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"Eirik," Gunnar asked distractedly as the pair of them stalked through now-empty streets, the smoke of burning buildings filling the air. "What say the Gods on the killing of children?"
Eirik was a thin man, with long limbs, but he was every bit as fierce as any of them. Gunnar did not watch him as he turned, instead shifting the girl to his other shoulder to balance the burden. But the fire in his face was one that he recognized as soon as he had seen it.
"They bear no love for it—and for that matter, neither do I. Do you know of children here?"
He didn't like the fact that he had to nod his head. Yes, he did. Better that their parents had shouted at them to run and hide in the hills. It made the whole thing more palatable when he only had to face men with blades in their hands.
Even still, it would have been worse to lie. Eirik wasted no time. "Where are they? Take me, now. We need to find them, and we need to ensure that nobody sullies himself there, is that understood?"
"They were hidden away, but I found them. With this," he said, pointing with his eyes towards the woman in his arms, who still struggled fruitlessly. "While we walk—can you help me with this? It stings badly, and I'd have it gone."
He turned, the point of the shaft stuck through him swinging through the air. "I don't know. Having it gone could bleed badly."
"I'm sorry?"
"I was saying," the tall, slender man said, a little louder, "that it would kill most men to have this through them, never mind to remove it."
"I am not most men."
"No, I suppose you are not, Gunnar. I suppose you are not."
A woman ran past them, nearly falling when she saw the two men. Their weapons never rose, just watching her pass by. There would be time later, if the need arose.
The largest building in the square was obvious before they were close, and it was more obvious still that Gunnar had been there. The door was covered in score-marks, a hole large enough to put the large man's shoulder through. And it hung loosely on the frame.
The rain and muck made it nice to get inside, but both knew that their fight was not inside. They would have to go back out, once they were sure.
A young man was there, one that Gunnar recognized but couldn't name. A last-minute addition to the party. He had put his sword back into its sheath, and the knife that each of them carried at his hip had come out. It took the both of them only a moment to realize what he intended to do with it.
Gunnar rolled the girl off his shoulder, slowing her descent with his arm even as he pulled up his sword. Eirik was quicker, his ax already swirling.
"Put that away, boy," he called out.
He was still too young to know what he was doing in the raids, but he wasn't too young to kill. There was no glory to be had killing children.
"They're all right here," he said. Gunnar noted the woman at his feet, no older than seventeen. He would have split the boy's head if not for the fact that Eirik's ax came down hard through his shoulder, splitting down straight through the boy's middle. He fell away, and Eirik put a foot on his body, pushing down to pull the ax free.
Then he entered the hidden room, half of a door hanging loosely across the entrance. A vicious growl came out, like a bear's, and a moment later a dozen screaming children ran out as fast as their small legs would carry them. Gunnar chased after them.
They were running as fast as their legs could carry them, but he could have caught them easily with his long, powerful strides. As they made the edge of the village, and towards the green hills, he slowed and stopped. He checked the edge of the houses to make sure that nobody would come after them. Then he turned back. He hoped she hadn't run. It would only make it worse.
Two
Deirdre was worried about what was going to happen next. She was surprised at the lanky man's calm demeanor after the man who grabbed her ran off. Who was he? Was he one of the men in her vision? Was he the weak one? She wondered. He had split the raider boy practically in half.
It was only after a moment that she noticed Alice in a pile on the floor. She hadn't been in the room before. Deirdre had hoped that she would keep her distance. If she'd just stayed away—
There's no reason to assume she would have been alright. Deirdre tried to to remind herself of that. The only person in the village who'd spent more than a moment talking to her lay dead on the floor in front of her.
She'd seen the big man chasing the little ones out of the room, screaming like a madman. Practically frothing at the mouth, she thought. She could still hear the screams of battle, of fear. All the death around her. She shivered.
The time seemed to pass strangely. When she wanted to think, it was going too quickly. Yet, now that she wanted nothing more than for it to be over, it seemed to last forever.
When the raid was over, she at least had her own two feet on the ground, and had all her limbs. That was more than many could say. The dead littered the ground, and the few who had been spared were barely able to walk. She wasn't surprised to find that they had more captured when they walked her and the others back to a makeshift camp.
The big men were perhaps thirty or forty, and they moved with the easy grace of men who knew how to use their bodies. The one who had been speared through walked in the front, not looking at her. She wondered if she could have run, but two men flanked the group of captured. They would have chased her down before she made the treeline.
Deirdre let out a soft breath and waited. It was all she could do. Only, they didn't bring her to the post where the others were tied up. She came to it, saw them looping rope thongs around the pole and then tying up the rest, but she was taken past. She didn't fight.
