Hello!!! Can I ask something about Snake?Maybe where he falls in love with a fem slave in the farm? I barely see some content of this man sadly (Do it the way you wish of course) Thank youuu <3
Authors Note: **Hiii :) thanks so much for your ask! Iâve had this one sitting in my inbox for a bit and kept sneaking in time to work on it whenever possible đ
Iâm so happy I could finally get it done for you I hope it was worth the wait! 𫶠**
Fallow Ground
Synopsis: Navigating a fragile bond built on restraint and quiet understanding in a harsh world.
CW: (Mature), Slow Burn, Power Imbalance, Guard/Slave Dynamic, Forbidden Relationship, Mutual Pining, Emotional Restraint, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Hurt/Comfort, Quiet Intimacy, Subtle Romance, Yearning, Bittersweet.
Word Count: 3,134
Disclaimer: The following is a work of fan fiction and does not reflect the official story or characters of Vinland Saga. The story contains material that may be upsetting for some readers, such as power imbalance, abuse, and depictions of slavery, and is intended for mature audiences only.
Snake never learned the names of slaves.
Distance kept the hand steady, he told himself. Guards who learned names hesitated, and hesitation got people hurtâor worse. Heâd learned that long before Ketilâs fields, back when the ground drank blood instead of rain and mercy was a mistake you only survived once.
That logic had kept him alive.
You worked the eastern fieldsâthe poorer land. Thin soil, scattered stones just beneath the surface, waiting to dull tools and split skin rather than feed mouths.
Work there was slower, heavier. Mistakes lingered.
You measured each swing, shifted your footing, adjusting when the blade caught stone. Your hands were raw, knuckles split and wrapped poorly, sleeves rolled even as the wind cut through the valley. Hair tied back out of habit, not care.
You moved like someone who had learned, long ago, that wasted effort was a luxury.
He stopped behind you without announcing himself.
âYour rowâs crooked.â
The hoe stuttered. You didnât jumpâjust paused, grip tightening as you turned enough to see who stood there. Snake watched from a few paces back, arms crossed, weight settled evenly. His perpetually tired gaze moved from the uneven furrow to your hands, then back to the soil.
âIâll fix it,â you said.
Not apologetic. No explanation. Just a statementâflat, factual.
For a moment, you thought he might chastise you, order you to redo the whole stretch, punish inefficiency the way guards often did.
Instead, he nodded once.
Nothing more.
As he walked off, he caught the reflection of your gaze in the corner of his eyeânot lingering, not defiant. Measuring. The same way he measured terrain before a fight.
You didnât look broken. Tired, yesâbut not hollow.
That unsettled him more than fear ever could.
Shouting dragged him from sleep one morningâsteel scraped free too fast, voices sharp with pride and stupidity. Snake crossed the yard in seconds, boots biting into dirt.
A group of his men had cornered a pair of slaves in the training ring, swords to their throats, one bleeding already. The young master stood red-faced nearby.
âEnough,â Snake snapped.
He wrenched one man back by the collar just in time to break the chaos before it became slaughter. Another swung at him in defiance. Snake drove a fist into his face.
They forced his hand. He broke a manâs nose.
He hadnât noticed you stepped in without being told.
Kneeling beside the mercenary who was nursing his busted nose.
You didnât hesitate at the blood. Didnât flinch when he snarled in pain. Your hands were steady as you pushed the brute's hands aside and pressed a cloth to his nose, calm voice cutting through his protests.
âHold still,â you said. âOr itâll heal wrong.â
Snake watched the way you workedâefficient, swiftly, unafraid. When you finished, you wiped your hands on your apron and stepped back without expecting thanks.
That was the first time he truly took notice, certainly not the last.
Youâd share your rations.
Youâd stepped forward when the madamâs voice sharpened, placing yourself between her temper and a younger slaveâs shaking shoulders.
Pain swallowed in silence.
He knew that feeling well.
Rain came one morning, steady and cold, turning the fields to mire. Work shouldâve stopped.
Snake spotted you kneeling in the mud, shoulders trembling with effort as you tried to force the tool back into sodden earth.
âThatâs enough,â he said, sauntering over.
You looked up. Rain tracked down your face, indistinguishable from sweat. âBâbut the quotaââ
âI said thatâs enough.â
Authority snapped clean through the air.
You nodded and pushed upright. Your foot slid.
The contact wasnât gentle or rough, rather quick. Instinctive.
Rain drummed around you. Mud sucked at his boots. For a breath, the world narrowed to the heat of skin through soaked cloth.
Snake released you as if burned.
âGo,â he said, rough now.
You nodded once and hurried toward the stables without a word.
Ketil was far from a cruel master, though his lenience could not negate the cage it merely softened. Some nights, when your stomach burned too fiercely for sleep, you lay awake counting breaths, wondering if restraint was any kinder.
That was when you began listening more closely.
You learned the farm by sound.
Which boards groaned. Which hinges stayed quiet. The chicken coopâs back hinge never complained. The root cellar steps only groaned on the third plank down.
You never stole anything worth remembering.
Bruised apples. Misshapen turnips. Raw seed and grain hard enough to cut your gums. Crusts stiff as bark, tucked into your sleeves.
Youâd been honest once. Proud of your work. Years ago, you wouldâve hated yourself for this.
But you didnât steal from greed.
You stole because hunger was a slow, humiliating death.
Moonlight spilled through the barn door in pale stripes across packed earth. You were almost finished stuffing a thin duffel with scraps meant for cattle when the night went still.
The wind died. The animals stilled.
Your body locked before your mind caught up, fingers clenched tight around the bundle. A shadow filled the doorway, broad-shouldered, sword strapped loose at his side.
Posture relaxed in a way that only came from lethal confidence.
You stopped. His expression was cold. Excuses were pointless.
âYou one of Ketilâs?â he asked, voice level.
He exhaled slowly, almost strainedâlike something heavy had settled behind his ribs.
âYou know what happens if I take you to the master.â
You nodded again, eyes stinging.
âYouâve been up to this for how long?â
ââŚSince last fall.â you admitted reluctanly
That gave him pause.
His gaze swept over you: the thin wrappings around your feet, the way your clothes hung loose, the sharp hollows hunger carved into your face.
âYouâre thin,â he said, no judgment. Just fact.
Heâd seen thieves before. Desperate men. Cruel ones.
You werenât one of them.
He took the bundle from your hands, glanced inside and winced slightly, only scrapsâ things no one would miss let alone search for â then placed it back against your chest.
âDonât let me catch you next time,â Snake grunted, shifting just enough to unblock the path.
âI-I wonât,â you blurted, stunned and relieved.
He closed his eyes briefly, then tipped his chin toward the door.
As you passed him, you looked back.
Something quieter. Reverent, perhaps.
You didnât stop stealing, you couldnât afford to.
But you kept your head down.
He noticed.
He also noticed where you didnât go. How you learned his patrols without being told. How you avoided his line of sight, worked faster. Took the longer paths. Found excuses to be elsewhere.
Mercy, once received, felt fragileâtoo easy to shatter if tested again.
He let the distance stand.
Until one winter evening, when you ducked out behind the barn to eat.
âStill stealing?â he rounded the corner, speaking mildly as if he hadnât appeared from nowhere.
You nearly choked, spinning around.
He stepped beneath the overhang patting off the snow peppered on his coat and dark hair.
âIâ I ah! um⌠Yes,â you admitted reluctantly. Lying felt useless to the man whoâd caught you twice.
âWhat was it I told you?â he asked. âDonât let me catch you again.â
Your face burned. âIf youâre going to turn me inââ
âIâm not.â He waved a gloved hand dismissively.
You released a breath you hadnât realized you kept, taking a small cautious bite of your takings.
He watched you chew, slow and careful, like the food might vanish if rushed. Something flickered behind his eyesâa memory. A past that tasted just as bitter as the spoiled root you swallowed.
âThereâs a shack past the treeline,â he said, moving to lean casually against the wall. âOld trapperâs place. Lockâs broken.â
You swallowed, staring at him curiously. âWhy tell me this?â
His mouth curvedânot a smile. Something sadder.
âJusâ donât want you starving is allâŚâ He muttered tucking his chin into the fur wrapped at his neck.
He glanced at you and sighed.
âListen, I've done terrible things,â he said quietly. âI just⌠I donât need another ghost.â
Snow fell softly around you. For a moment, the farm felt far away. The wars beyond it distant.
He stepped back, breaking you from your delusions.
âBe careful,â he said.
You watched him disappear into the night and realized, with a quiet ache, that this was the first time someone had chosen to show you mercy in a very long while.
And, frighteningly, you found it harder to endure.
After that day extra rations appeared where youâd find them. Never handed to you outright.
You told yourself youâd keep away from him.
This attention was dangerous. Kindness always came with a cost.
And yetâ you noticed him everywhere. Or maybe he noticed you? By the trough at dusk. Near the fields at dawn.
Coincidences, heâd tell himselfâa lie that almost held.
The distance between you began to change.
It became a habit before either of you named it.
When his duties thinned, Snake found himself drifting toward wherever you were working. When your tasks ended early, you found yourself listening for the sound of his boots as you lingered near the paths he patrolled.
Sometimes you walked together in silence. Sometimes you shared food.
Sometimes you rode saddle behind him while he made his rounds, the world reduced to hoofbeats, the thump of his heartbeat beneath your cheek and casual conversation.
You told him you were born near the coast.
That youâd known freedom long enough to miss it properly.
That you didnât hate himâand knowing that hurt more than if you hadâŚ
Snake had never filled his spare hours before. He slept, ate, workedânothing else. But when you were nearby, his attention drifted despite himself. Conversations dulled. Orders blurred at the edges. His gaze returned to you again and again, uninvited.
Without realizing when it began, all his unclaimed moments led back to you.
The trail outside the old masterâs house crunched under your boots as you carried water to the barn. Snakeâs quarters were quiet, shutters closed, the faint scent of smoke from his hearth drifting out. You kept your distance, as usual, focused on your task, though your ears pricked at every sound.
You heard it first by accident.
A grumble broke the morning calm.
ââŚRoald, you lazy fool, I swear⌠The fields wonât tend themselves!â
You froze, water jug balanced in your hands.
The voice was unmistakably the old masterâs, sharp with irritation, stepping into the sunlit yard.
Roald? The name tumbled out with the wind, a strange, foreign thing you hadnât expected. Your chest tightened, the syllables rolling over your tongue. Roald.
The old masterâs tone softened slightly, almost grudging, as if the name carried weight beyond anger. âIâll be damned if all this work falls on me while youââ He trailed off, shoving the door shut and disappearing toward the fields, muttering under his breath.
You lingered a moment, heart thudding. It sounded⌠fragile. Not the weight you imagined a man like him carried, yet it fitâthe silent strength, the patience, the quiet command.
The name rolled over your tongue, foreign yet fitting, and you imagined calling it, seeing if heâd respond. But the thought stayed lodged in your chest. You couldnât. Not yet.
In the world you knew, he was Snake. Roald, the man behind the mask, was something you werenât yet allowed to claim.
So you walked on, water sloshing gently in the jug, crunching over fallen leaves, the name quiet in your mind. RoaldâSnakeâhad never taken what wasnât freely offered. And so neither would you.
Night settled heavy over the farm, the kind that pressed close instead of offering quiet. Crickets rasped in the grass. Somewhere in the distance, a horse snorted and shifted in its stall. Snakeâs patrol had slowed to a crawlânot from laziness, but because nothing stirred when he passed.
He found you where heâd half-expected to.
Beyond the last fence line, you sat with your back to a low rise where the grass grew thick and uneven. He hadnât told you to follow him there. You hadnât asked. It had simply happened the way habits doâtwo paths bending toward the same place without a word exchanged.
He stopped a short distance away, boots planted wide, posture loose but alert. Watched you for a moment. Then cleared his throat.
You turned your head and smiled, patting the ground beside you.
âHere,â he said, nodding toward the loaf wrapped in cloth at his side. He set it down between you and lowered himself onto the grass a few inches away, knees drawn up, forearms resting against them.
You hesitated only a moment before reaching for it.
You tore the loaf in half and ate slowly, staring up at the sky. Stars pricked through the darkâscattered thin tonight, dulled by haze, but still there if you looked long enough.
Snake kept his gaze forward. His eyes traced the dark line of fencing, the sleeping barns, the paths he could walk blindfolded now. He watched like something might appear if he didnât.
âYouâre a talented swordsman,â you said at last, voice quiet but steady. âWhy this farm?â
He didnât answer right away.
Moonlight traced his jaw, caught in the tired set of his mouth. He breathed out through his nose.
âRunning off to fight pointless wars didnât fix anything.â
You shifted, propping yourself on your elbows so you could see him properly.
He was quiet long enough that you thought he might not answer.
âNo,â he said finally, shoulders dropping a fraction. ââŚBut it keeps others alive.â
You studied him for a moment, then smiledânot bright, not hopeful. Just real.
âThatâs something.â
His jaw tightened. He nodded once.
Eventually, it was time to move again. Duty didnât wait just because the night was quiet.
The loaf was nearly gone when he reached for the cloth to take it back.
The contact was accidental. Barely there.
The night seemed to draw in around youâthe grass flattened beneath your palms, the faint crackle of cooling embers far off, the distant creak of wood settling. You became suddenly aware of how close he sat. Close enough to feel the heat beneath his layers, coiled and restrained, like a blade kept sheathed by will alone.
His grip tightened once.
Then loosened. Deliberate.
âI shouldnât,â he said under his breath, turning his face away like the words tasted wrong in his mouth.
âI know,â you answered quietly.
You didnât pull your hand away.
He went still.
For a heartbeat you thought he might lean in.
Thought you might let him.
Thought the rules of this place, this life, might thin enough to slip through.
Snake had spent years making ghosts. Men remembered only by how they fell, not by what they might have been. He knew the shape of endings. Knew when something had to be stopped before it began.
âYouâve enough ghosts,â you murmured. âDonât let me be one.â
The corner of his mouth twitchedânot the empty calm he wore for others, not the dry smirk he used to keep distance.
Something real surfaced, brief and unpracticed.
When your fingers finally slipped free, neither of you moved right away.
You sat in the space where your hands had been, sharing nothing but cold air and the sound of each other breathing.
Then he stood without a word.
No apology. No promises.
Later, when he resumed his watch, you noticed.
His eyes scanned the barn, the yard, the darkened trails beyond the fence lineâmethodical, sharp.
And always, they came back to you.
For the first time in years, Snake felt a weight in his chest he couldnât name.
But he allowed it to stay just a little longer.
The night the farm burned, chaos tore through everything heâd tried to hold together.
Flames licked the edges of the barn. Sparks showered the ground. The heat pressed in from all sides, thick and choking. Through shouting. Steel. Fire.
He found you where heâd feared mostâcornered by the kingâs men, smoke stinging your eyes, a sickle shaking in your grip.
âStay behind me,â he ordered, offering you his hand.
You took it without hesitation.
He guided you down a narrow path between the barns. Your breath came in sharp, uneven bursts, the smell of smoke and scorched hay filling your nostrils. Broken wood and scattered tools snagged at your clothing. Ash fell like snow around you. Sweat streaked his face, his eyes scanning the shadows for movement.
Every sound seemed amplified: the crack of burning timber, the shriek of a distant horse engulfed in flame, the frantic wails of men at war. And yet, in the midst of it all, his hand never left yours.
When at last you reached the treeline, panting feeling faint, the firelight receding behind you, he helped you to the ground. You sank to your knees, weeping, dirt and ash smearing your face as your eyes welled with tears. Snake crouched beside you, bloodied, breathing hard.
âShh, itâs okay, youâre okay, Youâre alive,â he whispered, placing a hand on your back to steady your trembling shoulders.
âSo are you,â you sniffed, a shaky laugh breaking free.
You looked up with glossy eyes, tears streaking down your neck.
âThatâs my name,â he said, cupping your cheek and wiping a tear with his thumb.
Something in your chest ached at what it meant.
âI wonât forget it,â you said softly.
He nodded, eyes unreadableâthen pulled you into his embrace, a shaky breath leaving him as his grip tightened, protective. You fit against him like a piece he hadnât realized had been missing.
For a long moment, neither of you spoke. The smoke of the burned farm drifted around you, acrid and heavy, yet here, in his arms, the world felt impossibly still. His heartbeat thumped against your ear, steady, alive. You let yourself memorize it, knowing there would be no other proof of this night, this moment.
He didnât promise you freedom.
Didnât lie about the world.
But when this world took what it always tookâblood, sweat, peaceâhe made damn sure it never took you. Not while he stood guard.
For a man like Roald, that was love.
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