Chapter 66: Budding

By night, Snake and several guards trace a fresh theft to two culprits who made off with flour and dried meat, though the trail dissolves into other footprints and the search is abandoned. Come November 1015, Einar chats with Arnheid at the well while Thorfinn washes up. When she suggests Sverkel must be fond of them to lend a horse and share a meal, Einar credits their chores, but Arnheid gently insists it is simply because he is a kind man, leaving him blushing and speechless. Their pleasant moment is punished out of sight: Arnheid's mistress, Ketil's wife, strikes her and berates her for idling before her morning duties, coldly remarking that a slave woman falling for a slave man suits her station.

In the fields, roughly eighty percent of the sown wheat has sprouted. Thorfinn thinks the pale shoots look fragile and is quietly amazed that bread comes from something so slight. Einar frames the harvest as their first stride toward buying back their freedom, then wonders aloud what will become of Arnheid, who has no such path out. With nothing to do but wait on the crop, Einar drops to his knees in a theatrical prayer begging any god, be it the Christian Lord or Freya, to shield their fragile wheat, and he goads Thorfinn into praying just as fervently since they have no offerings to give. Meanwhile Ketil rides home with his eldest son, Thorgil, who muses that a battlefield might harden the timid Olmar the way it transformed Canute from a gentle prince into a hard king. Ketil, unwilling to risk his heir, dismisses the idea. The pair then meet Snake, who is marching two bound thieves toward Ketil for judgment: the culprits turn out to be two children, and Snake insists they must still answer for their crimes.

Snake's investigation confirms a string of thefts plaguing the farm. Arnheid tells Einar he is a good person, cementing his growing feelings for her, moments before her mistress beats her for the delay. The sprouting wheat becomes the tangible first step toward Thorfinn and Einar's freedom, and Einar's worry over Arnheid's fate surfaces openly. Thorgil arrives back at the estate and floats the idea of sending Olmar to war. The chapter ends on the reveal that the captured thieves are two young children, setting up the moral crisis of the next installment.

The story is dated to November 1015 and continues the Farmland arc's meditation on freedom, faith, and cruelty. Thorgil's account of how war reshaped Canute links the farm plot back to the wider saga. The children are later named as Sture and Thora. These events were adapted in Episode 31 of the anime.