TW: Some more child murder, mentions of rape
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Wooyoung couldn't bear looking at the cruel scene unfolding in front of him. The three women drained the boy of his blood while he painfully died in their arms. The surrounding Vikings played their animal skin drums and hummed festive melodies that reverberated in Wooyoung's bone mark. By the time the sacrificial boy slumped to the ground, the women had filled all three bowls with his blood. They walked over to the crowd that greedily pushed toward their blood-stained fingers. Flicking them, the trio sprinkled the villagers with the blood of their sacrifice.

"Blessed may you be by Odin's grace," they sing-sang. Wooyoung's stomach lurched as he watched how the Vikings closed their eyes to let the blood rain onto their faces. He and the other three kids didn't get blessed. Their garments stayed pristine and white.

Wooyoung's sweaty palm held onto that of the little girl to his left. She glanced up at him from time to time with the chiding eyes of an adult that couldn't bear his childish antics. When their gazes met, he gulped. He squeezed her hand to offer some solace in a place where no amount of solace could ever be enough. Terrified out of his mind, he couldn't also soothe the children by his side.

"Don't be so nervous. You are the most important guest tonight. Our future is blurry, but you will get welcomed in Valhalla for sure," she whispered. Disbelieving, Wooyoung stared at her little rounded features and the golden hair cascading over her white dress. Were these children born and raised to become a sacrifice or did all Vikings consider death an honour? Wooyoung had thought that was reserved to dying in battles.

"What is different for me than for you?" Wooyoung whispered. His lips dried out in the cold air and his face was numb, but he didn't care. The pricks in his skin were a welcome distraction from what was to come.

"You will be the last sacrifice and they will bind you to the well." She pointed up ahead to where the warriors from earlier had fastened their ropes to the sides of the wooden frame by now. They dangled there, ready to get used.

"Then the five greatest warriors of our village will do something to you I don't quite understand. But you will be naked for it and scream a lot. Don't worry, the drummers will mask your shame. After that, they cut off your head and throw you into the well so Odin can grant us wisdom and prudence."

A lump formed in Wooyoung's throat to constrict his breathing. With wide-open eyes that stung in the cold, he eyed the well. It must have been full of skeletons that had collected there over the years.

"Us four will not get the same procedure because we are talismans. They hoist us on the trees to pray to our bodies." Again, the little girl pointed for him. She didn't pick up on his distress as she motioned at the body of the dead boy that was getting hanged in a nearby tree like the most gruesome Christmas decoration. Blood dripped from his feet to the ground.

Wooyoung desperately wanted it to stop. Wanted to see no more dead children, but they had already taken the next girl from in front of him and he hadn't even noticed it. Her precious blood got collected once more as her youthful face lost all shine. Choked up by his helplessness and the fear that rendered him useless, Wooyoung just stood there.

His brain must have detached from his body to save him some traumatic sights, because the next time he snapped back to consciousness, the girl's fingers slipped out of his. When she met his shocked eyes, she waved at him with her tiny hands and a reassuring smile.

Wooyoung stumbled after her with a wobble, but a guard thrust the flat part of his axe in front of Wooyoung's body so he would halt. Shocked, Wooyoung balanced precariously on his soft knees. He couldn't bear to look at the scene unfold. As if he could melt the snow if he stared long enough, he glared at the dirtied white spread until the woman finished her round with her bowl. Only once the tiny body of the girl had been dragged off to dangle with the other three from the trees, Wooyoung dared to look up.

The snow in front of the well was flattened and bathed in spilt blood. He got shoved forward to join the red-haired woman at her place. She put a hand on his back to guide him, and he followed her beckon without a single thought crossing the white void of his mind. He couldn't flee, had nowhere to go.

Once his bare knees met the cold stone and he got bent over the rim of the well that was smoothened out from years of doing exactly this, Wooyoung's mind fully disconnected from his body. As he stared into the deep well and the masses of bones - mostly small, underdeveloped ones - he was no more but a lifeless doll. When they strung up his arms on his sides to fixate him on the ropes, he wondered if slipping from their grasp and just breaking his neck down in that well wouldn't be the better method.

He didn't, though, because he couldn't move and because none of his muscles complied with his panic anymore. After nearly collapsing, he could only feel ignorance.

Through the clouds, he still heard the jubilant voice of the red-haired woman. His unseeing eyes were fixed on the heavy axe that already rested in the hairy hand of the warrior who lingered to his right. He could already feel it chop through his neck. Twice or thrice, probably, since cutting off heads was difficult and a horrible agony.

"The most precious sacrifice is set. Who wants to go at him first?"

Several voices in the crowd yelled over each other. A short tussle broke out before they settled it with crude laughter.

Wooyoung prayed that his mind would stay far away from his consciousness when the red-haired woman shifted his tunic to bunch in his back and expose his naked behind. The crowd cheered and hooted at him.

Wooyoung stared at the pale bones.

His body jerked when hands grasped onto his waist. They were warmer than he had expected and the hips that pressed against him were still clothed.

Wooyoung swallowed the bile rising in his throat. He was too terrified to cry fully, but a few drops fell down the well to drip onto frozen human remains.

When for a long moment nothing happened and Wooyoung just sat there on shivering legs, the woman spoke up again.

"Sǫndúlfr, what are you doing?"

The weight that lifted off Wooyoung's heart was bigger than any boulder known to man. His shuddering breath didn't get unnoticed by the hands that now smoothed over Wooyoung's sides. Despite them coming from opposite ends of time, San must have understood. That Wooyoung was terrified of these things and that he had no way to defend himself. That he didn't wish to become part of their sick and honourable rituals.

"I'm thinking."

Wooyoung hadn't recognised his voice among the others, but now it sounded like honey to him. He hiccuped when he swallowed down a sob. Trembling hands tightened around his bindings.

"What is so important to be thinking about in this hour?"

As an answer, San shifted behind Wooyoung. One of his arms wrapped securely around the smaller male's body.

The other one swung down to cut his bindings with his axe.

Confused protests arouse in the crowd when San dragged Wooyoung backwards with him. Unable to stand straight and tumbling like a foal, Wooyoung hung in his grip. His bleary gaze found the enraged face of the red-haired woman.

"Sǫndúlfr, what is the meaning of this?! You are disrupting the ritual!"

A few men behind her had drawn their weapons, but they hadn't moved yet. San's body behind Wooyoung shifted when he balanced the heavy axe on one shoulder with his free hand.

"This one is off-limits. Either you sacrifice someone else or you take me down first."

More confused grumbles. They called Wooyoung a witch, accused him of having secret ties with San. When the crowd turned to look at Ljóðey with their vile gazes, she pretended to be just as shocked as them. Still, Wooyoung believed to see understanding pass her gaze as she urged San to go.

"Think about this again! You don't want to enrage the gods by taking their sacrifice away from them!" The woman was desperate, but San took none of her nonsense.

"Then you kneel right here. They aren't my gods, anyway. We'll leave and anyone coming between us and freedom will fall under my axe," San threatened them with a low voice. Just as he took a step backwards and tugged Wooyoung with him, an attack came from their right.

Wooyoung yelped when San ripped him away from the swing of the deadly weapon. His face got muffled in the fur of San's coat when San used the attacker's clumsy momentum to bring down his own axe. Blood splattered Wooyoung's coat. With a sickening squelch, San pulled his weapon back. The man gargled at their feet, not dead yet since San had used only one arm. Blood dripped from his weapon when he pointed it at the people once more.

Slowly, he backed out. Wooyoung looked only at him until San handed him a torch he brusquely ripped out of the ground. He broke the long staff in two so Wooyoung could hold it easier before he lugged him off. From time to time, he sent glances back at his people, but they didn't follow the two traitors. As an honorary member of the warriors, it was San's right to demand exile.

The second they were out of sight behind the tree line, Wooyoung couldn't hold the sob that burst from his lips any longer. A crow fluttered off when he collapsed into San's side. The man was forced to put his axe onto his back again so he could cradle Wooyoung close and engulf him in his warm fur cloak partly. Hushed mumbles reached Wooyoung's ears as San tried to soothe his hysteria. Trembling and shaking, Wooyoung was too far gone to regain control over himself. The images of dead children hanging in the trees were too vivid in his mind.

One of San's arms cradled Wooyoung into his side, the other one pushed the low-hanging, snow-covered branches blocking their way aside.

"It's fine. We'll be fine," San repeated like a mantra. He carried Wooyoung more than he dragged him. In the frosty night, Wooyoung sobbed on his warm shoulder until his snot caught on the fur coat. The Viking didn't mind. He merely slung his hair to the other side of his neck to offer his neck for Wooyoung to sob into as he led him up the mountains.

Wooyoung didn't know how long they wandered. He passed out several times in between as his body still stumbled through the powdery snow at San's side. Whenever Wooyoung regained his senses, the reminder that he was trapped here pushed him near a panic attack again.

He couldn't talk, too choked up to thank San or explain his dilemma. All he could do was wade along San's side until they reached the foot of the rock formations that towered into majestic mountains further beyond. They walked parallel to them for a while, protected by the icy wind that had picked up the higher they had climbed. By the time San found the cave he had been searching for, Wooyoung clung to him with frozen blue hands and lips.

With his last might, San hauled Wooyoung inside the protected hideout. As soon as his hands let go of the historian, Wooyoung collapsed to his knees and curled up. Trembling and shivering, he clutched at his body to find some heat, but all of it had been replaced by the ice in his veins.

San was gone for a while, but Wooyoung didn't have the energy to panic. Exhausted, he just laid on his side until the Viking returned with a pile of wood. A while later, a little fire burnt in their mid and San finally allowed himself to sit down with a groan. Darkness had settled on his brow, but his eyes sought Wooyoung to make sure he had crawled towards the fire by himself. Wooyoung closed his eyes to relish in the pin-pricks of sensation returning to his skin. Since he sensed no danger, San set down his axe on the ground next to him and leaned closer to hold his palms to the small flames as well. For a moment, there was peace.

No words passed between them as they warmed themselves back up. In the stormy night outside, the crows and owls filled the darkness with their ghostly calls.