“Walk with me.” My voice runs dry. With Aslaug and Shaw by my side, we make our way into the village. People cover their mouths with their hands when they see it is really me. Some, I recognize as those who traveled to Harald’s stronghold. They saw my longboat burn and believed me to be dead.
“The Maiden lives!” Girls and women shout from the railing of the longhouse I’ve shared with them for years. Waving, I allow a smile to grace my cheeks at how many of them look well, maybe thin because it is winter, but still full of vivacity. Men pound their torches into the ground and bang drums for my ascent into the Hall.
“The huntress has returned!” They cheer, and I struggle to breathe. I have done nothing to earn this welcome. I left them. Katrine, Edith, and Joanna are standing at the double doors to the Hall, beaming with pride. I let them think I died. I left them to deal with Jorvik, Bjorn, and Harald. My lungs are on fire as I dig my nails into Shaw’s arm.
“Breathe,” he murmurs.
“I don’t deserve this.” I force the words out. Sucking in cold air through my nose, I keep looking straight ahead, trying to wrap my head around the things I’ve done. I needed to eat, women needed to eat, so I hunted. I didn’t want anything more than freedom.
“Breathe, Rasha.” Shaw’s voice is low but soothing. “Be yourself,” he suggests. I let out a controlled breath. Behind me, the rest of the village is coming up the road to follow us into the Hall.
Jorvik is sitting at the council table on an elevated platform with Bjorn, Oslo, who is Katrine’s father, and two other men who have been councilmen as long as I have lived here. Shaw lets me go to blend in with the women. All around me, people are sliding into benches and passing around hot wine. More fires are lit, the crackling sounds of wood awakening the last memories I have of being surrounded by Vikings.
“We are intrigued to know how you survived,” Bjorn calls, his loud voice booming over the crowd, making the buzz of conversation die down. I look to my brother, the person who is supposed to support me and care for me in the ways I have always cared for him. I fed him, fought for him, and bent who I am for him, but Jorvik only nods in agreement with Bjorn.
“It was not my time to die, according to the gods. Do you believe in the gods, Bjorn?” I boost my voice the best I can and walk to the table. Pulling the bow out of the quiver and over my shoulder, I catch the silver shine in the firelight. People let out a mix of gasps and prayers. “This is the bow that the goddess Skadi used to hunt. It is by her will that I am here. Our gods need us. They need us to remember them.” I turn my back on the men at the head table to speak to the crowd.
“Prove it.” Jorvik’s voice counters mine. I whirl around, our blue eyes clashing like combatting waves fighting for the right to push the current to calm waters. “Only a maiden who is worthy can conjure an arrow.”
Another barrage of murmurs and shocked faces overwhelm Jorvik’s demand, but he calls for me to prove myself again and again. Glancing over at Shaw who is standing off to the side withthe women, I see him raise his eyebrows as if to tell me to unleash my newfound skills.
“Why don’t you hold a shield for a target, Bjorn? Since you and Harald don’t believe in the stories of the goddess anyway.”
He looks at me with those awful, dark eyes, flashing me a quick smile before picking up a shield from the corner of the Hall, and walks down the side aisle.
“When nothing happens and you prove to all these people that the goddess isn’t coming to save them, I want you to kneel before Harald when he gets here with the herd,” Bjorn snarls. My heart thumps against my chest as I gaze over the many people I have given fresh meat to and whose goats I’ve found wandering through the woods. The people who have pushed me around and taken me for granted.
After everything that I have given, is there no one besides Joanna and Katrine who are willing to stand up to them and support me? All this time, I thought I didn’t deserve a place in their clan, but maybe I have it wrong.
Jorvik stands. The noise from his chair scraping over the floor makes the room forget about Bjorn for a moment.
“Do you know why she was given to Harald?” Jorvik asks the crowd. Turning to Shaw directly, he says, “Do you know what she’s done? Did she tell you while the two of you were locked together in the Wild Hunt?”
My blood runs cold as the bow slides through the sweat forming on my palm.
“I am a maiden, and that is what Harald asked for,” I murmur, panic clouding my thoughts.
“You killed our parents. You owed this clan your fucking life, and you couldn’t make good on that promise!” Jorvik shouts, walking around the raised platform to meet me on the same level as I am standing with the rows of tables and benches. People know what he is about to say, but Shaw doesn’t.
“I hunted when I was a child to keep you fed, and the Beaivi Council deemed me a trespasser in lands that are free for all people.” My voice recedes, and I wish to be anywhere but here.
“What else, little sister. What else did you do?” he continues. I can’t stop the blood rising in my veins, tingling my flushed cheeks.
“I didn’t mean for it to happen, Jorvik. You know this. You were there,” I plead.
“Enough!” Shaw’s voice shakes the rafters, and the fires blow over, causing people to scream before the flames return to a normal height.
Jorvik says unrelentingly, “Tell them what the perfect maiden did.”
The room is deathly quiet. Still, there is no one besides Shaw to tell Jorvik this is unnecessary. No one, who has a full belly because I stalked a moose through the woods until my feet were frostbit, comes to my aid. Shaw’s anger is flowing through me, coupling with my anxiety and surging into my heart. My biggest fear is that when I tell him, he’ll take his chain back and his love.
“Tell them, little Rasha,” Bjorn calls from the back of the Hall, near the double doors where he waits for me to shoot the bow.
“There are those in this Hall who know me,” I start, finding my voice through the layers of resistance in my throat. “There are those who know I hunt and return with more than enough for our people. I was brought here as a child because I killed a boar on the clan’s land. I didn’t pay a due, so they took me to lure my parents out of the mountain and punish them. Instead of pledging myself to the Beaivi’s, I ran the first chance I could. My parents were killed in retaliation.”
“I have brought her back and have devoted our lives to this clan and council. Rasha never showed the same allegiance,” Jorvik adds to my speech. I genuinely would have rather died in the longboat than be forced to recount a history I’ve always tried to bury.
“She owes you nothing,” Shaw says, his tense body falling in line behind me. “I came here to ask for your help because she said I could count on her people. No clan has ownership of the forest. That is written in our oldest scrolls, is it not?” he asks the crowd. Gaining confidence, he walks around the room, choosing families to shake hands with as he speaks.
