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He had been pushed down to his knees three times today.
He had been slapped on the side of his head twice.
He had been surrounded and pawed at by a half-dozen boys who thought he had no manhood. They had all but stripped him naked before Ragnar had laughingly put a stop to it.
His food had been fed to him by Ragnar’s hand, in a roomful of people who laughed and stared at him.
Ragnar’s brother, Rollo, the one who’d wanted to kill him, had planted a foot on his rope when Ragnar pulled him up. The burn had not yet faded, from the rope or the malicious joviality it spurred.
And now, Ragnar led him towards the path to home, taking him by his dead brethren.
Athelstan was tired and hurt and humiliated. He was past the point of caring if he angered this man. He stopped in his tracks.
What followed was a moment of fear, then resignation as he willingly knelt. He saw the gleam of the knife, stared at his reflection in it as Ragnar stood over him. He was ready. So ready. Ragnar had raised his head and looked at him and Athelstan had almost whispered a thank you.
But then the rope fell away and he was still alive.
“Run away if you want,” Ragnar had said. He left Athelstan there.
Run? Where?
So he followed. He grit his teeth and swallowed his tears and followed like the dog he was.
By the time Ragnar stopped, Athelstan was so deeply entrenched in his misery he merely sat where he stood. He didn’t even take the pack and roll from his shoulders. Ragnar built his own pallet and ignored him, which suited Athelstan just fine.
“You’re quiet.”
Athelstan did nothing.
“What good would cutting your throat do, priest?”
Still he did nothing.
“Stop sulking and come here. I don’t want to start a fire so we’ll have to sleep close.”
Raising his eyes only, Athelstan looked at him. He was on his back, arms behind his head and legs sprawled. The smug half-smile on his face was galling. Athelstan felt the heat of rage stain his cheeks, followed by the sting of tears. He lowered his eyes. He did not move.
“Priest,” Ragnar called, sounding more like he cajoled his wife to bed.
Athelstan bit his lip. Hard. He was breathing through his nose and it sounded very loud to his ears.
“Don’t make me come get you.”
He squeezed his eyes shut and slowly lifted the straps from his shoulder.
“Leave off with that,” Ragnar said, meaning the roll of blankets and furs he held. “We won’t need them.”
Athelstan put that aside. He lay the pack down next to it. When he raised his eyes, he saw Ragnar had turned onto his side and propped his head on his palm. He was watching, and patted the blankets beside him with a lift of his brows.
“Come here.” Ragnar’s tone was now gentle, as if he coaxed a child.
Standing stiffly, Athelstan took slow steps towards him. He lowered to the ground once more, not kneeling this time, for his knees were bruised. He had just set one hand on the ground when he felt the hand on his wrist. Ragnar yanked it from under him, causing him to fall.
Then it was as if a serpent had him. Arms and legs wrapped around him and forced him onto his back and he struggled against them. It was useless, he knew, but he could not stop the flailing of his limbs. Ragnar did it for him, instead.
“What’s this? Now you fight?” Ragnar laughed, holding him tight and looking down on him.
Gritting his teeth, Athelstan kept his eyes trained on the stitching of Ragnar’s tunic.
“Athelstan,” Ragnar cooed, “you look like you might weep.”
He felt the man shift, bringing his knees up so that he could hover above Athelstan.
“Do you want to cry, little priest?” Ragnar asked, still in that soft, doting voice.
There were tears in his eyes, but Athelstan refused to let them fall.
“Won’t you cry for me? I want you to.”
He shut his eyes against them.
“Oh, Athelstan, you were so good today,” Ragnar sighed. “Why must you spoil it?”
Ragnar’s hands were hard on him then, turning him over onto his front. His wrists were taken and bound tightly. Too tight, really, and when Ragnar rolled him again, his own weight made his hands thump and his shoulders ache. Ragnar planted one of his hands beside his head. He could feel the solid strength of it, so close that if he looked to his left his nose would brush the sleeve.
“Look at me.” Even quietly spoken, the command was impossible to ignore. Athelstan opened his eyes.
The man stared at him, tilting his head and Athelstan felt a curl of dread.
“I want you to cry,” he said.
Athelstan bent his knees to try and kick out from beneath him. Ragnar dropped his whole weight right on his stomach. Breathless now, he stilled, looking past the other man and up at the sky. He didn’t see the blow coming.
Ragnar slapped him, open handed and hard enough to hurt. He struck his cheek with his open palm and waited until Athelstan’s eyes met his to do it again. “Cry for me, slave,” he whispered.
The blows continued; three, four, five times. Athelstan’s face was throbbing and hot. He tasted blood in the corner of his mouth.
“Athelstan,” Ragnar said, laying the sixth and hardest by far. His head whipped to the side and hit Ragnar’s arm. “I want you to cry.”
Seven. Eight.
“You are a stubborn slave,” Ragnar complained, and this time the back of his hand caught Athelstan’s other cheek.
The water in his eyes spilled over.
“I treat you so well, and you will not do this for me?” Ragnar took his chin and forced him to look up.
Athelstan was panting, fighting against sobs that tore at his chest. It hurt more than his face, like a great vise was holding him, bruising and breaking his ribs. But that was his heart, for the breaking was from within and it choked him. It clogged his throat and blurred his vision.
There was a gentle touch to his head, fingers weaving into the hair behind his ear. “That’s it. That’s it.”
The tenderness in that voice released the clamp and cleared his throat. His sobs were free.
“Shh, shh, shh…it’s okay now.” These words were whispered against his cheek, the one that ached and burned. It was kissed and nuzzled, but Athelstan barely registered this as he cried. The pent up anger, the fear and humiliation all collided and overflowed. It rushed from him in such great lamentations his whole body shook.
He was turned, rolled over to lay against Ragnar’s side. The solid warmth of the man’s arms was around him and his face was pressed into the breadth of Ragnar’s shoulder. “Let it out, now. That’s good.”
Ragnar held him, stroked his head and his back and let him cry. He didn’t know how long it took before he began to quiet but Ragnar never stopped his comfort. Even as the flood of tears slowed and his sobbing became desperate, hitching breaths, he was gently and lovingly caressed. When finally he was only shuddering with remembered gasps, Ragnar loosened his hold, but only to arrange them in a more comfortable position.
He didn’t ask anything else from Athelstan. He wiped his face, dropped a quick, chaste kiss to his lips, and settled down to bed.
“Go to sleep, priest.”
Oddly, Athelstan did.
In the morning, he felt rested. None of the anger or humiliation remained. HIs face was only slightly sore and his wrists were untied.
When Ragnar smiled in greeting, he shyly smiled back.