Slowly, uncomfortably, Goran changed before his eyes. The man in the saddle was young, dark-haired, and handsome. A sweep of black hair sat above a thin, sharp nose. Green eyes sparkled with mischief. When he smiled, Ulfar half-expected fangs.
“Me? It is not important. I am a friend.”
“I doubt it. Where’s Goran?”
The stranger’s smile was tinged with sadness that looked almost genuine. “Poor Goran was not as young and fast as he thought he was. He killed the Norseman, but he took a blade in the belly. We met last night and made a deal. Don’t worry about him. I am here to give you a great opportunity to join me and reap rewards you couldn’t dream of.”
Ulfar looked at the man. “Last time I got fed horseshit like that, it was by an old scrawny fucker with one bad eye.”
The stranger’s skin turned a dark shade of blue as he hissed and bared a row of big, sharp teeth. The next moment he was back to normal. “A misunderstanding. Ulfar Thormodsson, you are destined for great things. Surely you’ve been told this?”
A smile spread over Ulfar’s face. “Yes. Yes I have.”
“And—”
“And if you want your belly opened up so you can see what you look like inside, do tell me again.”
The stranger looked him up and down. “You don’t presume to refuse my offer, do you? I can make you rich beyond your—” The breath stopped in his throat and he looked in astonishment at the hilt of Ulfar’s sword as it inched closer to his breastbone.
“I just told you this would happen.” Ulfar said. “I’ve had enough of being toyed with.”
The stranger looked up at Ulfar—and smiled back at him. A thin line of blood leaked out of the corner of his mouth. Another line formed around the wound in his chest, blossoming out all too quickly. “We’re not done, you and I,” he whispered. “Not done at all.” The stranger’s face . . . withered, like a field in winter. The hair faded and turned gray at the temples, then at the top.
And suddenly it was Goran staring at Ulfar in surprise. He tried to speak, but nothing happened. Only blood, pulsing faster and faster as his life faded away. The sword stuck obscenely out of the old guard’s back, caked in blackening, thickening blood. Ulfar dropped the hilt of the blade as if it was on fire and whirled around.
Arnar stood beside Inga with his sword drawn. “Step closer, boy, and I’ll gut you twice over,” he growled. “I don’t know what’s got into you but you’re not coming near us.” He muttered something to Inga, who shook her head without looking at him.
Ulfar opened his mouth, but nothing came out. All he could think of was that voice.
Not done, you and I.
Behind him, Goran coughed, twice. The sickly, faintly metallic smell of blood drifted past.
Ulfar blinked—and Inga was there, right in front of him, thunder in her eyes.
The slap was fast and hard enough to make him taste blood.
“Remember who you are,” she said, looking him straight in the eye. “And get your head right. When you can be trusted, come find me.”
She turned and walked toward Arnar; she mounted her horse with ease.
Ulfar watched them ride away without a second glance. He heard Goran’s body fall to the ground, but he didn’t turn.
The mist faded. The clouds disappeared. A bird even sang to him from a nearby tree, but Ulfar didn’t note it. Instead he methodically drew the sword from Goran’s body, ignored the smell of the dead man, and set to cleaning the blade with long strokes of a rough rag.
“It’s important to clean your blade, Ulfar. If you just bang it back in the scabbard, the blood will make it stick, and then you’re dead,” he muttered. He wondered whether Uncle Hrothgar had sat like this, on a stone, when he’d taught him about blades for the first time. Whether he’d looked down and seen the spark of heroism in a child’s eye. Ulfar tried to remember how old his big uncle had been, and couldn’t. That was another life, another world.
So what was this life, then?
He looked at the sword he was stroking. It was clean and had been for a while.
Easing the blade into the scabbard and looking down at Goran’s corpse, he said, “I’m sorry, old man. If I find him again, I’ll get him properly.”
The horses had shied away from the blood, but they were old enough not to stray far. Ulfar sent a bundle of silent thanks to Alfgeir Bjorne as he saddled up and headed south. He looked over his shoulder at Goran’s corpse and urged his mare into a run.
“Can you smell it?”
The horse didn’t reply, but Ulfar didn’t mind. Two days on the road, and he was starting to think he was alone in the world. Now, however, there was something in the air: something fresh and cold to replace the smothering smell of dank pine and wet earth. He’d swapped horses once a day and kept up a good pace, but he still felt as if the forest would never end. Now the trees ahead were thinning out, and there was something up ahead.
The world of wood he’d been living in dropped away from his eyes, and he gripped the reins so hard that the horse whinnied in protest as his vision filled with blue. The path inclined down to the sandy banks of the water, and the fresh breeze made him sit up straight in the saddle. Ulfar shivered.
It was the big lake. He’d heard of it but never seen it before. A full morning’s crossing by boat, it sliced the country near in half, if the stories were true.
But there was something else as well. His stomach detected it before his brain caught up.
Somewhere close, someone was cooking fish.
Under him, the horse tossed its head and snorted, bringing Ulfar back to his senses. “Easy,” he muttered to the mare, “easy. Let’s . . . give you both a break.”
He dismounted and led the horses into the forest, far enough so he couldn’t see the path anymore. He tethered them to trees close enough to patches of brownish grass, and they accepted their fate with resigned calm and set to eating what could be eaten.
Ulfar was stiff and sore, but the walk back toward the path and the lake limbered him up. The smell was stronger now, and in the distance he could see tendrils of smoke rising lazily.
A smart man would pick his way through the forest and observe from cover, he thought. A smart man would get a feel for whoever started that fire.
But there was a familiar tingling sensation somewhere in the back of his head, so disobeying all his instincts, Ulfar strode out onto the lakefront and started walking very slowly toward the source of the smell. Soon enough, he saw shapes huddled around a line of smoke just past the curve of the coastline. He glanced inland and noticed the two scouts he would have run straight into if he’d gone sneaking, and he smiled to himself.
He inched closer, making sure his hands were visible at all times, but when he was within shouting range he wondered whether he needed to be so careful after all. The men huddled around the half-buried fire looked cold and weary. There were twelve of them. A particularly bony man sat by the fire, turning speared fish this way and that, flicking them onto the broken shields that appeared to be serving as plates.
“Greetings to the fire,” Ulfar shouted the moment he thought he could be heard.
A couple of heads turned, but no one rose to greet him.
Taking their silence as consent, Ulfar sidled closer. The smell of the roasting fish was almost too much to bear.
He was within spear-throwing distance when he saw the injuries.
Every man had them: heads wrapped in dirty, blood-caked cloth, broken forearms crudely splinted, a leg hacked off at the knee. The gaunt cook looked up at him. He flashed a quick signal to the scouts behind Ulfar’s back. The reply must have set his mind at ease. “Make way, fuckers,” he growled at his fellow men. “Guest rights.” To Ulfar, he said, “Welcome, traveler, to my court. I am Lord Alfrith. We’re a bit short on the furniture at the moment, but we’ve got fish.”
“I haven’t found a bench that tastes better than a well-roasted trout,” Ulfar replied. “I am honored, Lord Alfrith.” That raised a f
ew smirks. The gaunt man nodded and gestured to a space that had appeared between two hunched and hairy fighters.
“Where are you coming from, then?” Alfrith said as he deftly speared another fish to go on the fire.
“Uppsala,” Ulfar said. On his left, someone hawked and spat into the fire, making a loud hiss.
“Oh? And what did King Cushion say?” Alfrith snarled. “Is he going to meet Forkbeard the day after he learns to wipe his own ass?”
“He’s scared to,” a man with a badly scarred face chimed in. “He might hurt himself. Wiping your own ass is plenty dangerous.”
“You’d know, Uthgar!” Alfrith said.
“Besides, Alfgeir’s teats give mead these days, so he’s fine where he is,” another with a broken arm added. There was laughter around the fire, but it wasn’t the happy kind.
Ulfar chose his words with care. “Jolawer is young,” he said, “and like with the wenches, you don’t necessarily want to let a young man at the fighting. He’d be over and done in three strokes.” There was no laughter, but he saw the twinkle of amusement here and there. “No, just like the fucking, you want to leave the fighting to real men.” Some of the wounded fighters were nodding now. “I think Alfgeir Bjorne will protect the boy, but I don’t believe he’ll hold him back when the time comes. And when it does, they’ll know that Forkbeard was held by Lord Alfrith and his men when they needed it the most. I knew King Erik, and he did not beget a fool.” He had their undivided attention now. All he needed was to time it right. “The old goat could have fucking done it ten years earlier, though.”
The laughter that ripped around the fire was genuine now, a release of anger and pressure. Not for the first time, Ulfar thought of old Sven. Make them like you, he’d said. Not bad advice, that.
“And we do not need to establish the fact that Forkbeard was born from a thorny fart and a bad idea. So what is Old Shithead up to?” Ulfar continued.
“He’s raiding the plains, mostly,” Splint-arm said. “But he’s being quite clever about it.”
“He’s split his men up into groups of fifteen to twenty and has them spread out over the largest area possible,” Uthgar added. “They strike, burn farms, kill, rape, and run away. No battlefields, no big fights.”
“All we do is run after war bands,” Alfrith said. “And all of my men are worried that their homes are being hit next.”
“We’ve nailed a couple of them, though,” Splint-arm said. There were nods and smiles of grim satisfaction around the fire. “Nailed a couple of them right proper. And we would have got the last group, too. Except for that one fucker,” he added. “I told you he was bad news.”
“Oh, don’t you fucking start,” Half-face snapped. “All week: told you, told you, told you. Well, you tell me about him again, and I’ll set fire to your arm.”
“Oh yeah? And I’ll bang it on your good side,” Splint-arm shot back. “And you’ll thank me for it.”
Half-face made to stand up.
“Shut up, both of you!” Alfrith snapped. He swung the stick with the half-cooked fishes at them, pointing at each in turn. “There’s nothing you can do when you’re up against one of those.”
Ulfar’s chest felt like it was sinking into itself. He had to sit on his hands and bite his lip.
“Fucking fucker,” Half-face muttered. He looked across the fire at Splint-arm and mumbled something. The other warrior nodded back. Argument settled.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” a man with a stump-leg said. “I mean, who fights with hammers?”
Alfrith turned to Ulfar. “Forgive me, traveler.” He grabbed a piece of shield and slapped a portion of silvery fish onto it. The blackened skin cracked open, revealing the steaming pink flesh. “Here you go.” Ulfar nodded, still biting his tongue. “Will you camp with us?”
“I am afraid not,” Ulfar said, fighting hard not to show his excitement. “I think I’ll need to be on my way very soon.”
SOUTHWEST COAST OF SWEDEN
LATE NOVEMBER, AD 996
It was less of a beach and more of a strip of sand spotted with yellowing tufts of dried grass. At Audun’s back, the sea was a dense blue-gray, and thickening clouds signaled a storm.
“Hate ships,” Thormund muttered. “Fuckin’ hate ’em. Ain’t right. I’ve got legs for walking, not fucking gills for swimming.”
“That’s why the smart ones thought to make boats,” Mouthpiece mumbled. His jaw was still a mess, but he could speak more every day, much to everyone’s misery.
“You go, then,” Thormund snapped. “You go and roll around out there, pissing over the side, spewing every day, for some stinking fish guts. I’ll stay on land, fuck your wife, and steal your horse.”
“Make sure you get that the right way round, old man,” Ustain chimed in from up front, and the men chuckled. “Although, saying that, it would explain some of the kids I saw up north.”
More laughter.
Sweyn Forkbeard’s waifs and strays were massing on the beach. Ustain looked back at them and raised his voice. “Right, you sorry lot!” he said. “We’re going east, then north. The king has a plan, and we’re perfectly placed to make it happen.”
As Ustain continued to shout over the men’s heads, Audun saw Mouthpiece check furtively before sidling back toward him. Someone had learned a lesson or two, then.
“Wanna watch your back, big man,” he mumbled. “Some of them new boys have been staring at us since we got aboard.”
“Well, your face is kind of funny,” Audun said.
“They haven’t been looking at me,” Mouthpiece said.
Audun glanced around, but the men all looked the same. Still, he couldn’t quite dismiss Mouthpiece’s words. On the trip across the channel he’d felt . . . uneasy. “Thank you,” he said.
Mouthpiece shrugged and drifted away again.
“. . . so find yourself some running mates and go and break things!” Ustain finished, to cheers from the men.
The soldiers wasted no time splitting into two groups. Audun was left with Mouthpiece, Thormund, Boy, and a handful of the more feeble men from the camp. About sixty yards away, the crew from the old boat stood silently, looking at them.
“Come on, then,” Thormund shouted to them. “You’re with us.”
One by one the crewmen moved toward Audun’s group, but none of them spoke up. Mouthpiece muttered something about “wrong” and “suspicious,” but no one was listening to him.
“What’s the matter? Cod got your tongue?” Thormund said.
The sailors exchanged looks. There were nine of them, ranging from a thick-necked bear of a man to two small, weasel-faced boys who could not be a day older than fourteen. In the middle was the man Audun thought looked familiar.
“Olgeir,” said the man in the middle, followed by a murmur of other names.
“Where are you from, Olgeir?” Thormund said.
“Around,” Olgeir answered.
“Hm. You sound like a Swede. Been sailing much?”
“Yes—left Sweden a long time ago.”
“Fine,” Thormund said. “You want to lead?”
Olgeir shook his head.
“Great.” The old man pointed to Mouthpiece. “That one can’t talk but does when he shouldn’t.” He glanced at Audun. “And that one should but won’t, though he can. I guess I’m in charge,” he concluded, scanning the group with hopeful eyes.
When no one protested, he rolled his eyes and spat. “Off we go, then,” he muttered. “East, then north.”
The sailors turned and started making their way up the bank. On either side the other war bands had already started doing the same.
“Tell you again—watch your back,” Mouthpiece mumbled under his breath as he passed Audun. “I don’t know why, but it looks like some of them boys don’t care for you at all.”
Audun watched the sailors moving up ahead.
“I’m used to it,” he said as he started walking.
The sour smoke of wet, bu
rning thatch rolled over Audun, stuck to his clothes, and bound with his sweat. Screams rang out as Olgeir’s men rounded up the last of the workers behind the farm.
Thormund stood in front of the barn, barring the weasel-faced boys’ way. The smaller of them had his hands full trying to hold on to a skinny young girl in a soiled dress. Tears streamed down her face as she kicked and squirmed in his grasp.
Audun was vaguely aware that his knuckles hurt.
Thormund’s voice came to him like in a dream. “No, you little shits: because she has a father and a brother, and if you take her now they will not stop until they find you.”
“Come on, old man! We’ll let you watch and everything,” the bigger boy said. He was of a height with Thormund.
“No,” Thormund said.
The smaller boy inched up alongside what had to be his brother, still clinging on to the girl. “If you don’t step away right now, you scratchy fart, we’ll let the little bitch go and make sure you have an accident instead.”
Thormund gestured to Audun. “Want to go up against him?”
The boys turned and stared. Audun suddenly felt numb and tired. The people in front of him didn’t look real.
He shrugged and walked away from the surprise in Thormund’s eyes. The boys howled in triumph, and the bigger one pushed the old horse thief to the side.
The girl’s shrieks died down soon enough.
Later, when they were on their way again, Thormund caught up with him. “I don’t need you to save anybody,” he hissed, “but where I come from, you do as your chieftain asks you.”
The buzz from the blood-rage, the fistfights, and the four men he’d knocked down had turned into a dull, throbbing ache. It had been an effort to control it, but he’d managed. Now he just wanted to lie down.
He looked at Thormund. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “It won’t change them, won’t change her.” He saw, or thought he saw, disgust in the old man’s face, but he didn’t care. “Fate is fate,” he said.
“Well, I hope I don’t need your help when I meet mine,” Thormund said.
Audun thought of the wall, of the blonde woman. “Most of us do, sooner or later.”
Blood Will Follow Page 25