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"Good old fashioned tea and scones." My mother suggested, making my smile widen as I let out a groan of remembrance.
"Ugh, with cream and jam!" I retorted, recalling the delicious snack of my youth - something that was old fashioned to us but didn't exist yet here.
Hildr sighed, watching as my face washed with memories. Memories of her, of dad, of everything that I missed so dearly about my old time. Her eyes scanned me, the slight look of sadness that seemed to be everpresent in my eyes. "Does he know?" She asked, brows furrowing. "That husband of yours?"
Just the thought of Ivar filled me with a sense of guilt again. Oncemore I was torn between two worlds. I'd sworn that I'd never leave him, promised I'd never waver. And here I was. Wavering. "I-" I gulped back my thoughts, my self doubt, my pain. Only yesterday I had sworn that this world would be my world forever. But something had happened since then. Not just my mother. Something else that left me feeling as if I should at least consider the dangers of remaining in this time. "He knows I'm from the future. But I haven't told him about you yet."
She nodded understandingly, sending me a soft smile. "Do you love him then? Your Viking?"
"With all my heart." I answered, a tear in my eyes as I thought about what this meant. At some point I was going to have to choose between them. My mother and my husband. My whole world, the safety of the future, my family and friends, and a man that I loved more than life itself. Which, I had to remind myself, was a very real sacrifice that I might have to make. Not just words. Some day, I might truly be giving my life for Ivar.
"Do you think he could come back with us?" She questioned, already having presumed that returning home was my aspiration too. What she didn't realise was that her husband was on the other side of that damn stone - mine was here.
"I don't know. Even if he could, I doubt the stubborn fool would want to." I sighed, placing my head in my hands as I thought over this whole situation. God it was a mess. I'd promised myself in York that I wouldn't grow attached to anyone, that I'd just survive long enough to get home. But of course I had to go and fall in love. And in love with Ivar of all people. "And I don't think twentieth century police would take to kindly to him carrying an axe everywhere he went."
"No." She chuckled, such a familiar laugh that filled my heart with warmth. "No, I suppose not."
As she stood and left, bidding me farewell for now, I felt this crushing feeling in my chest return and I knew instantly what it was. I was panicking. Not something that happened to me often - I was usually quite a calm person, a relaxed person, but it was all so much. The previous two years were all so much. Everything began catching up with me, my breath catching in my throat as I desperately tried to scratch for air - my lungs quickly failing me.
As a tear ran down my cheek, my stomach churned and I leaned over the old rotting tree trunk beside me as I felt like my insides were turning into outsides. God I hated being sick.
I sat there for a moment, pale cheek rested on my arm as a few more tears ran down my face. What was I going to do? What was I going to say? I had to tell Ivar, surely. A part of me felt ashamed that I hadn't done already.
"God damnit." I cursed myself, kicking the dead trunk in anger. I suppose I just had a talent for getting myself into these difficult situations. God damnit. "God I'm a fucking idiot." As I continued beating up the tree, a voice sounded behind me - a voice that startled me from my small outburst.
"Iris?" Hvitserk stared at me in a mix of mild amusement and slight confusion. I jolted around, turning to face him as if I'd not been doing him - as if he'd not been stood there watching me bully a dead tree. "What are you doing?"
"Me?" I questioned, eyes glancing up to the sky as I tried to look inconspicuous. "I'm not doing anything. Just... Uhm... Just walking. What are you doing?"
"Watching my brother's wife kick a tree." He answered flatly, making my cheeks involuntarily redden. "What's wrong? You and Ivar aren't already fighting, are you? You've not even been married for a day yet."
"I-" He was right. We'd not even been married a day and I was already screwing things up. "No." I paused, not really sure what else I should say. What could I say to him? He knew even less than Ivar did. And yet I wanted to talk to him. I wanted to tell him everything. Maybe he could help me, give me the answers that I was looking for. He always seemed to do exactly that, or at least comfort me so that I could find the answers myself. And he was my friend. A friend that I would also have to leave behind if I went along with my mother's plan.
I was still so young. Most girls my age just followed along with what their parents told them. Go to college, get a boyfriend, give me grandkids, don't do anything too fun. But I wasn't the girl that I had been before all of this happened. I wasn't just my mother's daughter anymore, someone that followed blindly.
I'd been beaten, imprisoned, raped. I'd been to war, I'd killed people, I'd seen things that I never thought possible to see. I was a new person now. And I was going to have to do this my way.
"Hvitserk?" I asked, sitting back down on the tree stump. He walked over, sitting beside me - clearly taking notice of the small pool of bile on the floor as he sent me a concerned look. "If you had the chance to see your brothers again - to be with them, Ubbe and Bjorn - but you'd never get to be with the woman you loved ever again. Would you do it?"
He looked at me quizzically for a moment, trying to find the meaning behind my words in my reddened eyes. "I don't know." He answered, still sending me that old familiar look of questioning. "I wouldn't want to leave Ivar, would I?"
I couldn't help but chuckle through the tears that began welling in my eyes once again. "No, you wouldn't." I smiled, leaning in to rest my head on his shoulder - in the way I'd always done on those icy York days when everything had just become too much again. I'd never had a brother before. But, through blood or through marriage, it didn't matter to me. Hvitserk was a brother to me now. And it wouldn't just be Ivar that I'd be leaving behind if I followed my mother. It'd be him too. "But I'm serious."
"I know." He answered, placing an arm around me reassuringly. "He's not making you want to run away already, is he?"
Again I laughed, rubbing my eyes until they were raw. "I don't think anything he could do could make me want to leave him. Not now."
"But something has." Hvitserk observed, brows furrowed slightly as he tried to figure out my situation. "Something has made you want to leave."
Once again I felt my heart grow heavy, lips quivering and body shaking as I tried to find the words. "I don't know." I whispered, looking back up to meet his gaze. "I don't know anything anymore. I-" I paused as he looked back at me with anticipation - with a reassuring look that told me I could tell him anything. I wanted to. I did. But where was I meant to begin? "I thought that my family were gone forever." I began, the words coming to me on their own. I was like a ghost, finding my way without a single thought. "I thought I'd never see them again. And so you and Ivar became my home. But they're not gone, Hvitserk. And I can go back to them."
"Back to them-" He paused, a realisation dawning on him as quickly as the words left him. "Back to England."
All I could do was nod. Back to England. And forwards 1200 years. For perspective, that wasn't even the difference between the death of Christ and now. This moment. It was an eternity. And, when I got there, both of them would be little more than dust. My friends here, the man I'd come to see as a brother, my husband.
