The Raven Banner

by Tim Hodkinson

  Seeing the look of uncertainty on her face, he continued. ‘You told me earlier that you spent a lot of time hunting. This is no different. Imagine there’s a deer up there over the brow of that hill. You don’t want it to see you before you get a shot at it. Keep low. Move slowly and carefully. Be careful and deliberate with every step. If you think there is any chance you might be seen then drop to the ground and lie completely still.’

  Affreca nodded. Ulrich handed her the spear and she set off up the hill, crouched and moving with stealthy steps.

  As she climbed, she spotted the grey stone of the top of the building Ulrich had seen emerging over the summit above. She crept forward a few paces more and saw the rest of the building come into view. It was conical and appeared to have no windows. The top was ragged where stones had fallen off. Perhaps it was just an old ruin?

  The sound of voices came from above. Affreca dropped to the ground like a stone. For a few moments she lay, deep in the prickly heather, too scared to breathe in case whoever it was could hear it. They were men and they spoke in the tongue of the Gaels. They had the same accents as the old couple at the farm. It had a different accent to that of the Irish she had grown up with but she was able to understand what they said. The conversation was not exactly sparkling, consisting mostly of complaints about the cold and the weather.

  Affreca realised she was going to have to get closer if she was to learn anything useful. Moving with painful slowness, she crawled forwards, pushing herself through the heather, careful not to disturb it as much as she could. After a time, she found herself near the edge of the clump of heather. There was a clearing beyond it. Inching the spear forward, Affreca used the blade to slowly push aside the clump of coarse grass that lay ahead, giving her a better view.

  She now had a clearer view of the fort that sat on the summit of the hill. It was about thirty or forty paces away from where she lay hidden. It had one doorway she could see which was little more than a narrow gap in the wall. Two Gael warriors stood at the entrance. They faced inwards so were stopping someone from coming out, not preventing anyone getting in. The rest of what looked like a warband of perhaps nineteen men stood, sat or sprawled around the ground in a clearing in the heather that surrounded the fort. A few of them had swords, most had spears. None wore armour, though a couple had tough leather jerkins. They had lit a fire and one of them was cooking something in an iron pan over the flames.

  The oily smell of frying fish reached Affreca’s nose, provoking a gurgle in her stomach so loud she worried for a moment that the Gaels would hear it.

  ‘Why can’t we just kill them?’ she heard one of the warriors say.

  ‘You know fine well why,’ another warrior who seemed to be the leader said. ‘The chief told us we have to get his permission before we kill any Galls. Now keep your eyes open. There was a second longship seen sailing the coast. There must have been others on the ship that was wrecked as well.’

  ‘It’s dangerous, Oengus,’ another warrior said. ‘You think the Galls would wait for permission before they kill us?’

  ‘The chief understands that,’ Oengus, the leader, retorted. ‘He’s not stupid but he’s got the king on his back. We need to be careful in case we kill some of his new Gall friends.’

  The others all tutted, shook their heads, spat or generally showed their displeasure at this.

  ‘Why is King Constantine making peace with the Irish Galls anyway?’ One of the warriors made a face. ‘And what do we owe that old Cruithin Constantine anyway?’

  ‘He’s the King of Alba,’ Oengus said. ‘And our chief owes allegiance to him. So we owe our allegiance to him. Anyway, we’ve all done well from that arrangement so far.’

  The other warrior grunted. ‘Our chief gets rich but what do we get? Old Constantine always told us to fight the Galls. Now he tells us not to fight the Galls. It makes no sense.’

  Oengus sighed. ‘Look boys, this is just for a short while. War is coming with the Saxons. Constantine needs peace with the Irish Galls so he doesn’t have to fight Aethelstan of Wessex while looking over his shoulder to see if Amlaíb mac Gofraid is coming from Dublin to stab him in the back. When Constantine’s war is over, we’ll be back killing Galls like usual. In the meantime, we do what the chief tells us and we guard these prisoners. I’ve sent a messenger to tell him we have them here.’

  ‘Which way did you send him?’ another warrior asked.

  ‘He went by the secret path through the bog,’ Oengus said. ‘So he should be a lot quicker than if he went by the river.’

  The others nodded.

  ‘Look on the bright side,’ Oengus went on. ‘The chief might tell us just to kill them anyway.’

  Thirty-Three

  ‘We need to get out of here,’ Bodvar said.

  Einar could see the other Wolf Coats were restless. The wind had been chilling while out in it but the breeze had also helped to dry their clothes. Combined with the shelter provided by the walls of the fort this meant they were now well recovered from the shock of the shipwreck and the exhaustion of the struggle ashore. Atli and Starkad paced back and forth like caged bears. Skar sat on a big stone that had fallen from the collapsed roof. His chin rested on one fist, which was the pose he adopted when thinking.

  Bodvar had been explaining the situation to Einar, something he found utterly confusing.

  ‘If these men are called Gaels, and the Picts live to the north,’ Einar said. ‘And the people just south of here, before we get to Wales, speak Welsh, then who are the Scots?’

  ‘They’re all the Scots,’ Bodvar said.

  Einar blinked, then scratched his head.

  ‘Well whoever they are, we’re outnumbered by them,’ he said. ‘There’s what? Nineteen, twenty of them? They’re armed. We’re not.’

  The others looked more annoyed at him pointing this out than with the situation.

  ‘We’re outnumbered by a rabble,’ Atli said. ‘Bog men. They’re just local levy. We were out of it on the beach, exhausted by from the shipwreck when they got us. In a straight fight we’ll slaughter them.’

  ‘They might be the local levy but they’re not stupid,’ Skar said, speaking quietly so his words did not travel. ‘Those two at the door are waiting for us and the corridor is so narrow we can only go up it one at a time. And they’ll kill us one at a time if we try to rush them. We can’t climb out either. See where the walls curve inwards to create an overhang. It would be impossible.’

  ‘I don’t see why,’ Einar said, looking up at the sky above that was visible through the circle of the open roof.

  All eyes turned on Einar. The expressions on the faces of the Wolf Coats suggested they thought he was either mad or joking.

  ‘It’s no harder than the cliffs of Drangey,’ he said. Seeing their expressions unchanged by this he continued, ‘there are three things every Icelandic boy needs to know how to do.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ Bodvar said with a smile. ‘How to ride sheep. How to ride goats and how to ride his sister?’

  ‘This is no time for jokes,’ Einar said. ‘No. How to play Knattleikr on the ice. How to wrestle and how to climb.’

  ‘I’ve heard Iceland has some of the best wrestlers in the world,’ Skar said. ‘But I didn’t know about the climbing.’

  ‘Back home in Iceland we climb the cliffs to get birds’ eggs,’ Einar said. ‘There are overhangs at Drangey much worse than that one above us now. And much higher. That’s nothing.’

  ‘And you’ve climbed these cliffs?’ Skar raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Lots of times.’ Einar nodded. ‘We have a competition every spring to see who can collect the most eggs.’

  Skar and Bodvar exchanged glances.

  ‘Well we could do with finding out what’s going on outside,’ Skar said. ‘The rest of us might not be able to make it up there but if you want to try…’

  ‘You don’t believe me?’ Einar said, looking at the sceptical expressions on the faces surrounding him. ‘Right then. Wa
tch.’

  He looked upwards, assessing the walls for finger and foot holds. Spotting the start of his route up, he grasped a protruding stone an arm’s length above his head and hauled himself up.

  ‘I’ll distract the men guarding the door.’ Skar said in a low voice, now realising that Einar was serious.

  He went to the opening and shouted out ‘Oi you! Gael. How long are you going to keep us in here?’

  Einar ignored the ensuing attempted conversation and concentrated on getting up the wall. At first it was easy enough, certainly in comparison to some of the more difficult cliffs at home in Iceland. The uneven laying of the stones of the wall provided plenty of purchase. The wall itself was perhaps six or seven times his height but that was nothing to the dizzying heights most young lads in Iceland had to overcome. Food could be scarce on the wild northern island and the eggs laid by sea birds were a welcome addition to the table. There was only one way to get them and that was to scale the cliffs where the birds nested. Einar had never won the spring egg gathering competition but then again, he had always done all right. He had certainly never come last.

  There was one boy he had never beaten. No one had. Helgi Asbjornsson was a wiry lad with an uncanny ability for climbing. He was so good some thought a spider had crept into his mother’s mouth as she slept on the night he was conceived. He always collected more eggs than everyone else and he did it by being able to climb higher and reach more difficult parts of the cliffs than everyone else.

  The muscles on Einar’s shoulders and arms began to burn with the effort of hauling himself up the stone wall. He remembered that this meant he was not making enough use of his legs, so adjusted his position. Looking up he saw that the point where the wall curved inwards to create the overhang was just above. He glanced over his shoulder and realised that he was now four times his own height above the ground. If he lost his grip, the fall onto the flagstones would hurt. A lot.

  A memory surfaced in his mind of the last time he had seen Helgi Asbjornsson. Eventually, the lad’s luck had run out. Climbing near Hafnarberg, Helgi’s foot had slipped, sending him plummeting towards the rocks on the shore below. A bounce off the cliff wall on the way down had partly broken his fall but also broken his bones. It saved his life, but what sort of life was he left with? He was now a bent, lame cripple who huddled beside the fire in his father’s farm house. He was unable to look after himself and no woman would ever marry him.

  Einar hung backwards over the drop behind him, looking for hand holds above the overhang. He spotted two but they were out of reach. There was only one way he would be able to get to them. Einar glanced over his shoulder as saw the faces of the Wolf Coats below, watching him intently. If this did not work, he hoped they would catch him.

  He took a deep breath. Driving with his legs, Einar launched himself upwards, propelling his body up, past the overhang to grasp the handholds beyond it. There was a sharp intake of breath from the watchers below as he hung there for a moment, momentum swinging his body to and fro, his legs dangling in thin air beneath him. After a frantic scramble he managed to get his feet back onto some purchase on the wall. In a few more moves he had made it to the top.

  Feeling the cold wind on his face. Einar hauled himself up onto the lip of the round hole where once the roof had once been. Panting from the effort, he lay flat on the stones. His heart pounded and not just because of his climb. Now he was out in the open he could hear the Gaels talking below. They were cooking something and the smell nearly made him drool. Due to the conical shape of the wall he could not see them and they could not see him while they were as close to the fort as they were, but if Einar raised his head too high or one of them stepped a little further away from the fort they would.

  The view was nothing short of spectacular. From the vantage of the height of the fort, Einar could see it sat atop a long finger-like ridge. Behind him the ridge fell away to a wide valley filled with flat marsh and the river winding through it leading to the other fort in the distance on its raised hillock and beyond it another wall of hills. Before him was the wide, dark green ocean. Dark shapes of islands rose all over the horizon. One massive one was very close by, maybe only a couple of miles off the coast. It was long and had twin, conical mountains rising from the far end.

  Then he spotted what looked like a sheep with human legs and arms, lying in the heather a little way down the hillside from the fort on the seaward side of the ridge.

  He spotted the cropped red-gold hair and realised with a start that it was Affreca.

  A huge wave of warmth ran through his heart. She was alive after all. Somehow she had survived the shipwreck and was now watching the tower. He assumed she knew they were inside. Was she going to break them out? If so, how? The only other person she could have with her would be Ulrich and there was no sign of him.

  Somehow, he had to make her aware he was up there, without alerting the Gaels at the same time.

  Heart in mouth, Einar raised his hand and waved it once from left to right. Then he snatched it back, fearful the Gaels would spot it. They did not, but neither did Affreca, who continued looking at the door of the fort. Biting his lip, Einar raised his arm again and swished it about for longer than he was comfortable. This time it worked. Affreca saw the movement and looked up. She and Einar locked eyes and he knew she saw him.

  Affreca raised her own hands towards him and made a pushing gesture. He was unsure but surmised she must have meant he should wait, as she began to carefully, slowly withdraw backwards through the heather.

  Whatever she was doing, he hoped she would not be long. He had climbed up the inside of the fort but there was little chance of climbing back down again. In Iceland they had always continued on to the top of the cliffs. Climbing down was seldom required. The overhang on the inside wall of the fort would make it too difficult to go down. His only way down would be across the convex outside wall, straight into the arms of the waiting Gaels.

  Thirty-Four

  Einar lay waiting on the top of the fort. It was far from comfortable. The stones were sharp beneath him and he was starting to get cold again in the wind.

  Before long he saw Affreca wriggling back through the heather to her previous vantage point a little way downhill from the fort. Once in position she looked up to see if he was still there. Seeing that he was, Affreca pointed two fingers in a forceful gesture at the doorway of the fort.

  ‘Pssst! What’s happening?’

  Einar heard Bodvar’s voice come from the hole in the fort roof behind him. Careful not to make noise, he rotated on his belly to look down into the interior of the fort. Below he saw Bodvar was on the shoulders of Skar, looking up at him. Kari, Starkad and Atli had crowded around the end of the doorway so the Gaels could not see what they were up to.

  ‘Affreca’s outside,’ Einar whispered down to him.

  ‘Is Ulrich there too?’ Skar said from between Bodvar’s legs.

  ‘I don’t see him,’ Einar said. ‘But you need to go to the doorway.’

  ‘What for?’ Bodvar said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Einar replied. ‘That’s where she’s pointing.’

  Bodvar nodded and began to climb down from Skar’s shoulders. Einar turned back to see what was happening outside. He heard the Wolf Coats shouting at the Gaels guarding the doorway and hoped they were distracting them. Affreca was about twenty paces away, lying in the heather. She seemed to be fiddling with what looked like a leather strap on her arm. Then she looked up again. She nodded to Einar. He nodded back.

  Whatever was going to happen was about to start.

  Affreca rose to a crouch. Her right hand raised above and behind her head. Einar then realised the leather strap was a sling. In a moment it was whipping around, spinning above her head. The Gaels around the campfire saw her. They froze for a moment, shocked, then dived for their weapons.

  Affreca let fly the sling. It shot a stone through the air. Einar heard a crack like someone smacking a spoon onto a boiled egg. Belo
w him one of the men guarding the door fell lengthways into Einar’s view and onto the ground. A neat, round hole was punched through the back of his skull which disappeared in a gush of bright red blood.

  His companion, blood and consternation smeared across his face, turned away from the doorway to see what this new threat was. Affreca had already loaded a second stone and was winding it up above her head. She let it fly and the stone whined towards the Gael. He flinched but it missed anyway. Einar heard it crack as it bounced off the stone lintel of the doorway.

  Then the Wolf Coats erupted from the doorway like boiling water gushing from a geyser. The remaining Gael who was supposed to be guarding the door was turned away looking at Affreca. Skar powered into his back, sending him sprawling forwards onto the ground. Growling like a mad dog, Skar grabbed handfuls of the Gael’s hair, wrenched his head up and then dashed it down onto a stone on the ground below. He did it again then let go. The unconscious Gael’s head flopped to the earth. Bodvar grabbed the Gael’s fallen spear and stabbed him with it to make sure he was well out of the fight.

  There was no point in hiding any more. Einar rose to his feet so he could see better what was going on below.

  The other Gaels were running towards Affreca. She jumped to her feet and had time to sling one more stone before they were on her. She let it fly but there was no time to aim. The stone whizzed over their heads. She turned and began to run. The nearest Gael to her stopped and raised his spear to hurl it at her. Watching from the roof Einar saw he would not make the same mistake as her and hurry his shot. He was so close he could not miss.

  Then up the hill behind Affreca came a rider. Einar saw it was Ulrich, mounted on a horse, a battle spear couched under one arm. He was screaming a war cry and charging straight at the oncoming Gaels.

  Shocked by this new threat, the spearman aiming at Affreca hesitated. Bodvar did not. He launched the spear he had taken. It struck the Gael spearman right in the centre of his back and he went down.