The woman Runa gave a nod to the strangers from where she stirred a soapstone pot. Ottar had vanished into the barn after the cows, but it relieved Sidroc to know they had help. Running even a small farm alone would be an arduous task for a young couple, let alone for those advanced in age.
Sidroc did much of the talking, letting his father just look at him as he did so. He told of what happened when his father’s boat did not return. “Yrling came for me, took me to Signe and Ful. I was raised with Toki. Yrling began to raid in Summer, to Angle-land. But he always had a plan to build a ship, and he did. The silver that was given me as my portion of what you left went into the ship, as did everything Yrling had ever earned.”
“My little brother,” the old man mused.
“He captured a great fortress in Anglia,” Sidroc went on. “He died a few years later, in battle.”
“He died young,” came the murmured response.
Sidroc nodded. “He is in Asgard, that is certain. My son at Tyrsborg is named for him.”
It brought a flicker of a smile to the elder Hrald’s face.
Sidroc thought of something else from his boyhood. He bent down to his left ankle, untied the leg wrapping there, pulled up his legging. He unstrapped something from his bare ankle and laid it on the table before his father. It was the small knife he had given him as a boy.
“I have worn this every day.”
The old man almost gasped for breath, seeing this, and hearing what it had meant to his son. Sidroc grinned at him as he said the next.
“That knife helped me win my freedom on a slave ship.”
He told of traveling with Yrling and Toki across the North Sea to go a-viking, and of his success there. It was much to take in. The elder Hrald sat shaking his head in amazement.
“To hear how far you went, what you did.” He looked about the modest farmstead. “This was all I ever wanted.”
Sidroc was forced to nod. “Sometimes it takes decades for a man to learn this – what he truly wants.”
“I wanted peace. A woman who cared for me,” his father explained. He looked at his wife, sitting to one side, saying nothing yet listening with care to all. “I found her in Stenhild. She has a daughter from her first husband; he was lost to piracy, or the sea. The girl was a toddler when I first met her. She is wed now, living not far with her own family, and is a blessing to us. We had one of our own, carried away by the red-cheeked fever. She would have been about your age,” he added, looking at Hrald.
Hrald remembered Rannveig telling him that there had been a terrible fever outbreak, the same that had carried off Tindr’s sisters, and rendered him deaf.
They were still sitting at the table, with their ale cups before them, their hands flanking the thick-walled pottery cups that had been refilled again and again with foaming ale.
Sidroc drew a breath, and studied his father’s lined face. He asked the question he had always wished to have answered.
“Can you tell me what happened?”
The elder Hrald looked up into the darkening sky over his son’s head, then dropped his eyes to the scarred trestle top. No further prompting was needed; the story had been lying there on the surface of his life, unanchored, for over three decades.
“A gale came up.”
The silence that followed went on for so long that Sidroc began to wonder if his father, in his despairing unhappiness, had considered not trying to save himself, and instead had determined to allow the wind and waves reveal his Fate.
“I had a hard time with the boat; tried to make a run back instead of dropping sail and riding it out. The mast snapped.
“I got hit by it when it fell. It addled my brain; I could not see straight. The boat was taking on water. I lost an oar, and tried to steer her into the waves with only one, so that I would not be swamped. I was sure I was going to be pulled down to Ran’s hall.
“I do not remember much after that. I woke up on a fishing boat, three times the size of mine. They had found me drifting, and plucked me from the boat, which was half-flooded with water. I remember them telling me I could have drowned in my own small boat, it was so full.
“I was beholden; they saved my life. They were from Laaland. They had more nets to drop, but after that they took me to their sea village with them. I had no plan, but I must repay them. I could work my way back to Jutland, and the farm.”
And to me, Sidroc thought.
“One of the men had the chance to do some trading in the Baltic.” He turned eyes full of entreaty on Sidroc. “I could not say no. I could not say no.
“With each day, each week, my life back in Jutland became more and more distant. It was wrong to forsake you, Sidroc, and it pained me. But when Njord took me, and finally cast me toward Gotland once more, I could not leave.
“I landed again at Paviken. I came looking for Stenhild. I had spent a Summer with her when I had but twenty years. The Gods had driven me back here, where I had known the happiest time of my life. And I thought I could reclaim part of that. I found Stenhild again. She had a small farm. Eight, nine years had passed, but she was still there.
He paused and looked about. “I liked this coastland, here up north. She sold her farm. We bought here, built all you see. We made a life together, a good one.”
His father’s disappearance caused him so much pain. Just as his own did, to his own son. Hrald.
There was silence. The woman Runa had not stopped in her cooking. The fowl Stenhild had been readying had been pulled into bits, and was now simmering in a browis of wheat kernels and carrots. The air had grown chilly, and Stenhild spoke.
“Go into the house, you three, while we finish making our supper.” She looked at her husband. “Hrald, fill the jug as you go in. We will not be long.”
These homely needs were a spur to the old man. He looked at his son and grandson. “You will stay, you will stay the night with us,” he urged.
Sidroc must consent. “We will stay the night. And soon I will come back for you both, to bring you to my hall for a visit, that you might meet my wife and young children.”
The three men walked to the timber house. The door was low, cut so that all three of them must bow their heads as they enter, an old device to make it easy to disable any intruder upon entry. It made Sidroc laugh to see it, but he recalled their farm in Jutland had just such a door; he remembered his father having to duck to enter it.
The inside was snug, a low fire burning in the fire-pit. The man Ottar was at work over it, poking up and adding logs. Within there were no oil cressets nor tapers, but there were rush holders, and Sidroc lit an oiled twist of dried rush which cast good light so they might better find their way around the place. A trestle table stood before the few alcoves, with two benches flanking it. The elder Hrald came back and set the dripping jug on the table. He stood a moment, again just looking at his son.
His hand rose to Sidroc’s face. He touched the deep scar there.
“Your face,” he whispered.
Sidroc almost smiled, making the scar go crooked as it always had.
“Toki, when we were twelve,” he said.
“Toki.” The old man shook his head. “Where… where is Toki?”
“Lying under the burial mound I carried him to, in Lindisse.”
He now stared in wonder. His son gestured him to sit, and he did so. “You have much to tell me,” the elder Hrald said.
“You will know all,” Sidroc assured him. “Even those things difficult to tell. But tell me one thing first.” Stenhild was outside at her cooking, and there might be no better time to broach the topic.
“What is the name of my mother?”
“Jorild,” he answered.
Jorild, Sidroc repeated inwardly. How many years had it been since this man had uttered that name, he wondered.
The old man looked thoughtful. “It happened just before I wed Ingirith, a pairing I was bound to. But it was Jorild I always cared for.”
“And you sent her away?”
“Já. I sent her away, with all the silver I could give her. I had no choice. Ingirith would not have her there any longer. There was no peace at the farm with both women there. And I feared for your mother, and for you.”
Sidroc sat still, considering. “I saw Ingirith,” he said. “In Ribe. It was before I sailed with Yrling for Anglia. She had wed a baker. She hardly knew me. One of my half-sisters was already wed, and had left her.”
His father heaved a heavy sigh, hearing this. Then he lifted his eyes and in the flickering light, regarded his son and grandson. “We are much alike,” he admitted, with the beginning of a smile on his lips.
Sidroc nodded at this. Looking at his father was almost as if he looked at himself, two decades hence. The younger Hrald, with his far greater handsomeness, was the outlier, but any seeing him would peg him as an acorn dropped from the same oak.
The old man seemed to be thinking the same, for his gaze now fastened on Hrald. “Who is your mother,” he asked. He turned to his son to question him. “Who did you wed, that this boy has such looks?”
Sidroc gave a short laugh. “A noble woman from Cirenceaster, a place in Wessex. She was first wed to Yrling, and she became the Lady of Four Stones, the fortress he captured. Yrling died before the gates of her own family’s hall, when other Danes made claim to it. After he was killed I wed her. Hrald is our first born.”
The elder Hrald seemed to ponder the exalted circles his son had moved in. He looked again at his grandson, then to Sidroc. “A noble woman of Wessex,” he repeated, as if trying out this idea.
“Treasure brings much,” Sidroc told him. “Including the chance to wed women of wealth and beauty.”
The old man nodded and murmured. “Já, já.”
Sidroc looked about at the snug house. The door opened, and a smiling Stenhild came towards them with Runa, bearing trays of food and drink. Ottar took one of the trays and laid it on the table before them.
Sidroc had further words for his father.
“I think you have found treasure enough, here.”
Chapter the Twenty-second: A Favoured Home
CERIDWEN opened the chest in which she kept her prized store of parchment. Sidroc and Hrald were still away, and she would make use of the time to write a letter. She had long ago asked the old leather worker on the trading road to prepare several sheets of white-skinned parchment for her. Now she need only make up fresh ink, and deprive one of the geese of a long wing feather for her quill. She had no need to think of what she would say, but only let her quill speak the words of her heart.
MY DEAREST SISTER ÆLFWYN
When you hold this letter, you hold me. Know that I weep with you for a loss immeasurable. Hrald’s coming to us with these tragic tidings has yet been a bridge connecting us in our shared sorrow. To know the brief union of our children brought forth a son is the greatest balm. I touch Cerd’s little handprints each day, and marvel that Ashild has left so great a gift to us all.
Of the visitation to her tomb at Oundle, I can say only this. All that brings comfort to those who loved her, and those she is now inspiring – all of this is to me, good. I hope you will find comfort in it.
Hrald has become the young man he always promised to be, the best of both you and his father. May the little one in your keeping prove the same, of Ashild and Ceric.
I fear for my son. It is only knowing that he was in Worr’s keeping that brings me solace when I think of him. If they were granted safe return to Kilton, he will be with his grandmother and aunt, two loving and wise women, where he can begin, himself, to heal.
I have no greater wish than to see you, Ceric, and our Cerd. If this is willed, I shall know lasting contentment. May you be guided and guarded in all.
YOUR LOVING CERIDWEN
Thin as it was, the parchment was supple, and after she left it to dry she rolled it and tied it with a bit of yarn. Then she sewed it into a sleeve of linen, waxed with beeswax as proof against any wet.
Eirian was outside with her geese and new goslings when her father and Hrald rode back up the hill. Yrling was riding behind their father; he had been down at the ships and had hollered in joy when he spotted them. She ran to them, and soon the entire family had gathered to welcome them back. Ceridwen had Rodiaud in her arms, and the beaming smiles of both fell upon father and son. It was late afternoon, and after the horses were unpacked and tended to the men went to the leathern bags the animals had carried. Her father handed Eirian her new comb, with its closely spaced and perfect teeth. It was so smooth to the touch and so pretty to the eye that she gave a little shriek of happiness.
Her mother took full pleasure in her daughter’s delight. “Your father has a gift for selecting such things,” she said. She looked up at Sidroc, remembering the comb he had bought her on their first full day here.
“And this one is for you,” Hrald said with a grin, handing Yrling the black and brown one he had bought for him. Hrald took good care of his own hair, keeping it clean and combed even when travelling. “Every captain of a drekar should have pride in himself.”
Yrling spluttered, and then laughed. He put it to use right away, combing through the wind-blown strands. The tar-splotched places he had cut away were beginning to grow out, making him look less like an ill-shorn sheep. Sidroc, watching this, remembered the cousin he had lately been speaking of. Toki took great care of his own long yellow hair, enough so that the other men teased him. He did not think Yrling would share that vanity.
The men gave themselves a wash before coming into the hall. Sidroc gestured Hrald and Ceridwen into the treasure room; he wanted to tell her their news first, and alone with he who had shared the discovery with him. The twins would know soon enough.
Rodiaud, set upon the floor, went at once to her favourite spot, the plush weaving from the Idrisid ship. She plopped down upon it, and sang a little song to herself as her fingers traced the delicate designs woven therein.
Sidroc looked to his wife. There was no way to say it but to get it all out at once, and fill in the story later.
“My father lives. He is here, on the western coast, wed to a woman he met when he was twenty. When the weather warms, I will go and fetch them, bring them for a stay here, that you might meet them, and they know you, and our young.”
Ceridwen raised her hand to her mouth. Hrald had been nodding his head to his father’s words, and now spoke.
“We look like him,” he said, and could not help his grin.
The Moon was climbing again to its fullest orb, and the days Hrald could spend on Gotland dwindling. He tried to wring the most from every hour, and did so in the most tranquil of pursuits. He spent time with Tindr at the workbench in the stable, helping him repair a worn harness, and craft a bridle from tanned leather, with buckles and fittings Tindr had forged himself at the small forge. Together they fletched new arrows Tindr made, using segments of the stiff grey goose feathers from Tyrsborg’s gaggle.
He and Tindr took long walks in the forest, sometimes joined by young Juoksa, who could move as stealthily as his father, and be just as alert at picking out the trails of the long-eared hares, trackways of deer, and the best places to set snares for small animals. They did no hunting; it was Spring, and Hrald had, just now, no taste for the taking of life. Tindr’s quietness soothed him. It was not the hunter’s lack of speech, but his inner stillness that Hrald recognised, and valued. He remembered as a boy telling his father that he wished to stay here, and be like Tindr. He knew then that he could not, and he understood better now why he wanted this.
Meeting his grandsire was the most meaningful part of the trip, that for which he was most grateful. He had seen his father in the presence of his own sire, a man who meant so much that he had named Hrald for him. Both men had left sons behind at young ages. Both had suffered from doing so, as had the sons. Through their actions the three men, now united, shared a bond beyond expression. It restored something to Hrald, the sense of some circle of connection that had felt snapp
ed with his sister’s death.
A few days before Hrald was to sail, his father waved him over to the fowl house.
“Choose a cockerel,” Sidroc invited. There were several young ones, most bound for the pot sooner or later, and Hrald thought he was being asked to choose one for supper.
“That one,” Hrald pointed, “with the speckled breast.”
Sidroc gave a nod of satisfaction. He wanted to make Offering for his son’s safe passage back to Lindisse.
“I will sacrifice him to Freyr on the morning you sail.”
Some nights were already warm enough to take their meal outside. That night was one of them, and they had supped in a gathering dusk, the cooking fire growing brighter as the sky darkened. A single cresset in the middle of the table cast its own cheering yellow light. After Helga and Gunnvor cleared away, Sidroc and Ceridwen remained at table with their children. Rodiaud sat on her mother’s lap, gnawing on a crust of bread held tight in her fist, as a shower of damp crumbs fell upon her mother’s gown. Hrald’s soon departure hung over them, which though none wished to admit, loomed nearer whether spoken of or not. His father broached the subject.
“In three ships,” Sidroc judged, “your sailing should be a smooth one. It would take a fleet of raiders to attempt your capture.”
Ceridwen and Eirian turned their eyes to him. Hrald had avoided capture on the way out by having two ships, and the third they had won gave him a small fleet with which to sail back to Anglia.
Yrling looked instead to his big brother.
“Hrald,” he said, in full earnest. “Take me with you.”
His parents’ throats opened in a sound of dissent, but Hrald looked back at him with like gravity. It was just what Bork had asked, when he left Four Stones.
“Take me with you, Hrald,” Yrling pleaded. “I want to see Four Stones.”
“Nai –” began his father. His younger boy turned to him with his challenge.
“You just said there was no danger.” Yrling had his right hand on the hilt of his new knife, as if to show how prepared he was.
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