vikings, LA BELLE DAME

ix

"And there she lulled me asleep,
And there I dream'd - Ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill side,"

Ragnar was warm despite the chill that was disguised in the air as he had La Belle Dame in his arms.
A women that actually wanted to be held by him, a women who he might actually like. She may love him, but his feelings? He would not describe the feeling in his heart as love. It couldn't be... if it was then it he would curse himself. Love wasn't an emotion he believed he was capable of any longer.

They let the hours pass them by, a few moments of conversation passed but nothing of significance. They both stared at the sky, at the beginning it was the dull blue colour of day with a thin white covering of cloud moving towards them from the south. Then it swirled with shades of orange, purple and red as the God's paint palette revealed the masterpiece of a dipping Sun.

"Which do you like best? The night or the bright?"
She asked him as the sky began to settle into a deep ink of blue and black with a splattering of white, the distant stars and planets where the Gods dwelled.

"The sunset."
Ragnar answered. He liked how the colours would reappear at dawn, The Sun was a symbol to him; it was hope. Hope he wished to regain. It blinded him at sundown and half of him wondered if he would ever see such a sight again but then he was granted the sight a mere twelve hours later.

Sometimes the more he thought about it the more he understood how Althestan and his love of the Christian God. He was hope, his Gods were darkness.

"I like the night," She told him as she thought about the secrets and powers the night held that she couldn't understand. From what she knew, the night had a drug to mortals, fatigue and drowsiness she knew were symptoms. In plain language, the night made people tired.

As if on cue the King yawned and saw the women laugh at his stretching, the yawn transformed into a smile. This had been his first truly good day since Paris. A part of him was naive and let him look forward to tomorrow, to the future. However that can never be contemplated with La Belle Dame.

The Gods never allowed her to intrude on the personal feelings of mortals but they gave her a multitude of sense, beyond that of humans.
She was fluent in body language and could understand what the smallest flicker of an eyelash or the deepening of a wrinkle on the face meant

She knew her time was ending.

The realisation flooded her body like a powerful wave; she would have to leave him. She had to.
She had already gone against the only rule she had to stick to, in her pure and innocent temporary state; she had fallen in love with Ragnar Lothbrok.

His eyelids were dipping and the sleep was washing over him like the trickle of a new waterfall. It put at ease the worries and dark thoughts he had earlier in the morning. The sunrise seemed to him to have been a lifetime ago and his body craved rest.

But La Belle Dame needed him to stay awake.

"Ragnar,"
It came out as a croak as the sound avoided the lump forming in her throat, there was no reply,
  "Ragnar!"
She tried again, he lifted his eyes and stared at the lady in his lucid state.

Before La Belle Dame had been a lady in the flesh with only the lightness of fairies or pixies to Ragnar. She had been angelic but now his eyes were seeing past that trick and seeing another form of the spirit in front of him.

He saw wings.

Yet they weren't like the wings of Christian angels or cherubs, they did not dominate her back with long dusty white feathers. She did not

The wings were small, they begin between her shoulder blades and the dagger like tip only just reached her waist. They protruded underneath her dress which had been torn, threads hung down from the fabric and patches rested on the feathers.

They were the colour of darkness and had the texture of great Birds of Prey along with the coarseness of their hearts.

La Belle Dame's wings were made of black raven feathers.

The King had only a few seconds of consciousness left, he didn't have time to fully comprehend the new situation.

     All his drugged mind could think of was the image he saw in front of him; the mask being lifted off the pure and loving La Belle Dame and revealing the macabre reality beneath.

     Ragnar saw The Dance of Death in front of him, a person with a black hood to take him to Hell.
     Somebody he prayed to come and take him this morning, he had yearned to see this figure but instead he was graced with La Belle Dame.
     She had allowed him to feel happiness and love again, she had been so good at her task that the Viking no longer wished for death.

     Ragnar Lothbrok wanted in that very second to live but he could not escape what was coming next. No fairytale can last forever.

     La Belle Dame knew this would be her last moment with her love and she craved three words to come from his lips, to keep her going as she continued to watched over him in the dark, to do what she had been doing all her life,

     "Do you love me?"

     Ragnar heard Death ask the question, so he replied as truthfully and forcibly as he could, he wasn't ready to die, he wanted his heart to continue beating until he had earned his place in Valhalla.

     "I hate you."

     The King's last words were clear as he then closed his eyes and La Belle Dames run red with bloody tears. 

     She had done what she was tasked with, she had saved the King's heart but it had the side-effect of shattering hers beyond repair.

      The limited movement in the hours to come was intrinsically rhythmical, Ragnar's chest moved up and down as oxygen filled his lungs and then without fail, La Belle Dame let a sob escape her lips.
     Occasionally Ragnar's head would roll or he would shift in his slumber, this ritual would be followed by another tear cascading down from La Belle Dame blue eyes and the taste of black salt on her lips.

     During these hours Ragnar did not dream and the Lady did not think, they existed for no purpose and did nothing. They lived for the same reason that the stars moved in the sky; it was expected.
There had never been a clearer night, the stars shone bright and halfway through nature decided to showcase its power.

     Green lights filled the air and swirled in a performance of ecstasy, the phenomena was common yet rare for the Vikings. Known but unknown. It made the painting of the sky even more special and elaborate, half an hour of pure beauty that La Belle Dame would never see again.
     The green was mixed with shades of purple and light blue that mesmerised the observer, but La Belle Dame only stared at the marvel for a minute.

     She didn't find any beauty in nature anymore, instead she acknowledged the change in lighting and then went back to her routine of mourning and crying. The green light casting new and darker shadows on her pale and shuddering skin as Ragnar Lothbrok slept on in her arms.