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An Honorable Union Gone Awry

Elsa has to surpress a giggle about his snoring, it is so typical sounding of an enormous viking man like Canute was. She tried to ignore it, and she successfully fell asleep in a matter of seconds, herself exhausted from her first day as a wife (and coincidentally, a queen and orphan). In her sleep she moved some, ending up more pressed against him than she had started.
 
In fact, both of them seem to move closer during the night. And so Elsa finds herself with the sun kissing her face, one big arm slung over her body. Canute lies sideways with his queen nestled snugly against his warm body, his arm draped over her chest, holding her to him. He no longer snores as the night before, but slumbers silently on.
 
She stretched all of her limbs as she felt the sun warming her face. She didn't open her eyes, not wanting to let herself escape from slumber. She felt incredibly warm and safe, not cogniscent of the fact that who she was with she considered to be her enemy. She yawned and snuggled down into the pillow, breathing a huge sigh of content. She slowly realized that there was a body next to her, and opened her eyes slowly. She just looked at Canute sleeping there, he looked peaceful for once.
 
Indeed, so peaceful is the Viking in his slumber that he slings one big arm over his young wife, turning his body toward her. His body presses against her beneath the heat of their blankets, a warm embrace - as any young lovers, though certainly it's a rather different circumstance here.
 
The warmth from underneath the blankets was nice, but being so close to Canute was weird. She wasn't sure that she liked it, she wasn't sure that she was ready for that. She hated Canute, and he needed to know that. She wasn't going to cuddle with him. Elsa tries to push his giant arm off of her, but it's too heavy for her small frame to move. She wriggled her way down underneath the covers and slipped out from underneath his arm. She sat up and stretched, trying to slip out of the bed undetected.
 
Her luck isn't the best, it seems! Canute wakes as soon as she slips beneath that arm, though she wouldn't know it. He keeps those eyes closed until she is already sitting and rising from the bed, eyes sliding half-open to watch her as she stretches. It is not until she begins to rise that he makes himself noticed, sitting up in the bed to smack Elsa's behind with a toothy grin, "Mornin'. Going somewhere?"
 
She squeals and almost falls over when he smacks her butt. Guess she's not going to get away with sneaking out of the room. She sits back down on the bed, her butt stinging a little. She turns and looks down at him, he looks so comfortable and so pompous. Like he owns her, which technically he does. "Oh, um...d-do you not want me to?"
 
He smirks, one big arm stretching out to loop around her waist and tug her unceremoniously into the bed with him from her sitting position, to yank her onto his chest, cradled by that big arm. "Mm, so now you care what I want?" His grin returns, flashing teeth, "I knew I'd grow on you, wife."
 
She yelped as he grabbed her and tugged her back into the bed, throwing her on top of him. The truth was, he scared her and she knew that if she wasn't at least pleasant to him that he could seriously hurt her. She pushed against him with her hands, trying to free herself from his tight grasp. "Why do you have to hold me like that?" she asked, a little irritated.
 
He lifts a brow, his eyes twinkling, obviously amused. He decides, though, to humor her, sitting up in the bed with his arms crossed behind his head, leaning back against the headboard. "How should I hold you, then? How would you prefer your husband touched you, mm?"

He watches her intently as he awaits a reply, tossing aside the covers - apparently, despite the chilly morning, he's used to the cold. He sits in the soft bed bare as the day he was born, listening to his wife's response.
 
She shivers when he throws the covers off, Elsa is obviously not used to the cold. She wraps her arms around herself, trying to dispell the cold without having to tell him how to hold her or ask him to. She has to admit that she was much warmer a moment ago when he'd had her pressed up against him under the covers. He was doing this just to get her to let him hold her however he wanted to.

She shifted a little, obviously uneasy now. She sighed, "You can do it however you want," she muttered, still irritated. He'd won that so easily, it was pathetic.
 
He grunts, slouching against the headboard. He's apparently as disappointed by the easy win as she is. He shakes his head, furrowing his brows into a scowl, "I always heard you Celts were fiery, could stand up for yourselves. Put up a little fight once in a while, woman. I asked how you wanted me to hold you, not for permission to hold you how I want." He snickers, shaking his head again, tossing that mane of hair, "I don't need your permission for that. I'm bigger than you, if you hadn't noticed."
 
She narrowed her eyes at him and moved away from him, getting off of the bed and storming over to a trunk. She pulled a cloak out of the trunk and wrapped it around herself. She glared over at him, still laying there on the bed like he was king of the world. "If you really want to know, I don't want you to hold me at all. In fact, I don't want you to touch me at all."

She was furious now. He'd called her weak and had made fun of her ethnicity. She could say a million things about his ethnicity but she didn't. She tried to respect him, but maybe she shouldn't.
 
He seems to find her tantrum dreadfully amusing, head tilting back with laughter as she fishes the cloak out and voices her disdain and disgust with his touch. "You Celts are a strange breed! You can't stand the touch of your own husband? I hope all the men around here don't share my fate. We'd be doing them favors by taking their women then."
 
"My husband isn't a Celt. If he was, I'm sure I would relish in his touch." she spat back to him. She wrapped the cloak around herself tighter, trying to restrain herself from slewing more insults at him. She was fine with giving him some respect as he was her husband and he was now her king, but she wasn't going to do it if he was going to be like this.

"I'm leaving." she stated flatly and headed towards the door of the bedroom.
 
He appears quite willing to simply let her leave, not even voicing a protest against her insults. Indeed, she thinks herself free of her terrible husband for at least a while... until she reaches the door, at least, and he lets loose an amused growl, "Your husband probably would be a Celt, if your people weren't so terribly weak. Defeated in the halls of their own fortress. I dare say I have sisters who could have killed those farmboy relatives of yours."
 
Her face turns a deep red with anger at his words against her countrymen. She stops dead in her tracks, her entire body rigid for a moment. How dare he say such things. She spins around and glares at him from across the room, still restraining herself. "What do you want from me, Canute?" she hissed at him, saying his name like it was a curse word.
 
He smiles at her anger, waving it away with one hand and a shrug. His face would seem almost kind at the moment, were it not for the words he uttered only seconds ago. He pats the edge of the bed, head cocking to one side, "What do I want from you? ...mm, some of it you've already given me, wife." He clears his throat, lips suddenly spreading into a grin, "You don't like me speaking of your countrymen, do you? Come, sit."
 
She hesitates, not wanting to bend so easily to his will again. Her face grew even redder when he said that she'd given some of what he wanted already. Perhaps if she's already given it, then she didn't need to give it to him again. Hah, she knew that wasn't true, she couldn't even kid herself into thinking that. "No, I don't like you speaking of my countrymen. You have no respect," she growled at him, her anger still prevelent. She walked towards him slowly, stopping at the edge of the bed but not getting up to sit on it.
 
He nods, watching her thoughtfully as she approaches the bed. It is not until she has reached the edge of the bed that he speaks again, lips pursing as he offers his deal: "Fair enough. We'll play a game, then. Do you like games?" He grins, shaking his head, "You won't like this one, I don't guess."

He never waits for her to reply, just carrying on with the nature of the game as if he'd never even asked her a question, "For every day you treat me like the husband you simply adore - the man you dream about - I will neither speak of your countrymen... or, more importantly, I will not kill your countrymen. I will keep this stretch of coast, but not move beyond. I hear you have cousins to the north. Is that true?"
 
She narrows her eyes at him when he asks her if she likes games. Games? Now is not the time for games! Elsa opens her mouth to answer his question, but he keeps going before she can say anything. She closes her mouth and grits her teeth, forcing herself to listen as he describes his 'game'.

It didn't sound like much of a game to her. It sounded more like an ultimatum. She does whatever he wants and pretends like she loves him or he kills her countrymen and attacks her cousins. The worst part is that she knows she cannot stop him if he decides to attack. She nods slowly, "Yes...I have cousins to the north,"
 
He nods, affecting a terribly exagerrated sad frown, lips turning down almost comically. "You must be terribly worried... and so am I! I'd hate to have to turn swords on my own new family."

He smiles brightly, "But there's no need for that, is there? These lands are rich, and I can settle for your father's little kingdom. I am a humble man, after all. All it requires... is your cooperation."
 
Elsa knows for certain in this moment that Canute is a horrible man. That is a manipulator above all things, he cares only about himself. She'll hate him forever, even if she has to pretend otherwise. She balls her hands into fists, keeping her anger bottled up inside. If she explodes on him he will just hurt her family.

She takes a deep breath in slowly, "Fine. Fine. But you have to keep up your end. You won't attack anyone, you won't kill anyone."
 
He holds both hands, palms up, into the air, in an exagerrated shrug, "But of course, my dear. I've no need for killing, so long as I have something... else... to distract me." He grins, eyes trailing down his young wife, apparently satisfied with this little victory over her. "A deal is a deal, after all, isn't it?"
 
She hated him. She hated him, she hated him, she hated him. But she couldn't let her own pride overshadow the needs of her country, she couldn't let it cloud her judgement. She nodded, and slowly loosened her grip on the cloak that she'd wrapped around herself. She let it drop to the floor, the cold air immidiately hitting her skin and making her shiver. She was giving up.
 
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