Summary:Words can hurt a person. Alfred is really on that fact to get you on his side and tell him what he wants to know. If he has to use the fact that you are adopted by Ubbe, then so be it.
Warnings:dark!alfred, basically verbal abuse, strong language, mentions of death, reader is an orphan, mentions of adoption, dark content, angst, manipulation
You stare out the window, watching the sun slowly starting to set, darkening the sky. It only marks another day of your absence at the camp where you should be with your kin. You thought they would have found you by now but as the days fade away, so do your hopes.
Perhaps you aren’t as important to Ubbe as you were led to believe.
Hearing the cell door grind open, you turn your head away from the window to see the King that had imprisoned you here walk in. Alfred the Great. You can’t understand what’s so great about the Saxon King if he had to kidnap and place you in a cell to find out the plans for your Heathen people.
Alfred glances over his shoulder to the guards, telling them to leave with a silent nod and a wave of his hand. He then looks back at you, his tongue running over his lips as he takes a gentle, graceful step forward. “Are you going to behave today? Or shall I call the guards back?” he questions, tilting his head to the side as he folds his hands in front of him, showing off the shiny rings on his fingers.
“They’re going to start looking for me, if they haven’t already. And when they find me, my father’s going to make you cry out for your God and you’re going to wish you hadn’t taken me,” you spit out at him.
It makes him chuckle, his eyes reverting down to his feet as he takes another step forward. “They would have found you by now if they were looking for you. I don’t think your father, Ubbe Ragnarsson, cares much about the orphan child he burdened himself with,” Alfred says, his eyes lifting back to you making you slink back against the cold, stone wall behind you.
His words are cold and malicious, cutting into your heart as he tries again to break you down. You know this is his plan to get you to talk and you thought you would be strong enough to not let his words get to you. But in the dark of the night, they come back to your mind, floating around no matter how hard you try to swat them away. They linger, making you think if somehow they are true.
Ubbe didn’t need to take you in as his child. He didn’t need to claim you as his child even though there is no blood relation between you. You were found in the woods, swaddled in your dead mother’s arms beside your dead father. Ubbe could have left you for the wolves instead of burdening himself, his wife, and his other legitimate child with bringing you up.
So why did he save you?
“In time, he’s going to find a way to use what he did against you, make you do something for him. That’s the only reason why he saved your life,” Alfred speaks, making you think that he has read your mind now. “It is harsh times we live in, (Y/n). Why else would he give his family another mouth to feed if he saw something he could use you for?”
“Stop it. You’re lying,” you whisper, pushing yourself off the wall to walk past him, trying to get as much space between you and him as the cell will allow.
“If he really cared about you as much as you think he does, none of this would have happened. People would have been keeping an eye on you, they would have prevented my men from capturing you. Ubbe’s children are treated like royalty in your homeland, as far as I know. Well, his real children. No one cares about the adopted orphan,” Alfred continues, following you around the cell.
“Stop.”
“I’ve watched them since you’ve come here. After they discovered you’ve gone missing, they haven’t made a move.”
“Stop it!”
“They’re still there. In their settlements. Making no plan to come and rescue you.”
“Stop it!”
“They’ll leave you here to rot as you should have when you were a baby!”
“Enough!” you shout, turning around to yell in his face, showing him how the tears are now streaming down your cheeks. You’re shaking, your arms coming up to wrap themselves around your body to try and calm yourself down. “I can’t take words like that anymore. Please don’t say things like that anymore,” you beg, sinking to your knees as you let out a small sob. “Please stop.”
Alfred smiles to himself, thinking that he has done it. He has broken you. He has made you doubt the security you have in Ubbe’s family and he has made you doubt yourself.
Now he only has to plant the seed that he is the only person you can trust now.
He steps forward, places his hand gently on top of your head, making you jump as you look up at him. “My dear (Y/n). I say these things so that they do not hurt you when you realize it too late. Do you think your father would still love you if he knew how weak you are now?”
Those words make you cast your eyes to the ground in shame. It is a shame to be weak, to be seen as weak. And if people know you as Ubbe’s child, adopted or not, it would bring shame to him to be known as seen as weak.
“Do you think your father would still love you if he knew how you kneel in mercy before me, his enemy?”
That makes you close your eyes, causing more tears to roll down your cheek as Alfred moves his hand to cup your face. “You cannot go back now, can you, (Y/n)?”
You shake your head. People would know. They’d know that you didn’t fight your way out of your imprisonment. They would know that you had been set free out of pity or mercy. Ubbe wouldn’t welcome you with open arms or a loving embrace. You don’t mean that much to him anyway.
“I am all you have now. I am the only one who cares.”
You lift your gaze up to him as he wipes a tear away with his thumb. He holds out his hand for you, helping you off the ground and to your feet as he pushes the loose hair out of your face.
“Now, help me understand why they are here again and I will help you.”
You bite your bottom lip, tense up at the thought of betraying your clan, and let out a shaky breath. “I don’t-”
“I’ll let you think about it. After you’ve eaten something, rested on a bed, and had a hot bath,” Alfred gently says, coming to stand beside you so he can start leading you out of the cell.
You can’t deny that all those things sound amazing now after spending days in that cell. You’re not sure if this is Alfred’s plan to get you to talk, but when you look at him and his eyes, they seem softer and caring. Unlike how they were when he walked in.
You keep telling yourself that you shouldn’t feel guilty about accepting his offer. Perhaps he just wants to make peace now. Maybe this is his apology for treating you like shit these past few days.
You doubt you’d get the same treatment if you were to return to the Heathen Settlement…
Summary:Ubbe wants you to carry his seed. You want to live in solidarity. Only one of you can have their way and slaves never get what they want which means you can only dream a hopeless dream.
You’ve been told by many men that you’re beautiful, that you look like a goddess. That you’re the woman they would like to see grow big with their child. Of course, you never had a choice when it came to Ubbe Ragnarsson.
He chose you as his slave when you came in with the other thralls at the market in Kattegat, but he wasn’t going to use you to clean up and serve food. No, he intended to breed you so that his seed would carry on strong.
“It’s a wonderful thing being a mother. Having the gift to bring life into the world is like a miracle from the Gods. And I know a lot of women will be jealous of you having the opportunity to bring this child into the world. You should be happy to be here,” Aslaug told you when Ubbe announced your pregnancy.
But you’re not happy to be here. You didn’t want to be a mother. You planned on being a shieldmaiden when you were a child. Fighting in the Shield Wall seemed to be like a dream to you and it’s what you held onto when you were taken as a slave.
After meeting Ubbe and being in Kattegat, your dreams and plans changed. You long to just be alone. You want to live in a cabin in the woods, by yourself where you can do whatever you want and invite in whoever you want and kill whoever you don’t want to be near you. Being alone is the dream you cling onto, one that you know will never happen now that there is a child growing in your stomach.
Obviously, your unhappiness doesn’t go unnoticed by the father of your child. He’s kept quiet through the months, thinking that in time you’d get that glow of pregnancy and you’d soon feel that happiness of becoming a mother.
But now that you’re about to give birth any day now, he’s getting irritated with your constant melancholy.
“You are not happy,” he states with a monotone voice as he walks into the room, making your head snap over your shoulder to look back at him.
You watch him place his weapon down at the door of the room, something you always make sure he does before you talk to him because you can never be sure what he’ll do next to you and you’re not sure if carrying his child will be enough to stop him from killing you. Though, sometimes you think that’s not a bad idea.
“How can I be when I wanted none of this?” you mutter, taking your hand off of the large, round burden you carry.
“And what did you want? To live out in the woods like an outcast?”
“If it meant I’d be unbothered by you and everyone else in your fucking family then yes,” you hiss, snapping around to face him with a hateful glare in your eyes.
Ubbe smirks at you, thinking how feisty you have become since being with his child. You would never talk like this to him before, but now it’s a nice change. It makes the fight all the more fun.
Your glare dies when he starts walking towards you, your heart skipping a beat as your mind raced with thoughts of what he could do next. Would he beat you? Would he lay his hands on you while carrying his child or is he going to wait until you give birth and then ‘discipline’ you for all the things you had done wrong during your pregnancy? Or are his words going to be a knife to cut you now?
“Why do you wish to hurt my heart, (Y/n)? After everything I have done for you?” he whispers, placing his hand over his heart as he comes to stand in front of you.
You tell yourself to not feel guilty, that these are words to make you feel that way. You won’t let him. “You have done nothing for me-”
“I have spared you from a life of burden. Would you rather work 'til your hands bleed everyday and you cannot stand because your feet are blistered?” he asks, gently pushing a strand of your hair behind your ear. You try to pull your hand away from him, but it just follows you. “I have given you the mercy all thralls wish for. You won’t have to work as they do. All you have to do is be a mother to the children I give you.”
You swallow roughly and bite the inside of your cheek when you feel him rest his hand on the swell of your stomach. “Then why don’t you free me so that your children don’t come from a slave?”
Ubbe laughs, drops his eyes to your stomach, and swipes his thumb over the material covering the home of his heir. Any day now and he will hold what he hopes is his son in his arms. “You would have too much freedom then. I fear that if I free you, you will leave for the pathetic dream to live alone in the woods. And I cannot have that,” he says, leaning down to try and place a kiss on your lips.
But you turn your head, making his lips land on your cheek. “I promised the Gods when I saw you that I would never let you go and I would keep you as mine until one of us stops breathing. I intend to keep my promise to them,” he whispers in your ear, his voice making a shiver run up your spine and a shaky breath leave your lips.
“What makes you think the Gods care about your dreams?”
“What makes you think they care about yours?” he asks back, stepping away from you with a coy smile on his face. “They would have done something to save you by now if they cared. But here you are and here you will stay.”
You were told so many times how your motherly instincts will kick in the moment you hold your baby but all you could do was cry. Everyone thought that they were tears of joy. None of them knew that you were crying because you knew that your dream is now too far out of reach.
You waited for that feeling of motherly nurture to fill you, but every time you look at the son you birthed you couldn’t help but feel hatred for what they represent to you. It made Ubbe happy to have a son, but you know that soon he will ask for another.
No, we won’t ask. He will force another on you.
Hearing Ubbe walking into the room, you don’t bother turning your head to acknowledge him because you know he’s only here for one thing. “Your son is with your mother,” you bluntly say, staring at the wall in front of you as you pull the pelt of fur tighter around you.
“I know. I asked her to keep him for the night,” Ubbe says.
You can hear him taking his clothes off, your eyes closing in dread as a sob catches in your throat. You had only finished bleeding a few days ago and the healers have said that you are able to carry another child. It was only a matter of time before Ubbe made that happen.
He walks over to you, around the bed, and stands right in front of you. Lifting your head up by placing two fingers under your chin, you open your eyes to look at him, and a tear slips out to roll down your cheek.
You don’t want to fight anymore. You can’t bring yourself to fight. You can’t find the strength to push away the numb feeling inside you to fight Ubbe about this.
And he notices this.
“Don’t worry, (Y/n),” he soothes, wiping the tear off your cheek while caressing your cheek. “Your fire will come back once you’re carrying my child again.”
He pushes the pelt of fur off your shoulder, smiling to himself when he finds that you’re already naked. Probably because you didn’t bother getting dressed after taking a bath.
“I want a daughter,” he whispers, making you lie down on the fur that had wrapped your body like a gift to him.
“Fine,” you mutter, turning your head to the side as he crawls over you, kissing his way down your neck, over your chest, and across your body.
All you can do is close your eyes and think about your cabin in the woods, the peace you would have as a free woman, the life you would have without being treated like a breeding bitch.
Perhaps you would take the daughter Ubbe wants with you to save her from the way she would be treated. You have a feeling that she won’t have the same respect a legitimate daughter of Ubbe Ragnarsson would have. She would be known as your daughter first and foremost. The daughter of a whore. No woman deserves that.
But that’s all a dream now. A pathetic, lost dream that will never see the light of day.
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