× The gods are watching [Björn]

There was a certain calm in this village. All the people were strangers to him, just as he was a stranger to them. It had been a long time ago, a very long time ago since Björn wasn’t immediately recognized. He wondered if the people here even knew about Ragnar’s existence. About the things that his father had done and about the sons he had given to the world. But Björn didn’t cared, not now. He enjoyed the quiet and the peace while he wandered over the market. By a little stall he stopped and nodded politely at the elder woman who was standing behind it. The table in front of her was filled with herbs and vegetables that he had never seen before. Björn frowned his eyebrows as he picked up a strange looking vegetable and observed it. ”It’s ginger.” The elder woman said with a gentle smile on her face, which made her skin even more wrinkle. She could tell that Björn had never seen something like this before. ”Do you want to give it a taste?” She said, and took the ginger from his hands. Björn frowned his eyebrows as he saw the elder woman cut a little piece from it and peel it. After a minute, she gave it back to him. Björn brought it up to his nose and smelled it. Without hesitation he took a big bite and started chewing. A strange, bittersweet taste filled his mouth and made that he did not know what to do with his tongue anymore. Immediately tears appeared in his eyes and he spat out the ginger. The woman behind the stall started to laugh. Björn reached out for the jar with water on her stall and started to drink. Water gouged over the edges as he drank, and made his neck and chest wet. The woman was still giggling when Björn placed down the jar. He was just about to open his mouth to say something, when war cries sounded behind him. Immediately he turned his head and placed his hand on his axe. His heartbeat rose quicker than he could take another breath.

After a few seconds there appeared Vikings from between the houses on the other side of the trading square there. Their weapons bloody, their faces covered in war paint that was already mixed up with blood. In the fraction of a second, everything had turned into pure chaos. People started to run, to scream, and for a second Björn was overwhelmed with everything that happened. The elder woman turned around, ready to run, but an arrow hit her right between her shoulder blades. Björn clenched his jaws onto each other and pulled his axe from behind his belt. He stared straight at the warriors that were running towards him, and everything seemed to go in slow motion. Was there not a single place where he could just be a man instead of a monster? Was there not a single place where his mind and soul could be at ease? Was there not a single place where he could be facing love and life instead of misery and death? From the corner of his eye he saw the elder woman fall down. And then a roar guggled up from deep inside his chest. A viking came running towards him and Björn did not hesitate a second when he swung up his axe-arm. At the moment right before his axe beeched into the man’s head, he shared a moment of eye contact. Immediately a nauseous feeling crept up towards his chest. Was this.. But before he could do anything, the body already hit the earth. Dead. Björn crouched immediately, grabbed the dead man’s leather vest and turned him around. Whatever he had been thinking, was now being confirmed. Einar. Or whatever was left of him. His face was partly ripped of by Björn’s axe.

The only thing he could do was stare. Stare at corpse from the man who had fought many battles with him. Stare at the man that he had named friend many years. Nothing made sense, and a wave of confusion rippled over him. ’Come on!’ A familiar voice drew him from his comatose. Björn turned his head, saw the few warriors from Hjörtdal facing the intruders. Facing his people. Slowly he straightened his legs again and blinked with his eyes. Not a single cell in his body could understand what was happening. He recognized the warriors, but could not truly understand it. Why where they here? How did they know he was here? Where they coming for him? And then he saw the person from who the familiar voice was. Ubbe. And them all the calm that was left in Björn’s body dissolved. He pressed his body forward, started to run towards his brother who was now on the side of the fight. While he was running, he picked up an abandoned shield in the mud. Björn headed straight for Ubbe, full force and dodged every attack, since he could not tell who was friend or enemy anymore. ”Ubbe.” he roared with all the anger that was on the inside of his body. And there was plenty. He busted into his brother, shield first, knocked him right over. Björn threw away his shield and grabbed Ubbe by his collar, pulling him back onto his feet. Again. It felt like he had never left Kattegat. He roared again, not a word in particular, straight into his brother’s face. He was confused as well as furious, but his anger clearly dominated every other feeling that was left in his body. What the fuck was happening.

Ubbe was catapulted backwards, only to be picked up again by his collar. In Björn’s hand, he felt light as a feather. Björn’s muscles where tightened and full of adrenaline. In a moment of heat he could easily lose himself to his own strength, and this was one of these moments. His roaring filled the air and reached out above the other war screams. With a glowing look in his eyes, he stared at his brother who was staring right back at him. He saw a certain fear in Ubbe’s eyes. The kind he would be worried about in a normal situation, the kind where he would ask what was going on. But now he was on the other side of the line and nothing made sense anymore. Björn felt a sharp sting in his chest as Ubbe pressed the blade from his axe against him. ”Not now brother!” Were his words, and Björn’s looked like he could spit fire and burn the complete village to the ground. His linen shirt tore beneath the blade and bared the tattoos on his skin. ”You really want to do this now?” Björn shook and turned his head in vexation because of his brother’s words and felt the metal cut through his scarf-skin. A small stream of blood flowed from the wound that Ubbe’s axe had made. ”Björn!” Ubbe shouted, and Björn looked him straight into the eyes again. And then he released the collar of his brother, dropping him down again.

Björn took a step back, closed his eyes and spread out his arms, trying to think clear again. ”If I want to do this now?” he then yelled again, a lot louder than needed. Björn opened his eyes again and glared with a piercing look at Ubbe who was a few meters from him. ”By the Gods Ubbe, are you stupid?” He made his axe turn in his hand, an axe that was full of his friends blood. ”I have just killed one of my own men. Do you even have any idea what you are doing?” Behind him he heard footsteps running toward him. A warrior from Hjortdal. Björn turned and shouted again, thumped the man in the center of his face and then slashed with his axe through his left leg. He finished the man of by shattering his head with the back of his foot when he was on the ground. A grotesque sound filled the air, but at the same time it was the sound of life.. he wasn’t the one that had died. Björn spat onto the ground and looked at his brother again as he walked closer, his shoulders broadened. ”Don’t tell me our brothers are here too.” His voice sounded dark and raw. But by the look in Ubbe’s eyes he could already tell. And then he thought about another person, and his face changed completely. Where there had been pure anger first, there now appeared a sign of worry. ”Thora?” He then asked forlorn. Immediately he turned his head, tried to look through the crowds to see a sign from any of them. ”Ubbe where are they?” Björn yelled at his brother again, forcing him to give an answer.

”How would I know that you are here?” It confirmed that they weren’t here to look for him. This was an ordinary raid that happened to be in the same village where he and Rhona had looked for cover. How was something like this even possible? Was it work of the Gods? Ubbe took a step back, opening his arms in the same was as Björn had done before. ”So I need my big brother for everything now, you should have stayed, then you could join all of this but you ran.” A wrinkle appeared in Björn’s forehead, getting ready to answer Ubbe right back. To tell him that he should’ve used his brain, that this was his chance to show the people what he had learned over all the years. To show them his responsibility and take care of them. Not sending them into a battle, only to end up killed by one of their own. But then Ubbe said another thing.. ”..just as father did.” Björn felt like he was going to jump out of his skin. And it was for Ubbe’s luck that there came a Hjortdal Viking running towards him. Björn reacted all his anger towards the man, crushing his skull with the back of his foot when he dropped down onto the ground. He didn’t knew what he would’ve done if the man wouldn’t have attacked him. Would he have thrown himself on Ubbe? So when he stood there, his heart pounding, he couldn’t do anything else than staring at his brother. ”They all came!” Björn’s shoulders dropped down and he just shook his head from left to right. Slowly. ”She is here, she came with me.” Ubbe shouted at him just as he had shouted at his brother. ”Go find her, if it pleases you so much, she can take care of herself.” Björn snorted like a raging horse by those words. ”Oh I know she can, but I am not so sure if our seventeen year old, crippled brother can take care of himself.” The words came spatting out of his mouth, mocking. ”And that, Ubbe, that is where I am different. I would have come back to Kattegat when the time was right. Because I care more about my family more than I care about myself. But you, you are just too blind to see, too focused on your own triumph.” Björn shook his head from left to right and turned his back to his brother. ”Because of you I have my friend’s blood on my hands. I will never forgive you that. And if there is more of our blood spilled today..” He looked over his shoulder one last time. ”..I will kill you for it.” Those words felt heavy on his heart, and he didn't even know if he would be able to live up to them. But what his brother had done.. it made loose a part in himself that he didn't even know that was there.

Björn dissolved in the crowd, making his way through the people by swinging his axe with to much force that everybody who dared to stand in his way, dropped down in the blink of an eye on the exact same spot. He was going to look for his brothers, or anybody else from Kattegat who needed to be saved from the idiot mission that Ubbe had led them onto. This was a day he'd never be able to forget.