Athelstan

Name: Catherine
Age: 24
Contact: catherinesmells on plurk, OR stoptheworld26 on aim, or both x
Characters Already in Teleios: nope
Reserve: Yes!

Character Name: Athelstan
Journal: doctrinesornament
Age: 23 (tentatively. It's not given in canon but that's the actor's age, so.)
Fandom: Vikings
Canon Point: The end of the series, when Athelstan has more or less overcome the fever which has beset the community, and is recovering his strength.
Debt:

Class A: 11 Years - Treason (Against his country, against his church, against his king, against his master, thrice against his abbot, against his oaths, and thrice against god.)
Class B: 2.5 Years - Fraud (To the Earl, to Ragnar and his family, to the community, to the priests, in his life in general.)
Class C: 2 Months

Property Damage

Going on a drug binge

GRAND TOTAL: Thirteen years, 8 months

History: wiki-link

And now the Athelstan specific bits!

Athelstan was given to the monastary at Lindisfarne as a small boy, by a family who couldn't afford to feed him, and who all died of a fever shortly afterward. He grew up as a monk, pledged to his abbot, and lived a life of solitude, poverty, and labor. He traveled as a missionary for some time, and learned other languages in addition to Latin and Anglo-Saxon.

THEN VIKINGS CAME AND KILLED ALL HIS FRIENDS AND STOLE ALL HIS TREASURE.

Athelstan managed to prevent his own death by pleading for his life in Norse instead of English, and Ragnar Lothbrock, the head of the viking raiders, decided to take him as a slave instead of killing him.

After being taken back to Scandinavia, Ragnar got him liquored up and tricked him into teaching him some English and giving him a bunch of information about England, which he could use to better loot the country. Then he ran off to do some lootin' and left Athelstan to mind his kids.

When Ragnar got back he CAUSED SOME TROUBLE WITH HIS JARL IDK, but that did not stop him from clapping Athelstan on the shoulder and commending his babysitting skills. THEIR FRIENDSHIP GREW.

Then his Jarl/chieftan/jerk BASICALLY PUT A LOT OF EFFORT INTO KILLING RAGNAR, and Athelstan helped his family escape to a nearby boat. Then when Ragnar fell into some water all shot full of arrows, WHO JUMPED IN TO GET HIM? Athelstan, that's who. Then they took him to see Dr. Floki and Dr. Floki did some Norse healing stuff and Athelstan said a Hail Mary or something and RAGNAR GOT BETTER. ISH.

Then Ragnar killed the Jarl because he is a pimp. Then Ragnar TOOK ATHELSTAN TO SEE THE JARL'S SLAVE GIRL WHO WAS GETTING DRUNK BECAUSE SHE WANTED TO BE SACRIFICED ALONGSIDE HER MASTER AND GO ON THE DEATH BOAT WITH HIM.

He showed her to Athelstan as if to say: when I die, u r so coming.

& Athelstan was like: wow I am so not.

Then when she was actually killed Athelstan was like NOT LOOKING NOT LOOKING NOT LOOKING but Ragnar's TINY SON was like: HEY PRIEST WATCH WHILE THIS SLAVE GETS KILLED!

Anyway then like two episodes Later Athelstan was like: I AM NOT A CHRISTIAN ANYMORE I AM A NORSE GOD BELIEVER! And he broke some of his vows at a giant norse religious festival, and somewhat predictably, Ragnar tried to sacrifice him to the gods.

It didn't work because Athelstan like, IMMEDIATELY CHANGED HIS MIND AND DECIDED HE WAS CHRISTIAN AGAIN. (I think Athelstan is literally the LEAST OKAY CHARACTER ON THE SHOW when it comes to the issue of their OWN MORTALITY.)

Anyway, someone else was sacrificed and Athelstan was VERY UPSET. Also because he had a sponge-bath giving MAYBE GIRLFRIEND? I don't know it was never clarified, but he had to sit next to her during dinner the next episode.

THE NEXT EPISODE EVERYONE GOT THE PLAGUE. ATHELSTAN'S SPONGE BATH GIVING GIRLFRIEND DIED, as did Ragnar's baby daughter who was basically the only person to like Athelstan. Athelstan got the plague but didn't die because maybe a ram was sacrificed for him. HE WAS VERY SAD INDEED.

Then he came to Teleios c:

Personality: What may not be immediately obvious about Athelstan, even to himself, is the strength of his instinct for survival. He agonizes over why he was spared in Lindisfarne, but the truth is that it wasn't by any divine intervention or random act of mercy from Ragnar. It was because, in the few seconds Athelstan spent hidden in the chapel before he was discovered, he heard Ragnar speaking in a language which he knew, and the seed of a thought was planted: That he could better barter for his survival in the Vikings native tongue. That he could intrigue, communicate, or implore more powerfully, if he did it in Norse.

In other words, even in the heat of panic, when most of his brothers were mindlessly praying for their survival, Athelstan, without even thinking about it, was making plans.

This is the reason behind much of his assimilation into viking culture, over the course of the season. For the first few episodes he's in, Athelstan struggles to shave his tonsure. He prays every night. He dresses in his monastic robes and struggles to keep his faith. This changes only when he sees the bodies of the other monks, strung up and murdered hanging in the viking town square. It is at this point that he finally absorbs the fact that in this culture, looking and dressing the way he does is a part of what makes him less than human to those around him. It is a part of what makes his life disposable to them, and it is with this realization that Athelstan stops shaving his tonsure, and stops wearing his robes.

When he asks Ragnar about his position as a slave some time later, he raises the same issue again. Not that he doesn't want to do work, or that Ragnar personally treats him badly, but that as a slave, his life is not protected within the laws of their culture, and it is this that makes him want to be freed.

I believe that much of Athelstan's development is driven subconsciously by the larger powers within him, both of his urge to survive, and his deeply ingrained sense of devotion to god. For instance, I don't think that he would have initially made a conscious decision to give up his tonsure or habit. He wouldn't have thought of it as making a decision between keeping his old life or his faith, and assimilating into viking culture. Rather, I believe that he gradually permitted himself the path of least resistance. He distracted himself from shaving, and wore whatever else he could find when his robes became ragged or dirty, consciously, I don't think he would have acknowledged these as sacrifices he was making, to improve his chances of survival, but I think these are what they were all the same.

I think the initial reason for his interest in Ragnar's gods and legends comes from the same instinct. To ingratiate himself with the people who hold control over his life, and to make them feel as though they've shared something important to them with him. It's relevant that when he's alone with Ragnar's young daughter Gyda (in a deleted scene from the series), and relatively confident that no one who can hurt him is watching, he is flatly dismissive about the existence of the Norse gods. He doesn't even harbor any old gods/new god transitional post-pagan philosophies about them, he just straight up doesn't think they exist. Unless he's talking to Ragnar in which case gosh, maybe they do please tell me more, Sir...?

That said, there's a fair measure of genuine curiosity in Athelstan's nature. His interest in the Norse Gods maintains beyond the point where he thinks his life is in constant danger, and his fondness for the culture eventually transitions into what might be Stockholm syndrome. Athelstan tells Lagertha in one episode, that he only became happy when he first began living his life in the service of the abbey, and I think he experiences the same willingness for subservience as Ragnar's slave, and as his friend. He grew up under an oath of obedience, and the roots of his religious convictions run deep, even when he would consciously think of them as being broken.

Almost the only thing that Athelstan accepts easily when brought to Scandinavia, is the fact that his life is not his own. While he objects to his slavery on the basis of not wanting his life to be without value, he doesn't seem to object to the actual institution of slavery, or the fact that he's been taken as one. Servitude comes easily to Athelstan, and while he has countless opportunities to resist and flee (almost immediately after being taken as a slave, Ragnar leaves Athelstan alone to take care of his children and farm), the Monk never does. This is likely partly due to the aforementioned survival instinct coming through, as he has no way to return home and nowhere else to go, but it is also true that servitude comes easily to Athelstan. It is not only Ragnar's word, but a sense of responsibility to his children, and his property which keeps Athelstan from running at first, which evolves into an acceptance of his position in a household which he eventually feels he belongs too.

There is also the fact that Christianity had never condemned slavery in the past, and in fact, in the letters of Saint Paul (which Athelstan undoubtedly would have known, as some of the most important canon of the Catholic church), slaves are told in no uncertain terms to obey their masters as they obey god. In fact, this is totally where I got Athelstan's username from:

"Tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect; they are not to talk back, not to pilfer, but to show complete and perfect fidelity, so that in everything they may be an ornament to the doctrine of God our Savior." (Titus 2:9-10)

So while it is from his relationship with God and religion that Athelstan's instinct for servitude comes from, it is also through his relationship with God that we see Athelstan's capacity for dissent.

At first, he sees his abduction as part of god's plan, as a punishment for the sins of mankind, but as it becomes increasingly clear that Ragnar and the other vikings do this regularly, and that the world is still turning despite the destruction of his own home, Athelstan becomes more interrogative of his faith. He still prays, and he still speaks to God, but after the vikings ask him a million times, "If your god is so great, why didn't he protect you?" Athelstan begins to ask this as well. When he finally does admit to feeling angry about what has happened to him and his brothers, it's not towards Ragnar, who he presumably doesn't expect any better from, but towards God, for allowing it to happen.

It is this anger that finally does prompt his conscious decision to try and become more like the people around him. Towards the end of the series, Athelstan freely chooses to accompany Ragnar to a religious festival. He claims to believe in the gods, has sex a kiss and a SUGGESTIVE SPONGE BATH with a lady viking, thus breaking his oath of chastity, and renounces god, three times.

Then the Norse Priest tells him he's going to be sacrificed to the gods, and Athelstan literally, automatically reaches for his cross (thus outing himself as not quite as over Jesus as he might have claimed to be, and proving himself as an unsuitable and unwilling sacrifice.)

Again, I don't think that Athelstan is consciously lying about believing in the Norse Gods, and no longer being a Christian. On the contrary, being surrounded by people who believe strongly in their gods, and are willing to die on the absolute certainty that they will be rewarded for their sacrifices, is probably extremely attractive to a man who feels as though he's been abandoned by his own. Rather than having lost his faith, Athelstan has consciously rejected God, and is deliberately taking a path of defiance. He has been trying very had not to be a Christian anymore, but this isn't the same as no longer believing in God, or being able to shake himself free of the values that he's imposed upon himself from his childhood. It also still doesn't take precedence over his desire to live, which again rears back up the moment he realizes his life is in jeopardy.

The two crimes which will define Athelstans debt in Teleios, are treason and fraud. The treason is the physical betrayal of all the things he held dear in his life, and the fraud comes from the claim that because he has betrayed these things, that he no longer holds them dear.

He stops reading or looking at his bible, but still keeps his oath of celibacy for almost eighteen months before he succumbs to a sexy sponge bath while on a ton of drugs.

He learns the names of the viking gods, and claims to believe in them, but he still finds the idea of blood sacrifice monstrous and barbaric.

He dresses up and blends in and says whatever is necessary to survive, but he still believes in the one, Christian God, and still holds to Anglo-Saxon values, at his core.

At the end of the series, Athelstan is a man without a country. He hasn't truly accepted the values of those around him (he carries a new sense of survivors guilt, after another of their group volunteered to be sacrificed in his place, although those around believe that this man feasts with Odin now), but he is completely isolated from anyone who shares his own. He still doesn't believe in the Norse gods, but he has destroyed and forsaken any good grace he may have had with his own. Ragnar, who Athelstan had come to see as family, has clarified entirely that he sees Athelstan as a slave, and his life as disposable.

No matter how entirely he has tried to force himself to move forward and not to look back, to change and not have anyone question or doubt it, there is a core of compassion to Athelstan, a sense of responsibility and concern which may have been instilled in him by his upbringing at the monastery, but which now runs deeper than the culture that surrounds him. Things which even when removed from his religion, are still there, inserparable from him as a person. Which make Athelstan who he is.

Upon his arrival in Teleios, it is entirely likely that no matter what his heart tells him, Athelstan will do the same thing again. Push away his past, betray his values, and embrace the new higher power in service at the temple.

Because even at his most miserable, guilty and lost, Athelstan will want to survive.

Powers/Abilties: Athelstan's chief abilities are ones he learned at the monastery, and ones which would not seem all that remarkable in our modern times. He can read and write, mend his own clothes, prepare food, and is a gifted calligraphist.

He knows at least three languages, Old English, Norse, and Latin.

Appearance: By the time Athelstan arrives in Teleios, he has adapted somewhat to living in a viking culture. He has grown out his tonsure, so his hair is long and dark, and has a bit of a beard going on. He is also still sort of in recovery from a recent bout of the plague, so he's kind of gaunt and skinny looking right now.


Basically this is him at the end of the series. HIM NOT LOOK SO GOOD. In Teleios, once he realizes that clean shaven people are a thing again, he might lose the beard so that my icons are slightly more accurate.

Samples:

Actionspam Sample: Sample here

Prose Sample: Sample here