(no subject)

[thewidewideworld]

The acoustic in the tavern of Ribe were excellent for storytelling, passing sound down the hall just right.

Sinric was sprawled on a bench, holding court as he told his tale.

It was the story of Baldr, most beautiful and beloved of all the gods.

But with a twist. For everyone knew the story of Loki’s jealousy and Baldr’s death and the hands of the much maligned mistletoe, but what became of Baldr’s earthly family.

“For like many of the gods, Baldr walked among men, loved and been loved. For who could not love Baldr as soon as see him? Men had raised sons and daughters proudly, knowing their fair hair and sea blue eyes had been a gift from the shining one.”

“But Baldr’s death had sent a shudder through the land. And even those who did not know they descended from the bright god had wept and wept. Just as all the objects, alive and dead, wept to free him from Hel’s hall. All but the Sly One. “

He took a dramatic breath, hand over his heart to relive such a suffering. “The children of Baldr wept and wept till they made lakes of their homes. They wept so hard that their shining beauty faded and their eyes, once blue as the calm seas turned white as snow or dark as earth for all the water in them was wept away.”

Sinric held the crowd spellbound with his words, letting them wonder if this strange creature with his dark eyes and his odd looks was in fact a child of Baldr.

“And so they go still, Baldr’s tear-wrung descendants, till Ragnarök when he and his brother Höðr will make a new world and beauty will return.” He lifts his mead cup in salute. “Baldr!”

“Baldr!” Many voices call back, giving the skald a chance to wet his parched throat.

Sinric looks around the room as many voices come together to fill the silence after his story and more drinking goes on.

Comments

[thewidewideworld]

"Compassionate then?" Sinric hides his expression behind his cup. "Or simply bored." He looks around the room with a sigh. "I can see how one could grow tired with this life easily enough. What I won't give for some good wine. But alas the store of it I brought with me is almost done."

He cocks his head, watching Ragnar's eyes. "Enough to share perhaps."

[bigarmy_strangepants]

Ragnar's eyes glitter blue with curiosity. "I never had wine," he says. "The earl and his wife drink it with their special guests, at their greatest feasts. Sometimes."

[thewidewideworld]

"It is no small thing here. Grapes will not grow in these cold lands. Wine must be traded, carried. Cherished."

He holds Ragnar's eye for a long moment, his face almost unreadable. "Drink wine with me, this night?"

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"Yes," Ragnar says, eyes glittering sapphires. "And talk about the places the wine comes from."

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric drains his cup and sets it down, straightening his skirts as he rises. "Follow me."

There is something to the way he walks - a roll to his hips that is rather feminine and yet a confidence that he needs not look back to know Ragnar will follow.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

As he does -- fascinated by the ideas of far-away lands and of tasting real wine, and also by Sinric himself.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric's rooms are at the far rear of the earl's hall, accessed by a small door he can slips inside unseen. It suits him to come and go like this, to been invisible when he wishes.

The bed is the earl's second best, a sign of the status Sinric holds. But it is spread with Sinric's own furs - lustrous and black. The furs of the bears of Keivan Rus.

He sheds his outer coat, clasped down the front in the Rus style also and sets it aside. His tunic is a deep red, drinking the light as he brings a taper to the lanterns and candles.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

Ragnar looks around; he's never been that deep in the private parts of an earl's hall.

He walks over to the bed and runs an admiring hand over the black furs.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric watches with a quiet smile. So many of his memories of Ragnar are tied up with the brush of fur.

He adds more charcoal to the brazier, warming the room.

"Now, wine." He unpacks four skins from his pack, each of them almost empty. And something else - a small ceramic bottle sealed with beeswax, glazed in a white so bright it seems out of place in the muted tones of the room.

And then another treasure - a beaker made of Persian glass, chased with gold dragons. "Yes, it would seem the time for this."

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"What is that shiny, white thing?" Ragnar asks, fascinated. "Our earl never gets his wine in such vessels."

[thewidewideworld]

"I doubt even your earl can afford such spirits." Sinric chuckles. "It is rice wine from the far east. In truth, it is better for cleaning wounds than it is for drinking." He holds the bottle out for Ragnar to see, Chinese characters chased down its sides in black brushstrokes.

"You may try some if you truly wish but last of all. It kills the taste for all else."

While Ragnar looks at that, Sinric pours a measure of light red wine into the beaker, swirling it softly.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"Yes, that is the colour the earl's wine has, too," Ragnar says. "Once he spilled some on a servant girl's best dress, and she never managed to get the red out again."

[thewidewideworld]

"No, I would imagine not. There is a certain Frankish princeling I will never forgive for upending a beaker of it on my favourite gold silk gown." He muses, eyes in the distant past. "Here. Sip it slowly. Let yourself taste it."

He pours the rest into a simple clay cup, letting Ragnar enjoy the pleasure of drinking from glass.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

Ragnar carefully takes the glass in his hands and admires it before taking the first sip of wine.

"Oh!"

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric laughs warmly. "Not quite what you expected?" He asks, lazing on the side of the bed.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"It tastes of fruit and drink and darkness," Ragnar says. "Earth, and wood."

[thewidewideworld]

"Well spoke." Sinric smiles. "You have a skaldic heart as well as an explorer's will." He takes a sip of his own. "This wine comes from Greece, from the black and fertile soils of the island of Crete. An island from which gods are said to have been born."

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"Those must be different gods than ours," Ragnar muses, taking another sip of his wine.

[thewidewideworld]

"Yes, yes they are. But not unlike the northern gods in many ways. Zeus, father of the Greek gods and Odin have much in common. Gods of war, gods of the sea, tales of how it all shall end and begin anew. The Fates and Norns who weave the patterns of our destinies." He smiles. "They are much alike in many ways. As if the gods had chosen different names for different parts of the world."

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"It's probably a good idea," Ragnar muses. "We can't speak Greek, after all. So with us, the gods speak our own language."

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric makes an offhanded gesture and rattles off a soft speech in Greek, flowery and fluid.

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"That is Greek?"

Ragnar sips more of the wine.

"I like the taste of this!"

[thewidewideworld]

He nods a flick of his long lashes. "My mother tongue."

He raises his cup and finishes it. "In vino veritas." He smiles, setting it down. "In wine, there is truth. Alas, you may have to cultivate a friendship with traders from the east to get more of that kind. As will I as that was the last of it I carried."

[bigarmy_strangepants]

"The traders from the east come into Hedeby, rather than Ribe," Ragnar says, "as that is on the Baltic, rather than the North Sea."

[thewidewideworld]

"It is the traders who come past the Mediterranean Sea you want." He purrs. "The merchants of blue water, black soil and white sand." Memories make him smile. "You would not believe how clear those waters are."