Raider's Wake: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 6)

by James L. Nelson

  “Twenty ounces? You old criminal. Ten.”

  “Fifteen.”

  Louis pretended to think about it. He could have paid twenty easily enough, but he did not want Brunhard to know it. “I think I could pay fifteen,” Louis said at last.

  “Done!” Brunhard said, loud, and he laughed with pleasure. He reached over and took the girl’s arm and jerked her toward Louis. “Áed, tell the bitch she’s Louis’s now!” But Áed was too angry about how the affair had played out, and he just stepped back, leaned on the stem and glared at Louis, Brunhard and the girl.

  “No matter!” Brunhard said. “She understands, and if she doesn’t you’ll make her, even if you don’t speak their damned language. I’m sure you can show her something that’s understood the world over!” He laughed again and pushed Louis and the girl toward the after end of the ship.

  Louis looked at the girl and for the first time their eyes met. Louis did not see fear in her eyes, or anger or confusion or gratitude. They were expressionless, blank. The eyes of someone who was simply bracing for what would come next.

  He jerked his head toward the stern of the ship and walked off in that direction, threading his way between the rowing benches and around the mast. He could hear her light footfalls as she followed him. He could hear Brunhard talking in low and animated tones to his men forward and he could well imagine what reassurances he was giving them.

  They came to Louis’s leather sleeping sack and Louis pointed to the girl and then to the deck beside it. The girl looked out over the water, then up at Louis. “You are a God-forsaken fool,” she said. She spoke softly, and in Irish, a language she had no reason to think Louis would understand.

  “I am,” Louis said. “But I am also a fool who speaks your tongue.” With that he saw a flicker of surprise in her eyes, a thing he counted as a great triumph. But there was still an unforgiving tone in her voice when she spoke.

  “Since you’re a fool,” she said, “you don’t understand that that Frisian bastard will just take your silver and then throw you overboard and let his men have their way with me.”

  “He could have done that just now,” Louis said.

  “He’s toying with you. It’s what he does, can’t you see that?”

  “Yes, I see that,” Louis said. And he did. Maybe better than this girl, though she was already proving more insightful than Louis would have expected. No poor farmer’s daughter, this one. “But if he toys with me for a day or two, then that buys time to figure some way out of this.”

  He looked forward. In the light from the stars he could make out Brunhard coming aft, having no doubt assured his men they would have their fun in the end, that they needed only wait a few days more.

  “I don’t want Brunhard to know I speak Irish,” Louis said, soft. Then he grabbed the girl by the arm and jerked her close and pointed to the deck. “You sleep there, you understand?” he said, loud and insistent and in Frankish. The girl looked confused, as well she might be, but she kneeled down and then she lay on the deck.

  Louis had first thought to let her use the leather sleeping sack, to take the deck for himself. But he realized that they had roles to play now, and a slave did not sleep in greater comfort than her master.

  Brunhard seemed to materialize out of the dark. He looked down at the girl on the deck and then up at Louis. “Very well, you Frankish prick, you have your slave,” he said, his mouth set in its usual grin. “Now, will you keep me awake humping her all night?”

  “No, I think not,” Louis said. “It’s been a tiring day.”

  “Ah, you disappoint me. You won’t even have her share your sleeping sack?”

  “She looks as if she might bite and scratch. Wild cats, all these Irish girls.”

  Brunhard laughed. He was certainly having fun. “Maybe she’s not for you. Would you like to buy one of the boys at the oars? Half the price you paid for her.”

  “She’ll be enough for me, I think.”

  “Ah, but will you be enough for her? I doubt it. But if not, my men can help,” Brunhard said, and then his voice took on a more serious tone. “But see here. Since you are so damned tired I won’t make you drag out your silver tonight. But first light…fifteen ounces, you understand?”

  “I understand,” Louis said. He understood very well. He understood that he was the mouse, and Brunhard the cat, and Brunhard was having his fun until he decided the mouse had lived long enough.

  Louis shuffled himself into his leather bag and fell into a fitful and broken sleep. He would doze, dream strange dreams, and then wake suddenly, aware of the presence of danger. He would listen, and as the hours passed he heard the night settling down around him. The sounds of the horrors being committed on the other ships died away, the muted conversations aboard Wind Dancer faded until all was silent. Then Brunhard’s snoring started in, and nothing could be heard over that.

  It was sometime deep in the night when Louis woke again, eyes flicking open, tense and alert. He lay still, listening, but could hear nothing now, save for the liquid sounds of the water overboard. Even Brunhard’s snoring had become less pronounced.

  He heard a voice at his side, the words as soft as a breath. “I don’t think they’ll come for us tonight.”

  Louis turned his head. The Irish girl was lying on her side, facing him. Her eyes were open and the light of the moon that was now rising was reflected in them. Her great tumble of brown hair was pushed back off her face. Her expression was relaxed. Stoic, even. A pretty girl, a little more than two decades old.

  “No,” Louis agreed, speaking just as soft as she had, softer than the sound of the water along the hull. “We have a day or two before Brunhard tires of this.”

  They were quiet, the girl looking into Louis’s eyes, unblinking, her face still without expression. “Thank you,” she said at last.

  Louis gave a slight nod, acknowledging the thanks. He would have been annoyed if she had not thanked him, but he was embarrassed now that she had.

  “You’ve done more than any man would likely do, more than any man on this wretched ship would do,” she said. “You’ve thrown your own life away to help me.”

  “Not yet I haven’t.”

  At that the girl gave a ghost of a smile. “Tomorrow, tell Brunhard you’ve changed your mind. Tell him to give me back to his men. He’ll do it anyway, and that way you might spare yourself.”

  “You are not the daughter of some thrall, some slave, or some miserable landless farmer, are you?” Louis asked.

  “No.”

  “Then you know I can’t do that.”

  The girl nodded.

  “What’s your name?” Louis asked.

  “Conandil,” the girl said. “And I heard Brunhard call you Louis. Louis the Frank.”

  “I am Frankish,” Louis said. “I am Louis de Roumois.”

  The girl nodded again. For some time they were quiet, eyes open, listening.

  “That man in the torn red tunic,” Louis said. “On the third bench back, on the left side. Is he someone special to you?”

  Conandil smiled a bit more at that. “You are very observant, Louis de Roumois. I hope there are no others here with such keen eyes. Yes, that is Broccáin mac Bressal. My husband. His father was the rí túaithe of a small kingdom south of Dubh-linn. Do you know what that is, rí túaithe?”

  “Yes,” Louis said. “A king of some sort.”

  “Yes, a king who owes allegiance to one above him, the rí ruirech. The rí túaithe to the west of us, a miserable bastard named Eochu, betrayed us. Joined with the heathens to attack our rath and take us all, and the people in the countryside as well. Those who lived were sold. I tried to not be one who lived, but they took me anyway.”

  Louis was quiet, thinking about this. “You told your husband to keep silent, to not let on that you were husband and wife,” he said. It was not a question.

  Conandil nodded. “The men here are very cruel. If they knew he was my husband they would see that as a chance for great f
un. I made him swear he would keep still, no matter what.”

  Louis looked up at the stars. He could hardly fathom the agony the man must have felt, chained to a bench, sworn to silence, as the crew of the slaver made ready to take turns with his wife. He felt a bit better about having likely tossed his own life away.

  He guessed that when Brunhard and his men came for him, Conandil would throw herself in the sea, take her chances with a merciful God rather than a vengeful crew. At least he had given her that choice.

  Louis turned back to Conandil and her bright eyes. “Maybe we’ll find some way out of this,” he said.

  “Maybe,” she said.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Consider, noble Norsemen,” said the banded goddess,

  “how many fires burn brightly here…”

  Gisli Sursson’s Saga

  Louis closed his eyes and soon sleep had him in a firm grip at last, deep and without dreams. He slept through the rest of the dark hours, and when he came awake again the morning light was just making itself visible to the east and he was aware that something was happening and it was not good.

  He sat up quick, eyes open, his hand reaching out for the sword at his side. The only thought that could form in his groggy mind was, Already? He looked left and right to see where the attack was coming from, how many, how they were armed. It was still mostly night, with just the first gray vestiges of dawn. There were men getting to their feet, the sounds of some grand commotion, but it was all happening forward, in the bow. No one seemed to be paying any attention to him.

  Conandil sat up at his side and her eyes were also wide with surprise. “What is it?” she asked in a whisper.

  “I don’t know,” Louis said. He studied the chaos forward and saw there was more order than he had realized. The sailors were moving along the rowing benches, waking the dozing slaves with kicks and lashes from their rope ends. The long oars were coming down off the gallows and men were handing them along. More hands were gathered up in the bow, Áed among them.

  “Louis!” he heard Brunhard bark. He turned and looked aft. The master was standing by the tiller, arms folded, looking like the trunk of a tree that had been cut down at shoulder height. “Get your sorry hide off the deck, and your new whore, too! We have work to do!”

  Louis kicked his way out of his sleeping sack and stood and Conandil got to her feet as well. Louis pointed to the sack and said in Frankish, “Roll that up!” and Conandil nodded and got to her knees and rolled the sack, good thrall that she was.

  “What’s happening?” Louis asked. He was not sure if Brunhard would answer, but the Frisian could not resist the chance to speak.

  “Damned wind has come around out of the east,” he said and then took a moment to spit over the side. “We’re on a lee shore and the worthless shit anchor is dragging already.”

  Louis nodded, though he was not sure what all of that meant. But now that Brunhard had mentioned wind he realized that it was brisker than it had been the night before. Not blowing hard, really, but steady and strong enough to kick up small waves that broke on the shingle beach a cable length away.

  He looked forward. The bow of the ship was pointing straight out to sea and he understood that was because the wind was blowing from that direction. If the anchor did not hold them in place, the wind would push the ship onto the shore.

  Anchor is dragging…Louis thought. Maybe that’s what that means. But he could see even Brunhard was not feeling too talkative, which meant the situation had to be serious. He stepped out of the way and watched as the rowers ran their long oars out through the row ports and held them horizontal. Áed prowled the center of the ship, his mood apparently even more foul that was his wont, but that was no surprise. He would take the night’s frustrations out on the helpless men chained to the benches, but there was nothing Louis could do about that.

  “Listen to me, you sorry turds!” Áed shouted with particular vehemence. “We are rowing out against the wind, and by God you had better pull for all you are worth or I’ll rip the lungs out of each and every one of you! Do you hear me? By God you’ll pray for death if I have to put my hands on you! Now, stroke!”

  Nearly as one the rowers leaned forward, put their oars in the water, leaned back and pulled. Wind Dancer moved ahead, not with the nimble speed Louis had seen the day before, but fast enough. Up in the bow the sailors there pulled in the rope tied to the anchor as it came slack.

  “Stroke!”

  The rowers leaned into it again. More anchor rope came on board.

  “Stroke!” Four more pulls of the oar and then one of the sailors forward called, “Anchor’s up!”

  Now it was Brunhard’s turn to shout. “Keep them at it! Keep them at it!” he called forward to Áed, and there was no amusement in his voice now, and that told Louis that things were serious indeed. Brunhard turned to the man at the tiller.

  “Right through there!” He pointed to a place just to the left of the bow. “You see?”

  “I see, Master Brunhard!” the man at the tiller yelled. The wind was blowing stronger, the waves a little more pronounced. The men at the oars leaned into them, driven by the sailors’ rope ends and unmistakable sense of urgency aboard the ship. It was nearly the inverse of the night before, Louis realized, but now the wind was stronger and apparently the danger greater.

  “Stroke!” Directly ahead of them the sun broke the horizon with a blinding flash, the light falling on the water and the shore beyond and the wicked dragon tooth rocks through which they were threading their way.

  Beautiful! Louis thought. An amazing scene, the green water breaking white around the rocks, the brown gravel beach, the sandy cliffs running up to the shore beyond, all bathed in the morning sun. They could not ask for a more gorgeous place in which to die a watery death.

  “Stroke!”

  Now they were among the dragon’s teeth, rocks jutting up on either side, and even Louis could see how one false stroke, one mistake with the oars or wrong twist of the rudder could put the ship up against them, where the seas would slam them without mercy and the frail shell of Wind Dancer would be crushed like wheat on a thresher’s floor.

  And suddenly they were through. With one pull the ship slipped through the gap and there was only open water and the brilliant sun ahead of them, but Áed did not slow the pace at which he was driving the men at the oars.

  “Stroke!”

  Louis looked astern. Wind Dancer had led the way and now the second of Brunhard’s ships was making its way through the gap, and seeing the maneuver from a distance it looked more frightening still. The surf hit the dragon teeth rocks with great spumes of spray and the seas knocked the ship’s bow side to side, threatening to turn it one way or another and smash it to kindling.

  The oars worked furiously, though from the angle at which Louis was watching they seemed to just go up and down, up and down, rather than sweeping fore and aft. They looked far too inadequate to drive the vessel against the incoming seas, but, like Wind Dancer, the second vessel shot through the gap and into the open water.

  The third ship came through, and Wind Dancer was about two or three cable lengths clear of the rocks before Áed began to slow the pace of the rower’s stroke. The morning was cool, but the men on the benches were sweating hard. Conandil, unbidden, had gone forward and found a ladle and was bringing water to the men, one at a time. No one told her to stop.

  The three ships fell into line, pulling directly away from the coast, the sea beyond the bow winking and glinting in the light of the sun that was hanging just above the horizon. Louis looked over at Brunhard. He appeared more relaxed now.

  Brunhard, in turn, seemed to sense that Louis was looking at him. He turned and grinned, then nodded toward Áed, standing by the mast, calling the stroke. “I’m glad you didn’t shove your sword through his skull, Frank,” he said. “Áed may be a great filthy beast of an Irishman, but he knows how to keep the rowers at it.”

  “He seems to have a talent for sh
outing and beating men,” Louis admitted. Then, wishing to change the subject, said, “Will you make these poor whore’s sons row all the way to Frisia, or will you set the sail soon?” They were already quite far from the coast and Louis could not understand why they were still driving under oars when there seemed to be a fair amount of wind blowing.

  Brunhard shook his head as if Louis had asked the stupidest of stupid questions. But Louis knew he would explain because Brunhard could not resist explaining. “You see how the wind comes from the east?” he said. “You see the shore, including rocks and such, are to the west? If we set the sail, the wind will blow us onto the rocks.”

  “Why don’t you set the sail and steer the ship to the south? Where there are no rocks?” Louis asked.

  Brunhard grinned wider, shook his head again. “Why don’t you keep to buggering sheep, or something else that you’re good at and leave the sailing to me, eh?” he said. “We can steer to the south, but the wind will still blow us to the west. Not directly, true. If we steer south then we will actually be heading southwest because of what is called ‘leeway.’ Eventually we’ll be on the rocks. So, we set sail only when we are far enough away from the shore. But that is not the only reason.”

  Louis was about to ask what the other reason might be when Brunhard stepped forward and called for Áed to pass word for the rowers to rest on their oars. Once the rowing had stopped and Wind Dancer was no longer moving through the water, just rising and falling on the swells, Brunhard turned to one of his sailors. He gave no order, just pointed to the masthead. The sailor nodded and scrambled easily up the rigging, settling himself in at the top with legs twisted around the thick ropes.

  For a long time there was only silence. The slaves at the oars looked down at the deck, grateful for the brief reprieve from their work. The sailors leaned against the sides of the ship and stared expressionless out to sea. Brunhard maintained his tree stump-like stance, his head swiveling side to side as he slowly scanned the horizon.