➳ Dead and Gone
❛ pairing | dark!ubbe x reader
❛ type | oneshot
❛ summary | out of jealousy, ubbe kills reader’s ex-husband. the one she once thought was dead.
❛ warnings | jealousy, murder
A loose end could make anything go to naught. To his grave, grave misfortune… he had grazed over a loose end. His cup of ale was nearly dry and though he went to pour another, Hvitserk was there to receive him.
“He’s going to take her back.” He rumbles in his naturally gravely voice. Ubbe looks up from his drink, wiping his sticky beard clean. He’s drinking to numb the fear.
“It means nothing to her,” Ubbe says though the words are mechanical on his tongue at best. Hvitserk props up his eyebrows to form long streaks along his forehead.
You don’t actually believe that Ubbe, do you?
Ubbe takes up another cup, fighting against the nonexistent chains weighing him down while taking a long chug.
“Nothing from her husband that she once thought was dead?”
A miserable emptiness settles in his belly, turning his blue eyes to fixate upon the object of his affection. His wife. Not this… fucker’s wife. You were laying upon your marital bed with a seizure of laughs erupting from your lips.
“Father rejected your proposal three times! Why did you come a forth?”
Your ex-husband cheasily smiles, shrugging his shoulders as he turns his cup shyly in circles. Ubbe can see it in his eyes. The longing-- the wait that the blacksmith had gone through until he could come back to your arms. He missed you.
“Stupidity, I think. He didn’t send your hounds after me! I think he liked me. He was just too fearful to say so.”
“I think so!” You laugh in response. “He was upset... when you disappeared.”
“Was he?” Jómarr says, feigning some bullshit pity me face that made Ubbe’s stomach churn. “Not so upset that he didn’t force you to marr--”
Are you that delusional, Ubbe?
It wasn’t a issue if... it was an issue of when.
He isn’t sure if Hvitserk actually said such words, or if it was the Hvitserk of his mind, but it is all the same. Ubbe’s cup collides with the table. You jerk from your words with your ex-husband, stretching and calling out his name.
Ubbe!
“I’ve got it, (Y/N).” His brother makes his way from behind the heavy oak table, chasing after him as he steps out into the winter cold. It’s slurrying around him when Hvitserk steps out with his warm furs. Ubbe’s hands are busy, twisting and flapping his black hunting knife. His family… it would be sundered.
“He has to die.” Ubbe angles his head, snow catching in the patch of smooth rolls braided into a ponytail. He clamps his jaw shut.
“I’ll help you.”
“She can’t know,” Ubbe says, tremulous and cognizant of the need for artifice. “No one can know.”
Hvitserk wipes the snow off of his patchy honey facial hair, tongue poking out to caress the bottom of his lip. He rocks on his boots, then reaffirms any residual concerns that his older brother may have.
“When has that been a problem, brother?”
He wishes the man was less of a good man than he was. The man to his great disapproval was perfect in nearly every way. He would work with the blacksmith, banging metal on top of metal to form beautiful swords, cutthroat daggers, and sharp axes. He never took another wife. He drank to excess when required of him and at the same time, would cut his losses and return to the empty cabin he built from scratch.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
“Prince Ubbe.” The man clatters his hammer on the ground while holding the scalding prick of a thin, elongated chunk of metal. “It’s good to see you.”
Ubbe pulls his sword of its sheath, thrusting it onto the stands supporting showing pieces for those that had ordered from him. He rubs the sweat out of his eyes with muscular forearms.
“Jómarr.”
“How can I help you?”
Ubbe folds his arms one over another, standing with his arms slightly apart. His eyes settle upon the young blacksmith, leaving him no choice but to abandon his work and come around the pit where he was working.
“You’ve been visiting my wife.”
Jómarr stops in front of him, rubbing his ashen hands together. He bites his lower lip and settles with the irony taste on his tongue. He simpers at the prince, clearing his throat like a hornet had settled in his throat.
“I had no intent on--”
“I know what your intentions were.” He takes a small step forward. The blacksmith steps back.
“You think that you can charm her back into your arms,” the prince says. There is a dangerous undercurrent in his voice. One that Jómarr knows is malicious. There are plenty of weapons scattered about the room. Jómarr has one better.
“We can settle this with a duel,” Jómarr suggests, allowing Ubbe to turn into a dark corner of his workshop. Any prince was tasked with upholding the principles of their people. After a heavy beat of silence, Jómarr gurgles. A strap of leather cuts off his breath. Ubbe draws his short dagger from his back. He buries it into the man’s ribs, several pointed thrusts piercing him in perfect succession. His hard eyes glitter in pleasure from seeing Jómarr’s eyes go out, Hvitserk fighting every bloody flail until he was nothing but a heavy and limp body in his arms, in and out of consciousness.
“Should we bury him?” Hvitserk asks.
“Don’t bother,” Ubbe walks to a basin of water, cleaning any evidence off his blade. Hvitserk bears a sardonic smile, looking into the slow-burning flame of the workshop. “No one will remember him.”
“Let’s just burn him.” Hvitserk says far too jovially.
He drops Jómarr carelessly, then takes up his leg toward the flame. Ubbe takes a glance at his blood-lusting brother who chucks the strap of leather into the flame. Of course, Hvitserk couldn’t leave it there. It’s something of a strange dream when he bends down and helps swing this kind man over the flames. He smells crisp like the remnants of Jarl Borg after father blood-eagled him.
It was done.
Ubbe wakes with a start, your tears were wrenching over your cheeks upon the corner of the bed. He could ask what the reason was for your tears but for what? He knew the source of your pain. He lays stroking the bed for some time, a dull expression in his eyes. The flame warming the longhouse flickers low, leaving a shadow that flickers over the pearling tears down your cheeks.
“You’ve heard.”
“Tell me you didn’t do it.” You ask him for both the truth and a lie because it could have been either Hvitserk or him who ultimately did Jómarr in. He sits up in your marital bed, the sheets low around his hips.
“Do it?” Ubbe repeats, clearly missing your point. He’s not that stupid but still it aches him to see you so visibly shaken-- even if he was the source of the ache. This was... this was for your good. His good. Your marriage would be better off for it.
“Tell me you didn’t DO it!” You shout through the longhouse, reaching over to strike your palm against his bearded jaw. He catches your hand, twisting you over to lay on your back.
“Listen to yourself. Why would I do that?” Ubbe plays off.
“Out of jealousy.” You wretch a sob, bubbling over your cheeks like drops of rain. “Out of knowing that he was mine?”
He was yours? His eyes blow wide, now unapologetic in the events surrounding the day. Killing Jómarr, the young man who came in to pick up a weapon and skating out while everyone was far too busy to worry about the young princes who encountered the dead bodies.
You were in love with him. After all this time. That-- that couldn’t be. You were his. He-- He was yours. There was no room for third parties.
“There would be nothing to gain.” He replies.
The weariness seeps over you. He reads it on your face because of course, it was a relief. But then, in the same breath, it was not. Maybe this was the price for ridding himself of any suitors.
“I... I know.” You chalk out, knowing it was true. One he would pay gladly a hundred times over if it meant you here, climbing into his arms when he offers them out to you. Your cheek settles on his chest, smearing wet tears that should have filled him with grief. You weave in and out of bouts of tears.
“It’s just... I thought I lost him.”
You speak again after a moment.
“And then I did.”
@igetcarriedawaywithyou, @kylobien, @titty-teetee, @breathlessouls, @nejijjeoroo, @bcat1291, @readsalot73, @mslothbrok, @romanchronicles, @captstefanbrandt, @ailucascen, @michaeliskindahot, @cbouvier23, @naaladareia, @cbouvier23, @the-geeky-engineer, @lisinfleur, @funmadnessandbadassvikings, @tephi101, @akamaiden, @ethereallysimple, @venusloviing, @happylittlepuppydog, @beyond-the-ashes, @slutforrpg, @hipsternoionlylikeunicorns, @mixedwiththemoon, @sparklemichele, @alicedopey, @lif3snotouttogetyou, @rubyquartzshades, @noregretsandyeteveryregret, @dangerous-like-a-loaded-pistol, @deathbyarabbit, @unacceptabletatertots, @beyond-the-ashes (no sig), @babypink224221, @ivarandersen, @queen-see-ya-in-valhalla, @moose-squirrel-asstiel, @icarus-fell-in-spring, @end-of-night, @gruffle1, @lol-haha-joke@arses21434, @smileyparrots, @Moosemittens13, @miss-artemis-wild, @two-unbeatable-beaters, @wonderwoman292, @wish-i-was-a-mermaid, @fangirls94, @mcuimxgine, @killerb00sdeath, @heartbeats-wildly, @boo20017, @acacheofstrange, @shaelyn102, @astoryoffireandlight, @smokealone, @shaelyn102 @laketaj24, @peaceisadirtyword, @ly–canthrope @cris101071 @daughterofthenight117 @unassumingviking @ladyofsoa, @inforapound @winchesterwife27, @flokidottir-imagines-br, @sincerelysinister, @allvikingsfanfic,