Chapter Text
There was an endless field and scarlet brightness in Thorfinn's chest. It bloomed as steel dug into his lung and gushed as the sharp edge of the guard's sword scraped from his flesh. Stop. Canute ordered. Don't kill him. But, too late. Or too soon. The clumsy retainer had acted hastily, and, to Thorfinn's immediate disadvantage, he'd inadvertently disobeyed his King's order.
How Thorfinn had let him was the bigger issue, really. But the deed was done. The King shouted. Thunder crashed, and his steps fell like heavy rain on the floorboards. The Prince— no King's— voice held little resemblance to the whisper Thorfinn met, not long ago, in that burning forest. Good. Though Canute's steady command made the warrior's hands itch, this Canute made more sense than that whelk ever had; Thorfinn could hate this Canute. He hated him. Hated him. His enemy.
The King deserved to die for taking his revenge (for killing Askeladd?). This Canute deserved to die.
Who deserved to die?
In Thorfinn's eyes, the world disintegrated. An old woman, a broken wooden comb, and a burning house filled his vision instead. Why could Thorfinn taste ash mixed with the blood in his mouth? Why ash?
What was he forgetting?
The other boy, the King, stepped towards him, speaking in circles Thorfinn couldn't even begin to understand in his gnarled state. But, it did bring him back to the present from his brief lapse into blood-letted insanity. Wetly, Thorfinn snarled like a dog, upper lip curled. When the King stopped before him, though the warrior could barely print his tongue around the words, rage and blood staining his view, he still cursed him, burning metal and salt mixing in his mouth to lash out at the King.
Canute's eyes were heavy but dry. Thorfinn had the insane thought that he should be weeping. Canute's bloody cheek gave Thorfinn no satisfaction. The red dripped down like ooze. There was demise in it, squelching into the wood, falling as the king before him one day would. Like all the others before him and after. The Karlsefni wouldn't be around to see it, though.
This was the last Thorfinn would see of Canute.
A guard grabbed at Thorfinn's arm, the good one, dragging him. The boy kicked out, his leg connected with the guard's side, and the guard dropped Thorfinn. His body slumped back to the floor with a thud, face to face with Askeladd's. The man's icy blue eyes were dull now, and something sharp and final nestled in Thorfinn's throat. Askeladd's last words rang against the walls. Go beyond? He'd never even glimpsed an inch into his father's world. And who's fault was that? What honor did Askeladd find at the sword point of a meaningless whelk that he couldn't find at the end of Thorfinn's blade? Get up. Thorfinn said to his enemy. Get up and fight.
Or maybe he said nothing at all. Thorfinn was still; Askeladd stiller.
Perhaps dying now was actually a blessing— he didn't need to dwell on Askeladd's words or what he would do after his death. There was no after.
Leif's too-wrinkled face stabbed in his mind, the only face sharp and old against the blurry blonde heads and thick, dark brows which swirled like smoke exhaling from burning wood in a home he couldn't remember.
There was no before either, not really. Not for Thorfinn.
And now, the Troll's heir's last bit of reason and satisfaction was unreachable too, the Father killer dead beside him, blood mixing with the wood flooring. Meaningless.
He felt nothing. Everything. Then nothing again. Bitter. Blank. Empty.
That was the worst part, staring into the monster's peaceful, quieted expression. It wasn't Thorfinn's rage at his failure which was still ripping through in aborted, fading pulses, but it was the growing pit of emptiness reaching further and further into his stomach at the loss that pained him. His injury wasn't the only reason for his labored breath, not at all.
A guard pulled at his arm again and this time Thorfinn did not protest. He was stuffed in a straw filled room, but no doctor tended his wounds. Not even the magnanimous Canute could extend his mercy that far, not for an obviously dying traitor, even if that traitor never held any loyalties at all. He couldn't bring himself to hope to meet his revenge in the Hall, not in the indignity of straw, his adversary dead at the steel of another.
There in that cell, the world began to grey, pressure growing until Thorfinn couldn't muster any breathing at all. A ray of light filtered down, prickling his skin as it journeyed from a barred window, the last and only mercy bestowed upon the boy; the pity creating pities snuffed at last. Thorfinn closed his eyes. A golden field and rolling winds as far as the eye could see met him, scented with ash and blood.
—
He wandered that field, alone, with no aim nor understanding, until the sky cracked above. Pieces fell around him and the earth split. He fell into the pit, which swallowed him for so long that he closed his eyes and forgot he was falling...
A chittering noise surrounded him, and stale, damp air tickled his nose, pinpricks kissing his fingers. There was rock below him. He maintained his steady breathing, no matter his shock at his ability to actually breathe. Something primal screamed at him in his stomach. Run. It was no use. The noises clicked to a stop. A large presence looming directly above him, waiting, craggy rock cool and solid below.
Instinctually, his fingers curled around the hilt of his father's knife, and Thorfinn only had a moment to internalize the dissonant fact that he still had it before he opened his eyes to meet whatever fate would come and…
Oh.
A many legged monster with a painted face crawled above him in the dark and damp cave. Thorfinn met it with a blank expression, too shocked at the impossibility staring him down in all its distant amusement to feel what certainly should have been terror bubbling up in his gut. He aborted his presumed attack, though, instead hopping up, back, and settling into a defensive pose. He faltered at the surprising lack of pain in his body, looking down to find an unmarred chest and unbroken arm.
Right, then.
Thorfinn was dead.
Instead of dread, something old tilted in his heart. It couldn't be called hope.
It wasn't as uncomfortable as he'd been expecting from what the drunkard priest had described one cold afternoon. There was no fire nor ice, no torture racks or screaming or bodies. Just the hard ground, a cave, and a circling creature which was just bulky and intimidating enough to keep Thorfinn from immediately bolting. Perhaps soon, he'd be devoured. His eyes drifted over the scenery, a damp, jagged cave, the monster's body curled around it. When Thorfinn looked back, he was met with a new face directly in front of his own. Thorfinn clamped down on his surprise, intent on concealing any weakness to the creature. Its deep voice boomed, the words echoing but not quite connecting, foreign and strange in a way that Thorfinn couldn't pin down to any region he'd ever known in his short lifetime. The creature stopped then, staring intently at Thorfinn with the face of an old man.
Suddenly, something in his brain hissed, clicked. A sharp pain pierced his ear for a moment; he brought a hand to his temple…
"I see you're a traveler," it said, intelligible now but still undeniably alien. "Pardon. It's been several centuries since I've had the pleasure of wearing one of your kind's faces. I am called Koh. Tell me stranger, who are you?"
Thorfinn said nothing. Instead, he took a small and deliberate step back. The creature did not follow.
"Curious, you seem so intent on maintaining your guise… I wonder who gave you that advice…"
Thorfin's heel dug into the rock.
It suddenly stopped moving, then jerked, closing the space between them. Its face shifted into that of a woman, then a beast, then an old man.
"Do you seek power… or vengeance, boy?"
Vengeance?
"Tell me, are you not afraid?" It hissed.
Thorfinn couldn't help the quick movement that came in response, body perceiving the threat for what it was, shifting easily into battle mode. His knife arced directly into the monster's temple. Or, the space where his temple once was. The metal connected only with air as Thorfinn spun a leg up, dashing backwards several paces and not stopping.
"Quite quick, little one. But that won't work against me."
The creature's haughty voice laughed from the ceiling where it had fled, carapace scraping the rock, but its words were already fading at Thorfinn's back. Would the beast follow?
"Do you not seek… The answer…"
Thorfinn was not about to lose himself to the machinations of the creature. Even the beastly boy knew a devil when he saw one. He tuned out the words at his back. Though he wasn't above making deals, his desire was one which could only be realized on his own.
"How insolent." He caught the words halfway up the mouth of the cave. Thorfinn continued his flight, the creature's disappointment clicking behind him. It didn't follow, to his relief. He was hopeful it simply couldn't, not that there might be worse encounters above ground that were keeping it submerged. The latter was likelier. Thorfinn's luck had always been shit.
Whatever.
He had just the one thought on his mind, the reignited thought, the only one he'd had that mattered for as long as he could remember. It fueled his steps, like flight across a battlefield. He'd chosen it over home; he'd chosen it over mercy. He could fight through a few monsters for it. Or flee them. While hell wasn't ideal circumstances, those had never been ideal for him. If it was all he had left, he'd clutch to the silver thread dangled into the pit and beg it to guide him lower.
If this was hell, then Askeladd was bound to be here too.
Steady be his knife and swift be his feet.