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"What happened to Askeladd?"
It had been a little over two years since Canute and Thorfinn last saw one another in the setting sun on Ketil's battle-torn farm. The day it seemed to begin. And now they were here. Thorfinn had called in a favor, needing Canute’s help to safely pass back through the Baltic Sea.
They were both as they had been the last time they saw each other. They both stood by their own ideals, their own morals, and their own ideas of how to create a better world, and they were both so different from what they had been when they first met. That was what Thorfinn had been thinking about, and when he thought of the past, he normally thought of Askeladd as well, so he asked Canute that simple question.
Canute looked puzzled, and a short silence weighed heavily between them as they both remembered the day their mentor had died.
"What do you mean?" Canute asked, after all, the answer to Thorfinn's question was an obvious one. What had happened to Askeladd? He had died by Canute's sword, in Thorfinn's arms.
But that wasn't what Thorfinn meant, of course. He could never forget that moment after all.
"His body..." he clarified for Canute.
It was a silly thing to worry about. There was a time that Thorfinn would've been happy if Askeladd's body was left to rot in an open field, but as he was now, thinking of his past in a much different way, he hoped that wasn't what had happened to him.
"Oh." Canute sighed and watched the waves for a moment. It had been such a long time since then, and everything that happened immediately after his death had always been a blur. Canute respected Askeladd, despite what he had done, and he had been the very first man that Canute ever killed. Still, he did remember what he had ordered to be done with his body. "I sent him back home. To Wales."
"Wales?"
"His home..."
Canute went on to explain it all, everything that had happened in the hall that day, and how Askekadd was forced to choose between Canute and his homeland.
After all the years that had passed since Askeladd died, Thorfinn had never thought that there was still more to learn about the man. But Thorfinn remembered the tale Askeladd had told him the night of their final duel, the story of how he killed his father. 'How to truly kill someone you had' is how he had described it before beginning. He didn't remember the exact words, but their meanings were clear, and now he knew which land his mother had been stolen from. Wales.
"What are the customs there, in Wales? Do you know?"
"I believe that the dead are buried." Canute shrugged.
Thorfinn said nothing for a long time. He thought of the state of his father's grave outside the walls of Jomsborg, how it had been destroyed and scattered. He had hoped he would find a little peace standing over his father's grave, but it had only hurt. Still, Thorfinn wondered...
"Would I be allowed to enter Wales territory if you, the king of Denmark and England, vouched for me?"
Canute looked at Thorfinn with an arched eyebrow, looking at him like he thought he just said the strangest thing, but he composed himself quickly, easily finding amusement in Thorfinn's questions.
"I wonder..."
It was difficult to explain to the rest of the crew why Thorfinn wanted to make a small detour by Wales. The country wasn't known for being welcoming, and everyone just wanted to go back home after 2 years of travel. The reason Thorfinn had to go did not help their moods in the slightest.
He was asked if Askeladd truly deserved the respect. Leif especially looked especially horrified, and Thorfinn understood. Leif had only seen the bad, the killing, and the Viking leader. Thorfinn hesitated to explain his complicated feelings. He didn't want to make it sound like he excused all of Askeladd's terrible deeds. As he had once explained to Einar, Thorfinn would still describe Askeladd as a cruel person.
He had been raised by a cruel person, who could be incredibly wise and who, despite having hurt him, had also done many good things for him.
It was complicated feelings, and not all were ones he was ready to voice. But Thorfinn had opened up about how he wanted to know if visiting Askeladd's grave, as the man he was now, would give him closure he couldn't otherwise find, and slowly, with Gudrid and Einar taking the lead, the rest accepted it, although Bug-Eyes made sure to complain the entire way until their boat finally bumped against the harbor bridge.
Gratianus, the man that had led them through Wales all those years ago, stood on the shore. He looked like a weathered warrior from an entirely different time, standing with the wind in his back, a red cloak flowing with the wind as he descended towards them and met with Thorfinn.
Canute, who had promised to never interfere, had sent a letter. In it, he had explained that Thorfinn was the last surviving member of Askeladd's band. A slight lie, as Atli was also still alive, that is, if he had survived Gorm's attack on Vagn's camp.
Gratianus recognized him, having taken notice of him when they had first met, even though they had never exchanged words.
Thorfinn explained that all he wanted to do was visit Askeladd's grave.
"Is that all?"
"Yes. If you will allow me, I will... pay my respects, and then you will never see us again."
Gratianus' old tired eyes wandered from Thorfinn to the rest of the crew behind him. Thorfinn had not even stepped foot off of the ship yet. His harsh eyes lingered on the strangers to whom he had no connection. He only accepted their presence at all because they were with Thorfinn, and he only respected him because Askeladd had seemed fond of him all those years ago.
"You may," he finally allowed, "but they will stay here," he continued and motioned to the rest of the crew behind him.
Thorfinn felt a little bad about it, but he understood the mistrust etched into the people of Wales, and he would not disrespect them by arguing that his friends really posed no threat at all.
"I understand."
Gudrid came up behind him, worried for his safety, and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Are you sure that's a good idea? What if something happens?" She spoke quietly, not wanting anyone to hear her mistrust and worries.
Thorfinn just smiled and shook his head.
"I'll be fine," he assured her. He couldn't imagine that the Welsh people would pick a fight with him for no reason, especially not when Canute had vouched for him. He was sure it would break their non-aggression treaty.
A chill ran down Thorfinn's spine. He thought he had prepared himself, but maybe nothing would prepare you for seeing the grave belonging to someone who had been such a big part of your life. It was different from seeing the scattered remains of his own father's grave. That one had not resembled a grave in the slightest, but this...
A flat stone, clean, not overgrown in the slightest, sitting side by side with another grave.
On one stone a long name was written in a language he didn’t know. Though, from his conversation with Canute he knew what was written. His true name, and it was strange seeing that, Askeladd’s true language, in his own language. But on the other stone, a shorter name was written.
"Who’s that?" Thorfinn asked carefully.
"Lady Lydia. A direct descendant of Artorius, the royal bloodline of Wales... she was his mother."
"I see." Thorfinn nodded, again remembering how Askeladd had described his mother. A beautiful soul who had gone mad in the end.
On Lydia's grave was a small bouquet of yellow flowers, while Askeladd's was empty. Thorfinn wasn't surprised. looking back on the time they had traveled through Wales, Askeladd had been respected, but he hadn't been loved. There were no smiles greeting him anywhere.
He felt Gratianus' gaze bore into him from behind, analyzing every breath he took, and probably wondering why Thorfinn was so silent.
Minutes that felt like hours passed, and Gratianus sighed deeply behind him, a sound almost swallowed by the wind, followed by the crunching footsteps.
Thorfinn blinked and looked over his shoulder to see Gratianus walking away. Only then, watching him waking from behind in the uneven grassy terrain, did he see that age had caught up to him as well. He seemed to struggle for a moment as he sank into a protruding rock and watched the horizon.
Of course, he was only going far enough to be out of earshot, not so far that he couldn't keep an eye on Thorfinn.
Thorfinn turned back to the stones and felt himself at a loss for what to say and do. His hands felt useless hanging by his side, so he gripped the fabric of his cloak and twisted, holding it so tight that his knuckles were turning white. He had a hundred things to say, if not more, but nothing came out.
He remembered Askeladd's last moments, the moments he had spent using his last breaths to encourage Thorfinn to do something better, to make something more out of life, to go further, and to become a true warrior, but all Thorfinn had done was scream. He hadn't wanted to accept that those were Askeladd's final moments.
Even if he had, he hadn't been in a place where he could appreciate the good things that Askeladd had done for him.
"I..." That voice did not sound like his own.
For a moment he didn't feel like a twenty-four-year-old man, but instead, he was seventeen again, standing over a dead man. The man who had begrudgingly raised him.
He let himself wonder if it had been a mistake coming to Wales.
Just like when he had stood over his father's scattered grave, Thorfinn was hurting.
"I... uh... hi, Askeladd." He scratches the back of his neck and realizes that he had never spoken to Askeladd. He had shouted, been snarky and sarcastic, and as threatening as he could manage. He had never used this tone, and he was sure Askeladd was rolling sighted underground.
Thorfinn looked down at his boots, then at the grave, and then at the sky. He had thought the words would come easier when he first spoke, but the introduction had definitely been the easiest part.
"Okay..." he said, letting out a deep sigh. "I... never thought I'd go out of my way to see you again. For so many years I wanted you dead, but now...
He raised a hand and rubbed at the back of his head.
"Or maybe since the moment you drew your last breath, I wish you weren't. I couldn't really think when you died, but I think I had a lot of regrets, you know. And a lot of questions." Thorfinn looked behind him again, at the same horizon Gratianus was looking at. And he continued speaking. "I don't think I got it at first. What you told me at the end. I guess I didn't think you were the type of person who could want that for me, nor that you respected my father."
There were a lot of things he knew and understood now that he hadn't before. He knew who Askeladd was, he knew the truth behind his father's death, which made it easier to believe that Askeladd had respected him and wanted the same for Thorfinn that his own father would’ve wanted in the end.
"Go further..." Thorfinn mumbled, looking back at the silent, unresponsive grave. "I'm going to do it. I've been to Miklagaard, I've... gotten a family, like my father. A wife that loves me as my mother loved my father. I even have a child and a good group of people who care about me." His shoulders slumped more as he relaxed, his voice and words flowing easier through him. "I'm going to bring them all to a place without war or slavery... free from the kind of people we used to be and the kind of person your father was. That's... my battle now."
The wind blew harder, nearly knocking Thorfinn to the side. It sounded like laughter in his ears.
"That's... what I wanted to tell you." He paused for a long time again, before speaking, his voice barely a whisper this time. "And also... thank you, Askeladd, or... Lucius.”
He let the final words hang there. That was how he wanted to leave this, with the gratitude he never got to give or knew he wanted to give.
He blew out a breath and shuffled. He was about to leave. He had said what he needed to say. He had finally said goodbye, in his own way, but he cast a glance back at Lydia's grave and the flowers there.
He glanced back at Gratianus, whose eyes had shifted, looking at Thorfinn.
He didn't feel as intimidated.
He reached down, grasping at the plants by his feet. Weeds that looked like flowers, not as pretty as the yellow ones, but maybe that fit perfectly, and he placed them on top of Askeladd's grave.