Chapter Text
01.- Through hell to the stars
Britannia was in a dire situation, Jude knew that, his father had told him that since before he could remember, but he personally could not understand the necessity of this alliance. The Northmen were little more than savages. No matter how much they had promised to change, they would always be brutal raiders from the fjords, that’s what all of his mother’s ladies-in-waiting said when they thought he was not listening.
“I expect you to be on your best behaviour,” said his mother, Queen Denise of Britannia, looking up from her needlework. “we didn’t make this journey for you to upset the Jarl’s heir.”
“Yes, Mother." he rolled his eyes as he turned to look from the carriage window at how they passed the misty hills rolling past.
“Listen here, my child. "Denise sighed wearily. “Neither of us holds any fondness for the Northmen, but the Jarl’s longships and warriors are what Britannia needs to survive the coming storms, especially with the Spanriad sudden expansion. You will be courteous.”
“I know, Mother," he said, hiding his true feelings. “It is my duty.”
Jude kept looking at the window, longing for the grassy fields of his home, permitting himself to daydream about galloping on his mare, going hunting with his brother in secret, running through the tall grass and swimming in the creek near the palace – all those liberties died when he presented as an Omega at fifteen.
He was an Omega, he that was the heir of the crown of Britannia. Suddenly all of it was gone with the earthy and subtly sweet smell of wild Poppies and ripe Pears, an unmistakable and undeniable Omega.
His world ended before it even started.
"Jude," his mother finally put her needlework aside, “I am being serious. I am aware of your opinion of these arrangem—"
"Mother," Jude said with more force than he intended, “I have no opinion of the arrangement because I was not consulted. Neither Father nor you even thought about my opinion.”
“The Haalands have an excellent reputation.” The Queen said decisively
“Reputation?” Jude’s lip curled. “No matter if they dress him in the finest clothes or how many call him 'lord', he would always be a savage, blood-stained reaver from the north!” he growled, then he forced a bit of properness. “Your Highness.”
"This", said his mother, her usually sweet-tart blackcurrant scent going sour, “is the kind of attitude I do not want to see when we meet the Jarl and his family. You are a prince. you are a Bellingham. You represent our house and the crown of Britannia. Act like it.”
Jude kept his jaw clenched, fearing that if he spoke he would be scolded like a wayward pup caught raiding his father’s study.
“Understood?
The ambience in the carriage grew thick and stifling. The urge to curl into a tight nest of furs and blankets rose in his chest; he had to swallow down a pathetic whine that threatened to slip free.
“Understood, my son?” she pressed.
“Yes, your Grace.” He answered softly, eyes fixed on the hills beyond the window.
Denise picked up his needlework again. “It is not my wish to wound you, my boy, but this is your—"
“My duty", the word tested like ash, “I know, Mother."
(...)
Erling Haaland had no plan to marry. None whatsoever.
He was the Jarl’s heir, a proud Alpha that lived with salt water in his hair, the sound of the waves crashing into longboats, the simple joy of the hunt, the burn of a strong mead and the roaring chants in the great hall. He had become what he always wanted: a terror on the battlefield and a disaster in any marriage conversation.
His scent, the pleasant mix of pine, saltwater and wild thyme, clung to fur and leather, untamed and unapologetic. No well-mannered, courtly, proper Omega would ever tame him.
Sadly, his mother did not agree in the slightest.
Erling ducked under the low doorframe of the sleeping alcove at the far end of the longhouse and stretched, his back popping. The great hall was already alive with morning noise, thralls tending the central hearth, the crackle of burning pine logs, and the low murmur of his father’s huscarls breaking their fast.
Smoke curled upward toward the roof vents, carrying the rich smells of porridge, salted fish, and his mother’s sharp lingonberry and yarrow scent.
And there she was.
Gry Marita Braut stood near the high seat, a queen in furs and iron keys, arms crossed, eyes locked on him the instant he appeared.
“Erling Haaland!” she hollered, her voice cutting through the hall. “You will not avoid this conversation again. The delegation from Britannia arrives within days, and you are still behaving like a wild young wolf with no thought for the pack.”
He grabbed a hunk of bread from the table and tore into it, snickering around the mouthful. “Good morning to you too, Mamma. I slept well, thank you for asking.”
She did not smile back. “The alliance with Britannia is no jest, Erling. The Jarl, your father, has already agreed to the match. You will meet this prince with respect and not embarrass this house.”
Erling rolled his eyes and took a swing of buttermilk a thrall had already poured for him. “I hunt. I fight. I drink. I have no interest in being some pampered southern Omega’s lapdog.”
His mother’ scent soured with irritation. “Erling, you are the heir, and your duty is heavier than any childish wishes. You will be the Jarl–”
“You do not know that," he corrected her.
“Yes, I do,” she affirmed, “and as the Jarl, your duty is to protect Nordheim.”
“Yes, Mamma,” he sighed. “I know.”
The oak door of the long house opened, letting the cold air in, and Jarl Alf-Inge Haaland entered the hall like he did most things: loudly and with any attempt at subtlety or shame.
“Wife!” He said with a grin, greeting Gry Marita, as he had not seen her for a year instead of since the moment he had woken up.
Gry Marita didn't turn to greet her husband, she had stopped mid-lecture with the quiet resignation of a woman who had heard her husband coming from three rooms over. “Husband.” She said in a flat, resigned voice.
Alf-Inge’s scent rolled ahead of him into the hall: aged oak and iron, the smell of a man who had spent thirty winters mending roofs, sharpening axes, and hauling nets, not merely raiding for glory. He crossed the hall in a few long strides and dropped onto the bench beside his son hard enough to make the whole thing groan.
“Boy!” Alf-Inge boomed next, clapping a hand on Erling’s shoulder hard enough to make him stagger half a step, bread still in his mouth.
"Pappa," Erling raised his cup of buttermilk in a mock salute, not bothering to hide his relief at his father's interruption.
The Jarl grabbed a hunk of bread off the table without asking, exactly as his son had done minutes before. “Your mother’s face tells me she’s already been at you about the Britons.”
“She has,” Erling said. “Repearedly.”
“Good.” Alf-Inge said, taking a swing of his son’s cup. “Because she’s right.”
Gry Marita finally turned, arms still crossed, one eyebrow raised and a smug, satisfied smile on her face.
Erling groaned and let his head fall back. “Not you too.”
“Walk with me, boy.” Alf-Inge stood, ruffling his son’s hair and grabbing his neck, the gesture was more of a command than an invitation.
They stepped out past the palisade into the cold morning air that smelt of salt and woodsmoke, with gulls crying somewhere over the fjord. They walked in silence for a while, boots crunching over frost-hardened mud, past the drying racks heavy with fish and the pens where the goats complained about the cold.
“You hate this,” Alf-Inge said finally. Not a question.
“I don’t hate the idea,” Erling said, then reconsidered. “I hate that no one had bothered to ask me, Pappa.”
Alf-Inge huffed, and it sounded too much like a chuckle. “No one asked me either, boy. Not about your mother, not about the Jarldom, not about half the things that ended up happening in my life.” He stopped walking and looked out over the fjord, where the grey water meets the greyer sky. “You think I wanted to spend my twentieth summer standing in front of the Folkmoot, waiting for the freemen of this land to choose if I was worth following? I stood there with my father’s sword in my hand and my knees like water, and I did not know if I would walk away a Jarl or walk away being just a Haaland.”
Erling glanced at him. He’d been hearing this story since he was five or six summers old, but he had never heard it like this. “You always said you knew the Folkmoot would choose you.”
“I lied.” Alf–Inge smiled, but it did not quite reach his eyes. “A man does not get to be afraid in front of his son… not until his son is old enough to protect himself.”
Erling said nothing, so his father went on.
“You are not Jarl yet, my son. You might not ever be, if the Folkmoot decides differently when the time comes, this our way, and I will not lie to you and say otherwise.” He turned to face Erling fully now, his face full of paternal pride and stubborn seriousness. “But whether they choose you or not, you are my heir today, and today Nordheim needs Britannia to look at us and see something worth allying with. Not raiders. Not the savages the southerners tell about to frighten their children, but as people worth respecting, as allies.”
“So I’m to be a – a token," Erling said, bitterness creeping into his voice. “A breeding stallion for the Britons.”
Alf-Inge let out a huffed laugh. “You are a prince marrying a prince. That is not nothing, boy. That is history being written, and you get to hold the pen even if you didn’t choose the ink.” He clapped a hand on Erling’s shoulder again, gentler this time. “I did not choose your mother for love, I did not even choose her, but the love came slowly, but it came until I couldn’t remember why I’d ever been afraid of it.” He looked back toward the longhouse, he could picture his wife that was probably still glaring at the space where they’d been standing. “I am not telling you that you will love this British prince. I am not telling you that duty and misery are not the same thing, no matter how much they can feel it at nineteen.”
Erling exhaled a long breath through his nose, watching it fog in the cold air. “You make it sound easy.”
“It is not easy. It was never easy.” Alf-Inge started walking again, back toward the gate. “But you will do it anyway. Because you are my son, and because Nordheim needs a future, and because sulking about it will not make the Britons’ ships arrive any slower.”
(...)
The arrival of the Britannian delegation turned the fjord settlement into a spectacle. Longships had been cleared from the docks, and a path of fresh pine boughs led up to the great hall. Thralls and freemen alike gathered to stare at the southern strangers in their fine cloaks and polished armour.
The banners had been raised since dawn, Bellingham royal blue and silver snapping in the wind alongside the deep burgundy and gold of the House of Haaland, an alliance stitched together in cloth before it existed anywhere.
Jude thought it was the first sign of civilisation the Northman had ever shown. He stood beside his mother in his most formal coat, which glowed against his dark skin in a deep royal blue, embroidered with silver thread that caught the weak northern sunlight, doing his best impression of a prince who wanted to be anywhere else.
“Smile.” Denise murmured through her own perfect, practised smile, not moving her lips more than necessary.
“I am smiling," he muttered back.
“You are baring your teeth.”
He adjusted his expression a fraction as the Jarl and his kin approached. Alf-Inge first, broad and grinning and entirely too loud for a formal court greeting, then Gry Marita beside him, regal in a strapped burgundy dress and furs that accommodate the weather, and to the right of Jarl was –
Jude’s first thought was that Erling Haaland was enormous. His second thought, which made him feel terribly ashamed and which he buried immediately, was that he was not unhandsome, in the way a bear is not unhandsome, impressive, undeniably present, and not something you wanted to get close to.
When Erling’s gaze fell upon Jude, he couldn’t help thinking that the Brit was pretty, like a deer treading carefully through the fresh snow, delicate, graceful, and entirely out of place among the rugged pines and salt-crusted longhouses. The Omega was smaller than he expected, but there was steel in that spine, though. Interesting.
When the formal greetings began, Jude stepped forward and extended his hand, expecting the firm clasp common among nobles back home.
Erling looked at the offered hand for half a heartbeat too long, as if it were a foreign object he had to translate. Then, with a surprising amount of gentleness, he took Jude’s hand gently in his much larger one, bowed his head, and brushed a light kiss across the back of it.
Jude went rigid. A flicker of offence flashing across his face. The audacity of this brute, suddenly the reality settled in like cold seawater. He was an Omega. This was how any proper Alpha back in Britannia would have greeted a royal Omega of his station. The realisation stung more than the gesture itself.
This was not a cruel mockery of a brute Northman, but Erling’s expression held nothing but solemn courtesy, the kind of practised formality of a man who had been coached on how one greeted a highborn Omega and had committed to the performance completely.
Right, Jude thought, the heat in his chest curdling into something more like resignation. Of course. An unmarried Omega prince did not get handshakes, not even from savages who apparently knew that much of Britannian custom. He should have expected it. He had expected it, from his countrymen, at least, and simply forgot himself for a moment, forgetting what he was, standing here dressed in his finest like a fair maiden being offered to a lord. Because that was what he was, after all, an Omega offered to the highest bidder.
Erling straightened, his pine and salt scent steady and strong. He offered what he clearly thought was a charming half-smile. “Prince Jude of Britannia. Welcome to Nordheim. I’m so happy you could come."
Jude forced his expression into something polite and neutral, suppressing the sharp retort that wanted to escape. “Thank you, Lord Erling. I’m so happy to be here.”
Neither of them ment it.