by Ken Hagan
Thrandt refused all my entreaties to take a bag of Hakon’s coin in payment for his stewardship over the work, or for his carpentry. I suspect that, like me, he thought of it as a tribute to Hakon’s memory to see the monks re-established at Kildobhan — a toil of love that needed no reward — though he has not said so outright. He and Sae-Unn are surprised and grateful that I have kept on Hrut as crewman on the Meuris. Perhaps the shipbuilder and his wife consider that the settlement of their son’s future puts them in my debt, though I have assured them countless times that it doesn’t.
*
My walk has taken me to the head of Slaidh beach, where Gufa and Oengus are building the curach. Oengus has his back to me. He doesn’t see me approach. Gufa has sight of me, but he keeps his head down and lets Oengus chatter away. He and Oengus are twisting hazel rods called stringers through lathes of willow to form a woven hull.
They have a bundle of supple stringers that have been softened in advance in the beck. The framework is hull-side up, showing ribs of green willow and thin stringers of water-darkened hazel woven through from end to end. The curach is one-third complete. Built without ridge or stern, it looks like an oversized wicker basket — the kind that women use to scoop grain from a store-tub.
‘I tell you,’ says Oengus with emphasis. He grunts, while he strings hazel through the willow weft. ‘I tell you, Brother, he won’t let her go!’
‘Well,’ replies Gufa with gusto, ‘Here comes the man, who will have something to say about that!’
Oengus spins round. His round, tonsured face blushes ear to ear. ‘Forgive me, Skipper Thralson.’ He nods over my shoulder. ‘You see why it is best for me to keep a vow of silence! I thought you were busy with the ship.’
‘The Meuris is roped and rigged. We wait for the tide to turn.’ Admiringly, I run my hand along the frame of the curach. ‘I was only curious, Brother Oengus, to see how these things are built.’
Oengus laughs. ‘Truly, a test of patience.’ The monk is absorbed in cutting a stringer of hazel, a long one that he has selected from the bundle. With his knife he trims one end to a point. He flexes it like a whip, so that it can be woven more easily between the ribs of willow. ‘Tomorrow,’ says he. ‘We stretch bullock-hides over the hull and seal it. Once the skins have shrunk to the frame — within a week, Domino volente — we will try it on the waves.’
‘Pity,’ I reply. ‘I won’t be able see your boat on the water.’ I kneel beside Oengus to help pull a stringer of hazel through the weft. ‘We will be at sea by then — well into our voyage.’
‘But will our blessed virgin be onboard?’ says Gufa bluntly. ‘That is the question!’
Gufa’s remark takes me aback. I answer with bravado — but without fully pondering his words. ‘I have no doubt that Paperkali will bring along his figurine of your Lady Saint — the one carved from soapstone that Abban sanctified for him. When we are out at sea, and bouncing on a swell off the coast, he will feel safer under her protection than mine.’
Gufa guffaws heartily. Encouraged by his irreverent response, I make more fun of Paperkali.
‘Honey-monk will kiss his lovely lady all the way to Arnkels-cove. He will be on his knees for the entire voyage, his rosary beads going; fingers ‘crossed’ for luck. I don’t think Brother Paperkali trusts me as a skipper, poor man! I don’t blame him’
Oengus ignores the jest. ‘Skipper Thralson!’ he scolds. ‘You shouldn’t mock the Blessed Mary.’ He makes a hasty sign of the cross. ‘Brother Gufa should know better! We weren’t speaking of the saint! Don’t you get it? It is M’lym. Father Abban won’t let her go!’
‘That cannot be,’ I reply sharply. ‘Abban has given his blessing. He can’t go back on his word.’
‘The Holy Father won’t break an oath,’ says Oengus. ‘That would be a sin.’
‘Father Abban hasn’t withdrawn his blessing,’ says Gufa. ‘Not as such! That would never do! M’lym is free to sail to Brythuniog and search for father and brother — if she chooses.’
‘So what has changed?’ I ask.
‘The Holy Father has given her a choice,’ says Oengus. ‘An opportunity to take a different path.’
‘I feel sorry for M’lym,’ adds Gufa. ‘She will be exhausted, poor girl. He has kept her confined in the chapel all night.’
‘All night, on her own?’
‘Father Abban sent her in there to pray,’ says Oengus.
‘He told her to stay in the chapel,’ says Gufa, ‘to pray for as long as it takes — and not come out until she has decided what path she will choose.’
‘The Holy Father is right,’ says Oengus piously. ‘M’lym must seek guidance from God.’
‘Mark my words, Skipper Thralson,’ says Gufa. ‘I know Father Abban’s ways. When the girl finally succumbs, she will choose to remain at Kildobhan. That will be her only path.’
‘She can’t!’ I yell back. ‘She won’t! Surely her only path — as you call it — is to come with me. If it is at all within my power, we will find M’lym’s family. Who knows if her father and brother are still alive? Impossible to say! But if they are alive, we will track them down to wherever they have been taken. I will use Hakon’s loot to purchase their freedom.’
‘All well and good,’ says Gufa. ‘A mission of mercy, and one that does you credit — but Abban has laid another life before her.’
‘Another life?’ I ask.
‘A life,’ replies Gufa, ‘in which M’lym will renounce her family, and, like us, forsake all worldly attachments.’
So engrossed were Gufa and I in pulling a stringer through the frame that, without our noticing it, Father Abban has joined us on the beach. Oengus jumps, red-faced, to his feet.
‘Skipper Thralson,’ begins Abban. ‘I owe you an apology! I had intended to speak before you sail for Vadrar-fiord.’ He frowns at Gufa and nods disappointedly towards Oengus. ‘It seems that you may have heard it from others.’ A clap of his small hands, and both monks hurry away from the beach, leaving the curach and stringers behind.
‘Sister M’lym-kun,’ says Abban, ‘is a pious young woman, studious in her devotions — too valuable, in my view, to be lost to the Church. In a short time she attained remarkable skill as a scribe. What better life than to take holy orders as a virgin of God? If she prefers such a life — it will be her decision, Skipper Thralson, hers alone — I will undertake her instruction at Kildobhan until a placement can be found for her with Sisters of the Faith.’
Chapter 54
We can’t cast off until the river-mist has lifted. I have kept the crew onboard. I don’t want Halp or Fjak slinking off to the brew-house and coming back legless to the ship — that would be a bad omen for my first sea voyage as skipper.
From here at the jetties, nothing can be seen of Vadrar-fiord apart from the roofs of Lodin’s fort. Morning mist encircles the mound. It hides fort and settlement from view. A watery haze hangs over an-Shuir. The haze seeps up from the river, and laps aloft over the unseen palings. The rooftops of the fort are pitched eastwards. In pale sunlight, they shine with dew above floating vapours of mist. They seem to have lost their foundations on land — to have broken free from the mound, like capsized hulls adrift in the sky, carried off on a flood of mist.
The sky is bright overhead, there is warmth in the air — a fine day is in prospect to begin our voyage. Jötunn Ormson and Ingvar Lodinson are itching to be off. When they turned up at first light, I told them it was unlikely that we would make the early tide. The foster brothers went off to the brew-house.
The mist is damp and dense on the river. Kaupships and toll-wherries are moored upstream of the Meuris. Like us, they won’t move until the mist has thinned out. Last night, dozens of fishing-curachs were carried ashore in moonlight and left upturned on the beaching grounds. This morning, boats and beach are hidden in mist. Nothing downriver can be seen from our moorings.
Calls of herd-boys can be heard sounding indistinctly through the mist, and the snorting and lowing o
f bullocks, as their hooves rattle on loading-ramps up to the ships. We hear high-pitched bleating, the unending plaint from a flock of lambing ewes. The ewes will be taken across by wherry to give birth on the pastures of Inis-cáera. A brace of lean brinded bullocks, as I heard yesterday, are going upriver to Inis-tioc. Tioc will rear them for breeding. The other bullocks will be sold for beef, mostly cattle trade on the south coast. One of Hakon’s cronies, skipper of a kaupship, has bought a full ship-load for the market at Inis-dubh. He will be the first skipper from Vadrar-fiord to benefit from the Thor’s-day truce agreed with King Amlav.
Moments before, a dun horse, favourite stallion of Lord Lodin, was brought down from the fort. Deasún’s gelding, a stocky cross-breed from Weis-fiord, whinnies and shudders to greet the stallion. The Custodian will be here soon to bid farewell to Ingvar and Jötunn — his son and foster-son. Thereafter he will ride into the western hills to hunt with his son-in-law Deasún.
A huntsmen fodders Deasún’s gelding and sees to Lodin’s horse. The man pulls a bag of oat-feed over the animal’s neck. The stallion chomps in haste, eyelids droop, horse-breath steams from the bag. The horse swallows greedily. He knows that, should his master appear soon, his fodder-bag will be removed before he is done.
With the death of Clithna, shared grief has tightened the bond between Lodin and his son-in-law. Each man bears his grief openly, neither is loath to recall — with a tear in the eye — the whimsical moods or wilful defiance of cherished daughter and wife.
Not so Lady Aghamora, she hides her loss well, or prefers not to dwell on the past. She speaks less of her daughter than she does of Hakon. She shuns the maudlin company of husband and son-in-law. Care for her grandchild, little Clithna, is uppermost in her thoughts.
As for Ingvar, he loved his older sister, while she was alive, loved her as much as he feared her, but he has a future in Weis-fiord to think of. A new life beckons as a foster-son. Everyone says he will be under the thumb of King Orm. He won’t have as much leeway with Orm as he has had with his father.
Lodin and Deasún find consolation together in the hunt, a welcome distraction — a manly appetite for their grief. They drink heavily, while on the hunt. They call to mind their darling, daredevil girl. This will be their third outing into the wolf-hills in as many weeks. Their hunting party, about thirty strong in huntsmen and hounds, always carries enough grog and grain to be away for four or five days. The huntsmen — Erse-men from Deasún’s clan — loll back on a huge hunting pile, spears, staves, trap-nets, grain-bags; bladders of grog. They watch impatiently for a break in the sky or stare blankly towards the overcast river. Shaggy wolf-hounds, lank-eared in the mist, sprawl dozing at their feet.
*
‘It is past noon.’ Ingvar’s eyes are glazed. Lodin’s son stinks of brew-house grog. He and Jötunn have been in the brew-house all morning. ‘You’d think father would be here to see us off. What the hell is keeping him?’
‘Be patient, man,’ replies Deasún. ‘As soon as your father sees a break in the sky, he will hurry down from the fort.
I look above the mast. ‘If that is the case, Deasún, it might be a while before he comes. There is no sign of the mist clearing and we have lost the first tide.’
‘What about a game of ‘kroners’? A game or two while we wait?’ Jötunn grins from ear to ear. ‘I carry a set of disks in my purse.’
‘“Dead or bluff”?’ returns Deasún readily. ‘Why not, Jötunn? Count me in.’
‘Those damned disks of “Dead or bluff”,’ says Ingvar with a laugh. ‘They are all he has in his purse. I had to pay for his ale. Forget it, Deasún. No point in playing him. He has no hack or coin to put up a stake.’
Jötunn ignores his foster brother. ‘What do you say, Thralson? Shall we chalk out a board of squares on deck?’
*
Baldr signs for Kru and explains Jötunn’s last move of a brass disk on the chequerboard.
Derdriu and Dantzk, their faces shining with mist, her head on his shoulder, lean back lazily against the lowered yard-arm. Ingvar has curled up, asleep on stern-deck.
On the makeshift board of squares chalked on deck, only three of Deasún’s silver disks remain. Jötunn has been cautious in his moves, slow and deliberate. A morning’s ale in the brew-house hasn’t dulled his play. Jötunn has countered Deasún’s attack, stolen twelve silver disks from his opponent and built three double ‘kroners’ of own. His position on the board looks unbeatable. Deasún was forced to concede the first game of ‘Dead or bluff’ — so the winnings from their second encounter, and the bragging rights for best of three, will go to Orm’s son.
The crew of the Meuris gathers round to watch the end of the game. Fjak is on edge — he and Halp have a stake on the outcome. Halp’s wager is on Jötunn, Fjak’s silver is riding on Deasún. Halp wears a sly grin. Hrut crouches behind Fjak; whispers something in his friend’s ear. Fjak nods in agreement and nervously scratches his bald head.
Deasún has next move on the board; he stalls and withdraws, the ploy of a huntsman to throw Jötunn into confusion. He wants his opponent to question whether the position on the board is as strong as it seems. The Erse-man gets to his feet, yawns and stretches, dusts some chalk from his fingers, rubs first one knee, and then the other, as if he caught a cramp from kneeling on deck.
‘Tell me, Thralson,’ says he unexpectedly. ‘What’s the point of your putting in at Slaidh? Can’t you take “no” for an answer? That spoiled child has turned you down twice. She chooses to stay with the monks. Isn’t that enough for you! For Christ’s sake, forget the ungrateful brat. Call an end to it!’
The crew’s eyes are on me, but I make no reply.
Deasún carries on. ‘I don’t blame you, Thralson,’ says he. ‘I can tell you. I am not one to figure out women. Least of all, my poor Clithna. We were man and wife for three years, and yet, all the time we were married, she remained a mystery.’ He breaks off sadly and then suddenly his face brightens.
‘Talk of women! Can’t imagine what got into Tioc’s daughter! Who would have thought it, eh? Married to that tight-arse Gil-Phatric. She once put it about that she would rather die a virgin that be his wife. Now, in a matter of months — quick as a bloody miracle — she has a baby son from him. The little boy will be a future King of Osri.’
Ingvar has woken up; he is making water over the ship’s stern into the river. ‘What’s that you said, Deasún?’ he asks without turning round. ‘Tioc’s daughter? Didn’t she die in the battle for the tide-head?’
‘No,’ replies Deasún. ‘Leasha, the older girl, she was killed at reed-ford. It’s her sister Beyveen who has married Gil-Phatric.’
Jötunn interrupts in annoyance. ‘This daughter, that daughter, this girl, that girl: who gives a shit? I know what you are up to, Erse-man. You want to unsettle my game with tricks and endless chatter. Your bluff won’t work. Too late to save your bacon! Come to the board, man. Make your last move. Finish the game.’
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