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"She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild, and manna dew, And sure in language strange she said-"I love thee true,""

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"She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said-
"I love thee true,""

     Ragnar Lothbrok has always been of a sturdy build, a true Viking in his book. But the sorrow and the years of physical torture and pain has taken its toll on the lining of his muscles, withering them away to his present state. Verging on a fragile and pathetic state.

     La Belle Dame felt it in his fingers as they occasionally traced contours on her neck. They were more like skeleton bones on her skin which he noticed was as white as milk with veins juxtaposed as blue blood ran down them.

     "Tell me, when was the last time you ate?"
     She asked him, at first Ragnar felt a patronising tone to her voice. The voice of reason, he heard Aslaug for a moment. But then he felt the sincerity of her voice, it was not scorn at all, it was concern.

     "I can't remember."
     He told her, his mind had the ability to bid the hunger pains and thoughts from his head. The drugs had damaged every nerve it touched. Ragnar could never have done it in his youth, yet as he got older the less his soul wanted to care for its temporary body.

     La Belle Dame stared into the middle distance and scanned the interwoven connections of exposed roots and newly germinated plants. She in truth did not have the faintest clue what she was looking for as her tastebuds had no experience.
     She hoped her limited intelligence and instinct would tell her what to pick to rebuild Ragnar, to fill his stomach and give his morbid skin back its colouring.

     "I thought so."
     She mused whilst Ragnar now focused on fighting the physical pains of starvation. It came on suddenly, it was almost as if the minute he accepted he needed it, his began to crave it beyond reason.

     "What are you looking for?"
     He let go of the reigns and allowed the horse to roam by itself. Ragnar moved his fingers to her hair and dragged them down, pulling the hair down slightly. He reached the coarse ends and let go, the red hair springing back into perfectly formed curls.

     "Liberation."
     She commanded the word as she spoke, liberation for Ragnar was her only goal in her life.
     She lived for him, she was made for him so liberating his starvation seemed like one of the things she had come here to do.

    The King did not answer instead he shook his head whilst scoffing. He thought he needed liberation from a plethora of things, hunger not being top. He could live with physical pain, that's all he has known. Vikings were tough when it came to that form of pain, it was his mental pain that would kill him in the end.
     Although what was top of his list was the liberation of a certain sinful lust.
And he wasn't sure if liberation meant fulfilment or banishment.

vikings, LA BELLE DAMEWhere stories live. Discover now