20: Blood Eagle 20: Blood Eagle In the days following his victory at Reykjavík, Vetrulfr consolidated his power and forced the remainder of the Althing to kneel.
They were made to renounce their foreign faith and beg forgiveness from the gods of their ancestors.
Even now, his úlfheðnar acted as inquisitors across Ísland, tearing down Christian sanctuaries, seizing wealth, and punishing those who refused to return to the old gods.
Ívarr still lived, but only because he served a purpose.
His death was certain…
only delayed, not denied.
Vetrulfr returned to Ullrsfjörðr, the new capital of his kingdom, where he named jarls and thanes from among those warriors who had proven their valor and loyalty.
These men would carry his vision forward, rebuilding a realm worthy of the gods, a bastion at the edge of the Christian world.
And they would do so with the same methods that had transformed Ullrsfjörðr into the stronghold it now was.
When the day of his coronation arrived, his mother carried a crown forged of Damascus steel.
It was simple, crude, but unyielding; just like Vetrulfr.
She would perform the rites as the highest remaining seiðr in Ísland.
But before the crown could grace his brow, a great blót had to be held.
Trodden out, stripped naked, bound in chains and covered in the rotting blood that still scarred his flesh from the battle.
flogged through the cobbled streets of Ullrsfjörðr, came the last Christian goði of Reykjavík, Ívarr.
Unwashed since the day of the siege, his body was coated in filth too grotesque to describe.
Surrounded by warriors with raised spears, dressed in full armor, he was marched to the harbor as chants echoed ancient and primal.
There, staked into stone, stood two diagonal timber posts, their joints reinforced with iron—a shrine built not for prayer, but punishment.
He stared at the posts in confusion, thinking them some crude crucifixion.
He did not recognize the shape, nor the fate that awaited him, but his imagination was kinder than the truth.
Forced to his knees and bound in such a way that he could not rise, he looked up at Vetrulfr and Brynhildr, standing side by side.
Hatred burned in his eyes, but before a word could leave his lips, Vetrulfr struck him with a clenched fist, knocking his teeth into the sand.
Then, raising that same bloodied hand, Vetrulfr addressed the crowd: “The gods return to Ísland!
With our victory, we will build a realm cleansed of Christian rot, untainted by the world’s decay.
While the North bleeds, we will grow strong.
we must offer a gift.
This traitor shall be our sacrifice, here in Ullrsfjörðr, untouched by the dead god’s reach.
We honor our ancestors with the rite they reserved for the greatest of traitors.
A rite so cruel that he who endures it without scream or sob may yet earn redemption.
I speak of the Blood Eagle!” The warriors of Ullrsfjörðr howled in response.
Brynhildr raised her hands and began the invocation: “In the name of Ullr, Óðinn, Þórr, Njörðr, and all the gods of our forebears, we give you this offering!
Bless this land today and for all the days to come.
Begin!” Just as the úlfheðnar stepped forward to begin the rite, a great horn bellowed through the fjord, its call bouncing across water and stone.
Brynhildr turned to Vetrulfr.
“Intruders come by sea!
Prepare for battle!” Vetrulfr unsheathed his sword and snarled: “It seems the gods wish to test our faith.” He rushed to ready the defenses, not knowing who approached, only that their arrival was an offense.
— Nearly a moon had passed since the sails of the Jomsvikings cut westward across the Baltic.
Some whispered they had been claimed by Njörðr’s wrath, lost beneath the waves like so many arrogant ghosts.
But on the twenty-ninth day, as Reykjavík’s fires still smoldered and ash settled like snow, the dragons returned.
Shields tight along their hulls.
Only the sound of oars, and the wind, and the steel certainty of men who demanded a seat at a table already set.
Somehow, they had overshot Vestmannaeyjar and Reykjavík entirely, arriving instead in the Westfjords; as if Njörðr himself had guided them with the winds and the tide.
There they found something that should not have existed: a great city, fortified and thriving, unknown to their records.
Its grandeur was greater than anything they had ever seen north of Hadrian’s wall.
Armodr Ulvsson expected a town with a weak palisade, not a Roman fortress.
He turned furiously on his scribe.
“You told me Reykjavík was a glorified village!
You lied to me!” The scribe, stunned as he studied the walls nestled in the fjord, replied: “This isn’t Reykjavík…
We are in the Westfjords.
But this place,this fortress…
This place should not exist.” Realization dawned.
Had this city been built by the same Varangians who sacked the Abbey in Bobbio?
If so, they were far more capable than he had imagined.
After a long silence, Armodr gave his order: “Find a way to signal them.
We came for war, but I will not charge blind into the den of wolves we cannot see.” A white shield, unmarred, was raised on a spear above the prow of Armodr’s flagship.
The sails were drawn, oars stilled, and the fleet drifted anchored at distance.
Then came the horn; three steady blasts, not a cry of war, but a plea for caution.
A skiff lowered, bearing only two men.
The other held no weapon, only a silver-bound horn and a folded banner of wolfskin.
Armodr had chosen his message carefully: We are wolves, not jackals.
We will feast beside you…
or fall with fangs bared.
CREATORS’ THOUGHTS Zentmeister Just a heads up, I’ve come down with something, and will be taking the next few days to decrease my chapter output.
I’ll get back to the normal two chapters a day routine when I am able.
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