Chapter Text
The children are in bed when Athelstan turns to them a few nights later and says, “The skalds of your people - what do they do?”
Lagertha looks pleased. “You have been thinking about our plan, then,” she says. “Skalds are - rare, and valued as such, among all the Northmen. It is one thing to be a singer of songs, entertainment for a cold night and a warm plate of food. It is another to tell of deeds and have the whole world listen. Those a skald sings of are remembered when they have gone to Valhalla - immortal as they drink with the gods, but immortal here in the world of men as well.”
Athelstan swallows visibly. Voice hoarse, he says, “You truly think I can be your skald?” He looks from Lagertha to Ragnar. “I’m a priest. I’m no poet. I have no tales to tell - and right now, you have no tales for me to tell.”
“We will,” Ragnar says. He leans into Athelstan’s space, wills him to believe. “We will, and you will know exactly what to say. You were meant to find your way to us, Athelstan. Not to care for our children or milk our cows or warm our bed. You were made for this.”
“I was made to be a priest!” His voice rises high, and he seems to be bordering on hysteria now.
“You were made for us,” Lagertha says.
He reaches out, resting a hand on Athelstan’s shoulder as he searches for the right words. Gently he says, “If this were not the will of the gods - yours and mine - why would you be here with us?”
Athelstan bows his head. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I have been seeking answers and finding none.”
Ragnar brings his hand up to the side of Athelstan’s face, tilts it up to look at him. “Stop seeking,” he tells Athelstan. “Stop trying to search for things that are not there. There is no answer to find - the gods do what they will, and we are left to make the best of it.”
Athelstan nods slowly, closing his eyes as if he is speaking to his god - whether in supplication or farewell, Ragnar is unsure. It throws him off, for a moment, wondering if this is all the answer he is to receive, and he waits. The furrow in Athelstan’s brow grows deeper, more worried, and finally on impulse Ragnar leans in and brushes his lips against Athelstan’s.
It doesn’t really start out as a kiss, not really - even the kisses Ragnar stole from the fisherman’s daughter when he was 11 were wilder, a messy press of lips that had them both laughing and wondering what it was they were meant to do to kiss in the manner of adults. No, what he and Athelstan are doing is a sharing of breath, a giving of comfort in the only way Ragnar can think to be understood.
He is not a gentle man - it does not sit easily on his shoulders, and all of this would be easier if he could bash a sword at Athelstan’s worries and pull him quickly behind Lagertha’s shield until they are all on firmer ground. This is the hard way.
Taking a deep breath, he deepens the kiss.
Athelstan’s mouth opens on a soft little sigh. Ragnar sips at his mouth, tasting him for the first time. His lips are chapped, a little awkard as they slant under his, and his breath still carries the ale from dinner, but he lets Ragnar take his time and all of it adds to the laziness of the kiss. They melt into each other, and when Ragnar finally pulls back Athelstan’s lips catch at his, following him up like he can’t bear to let go.
“Say you are ours,” Lagertha demands quietly, watching them in assessment from the far end of the table. “Say you will do this with us.”
“I don’t know how,” Athelstan says, eyes still closed.
Ragnar leans down and scrapes his teeth gently along the shell of Athelstan’s ear. “Say you are ours,” he says, “and we will make our way together.”
On a wordless shudder Athelstan turns his face to Ragnar, and then they are kissing again, fierce and artless, an answer in all but name.
Lagertha is moving behind them, and as he takes Athelstan’s mouth he hears her footsteps, feels her hand slide into his hair. She sucks a bruise into his neck, and it makes him pull Athelstan closer to him, bite at his lower lip to see what Athelstan will do. His hands come up to Ragnar’s shoulders, one of them finding Lagertha’s.
It is the first time he has touched her. Ragnar finds himself smiling into Athelstan’s mouth, because this - this feels like a vow.
She pulls them to the bedroom, and they fall into the bed together, Athelstan between them. He looks at each of them in turn as if for instruction, and Ragnar traces the shape of him beneath his tunic before pushing it up. The skin of his stomach is milk pale, and he doesn’t have a warrior’s hard muscle. Athelstan has lived a life in the service of a dead god, Ragnar thinks, one who collects gold and jewels and people, shuts the most treasured among his hoard away from grasping hands without realizing that beauty of form and strength of purpose shines brightest when admired by one with the skill to put it to use.
Ragnar intends them to use all of Athelstan, mind and body, until none can dispute their claim.
Lagertha is watching him, and must see something in his expression as an invitation, because she spreads a hand across Athelstan’s chest and slowly scrapes her nails down, four thin lines of red rising up in her wake. Athelstan’s hips jerk up, breath catching in his throat, and she follows the trail she just made with her mouth. Ragnar helps her with Athelstan’s trousers, tugging at the lacings, and she licks at his hipbone as Ragnar pulls the fabric aside to free Athelstan’s cock.
“Look at him,” she murmurs against Athelstan’s skin. “See how much he needs us.”
Athelstan is shaking now, as if he were naked in the dead of winter, and his mouth is shaping words that Ragnar thinks he might understand if they were spoken aloud. If they are pleas, Ragnar wants to give in.
“Will you take him in hand?” Lagertha asks, and Athelstan’s hips snap up again, wordless assent.
Ragnar can deny them nothing, he thinks.
He leans in to kiss his wife as his hand slides up to wrap around Athelstan’s cock, and she sighs into his mouth, her hands twisting at his hair. She has never been afraid to lead him, and he lets her deepen the kiss. Athelstan’s cock is leaking precome, twitching into Ragnar’s hand, so he thumbs at the head, pushing back the foreskin and spreading the slickness as far as he can before moving slowly down the length.
“I can’t,” Athelstan begins, and it takes a moment for Ragnar to realize he’s speaking English now.
“You can,” Ragnar answers him. “You are ours, and you can.” His hand tightens on Athelstan’s cock, and Lagertha bites at his neck as she wraps her hand around his, speeding them up.
“Yours,” Athelstan moans, and spills into their hands all at once, shaking in their grip as they pull every last spurt of seed from him.
They pull Athelstan’s shirt off, wiping their hands off on it, and Lagertha kisses Athelstan as Ragnar licks at the splatters of come on his stomach, cleaning him until all he can taste is the salt of his skin. This is unexplored land, he thinks, untouched by any hands but theirs. The thought of it warms him, and he bites at the skin under Athelstan’s nipple, marking him like the act of raising a bruise can stake their claim, make it permanent.
They are still mostly clothed, and suddenly all he wants is the press of their skin against his. He wants to touch them, to see them glow in the candlelight. So he says, “Come on, off,” and starts tugging at Lagertha’s clothes, making way for Athelstan to help him with his, until at last they are naked, wrapped up in one another.
“I think,” Lagertha says, “our skald might need an example set for him.” Her hand is playing with Ragnar’s bollocks now, weighing them in her hands and tracing down the seam with the pad of her thumb. The other is resting lightly on Athelstan’s ribcage, and she trails it up his chest to cup his cheek. “See how he blushes so prettily when we touch him? Imagine the color we could raise if we fucked.”
“You should,” Athelstan says, and for a moment seems startled to hear his own voice. “I mean, you have given me my - comfort. You should find your own.”
It makes Ragnar smile. “Stay, and aid us,” he says. “You may find that the need rises again in you to seek the release of our touch.”
Athelstan blinks at him. “I hadn’t thought to leave?” he says, confused.
“Good,” Lagertha says, slapping him lightly on the cheek. “The night stretches on, and we are far from finished with you.”
Ragnar lets Lagertha ride him, as she prefers. Her body, as she sinks down on his cock, stretches out like a bridge between him and Athelstan, and he watches her pull Athelstan - theirs, theirs, he thinks - into a bruising kiss that seems to go on forever. When she breaks it off he gasps for breath, and Ragnar gasps with him, because Lagertha is squeezing him tight and Athelstan’s blush runs down his chest and he has never seen anything like this in all his travels.
“He rises to meet our challenge,” Lagertha says. Her nails dig into the meat of his thigh as she leans back a little, letting them appreciate the soft sway of her breasts as she moves in rhythm. When he follows her gaze, he sees that Athelstan’s cock is becoming hard again, and one of his hands is clutching at the bedding while his other hand rests on Lagertha’s hip, held there by one of her hands.
“Still won’t touch his own cock,” Ragnar manages. He can’t think of Athelstan laying hands on himself or he will be lost. He focuses on the bite of Lagertha’s nails and the pain clears his head for a moment - but it is a near thing.
“If he won’t touch himself,” Lagertha says with a twist of her hips, “then it falls to you to care for him.” She pulls Athelstan’s hand away from her hips, swats him on his bottom like a naughty child and smiles at the little cry he gives. “Go up by Ragnar. He will show you something you will enjoy.”
Athelstan crawls up the bed, meeting Ragnar’s gaze unflinchingly - finally, Ragnar thinks, and reaches for him.
He pulls Athelstan’s hips in, bites at the same spot where his wife staked her claim earlier. It has since bloomed an angry red, and he coaxes more color from it, loving the sound it tears out of Athelstan.
“Come on,” Lagertha says breathlessly. “Show him what you know, husband.”
Ragnar trails his tongue across Athelstan’s hipbone, spiralling closer and closer to where his cock is swiftly growing to full hardness. When one of Athelstan’s hands twists into his hair, he decides that the time for preamble has come to an end and takes the head of Athelstan’s cock into his mouth.
“Watch yourself take his mouth,” Lagertha pants, driving their pace higher as Ragnar feels her begin to clench around him. He looks up at Athelstan, brings a hand up to cup his ballocks as he sucks hard at the head of his cock. Athelstan is staring down at him, storm-blue eyes wide with wonder, pupils blown wide in the firelight. They have wrecked him, Ragner thinks, and lets himself moan around Athelstan’s cock.
He can hear Lagertha cry out, and feels her fingers at the place where they are joined, rubbing at her clit as she clenches around him. “Swallow him,” she says, nails digging harder into his thigh, and he can’t help but take Athelstan deeper, feeling him pulse at the back of his throat. He is all sensation, now, taking and taken, wrapped so thoroughly in these people that he can’t untwist himself from the pleasure he feels.
He can’t last - and when Athelstan says, “Please,” in a voice hoarse with need, he slams up into Lagertha, fills her with his seed and feels her clench and pulse around him, taking him all the way. “Please, please, please,” Athelstan is saying, and Ragnar feels the buzz of his release moments before he swallows down the hot salt of his come, choking a little as it fills his throat.
When he finds himself again, the first thing that registers is the tangle of limbs, the drape of Lagertha’s hair across his stomach, the silk of Athelstan’s skin against his fingertips. Ragnar is warm and slick with sweat, and if he could he would live the rest of his life like this. But no, there are promises to fulfill, most of all to himself, to the gods that set him adrift, to the people who found him empty and filled him up.
Athelstan stirs beside him, makes a noise of discontent that has Ragnar shifting to look at him. It takes him a moment to register the tears that shine on Athelstan’s cheeks. “What is it?” Ragnar asks him, brushing a tear away with his thumb.
“I thought,” Athelstan says, voice shaky, “when we joined together, that I would feel a sign - a disconnect from the world, in retribution for the forsaking of my vows. I have always thought that God punishes the wicked, that there is a just and righteous order the Lord has put in place. If what we have done is wicked, why has he not turned from me? Why do I feel so...”
“Good?” Lagertha suggests gently.
Athelstan nods. “I know I am supposed to be ashamed for what I have done, and I am. I am, and I can’t help it. I have thrown aside my chastity, laid hands on another’s wife, lain with a man - I have done things my Lord has forbidden.” He takes a gasping breath as his words come quicker, tears falling on his cheeks. “And as I confess my sins here I feel the echoes of the joy I took in them, and I cannot understand why am I allowed to feel so good if what I have done is so bad.”
Ragnar’s hand is wet with Athelstan’s tears, now, and Lagertha is tucking herself under Athelstan’s arm, folded against his side with her hand on his heart. “I think you feel good because you are where you were meant to be,” Ragnar says finally. “You have a purpose beyond caring for treasure nobody but your god will ever see and singing songs nobody but your god will ever hear.”
“If you were not meant for this,” Lagertha says, “it would not be. You take joy because you were made for joy. You found Ragnar because he is yours, and we took you because you are ours.” Her eyes catch Ragnar’s, grinning her iron-edged smile, and he loves her fiercely. “We will see, as we go on, all the things that we can take for ourselves. Because the gods have blessed us, Athelstan - ours and yours.”
He has calmed himself at their words, tears drying up until all that’s left are shuddering breaths and the press of his body against theirs. “I would give you what I can,” Athelstan says at last. “And I would have you take what I cannot.”
---
They present their skald to the thing at Kattegat three months after Lagertha and Ragnar return from the sacking of Hexham. It will be the last meeting of the men of their people before the long winter crashes over them, and Lagertha decides that it would suit them well to give them all something to think about as they shut themselves inside to wait for the spring to come. The three of them have spent hours going through the tales of the day, the bravery of their men, Ragnar’s cunning, the attempted rape of Lagertha and her courage in its wake, the glitter of the swords left unguarded in the morning sun.
Athelstan sings their story for them again and again after days in the field, until Bjorn is scowling and even Gyda begs for a different song. At night, long after the children have gone to sleep, he murmurs it into the valley of Lagertha’s thighs, traces it along the bumps of Ragnar’s spine, shapes the words around moans as Ragnar fucks him slowly into the bed and Lagertha licks at his nipples.
Preparing for the thing, they clothe Athelstan in furs and jewels pried from Hexham’s treasures, befitting a skald of the highest skill. “You will dazzle them,” he tells Athelstan, who frowns.
“I’m supposed to dazzle them with my words, not my garments,” he replies
Lagertha laughs, brushing a hand over the crown of his head where his tonsure has grown in and ruffling the dark curls of his hair. “You can do both, and be twice as effective,” she says. “We must use all the strengths we have if we are to survive the fiercest of battles, my skald.”
“We fight with what we have,” Ragnar agrees. “The thing will be as much a battle for us as any we have yet faced. There will be resistance from Haraldson, from his men, from those who would not hear the truth of your words no matter how beautifully you sing them. When we do this, there is no turning back.”
Athelstan’s chin tilts up. “I would not want to turn back,” he says. “Not with what lies ahead of us.”
“You will conquer them with your songs, skald,” Lagertha says. “When the time is right, our swords will take care of what resistance remains.”
---
“So,” Earl Haraldson says when the cheering has died away. He looks out across the crowd, who are still murmuring in approval. His expression is bleak. “Not just a farm slave, then.”
“No,” Ragnar says. “As it turns out, he was the only treasure from Lindisfarne worth keeping.”