2

3rd person pov

Haraldr was lying on the ground when all of a sudden he groaned 'uhh what the hell happened? 'the last thing he remembered was walking through the veil and then a bright light after that nothing'.

He started touching the ground underneath himself 'hmm at least I'm lying on something soft so it can't be too bad' he was slowly regaining his sense of self. 'I think I hear bells in the distance'.

He put his hands in front of his face and started massaging his eyes 'I am not doing that again'.

"lord"

As soon as Haraldr heard the sound his battle instincts kicked in and he flew open and there looking down at him was an older man in his late 40s maybe early 50s with a rough-looking appearance and a posture that resembled people who spent their lives going hard physical labour. The man's was carrying a simple wooden hayfork which he currently was using a cane, looking like he had recently been running a marathon.

"Lord, why are you just lying there in the field?" the man asks looking at Haraldr like he is some sort of unknown entity that the man had never seen before.

It was then Haraldr realized that he couldn't understand any of the words that came out of the man's mouth. However, it did sound a little germanic a language similar to old Norse which he had learned with the help of a lozenge to aid in his runework. He decided to subtly cast a translation charm, while only temporary unlike lozenges it might give him enough time to figure out what language the man was speaking.

Haraldr looked to the man and replies "can you repeat that"

"lord?" he answers, looking confused.

"Why are you calling me Lord?" now Haraldr was confused

"well I have never seen anyone with that kind of well-made clothes who was not of noble birth but I have also never seen a lord just lying in a field of grass before." He huffed probably thinking Haraldr was a simpleton.

Haraldr looked around himself and now noticed that he really was lying in a grassy meadow. He slowly picked himself up and looked around and he noticed in the distance a hill with a stone fort of some kind. Looking even further as far as his eyes could see he noticed he was on an island.

Turning himself back towards the man he asked: "Where are we?".

"lord? how can you not know? did you hit your head? we are on the island of Lindisfarne in the Kingdom of Northumbria"

'Northumbria? where have I heard that before?' he looks through his memories which thanks to his Occlumency are pretty good he found the answer from a memory of reading one of the books from the Hufflepuff vault his eyes widened before closing down his shield thinking

'Dear Merlin! I somehow travelled back in time to the early middle ages where the Catholic church has, even more, sway over the masses than in the future'. Haraldr grimaced.

He started sniffing in the air and noticing an awful smell and took a closer look at the man in front of him, he seems to have on him some sort of cheap wool tunic with dark stains all over it. "And what are you doing here in this field?"

the peasant looked at him or at least assumed he is one based on his clothes and said

"Oh! I work up at the monastery tending to the livestock, I was outside gathering some hay. When a saw a white light from these fields and went to investigate, but while on the journey here I saw two boats of a type I have never seen before on the shore with a dragon on its bow. There were about 20 men the size of giants with devil marks on their faces. I panicked and thought the light from before was a sign from God warning me of the attack and ran towards it. I heard the bells ringing behind me and I ran as fast as my legs could carry me here but all I found was you"

Haraldr tried to process this information 'giants with devil marks, dragons on the bows of their ships, Lindisfarne could it be? have I travelled back in time to the start of the "Viking Age" as my mother who was raised muggle would call it?'.

"lord? please help those poor priests I'm sure those devils are defiling the divide monastery as we speak"

Haraldr stopped his introspection and answered, "Of course! you run along and get to the nearest town to warn them and I will see what I can do".

But inside his mind, he was thinking 'sod of to that! I have no love for the Catholic church and there so-called priests who would love nothing more to burn people like me at the stake, or at least crucify me for being a spawn of the devil. No, I am far more interested in these Northmen that his Hufflepuff side originates from'.

Haraldr had read up on Norse mythology before going through the veil, mostly because one of his ancestors impersonated the god Thor. He knew that their pantheon did have a god of magic even if he was also seen as a trickster god. They would at least be more open-minded to his powers especially if he introduces his magic as a benefit to their people and maybe even find some other Magicals in this day and age. The unnamed peasant looked relieved and started running to the nearest town without even saying goodbye which Haraldr was fine with since he had not even examined if everything he had brought with him survived the trip. He took out his manor trunk from a necklace he had around his neck enlarged it to normal size and put his finger on the trunk and pushed his magic into the blood-based ward he had around it, to see if all the life-signs inside were ok. He took a relieved sigh as everyone inside was fine but decided to keep his elves and familiar inside for now at least until he found a safer place for them. He took out his full armour set and put it over his padded jacket and coif, the armour had form-fitting enchantments so the armour perfectly formed around his body and locked together so it looked like it was made as a single piece.

'This might be overkill for this time-period but being overly cautious can not hurt'.

Then he put a powerful *notice me not* on himself because he knows he stood out with the armour. The armour looked like overly polished silver that was almost blinding and belonged in the late middle ages. He then shrank his trunk and put it back inside the necklace and started to run towards the monastery and hopefully to a new beginning.

Haraldr ran the entire way to the monastery and when he arrived he found one of the simple wooden gate doors was just lying on the ground. He also saw that the stone hinges on one side had been chipped off 'clever'.

He wondered why the monastery had high encircling walls but such a simple looking main gate? 'probably because no lord or ruler in these lands would dare attack a monastery they will be committing sacrilege and lose favour with the church'.

Now Haraldr cant claim to know everything about Christianity, but he was forced to learn during his pureblood education with Sirus about the main instigators of the "witch" burnings even if they were quite pointless with Magicals having access to the flame freezing charm.

He started to slowly walk towards an arcade of some sort leading to an open area that was square-shaped, where he saw about 20 men wearing some form of leather gambeson with two of them even having an iron chainmail shirt over their gambeson. Some of the men also wore an iron helmet with a peaked cap and fixed visor, others had runic looking tattoos on their faces and necks. They were rounding up and tying up what looked like Christian monks and taking whatever valuable things they could find and putting in a chest.

Two men seemed to be somewhat in charge of these ragtag team of north men, both strangely were not the most armed of the group. One of them could be mistaken for a giant he looked to be about 6 foot 10 inches or 208 cm with long light brown hair in a simple braid. He had the massive body of a hard-working man. The second man was closer to his own height at 6 foot 4 or 193 cm but while the first man has a massive axe and looked more like a berserker the second man's eyes had similar eyes to his own intelligent and calculating. This man's body was looked fit but was more built for speed than power. He also had short blond hair with an intricate braid in the back of his head.

He realized nothing was going to happen unless he introduced himself and they looked about done with the raid. He removed his *notice me not* and all of the Northman's eyes become huge and the took up a guarded position and readied their weapons for a fight. The smaller one of the men also looked at me with a shocked expression on his face but that quickly disappeared and was replaced with a calculative stare.

Ragnar Pov

I had finally convinced my brother Rollo not to kill all the monks in the monastery. Not because I cared much about them but they were more valuable as slaves to be sold to the Saxons. The one Munk who spoke their language could be a great source of information for future raids to the west. While the rest of the men had not been certain that England existed, my faith was never in doubt as I had spoken to the foreign merchants that I bought the sunstone and sundial from. These merchants had informed me that they themselves had traded with the Anglo-Saxons. Why Jarl Haraldson did not believe there were no lands to the west when he himself must have spoken to the merchants was baffling to me.

My mind was getting off track though, as I and the men started rounding up and tying up all the monks' something amazing happened. A man like figure appeared in thin air covered from top to toe in the shiniest metal he has ever seen. With small pieces of some sort of writing in what looked like gold. He had some sort of fur over his shoulders and a black cape made from a material that I have never seen before. A helmet so majestic it was worthy of Odin himself. all the Northman I brought with me had taken a guarded stance and unsheathed their weapons.

I looked closer at the man-like figure and saw that there were no gaps in his armour or between the metal pieces and wondered: 'how is that even possible?'

When looking closer at the script on the metal my mind goes blank 'by Odin's eye, are those the same runes that are on the Einang stone in Norway that our people believe was given to us by the gods'.

There looked to be far more of them than are known by our people. Before I had time to speculate further on this stranger, I looked over at Rollo and could see the greed in his eyes at the man's? armour that gave the impression of being made of polished silver. I might be a simple farmer but even I knew that wearing silver will not protect you in a fight.

I was no fool though, I could feel the stranger's presence somehow and it was overwhelming. I was not about to underestimate this man, but before I could say anything Rollo gave two of the men a signal to attack the dangerous being in front of them.

Haraldr pov

When I see the guarded position of the men, I tense up and start to read the men's mind. Most of them were wary but thought little of my presence as they believed I was wearing silver. The ones that stood out were called Kauko, Erik, Leif, Arne, and Torstein. These men clearly had more experience with fighting and were not about to attack me without some forethought. They had also seen the Norse runes on my armour and were not sure what to make of them and were therefore even more reluctant to attack. The man named Floki have also noticed the runes on my armour and thought that I was a sign from the Aesir and has an impression of giddiness about him. The big man Rollo, on the other hand, has only greed on his mind as he gazes upon the "silver armour" on my body. All the man could think about were all the things he could do with that kind of wealth.

Now the interesting one was the one named Ragnar. This man had felt my magical aura somehow, and that made me somewhat hopeful for the future. That was until I checked his own aura, it was slightly disappointing to find out Ragnar's aura was only that of a squib from my old world. When looking through the monks' minds, however, all I could find was thoughts of me being some kind of angel that has come down from the heavens to save them. One of the monks even seem to have a small magical aura of his own but it was smaller then Ragnars and almost seemed to be suppressed somehow. I have never seen anything like it and the issue deserved further study.

Unfortunately, I did not have more time to think about it because two of the men came at me, one with a gambeson and chainmail he was equipped with an axe and shield while the other only had a gambeson with a smaller axe in one hand and a knife in the other. The man with the axe and shield went on the offensive. I took out my hand and a half sword and easily parry the man's overextend swing. Clearly, he was inexperienced and had probably borrowed his armour from someone bigger perhaps a father because it was sitting kind of loose, but I did not have time to think about that. As I did a piercing manoeuvre that went past the man's poorly held shield and without any interference went clean through the mail and into the man's gut. I pull out the bloodied sword without any resistance as the young man fell to the ground with a nasty stomaching wound, slowly bleeding out.

Before the second man could even react, I smash the man's unprotected head with my pommel and he went out like a light. There was silence throughout the courtyard, except for the screams of the man dying in front of me. Now I did not care about this man's fate but I could not start my new relationship with these Northmen by killing one of their own.

I went down on one knee and said in Norse " I can save you if you want?" the man looked at me in agony and could not understand what I was saying, his mind most likely focused on the pain.

I added "do you want to be saved?" more forcefully this time.

The young man finally looked at me clearly and said "yes".

While I did not know much about healing magic, as I only really know how to make healing potions and did not have any on hand. However, I could push my magic into the man to make his body heal itself. Now the only reason I could do this is that my large magical core and the phoenix tears in my blood give my magic somewhat of a healing property to it. This could also serve as a test to see if I could have a future with these Northmen.

I put my hands above the wound and started pushing my magic into it. With my intent to heal this man at the forefront of my mind, a bright light forms around my hands and is gently guided towards the man's wound, the shock that I hear coming from the people around me were ignored as I was concentrating on my task. The first thing that occurs is that the blood on the ground starts to slowly hover in the air while being cleaned by the magic at the same time before going back inside the man lying on the ground, gasping as he feels his wound knitting itself back together. The procedure only lasts about 30-40 seconds before there was no more blood on the ground and the man's stomach now free of any hint of ever being pierced in the first place. I get up from my kneeling position and am now confronted by the disbelieving faces staring back at me.

'Wow that took a lot more out of me than I thought, I also noticed that the replenishing of my core was happening a lot slower than before I arrived here. Enough to be disconcerting but not enough to panic. I will just have to take longer breaks between big feats of magic until I can find out why this is happening'.

"Impossible" "it's a miracle" "but why would this angel use his powers on a pagan" spouted the priests. There was even one who said "daemon" with such vitriol that even shocked me a little.

Not that I can understand them since I have not hit these monks with a translation charm but the tone of the message came across.

The Northmen, on the other hand, were looking at me strangely, but still with some wariness in their eyes. So, I decided to look through their minds a second time. Most did not know how to feel but the majority were thinking that I was a Seidr of some sort or even the trickster himself. This was especially true for Rollo who became even warier of me. Floki, on the other hand, was looking at me as if all his prayers have been answered and was convinced that I must be some sort of herald of the gods or even a personification of a god himself.

'That makes me worried, I did not come here to be worshipped. I came because I wanted a second chance and if possible see magic thrive once more, the right way this time'.

Ragnar was somewhere in between, thinking that what I did was magic but not sure of who or what I am.

Ragnar Pov

I was disturbed, I had just seen real magic performed in front of me. Not like the Seidr back home with their prophecies and vagueness, but magic that you can actually feel, see and touch with your own senses. It was used to save one of my own. Which I had mixed feelings about, the man even has a sword, helmet, and armour that looks like it was made by the dwarves of Svartálfaheimr.

I did the only thing I could and turned to the man and asked "who are you? what are you?

The man looked directly at me with what looked like green orbs of power through the slits of his helm " I am Haraldr, as for what I am is not important, what is important is that I am looking for a passage to Scandinavia. Will you allow passage on your ship?"

Before I could answer him Rollo grabbed me aside and said " you can not honestly be considering this brother? he is most likely the trickster, he will bring misfortune on our trip back home"

I pulled my arm away hard and looked at him " you say that after he just saved one of our men`s life. The trickster would not waste his power on a mortal. He is powerful he has a Norse name and speaks our language, besides do you really want to leave him here with the Christians? What if he joins them when we come back for future raids?".

Floki had joined at this point and said "You can not deny this man, he clearly is a sign from Odin, a gift! We can not afford to squander it".

Rollo looked frustrated with Floki and looked at me and said " this is a mistake"

I looked at Rollo "I have no choice brother"

Rollo was not happy "do not say I did not warn you" and walked away. He grabbed the chest of silver and gold items and started hauling it down to the beach and into the boat.

Floki just gave his little giggle and went to take the monks back to the ships. I started walking to the man and when I stood in front of him, I reached out my hand and he takes out his metal-clad arm in response before clasping it with my own.

I answer "welcome aboard!".

'I hope I made the right choice.'

Haraldr Pov

'so far so good' I thought as I take my seat aboard the longship.

'Truly an innovation of the time to be able to both sail on open water and up rivers'.

It looked to be about 17m in length from bow to stern with about 20 rowing benches which make sense considering the size of the crew. From what I had seen from the minds of the Northman, Floki was the first one to design these type of ships which was certainly impressive.

'He would be a great asset for any Jarl to have'.

Ragnar approaches me as we get out on the open ocean and say " it looks like thanks to you we are overloaded" he then looks at one of the men an says "Leif" and nods with his head towards one of the monks.

The monks were sitting on the floor deck holding their hands in desperate prayer Leif picks the monk up and takes to the port side of the ship then he takes out a small knife and stabs the man in the neck and pushes him overboard. The monks become terrified not understanding why it happened.

The Northman just laughs and Ragnar turns to me and said "you now of me a slave" before smiling at me and then he sits down.

I decide to take off the helmet from my head to feel the sea breeze and just smirks taking in their reactions to my appearance. Floki just smiles at me like he had his theory proven true, the other men just look at me and start spouting "he is touched by Thor" in shock.

I was confused at first while Magicals tend to be born beautiful and do not suffer from thinks like obesity my looks should not be given such a response until I realized my lightning bolt scar was visible for everyone to see

'could it be that my lightning bolt scar will finally be a benefit instead of a curse?'.

Before I could comment on their words, Hedwig had decided that she have had enough of the manor trunk and appeared in a flash that sounded like lightning.

She was now sitting on my right shoulder and started chirping that sounded like "finally free from having to stay in that box".

The Northman gasped and I did not blame them, a thunderbird is a beautiful and majestic creature. With glowing white feathers that sparkle with arches of lightning going throughout its body and electrifying blue tips at the end of its tail feathers.

Ragnar was the first that regained his equilibrium and said: " What in Oden`s beard is that?".

I looked back at Ragnar and smiled "this is my familiar, she is a thunderbird and will help us make sure we have fair winds all the way back to Scandinavia. Won't you girl?"

Hedwig chirped back at me and in a lighting bolt disappearing into the clouds.

The journey to what I later found out was Kattegatt a small trade town in modern-day Denmark took about 7 days with fair winds. Hedwig did not seem to be affected by whatever is causing the problems with this worlds ambient magic, but that could be because of our familiar bond, Hedwig does not need ambient magic to refill her magic she can just take from my own. So that could also be one reason why my recovery rate is so drastically slow.

During our journey, I learned more about Ragnar and his men. As the journey progressed the Northman started taking out primitive grooming tools like combes, the men clearly cared about personal grooming not that Haraldr was judging. It was just odd for this day and age with the social class these men belong to. With Ragnar having been proven right about the more lucrative raiding opportunities to the west, his fame will grow and that means that more men will start to follow him starting with the men on this boat.

With Ragnar I learned a lot more, he is clearly intelligent and ambitious. He also has a good heart and wants to help his people find good fertile lands. Not that that was the only reason for him going on raids, he seems to have an abundance of wanderlust and an itch for a good fight.

These men all wanted to die in battle so they could be taken by the valkyries to Odin`s hall in Valhalla and fight with the gods. When Ragnarök comes, and Ragnar called me out on it, that I might not make that young man a favour by saving me from a good death. I argued that their small scrimmage was not enough to valid Valhalla and it was just not the man`s time to die. Ragnar seems to have agreed with me on that point at least, eventually, we sailed through a u-shaped valley and we could see Kattegatt in the distance.

My last thought as we approach the dock were 'I will tell Hedwig to stay away, for now, I do not want to know what this jarl would do if he found out about what she was truly capable of.'