Kætil IV: The Northern War
The Eighteenth Day of the Seventh Moon, 873 AD.
River Isanar, The Frozen Trails, Scelopyrea.
Krakevasil, the last two moons had been fun.
Kætil couldn't help but smile as he put his sword through the groaning form of the wounded man beneath him. He was a reborn man now, tied to the power of his god as much as any druid was. He may not have been able to hear his god's voice, but he knew for a fact that he was indeed destined to stand by the Raven-God's side. He was better than the others. All the others. He was reborn.
Of course it wasn't only his newfound connection with the Raven-God thanks to his runic marks that was making him enjoy life a little more right now. No, not at all.
The war had begun in earnest, and he was at the forefront of every skirmish. Some he won, some he lost, but in all of them the foe followed them south. Sometimes they even set off before him and he needed to follow them instead, but that was no cause to complain. He'd much rather be the pursuer than the pursued, no matter how big the advantage arriving first and having time to prepare gave him and his boys was.
The last two months had seen him back on the frozen trails that ran parallel to the river Isanar, and given the amount of times he'd had to ford the river in full armour it was a miracle he hadn't almost drowned yet. The summer rains had mostly subsided, so there were far more suitable fords than there had been when the river had been a rush a few months back, not to mention the fact that they weren't transporting the gravely wounded this time so there was far more mobility in his little force.
He boasted of a few hundred men under his command, perhaps four-hundred, scattered along the western riverbanks. There were a few little islands and islets that they would have to take control of as well when they moved further south, carved out of the land by the passage of the winding river over the long centuries that the Isanar had nourished the northlands, but that would more be a job for parts of the actual army. As of right now his instructions were just to keep the enemy engaged and fight them along the river, instructions that he was more than happy to carry out.
A little bloodshed was good for the soul after all.
There was another reason he'd been rather more content recently, but that was of a more... private nature. To have found a woman who was not only touched by the Carrion-King, but also by greatness, was amazing by itself. Add onto that the fact that she was his equal with steel, that she had been willing to carve runes into his person to help him fulfil his great destiny, and that she seemed just as... intrigued by him? Well, how could he not be happy?
He'd need to tread lightly around father about this subject, and the rest of the druids as well. Their coupling was never going to be without complications due to their statuses, what with him being the son of the Great Jaerl and her being a prospective high-flyer in a mystic order, but the two of them were fine enough with keeping their unions a secret for now. Important conversations were for the southern folk and their strange ways, not a true man and woman of Scelopyrea. They'd do as they pleased, try to keep it under wraps, and talk it out when the war was over and won. Probably. Father wouldn't be pleased, he seemed to have rather oddly done a turnaround on Svaltha these last few months and been rather opposed to her presence, but this was one thing Kætil was unwilling to compromise on with his father. This time he would have his way, and some grumbling notwithstanding his father had mostly respected his decision. Kætil was glad of that; he had no wish to grow distant from his father, not with how well the man had treated him all through his life. His father was a good man, better than most, and he very much wished to have his father remain as a part of his life as he moved forwards onto new and exciting things.
As pleasing as such trails of thought were, they weren't needed at the moment. He cleared his mind and brought himself back to the present, looking over at a few of his men who it seemed were finishing off the last of the wounded.
The druids had been very clear on that matter. No captives. No thralls. No surrender. If an enemy threw down their weapon, they were to be killed. If they were wounded in the battle, they were killed. If they stood and fought then they, of course, would need to be killed.
Such brutality in warfare seemed to have been conducted by the foe as well, who had left more than a few of his lads broken and dead behind them. The actions of the foe in the killing of the wounded had enraged his own men so much that they'd probably have done the same even without the orders from the druids. He'd had to stop himself from pointing out that they'd done the same thing and the foe may simply be reacting as they had, but that would only have fallen on deaf ears. He didn't care anyway. He had his own jobs to do, and caring for the wounded soldiers of the Eyvindottir was not one of them.
"Strip the dead of weapons and armour and load it all on the carts. If they've got valuables then nick 'em and keep quiet about it or you'll need to give them up to your chieftains, like me. There's few men who wanna give up their own treasures to their rulers, that's for sure. Do it quietly and I won't ask any questions, on the condition that anything inscribed with runes is brought to me. Any man who does so will be rewarded."
He smiled a little as he heard the grunts of assent from his men. Syren was somewhere to the south getting the next ford ready for the skirmish that was inevitably going to fall upon it, and therefore couldn't be with him at the moment, but the men and women under his command had been trained well. They were good fighters. Not exactly what he'd call 'good people', but probably as good as was likely to arise out of such times.
"And the dead, boss?"
Kætil sniffed the air, and for some reason as if on instinct his gaze turned north.
"Burn the bodies," he said, the words spilling forwards before he'd even realised what he was saying, "I don't want anything else getting to them."
He'd surprised himself a little at his words but couldn't deny the pull, or rather pushback, he felt when thinking and looking to the north. The great northern mountains were still shadowed by that mass of black cloud, and he had no intention of finding out what was causing such a phenomena. With any luck his men would put his words down to not wanting the bodies to attract predatory Umbra, which was true, but he didn't want to have to explain to his men that his commands were the result of gut feelings and barely understood hunches.
That said, given how he'd caught some of his men looking north with the same look of unease he'd no doubt sported these last few weeks he wouldn't have been surprised if they accepted his reasoning without question. There was something, or someone, up there. The Jotun must have known it, for why else were they moving south? The Brythonian traitors to the west must have known it, for why else would they have closed themselves off even more than they normally did? It seemed now that the Scelopyrene knew it, for now even he felt his gaze fall uneasily upon the north on occasion.
Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to begin moving south of the Aenir?
He shook his head at the thought of such superstition overtaking his senses. He was Kætil Dyfedson, not some frightened child. There was nothing left past the northern mountains save shadow, frost, and ash. Nothing could live up there.
"You got it boss. Best to keep the Direwolves away, and no mistake."
Kætil nodded at the man in acknowledgement. He had no idea about the names of the people under his command at the moment, save one or two of the veterans he'd commanded since before the debacle with the two Jotun at the caravan, and he hadn't really the inclination to learn them. They were dying off and being replaced too fast for him to really grow attached to any of them. Instead he maintained his little inner circle; he preferred it when it was just him, Svaltha, Syren, and Krai. They were his true friends, real companions with which he had formed a strong bond, and as a result they were the ones he tried to stick with.
Syren was away at the moment, yes, but Krai was still somewhere in this field. He'd been wounded again recently, having taken a spear to the shoulder, but luckily his heavy chainmail had protected him from the worst of the blow. The young man's shoulder was badly bruised, but it could have been a hell of a lot worse. Thank Krakevasil for good craftsmanship and a well fitting gambeson, and let there be no mistake on that.
"Oi, Kætil!"
The rapidly approaching voice of Svaltha broke him from his musings on the whereabouts of their other friend, and he turned to face her with a grin on his face as he took off his blood-stained helmet.
"Svaltha. What brings you to this neck of the woods, I wonder?"
She rolled her eyes at his sarcasm, gripping his forearm in a warrior's handshake.
"My answer remains the same as the last half-dozen times you've asked."
"And that is?"
"Bloodshed, as always."
He snorted at her jest.
"How was your meeting with your superiors? There's a few rumours going around, but no-one knows what the druids have been getting into a frenzy about recently. Well, if anyone does know they don't want to speak of it. I can't say I blame them either, but I was hoping you'd be feeling generous enough to share this information with me."
She smiled at him with a wolfish grin and... and something in her eyes that he couldn't quite place, something almost akin to frenzy, if well-hidden. Excitement, but excitement in a rather more dangerous way than normal. Well, that was normal by the standards of most people. The two of them seemed to wear that particular brand of excitement around each other a lot these days.
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"I think I've been more than generous enough with you recently, Chieftain. I don't remember you complaining about the parts I've shared with you before now."
He swallowed hard at her double-entendre, knowing that whilst the conversation did sound like him asking about druidic happenings she had managed to twist it into a rather more... intimate conversation. It wasn't what he had originally been asking about, since he was interested in learning what exactly had the elders of the druidic orders in such a worried state at the moment, but he wasn't going to complain about where this conversation had gone. This promised to be rather more fun, after all.
Still, at the moment he had a job to do, so he got his mind out of the gutter and moved to direct his men towards the building of the pyres.
"Come on Sval, there's bodies to burn. Not afraid of a little burning flesh, are you?"
She scoffed at him as if he'd gone mad.
"Me? Of course not! It smells rank and there can be no mistaking that, but that's what hemp flowers are for."
He couldn't help but look back at her and pull a confused face, but he'd be lying if he said he weren't a little intrigued.
"Are you... are you suggesting that we inhale burning hemp flowers from the funeral pyre of our foes? Because there's little chance of us having any other fires in the immediate future."
She shrugged at him, smirking.
"Do you for a second believe that Krakevasil would find it distasteful? No. The God of Slaughter would find it amusing rather than blasphemous. So are you in or what?"
He huffed out a genuine laugh whilst shaking his head in disbelief at what he was about to say.
"Fuck it, sure. It's not like we haven't already done some terrible things already. You do recognise how fucked this is, right?"
"We're Scelopyrene, Kætil. Morality is for southerners to pine over and debate. We have our limits, true enough, but loyalty is all that matters up here, not how tasteful your actions are."
"And don't I know it. Well, anything to distract from the foul smell I guess. Oi! We want a pyre, not a haphazard pile! And I told you to strip them of- sorry Svaltha, I need to sort this mess out."
He gave his partner an apologetic smile, which she waved away with an amused smile.
"Don't stop working on my account. There's yet more blood to burn from those corpses, so get to it."
He gave her a mocking salute as he began to walk towards the heap that currently constituted what would become the newest pyre along the banks of the river Isanar. Krakevasil, he was having fun recently.
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"So, you wanted them burned."
Svaltha's voice cut through the silence of the tent. Just by her tone it was clear that it was not a question, but a statement. It took him a few moments to gather up the willpower to break the silence himself in response, but eventually he did.
"I did."
"May I ask why?"
"I take it you won't accept 'keeping the Direwolves and Nesters away' as an answer?"
She laughed a little, a sound that he'd found he rather enjoyed these last few months.
"Kætil, you and I both know that I know you too well for that. We both know very well that Direwolves aren't likely to scavenge for corpses in half-frozen earth when there are warm bodies around."
He smiled a little. She wasn't wrong, but then when was she?
"No, they won't."
"So why then?"
He remained silent for a little while, unsure how to put his reasoning into words. Luckily he never had to, for it seems she felt much the same way.
"You think there's something out there, don't you?"
He nodded a little, but the motion was barely a movement given that he was still led down with his head on a few furs.
"I don't know why, but I do think there's something out there, Sval. I've seen... I've seen and heard of omens. Bad ones. Something dark is coming. 'Your kind will not understand for many years yet', that's what one of the Jotun said to me when I asked why they were moving south. Just by that it sounds like whatever this thing is may still be far away, but when I look north..."
"I know," she said, carrying on as he trailed off, "I feel it too. My god tells me not to try and see what lies beyond the northern mountains, for he wants no part in whatever lies up there. Given the beginning of the Jotun's exodus south and the pervading unease we all feel when we stare for too long at the north... yeah, I think something's out there. I don't think we'll know of it for some time yet, but it's out there. There is some other news I've been... I haven't been keeping it from you, I just haven't really known how to word it delicately."
"Svaltha," he said, grinning a little, "when have I ever cared about delicate?"
She snorted, sounded like she was about to make a jape, then stopped herself for a moment. When she spoke she had returned to the more serious tone of their conversation so far.
"You asked me earlier about news from the druids."
He turned to face Svaltha, her features framed by torchlight as she rested beside him beneath the furs of their shared tent. It was his tent really, but given that she was a druid it was only proper she be allowed the pick of any man's tent she wished. It just so happened that she picked his while he was still in it. Strange, that.
He smiled a little, but then forced his mind to focus on the here and now so he could answer your question.
"I did. There are some... troubling rumours going around."
She nodded at him, her sombre face rather at odds with the expressions they'd both worn the last few hours. Krakevasil, but they were still covered in a sheen of sweat from the rather exhilarating 'exercise' they'd already indulged in tonight.
"The Omen was spotted off of the Bay of Seals a moon or so ago. She was hailed but her captain said nothing, just began sailing towards the west."
Kætil blinked a few times. The Omen? Wasn't that-
His eyes widened a little as he put two and two together. That wasn't possible, he hadn't been seen in years, almost a decade! How could he have- no, he couldn't of survived sailing into that accursed place.
H e was speechless for a long while, and when he did speak his voice was hardly a whisper. His eyes were wide with a mixture of reverence and fear, and despite all the prowess he may have been able to boast of, all of the glory he'd earned, he still felt a very real sense of danger as he uttered out the only words he could physically force out at the moment.
"Uncle Hreidar..."
Svaltha nodded.
"Aye. It's your uncle, all right. He... no-ones sure how, and your father, I mean the Great Jaerl, blew up in a fierce rage when he learned of his brother's whereabouts. When he calmed down a little he reminded his court that Hreidar's exile still stands, doubly so now that he's returned from... from the Cursed City. 'If he sets a foot on Scelopyrea he'll find it cut off', I believe those were your father's words."
Kætil nodded slowly, taking this in. Uncle Hreidar was alive. He'd hardly known the man before he was exiled, but he'd learned enough from those around his father to know that the man was dangerous. Was wrong. Hreidar Ostæinson had been the youngest son of Ostæin himself, and was the runt of the litter. He'd wanted to prove himself the equal to his older brothers, and had declared that he was going to sail into Gorratar itself to learn the lost secrets of the Sotenari Empire. There had been a great deal of shouting and fighting back and forwards between Hreidar, his siblings, and their father on that day. Everyone had known that Hreidar was a sick and twisted thing, but what he'd done before leaving...
The day before he was set to leave he was discovered in an act that had made Kætil genuinely sickened upon hearing about, and then he'd apparently boarded his ship with the vilest runts he could find for a crew and sailed off on his quest. Kætil and Svaltha had talked only that day about how morality was for southerners, that they had no such qualms over committing abhorrent acts, but the things that man had done... even a god so drenched in gore as Krakevasil must surely have seen him as evil. That had been nearly a decade ago, and no-one had seen him since. Well, until now, apparently.
"How did he get past Anatolikoi without anyone noticing him? The Omen isn't exactly a missable ship."
"I don't know," Svaltha replied, a very real measure of concern in her voice, "the men of Suðrgaard should have seen him and reported in, but according to the druids in that region they never caught wind of him at all. It's as if he just... appeared out of the seas."
He shuddered a little as she continued.
"Still, I can't see anyone offering him refuge in the entire northern world. He's a vile man, viler than any other, and there's no-one left who might trust him in all the land. The things he did to his sister... Raven-God protect me, but he's not right. I doubt he could even be called a human anymore."
"He always was more monster than man, at least according to my father. Don't bring up father's sister. It still sends him into a truly black rage, especially since she never even had a name for him to mourn her by."
Svaltha nodded at him.
"I have no intention of bringing up that subject. What of your other uncles?"
Kætil shrugged.
"My last uncle, my last true uncle, that monster doesn't count, died a few years back. So did my aunt. Of the eight children Ostæin the Great sired it seems only two are left."
"How did they die?"
He stared at her for a little while, eyes narrowing, before he smiled when a realisation hit him.
"You think he had a hand in their deaths, don't you?"
Svaltha turned away a little, cheeks going pink.
"Maybe. It just seems odd that he'd wait until the last of his siblings save only your father died before making his return to northern waters."
"Well, I don't think it had anything to do with him."
He thought for a little, a few thoughts coming to him, but he tried to shake them away. No, uncle Hreidar had been away that whole time... hadn't he?
"Uncle Rogar was killed in a raid on the mad Count of Mytenaeopolis. He survived the crossbow bolts, but the poison they were tipped with was too fast-acting to save him from. Uncle Osvald sailed into the Great Ocean and vanished, probably shipwrecked and drowned. Maybe he even met one of the great serpents, but that's besides the point. I don't really remember the other two uncles, or my older aunt. They died when I was too young."
She nodded at him slowly.
"Do you miss them?"
He scoffed.
"Of course I do, they were family! Rogar could wield a boarding axe like no-one I've ever met, and Osvald was the best helmsman this side of the Drakespine mountains! It's bloody impossible not to miss them, especially with a war like this rapidly heating up. If Hreidar really was in these waters the two of them would be out their to avenge their youngest sister as soon as word got to them of the Omen's return, and I'd be damn well tempted to join them too."
"You'd find much support, Chieftain." Svaltha moved to prop herself up on one elbow, giving him a rather distracting eyeful of her chest that, despite the serious tone of their conversation, he couldn't help but be drawn to. She leaned in a little, conspiratorially, and spoke in a hushed and whispered tone. "Krakevasil dislikes that one. Our god whispers to those touched by him of Hreidar's return, of how he styles himself 'Chosen'."
Kætil worked his face for a moment in confusion.
"Chosen?"
His partner nodded.
"Yes. 'Chosen'. Chosen of what or who, we don't know. What we do know is he is not Krakevasil's chosen."
"Maybe the chosen of the treasonous gods of the Corvid Pantheon?"
Svaltha scoffed at his musings, and on reflection that was a stupid thing to say. The weak-willed traitor-gods of the Brythonians wouldn't have the spine to back one who stood against Krakevasil. Even if they did, no god would lend its strength to such a monster. Treasonous or not, the Corvid Pantheon would not stoop that low. He shook his head.
"No, that's not right. Well, at least if he goes by the name 'Chosen' he might distance himself from my grandfather's legacy. I've heard stories of where he went, stories of Gorratar. The magics used there were terrible and black, or so the stories go."
Svaltha nodded at him.
"I've heard much the same. I'd be surprised if there were anyone alive the world over who hadn't at least heard one story of the horrors contained within that place. No sane man should ever wish to learn what secrets lie within those silent halls, and if they should succeed and learn from those ruins..."
She shuddered a little, and Kætil pulled her flush against him. They'd talked enough of old ghost stories and misbegotten traitors for one night.
"Come on, enough of all that. There's still plenty of time till the morning."
Her serious expression faded almost immediately into a wolfish grin.
"Again? Try not to be too tired tomorrow; there's a long few months ahead of us."
"That there are," he said in a low tone, his mouth an inch from her neck, "so we'd better make the most of tonight while we can."