The hall of Vetrúlfr at Ullrsfjörðr blazed with torchlight. Heavy tapestries woven with swirling beasts and rune.
Marked ships hung between stone columns, while braziers burned hot enough to drive back the northern chill entirely.
Eithne entered hesitantly, guided by a thrall girl who kept her head lowered. Her hair was still damp from the rough washing in the servant quarters, her skin raw from scrubbing.
A coarse wool dress, plainly cut, hung from her shoulders. It was cleaner than her ruined habit had been, yet she felt the shift keenly; from bride of Christ to household property.
Her belly still churned. The gruel she’d been given was thick with barley and goat’s milk, enough to strengthen her legs but robbed of any comfort or spice. Meant, she realized grimly, to sustain without uplifting.
Now she stood on the edge of the mead hall’s roaring life.
Long tables ran the length of the space, crowded with warriors. Platters of boiled meats and cheeses were stacked high.
Dark bread tore easily in rough hands, mead horns were raised again and again. Gold and silver-rimmed vessels captured the firelight, spilling it across the boards like liquid sun.
Near the dais, a skald stood atop a low drum, harp slung across his chest. He struck it with a snap of his wrist, sending eerie notes into the smoky air. His voice rose in a fierce chant:
"They came on the field like storm-driven gulls, screaming for land, for crown, for God’s breath; And found instead the wolf’s jaws gaping wide, their hearts a feast, their gold our song!"
The warriors pounded fists on the tables, shouting approval. Some clashed spear-shafts or raised their blades, so the edges shone under the hall’s dancing light.
Further down the hall, thralls poured ale into waiting cups, their eyes never rising. Others swept away bones for the dogs that prowled beneath benches, waiting for scraps.
It was not only the men who feasted. Spread across benches and low tables were treasures heaped in open display: torcs stripped from fallen Gaelic lords, gemmed belts, cups and reliquaries still bearing the faint scent of incense.
Children scampered among these piles, some tracing patterns in the dust with sticks of chalk.
Eithne’s breath caught when she saw a golden crucifix tossed carelessly among copper jugs; its arms bent, the Christ figure battered.
It seemed to mock her, gleaming beneath rough laughter.
At the head of it all sat Vetrúlfr, wolfskin thrown back to reveal mail still smudged with old blood. Beside him perched Róisín, her gown richly dyed and trimmed with fur, a fiery braid wound with thin bands of gold.
One hand rested on Vetrúlfr’s arm, thumb idly tracing a scar there. They spoke low between themselves, their son nestled sleepily in Róisín’s lap, blinking against the noise.
When Eithne was led forward by the steward, she felt the eyes of the hall close on her like a net. Murmurs rose; soft speculation on the new thrall, the pale nun who once prayed for her people now forced to stand before the wolves who devoured them.
Róisín’s eyes found hers first. There was a hitch, a momentary tightening in the queen’s throat, then a quiet nod to the steward.
"Bring her here," Róisín said, voice gentle but firm. Her accent was still Ériu’s, though smoothed now by northern cadence.
Vetrúlfr watched Eithne with a calm that unsettled her more than any roar might have. His pale blue eyes, sharp as glacier ice, seemed to measure her worth like he might a war prize; or a stone for a new hall.
"You’ve been fed?" he asked, his voice low, rough-edged from shouting orders over surf and wind.
"Yes, my lord," Eithne managed. Her voice cracked on the words. The hall’s attention eased back toward the skald as he launched into another verse about the rivers of Connacht running red.
Róisín reached across and brushed Eithne’s hand. Her touch was cool, her face soft with something that might have been sorrow.
"You will serve in my chambers," she said. "Attend me, help with the child, keep my little hall in order. None here will harm you so long as you obey."
Eithne’s heart slammed against her ribs. Was that truly mercy? Or simply a slower doom? But seeing Róisín there, crowned in gold and wolf-fur yet still somehow the bright girl she’d prayed beside; she swallowed her dread and nodded.
A loud cheer rose then, shaking the rafters. Two warriors had stood to boast of their kills, raising bright blades aloft. The skald twisted his harp strings, matching their swagger with dark, rolling chords.
"And so they fell, kinglings and kerns, priests who clutched splinters of saints, their wails rose sweet, fed our crows, their gold lit our hearths, their daughters our halls."
Men roared approval, slamming drinking horns against their shields. Dogs barked at the noise, tails lashing.
Róisín leaned to murmur in Vetrúlfr’s ear, her fingers still resting on Eithne’s wrist as if to anchor them both in this place of steel and storm light.
Vetrúlfr only nodded, his lips curving faintly as he surveyed the raucous hall; the gold, the firelight, the blood-bound loyalty.
His hand rested over Róisín’s where it touched Eithne, heavy and certain.
And in that moment, surrounded by the clash of hard laughter and the skald’s savage song, Eithne felt the weight of what this place truly was: not simply a court, but a crucible.
A forge of empire and legend, fed by the spoils of the broken, burning west.
She knew then the tortured Christian girl she had known was gone, replaced by a queen of pagans both fierce and fair.
And perhaps Róisín’s transformation was only the first omen of the world that was to come; a world Vetrúlfr would carve with steel and shadow.
All Eithne could do was weep for the world she had known, now burned to cinders, and brace herself for the tribulations the Lord had set before her.
Like Joseph in Egypt, she was forced now to serve a heathen king.