Ragnar wasn’t very good with socialization, had never truly been even when he had been the Jarl of the Cove. He was not loud and boisterous like his kinsmen and while this worked to a certain advantage it also made him seem social inept (which maybe he was), favoring to listen to others talk than listen to his own voice drone on. He studied her then, as she took a moment after he invited for her to begin speaking, though Ragnar did attribute to this to nervousness on her part; merely he assumed she was attempting to gather her thoughts, or rather, questions. Her first question brought with it a brief moment of puzzlement as if she asked him why he breathed. In hindsight, it was like asking something as equally hard for him to define. Perhaps Thistle was better at putting words to what it meant to be a ‘Viking’ than he was. It was his way of life. What did it mean to be a Viking? He could easily use the words the packs he raided had used to define them: heathens, demons, et cetera. “It is a name for my people,” He responded, his brow furrowing as he tried, for his subordinate’s behalf, to attempt to think of the ways he could describe it. “In our native tongue we call ourselves Víkingr. It describes my culture,” Ragnar paused, salmon colored tongue sliding across his lips and nose sure that she would wish to know a bit more about his culture.
“I come from the far North, harsh environments with harsher wolves. It is almost a different world down here, softer, perhaps why so many don’t like me. I have not changed my ways of life to accommodate here and I don’t intend too,” He offered Julooke a trademark smirk of his, shrugging his broad shoulders. He had never came with the intention of making others like him, Ragnar wasn’t concerned which such shallow, people pleasing desires that he did not have. “Our reputation infamously proceeds us; we raid, and kill, and take because our resources are limited and it is survival of the fittest up there,” And if that had entirely disgusted Julooke and wholly changed her opinion of him to a bad one, well than, it was what it was. Ragnar was not in the business of romancing himself to make him seem like something he wasn’t because he felt no shame for his way of life. Why did he have too? Only because it didn’t match up with ‘morals’ — something that everyone seemed sure Ragnar (including Ragnar himself) lacked? It was an extremely vague and basic description but Ragnar was finding it hard to put words to his way of life. “I will be teaching my children my native tongue so they speak both fluently, like I do, and I will teach them of my Gods, and my culture.” Ragnar was aware that it would prove to be difficult because they would not be surrounded by the rich and perhaps, brutal culture that Ragnar had grown up in.
Ragnar would not fail Odinn in making his children true Vikings. He had been brought here by the Allfather to rise a Viking pack, and to convert those that were willing to learn the way of life. So far he had fallen behind and internally, the Viking feared that he would lose the Allfather’s favor.
