069

After returning to Kattegat, I left the silver for distribution to my people, and I divided the slaves into Slavs and the rest, I ordered the Slavs to be sent to my private village, and the rest was placed in slave quarters. In a few days they will be transported to the copper mine, but first we will check if there are any useful professions among them...

Unfortunately, King Harald was no fool, all slaves were only fit for hard work and there was no one talented in this group.

The conquest of Hordaland will be difficult, unfortunately, although I do not know if there are any significant local forces there, but subjugating all the settlements scattered on so many islands will be time consuming... and although I was tempted to do it immediately and conquer it all at once ... I decided to do it in stages, which was more logical.

In the first place, I will appoint Erik to strengthen our ties with the newly conquered area of ​​Agder ... Trade, some religious celebration, we will also need eyes and ears there... Perhaps the King will keep his word, perhaps not ... but it's better to keep hand on the pulse. I also sent 80 people led by Leif and Rollo to start convincing the people of Hordaland what was best for them ... of course they were a stick, the carrot was in Kattegat.

I was sitting in the kitchen trying to think about the next steps, but the sight of Hild cleaning the floor made me hard to focus ... Hild ... actually I wanted to wait with it, but it doesn't matter much whether now or later ... Next spring we are going to plunder the west coast of England.

- Hild, pour me a beer and come over for a moment.

The redhead obeyed my instructions immediately, even without a finger, the service was better than at the Hilton.

- Hild, have you been here for a while, do you want to return to the slave barracks?

- Did I do something wrong, Lord? I'll get better, please not send me back.

- Hild, it wasn't a threat, it was a normal question. You've been here for a while now, performing your duties. So far I do not see any negative behavior on your part. I asked because maybe you want to be with Christians, pray together? I'm just giving you one more chance to change your mind ... because in the future it won't be possible anymore ... See, Hild, I'm trying to be kind and fair even to slaves.

- I understand, Lord.

- Hild, you can go back to your duties, and if you have any problem, feel free to tell me ... and you don't need to be afraid of me, I'm not that scary.

Out of the corner of my eye I noticed that Mira appeared in the kitchen and had a smirk on her face.

- 😏👌👈😘🤫

- Well, I intend to do so and Lagetrtha knows it, so you don't have to cover me up. How's Yrsa?

- 👌🥱😴

- Well, let her sleep. I know you have more responsibilities with her now, but don't forget to train as well.

- 🥱✌💪🤛

- You think I'm boring. You want a sparring. And you think you will win with me? Mira you're funny... And with the help of which army will you do it?

We had a short sparring, Mira didn't win it, but I was proud of her ... she threw sand in my eyes, pretended to be injured, and when I checked if nothing happened, she tried to hit me in the balls. She fought dirty ... fortunately, Mira understood a simple rule. It's not the style that matters, it's winning.

Over the following weeks, the stone wall was completed, as was the construction of the surrounding alarm towers and the market. The only project that has not yet been completed is the construction of a copper mine and the surrounding infrastructure ... at first I wanted to move more slaves to help, but sometimes more people will just interfere with each other's work.

Having some slaves who were currently bored with a lack of work, I decided to cut down a few kilometers of forest and create farmland in its place. If the Kattegat is to grow it has to feed, and the second reason for cutting down the forest is security. The approaching enemy will be spotted faster.

Another project that I was going to implement was the extraction of salt from sea water. There was nothing difficult about it, you just had to boil sea water and do it as long as there was only salt left. Then you had to break it into a fine powder with the help of a mortar.

(King Harald / Queen Gunnhild POV)

- Husband, and what are you going to do in this situation, we must not allow ...

- Gunnhild, we're not going to do anything right now. We lost too many people, and the weapons that the enemy has at their disposal are very dangerous, shields do not protect against them.

- Call the other Jarls for help.

- I can't do that, when they see that we are weak they can throw themselves into our throats. It is better to have one strong opponent, many kilometers away, than several smaller ones right under our noses.

- So you won't do anything?

- I will not do anything myself, but I will announce that a new, strong and ambitious opponent has appeared. The other Kings and Jarls will become wary and perhaps make an alliance against him.

- What if he defeats such an alliance?

- Nothing my dear wife, I'll keep my oath. In return for some taxes, we will gain someone strong to support us.

(End POV)

The time of harvest has come and the rented ships from the raids have returned. My earnings were not high, but there was always something in my pocket. Rollo and Leif returned from pacifying the next islands. There was no force there to oppose them. Single farms, settlements of several houses, nothing to worry about ... Another good news was that Lagertha was pregnant again.