The sky split open with a thunderclap so savage it seemed the heavens had torn their own lungs in grief. Rain fell in torrents, not as gentle drops, but as a relentless deluge that devoured every sound—save one.
A boy's cry.
"Mother…. Mother… Mother…M-,"
Ragnar clung to the coffin with the desperation of a drowning man grasping driftwood.
His black hair, soaked and matted to his forehead, dripped rivulets of water onto the varnished wood. His obsidian eyes—once watchful and quiet—spilled tears until his body could offer no more.
He didn't sob. He howled. Like a wounded animal at the foot of something divine and indifferent.
Inside the casket, Althaea lay in still repose. Her features were serene—too serene. Her face, once so full of life and gentle wisdom, now wore the frozen peace of death.
Her black hair framed her face like a dark halo. A faint smile curved her lips, as if she knew a secret she'd carried to the grave.
"Mother… Mother…"
His voice cracked,
"Why? Why? Why are you leaving me?"
A calloused hand settled on his shoulder. He turned.
Ian Brooke—his grandfather—stood there, aged and rain-slicked, yet steady as stone.
Ragnar turned to see an old man standing by the carriage's door.
"Grandfather, I am sorry… I am sorry…sorry…"
The man wrapped his arms around Ragnar,
"You don't have anything to be sorry about,"
His gaze shifted to the woman in the coffin,
"Althaea,"
Her name left his lips like a prayer unravelling.
Ragnar croaked,
"I-I was her son. Yet I-I couldn't protect her…"
The man patted his back,
"You are her son," Ian corrected gently. "And you did protect her—in every way you could."
Ragnar reached into the coffin and brushed a trembling hand across Althaea's cheek, his thumb trailing the contours of her face as if trying to memorize what time would soon erase.
"Mother… I am sorry for being so pathetic… I am sorry."
Behind Ian, a middle-aged man emerged, rain darkening the shoulders of his coat.
"Father, how could Althaea leave us like that,"
His eyes rested on Ragnar,
"How could she leave him like that. What will happen to Ragnar and Halina now?"
Ian Brooke turned to a teenage girl on the bench. Her black frock drenched with rain and tears.
"My granddaughter and grandson, they are my responsibility… My daughter, rest well."
He turned to the man behind him,
"Percival, take care of Ragnar. Let me go to Halina."
Percival nodded before stepping into the carriage.
"Ragnar," he rested his hand on his shoulder,
"Ragnar, Althaea, she… she was tormented, broken, used but she never complained. Do you know why?"
Ragnar looked at Percival, his eyes teary.
"For us, for me,"
His voice cracked,
"For her useless son."
Percival crouched near the coffin, his eyes became moist at seeing his sister.
"You're not worthless. And she never thought you were."
He wiped his face and stood.
"Ragnar, stand back up,"
"You have to take care of Halina now. Althaea has left her in your care now. Be the good son you have always been."
Ragnar buried his face in his hands,
"Mother, you always made me promise you many things. But today,"
His voice choked,
"Today, I promise you three things-,"
"First- I will never let anything as much as touch my sister's hair. I will give her everything she wants. If she wants the world I will give her the world."
"Second- I will fulfil every vow we made. Every dream you left behind."
"And third—"
His voice dropped to a growl.
"I will take revenge."
His eyes blazed with fury, red as lightning-flushed clouds.
"The people I share blood with—the ones who turned your life into suffering—I will rip their jaws apart. I will bury them in ruin so complete, they will beg for the mercy of death."
"Ragnar…" Percival wrapped him in an embrace. "Don't. Althaea wouldn't want you to drown in vengeance."
Ragnar clutched him tightly.
"Uncle… they hurt your sister. Don't you want revenge?"
Percival's voice broke as he whispered, "I did. I still do. But she begged me not to. She said it was alright… she always said it was alright."
Ragnar pulled away. "She made me promise only one thing: 'Don't raise your hand against your father again.' She said nothing about the rest of them."
"Ragna—"
But he was already gone.
Rain lashed his body as he walked toward Halina.
He walked towards his sister. Halina.
"Halina,"
The words left his throat. Halina looked up at her older brother. Her beautiful face stricken with tears Her eyes—Althaea's eyes—were red from crying. She looked like a mirror of their mother,
Ragnar crouched, his fingers curled around Halina's hand.
"Halina, leave with grandfather."
Halina snapped her hand back,
"Leave, why? Will you return alone?"
Ragnar took her hand again, burying his face in them.
"Tell me brother! Will you not come with me?"
"…"
"Tell me! Will you come with me or not?!"
"…Sorry…"
"Brother… Brother, who else do I have in this world but you? Why are you doing this?"
Ragnar stood up,
"Go and send mother off…"
He caressed her cheek,
"Go Halina, I want you to be happy."
Halina placed her forehead against his chest, where old scars peeked through torn fabric—scars earned in silence, scars endured for her.
Scars he tolerated since childhood. Scars he bore from their father. Scars he took for his sister and mother.
"Brother, please don't leave me…"
"Please… please don't leave me alone."
His arms didn't move.
"Go."
Her voice trembled.
"Brother…"
"GO AWAY! I DON'T WANT TO SEE YOU!"
Halina stumbled back. Her brother raised his voice at her for the first time. His voice—once her lullaby—had turned to steel.
"Y-You…"
Her voice cracked as tears threatened to spill.
"Let's go,"
Ian intervened,
"Ragnar, take care of yourself. I will take care of Halina."
Ragnar nodded,
"Yes grandfather."
Ian and Halina walked to the carriage where Percival was waiting for them.
As they walked toward the carriage, Halina paused. One foot in the doorway, she looked back.
Her brother stood in the rain, motionless.
She ran to him. Hugged him. Whispered in his ear.
"Take care of yourself…"
He didn't hug her back.
She returned to the carriage. Ragnar watched it pull away, into the mist. Into a world he no longer belonged to.
Then he turned.
Toward home.
TAP!
Before him loomed a mansion—grand, cold, and soaked in opulence. Statues wept rain, gardens drowned in silence.
CREAK.
He entered. Walked down a corridor. Stopped before the doors to the banquet hall.
From behind them: Laughter.
TAP.
He stepped inside.
Chandeliers glittered. Silverware clinked. Firelight danced across faces twisted in mirth.
His family.
His tormentors.
"Allen!" a voice jeered. "Did you bury that wench?"
His family. His kin. Uncles, aunts, grandparents and his own father sat on the dining table where they had opened their finest wines, baked their best bread, grilled their fattest turkeys.
'Mother…Why did God make demons? Are they not enough for him?'
His father, a man with blonde hair and blue eyes sat at the very end of the table chatting happily with the others.
His eyes spotted the drenched Ragnar.
"Oh, look who it is! Allen!"
Faces turned to Ragnar, their smiles wide.
Another laughed. "Finally, the bitch died! She was such a nuisance!"
A woman sneered.
"Finally, that bitch died! She was annoying as hell."
A man laughed, sipping his wine.
"What happened, Allen?"
Ragnar's father smiled.
Ragnar clenched his fists,
'Allen, that horrid you name you call me by. It disgusts me.'
"Where's Halina?" he asked lazily.
"She left… with her mother's father."
"Mother's father?" an old man blinked. "Not me?"
Ragnar sighed. "No… with a real grandfather."
Maximillian shrugged. A woman leaned against his shoulder.
"Honey," she purred, "isn't it for the best? That girl looked too much like that woman."
"Maybe," Maximillian sipped his wine. "Maybe it was."
TRICKLE!
TAP!
Blood trickled down from Ragnar's clenched wrist. He turned on his heel, exiting the room.
The table erupted with laughter again.
WHAM!
The doors burst open again.
Ragnar stood there, soaked in oil. A burning log in hand. A bucket of oil in another.
POUR.
He stepped forward, eyes wild.
"Maximillian Beaumont," he said, voice steady, "I vow to make you all pay for what you did to my mother."
They stood, stunned.
"Allen! What is the meaning of this?!"
"If you value your lives…" Ragnar's voice rose above the storm, "take this log and kill me now. Because if I live…"
He threw the torch.
"…you'll regret it."
The flames from the fireplace licked the air as the burning log clattered across the table. A golden tablecloth caught first—then a bottle of wine exploded into fire as the oil on Ragnar's soaked clothes began to sizzle with threat.
"Are you insane!?" a woman screamed, leaping to her feet as embers snapped into the air.
Maximillian Beaumont's smile faltered.
Ragnar stood there—drenched, unblinking, a human fuse.
"I am insane," he whispered, voice hollow, cracked, "Insane enough to tolerate you all so much."
The log rolled to a stop, flames dancing inches from a trembling servant's foot. No one moved. No one dared.
"You mock her death. You mock her life." He muttered.
"You laughed while she withered. You watched as he—" he turned his gaze to Maximillian, "—broke her bones and burnt her dreams."
"You all dined on her silence," his voice now thunder,
"and drank wine over her grave!"
"Allen—" his grandfather's brother tried to reason.
Ragnar took a step forward, the oil on his shirt dripping onto the marble.
"No. Not Allen. Not your puppet. I am my mother's son. I am the storm she left behind."
He dropped the bucket in his hand, letting it thud to the floor without catching. It was a warning, not a blaze.
"I will burn this house down one day. Brick by brick. And when I do—"
he looked directly at Maximillian, whose smugness had long melted into unease,
"—you'll wish you had died tonight."
He turned on his heel, blood mixing with rainwater on the floor, and walked out—leaving behind silence. A heavy, bone-deep silence.
He turned one last time,
"My name is Ragnar, Ragnar Etskald. The name my mother gave me."
Only the storm outside dared to speak.
Thunder rumbled in the distance. Not far behind him now.
And from that night forward, the name Ragnar Etskald would become a whisper in the halls of power. Not for his strength. Not for his madness.
But for the promise he made beneath a grave and a godless sky.
A promise bound by grief.
An oath sworn in fire.