by Oskar Jensen
‘I know,’ she stammered. ‘The beast was right here! But it’s gone now. And I’ve … I’ve got a message for you, from Knut. Where are you?’
The smell now hung so thick it might have been grease in the air. Roof and walls were low and close, hemming her in, but she’d come this far. And squinting ahead, she thought she saw a figure, covered in furs.
Somewhere, flies were droning.
The figure turned its face to hers – except, it couldn’t be a face. It was too long, too heavy, too low down.
The thing – Thorbjorn? – growled again, enormously loud.
Not a man’s growl, but a bear’s.
A huge, furred limb reached out for her. She saw teeth, and she ran, ran, ran.
Everything she’d heard about berserkers had been true. She was out in the sun and racing to Hestur, and everywhere were bears, bears in doorways, bears in the street, but she was in the saddle and kicking away and Hellir was behind her, behind her.
‘And that’s why the beserkers were all in hiding. Men turning into bears – that’s just the sort of pagan magic Folkmar wants to stamp out. If the beast is following his orders, then no wonder it attacked Hellir,’ said Astrid.
‘It must have taken you for one of them. It’s a shame that you never saw the beast.’
‘You’d never have dared look either. Besides, there was no time.’ She glared. ‘So anyway, I came straight to you, and you were asleep, so I went to my bed. Folkmar was there –’
‘In your bed?’
‘In a chair. I was so mad at Knut for sending me that I asked all about Christ, and –’
‘Astrid, not you too? What were you thinking?’
‘You needn’t worry about that. Turns out Folkmar’s less interested in my “soul” than in … well … I swear, Haralt and Knut, they’re as bad as each other.’
‘I don’t understand … ‘
‘They’ve both been looking to get me married off to suit themselves. I see it now … parading me before their favourites like a prize mare. Thorbjorn or Folkmar: which is worse?’
‘Folkmar would never marry a pagan.’
‘But what if they win, Leif? What if they win, and we’re all made Christians? Or what if they lose, and I’m given to Thorbjorn instead?’
She was tearing up whole clumps of herbs, her arms shaking.
Leif went to her. ‘They use you. All of them. It’s what they do. Your brothers, Thyre – all they want is power.’
He was getting angry too. ‘These tall, pale lords, with blood upon their hands – they only care for keeping this land theirs.’
Astrid glared, but Leif didn’t notice. ‘And where are you and me in all of this? Just pieces on a board, moved on a whim.’ He remembered the ivory gaming piece, sent flying by Haralt’s fist.
‘That’s my family you’re talking about, Leif.’ Her words were slow, hard, measured.
‘I know – and do they act like it to you?’
‘I don’t care. You’ve no right to go casting slurs on those you’ve come to serve.’
‘Astrid, what is this –’
Furious, she cut across him. ‘No one’s going to sell me to another man against my will. But you, you’ve sold yourself already, to my father. Remember? You’re sworn to follow him; you eat at his bench. So don’t go biting the hand that feeds you, all right? What’ve you got against them anyway? The king’s not hurt you.’
‘In Iceland,’ Leif shot back, ‘they have no king. Just poets, traders, farmers – and it seems to work all right!’
‘Well why don’t you just GO to Iceland then!’
He had no answer.
‘I’ll tell you why –' she was shouting now – ‘because you love all this. The power. The importance. The courtliness. You say you don’t but you love it, because it makes you think this is where things happen, and it makes you feel like you’re a part of it all. You’re scared of Christians because they’ve no need of skalds – what’s the point of someone who can make up poems about gods no one believes in anyway – and you’re not going to leave Jelling, because so long as you are the king’s skald, you can say you matter!’
She wiped some grass-green spit from her mouth. ‘Besides, you’d never leave these silly stones until you’ve proved yourself somehow, which is, by the way, just like a boy and incredibly boring. And now you’re all agog with this big danger, and your sacred destiny – you get to make the choices, you’re going to save the trolls – and you know what, Leif? You know what? Good for you, but leave me out of it, because I do know what I want, and if anyone’s running off to Iceland, it’s me. So don’t pretend we’re in this together, because they may be my family, and your skin may be darker than ours, but you’re more one of them than I’ll ever be, and I’ve had enough!’
She stared at him, face flushed, daring him to bite back. There was a hush. Bees flitted round the rosemary.
‘You wouldn’t, though, would you?’ said Leif, at last. ‘Leave, I mean?’
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘Not now everything’s started to happen. Not until it’s over, one way or the other. I just wish …’
‘Yes?’
‘All this magic – I just wish it didn’t have to be so destructive. Bears, beasts, storms, fire – why can’t anything just be fun?’
Leif rose. ‘You know, that sounds like a challenge.’
SEVENTEEN
‘Bleagh! This mead might as well be pond water …’
‘You should’ve brought some herbs from the garden.’
‘I did,’ said Astrid, suddenly remembering. She brought forth a clump of jagged leaves with young yellow flowers. ‘No idea what they are,’ she said, nibbling one, ‘but they taste interesting enough.’ She shredded the plant into the bucket of honeyed liquid.
They had broken into a storehouse, split the first cask they’d found, and filled a pail. Now, they were taking turns to raise the pitcher to their lips.
‘’S the same,’ she shrugged, mead dripping from her nose as she raised her head. She was disappointed. ‘You promised to show me something amazing. You do know this is this year’s mead, right? There’s no yeast in it yet – it’s just honey and water. You can’t even get tipsy on the stuff.’
‘Oh, Astrid. We’re not trying to get drunk.’
‘Oh. Then what are we doing?’
‘I know a way,’ said Leif, tapping his nose, ‘to make it taste like Kvasir’s brew itself.’
‘More spells? Is that the “fun” you promised me?’
‘When I am done, this mead will free us from ourselves: for just one night, we can forget. Leave ourselves behind, if you like. I hope …’
‘You hope?’
‘I’ve never tried it! But it can’t be hard – all that you need are three runes, and a rhyme.’ Leif hunched over the pail. Astrid leant closer, interested in spite of herself.
With his forefinger, Leif traced a shape in the liquid: F.
‘Wealth will undo kins’-ease;
Wolves too live among trees.’
‘Fe,’ he said. ‘That’s for wealth.’ They watched as the rune faded.
He bent again. L, he drew.
‘Water falls from on high;
Fine gold things please the eye.’
‘Log. That’s for waterfall.’ Again the letter vanished.
‘Last one,’ he said, etching the final shape: R.
‘Riding ruins the horse;
Reginn forged the best sword.’
‘Reid, for riding.’
As he spoke, the drink rippled like a lake in a storm, and bubbles bucked and sprayed as breakers on a wave. Astrid goggled, and the froth cleared, leaving a liquid no longer pale yellow, but rich red gold.
‘Wealth, waterfall, riding,’ she muttered. ‘Well, either a troupe of tiny golden horses is about to dive down my throat, or this is going to taste incredible.’
‘Those both sound pretty good,’ said Leif, and drank.
It was midnight when they staggered from the hut, t
heir quarrel quite forgotten. Whatever Leif’s magic was, it had certainly worked.
‘They’re all asleep!’ said Astrid. ‘Jelling is ours!’ She ran into the hall, arms wide and flapping, ‘kak kak kak’-ing as she went.
Leif tripped after her.
She was standing on the high table and spinning on the spot, her dress flowering round her waist, a blur of close-cut breeches below.
He stumbled down the hall, tottering into the earth bench along the left-hand side. The only sleepers lay across from him – Haralt’s men – and their snoring rose to the rafters. They had feasted well, and drunk better – the snores said as much – but Leif was still wary.
‘Where’s the rest of them?’ he hissed.
‘Hiding in Hellir. And good riddance! They’re unbearable.’ She collapsed into fits of giggling.
‘Shh,’ he said. ‘These ones will wake …’
He tried to vault up onto the dais, missed, and fell back heavily on a pile of abandoned cloaks.
Astrid sniggered. ‘Leif sore-arse.’
He put out his hand on something hairy, and held up a felt mask. Then another: wolfsheads. ‘Oo! We had these at Hedeby,’ he said.
He tossed one at Astrid. She lunged, missed, overbalanced and toppled to the floor in a heap. It was Leif’s turn to snigger as she struggled up, shrugging out of her rucked-up dress, a pale blue pool of wool beneath her feet.
‘I could be a boy,’ she said, looking down at her tunic and riding breeches.
‘Not with Sif’s gold hanging to your shoulders.’
Roughly, she grabbed her hair in one hand, piling it atop her head. With the other, she jammed the mask on over it. ‘Now?’ she asked, from somewhere beneath the long grey muzzle.
He shook his head, laughed, donned his own mask. ‘Rrreuf!’
She whined back at him in imitation of wolves they had known. Then, ‘Come on,’ she said, ‘I’ve had an idea.’
Taking her hand, Leif allowed himself to be led – in a less than straight line – to the door on the left, behind the throne.
She turned to him. ‘Knut’s got some wolf pelts from the hunt! And he’s gone down to Hellir to help protect his men …’
She tried the door. ‘’S locked!’ Remembering, she opened her mouth to sing the lock open. Just in time, Leif clapped a hand across her mouth. ‘Too loud,’ he hissed.
She glared at him, deflated.
Leif tugged the hem of his sleeve, pulling off a few frayed fibres. These he sucked, and thrust into the iron lock. ‘Yarn-jarn, spittle-lykill,’ he slurred. The door clicked open.
‘Howdo do that?’
‘I’ve no idea!’
They edged into the room. Draped across an empty bed, clear in the light of a low-burning oil lamp, were two shaggy wolf skins. Astrid grabbed them. Then she yelped.
Haralt was sitting in the other bed, facing right at her.
‘Oops, forgot you,’ she said. Haralt didn’t move. Spread open on his lap was an odd thing – thin scribbled sheaves between large leather boards. Now she looked more closely, his eyes were closed and he was clearly sound asleep.
‘Wassat?’ she whispered, pointing.
‘A book,’ breathed Leif, tiptoeing over. His hands itched to pick it up, to possess it. He squinted at the Latin words. Haralt had underlined a section.
… concerning the third stage of conversion. In discussing the treatment of false idols, St Gregory states that, when gentler methods fail, the sacred places and totems of such peoples must be deliberately destroyed, thus demonstrating the powerlessness of their gods. In just such a manner did Moses cast the golden calf into the flame …
‘What does it say?’ said Astrid.
Leif looked at the spidery foreign symbols. ‘I have absolutely no idea.’ He frowned at the book. ‘But he hasn’t got very far …’
The tread of heavy feet startled them both: someone was coming.
‘C’mon,’ hissed Astrid, and shoved him out into the hall; kept shoving till they were out under the stars.
‘Let’s put the skins on!’ She had already thrown one pelt around her shoulders. Now she flung back her head, and howled.
‘Shh,’ said Leif, again. ‘Not here!’ And now he shoved, and she shoved back, and they were both rolling on the grass.
The Yelling Stones thrummed in the quiet of the night. Throb and thud, throb and thud, as regular and vital as a heart’s beat in their pricked-up ears. They scurried and scampered on all fours, yipping and yelping past the mound.
‘Leif,’ said Astrid – or tried to. All that came out was a bark. Something very strange was happening as they raced past the stones; something that rippled the cool night air and ran right through their bodies.
And then – then she forgot. Forgot everything. She was ahead of Leif as they left the hall behind, and she glanced over her shoulder with a grin as she dropped down to the earth. Peddling her hind legs, she stuck up her tail and waggled it at the moon. He growled, leapt, and over they rolled again.
She came up on top, astride his belly, and their muzzles clashed in the greying night.
‘Catch me,’ he heard – though not exactly in words – and the chase was on.
The night was a tapestry of scent and sound, streaked and shot through all around with trails and traces that perfumed and trickled, cobwebbing odours of coming and going. And through this thicket of reeking and rustling, the two figures ran, and romped, and melded into night. Howls serrated the silence, falling and rising in eager harmony.
Blood was hot; hunger was cold. This much she knew. Everything was streaks of grey, blurred beneath a pale-faced moon. But the smells – they were thick bright ropes of warm, furry taste, pulling her this way, pulling her that.
Not this one though – this smell meant danger. The boy-wolf nipped her flank and she spun, growled, stared him into silence.
Something was coming.
A man, ambling through the trees. He swung at flowers and ferns with the long, straight iron-stick that stretched from his paw. Sound was coming from his mouth – something between the lowing of a cow and the mewl of a tomcat.
The other wolf crouched, hackles low, and she shouldered him back. Wait.
Two other men followed the first. They were stalking it, she realised, trying not to be seen. One was tall and thin, the other enormously fat.
You could feed a pack on that one for a whole winter, she thought.
Tall nodded to Fat, and Fat let out a series of low noises, passing his paw across his chest before pointing at the first man, still strolling on ahead of them. Tall spat, turned, and strode back into the dark.
Then the night air throbbed with the beat of wings. A bright light descended – too bright to look at – and she flung herself, flat and panting, down in the tall grasses.
She smelt strange things for which she had no name – sand, spices, searing heat – and heard a cry, a whirring, a thud.
Then there was the fire-smell in her nostrils. She whimpered, afraid, and cracked an eyelid open.
The first man lay still, reeking of death – she licked her lips – and Fat was speaking again, pointing further ahead of him. The bright, winged shape lifted into the air, and sped away eastwards, trailing flame. Fat bent, touching his paw to the dead one, before shambling off in the direction Tall had taken.
The two wolves crept closer to the body, snuffling and squinting. She cocked her head on one side, trying to work something out.
Dead man’s shape was all wrong.
EIGHTEEN
The horns blasted redly through the forest, borne in on the light of the morning, flooding trees and ferns in sunshine and discord. The clamour swam around two sleepers, cradled in the roots of a giant beech. From beneath their torn and matted pelts they stirred, and rose, and yawned.
‘Ungh …’ said Leif. And then: ‘My head!’
‘Not so loud,’ moaned Astrid, pointlessly. The horns had not stopped.
‘What’s that noise?’ he asked.
‘My tongue’s like old birch bark. And my head feels like Thor’s anvil. What summons?’
‘It’s calling everyone to Jelling. On pain of death.’
‘That’s nice,’ said Leif, and settled back down under the furs.
‘That means us, too.’
‘Oh.’
Astrid stood. Then wished she hadn’t. Then, so that at least she had someone to share the pain, she heaved Leif to his feet. ‘We’d best leave the skins,’ she said. ‘Look at the state of them. Leif …’
‘Yes?’
‘I think we saw the beast.’
‘Did we? Yes – and Folkmar. And a body …’
‘And – and Haralt? I can’t remember it properly.’
‘Nor can I. And Leif?’
‘Yes?’
‘Did we become … I mean, were we …?’
‘I think so.’
‘Wow.’
‘Wow.’
The hall was nearly full when they arrived. Leif and Astrid crammed into his space on the bench. Folkmar had Haralt’s seat at the high table; Haralt himself had the floor. Both of them looked very tired … and very smug.
Hands on hips, Haralt paced about, waiting till all the places were filled. Then he turned to address his father. ‘King Gorm, I appeal to you to resolve a dispute that has arisen between me and a person or persons unknown.’ He spoke dry and fast, like a shower of pebbles.
Gorm shifted in his seat. ‘Could you not have called upon Knut, your brother? He is Gothi of all this company.’
‘No, Father, for Knut is caught up in the case I bring before you.’ Gorm glowered.
‘What is the nature of this dispute, my son?’
‘It concerns the killing of one of my bondsmen, Harmsorgi the Converted.’
The room rippled with surprise.
‘When was the killing?’ said Gorm.
‘Late last night, in the forest between here and Hellir.’
Astrid caught Leif’s eye. ‘The body,’ she said. ‘I remember …’