Harald had been brooding beside the fire, plotting his next move and going over his schemes relentlessly when the young lad rushed in. He was about to have his Housecarl beat the unfortunate boy to pulp before recognition dawned on him; the lad was one of his men albeit one of the newer ones. He gestured irritably and had the boy wait a moment while he slowly drank from the tankard in his hand; taking note of the boy's blanched face.

"Well?" He demanded, staring up at the boy's face. He had deliberately not risen so as to retain some small excuse for the height difference.

"...They're dead!" The lad blurted out making Harald scowl. He reached up and slapped the boy hard across the face.

"Be more specific! Who and why should I care?" Stunned, the boy rattled out the story while he quaked under Harald's increasingly murderous glare. The dwarfish man hurled his tankard across the room as he swore before leaping to his feet and storming outside into the cold air. He had partly hoped one of the offenders might be nearby to exact immediate punishment upon but alas there was none. He rounded on the boy angrily.

"You morons! Now Ragnar can demand a fee of me for this attack as it wasn't on his slaves and I don't like parting with my valuables." A cold gleam entered his eyes. "Luckily there's another route to make up for your idiocy." The boy looked hopefully. What a fool he was.

------------------

Harald strode towards the healing house having heard of Ragnar's presence there and called out.

"Ragnar, I know you are here! I have come to pay the blood price!" The young lad was forced towards the house. He was bound and naked, relieved of everything including his own weapon; the latter being the most terrifying aspect of the situation as he realised his own fate. Harald nodded and his Housecarl stepped forwards with a newly whetted axe as two other men held the lad down to stop his struggles. The axe descended and the man, barely beyond boyhood, died instantly; his head bouncing into the healing house before rolling to a stop with its eyes staring gruesomely up at the occupants in apparent disbelief.

"And it has been paid!" Without waiting for a reply Harald turned on his heel with his men in tow; discipline had been restored and he was no longer at a disadvantage.