A Fire of Roses

by Melinda R. Cordell

  Skeggi knew he was something of a mess right now. He and his brothers had lost their parents last year at sea. They’d run a small fleet of fishing vessels with their grandparents, and a fast-moving squall hit them and whirled them to the bottom of the sea.

  With their parents gone, Skeggi, who was all of 16 years old, was hard-pressed trying to make sure his brothers were all fed and taken care of. He wasn’t so much worried about what they wore. And the two littlest ones smelled like pee and, as a result, he did too. He was not very much into housekeeping. There was too much to keep up with.

  Skeggi used to create poems all the time. After their parents had died, he barely had time to play with words, with all the work he had to do around the house. He felt like he was missing a part of himself – besides his own parents, of course. But not being able to work on his poetry made him a lot angrier than normal.

  While the fish were cooking, his younger brothers were busy playing a game, or what they considered a game, that they called “Go For the Nuts.” This game was self-explanatory and usually ended with one or more of his brothers lying on the floor crying with his hands over his jewels. The two littlest brothers were very skilled with sneak attacks.

  Skeggi lost patience. He was trying to get out the door on time to go to battle practice, but before he could go he had to feed the barbarians or he wouldn’t be a good parent. And it was hard to feed the barbarians when they were fighting all over the house and trying to hit each other in extremely sensitive locations.

  “Stop it!” Skeggi said, slamming a pot on the tabletop. “Don’t play that game in the house if you ever want to eat breakfast again.”

  Grudgingly, his brothers came pouting to the table and sat down. Skeggi put the cooked fish on their plates along with what was left of the bread, and filled their mugs with sheep’s milk. They finally ate while kicking each other under the table and showing each other mouthfuls of chewed food. Skeggi had to smile a little. They weren’t bad kids, not at all. They were just as silly as any other little boys.

  Once they were finished, they ran outside, leaving Skeggi to clean up the scraps. He piled the fish bones on a plate and threw it out to the dogs, then swept the crumbs off the tables.

  They were out of fish and bread again. He quickly mixed some dough in a bowl with his hands, turned it out and kneaded it, and threw a damp cloth over it to rise. He would need to go fishing later today, after battle practice with his sword-friends. Skeggi sighed. There never seemed to be enough time in the day to do everything that needed to be done.

  “Someday, I might even get to write a poem,” he said, washing the bread dough off his hands. But once again, this would not be the day.

  Skeggi put the plates on the floor for the dogs to clean up. He braided his long brown hair to keep it out of his face, threw on his threadbare fur cloak, grabbed his spear and shield, and ran off to the dragon keep to join his sword-friends.

  The sword-friends always met at about mid-morning near the queen’s castle on the parade grounds, and the swordmaster would come out and train them in the ways of combat and song-magic.

  Skeggi shut the heavy oak door behind him. He paused a moment on his front step and filled his lungs with the fresh morning air that smelled of wood smoke, spruce needles, and the soft loam of the pine forests that grew along the sides of the mountain that his home city, Skala, was built on.

  Then Skeggi whistled.

  An answering whistle came from the beech tree next to the front door. From a hole in the gnarled old trunk gleamed a pair of round, golden eyes, their black pupils sliding large and then going small. Out of the knot in the trunk climbed a little owl that lived there. The owl stepped onto a branch, stretched one wing and then the other, then opened its white-bottomed wings and sprang into the air, flying to Skeggi, its bounding flight much like a woodpecker’s. The little owl landed on his shoulder onto a leather patch he’d sewn there after a puncture wound in his shoulder from the owl’s sharp talons had become infected.

  “Good morning, Smoke.” Skeggi handed a piece of fish to the owl from out of his pocket. The owl made a happy chirp and seized the fish in one of her talons. She shifted to stand on one foot. Then, gripping the fish in her other foot, she began to bite messily at it, snarfing down chunks of meat and leaving crumbs of fish all over Skeggi’s shoulder.

  Despite her name, the little owl was brown with white spots, not grey. Skeggi had named her Smoke because she’d survived a fire in the forest, when some dunderhead had poured ale into a camp fire to put it out, thinking it was water. The fire had exploded into the dried spruce needles that carpeted the forest floor. Skeggi had joined the rest of the Vikings in treading out what was left of the fire, walking through the smoldering area and throwing shovelfuls of dirt on anything with an ember in it. There, Skeggi had found the little owl, half-dead, lying on the ground. It was just a young owl, a fledgling, so he’d raised her himself.

  Smoke couldn’t live in the wild any more because she’d breathed too much smoke. The little owl seemed to understand this, for she never tried to leave to live in the wild. She was content to sit on Skeggi’s shoulder and follow him around. He built a warm nesting box next to his chimney where she lived in winter, which helped keep the cold away.

  But even the nesting box wasn’t warm enough in the winter blasts. Last winter Smoke had come down with a breathing problem, probably pneumonia. Skeggi had let her live in the house, feeding her bits of meat on a perch in the corner of the house with an oilcloth spread under it to catch the pellets she’d hacked up, along with all her guano. She’d slowly recovered, and had been in good health ever since spring arrived, much to his relief.

  He scratched the owl’s head. Smoke’s eyes half-shut and she purred deep in her throat. When it rained, the owl would crawl inside his cloak. He would stroll in the rain with a little pair of round, yellow eyes staring from just above where his silver brooch held his cloak shut.

  Skeggi hurried through the small city, owl on his shoulder, to see if his friend Ostryg was at home. They usually walked with each other to the Queens’ fortress to practice becoming a great warrior – or at least a competent one.

  Morning in Skala was one of his favorite times of day. The smell of wood smoke from many chimneys hung over the town. The quiet conversations of many people in the streets, the complaints of the sheep on the hills, and the music of a hammer striking iron in the forge came to Skeggi.

  Skala, his home city, was built on the side of a mountain and had over 700 people living within its walls. At the top of the mountain was the Queen’s keep, a majestic fortress overlooking the ocean. Up there, one had a fine view of the great mountains of the fjords and the endless sea.

  The fog thinned enough to reveal the great longships that stood in the harbor. The masts of their home fleet stood side-by-side with a trader scow from the Balkans, several Moorish ships from Iberia, and a number of Viking ships from places like Oslo, Hedeby, and Birka. Sometimes a couple of Roman ships would come by; sometimes a group of monks would come up, trying to persuade the queen to build a church or a monastery. The town was a busy place, and Skeggi liked seeing all the new people and hearing stories about faraway lands. He wanted so much to live a life of exploration and adventure. This was hard to do when he had four hungry brothers to feed.

  Skeggi sighed again. At least he had these combat lessons. He could only hope they would someday lead to bigger and better things in the wide world.

  The fog lay everywhere. The ocean had vanished under its grey blanket, and the surge and thunder of the everlasting waves came from nowhere and everywhere.

  Skeggi loved how the fog always softened edges and made the world into someplace new. When he walked, a beech tree would suddenly loom into view as if a magician had placed it there. Then a house would magically appear. His world brought him a new surprise with every step, and Skeggi loved this.

  But the problem with fog is that it often brought invaders. This kind of weather made it easy for
ships to creep up on the city, sneaking around the many islands scattered generously around the coastline, which gave them many hiding places. That he didn’t like.

  He’d heard reports from further down the coast of raids on wealthy farmsteads and mead halls. The Danes were stealthy. The coastline was long and rocky and full of hiding places, and those sea rovers know the coasts and islands like the back of their hands.

  Usually from this point in the city, Skeggi liked to look out over the ocean, watching the different Viking ships pass to and fro from one port to another with their cargo. Some ships were for fishing and bringing in herring. Some, only a few, were out for plunder. But these didn’t roam on the open sea unless they were heading for foreign shores. Mostly.

  Skeggi’s owl left his shoulder and flew ahead of him with soft peeps, swooping up into a nearby fir tree. She crouched among the branches, peering down at something in the grass, absolutely still.

  But now his friend Ostryg’s house appeared out of the fog.

  “Ostryg!” Skeggi shouted as he hurried through the city.

  “Get out!” roared a man’s voice from the house. Skeggi grimaced and stepped back a few paces. He knew it was Papa Ostryg, and he wasn’t yelling at Skeggi. But still.

  Ostryg stumbled out of his house. He ducked and flung up his hands as something shot past him and slammed against the courtyard wall so hard that chunks of stone pattered on the ground from the impact.

  Curses followed Ostryg as he ran from the house, his face bright red and furious. His eyes met Skeggi’s, and he turned even redder, lowering his eyes, walking past him very quickly.

  Skeggi followed him, trying to keep up.

  Once the swearing behind them faded and stopped, once the house vanished in the fog, Skeggi said, “I need to get you out of that place.”

  “Not. Another. Word.” Ostryg’s voice shook with anger.

  Skeggi fell in at his side.

  Ostryg’s shirt was askew, tied wrong. Ostryg didn’t notice. He took off his fur cap and tried to comb out his long blonde hair with his fingers, but they kept getting tangled up.

  “I have a comb,” Skeggi said, opening up the pouch that hung at his waist.

  “No!” Ostryg said. “I said not another word.” And then he closed his mouth tight like a clam.

  They hurried up the street together. Skeggi’s brain was racing. He wished he could bring Ostryg into his home, even though it was the center of chaos in all of the world. But he wasn’t sure how Papa Ostryg would take it – and he didn’t want to get on that man’s bad side. And, of course, there was the question of how Ostryg would take it. As far as Skeggi was concerned, anything had to be better than living with Papa Ostryg – even living in poverty with a bunch of insane brothers.

  Something thumped Skeggi on his shoulder. Smoke had returned on noiseless wings. She leaned forward on Skeggi’s shoulder to show him a limp mouse in his beak.

  Skeggi pulled his head back from his present. The last time Smoke had stuck a mouse in his face, he’d discovered it was still alive because it had bitten him in the nose. “No thanks. That’s your mouse.”

  Smoke threw back her head and started to swallow the mouse whole.

  “I wish you wouldn’t do that right next to my ear,” Skeggi grumbled.

  Ostryg grinned a little at that.

  They headed up the side of the mountain through the streets of Skala as the little owl preened herself. At the top of the mountain was the Queen’s keep and the dragon stables, where Skeggi, Ostryg, and their other sword-friends had their fighting lessons.

  They didn’t speak much until they got there. Ostryg had gone back to fuming while braiding his beard, and it was no use talking to him when he was in this temper. He especially hated it when he Papa brought his disagreements out into public where everybody could see him being humiliated. Nobody dared cross his Papa, not even Ostryg, his son.

  “You want Smoke to ride on your shoulder?” Skeggi asked.

  “Piss off.”

  Skeggi took that as a no. Also Ostryg hated anything that smacked of charity. His papa was rich, but didn’t think it worth giving Ostryg anything.

  And at last, here was Queen Saehildr’s great keep. The guards, recognizing the two (and the owl), let them in through the side gates. Skeggi led the way up the long series of garden stairs that led to the top. There they ended up on a wide parade grounds next to the keep, but still within the high walls that kept them safe from invaders. The dragon stables were far above them, at the very top of the queen’s keep. Skeggi smelled the sulfur and scorch from the stables, and the carrion smell of the remains of the cattle that the dragons were fed, though the stable masters did their best to clean up after feeding time.

  Skeggi and Ostryg flopped down on the ground next to the field.

  Here was Dyrfinna standing like the goddess of war, swinging her sword in circles, trying not to meet Skeggi’s eyes. Here was Gefjun sitting on the ground looking pretty with her red hair braided into a roll on the back of her head, now making googly eyes at Ostryg. Gefjun and Ostryg had been sweethearts for some time now. Skeggi rolled his eyes at their antics but mostly he put up with it.

  “Where’s the swordmaster?” Skeggi asked.

  “She’s late,” Dyrfinna said flatly.

  “Well, I gathered that, since she wasn’t here,” Skeggi said, annoyed. The swordmaster was usually on time and took them to task if they were late. Not this time. Odd.

  But as soon as she saw the little owl, Gefjun came over to coo at Smoke. “Who’s the pretty owl? Who’s the pretty owl?” Gefjun reached up to stroke Smoke on the head. Her big owl eyes closed with delight.

  “Come on over here and fight,” Dyrfinna complained. So the two young women started sparring. Ostryg cheered Gefjun on, telling her how hot she was, until she finally put her sword aside and came over and whacked him.

  Dyrfinna put down her sword. “Stop that. We’re practicing.”

  “Come on, let a girl have her fun.” Ostryg rubbed his head and made a kissy face at Gefjun.

  “Aaa! No kissy faces.” Gefjun toppled over the top of Ostryg.

  He cried, “Help, you’re crushing me!” which earned another thwack from Gefjun.

  Skeggi was exasperated with Dyrfinna … mixed feelings, really.

  Dyrfinna was sullen because he’d broken her heart only last week. She truly loved him. When she would visit Skeggi’s house, she’d given his little brothers piggy-back rides and fought epic sword battles with them up and down the road. Then she and Skeggi would go on walks where she talked about her dreams of leading armies and his dreams of carrying on the shipping trade his parents had started but his grandparents were still carrying on, now that they were gone. Skeggi did love a life at sea, guiding a ship to distant ports, of traveling to faraway lands and meeting people of other cultures and races and trying their foods and listening to their stories and gawking at the amazing buildings and homes as he walked through foreign cities.

  Though she loved him, he couldn’t think of her as anything more than a dear friend.

  It wasn’t her fault that their relationship didn’t work out. It was just that Skeggi didn’t feel the pulse-pounding love that she had been experiencing. He didn’t want to lead her on and give her false hope about their future.

  So finally, last week he screwed up the courage to make the break. Skeggi took her on a walk, where he said that she was a wonderful person, but he just didn’t love her the same way she loved him, and it was his fault.

  She didn’t take the news very well.

  Her face got red, then redder, and tears started up in her eyes. Dyrfinna had tried to speak, but nothing came out.

  So she knocked him down.

  From the ground, Skeggi watched her storm away, hands over his nose.

  Even a week later, his nose still hurt, though it hadn’t been broken. And it was very awkward to be around her.

  But at the same time, Dyrfinna refused to hold on to him if he won’t have her
. She was too proud for that.

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