Between cross and raven Chapter 26. What cruelty shapes
Thank you @ivarthebadbitch for sharing your thoughts and willing to be my beta for this fic <3 And making this: https://www.tumblr.com/ivarthebadbitch/823081314192392192/he-leaned-back-slightly-watching-her-with-visible?source=share
.-.-.
To conquer a land of mud and water, you had to cut it in two.
From his vantage point atop his custom-built chariot, the Great Heathen Army looked exactly as Ivar intended: a split serpent, coordinated and lethal.
His brothers did not understand that this particular place on earth had a shape, a rhythm, and if a man did not learn to read it, it would swallow him whole.
They were striking deep into the delta, targeting the trading settlement of Daventre. Ivar had split their strength. Ubbe and Sigurd had taken the longships, commanding the fleet that carried the heavy provisions and their finest oarsmen along the winding river called Isla.
Meanwhile, Ivar and Hvitserk led the land vanguard; hundreds of mounted warriors and men on foot keeping perfect pace with the oars from the riverbank.
The rumble of the heavy wooden wheels beneath his chariot vibrated through the timbers, humming directly into the iron braces on Ivar's legs. He was locked into the high, central saddle of the chariot, a masterfully engineered frame that allowed him to stand tall, commanding his horses and his men.
To his right rode Hvitserk, matching his pace on a powerful stallion, his eyes scanning the tree line for any sign of Frankish resistance, briefly meeting Ivar’s.
His brother did not see the sweat dampening the wool beneath Ivar's tunic, or the dull, throbbing ache in his legs where the leather straps pulled tight. Hvitserk only saw the mask.
Ivar flicked his gaze toward the riverbank beneath his wheels. They were riding in the exact place that slim, trembling finger had pointed to on the map in the dark of his tent.
Ubbe had been ready to march them blindly along the western bank, lured by the wide, deceptively flat green meadows. The argument around the central campfire the night before had nearly boiled over in front of half the camp, with Ubbe insisting on the obvious open ground. But Ivar had stared through the crackling flames, his eyes locking onto his older brother’s with a lethal, unyielding intensity.
"Last time, you made a bad call and I nearly died because of it," Ivar had growled, letting the bitter weight of that old memory hang heavy between them. He had paused, watching the flinch in Ubbe’s jaw before twisting the knife. "You had to leave me behind, Ubbe. Allow me to make this decision this time. You owe me that."
And if he had not forced Ubbe to yield, their horses and his heavy chariot would currently be sinking to their chests in the black, suffocating muck of the palus profunda.
Instead, they kept to the eastern side. They trod upon the firm, solid ridge of compacted gravel and sand left behind by the Cursus rapidus. The ground held. The vanguard moved without missing a single step.
Ivar's hand instinctively pressed against his chest, feeling the stiff roll of vellum tucked safely inside his leather tunic. Combined with Magdalena’s ability to read it properly, it was his secret weapon.
He glanced over his shoulder at the supply cart trailing directly behind his chariot.
The heavy wagon was driven by Hvithár. Wedged deeply inside the cart, hidden between heavy wooden crates of salted provisions and iron spearheads, sat his slave. Magdalena looked small, her cloak pulled tight around her shoulders against the biting river wind.
Right beside her, taking up most of the space in the wagon bed, lay Garmr. Ivar had left the dog there for a reason. Garmr was a guard, an extension of Ivar's own eyes to keep her safe from the rough, predatory impulses of the camp when Ivar had to be elsewhere. And to ensure she didn't try to run.
As if feeling the weight of his stare, Magdalena’s head lifted slowly from the depth of the wagon. Her pale face emerged from the shadow of her veil, and her eyes found his over the wooden lip of the cart.
The wind whipped a strand of Ivar's hair across his eyes, but he did not blink. He did not smile at her, nor did he offer any sign of comfort. He simply stared down at her from his chariot. He wanted her to look out at the marching army on the gravel banks. He wanted her to look at Hvitsár’s broad back, at Hvitserk’s gleaming axe, and know that she had guided them here.
He needed her to feel the weight of that all.
Because the truth was, she made no sense to him. She made him doubt his own certainties and forced him to question things he had never dared to look at.
She mattered to him; a realization that terrified him more than any Frankish army.
And so, it was infinitely easier to force her into hating him, to make her an accomplice to his cruelty, than it was to face the fact that a Christian slave had found a way behind his armor.
He wanted her to hate him. He needed her to. Hate was a currency he understood; it was clean, predictable, and safe. If he could force her to look at this army and loathe him for what he was making her do, the unsettling warmth she brought out in him would die. It was infinitely easier to handle her hatred than to face the terror of her kindness.
Daventre was rushing to meet them, and for the first time, the Christians would find that the Northmen knew their river better than they did.
.-.-.
The gravel gave way to trampled earth as dusk settled over the banks of the Isla. Wagons formed a jagged perimeter, stakes were hammered into the dirt, and within an hour, the scent of roasting horseflesh and damp wood smoke choked out the clean smell of the river.
Magdalena’s limbs were stiff, aching with a deep, dull throb from hours of being wedged tightly against the rough wooden ribs of the cart. She hadn't been allowed down once during the entire march.
The moment her wagon rolled to a shuddering stop, Hvitsár hauled his heavy frame down from the bench and unhitched Garmr. The dog gave a low, rumbling sigh and settled against the wheel, sitting like a stone sentinel in the mud while a group of northmen began clearing a space nearby to raise Ivar’s tent.
Through the gaps in the tall wooden slats of the cart, Magdalena saw Brechje maneuvering through the chaotic maze of bodies. The young woman was struggling under the weight of a massive iron cauldron filled to the brim with sloshing river water, her face lined with sheer exhaustion and slick with sweat in the orange glare of the campfires.
Brechje blinked, a flash of startled recognition crossing her weary features when she spotted Magdalena shifting inside the cart. As Magdalena carefully pushed herself up onto her knees Brechje gave a swift, barely visible shake of her head.
"You should not be standing up where the men can see you," Brechje muttered softly, her voice barely carrying over the roar of laughter of a group of drunk warriors wrestling a few yards away. "Not when he is not around. The prince has a short temper today.”
Brechje dumped the heavy iron cauldron onto the mud with a dull, ringing thud that splashed water over her boots. She wiped her forehead with the back of a filthy sleeve, stepping a fraction closer to the side of the wagon.
"The thrall girls in the back wagons... they are whispering," Brechje said, her voice dropping into a tight, conspiratorial whisper as her eyes darted toward the guards. "They say the nunna bewitched Ivar the Boneless. That you used a holy curse to keep his blade from your throat."
Magdalena’s breath caught in her chest, the raw fabric of her habit feeling suddenly tight against her skin. A curse. If only they knew that the only magic keeping herself and her sisters alive was a piece of vellum and a soul fracturing under the weight of her own complicity.
Before Magdalena could whisper a reply, the heavy thump of crutches against the hard-packed earth cut through the ambient noise of the camp.
Brechje’s eyes went wide. Without another word, she seized the handle of the sloshing cauldron, bent her head low, and scurried off into the flickering shadows between the tents, practically melting into the crowd.
The warriors who had been wrestling moments before quieted down, stepping back to clear a wide path. Through the haze of wood smoke, Ivar appeared.
He leaned heavily on his crutches, every rhythmic strike of wood and iron against the frozen earth driving a tense quiet through the camp. His face was set in hard, angular lines, illuminated from below by the embers of the central fire. His cloak hung dark over his broad shoulders, dusted with the grit of the day’s ride.
Garmr’s ears twitched, but the massive hound remained seated at the wheel, a silent boundary between the camp and the wagon.
Ivar stopped beside the wagon. His sharp eyes swept over the empty space where Brechje had just been, before flicking upward to lock onto Magdalena. He took in her position: kneeling up high in the cart, hands hidden in her stained sleeves, pale against the gloom.
Instead of a command, Ivar simply raised two fingers to his mouth and let out a sharp, piercing whistle. Garmr’s ears perked instantly. Ivar flicked his chin toward the tent that had just been raised a few yards away, then shifted his gaze to Magdalena, offering a curt, dismissive nod that told her to follow the hound.
A sharp sting of humiliation flared in Magdalena’s chest. He was directing her like an animal again. But as a bitter gust of river wind whipped through the wooden slats of the wagon, biting through her damp habit and making her teeth chatter, pride lost its edge. The thought of nesting atop Garmr’s pile of furs out of the freezing draft was far more tempting than sitting outside in the dark.
She gathered her skirts and clambered down from the wagon bed, hurrying after Garmr as she bounded toward the tent.
Inside, the space was bare and functional, set up strictly for a single night on the march. The wet floor was covered with straw. In the corner lay a low wooden bed frame stacked high with heavy pelts, and beside it sat the small wooden chest containing her medical supplies.
Ivar crossed the threshold, and the instant the heavy fabric fell shut behind him, the formidable warlord vanished. He lurched toward the bed, letting his crutches clatter noisily to the dirt floor. He collapsed onto the pelts with a ragged exhale, sagging into the furs as the sheer, suffocating weight of the day's pain rushed in to claim him.
Magdalena didn't hesitate. Moving with quiet, practiced pragmatism, she dropped to her knees beside the bed. She reached for the heavy iron braces locked around his calves, her fingers working deftly at the stiff, cold leather straps.
Ivar’s jaw clamped tight, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the furs beneath him. Foul, hissed Norse curses spilled through his gritted teeth, every movement of his legs sending sharp agony shooting through his body. Magdalena remained silent. She kept her eyes lowered, hyperaware that a single wrong word, a sigh, or even a misplaced glance could ignite the temper coiled tight inside him.
Once the braces were stripped away and set aside, she shifted her focus to his arm. She unwound the linen wrapping, inspecting the jagged pink line across his skin. Finding no heat or red streaks, she reached for her wooden bowl, mixing a pungent paste of crushed garlic and honey before gently spreading it over the tender flesh.
"I am growing short on clean linen and honey," Magdalena said softly.
Ivar shifted his head on the furs. His eyes locked directly onto hers.
"I’ll get some once we raid Daventre," he muttered hoarsely.
Magdalena’s fingers froze against his skin, her breath catching tight in her throat. "You speak of it as if it were a market stall. People live there; families, children, priests-"
A cold, sharp smirk touched the corner of Ivar’s mouth. He leaned back into the furs, watching the horror ripple across her pale face, savoring the raw reaction he had intentionally provoked.
"-Simple casualties, sacrifices for the greater good." Ivar repeated, the word dripping with casual disdain. "My brothers see a fat Christian trade town. They see silver chalices in the church, barrels of Frankish wine on the docks, and cattle to slaughter. They think like wolves chasing scraps."
He caught her wrist before she could pull away, his fingers locking around her pulse point, forcing her to stay close.
"They don't understand the shape of this land," he continued, his voice dropping into a low, hypnotic intensity. "Daventre sits right at its throat; high and dry on the sand ridge where the floods can't touch it. Once we take that ridge, nothing moves from the North Sea into the heart of the empire without my leave. We control the trade, the iron, the grain. My brothers want a raid..."
He leaned in closer, his eyes glittering with calculated ambition.
"...I am taking the gateway."
"Why?" Magdalena’s voice broke through the quiet of the tent, trembling with a sudden, desperate anger. "Why are you doing this?”
Ivar gave a sharp, bitter scoff. He shifted on the furs, pushing himself up to sit upright.
"I am a cripple," he growled, the words flat, heavy, and unyielding. "I will always be a cripple. So I have to be ten times better than any of my brothers for them to give me an ounce of respect. And that is the difference between you and I, Sancta Maria. I slit throats, while all you do is turn the other cheek.”
He leaned forward, locking his gaze onto hers like iron hooks, twisting the blade deeper.
"When a man cannot run, he learns to listen. Inside your convent I lay for days, watching the shadows, listening to your guards grumble, your old monk bless the dead, and your sisters whisper poison when they thought no one was paying attention."
Magdalena’s chest tightened, her breath catching in her throat.
"Those holy sisters you so desperately want to protect..." Ivar lowered his voice, dropping it into a venomous, intimate purr. "Behind your back, when she thought you were out of earshot; the scrawny, mousy one, Lidewij; she called you the Mozarabic bastard."
The revelation dragged a memory straight out of the dark, flashing behind her eyes with terrifying, suffocating clarity.
Suddenly she wasn't in a Viking tent on the Isla; she was four years old again, weeping because she had wet the bed. She could hear the heavy, echoing thud of her mother’s husband's boots coming down the hall, the sharp whistle of the leather crop slicing through the air, and the blinding, burning sting across her small back.
"You are a stain on this house!" he would roar, his face bloated and red with ale. "Not a drop of my blood in you! A bastard thorn!"
She remembered the agonizing weight of his hand grabbing her by the collar, shoving her down the splintered wooden stairs into the pitch-black wine cellar, locking the heavy iron bolt behind her for the night. She remembered the rats scratching behind the massive oak barrels, their cold, wiry feet running across her bare toes while she curled into a tight ball in the dirt, trying not to breathe too loudly; because even the sound of her eating at the dinner table had been enough to earn a backhand across the mouth.
Magdalena crumbled. Her hands dropped uselessly to her sides, her chest heaving as the color bled entirely from her face, her eyes wide and staring into nothingness.
Ivar watched her closely, shifting his weight. It was not entirely the reaction he had figured on. He had expected tears of denial, pious anger, or outraged defense of her holy order; not this hollow, shattering grief.
His eyes narrowed, studying the way her shoulders caved inward.
"Is that what cuts you so deep?" Ivar asked, his voice dropping low, almost incredulous. "A word? Bastard?"
He let out a short, dry breath; not quite a laugh, but heavy with dismissal.
"A bastard can swing an axe, Magdalena. A bastard can win gold, take a fleet, or claim a kingdom if he has the stomach to carve it out. Blood is cheap. Being a bastard is nothing; it is merely an inconvenience of birth."
He shifted his weight on the furs, a bitter shadow crossing his face as he tapped a hand against his own useless thigh.
"Being a cripple... being born with legs that will never carry your weight in a world that only respects strength... that is a curse."
He leaned back into the shadows, his tone softening into a rare, quiet cadence as he watched her frozen form.
"My father left me in the woods for the wolves the day I was born because of these legs. It was my mother's love that kept me alive; she fought for me when no one else would. I think you and I aren't so different when it comes to mothers?"
Slowly, Magdalena stood up.
The trembling in her limbs vanished, replaced by a sudden, rigid resolve. She straightened her spine, raised her head, and looked directly into Ivar's eyes without a single trace of fear.
"My mother is a weakling."
Ivar’s eyes narrowed slightly, intrigued by the sudden steel in her voice. "Explain."
Magdalena looked down at the dirt floor, a deep, burning shame flushing hot across her cheeks, though her voice remained steady.
"My mother's husband... he hated my mere existence," she whispered, the raw truth burning her throat. "And therefore he thrived on disciplining my disobedience."
In her mind, the dark kitchen flashed before her; the heavy leather strap raised high, and her mother standing quietly in the doorway, wiping her hands on her apron, her eyes fixed firmly on the stone floor while her daughter screamed.
"My mother let him," Magdalena said, looking back up to meet Ivar's intense stare. "She stood there and allowed it all. And then she allowed him to send me away to the convent, just to sweep his house clean of her shame."
Ivar’s posture went rigid, a sudden, dark tension coiling through his shoulders. He clearly didn't like the mirror she was holding up, nor did he like the strange, bitter symmetry between them.
"Cruelty shapes a person," Ivar growled, his jaw tight. "It made me walk. It made you bend the knee."
Magdalena met his glare without flinching.
"Cruelty did not shape me into anything, Ivar. It simply made me an unwanted child."
The words hung in the dark stillness of the tent, thick and suffocating.
For a long moment, Ivar said nothing. His eyes remained fixed on her, stripped of their usual mocking glint, replaced by a quiet, brooding gravity. The air felt thin; not because he was about to strike, but because for a fleeting second, the wall between a conqueror and his captive had dissolved again, leaving only two souls forged in the cold fires of rejection.
Finally, the prince shifted back into his bed of pelts with a low, weary exhale. The heavy furs rustled in the gloom as he settled his legs, pulling the dark blankets over his chest against the biting river draft.
"Lie down," Ivar said softly. The sharp, mocking edge was gone from his voice, replaced by something quiet and strangely muted. "You can sleep with Garmr. She is warmer than the straw... and tomorrow at dawn, the Great Army rides to conquer Daventre."
Magdalena didn't hesitate. She swallowed the knot in her throat, stepped carefully across the damp earth, and dropped to her knees beside the dog.
Garmr gave a deep, huffing sigh as she settled beside her, her warm flank pressing against Magdalena's freezing side. Magdalena tucked herself tight against the dog's ribcage, burying her cold fingers into her thick fur, relying on the wolfdog’s steady heat to ward off the chill of the night.
Lidewij. The name echoed in Magdalena’s mind, sharp and ugly.
For years, she had believed the convent was a sanctuary; a holy refuge from her mother’s husband. Yet all along, beneath the quiet prayers and soft-spoken hymns, Lidewij had carried the exact same venom.
Abbess Gerhild had never missed an opportunity to remind Magdalena of her mother's sin. Every midnight vigil on frozen stone floors, every hour spent scrubbing the damp chapel flags until her knuckles bled, had been framed as a mercy; a chance to scour away the tainted, Mozarabic blood in her veins. She had spent half her life carrying her birth like a heavy wooden cross she was expected to die under, apologizing for simply taking up space.
And then Ivar had casually dismissed it all as dust on a sleeve.
To him, it’s just an inconvenience, she thought, her breath catching in her throat. A detail to be worked around or crushed underfoot.
A sudden, fierce impulse tried to bloom in her chest; a dangerous, intoxicating urge to believe him. To throw off the suffocating weight of her shame and decide he was right.
But almost instantly, her holy upbringing recoiled.
No, she told herself firmly, her fingers clenching tighter in Garmr's fur as she fought the terrifying thought. He is a heathen. He does not understand the purity of God’s law. Of course a bloodthirsty pagan sees no sin in a stained origin; his people know nothing of salvation or damnation.
She tried to push Ivar's words away, to lock them behind the pious logic she had used to survive her entire life. It was a heathen's worldview, plain and simple. It didn't apply to her. It couldn't.
And yet... the words refused to leave her.
Even as she tried to dismiss him, the crack in her foundation had already formed. Ivar hadn't dismantled her shame in a single evening, but he had done something far more unsettling: he had forced a wedge into her reality. For the first time in her life, she had heard someone look at her greatest burden and treat it like nothing.
Magdalena pulled a spare corner of a fur over her shoulders, resting her cheek against Garmr’s warm, heavy flank.
Outside, the camp thrummed with the muffled clatter of iron and the cold, rushing waters of the Isla. Tomorrow, the sun would break over the ridge. Tomorrow, Daventre would burn, and innocent people would bleed for the supplies she needed to keep this crippled prince alive.
Magdalena closed her eyes, listening to the quiet, heavy breathing of the young man on the bed and the steady heartbeat of the dog beneath her ear.
She wasn't ready to let go of her cross. But as she lay in the dark, troubled and unmoored, she realized the terrifying truth: the heathen hadn't undone her beliefs, but he had shaken them. And for the first time, the holy walls she had built around her soul no longer felt quite so solid.
.-.-.
A/N: So, this is one of those chapters that turned out not like I planned. And I love it! In Magdalena’s mind, the Christian world was supposed to be light, purity, and holiness. Yet it gave her abuse, cellars, and silent betrayals from sisters like Lidewij. Meanwhile, this "savage" pagan warlord; the ultimate villain in her upbringing, just casually dismantled part of her lifelong shame. To him, her bastardy isn't a sin or a mark of damnation; it's just a neutral fact of life.
And ‘the Mozarabic bastard’, did I outline her entire backstory including her father’s and mother’s? Of course, because what’s an OC without a proper backstory? More will be revealed along the way.
Cursus rapidus: ancient monumental Roman trackways
Palus profunda: deep swamp.
Love to read your thoughts as always!
Xoxoxo Nukyster
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