(no subject)

[thewidewideworld]

{Continued from here}

Sinric heads down the stairs and out into the gardens, a wrap pulled around his shoulders and his hair still damp. He breathes in the scent of approaching evening as if committing it to memory before turning towards the lake.

He has no idea which way Athelstan might have gone but the lake always seems like a good place to start.

Comments

[athelstanthescribe]

"Who is Kamino?" he asks. "One of your musician friends?"

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric shakes his head and touches the scar on the back of his shoulder. "Emperor Saga. He asked me to keep calling him by his previous name, his childhood name as he didn't feel he had earned his title in my eyes. I think it helped to remind him to stay grounded."

[athelstanthescribe]

"Ah." He nods. "Every king and emperor should have such a reminder, from time to time."

[thewidewideworld]

"As you are for Ragnar?" He asks softly.

[athelstanthescribe]

"He is not a king - yet." He glances down. "But perhaps, a reminder of things past."

[thewidewideworld]

"Yet." He nods but ducks his head. "But I would not say past. A reminder of that which matters. A sight that can become hazy with the wine of power. I think that is what Kamino needed - a reminder not to let power change him from the good man he was trying to be."

"As the simple desire to be with the man he loves reminds Ragnar."

[athelstanthescribe]

"I hope Lady Lagertha - Earl Ingstad, as she is now - can remind him of that in my absence. She was a good ruler of Kattegat in his absence."

[thewidewideworld]

"From all you, both of you have told me of her, I'm sure she will make a good and wise leader." He smiles, "However I suspect she will remind him of other things. Mostly of how little he likes his current wife."

[athelstanthescribe]

"Yes. I almost feel sorry for Aslaug, at times. She didn't get at all what she thought she would."

[thewidewideworld]

"Power, prestige?" He asks, tilting his head. "The love of a powerful man."

[athelstanthescribe]

"I don't think she would mourn too much for the lack of love, if she had the rest. But when she and Ragnar met, she really only knew his reputation."

[thewidewideworld]

"Ah. I understand. Eudokia, my- Constantine's third wife made much the same mistake. She, like Aslaug, bore many sons but it did little to lift her statue to that she desired."

[athelstanthescribe]

"And Ragnar so often fails to behave as she thinks proper."

[thewidewideworld]

"As the ruthless and ambitious man she thought he was should? Clearly she doesn't see the gentle farmer beneath."

[athelstanthescribe]

"Which isn't to say he can't be ruthless and ambitious. But he wasn't born to be a king."

[thewidewideworld]

"A farmer, an Earl, a father, a lover." Sinric's voice fall softly into the sing-song sweetness of a story-teller. "Ambitious, ruthless, curious, gentle. We are none of us only one thing. And what we are may change a hundred times in a lifetime or a breath."

[athelstanthescribe]

Athelstan nods.

"The trouble is, Aslaug tries to shape him, and he resists."

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric smiles, a warm confiding smile. "Stubborn. I forgot to add that to the list."

[athelstanthescribe]

"Perpetually", Athelstan agrees, but his own smile is much weaker.

[thewidewideworld]

"We means he'll never give up on the people he loves." Sinric adds softly.

[athelstanthescribe]

He looks away.

"Even when it might perhaps be better for him if he did."

[thewidewideworld]

"Especially then." Sinric shrugs. "Or perhaps especially if he is told so. You values your health and happiness far higher than his own."

[athelstanthescribe]

"And I am not allowed to value his in the same way."

[thewidewideworld]

"Oh yes. And just as stubbornly so. I suspect that's why you two talk each other into such knots."

He shakes his head. "But that was not why I came seeking you, but to ask what you need? And how, if you will, I can help?"

[athelstanthescribe]

"If I knew it so clearly, I would tell you", he says honestly. "But I think I'm going to leave that room to the two of you, and go back to my brother's."