Thread: From the Land of Ice and Snow (Novocaine & Jolie)

Caoimhe's heart felt squeezed in a vice. Her face had gone pale, causing the thick scattering of freckles to stand out againsa the simple beauty. She whimped as the Viking's hands painfully snagged in her long red hair. All around her, she heard the sound of the Viking language gutterally ringing out in the cold-crisp morning air. Her Scandinavian language skills were marginal and unless she focused, she rarely grasped everything word. Instead, it was a terrifying cacaphony of threatening words. Oh why hadn't her father told her to flee, she thought frantically. Why hadn't they fought back. They would have died, but it would have been a death fighting against enemies. Now, she knew in her heart that she and the other women would end up enslaved and she knew the kind of savages these men were. They would probably torture the men and she'd heard that some Vikings even ate babies. The though had her gagging as she heard the man saying something above her. She looked blindly up at him trying to grasp what he had just said. He had spoken faster and with more heat this time. Yes, she said stalling for time. He gave her a stern look and slapped her across the face. The blow left a copper taste of blood in her mouth and snapped her head back, pain articulating out like jagged spears of pain. She cried out in pain, gasping, Please! His grasp on her hair when her head rocked had sent more pain through her scalp and left her feeling utterly helpless. Shut up, was how she translated his words. Her golden eyes widened and she nodded fearfully staring up at him. I quiet. She said and then clamped her lips shut as if she feared he would hurt her again. Her entire body felt like it was going into shock as she saw her friends, her neighbors being mistreated. The monk on the ground had helped teach her to read and write. The woman being stripped, a thirty-year old widow with three children knitted wonderful sweaters and sold them when merchants would pass by the village surrounding the monastery. Leaving the chaos and mayhem, Caoimhe's eyes sought out the barbarian's who held her and she wanted to spit in his face and tell him what a monster he was. What had anyone here ever done to them? What glory was there in killing and burning out simple peasants and monks? He ignored her spiteful look. Put out fire, put out fire, she cried out as loud as she could. Bad men kill you if you don't put out fire. She kept feeling like she was going to be sick, but she forced her nausea down wishing the man would loosen his grip on her hair. Around her, people tried to obey her instructions. She could see some of the Vikings looting homes further off and imagined other barbarians would soon be sacking the monastery with its religious relics and icons and gold candle sticks. Her thick braid didn't tear, but she felt long a dog on a string as she stumbled behind him, crying out from time to time, tears staining her face, terrified. Peter, the oldest boy, of the widow woman was starting at the man holding her by her thick red braid, slack-jawed, his eyes wide. When she was asked where the nearest town was, she tried to focus on him. Never been, she said. Two days travel by cart. God, she hated his vile grin. He was probably the kind of man who loved inflicting pain. She expected he would soon butcher children like Peter and her father. Such a man could never respect the elderly and their wisdom or the future of a village like this in its children. One slender hand reached up to her braid, her face grimacing in pain as she stood up on her heels trying to ease the pressure as he stopped to look about him.