Slowly, through her nose, the way she'd taught herself. Her hands uncurled at her sides one finger at a time.
"The Pact requires the sheet," Henry said.
"The Pact required a marriage. There's been a marriage. We're done."
Henry opened his mouth. Looked at Ivar's face. Looked at the other Viking lairds who had arranged themselves nearby, cups in hand, eyes elsewhere. He closed his mouth.
"I'll need tae note the refusal," he said carefully.
"Note what ye like," Ivar said. "Good evenin'."
And with that Henry left.
Matilda stood in the middle of the emptying hall and looked at the floor for a moment. Then she looked at Ivar.
He was already looking at her. Not with the careful softness she'd spent years dreading. Just looking. Waiting to see what she needed.
"Thank ye," she said.
He nodded once. Then he offered her his arm, and she took it, and they walked out of the hall together.
The chamber was quiet after the noise of the hall.
Matilda stood in the center of it and breathed.
The distant voices, the footsteps on the stairs, the fire Sigrid had built before leaving. The candles lit in every corner, all of them, because he'd told Sigrid and Sigrid had done it.
She heard the door.
Ivar entered, closed it behind him, and locked it. The sound, solid, final, did something unexpected to her chest. Not dread. Something else. The feeling of a door that was closed from the inside rather than the outside.
He turned.
They looked at each other across the lit room.
"He'll try again," she said. "Henry. Tomorrow, or the day after."
"Aye. Let him try."
"And ye'll say nay again."
"Aye."
She looked at him steadily. "Why?"
He met her eyes. "Because it's none of his concern."
She held his gaze.
There was more in that answer than the words of it and she understood it without needing it unpacked. He'd looked at Henry and said no the way he said everything that was final.
No anger, no performance.
Just nay.
"Thank ye," she said. "Fer all of it."
He nodded once.