Viking, me.

Chapter 3 - not on the rolling hills of ireland anymore.

"Sorry" I said averting my eyes. He shrugs off my hand and walks on to the side of the boat. I follow before I'm tugged after him. Rotating my wrists I try to relieve the pain.
"Don't move" he says I watch as he ties the end of the belt still binding my wrists, to a metal loop on the ships side. He leaps over the side of the ship I stand there looking where he jumped down. With the wavy box on his shoulder he still manages to land some what perfectly. This man, has such brut strength that they just didn't have at home.

He placed the box down and reached up to untie me. I look down at the gap between the dock and the boat, wide enough to see the dark water below.
"Jump down, we don't have all night" he said rushing me. I look down nervously and place my bound hands down on the wood. I sit on the thick wood as swing my legs over the side so in sitting on it like a church bench. I push off the side and I don't land, I open my shut eyes to find my self being lowered slowly. Sven held me and placed me on to the ground picking up the belt again and collecting his things before we walk away from the boat, to the corner of the wooden dock.

As we pass by the towns people the give me strange looks as if they've never seen a girl before. This community dress differently, heavy looking dresses and long cloaks. Most things featuring dead animals. Whispers could be heard and kept behind Sven keeping my head down. The thought has been circling my mind, why am I the one being taken from home with monks? Why me? I hadn't plucked up the courage to ask, let alone ask anything pressing of him. I could hardly say his name out loud.

I looked up, gazing at the sky I noticed that I could still vaguely see the same consolations, so that thought comforted me, I'm still under the same sky, my friends at home will look at the sky and I know we see the same stars.
It's a little heart warming to know that.

Sven set out down the wooden box with a thud and stands expectantly. Looking up under my eyelashes. He extends his hand to the box.
"Sit, while we wait" he said.
"Okay" I pause and harness all my courage "but what are we waiting for?"
He had been looking away focusing of the streets and when I spoke his eyes snapped to my face and looked at me with a strange expression.

A few minuets passed and with out a response I forgot what I asked. I looked around the harbour, the boat bobbed up and down almost undetectably. There was a few lingering bodies, but they were leaving.
"When he gets here it's best if you just keep your head down and do as instructed" he suddenly said grabbing my upper arm roughly and pulling me up off the box. There was a cart coming down the dirt road, the clatter of heavy trotting hooves getting louder as they got closer.

"Who's coming?" I ask looking down the road following his gaze. When he didn't reply I asked again more forcefully.
"Our cart, now shut up, he's here" the horse and cart stopped just in front of us and the man atop the cart looked at me first thing. His eyes scanning me. I felt a little exposed under his scrutinising eyes.

He spoke lowly to me, his words I couldn't under stand. His voice thick with subduction. I found his appearance unusual, he had black markings around his eyes, that weren't burns or scars, it looked removable, because when he rubbed his eyes it smudged.
His hair shaved around the sides and back and left long at the top to fall into a pony tail. It was ashy blonde colour with brown running through it.

Sven made an alarmingly animal like sound and hissed a few words at the driver. He straightened up and laughed at what Sven had said but I'm sure it wasn't funny. Sven's stony expression told me so. He lugged his box off the ground and too the back of the cart and turned for me. "Get on the back" he said as he climbed up onto the front with the driver. I clambered up and nestled my self between the boxes that were already on the back. I splayed my dress over my legs to keep warm.

The two men chatted in low toned voices. There was the occasional laugh and I felt so out of it. It's like being lonely in a crowd. Or like being on the side if a mountain. I might as well be, because I can't speak the language and I don't know anything about these people.

The cart bumped along the stony roads and I was jostled around the boxes and what seemed to be fishing equipment, rattled uncontrollably. I tired to face the direction we were going. I was sitting so uncomfortably. There was more space to sit up at the front and it annoyed me that I was lumped I'm with the cargo, you shouldn't treat a human like baggage. We have been traveling out further away from the centre of the village, and as we did we entered the wooded area. Small houses lit by torches of fire. It was bitingly cold, the wind had picked up and caused the cold air to circulate more. The rattle of metal fishing equipment hadn't stopped.

I twisted to look in the direction we were going again, and the was a tightness pulling at my waist. Looking back I saw that I had entangled myself in the fishing nets and hooks. I don't have to hold my position much longer because we came to a stop out side a small house with a horse stabled to the side. Sven jumped down and pulled the box down. He didn't pay much attention to me because he walked straight into the house and came back out to pay the cart man.

"Get down" he ordered looking at me only when the cart man mentioned me.

"I can't" I said shaking my head.
He looked at me strangely.
"I'm caught in the fishing net" I said.
Looking away form his amused eyes. He lunged up into the back of the cart and produced a deadly looking blade in a bone handle. It had a rounded created blade like a curving spine.

He spoke matter of factly to the cart man as he slit the netting to free my ankle. The hooks had pierced through the material of my dress. He grabbed a hold if them and yanked them straight out ripping long tares out of the fabric.
I had tried to stop him after he pulled out the fist one my slapping his shoulders and pausing him away, but failed as I now had three tares in my dress.

He jumped down from the cart untied me and dragged me from the cart to his side. Saying good bye to our driver we walked, and when I mean we I mean he, he walked and I followed leaping after. It took my eyes time to adjust to the lighting of his home, it was dim and was warm, a fire was light in the centre of the room, fur rugs lined the floor and looked very comforting. It was very dark, the house being made of wood cast more shadows. Sven unaware of my gawking, walked straight in and through to his fire pit and knelt beside it. He must have got somebody to light it for him on his arrival home. I stood beside him looking around.

The one thing that kept running through my mind was 'I'm not on the rolling hill of Ireland anymore'.