Tile: But not what we may become
Author Zara Ravenwood
Disclaimer: JKR owns The Founders, the title is taken from Hamlet
info from :
http://www.vikinganswerlady.com
Warning: The medieval view dose not necessarily reflect my own, however thoughts who can not handle such topics in a historical context may not like this fic. A huge thanks to songbook_99 for betaing.
Summary:What if Helga was Lazy? Salazar was naive? What if Rowena hated the idea of an education? And Godric was far from bold? The Founders we know are the heroes of their age - full of passionate notions and deeply held values that would shape the Wizarding world for a millennia, but they weren't born with them. Some times the things we feel strongest about as adults are the things we hate as children. A coming of age story.
Chapter 1: Helga
The frozen ground lay stretched out before her, like the beginning of the world. Helga wandered aimlessly among the snow drifts, stopping here and there over frozen waters. She didn't know where she was, or why she was here, and she didn't care. Her red braids flapping against her apron, she shivered in the cold, looking for any signs of human life, for any signs of any life.
There was none and Helga smiled. Wherever she was, it was better than where she had come from. There were no screaming children to watch, no thralls to oversee, no wood to carry, no food to make,no Ásgerðr the spae-wife telling her how she needed to cultivate her prophetic skills for the good of the settlement. It was peaceful here.
The peace was shattered about half a second later by the loud crash of a bronze Cauldron beingknocked over. Helga snapped awake. "Godric! What are you doing?!"
The short English Thrall paled, backing up to the wall - anyone would think the boy received regular beatings from her father rather then being one of his favorites. "S-S-sorry, Mistress H-Helga."
She took a deep breath and counted to twenty seven - slowly. The boy was such a coward it drove her crazy. Of course the stuttering wasn't a sign of fear - it was the sign of a bad tongue. But even when not being chastised the boy was a meek thing. She wondered if all the English were like this - or only the ones Father brought home. "Just answer the question, Godric," she said tartly. "Did you drop that?"
"Yes."
"Then pick it up and let me get back to bed."
"I'm s-sorry,Mistress H-Helga, b-but I can't - I was
sent to w-wake you."
Helga nodded. Most likely he had been too frightened to wake directly so he had knocked the cauldron from its hook. Couldn't blame him really - he had duty and so did she. Unlike her, Godric couldn't dodge them as easily. "Well, let's get to Old Ásgerðr then...." Ásgerðr was the oldest witch in the settlement - the older person at all in the settlement renowend among wizards and Muggles alike. Something that had startled Godric quite a lot when they had first come - apparently English Muggles were starting to turn on there magical neighbors. She wondered vaguely if that was why the boy had never tried to escape. On the other hand, he seemed to miss his homeland quite a bit.
The two of them made their way to her house, trudging through the thin snow that was already falling always went with her to her lessons. He was a powerful Wizard in his own way - his potions and herbs cured better then even Ásgerðr's, and his knowledge of dark curses was something disturbing.
Not that Helga was any weakling in her own right. Her inner eye was, in Ásgerðr's's own words, "Staggering," and she suspected she was well on her way to becoming a ráða rúnom, a Rune master - though that would probably take another decade or twelve to achieve. The thought of doing that much work, though, was distasteful. Why that was living most of her life over again. There was no way Helga was going to put in that much work for anything, let alone in the service of her little village.
Definitely not for this little village. It was so ..small .. sometimes she wished she could be like the men and go A-Viking, trading, and exploring with half the world. Not that she wanted to actuallybe a man ofcourse - she was looking forward to being Mistress of her own home someday day. (It meant more servants to do the household work, and all she'd have to do would be to over see it.) But the idea of spending two hundred years in a place where she already knew every rock by heart was infuriating.
More to the point, Helga loathed the idea of being in service to others. What was the point of being a Jarl's daughter if you had to labor like a thrall woman? Worse then a thrall. A thrall served one master - a spae-wife probably would have the whole village come to her with trivialities.
They reached Ásgerðr's house and walked in. "You're late," the old badger scolded. With her bulky form and fierce face, she did indeed resemble an enraged badger.
"I was working," she lied easily, and flinched as the woman looked her in the eyes.. She had the uneasy sensation that her mind was being pierced some how.
"No, you were not."
Flushing, Helga inclined her head slightly, a bit scared of the old woman.
"There's a ship leaving next week. We're to prepare it for its journey."
Helga blinked. "But that's really important. If we do it wrong, it could sink!"
Ásgerðr simply waved away her protests. "Then we'll have to see that it's done right. Godric, you'll be brewing something to shield it from flame and arrows - something stronger then a flame freezing charm. Helga, you'll be enchanting the protective charms and runes."
Helga trembled slightly, loathing having this much responsibility on her head. Besides, private charms for a whole ship would be long, painstaking, and tedious work. Very tedious.
Godric, for his part, seemed to move with uncharacteristic slowness, as if he was equally loath to perform his duties. It took her a moment to realize why - the ship was bound for England from what she'dheard. Doubtless he felt like a traitor. She made her way over to him. "Cheer up, Godric. You're one of the Norse now. Well, sort of."
"Yes, Mistress," he answered obediently, but he didn't seem to cheer up at all.
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She had been working on this cursed ship for three
days now, and her head was aching with the endlessness of it all. Her mind was drifting when she saw something odd. There was a flock of birds flying overhead - flying low and in an odd pattern. There was something... important about that pattern. Something familiar. It looked very much like runes actually - the runes for famine. It was just a coincidence,she was sure, but fear gnawed her like a wolf.
There was no way there could be a famine - they had stores. She watched the birds till they flew off. "S..something w-wrong, Mistress-Helga?"
Abruptly she realized she was trembling. "Godric! Run home! Run to Father! And Ásgerðr! Bring them here!"
It's possible he read the fear on her face because he took off running faster then she'd ever seen anyone move - and he didn't stop at all, even after tripping.
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"I don't get it!" Godric hissed in frustration as they lessoned a bit apart from where the freemen were talking in the Thing. "Why aren't they listening to your f-father?"
"Scared of causing a panic I expect." Helga shrugged. "But I would not worry, We'll be fine. Father's made provisions. He'll take care of us..."
At first there was nothing really to worry about. They rationed there food out carefully and made the appropriate offerings and prayers to the gods (which made Godric very awkward for some reason - she offered him the chance to make an offering of his own and he replied politely that his God would prefer a song of praise to meat) and got a little more creative with their cooking. The only real effect it had on Helga was that she now had more to oversee in her household than ever before.
Lessons with Ásgerðr were put off for time's sake. Then winter hit. It wasn't a particularly bad winter but its mildness proved to be their bane. The other villages, who hadn't stocked up on extra provisions, become desperate - desperate and resentful. Half crazed by hunger, they raided the village frequently - mostly for food but sometimes carrying off people and burning buildings. The raiders could be fought off but the fires were a another problem. Though the raiders hadn't specifically targeted the granaries to be razed,the flames frequently spread there. By spring, there wasn't a household that hadn't lost at least several people to hunger. Hunger brought weakness,weakness made plowing difficult , which summoned in its turn disease.
"We've got to do something." Helga, Godric, and the rest of the household who could move were all working in one field. She looked at the man who had spoken “ he could barely stand but he was pulling weeds along with the rest of them. "We still have our ships."
"Even if we could find the strength to row them, everyone would be dead by the time we got back -either way we are too tired to even steal food, staying here and living as best we can from the land is our only choice.”
Helga said nothing. She wanted to back her father's orders but the debate was getting so heated in the village she dare not speak.
Late summer marked the passing of Ásgerðr. Helga had sat by her side for days trying force her to eat, but the woman refused. "Look into the water, child." She pointed to a scarring vessel. "Tell me what you see."
"Now's not the time for this. Please eat."
"Look. I need to know. I need to know you're ready for this."
"Ready for what?"
“Your duties, your destiny." Helga said nothing - you didn't tell your dying mentor that there was nothing, nothing at all, they could teach you to prepare you for this.
Fall brought what little harvest there was - enough to make it to winter but no more - not that there was much of a village left by this point. There were maybe twenty-three able-bodied men, women, and children - able-bodied now meant those who stood a chance of living out the month.
It also brought the death of her father - not by the grip of famine or plague but by the hands of one of his household. The man had been caught stealing extra rations and had killed him fighting for his life. Helga herself saw him flee. "Don't bother going after him," she had said at length after life had left her father's eyes. "He will not live long anyway." And his body had been found not long after, not a half league from the village.
At the onset of winter, Helga found herself trying to summon fish and fowl in to a basket, now the only source of food. Godric, next to her, wasn't doing much at all. He was oddly lethargic lately - his eyes constantly over the sea. She didn't bother scolding him. Actually she felt sorry for him - knowing that he'd probably meet his end here, on foreign shores. She surveyed the ocean herself from time to time. This time her gaze met something - the long ship they had worked on. "Godric!" she yelped, jumping up. "Gather everyone you can find - everyone - and bring them here now..."
"W-what are you.." Then he spotted the ship as well."N-no. We'll n-never steer it, Helga." His voice was respectful but oddly firm. "There's no one strong enough."
"Then we'll use magic!"
"I.. don't know the s-spells.... do you?!"
"Then we'll make them up!"
"And t-then -what?T-the minute you get to a port, you'll be taken and sold."
"I know, Godric! But we really don't have any more options now, do we? Or do you want to die here?"
But not what we may become by Zara Ravenwood
Chapter Notes: Disclaimer: JKR owns The founders,the title's is taken
from Hamlet info from :
http://www.vikinganswerlady.com
Warning: The medieval view dose no necessarily reflect my own, however thoughts who can not handle such topics in a historical context may not like this fic. A huge thanks to songbook_99 for bateing.