Episode 26: Ketil's Farm

Ketil introduces Einar to Thorfinn and lays out the arrangement: the pair will clear his forest, cultivate it, and reap wheat, which he will buy at a fair rate. Once the value they generate surpasses their own price, they may purchase their freedom, perhaps within three years of hard work. Einar is thrilled and accepts eagerly, and the freedman Pater, who won his liberty the same way, wishes them luck. Ketil tells Einar to rest and observe Thorfinn for the day.

Following Thorfinn into the trees, Einar marvels at how much has already been felled and learns everything on the far side of the river must be cleared. He soon lodges his own axe in a trunk on his first swing. Wanting his freedom faster, he refuses to rest, and Thorfinn shows him to cut so the trees fall perpendicular to the water for floating downstream. When lunch arrives, farmhands hand over a meager portion and demand thanks as free men delivering food; Einar bristles, but Thorfinn quietly accepts it and thanks them. With a tethered horse, Thorfinn pulls while Einar pushes, hauling logs toward the river.

By evening Einar is exhausted and furious at the farmhands, whom he brands half-slaves lording over those beneath them. He wants to report them to Ketil, but Thorfinn warns it will only invite worse harassment, which frustrates Einar further. When Ketil passes by asking about their first day, Einar starts to complain, then loses his words entirely at the sight of a beautiful woman, and Ketil moves on assuming nothing is amiss.

The next day, Einar is surprised to see the wealthy Ketil working the harvest himself, patiently coaching his sullen son Olmar on cutting wheat low for the grazing livestock. Olmar, uninterested in farm chores and set on winning fame with a sword, storms off on horseback, struggling even to draw his overlong blade. That night Olmar practices, boasts of joining Prince Canute's army, and quarrels with the family of the woman in his bed, who hope to marry into Ketil's household; disgusted, he declares all women rotten and rides off to drink with two farmhands. In their own beds, Einar tells Thorfinn how soldiers twice ravaged his village, first the English king's men who killed his father, then the Danes who pillaged under the guise of liberation, leaving him certain such men are beasts in human skin. Thorfinn says nothing, quietly recalling his own past.

Ketil offers Einar and Thorfinn a path to freedom by turning his forest into wheat fields and outproducing their purchase price. Einar embraces the goal while chafing at the farmhands who bully them. Ketil's restless son Olmar is introduced, contemptuous of farm work and hungry for battlefield glory. Einar recounts the twin raids that destroyed his village, hinting at the shared trauma that silently binds him to Thorfinn.

Ketil's Farm aired on January 17, 2023, as the second episode of Season 2, adapting chapter 56 and part of chapter 57. Michiru Itabisashi directed from a storyboard by Tadahito Matsubayashi. The episode establishes the estate's social hierarchy and formally introduces Olmar, Pater, and the farmhands Fox and Badger.