Runeheim slows to a halt, the frigid winds locking the city into a standstill. Nighttime cold was too big a risk for most, so the shattering of glass went unnoticed. Crime was all too easy, businesses closing early, staying empty longer. It isn’t until the sun rises that a frantic bar maid sees the broken window, and rushes to unlock the door, terrified of what she might find. Are they ruined? Is there food? Will she have to find a new way to support her family? The door creaks open. The smell hits her just before the vision.
A scream wakes runeheim.
The tension grows in the silence. Svanhildr looks calm, but Skarde and Fritjof both feel the quiet rage filling the air.
“Breaking and entering.”
“I’ll pay for-” Skarde is quickly silenced by a fierce look from Svanhildr.
“And if that wasn’t bad enough. You do the one thing, the one, specific thing I told you not to.”
“We just thought-” Fritjof is the one silenced this time, by a soft laugh, almost more terrifying than the stare down.
“You thought?! Tell me please, where have you been hiding that particular talent, and why have you not showcased it for me before now?! No. You two do not think. You were caught, fully nude, on a tavern table, Shaving!” Svanhildr’s voice barely raised, but their gaze grew even more severe as the two hooligans smiled and elbowed each other’s ribs playfully. “The window and the barkeeps discretion is already paid for by house Saenger. But you two owe me personally for not throwing you both out on your ear. At the very least, some peace and quiet you owe me. Now, get out of here before I have someone throw one of you in the pillory just to keep you separated”
Skarde and Fritjof quickly exited Svanhildr’s study, pausing after they were out of earshot to look at each other before bursting into laughter and stepping once more into an embrace. “Your place or mine?”
A tangle of furs and body parts and sighs later, the two lay staring at the ceiling.
“How was burying bodies?” Fritjof finally broke the ecstatic silence and he snuggled into Skarde’s chest.
“Not as exciting as I hoped, Callistra is a bit shy” they both chuckled. “I missed you frit”
“I know. I missed you too…” There’s a long pause before Fritjof speaks again, “I..I might have to leave you for a bit longer though”
Skarde’s breath catches, “was I that bad this round?”
“Hah, never” Fritjof kisses Skarde on the nose. “But I’ve had a lot of time to think and,…there’s some things I need to take care of. Look in to. All that”
“Sure, I’ll pack and come-” Skarde is silenced by another kiss, this one on the lips.
“I need to meet with someone alone.”
“You…you’re going to come back right? Intact?”
Fritjof brushes his thumb across the bare line he shaved into Skarde’s eyebrow the last time they spoke, and repeated the same words. “I’m not going to abandon you”
