Page 9 of The Thornwyck Rose
If Baldwin spoke of this to Henry, the consequences would not stop at him. But Baldwin had a heart, and over the years, he had shown a measure of kindness toward Ragnar—one of the few who had.
“Please,” Payen whispered. The word tasted like ash—a plea to see his own son.
Baldwin’s eyes swept the empty attic, then the landing at the stairs. His shoulders sank.
“Make it quick,” he murmured. “Before someone comes.”
Payen clasped Baldwin’s shoulder in thanks and slipped past, ducking under the low rafters. The door creaked softly as he eased it open.
Inside, the room smelled of straw and smoke from the kitchen shaft from the ground floor below. A single candle guttered in a dish of tallow, casting a thin halo of light over the cot where the child slept curled against the summer heat.
Seven, almost eight years old, and bigger than the servant boys, Ragnar’s shoulders already hinted at the fighter’s frame he’d one day wear. His hair, tousled and damp at the temples, was a darkened gold, the color of barley before harvest. His cheek rested against a folded arm, and his lashes lay thick over sea-blue eyes that mirrored the man watching him sleep.
Payen crouched slowly, placing one knee to the floor. He watched his son for a moment in the peace that only sleep could grant a child born into a grim world.
“Ragnar,” he whispered, low andwarm. He laid a calloused hand lightly on the boy’s shoulder. “Wake, little wolf.”
The boy stirred, brow creasing, then blinked up blearily. His face shifted from confusion to joy in the space of a breath.
“Father?” His voice was soft with sleep, but eager, too, as he sat upright.
“It’s me, boy,” Payen said, unable to keep the smile from tugging at the corners of his mouth. He brushed a bit of straw from the child’s shoulder and sat beside the cot.
Ragnar leaned into him without hesitation, wrapping both arms around his father’s neck. The boy’s warmth clung to him, and Payen closed his eyes, letting the embrace anchor him.
Payen held him close for a long moment, a reminder that not everything in this place had hardened.
He pulled back slightly, looking into his boy’s face. “What have you learned while I was tending the Marches?” he asked gently. “Has Father Osbert filled your head with more verses and riddles?”
Ragnar beamed, still clinging to his arm. “I learned a verse yesterday,” he said. “From the Book of Matthew. Father Osbert said the kingdom of Heaven is for all children.”
Payen’s throat tightened around the words he didn’t want to speak. “Did he now?”
The boy nodded earnestly, though he was bleary-eyed. “He said there’s no pain there. No fighting. Everyone belongs.” His voice dropped. “Do you think I’ll go there? Do you think I’m still a child?”
The question hollowed his spirit.
For a long time, he didn’t answer.
In his mind, the mists of Helheim curled like breath in winter—cold, gray, and silent. He saw Astrid’s blood on the wooden floor planks again. The way her hands had reached for him even as she fell.
“Perhaps you will,” he said softly. “It sounds better than the mists of Helheim.”
He smoothed the boy’s hair back from his brow, eyes tracing his features as though trying to memorize them.
Heaven. A place with no pain, no fighting. No walls. No orders barked down staircases. No Henry.
The boy deserved that world more than the one Payen had bargained his life for.
But instead, Ragnar survived here—in the keep of a man who saw him only as a pawn, as leverage. His son’s world was books and priests and the smell of cold, damp stone. Payen wondered if even a child could grow up whole inside a cage built of other men’s wars.
He cleared his throat and forced a small smile. “Tell me, Ragnar—do you like your life here?”
The boy hesitated, as if testing the question. His fingers tightened in his father’s tunic, and his sea-blue eyes searched Payen’s face.
“I am a prisoner here, aren’t I, Father?”
Payen exhaled, the candlelight dancing with the draft. His lip trembled with the truth, but if Heaven were true, maybe he should let Ragnar be a child for a bit longer.
