Chapter Nineteen

He was gone. Somehow to know that made her chest so much lighter, it lifted a terrible weight from her shoulders and eased her heart, but somehow Rolf had left something dark and twisted behind him. She saw it, everywhere she turned, every shadow was now dangerous, every sound the warning her ears were so desperately searching for. Without meaning to, she had grown comfortable. Without meaning to she had started to trust, trust in those around her, trust that her work made her safe and gave her worth.

What was she to any of them really? Freya wouldn't care if something happened to her, she didn't already. Frigga was too young to understand, too young to even remember her if she was suddenly ripped away. Tyr cared, Tyr was kind and soft and warm, but what could he do?

Everything depended on Ivar. He had stripped her of everything the moment he'd thrown her over his shoulder that day in town and now her entire life was in his hands and she only lived and breathed because he let her.

She had to stifle that short, cold laugh building in her chest, that pain tearing through her heart. It wasn't the will of the gods, it wasn't fate or destiny. One man had done this to her. One man had made her less than human and robbed her of everything and he would do it again the moment he felt like it, the moment it made sense to him he would tear her away and she would lose everything all over again.

She stared down at her hands, red and sore from washing their clothes in the river water and she had to bite it back. She was so close now, so close to cracking, so close to letting those tears stream down her face.

"Don't listen to my uncle, Enid," said a voice, and she turned then, seeing Tyr with his spear resting across his shoulders as he scuffed his heel in the dirt. Somehow he looked so small, so young as he stared at the ground with eyes that didn't see, somehow he looked so strong. "He means well, but he's not always that smart," Tyr sighed. "I'm sorry that he hurt you."

Enid reached for it, tracing the crack on her lip and feeling the cold bite of her own fingers. For a moment she was back there, staring up into those terrible eyes and knowing she had no way of escaping, but then she saw him, Tyr glaring up at his uncle, his face scrunched up in a fierce scowl even though he was just a child, and she smiled, feeling something warm brewing in the pit of her stomach.

"Why do you call him uncle?" she asked, flinging the clothes into her basket. "Ivar called him cousin."

"He is Ivar's cousin," Tyr nodded. "But my grandparents died when Ivar was very young and his uncle took him in. Rolf is more like a brother to him than a cousin so Ivar said we should call him uncle. He's a good man, Enid. He's just-,"

"He's not," Enid cut in, and Tyr stared at her a moment, his eyes wide and unblinking before he sighed and shook his head.

"I understand why you think like that," he said. "But he wouldn't have harmed you if you were a free woman."

"So it's because I'm a slave?" she hissed, and she watched his shoulders rise and wince almost like she'd slapped him.

"Yes," he said. "It's just how it is… but I don't see you as a slave, Enid. We don't get many visitors out here, but next time just come with me. I won't let you get hurt and I won't let my father make you stay."

She felt that anger, that stunned horror inside her begin to melt. How truly she believed that he meant it, how deeply she trusted that he was speaking from the heart, but there was more to life than that.

"You can't…" she sighed. "What you see me as doesn't matter, Tyr. I belong to your father and you're still a child. There's-,"

"That's not true," Tyr cut in. "I'll get my armring soon and then I'll talk with my father and free you. I'm not strong yet, I know that, but I can support you on a small farm and I'll get gold from the raids. It won't be much, Enid, I know that, but I want to do it for you… After my mother died… it was horrible here. My father loved her so much it almost killed him. You changed that. You helped us and now I want to help you and I don't want you to get hurt anymore."

She stared at him, her heart somehow breaking, somehow lighter and easier than it had been in a long time. So quickly she reached for him, holding him to her chest and brushing his hair with her fingers and it took her a moment to accept all he had said, a moment to let those words sink deep down inside her and take root. She pulled away then, taking a step back and holding him at arm's length.

"If you want to help me, then take me with you when you go to England."

"You want to go back?" he asked, and she saw that flash of pain in his eyes, that sadness and she almost shook her head, she almost took it all back, but then she couldn't.

"Yes," she said. "I don't belong here, Tyr. Even if I were free your people would never accept me."

"They would," Tyr sighed. "They already accept you a lot more than you know just because you speak our language… but you wouldn't be happy here, I see that, Enid. You'd be safer here, but if you want to go back, then I'll take you."