Floki (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
gods_that_haunt_me) wrote2015-05-12 02:07 am
gods_that_haunt_me) wrote2015-05-12 02:07 am
Entry tags:
OOM - part two
[Part One]
Early in the morning, Helga wakes up and carefully slips out of bed, not wanting to disturb Floki. She cooks breakfast for the both of them, porridge, as it's the only thing Floki can eat at the moment. Gently waking him, she helps him sit up, and she spoonfeeds him, sharing the porridge out of the same bowl.
Later, with the assistance of a servant, Helga changes Floki's bandages and applies a fresh healing paste to his wounds. The gouges in his side still ooze blood, but they don't seem infected. Helga only worries that they're too deep to close up properly.
For Floki, sitting up to have the bandages removed and the clean ones wrapped around him is painful, as his ribs still feel as if they're stabbing his lungs with every breath he takes. But he is determined to do some things on his own. Like standing. With the help of a wooden staff, of course. But not for too long because the bed is really quite comfortable and lying down is good.
Sometimes, with a silent plea to the gods, he tries to move the fingers of his right hand. And tries not to panic when he finds that he can't.
He would truly go out of his mind if not for Helga. And this idea of Athelstan's is the next best thing to divine intervention.
Early in the morning, Helga wakes up and carefully slips out of bed, not wanting to disturb Floki. She cooks breakfast for the both of them, porridge, as it's the only thing Floki can eat at the moment. Gently waking him, she helps him sit up, and she spoonfeeds him, sharing the porridge out of the same bowl.
Later, with the assistance of a servant, Helga changes Floki's bandages and applies a fresh healing paste to his wounds. The gouges in his side still ooze blood, but they don't seem infected. Helga only worries that they're too deep to close up properly.
For Floki, sitting up to have the bandages removed and the clean ones wrapped around him is painful, as his ribs still feel as if they're stabbing his lungs with every breath he takes. But he is determined to do some things on his own. Like standing. With the help of a wooden staff, of course. But not for too long because the bed is really quite comfortable and lying down is good.
Sometimes, with a silent plea to the gods, he tries to move the fingers of his right hand. And tries not to panic when he finds that he can't.
He would truly go out of his mind if not for Helga. And this idea of Athelstan's is the next best thing to divine intervention.
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He grins.
"I'm not dead yet, Björn," he assures him, his tone lighter and more mischievous than when he had told Athelstan the same thing.
He looks over to the boy's father.
"No thanks to you, Ragnar."
Of course it's said in affectionate jest, because he wouldn't be alive if not for Ragnar. But did he send the priest to take him to Milliways instead?
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But Athelstan being here might indicate they've already been and got him healed.
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"I am in the hands of the gods. And Helga."
A beat.
"With whom Athelstan conspired while I was asleep that he should visit more often, so that he would annoy me into healing faster. One would argue that it's working, as I want nothing more to get away from him. We've already spent too much time together. People might think we're friends."
This is all said without much of his usual bite. But that could only be because of his drowsiness.
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He turns around and winks at Athelstan. He might even make a vestigial thumbs-up sign so neither Floki nor Björn can see it.
Well done, little monk!
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Not so fast, little monk!
It's then that Helga returns from a quick meal and few errands. She pauses at the door, surprised to see everyone.
"I must be lucky," she says. "It seems as if the handsomest men in Kattegat are in this one room."
She brushes past Athelstan and Ragnar with smiles for each of them, before making her way to Björn and lightly ruffling his hair. Then she leans down and kisses Floki's forehead.
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He steps back and nudges Athelstan with his elbow.
Because the 'handsomest men' clearly include the little monk!
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Athelstan bumps him back affectionately, but his eyes linger for a moment on Helga, who is very pretty.
He heard.
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The boy grins and blushes as she playfully hugs him from behind, and he squirms, caught between that awkward stage between adolescence and manhood, but really, really wanting to be a man about this.
"Look at how he turns as pink as a berry," Floki chuckles. "I'm sure you'll have the same effect on the priest, and quicker."
Helga catches Athelstan's eyes over Björn's head as she releases him. "I probably won't even have to touch him."
"You probably won't even have to be in the same room," he retorts, an eyebrow raised, as he too, catches the glance between them.
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Oh yes, let's tease the little monk! Everybody here likes him, after all -- even Floki probably, in a strange way lined with barbs and denials.
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"Not as much as Bjorn", he retorts, fighting back a grin of his own.
...this may or may not be a complete lie.
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Teasing? Promising? Helga is bewitching like that.
But then she turns her attention to Floki, bending over him and stroking his head, and it's clear who she belongs to first and foremost.
"Are you in pain, my love?" she murmurs.
Floki doesn't want to say outright in front of everyone. "I'll live," he replies instead.
"Yes, you will. I'll give you something to sleep easier."
And she goes over to the table by the fireplace to prepare something with roots and herbs.
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"We should let Floki sleep in peace", Athelstan agrees, only a little reluctantly. "Helga, see to it you eat and rest as well. I'll be checking."
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Floki drowsily waves his left hand (the 'good' hand) at him. "You'll be checking? What are you now, a nurse? Get out of here."
But then he says, "Ragnar-- wait."
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He winks at Helga, then turns back to Floki.
"Yes?"
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Athelstan ushers Bjorn unobtrusively out of the room, in case Floki wouldn't want to say whatever it is in front of them.
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"Ragnar. I should have been dead. For a while I thought I was dead. And when I was dead, I had a dream about you. About us. About all the magnificent ships I would build for you, and all the wonderful places we shall sail to. I saw it all, Ragnar. It truly is our destiny."
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He puts a hand on his friend's shoulder, and smiles at him.
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"I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to make any more ships for you," he says quietly. He glances across the room to where Helga has her back turned. "But I know I can now."
And he wiggles the fingers of his right hand, still bound in a sling. He winks at Ragnar.
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He smiles -- without that place, some very recent developments with Athelstan would have been very unlikely to have happened.
"Including the awesome future, and the really big ships!"
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Which sort of starts a brief coughing fit, and he winces at the pain in his chest, even though he remains stubbornly undaunted by it.
Helga comes over with a cup in her hand.
"Look at you two, plotting and planning like little boys," she says, as she helps Floki lift his head to drink his medicine.
"Wait, is this the one that tastes like reindeer piss?" he asks, before putting his lips to the cup.
"No, not this one. You'll drink that one later before supper."
Floki lays his head back on the pillow. "Always something to look forward to, Ragnar," he chuckles.
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Still the farmer, in his metaphors.
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"Mmm," Floki hums, his eyes closed. "Always something to look forward to..."
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And with that, he nods at each of them, and walks out of the hut, to where Björn and Athelstan are waiting.
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