CHAPTER 44

They lingered by the firefalls for almost an hour, not quite believing the sight they had stumbled upon. Thyra mumbled something incoherent, her hand wrapped around the pendant at her throat. It was a desperate, scared sound that made the hair on the back of Merida's neck stand to attention, but she paid no mind to it. These were her lands. Merida did not fear them.

Ysra and Sif stood at a distance from the shore of the pool that gathered at the bottom of the waterfall, eyeing the sky and the line of the woods, turning at any brush of a tree or scattering of a bird.

Merida sat by the water's edge beside Thyra. Even with her hand fully submerged, the red ran thick enough that she couldn't see her fingers through it. It was almost like blood. The comparison made Merida feel sick to the stomach. A waterfall stained red, the Seer has said, and here the firefalls flowed a grateful crimson, the gush of water so strong that she could feel the earth's anger as if the spirits around her were screaming.

So literal the Seer's words were. So literal that she began to wonder about the other truths he had given her. A band of knots, a bear's fur, matted with blood and an orange city.

"It does you no good to think of the Seer's words now," Ysra said, speaking in Merida's native tongue.

Hearing the familiar words soothed her, despite their meanings. Sif eyed the two warily, shaking her head, but soon sunk to her knees, coaxing Thyra from the water, pulling black the blood-soaked white of her dress. Merida wanted to ask Ysra how she'd known of her worries- if she could read the thoughts straight from her head. But it was obvious, written clearly on her face, and Ysra had heard all about the prophecy the moment they'd stumbled upon the red of the falls.

"You won't know their meaning until it comes to pass," Ysra said, changing to Kattegat's language, to the pleasure of Sif, who nodded thankfully.

"And why must that be the way it goes? Why can't I know it?"

"It is their way," Ysra said, even though it might've been her way now too.

"Why?" Merida insisted.

"The Gods do not believe we can withstand too much reality," Sif said instead, standing and leaving Thyra to her muttering.

Merida said nothing more. Who was she to know the will of Gods, no less the ones she had learned of only recently in her life?

"Death haunts the air," Thyra croaked out suddenly, standing with her arms stretched out, feet splashing in the water. "I can sense it."

"What is she talking about?"

The Sif began to laugh. It was a deep, bellowing sort of laugh that might've sounded more natural coming from the lips of a man. The sound unsettled Merida, making her shoulders square defensively as Sif finally calmed.

"You don't know," the woman stated. "You really don't know."

It seemed she would get no answer as to what it was she hadn't been told. Sif started forward, Thyra trailing behind her. It was only Ysra who waited, watching her with dark, careful eyes.

"Lead the way."

Merida assumed leader, snaking through the trees. The air was cool against the few patches of skin that were exposed. Her hair had grown longer since she had last stepped foot in her homeland. It was thick, laced into tight braids down the back of her head, as Lagertha sometimes did. She tugged on the platt, feeling the pull of her hair. Her mother would hate it. Before she could pull them out, Thyra's muttering took her attention again.

Beside her, Sif was tense, her shoulders unfurling, hand grabbing the hilt on her belt. Merida continued forward until she was in line with the edge of the trees, ducking low enough beneath the blooming branches until she could see the castle.

"This is wrong," she seethed between gritted teeth.

The walls were lined with men in red- the same red as the firefalls.

"What is it?" Ysra said, coming up beside her, gazing up at the large, stone walls with round eyes.

"Those are not my father's men."

Only then did the true realisation of what that meant sink in. Wessex men had taken the castle. Her family...

"We wait until dark, then we can scale the wall," she said, resolve strengthening her words.

They did not question her, as Merida might've wanted them to. She was left hoping that her plan was good enough, that once she was inside and she knew the full scope of the invasion, she would still be able to find her family, still be able to take her home back.

This darkness was as black and suffocating as thick oil. Their movements towards the east wall reminded her of the invasion of Paris, of Lagertha and her Shieldmaidens' attempt at scaling the watchtower. The outcome of that past battle did not inspire her now. Merida moved first, letting the three women follow at their pace and wariness. The east wall looked toward the sea, just as her bedroom once did. She hoped that the living quarters would hold less surveillance than the rest of the Keep. It would take many men to hold the castle at full strength. More men than Ecbert could afford to send.

The usual fire that illuminated the tower from above was quenched, and in its place a hollow blackness that stared like a gaping mouth. Merida aimed for its lip, letting her arrow embed in the wall below their target, a thin piece of rope connecting the window to her hand. She claimed first, scaling the wall in the opposite way she used to escape her room when she'd been younger and more immature. It had been easier slipping down the rock face and into the woods as it was reaching up and over. Her body lay flat against the rock, pausing each time a noise grew too loud and continuing when it grew quieter again.

When she reached the ledge, she paused again, leaving a gap less the arrow snap under too much pressure. Yet again she was moving without thinking, pushing herself up in a mock jump, catching the window smoothly, the rope latching between her legs.

In the room, only darkness stared back at her. It was almost stifling, how silent it was, how obviously untouched. The air reeked of dust and as she moved her way through the room, her hands came back grey and powdered. She didn't dare light a candle.

Merida held the rope as the others climbed up, Thyra first, then Ysra, and Sif. They didn't speak as they spread through the room, disrupting the dust, reaching the door. Carefully, the four descended the stairs, creeping down until the alcove bled into a dark, deserted corridor.

"Stay here."

Ysra gripped her wrist. "But Merida-"

"Stay here."

Merida crept out into the hallway, back flat against the wall, face shielded from the light of flickering candles. The noise of the hall grew louder, the sound foreign and cold. It felt wrong to stalk the halls in such a way, lingering as if a ghost. This was her home, hers. As she reached the end, she hung on the corner, gazing down at the scene below.

Wessex men drank at her tables and laughed under her roof, dining on her food. Upon the large throne at the centre of the room, a man cloaked in red lounged with a golden cup in his hand, her mother's circlet lying slanted on his head. Merida seethed with anger. She felt red hot until suddenly she didn't... Her body shook wrought with ice.

In the centre of the room, encased in a wooden box, lay a pile of furs. In the centre, the same emerald jewel that decorated her mothers glimmered in the middle. And beneath it, all, lay her father, face as white as a ghost.

Merida stumbled back into the darkness of the hallway, falling into the stairwell, arms being caught by Ysra. Thyra mumbled something and then she was being dragged upwards, back to the black of her childhood room. She fell upon the floor, head finding someone's shoulder. Her teeth bit into the skin of her hand and Merida sobbed. Sobbed for a loss she had never felt before.

Just this once, I want our destiny to be true. She had said that, had wished it with each inch of her being. She wished she could take it back. This was her destiny- a bloody fate that saw the Bear King dead, her own father murdered beneath the roof of his own home, and the waters of her Kingdom running red with treachery.

~

The wind was as sharp as a knife against his face, the cold like icicles painting his skin. Bjorn crouched against the thick bed of snow, gazing out upon the planes of white, waiting. Waiting for the beast that taunted him.

It reached its large head, standing on hind legs, paws scratching the air in some sort of ritual meant to scare him. Bjorn knashed his teeth like a snarling wolf, waiting. Waiting for the bear to advance.

But still, the bear growled and stomped, and Bjorn grew impatient. With the thick dagger in his hands, he dashed forward, feet falling through the powdery snow, laboured by the freshness. He was too slow. With paws the size of a man's head and claws the size of small knives, the bear fell upon four feet, slashing Bjorn's front as he did so.

Bjorn fell back against the ice with a shout, crawling from the animal that stalked him. He still held the dagger in one hand, the small battleaxe in the other, but now they felt heavy. Crawling, crawling, crawling, and suddenly the bear was upon him again, looming above him, mouth gaping over. As the bear fell upon him, Bjorn drew his long dagger upwards again and again and again until it fell back, rearing for a second attack.

Red splatters stained the powdered snow. The bear snarled at him, eyes a deep, dangerous black. With the dagger planted in the bear's stomach, Bjorn slipped the axe in his hands once, twice, and swung it over his shoulder, landing the blade firmly in the animal's head.

Bjorn screamed almost as loudly as the bear did.

His face felt hot despite the bitterness of the wind. The animal fell down upon the ice, blood pooling from its head, snaking a river to pool at Bjorn's feet. He ripped the axe from the creature's body and threw it to the floor and once again there was silence, his shout disappearing in the vastness of the icy planes.

He placed his hand against the animal's snout and closed his eyes. He had already given Merida a carving of a bear and he wished to place his ring around her neck too soon. Bjorn opened his eyes and turned from the animal. He would give this to her father. A bear's fur matted with blood.

note on historical inaccuracy-

at this time, Wessex wouldn't have had a uniform or colour as such, but for the purpose of writing fiction, they do in this book :)