Ragnar watched as Thistle smiled at him but the betrayed Viking — a startling trend though, ironically, this was the first time he'd been betrayed by a wife — was in no mood to return it. He did not feel mirth. He did not feel joy. Instead, he felt only icy anger, and the cruel thought that he should have never taken Nerian as a wife and instead kept her where he knew now that she belonged: as a slave. She could be someone else's slave though because she was no longer welcomed at Stavanger Bay, no longer apart of his family. She could go back to her precious Priestesses that he had stolen her from because he didn't want her anymore. While Ragnar's greeting could have been more tactful he had assumed (apparently wrongly so) that there would be time for expressing little love nothings later, providing either of them were still in the mood after this grim discussion they needed to have. He wasn't, currently, in the mood to jest or whisper love nothings. Though duty did not always come before love, much had happened in his absence and it was that, that he desired to speak of first and foremost.
“You're right, you're right,” Ragnar spoke coyly, a soft hiss of ice in his voice. “The important things that happened in my two week absence can wait,” The Viking conceded softly, sure that it would evoke Thistle's wrath upon his head. Two weeks felt like a life time to Ragnar, and while he had missed her, very much so, he was a Jarl and the fact that two wolves had just upped and disappeared, both of whom had great responsibilities to the Bay was unsettling to Ragnar. Likely, he would apologize to her later after they had their sure to come screaming match at one another because these days that was what Thistle and him did best: scream at one another. “I shouldn't have left,” Mostly because Julooke's unexplained leaving from the Bay made all of his efforts to find the man responsible for nearly taking her life were now futile. Of course, tracking him down might save future females from that kind of thing, his desire to continue the hunt was gone, siphoned from him like the breath of life. Ragnar didn't blame Thistle for it — it wasn't her fault. It was the fault of the wolves responsible. “I do not blame you,” The Viking said in a truly soft voice, figuring that he might as well address the largest elephant in the room first. “You shouldn't blame yourself either, if you are. Nerian is a woman grown and capable of making her own decisions. She wasn't honest with me,” After all he wasn't entirely incompetent — despite what other wolves might have thought. Just because he was quiet didn't mean he was slow. “And for the past two months she has kept herself away from me, barely talking to me. My interest in her had been waning for some time, I expect I'm lucky that she made the ultimate decision for me,” Despite that, either way, he had intended to end it with her, simply, her disappearance from the Bay eliminated the any breaking of the news he might have had to do.
Ragnar looked away from her, towards the canopy of the ancient woodland that stretched around them. “Taking her as a wife was a mistake and I am sorry for the pain that the mistake has cost you,” The phrase Be careful what you wish for came to the forefront of the scarred Jarl's mind then, and he let out a soft, cruel snort. “She has betrayed us, leaving without so much as a word and she will pay the ultimate price for it. If she ever comes back she is not welcome here, do you understand? She is not welcome in this Bay, nor in this family. Chase her away. Or I will kill her.” Ragnar very rarely shared his emotions, and though Thistle was the true holder of his heart, his true love, it would be a lie to say that Nerian hadn't held a small piece of it, and that her betrayal didn't hurt him in a small way; and that in the conclusion of it he was absolutely merciless. He'd been stabbed in the back too many times for him to care anymore.
“Since Julooke, too, has left without a word, I am not sure that I will accept her back, either. I don't think, even if she returns, that she has any right to her children. A real mother doesn't abandon them and anyone that does should have no rights to having them back.” Verrine would probably disagree with Ragnar's decision, and perhaps it would cost the Jarl the loyalty of the Ostrega male but there were clear and concise consequences for abandoning the Bay. Ragnar would truly show them what it meant to piss off a Viking, what merciless truly looked like. He'd been betrayed one too many times by those he was close too, whom he considered friends. Whom, in some way or another he loved.
Winter was coming for Stavanger Bay.
