well?" Dragmall grunted under the weight of a straggler who had attacked his shield. He kept his stance tight. One of their men behind the wall jumped over him, shoving an axe down into the skull of the assailant.
Svea checked Asvoria's group, determining they were capable of holding their own.
"To the village!" she announced, separate from the wall to let the others run forward, then joining them.
She walked through the village despite the feverish running around her, taking in the impoverished state of their living conditions.
They didn't live differently from villages like her own. Something in that was comforting, but also worrisome.
At first glance, the only goods the village seemed to have in possession was livestock, but Svea looked over the grains and food she was unable to identify, intrigued. She moved her hand into a sack of what had been harvested, letting it slip from her palm like a stream returning to the bag.
Svea then hopped one of the fences, using her axe to dig in and unearth the soil, crouching down to run her hand over it, then picking the tuft up. Her husband had followed her.
"Their earth is different from ours."
"Their gods are newer," Svea shrugged. "Perhaps they haven't offended them yet."
Hurrying to stand in front of Svea protectively, Dragmall fixed his gaze on the farmhouse door as it swung open.
His axe lunged forward, burying deep into the chest of the man who had stayed behind to defend what little was his.
The body fell soundlessly.
Dragmall stepped over him to press his boot against the doorframe, keeping it open as he peered further inside. With a tilt of his head, he beckoned Svea to follow.
They entered cautiously.
The air was thick with the scent of smoke and grain. . . the remnants of ordinary life.
A cat darted from beneath the table, knocking over a cup as it fled deeper into the shadows.
"Freyja is with us for this raid," Dragmall prophesied from the cat, taking it as an omen. A small smile tugged at his mouth as he watched the feline vanish. Rifling through the house, his hand passed over things that had once been private.
Lingering by the hearth, Svea's eyes fell onto a pair of children's shoes abandoned on the floorboards. She frowned, looking to the bassinet beside the bed. "I don't think these people were warriors, Dragmall," she said quietly. "Perhaps this is the wrong village."
Her hand brushed the bedding, feeling the imprint of those who had slept there. Something firm resisted beneath her palm. It was a small book, tucked under the pillow as if hidden in haste.
She pulled it free then flipped through its pages that were filled with a foreign script and pressed flowers between the pages.
What was on the pages meant nothing to her, she couldn't even trade the cover which was softening from years of handling, but she slipped it into her sack of the same.
The floorboards creaked underfoot as she moved further into the house. In the corner stood a poor man's altar: uneven candles, a little wooden stand, and a hand-carved cross. Splintered and simple.
Svea wrapped her fingers around it, lifting it from the table.
She blew out the last flickering flames, the smoke curling up between her fingers. She traced the grain of wood until a splinter pricked her first finger. Around it, small offers had been placed: wilted flowers, a bowl of food, alongside a few prayer beads carefully laid out despite their poverty.
It's poorly made. . . but clearly important to them. She thought. Did it belong to someone they loved?
"Mōdor!"
The cry shattered the stillness.
Somehow, a cry for one's mother was universal.
Svea turned sharply, catching sight of a little girl tumbling out of what Svea could only tell was a very shallow room for storage, her small hands clutching at empty air.
Dragmall looked to them, his long brown locks following the motion as he watched Svea lunge forward, her hand rising instinctively to halt him. She pressed her fingers to her lips. "Shh," she warned softly, her voice creating a strange calm in the chaos.
Her green eyes shifted toward the woman still hiding - a mother clutching her baby tight against her chest, trembling. Svea kept one hand raised to hold Dragmall back, the other open in quiet instruction for the little girl to return to the closet.
Her gaze met the woman's, giving the mother the reassurance she had been searching for.
An understanding between women that children would not be harmed.
She glanced down once more at the infant, amazed it had slept through the noise as thought swaddled in divine ignorance. Svea hesitated, then reached for the closet door, easing it shut, sparing them from the sight of what would come next.
"Let's go," she said at last. "There is nothing more in this house."
Dragmall lingered, staring at the wooden door. "And if they come to burn the village?" he asked quietly.
Biting her lip, Svea kept to herself that she had already considered the same. She had seen it before - villages burned to ash, even their own people.
The memory of Dragmall's home still haunted her: his people, his soil, devoured by the same kind of greed which had now fallen into reach.
"We'll distract them with livestock," she decided. "They'll chase what they believe is theirs. Better they take the farmers than the people."
Stepping forward, she struck the farmhouse door with an axe she had found at the edge of the dwelling, leaving a deep notch in the wood. They'll know this place has been claimed. Nothing left of value here.
"Asvoria!" Eumelia shouted as the blonde stormed toward them, fury rising with every step.
"Enough!" Asvoria barked back, her chest heaving. "I lead here."
Eumelia's jaw tense, snapping in return. "Jarl Aeneas will want captives to question, to take as thralls."
"He doesn't speak their tongue!" Asvoria's voice broke into a growl. "This isn't about questions, it is about vengeance!"
The clash between them thickened the air. Asvoria's eyes burned as she closed the distance, her shadow swallowing Eumelia's thinner frame. She was narrow, less muscular, as an archer would be compared to an axe-wielder. "We need our people alive. We take what wealth we can, leave the rest."
Following with her sight, one of the raiders, who were happily tormenting villagers by chasing them as they cried during the attack, Eumelia continued, "You -" she straightened out but no one could mistake the hard swallow.
She had been empowered by Aeneas but was weak to herself, nothing else mattered. Her fingers curled into her palm.
"Leave him be," Asvoria commanded, leaving no room for argument. "Go. Collect the wealth you and your Jarl worries so much about."
Neither spoke after this. Instead, Eumelia stared at Asvoria to find the truth behind what she had said. She couldn't ignore the comment, no matter how quickly it had passed.
Your Jarl.
It ran through Svea's mind as well. She had separated from herself at that moment.
Was it usual for Asvoria? Was she simply that offended to have been sent on this raid?
Asvoria had always loved battle, she had abandoned Valkvann for glory as a Shield-Maiden.
The only way it made sense to Svea was that being sent on what could easily be construed as a suicide mission for Aenea's desire for wealth had crossed a line in her that others didn't know.
On the other hand, it could have been Aeneas sending along his watchdog.
In an attempt to diffuse the warring heads, the proxy leader of Valkvann stepped between the two. "This is a farming village," she pointed out, gesturing to the rich land that lay all around them. "The most valuable thing here is its land. There are no soldiers among them."
Refusing to take the disrespect to herself or to Aeneas, Eumelia offered what she thought to be reasonable. However, her frustration with Asvoria still guided her responses. The words dragged themselves out through her clenched teeth. "Then we'll claim the land in Aeneas's name."
Rolling her eyes, Asvoria gave in to the side of her that refused to be tamed. She couldn't keep biting her tongue - not for anyone. She had been sent on a mission intended to keep her from returning; now she would live as a woman with nothing left to lose. Aeneas had sent her to die - why else would he have sent her with unseasoned fighters, ones who had spent their lives as peaceful farmers with little if any battle experience, not to mention so few in number?
She gave a dry, humorless laugh. Hissing when she spoke, "Very well. . . where are the true warriors of this land?" She asked, continuing in towards Eumelia. "Who will hold it for him, fool? With what men? What good is dirt to the dead?" She asked as she pressed closer to her, pushing. "Burn it. Burn it all." Her voice gritted furiously through her teeth, like a rabid animal, as spit came forward with her response.
With his sights on the house he had taken part in ransacking, the tannest of the four spoke.
"We should leave it standing. . . for now. There are animals of value. There is a beautiful young goat just on that farm there -" Dragmall pointed.
He might not have had the pull necessary to speak with these women; it was true if anyone did it was Svea - especially with Asvoria. But, not being Svea, when it came to Eumelia and Asvoria, would be the best thing for the moment, a small favor of the gods even.
Asvoria grunted, leaning forward as some of her hair fell out from the style that had held it back. She ran her hand over her face, not caring that grime smeared onto it; she shook her head at how her orders fell on deaf ears.
With Dragmall's opening toward peace, Svea took her chance to nurture the seed her husband had planted.
"If we burn this place, we'll call attention. Let us take what is valuable and leave the village standing."
It wasn't a contest of egos; she wanted to spare the woman with young children she had permitted to remain hidden in their tiny room.
While the houses of the Northmen held no closets, only dressers, she had been intrigued by the style of buildings here. She had heard of "closets" before, but hadn't known they were meant to hide more than just clothes.
She hesitated, taking a step toward the blonde, placing her hand on her shoulder as the two locked eyes. Giving a small nod to encourage her to heed the advice, Svea waited until Asvoria returned a single nod, then turned her head and stepped away.
Raising the signaling horn hesitantly, Eumelia called for their people to focus on the ransacking. Pens were formed to bring the animals aboard or to tether them beneath the decks.
She had been outvoted between the two leaders, and even she was not foolish enough to challenge the will of the majority - farmers who would always prize a fine beast above gold.
The raids carried on with their preparations until, in their hunger for more, they strayed too far toward the coast.
Where the true enemy waited.
An arrow split the wind, striking one of the party clean through the back and out the chest. He dropped to his knees, the sand darkening beneath him.
"Too early!" snapped a man on a speckled horse, his armor glinting in the sun as he looked above them from the cliffs.
The Vikings turned as one to face the incoming host.
These are the soldiers, Svea recognized immediately. Adorned in gold and silver, blessed by the very land we've come to challenge.
Others took notice too.
"We can take them," Eumelia said, smirking. Even from afar, her blood stirred - the thrill of a proper fight rousing something fierce within her.
"If they leave here alive, we have failed," Asvoria replied. Her own smirk broke across her face, pushing one cheek upward as she grabbed her shield once more.
Smacking her axe against it, Svea crouched slightly. "Together!" She shouted, and the raiding party fell back into their preferred: the shield wall.
Narrow slits had once again been left between the shields, not as a flaw in the design, but so Asvoria and Svea could be their eyes. The two exchanged brief hand signals, hidden from enemy sight, permitting the wall to split into twin lines which were pressed close as one - ready to strike like jaws.
The man rode in cautiously, the weight of his horse shifting beneath his armored frame as the other riders followed in his wake. "We only wish to speak," he coaxed, his brow twitching at the silence that met him. "Do any amongst you speak the common tongue?"
His gaze swept across the wall of shields, trying to understand the shape of what he had faced.
Another soldier leaned toward him. "They are heathens, my lord. The common tongue is not among them. We learned that with the last group."
"All people release the same cry before death," the commander murmured, his voice curling with disdain. "Pain is the same language. Did we not learn this before as well?"
A few of his men stifled their laughter, memories flickering like sparks in their eyes. Had they already forgotten the faces of the comrades or civilians they had buried?
"So much talk and fear of the Northmen," the man continued, "and yet I find them disappointing. They do not fight as the tales claim. Perhaps we were simply warned too well."
Svea's brow furrowed. Warned?
Her thoughts caught on the word, turning over the question of who had betrayed their coming. How could anyone? Who knew how they fought?
Still the men prattled among themselves, unafraid, safe within the sound of their own speech.
"Do you think any of these savages are worth something alive?" One asked.
"Nay," another replied.
"I speak the common tongue," Svea announced, standing tall.
Her defenses held firm as she stepped ahead of the group, leaving the safety of the shield wall behind her.
For a fleeting moment, she wanted to smile at their shock but she knew better than to soften before men who already underestimated her. Better to be silent than risk bruising her own pride.
"As do I," Asvoria added, moving up beside her. The two stood shoulder to shoulder - neither expecting they'd need anyone else.
Men are curious creatures, too often, that curiosity is their own undoing. The women in their homes spoke with soft, lilting voices, like young songbirds that had never known the pleasure of flight. They spoke gently, when life allowed them such luxury.
But these women, clad in the garb of men, spoke with voices deeper and steadier.
Some might even say, alluring.
Their words carried the rough edges of their own tongue, yet to the soldiers' ears it was not harsh, but strange and fresh like hearing their mother's language, the very one that had cradled them since the day of their birth, reborn.
A few of the soldiers paled, shuffling where they stood. One lowered his head, shame shadowing his face.
"Thank you for translating," said the commander, recovering his composure. He looked over their group, searching. "Where is the man in charge, then?"
He pointed toward the largest of the Vikings behind the wall. "It's him, isn't it?" he mused aloud, almost with awe. Nay, that is a beast. That is a warrior. The thought alone thrilled him; the promise of a worthy fight on English soil quickened his blood.
Asvoria clicked her tongue. "No," she said simply. "You speak to us."
The commander blinked, then let out a sharp laugh, joined by the men behind him. "It cannot be," he said through his grin. "Women do not fight. Women do not lead."
Svea tilted her head. "Tell me," she began, her braid sliding over the leather that armored her chest, "does it truly matter whether it's a man or a woman who kills you - if it still means you're dead?"
Her voice was calm, almost curious herself. Her green eyes drifted over the soldiers, nothing that every face was male - and every one of them was afraid.
Asvoria scratched just above her ear, eyes locked on the commander.
She wants to attack, Svea thought.
Do I?
What is there truly to discuss between us?
The man swallowed, his earlier confidence faltering. The question had startled him so he chose to ignore it. "Our king wishes to meet with you," he said. "Won't you come with us? Peacefully?"
While he spoke calmly, it did not dissuade Svea's new found curiosity. She wanted to understand their customs: to know what their women did while their villages burned. She wondered at the differences in the soldiers' armor, the strange symbols stitched on their banners.
"Your king?" Asvoria's sandy brows furrowed. She stood near the edge of the cliff, the waves below snarling like beasts. "How has he heard of us?"
With a tone dripping in false civility, the commander quipped, "The last time your group invaded. . . we prepared in case you ever were to return, of course."
His dark eyes narrowed. Neither woman trusted the look sitting behind them. These eyes were not those of an observant man, but of one who demanded instant gratification, who lived on the misfortune of others.
This commander was the kind of man Valkvann had once shielded young girls from.
The same kind Svea had once killed.
And she would do it again.
"Won't you come with us?" he prodded, trying to maintain what he imagined was their favor.
Asvoria's nose wrinkled faintly, enough that Svea noticed, though not enough for the self-absorbed man before them to see.
"Did you offer that same courtesy to the last group?" she asked coldly. Her Her mind raced through memories of those who'd come here before her; none had been foolish, none particularly impulsive.
Defensively, the man straightened. Even he could feel the shift in the air now.
"We didn't know you would come last time," he said quickly. "None of them even spoke the common tongue."
Svea's eyes flickered toward Asvoria, her head tilting slightly. The unspoken message passed between them. A decision would be made here. . . and it would decide who lived and who did not.
One favored the thought of a hostage, to learn more. The other was ready to kill, to make an example and carve justice into the land that had taken their kin.
Either way, this army would not leave alive.
"What then, does your well-prepared king offer," Asvoria asked, "to make this so-called peace worth our time?"
Her voice was calm, almost curious, but her instincts hissed through the wind that carried the same thoughts as her,
Do not trust him.
Slit his throat where he stands.
The man dismounted, his boots sinking into the damp earth. He thought lowering himself might bridge the gulf between them.
"His word," he said simply.
To the Anglo-Saxons, the King's word meant something sacred.
To these women, it meant nothing.
"His word," he repeated, more forcefully now, as if they might suddenly comprehend its weight. "Which he gave on knee to the Bishop of our good church."
Asvoria laughed so heartily she snorted the way a pig would have.
Svea did not understand.
Bishop? What sort of confidence is that word supposed to inspire? Is a bishop a god? Why would a king bend the knee? Who rules them if not their king?
"Tell me," Asvoria said aloud, circling him now like a wolf, "is the rest of your country as poor as this village?"
In doing so, she separated herself from Svea, circling the outer edge of the group that had approached them. It gave her a better look at their faces. Her movement forced the soldiers to draw in tighter, as though proximity alone could keep her at bay.
These men were facing something they did not understand: women who stood as equals to the towering, savage Northmen behind them. More terrifying still was the fact that these two commanded them. That question alone haunted them: why would men follow them?
The commander swallowed hard, grinding his teeth. "You are visitors here," he said at last. "We've questions for you first."
A twitch at his hand, small but unmistakable, betrayed him. It was enough to make his men follow suit, each resting a hand upon the hilt of his sword.
Asvoria smirked, catching Svea's subtle step away from the shield wall. The two women moved like predators, closing in from either side. The prey had not yet realized what it was.
"Nay," Asvoria said softly, her tone mocking, repeating the very word that had revealed their true prowess of the common tongue. Her eyes gleamed beneath the shadow of her helm, "Invaders."