#bread team

“What keeps your thoughts so far away, my lady?”

Aethelflaed blinked, allowing his words to break through her reverie.  

Erik slid his large hands around her waist to rest atop her stomach and pressed a kiss to her dark hair.  Turning to meet his gaze, she couldn’t stop the corners of her lips slipping into a sad, gentle smile.  Tenderly, she cupped his face and leaned her forehead to rest against his shoulder.  She sighed, answering his words.

“I was thinking that God is cruel.”  

Aethelflaed breathed in with the rise and fall of his chest.  

“Cruel?” He questioned.  “What do you mean by this?”

Aethelflaed tilted her head back to meet his eye, “Do your Gods not set your paths before you?  Do you not believe in fate?”  

She searched his eyes, finding only curiosity and ardor.  After a few heartbeats, she felt the hum in his chest as he nodded in the truth of her pondering. 

Assuming that was all the reply she would receive, and not sure if she desired more than that, Aethelflead turned her body once more, her back resting against his large chest.  She let her gaze wander to rest once more on the scene outside her window. The harbor with its hundreds of floating vessels ready to invade, plunder, and ravage her people’s way of life. 

At least that is how she was brought up to believe. In earnest, what she still believed of many of the Danish men she had the misfortune to meet. But Erik had flipped all of her suppositions on their head. 

Leaning her back further in to rest against his chest, she was surprised when she heard his deep voice speak. 

Erik sighed, “Yes, this is true. Many Danes believe that the Gods set our fates.  That our paths are weaved as a thread by the Norns into the tapestry of the tree of Yggdrasil.  Creating its roots and thus forming the world.”

Aethelflaed closed her eyes, allowing herself to drift along with his words. Content to hear the lore of his people and let the timber of his voice quell her fears. If only for a moment in time. She breathed in deeply. The heady musk of him allowing her to further sink into his calm. 

“I know it is something my brother believes.  For him, The Allfather has grand fates for the sons of Thurgil.  We are to be renowned warlords. Men should fear us and follow us.”

He paused for a moment as if debating his next words.  Quietly, slowly, unsure if he wanted to hear her reply, Erik spoke once more, “Do you think your God bringing your path to meet mine was an act of malice?”

Aethelflaed sat up, spinning to face him, hurt plain on her face that he would think this was her meaning.

“No,” she protested quickly, her hand once more reaching to take his face gently, “that is not what I meant.  At least,” she paused, gathering her thoughts, “not in the manner you may be thinking.”

She paused, waiting for him to bring his eyes up. To meet her own.  It took only a heartbeat before he did so, searching her face.  

Without meaning to, she felt the corners of her mouth ghost up into another sad smile.  Slowly, she brought her other palm up to rest along his cheek, keeping his face between her hands.

“Before meeting you, Erik,” she started only to pause and swallow down a tear, “before you, I was alone.  I was a frozen lake.  But then you melted me awake.  I was lifeless and cold. A captive in my own life. I lived moving from room to room without being present in any of them.  Aethelred held me like that frozen lake. A thing to be witnessed, maybe marveled at for its proximity to power, but not to be alive. To be free and flowing. 

But you,” she enunciated her words, calm and sure, “you, my sweet Erik, have brought a thaw in the midst of winter. You have turned that frozen girl back into the movement of life.”

She felt the lump in her throat grow seeing the way his eyes lit with love at the sound of her words.  Overcome with emotion, she folded herself into him, wrapping her arms around his muscled torso and resting her forehead against his chest.  She took a stuttering breath, but when she continued her words were clear.  She did not falter.

“Meeting you, loving you has been the single greatest joy of my heart. But knowing that fate, that the will of your Gods or mine, brings us here, together, only to face our own people, our families fighting and killing one another. That is a cruel fate. Worse than death,” she sobbed as her words were muffled by Erik’s lips pressing kisses along her mouth, her jaw, her temple, her face. 

These were not the kisses of passion and desire they had shared before. These kisses held a power. A depth of love and devotion and a promise. 

Pulling himself back, Erik held Aethelflaed’s face gently between his palms, mirroring her comforting gesture from moments before.  Softly, he trailed his thumbs in gentle circles, soothing and calm.

“I know, my love.  An uncertain future can be a daunting one.  But I will not allow my path to stray from yours.  I swear it.  I will not be severed from you.  Not by your weasel of a husband.  And not by my brother.”

“How?  How can we do this, Erik?  You would forsake your brother, your people? I wish to be rid of my husband’s torment and cruelty.  But to abandon my father and his dream for a united land…” Aetheflaed felt herself shrink inwards, pulling away from his warmth, only to feel the pull of his voice bring her back.

“We could be that dream, Aethelflaed.  You and me.  The heathen and the princess,” he chuckled mirthlessly, but continued on, “we could bring the people together.”

Aethelflaed scoffed, not unkindly, “it will not work, Erik.  The people are not ready.  Yours or mine.  The love of two people is not enough to still the generations of fear and hate and conquest.”

Erik wrapped his arms closer around her and pressed his forehead to hers.  For several moments, she settled her fears in his embrace.  The frustration and despair once more dissipating while he breathed him in.  If they were destined for their love to be torn apart, she wanted the memories of him to last her lifetime.  His scent, musky and dark with an air of honey.  His embrace, full of power holding her down to earth.  An anchor against a raging sea.  

“Then we will leave.  We will leave here and let these big men fight their battles.”

For the second time that night, his words caught her off guard.  “I will take you away and we will live on a little farm and have a simple life.” 

“I can not ask this of you.”

“You did not ask,” his response clipped her argument. “I have followed my brother here.  I have witnessed his obsession with gaining glory and position amongst our people grow while I linger beside him.  It does not stir the same passion in me.  I do not feel that my fate is pulled to be that warlord my brother envisions we will become.  You say that you were a frozen lake before finding me.  If that is true then I was a wave floating along in my brother's current.  Flowing along as he flowed.  But now I have found my own current.  Our flowing river has diverged into two and my wave has broken from its former course.  Found its own path. To you, Aethelflaed.”

Throughout his confession, tears welled in Erik’s eyes, threatening to fall.  He lifted his head to see Aethelflaed smile through tear soaked cheeks.

“Is this truly what you desire, Erik?”  Aethelflaed’s voice was strained as she fought against the emotions pouring from her heart. “You wish to leave all behind, for a simple life with me?”

“Yes, my love.  Though,” he paused, sniffing and trying to fight back his own tears, “in truth I don’t know how to spirit you away from here.  Not yet.  And you have not told me if you’re willing to come.  You did not ask me to make this choice.  And I will show you the same respect.  I would not ask you to forsake your father and your people, if it was not,” but his words were left unsaid.

Aethelflaed pulled his face to hers and kissed his lips pouring out the overwhelming love and anguish she could no longer contain.  The love she felt consumed her in that moment, pulling at her heart and tightening a coil in her stomach.

“You do not need to ask me, either.  I will leave with you.  I want a life away from here.  With you,”  she confessed her choice in a flurry of words, the world feeling as if it were spinning in reverse.  Erik rested his forehead against hers once more, gently wiping away her tears and peppering her face with kisses.

“I do not know how we will do this, my love.  But I will find a way.  We will find a way,” he promised, his voice thick with conviction and emotion.

They stood together, locked in embrace, silent tears continuing to fall.  Aethelflaed felt her breathing slow and the pain and overwhelming fear for their situation slowly release from her stomach.  Her shoulders relaxed and she breathed in, her head clearing from the rush of emotions.  And then it came to her.  The solution.

“Uhtred,” she breathed.  Tilting her head back to meet Erik’s questioning look, she continued, “Uhtred is our answer.  My father will send him to negotiate.  I know him.  He will help us.”

Aethelflaed waited as Erik stared at her face, saw her belief.  Her sincerity.  She watched as his face broke into a smile and he nodded, before he brought another kiss to her lips.

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4cr: On that note, Phantom Trigger is set for a Nintendo Switch release. How would you describe the game?

This is a story about having an enemy inside of you. It has a prominent combat system. The player has three types of attacks, and can achieve different effects by combining them, from freezing to gravitational bombs that you can attach to the enemy.

The plot is unfolding slowly, and becomes an ambiguous story. The game is every atmospheric, with bright neon colors that contrast with the gloomy words and electric music soundtrack.

4cr: Was it hard to bring the game to the Nintendo Switch? Any particular challenges during the development process?

We didn’t have much trouble porting the game. It was developed to be played with a gamepad from the every beginning. And, as you know, Nintendo Switch has two gamepads, so we just HAD to implement a Co-Op mode!

4cr: Elephant in the room: Hyper Light Drifter. And... go!

Many people compare the game to Hyper Light Drifter, which was one of the inspirations, but Phantom Trigger is much darker. Phantom Trigger is a dark fantasy game – lollipops covered in spiderwebs, big eyes following the player from the flowery jungles, and other weird environments in the spirit of Alice in Wonderland is the base of Phantom Trigger style.

4cr: Thank you for your time. Is there something else you'd like to add before we go?

Buy game, share love ;)