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

by James L. Nelson

  Sea Hammer, too, had been in sight for some time, standing offshore, running a little east of south, but she had disappeared from Harald’s view before the sun had reached its high point in the sky.

  Thorgrim intended to get far enough out to sea so that Brunhard would not see him pass by, would not know Sea Hammer was waiting off the great cape to the south. Thorgrim planned to sail all night, if need be, but Harald knew he hoped to reach the cape before the sun went down. If they spent the night racing south through the dark, there was good chance they would pile up on the cape before they ever saw it.

  The wind was from the west now, the quarter from which it most often blew in that particular stretch of ocean. That was good for Thorgrim, as it let Sea Hammer run away on one of her best points of sail. It was good for Dragon as well, allowing her to drive on under sail with no danger of being blown ashore. It was presumably good for Fox, somewhere ahead of them, and even for Brunhard and his ships. For Harald and the men of Blood Hawk it did almost no good at all, other than saving them from the additional misery of rowing into a headwind.

  Harald turned and looked up to the top of the mast. He had insisted that the mast be restepped, even though Thorgrim had pointed out, tactfully as he could, that it was unnecessary given that Blood Hawk had no sail. But a mast made a good lookout perch as well, and Harald wanted it up. A few temporary shrouds were all that were needed to hold it vertical, since it had only to bear the weight of a man, and not a yard and sail and the extreme pressure the wind would place on the rig.

  The man aloft was Starri Deathless, keenest eyes among all of them. Harald had not expected to have Starri with him. Thorgrim had not expected it. In truth, it seemed even Starri had not expected to be with Harald aboard Blood Hawk.

  It had been decided on the beach that morning. The men had been roused well before dawn. They had breakfasted on the last of the fresh meat Failend had brought in, along with rough oat cakes and ale.

  “Father, I need more men,” Harald said as they gathered on the beach, breakfast done, the food and cooking gear being stowed away. Thorgrim had picked men at random to go with Harald, knowing none of them would be any more enthusiastic than Harald was at the notion of rowing rather than sailing, of tagging along rather than being first into the fighting.

  “More men?” Thorgrim asked. “You have men enough.”

  Blood Hawk was pierced for fifteen oarports per side, a total of thirty oars. She needed thirty men to row her, and if she had been going to sea as part of a raiding fleet she would have had at least another twenty men on top of that, for fighting and for relieving those at the oars. But Thorgrim had picked just twenty-four men to join Harald in driving the ship south.

  Harald knew perfectly well why he had done that; Thorgrim wanted to use the minimum number of men possible to limit the discontent, and, more importantly, to provide himself with the maximum number of warriors on board Sea Hammer. But Harald would not stand for it.

  “The men aboard Blood Hawk can do nothing but row, and yet you won’t give me enough hands to relieve the men at the oars?” he said, trying to sound reasonable, not bitter. “The gods alone know how far we will have to row. I need at least enough men to man all the oars.”

  “You make a good argument,” Thorgrim said. “But I must have men enough aboard Sea Hammer…”

  You mean that Sea Hammer alone will be doing anything worthwhile, Harald thought, and in the silence of his mind he gave free rein to his bitterness. Then he said, “Still, there are dangers everywhere, and Blood Hawk can’t sail away from any of it. You are only looking at taking some slow merchant ships. I don’t know what I will be up against, me and my men.”

  After a lifetime as the son of Thorgrim Ulfsson, and the past two years a’viking with him, Harald knew perfectly well what sort of arguments would work on his father. Any suggestion that he was being unjust, any implication that he was taking the best for himself, would have an effect more powerful than the strongest drink. Thorgrim, Harald knew, already felt bad about stripping Blood Hawk of her sail and Godi of his command, of putting Harald in charge of the impotent vessel. And he knew he was on the right tack with this argument.

  “Very well,” Thorgrim said. “You may have fifteen men more. And I will let you choose them.” Thorgrim framed that last part as if he was doing Harald a favor, but Harald knew it was anything but. His father had had his fill of telling men they would be left behind for a day or more of backbreaking rowing just to catch up. Now, if Harald wanted more men, he could tell them.

  Fair enough, Harald thought. The victory this time might not be unequivocal, but it was his.

  Harald chose his men, then they loaded the gear back aboard the ships and shoved the ships out into the water so only the very forward-most curve of their bows rested in the sand. It was still not yet light enough for them to wend their way through the rocks to the open sea, but Thorgrim Night Wolf meant to be ready to get underway the very second it was feasible.

  He and Harald and Godi and Fostolf gathered together on the sand for one last discussion before they climbed aboard their ships and headed off in their separate directions. Starri was there as well, as usual, though he said nothing, and just seemed to stare out toward the east.

  “Sea Hammer will get far enough from the cape that the land is partway below the horizon,” Thorgrim said. “We’ll wait with our sail down so we’re better hidden. Then when Dragon is able…”

  “Night Wolf,” Starri said, interrupting as if Thorgrim had not been speaking at all. “I think the gods are whispering to me.”

  The four others were quiet as they turned toward Starri. They were all accustomed to his madness and the wild things that came out of his mouth. On the other hand, not one of them doubted that the gods whispered to him as they did to all berserkers, who saw and understood things that other men did not. Sometimes that was good, and sometimes it wasn’t.

  “What do they say?” Thorgrim asked.

  “They say I should sail with young Harald. Would that be all right with you?”

  At that, Starri pulled his eyes from the black eastern sky and looked at Thorgrim. The split arrowhead around his neck, the sign that the gods had given him, showing that Thorgrim was favored by them, was polished to a dull silver from Starri’s constantly rubbing it, and now it seemed to glow as it picked up the faint light of the stars.

  Thorgrim nodded a bit as he seemed to consider this. Harald tried to read his face: worry, irritation, disappointment? But divining Thorgrim’s thoughts was no easy business. Harald was more proficient than any of them at that task, and even he could rarely see past the stolid mask. And he could read nothing in Thorgrim’s emotionless response.

  “You can sail with whoever you want to sail with, Starri,” he said. “If that’s all right with Harald, I mean.”

  “Fine with me,” Harald said, as surprised as any by this. Starri would always choose to go where there was the best chance for fighting, and Blood Hawk, trailing behind under oars, did not seem to be the place for that. But they also knew that arguing with Starri was pointless, and Harald would indeed be happy to have him aboard.

  The first gray light was appearing by the time they climbed back onto their respective ships, and soon after that it was light enough to make their way to sea. Thorgrim led the way in Sea Hammer with Dragon coming astern of her and Blood Hawk, oars fully manned, Harald at the tiller, coming last. They made their way past the rocks that littered the seas just offshore and out into the clear, open water. For some time they were all under oars, and Blood Hawk was actually foremost, making her way south, with Sea Hammer shaping a course offshore.

  As the light grew Harald took advantage of Starri’s presence and sent him up the mast, but even when daylight had come full-on he could see nothing of any of the ships for which they hunted: Brunhard’s ships or Fox which had gone ahead the day before.

  It was not so long after the sun rose that the breeze started to fill in. Sea Hammer and Dragon set their sa
ils, flogging and filling in the wind, and Harald felt a stab of irritation and even envy at the sight. Soon Dragon passed down their larboard side and drew ahead and Sea Hammer grew more and more distant as she stood off toward the horizon.

  The day settled into its monotonous routine. Once it was clear the other ships were pulling away, Harald relieved some men of their duty at the oars. He had already calculated the fairest system by which he could rotate men through that work and still maintain steady progress south. He would not ask Starri to row. That was pointless. But he himself would pull an oar just the same as any other man aboard. He would not have it any other way.

  He was just off his shift, could still feel the strain in his arms, as he stood at the bow and looked south and looked up aloft at where Starri had affixed himself to the masthead. He was certain that Starri would have called out if he had seen anything, and that it was pointless to ask, but he could contain himself no longer.

  “Starri! What do you see?” he called.

  “Water, Broadarm!” Starri called. “Water and Ireland. Just what we’ve been looking at this past year and more.”

  “Very well,” Harald called. He looked out at the sun, setting toward the west. “You may as well come down to deck.”

  He walked slowly aft and Starri came down the mast, half climbing, half sliding. He stepped up on the small afterdeck and turned forward. The men were moving with an easy rhythm, having fallen into the stroke so completely they were probably not even aware of what they were doing, just letting the muscles in their arms and backs move as they had learned to move.

  “Listen up, you men,” he called and he was aware that the way he spoke, the words he used, the tenor of his voice, were all those of his father’s. But he did not know of any other way to speak to men such as these, and, still angry as he was, he supposed Thorgrim Night Wolf was not a bad one to imitate.

  “You’ve been rowing hard, I know,” he continued when he had the attention of everyone on board. “We all have. Save for Starri, but he’s played his part. In any event…” He was losing the train of the thing and he knew it and he struggled to get back to it. “The others, who have been sailing, they’ve pulled well ahead by now. So I…”

  He was about to say I would like to row through the night, but he caught himself. Instead, he said, “We will row through the night. Every man will take his place at the oar, me included. But if there is fighting to be done, plunder to have, we will only be part of that if we’re bold enough to do this thing. Are you with me?”

  When he had played this out earlier in his head, Harald had envisioned cheers at this point, fists held aloft in solidarity. That was not the reaction he received. But neither was he greeted with any sort of protest. Instead he saw nodding heads, grim but determined looks.

  That would do.

  Harald ordered some of the idle men to roust out food and water. When the others had served themselves, Harald took his share and sat on the edge of the afterdeck. He ate and looked up at the sky. A moon was hanging in the east and he was glad of that, as it would help keep him from piling the ship up on the Irish coast. It was too early yet to see any stars, but when he could he would take note of them and they would also help him fix his position as well as mark the time when he should change the men at the oars.

  “Broadarm,” Starri said, appearing at Harald’s side. “That was well said. Like your father would have done.”

  Harald grunted. “Thank you,” he said. It was not exactly the compliment he might have hoped for.

  “What would you have me do?” Starri said. “I can pull an oar as well as any man, but sometimes I don’t think people believe that.”

  No, they don’t and with good reason, Harald thought. Starri was strong and nimble, but he lacked the attention necessary for the long and monotonous job of rowing. Most men, in that situation, could let their minds wander off, while their bodies maintained the steady, rhythmic motion. But not Starri. Once his mind was off somewhere beyond the ship, it was as if his body tried to follow, and soon he was out of rhythm and fouling the oars of the men in front and astern and a great mess ensued.

  “Sure, you are a fine oarsman,” Harald said. “But we need your eyes more. No need to go aloft. Just place yourself in the bow and look out every once in a while. Make sure we are not going to hit anything, or row into some trap laid by Brunhard.”

  Starri nodded, fine with that arrangement, and he headed off to the bow. Harald slept some, then woke and looked at the stars, then slept some more. He was confident that he would wake when he needed to, and he did, sitting up and looking about and recalling where he was.

  He stood and stretched and in a soft voice rearranged the men at the oars, taking his own place at the aft, starboard side. And they pulled on through the dark. The seas, at least, were calm: long, low rollers coming in from the northeast, lifting Blood Hawk with a gentle motion, twisting her a bit as they set her down, then lifting again, as steady and regular as the rowers’ strokes. Occasionally something would jump from the water nearby, but Harald found it was much less disconcerting with the ship underway. Somehow, lying motionless, they seemed more vulnerable. But now they were moving, active, ready to fight. Or so it seemed.

  The moon passed overhead and the men hauled on the oars, then rotated again, and sometime later rotated one last time. Those not rowing slept where they could, crammed near the bow and stern, but there were fewer than there would normally have been, and Blood Hawk was a tolerably large ship and they found room enough.

  Starri did not sleep, which was not unusual for him. A few times during the night Harald made his way to the bow to see what Starri was seeing, but it was not much. Water, and the dark outline of Ireland off the starboard side. Harald looked out at the coastline, a dark presence against the starlit skies. Dragon, he was sure, would not have sailed on through the night. They would be hauled up on a beach somewhere, and not so far away.

  If Blood Hawk had stopped for the night, then Dragon would be many miles ahead by now. But as it was, they would not be so far behind Fostolf’s ship. They might even have overtaken her, but he doubted that.

  They pulled on, and finally the dawn came again, spreading gray along the eastern sky and then red and orange, and the sky itself growing to a pale blue as the blackness retreated to the west. Harald had been sleeping, but he woke as the first hints of light began to appear on the horizon.

  “Starri,” he called, once he was sure there was light enough to see some tolerable distance. “Up to the masthead, if you would.”

  Starri Deathless, eager as Harald, went hand over hand up the temporary shroud, clutching the rope with his bare feet, then climbed squirrel-like up the last ten feet to the top. The day before he had rigged a loop of rope around the mast to serve as a sort of chair and now he settled himself into that and began to systematically scan the horizon.

  Harald wanted to dance from foot to foot with anticipation, he wanted to call out to Starri and ask what he saw, but he did none of those things. Instead he remained fixed in place, looking off at the distant shoreline, doing his best to imitate Thorgrim Night Wolf, who always seemed unmoved even when everything was collapsing around him.

  Starri will call out if he sees anything, Harald assured himself.

  “Broadarm!” Starri called down.

  “Yes, Starri?” Harald called. Here we are, he thought.

  “I see nothing!” Starri called. “No ships, anyway.”

  Of course…Harald thought, chastising himself. What did you think, that the sun would find us right in the middle of Brunhard’s fleet? Even rowing all night they could not hope to cover anything like the distance a ship under sail would make. Dragon, Sea Hammer, Fox, Brunhard’s ships, they had all left him well over the horizon. He felt the bitterness creeping back.

  His mood did not improve as the morning wore on and the men had their breakfast and then switched out their places at the oars. Harald was pulling once again, his body moving with the oar, his mind racin
g, wallowing in the unfairness of it all. He toyed with the idea of just beaching the ship, lighting a fire, having a grand feast ashore, letting all the men get roaring drunk. Why not?

  Then Starri, who had remained silent and aloft since dawn, called out again. “Broadarm! I see something! Ships, it looks like! Right ahead!”

  Harald felt something jump inside him. He swiveled around, trying to look forward while still maintaining his stroke, an awkward motion. Then one of the men named Gudrid was standing beside him and said, “Let me take the oar, Harald, so you may look.”

  Harald nodded his thanks, more grateful than Gudrid could have known, and slipped out from under the loom as Gudrid slipped in. Harald moved quickly to the bow, stepped up onto the foredeck, craned his neck around the stem. He could see water and land. And something else. Something on the water. At least he thought he did. But it was very far and he did not have the advantage of Starri’s height of eye and vision.

  “What do you see, Starri?” he called.

  “It looks to be two ships!” Starri called down. “They’re not under sail, so it will be hard for you to see them. Two ships and they may be lashed one to the other. They are very close to each other, anyway.”

  Harald frowned and looked forward again. Fox and Dragon? That was the most likely. Brunhard’s ships? Perhaps. But if they were Brunhard’s ships, then where were Fox and Dragon?

  We’ll know soon enough… Harald thought. This was one lesson a man learned from seafaring: sometimes there was nothing you could do but wait. You learned that, and accepted it, or you went mad.

  Harald walked aft again. Not all of Blood Hawk’s oars were manned; some he had had to leave unattended to see that the work was fairly distributed. Now he said, “Let’s get all the oars manned, close as fast as we can.” He stopped short of ordering specific men to the oars, but he did not have to. The warriors’ blood was up now, their curiosity fully engaged, and they were as eager as Harald to find out what was going on. Harald had hardly finished speaking the words before the remaining sea chests were occupied, the missing oars run out through the oarports.