The Yelling Stones

by Oskar Jensen

  ‘As if I wasn’t scared enough already.’

  ‘These tracks led up from out of the river …’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And the river flows out of Lake Faarup …’

  ‘So, what are you trying to get at?’

  ‘Last time we were out at night you told me the lake leads right down to the underworld. And anything could swim up out of it. Well … what if what we’re tracking came from there … from the underworld?’

  ‘Why would Folkmar’s beast be coming from a pagan place? Unless our Hel is the same as the Christian Hell … But they sound so different. Theirs is hot, for one thing …’

  ‘That wasn’t what I was thinking,’ he said. ‘I meant, what if these tracks are not the beast’s?’

  Astrid didn’t answer. She had stopped dead. The night was cold, yet she could feel sweat beading on her palms.

  They had come to a widening of the gorge. The river arced round to the right, cutting a sheer channel through the crumbling rock wall on the near side, but leaving a wide bank of earth and scree on the inside of the loop. The bank shelved up gently, breaking into rocks and trees that stretched to meet the sky. A couple of straggling spruces clung to the cliff face, which rose, straight and bleak as bone, a jutting mass of rock awash in cool moonlight. High, high up, remote and unreachable, one cave pocked the wall of grey. And down at their feet, stone met water, and the mud bank vanished, and with it, all trace of the paw prints.

  Wherever the beast was, it was not before them.

  At a loss, the two of them, dwarfed in that harsh, sheer space – it might have been made for giants rather than men – stared at the rock wall. And, gradually, they noticed something else. The tracks had gone … And so had the silence.

  From behind them, came the sound of heavy breathing.

  There was no wind that night, yet the hairs on the back of Leif’s neck, which had begun to stand on end, were moved by a warm breath that came and went with the sound behind them. It almost tickled. And, with the breathing, came an overwhelming smell.

  It smells like my grandmother, at the end, thought Leif.

  And Astrid thought, It is the smell of death.

  Their hearts were two caged blackbirds, beating at their bars. Beat one. Beat two. Beat three.

  They turned together. Poised on a rocky outcrop, a spear’s throw from where they stood, was … not a dragon. Not the bright winged beast. But a massive black hound.

  Its mouth, which could have swallowed a calf whole, was drawn in a rictus grin, slobbery red tongue lolling from one side. Teeth like swords. Heavy muzzle. Eyes of burning coal, black and red, no pupils – that head was the worst thing in the world.

  Its body might have been the dark itself, wet and dripping and spawned of nightmares. A brutal heaving chest and dear gods but its paws! One blow would fell an ox with scarcely any effort. And it was crouched, and it was grinning, and up it rose.

  Leif was struck dumb. Astrid’s knife slipped unnoticed from her hand. And in a single bound –

  In a single bound, it was past them, leaping so close the rush of air knocked them back, rag dolls flung against the rock wall. Dazed, they turned to follow its flight. As their heads turned, they heard the beat of dreadful wings.

  Something had risen above the trees on the far side of the valley. A vast black silhouette against the moon’s white face, a vaster black shadow in the gorge and on the cliff, the shadow of that wingspan swallowing river and trees and scree and slope. A dread figure rising on the moon, and now it dropped; bearing fire and sword it fell upon the dog, who opened slavering jaws to bay defiance. Then beast and dog met, and their meeting shattered the night, tore a hole upon the earth and rent the sky, and Leif and Astrid, stunned, could only stand and watch the battle of these giants.

  The winged beast fell feet first, and kicked out as it came, striking the lunging hound full in the chest. The dog reeled back, jaws knocking together in confusion, and the beast alighted on a spur of rock.

  For a moment it was still, and they had their first real glimpse. It was a man, or like a man, thought Astrid, though tall beyond the reach of normal men. White robes swirled over a tight cladding – armour? scales? – of shimmering mail, too bright to quite make out. No longer silhouetted, ‘light’ now seemed the best way to describe it; it shone hot, harsh white, a stronger light than was ever meant for northern places, and though Astrid longed to see, she had to screen her eyes with her hands.

  And anyway it was moving now, a blur of heat and sharp, shimmering edges. With one wing beat it rose aloft and bore down on the hound, sword raised to strike. The sword was fire itself, a living flame, but the dog was ready, twisting aside, wrenching at one wing. A cry came from the beast then, like the screech of an eagle but higher still, and louder, and wilder. It struck out with a leg, and its feet might have been taloned, for it drew blood with that kick – black blood, hot and steaming – and the dog let go its hold and howled.

  They came at each other again, both on the ground now. The dog sprang at its throat, looking for a fatal bite, and the beast ducked in low so the dog’s teeth scraped its forehead, at the same time driving its flaming sword up, aiming at the Hel-hound’s underbelly. Impossibly, the dog ducked its head against the beast’s, arching its back into the air and over, somersaulting through the night to land, twisting, behind the beast.

  The earth shook with the impact, and the rock split. A gutsome stink of singed dog carried across the water so that Astrid wrinkled up her nose, and now there were fur and feathers massing in the sticky black blood.

  With another unearthly scream the beast swung round. Sheathing its sword it dived upon the thrashing dog, still trying to rise from its fall. With grappling arms it seized the hound, and they came up chest to chest, the dog’s hind legs scrabbling at the beast’s scaled front. With a crack and a whirr of the threshed night air, the beast’s wings began to beat.

  And they rose!

  That dog must have weighed more than three full-grown male elk, and still the beast’s almighty wings bore them into the air. Grunting in pain, the hound made a desperate effort to seize the beast in its jaws, but the teeth slid from the burnished armour. High above the river the titans hovered, dwarfing the valley below.

  A third screech, louder than before. And then the beast let go.

  The beast let go, and the hound crashed into the waters. The world erupted, river rising high as a mast in one unstoppable wave. Leif and Astrid were dashed against the rock. Had they not already been hard up against it, the impact would surely have killed them. As it was, drenched and sore, they opened their eyes to see the beast, hanging on high, as it drew the burning sword again and gripped it, point down, in both hands.

  Then it was in the river and the sword buried to the hilt in the hound. The beast wrenched the blade free and threw back its head. Feet dug into the dying dog, it swung with a mad violence again and again, and the river steamed and hissed. Over the noise of the churning and striking came the hound’s death-cry.

  Leif felt that the stars might fall at the sorrow of that cry. Astrid, blinking back tears, remembered a dog she had once had that wandered too near the back end of a horse and got its head kicked in. It was the first time she’d thought of it in years.

  At last, it was done. The butchered body of the dog sank beneath the waters, lost in the inky murk of its own black blood. The beast rose up with lazy, languid beats – sword dangling from one hand – and then it swivelled its awful head, and looked straight at them.

  They both screamed. They couldn’t help it: that face, and that gaze, was beyond anything they could handle. To meet those eyes was like being asked to carry a mountain, or being forced to a cliff’s edge and told to fly. The face was like a man’s, but entirely other, inhuman in its weird and perfect beauty. No face should ever be so perfect, but that one was, and it was pure, and serene, and cold.

  Blinded with light and fear, they had to close their eyes, even though to do so was beyond awfu
l. Air moved on their faces, and they knew it was landing before them.

  Astrid clenched her legs tight together, fighting to control her fear. She might be killed, but she would not die a coward.

  The rustle of folding wings. The clink of shifting mail as it bent. That dread face could only be a hand span from their own and, yet, they felt no breath at all. A rasp and a whoosh as the sword was raised to strike, and then –

  Nothing. What seemed like seven years of … nothing.

  Her courage beyond anything she could ever have dreamt before that night, Astrid cracked open one eyelid, no wider than a lash.

  The face was right before her. But it wasn’t staring back. It was looking lower … it was looking at her neck.

  Judging the best angle to chop at, she thought. But then the beast brought forward one long, slender white finger – tipped with a cruel, curving nail – and touched it to the pendant at her throat.

  It screamed, and the noise full in their faces rent their eardrums, and they crumpled, stunned and deafened, and when they struggled to their senses –

  It had gone.

  A streak of black water, a crevice in the rock. A tarry mass of fur and feathers sticky in the moonlight. And around her neck – she’d barely glanced at it before – a little silver cross, not a Thor’s hammer at all.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Next day, pale and red-rimmed, they reported to Thyre in the grove. It was the only place where they could be sure of secrecy. Bumblebees and butterflies laced the heady air beneath the lindens. The queen seemed to be spending ever less time in the hall – shunning even her own bedchamber – and, by the look of her, the baths as well.

  ‘I refuse to take refuge from that pox-ridden Saxon behind my own door! It’s nearly midsummer; it befits me to spend time outside, in the sacred places.’

  They told her what had happened. ‘And here it is,’ said Astrid. Bowing her head, she took the silver pendant from round her neck – and winced, as her mother jerked back with distaste plain upon her features.

  ‘Blast that silversmith! I’ll see he gets no more custom in Ribe.’

  They all looked at the gleaming trinket. The hammer’s ‘shaft’ clearly protruded well above the thin head, forming a cross, rather than a T-shape.

  ‘I think that it’s known as a “crucifix”,’ offered Leif.

  ‘It’s known as a swindle, that’s what it is,’ said Thyre. ‘Mixing Christian trinkets in with decent Thor’s hammers! Still, it saved your lives. I should never have let you go after that beast, that –’

  ‘Angel,’ said Leif.

  ‘Angel?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Astrid, ‘we’ve worked it out. The other day, Haralt was asking whether Christians have anything like our Valkyries. Folkmar went on and on – it was all Powers this, Dominions that … Haralt lapped it up, of course, he loves that sort of thing. There was a picture in one of Folkmar’s “books”. Winged avenger, bright light, burning sword – the lot.’

  Thyre nodded. ‘I remember a little of that. What was it – angels stand somewhere between men and the gods, or “God”, I suppose – and are sent to earth to carry messages, or perform important tasks. They sound extremely dangerous. If this is one of them, then it’s been sent to do Folkmar’s bidding by his god: a tool of destruction in his chubby hands.’

  ‘But the Danes have fought angels before, and won,’ said Astrid. ‘Ivarr the Boneless drove them out of Norwich, in eastern England, once upon a time.’

  ‘Those were Angles, daughter, not angels,’ said Thyre, in some irritation.

  Leif stepped in. ‘Folkmar’s angel: it all makes perfect sense,’ he said. ‘But that still leaves the hound the angel slew. I’m almost scared to say it, but I think –’

  ‘Garm,’ said Thyre, with a brisk nod. ‘The hound of Hel.’

  ‘Garm?’ said Astrid. She’d been raised on terrifying tales of Garm, the watchdog of the underworld. The stories had not lied. But there was one problem with this … ‘Isn’t he supposed to fight the god Tyr, you know, in the final battle of Ragnarok when the world ends?’

  Leif nodded. ‘Except it seems he’s left his post early. He must have been set loose to fight the beast, and swam up through Lake Faarup in the night. But the angel killed him, so he failed.’

  He stared at Thyre and Astrid, ashen-faced. ‘It’s just as the – my trance, I mean – foresaw. If Garm is dead, then Odin’s vision cannot come to pass. The future will all change. And there will never be a Ragnarok.’

  It had seemed mad, when the stones had warned him that the world might no longer end as had always been foretold, that the thought could worry him. But it did. If that certainty, dismal as it was, was removed, then what was there to hold on to? What else might not give way beneath their feet?

  Leif saw his own terror reflected in the faces of mother and daughter in front of him – so similar, so scared. The bees, the flowers, the sheltering leaves, seemed sadly out of place.

  Thyre was the first to recover from their grim thoughts. ‘We cannot fight the angel,’ she said. ‘If the hound Garm cannot best it, the three of us stand no chance. If only Knut – but no matter …’

  She jutted out her jaw. ‘So we focus on the priest. I think I can hold my husband to the old ways – in the end, Gorm will always listen to my counsel above a stranger’s. But if he can’t convert the king, Folkmar may try something else. We all know the greatest source of strength around here is –’

  ‘The stones,’ said Astrid.

  ‘I’m sure it was the stones that led him here,’ said Leif. ‘He often spends his nights staring at them.’

  A memory flashed like summer lightning. Folkmar asking Haralt about their magic. How had he put it? ‘Real power, the power that comes from untold centuries of belief and worship.’

  ‘Whatever happens,’ Thyre said, ‘we must keep him from the stones. If he uses their power for his own ends, the old gods will fall. It would be best to drive him out of Jelling altogether. I shall set up a scorn-pole!’

  ‘A storm-pole?’ said Astrid.

  ‘Be a dear girl,’ said Thyre, in a voice that could have withered the World Tree, ‘and run along to the stables? I need you to fetch me a mare – that young grey, perhaps. Oh – and a woodcutter’s axe.’

  Astrid obeyed. No one could refuse her mother when her mind was made up.

  ‘I take it you at least know what a scorn-pole is?’ asked the queen.

  Leif nodded. ‘A totem that you plant into the ground. You face it at your target, and cut runes into the pole. It asks the earth’s spirits to drive the one you’re scorning from the land.’

  ‘Very good,’ said Thyre. ‘Egil Skallagrimsson used just such a pole to drive my husband’s first wife, Gunnhild, from Norway – it’s a long story. Maybe this will have the same effect. But –' and they looked up at the gentle clip-clop of hoofs – ‘aren’t you forgetting what has to be set on the top of the pole?’

  Astrid had returned, leading the most beautiful young mare – soft grey, shaggy mane, huge brown eyes. She stroked her hard, long muzzle as her mother took the axe.

  Leif felt sick. ‘A scorn-pole’s always topped … with a mare’s head.’

  He saw Thyre nod – step forward – saw Astrid back away, eyes wild, mouth open in protest – the axe rise high – and then it all slid away, as he fell into a dead faint.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Thud.

  Leif groaned, stirred, turned. Rustle. Thud.

  And he opened his eyes. He was alone in the grove. It was twilight, still, silent. And a squirrel was dropping acorns on his head.

  Seeing him come to, the squirrel came down from the tree – practically poured itself down the trunk – and scurried over to stand by his head. Close to, its needle claws and long, curved teeth were unnerving. But not half so much as its eyes: they were cold, hard stone.

  ‘Tell us what you’ve found,’ hissed the squirrel.

  ‘… and Thyre’s setting up a scorn-pole now,’ he finished,
‘to set the shaming spirits on the priest.’ He had told the stones everything.

  ‘No good,’ came the reply. ‘The spirits have all fled. All are hiding, all are scared. Garm, the hound of Hel, fallen? Truly, this outlander priest wields the power of a god. His book, his staff, his rituals: so potent. All this, and then he has the angel too.’

  ‘And yet,’ said Leif, ‘you want me to stop him?’

  ‘Yesss,’ they said, and the hiss was long and harsh. ‘He must not seize our magic. Or all the North shall fall.’

  ‘As long as Gorm is king, he has no chance,’ said Leif. ‘But … but if Gorm were to die with Knut abroad …’

  ‘Then Haralt takes the throne.’

  ‘And Haralt would convert: we’d be undone. Then Folkmar would be free to do his will.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Perhaps?’ said Leif. ‘Of course he’d take the Cross!’

  ‘When we three wrought our spell, in the long-before,’ said the stones, ‘we wielded the power of the land. To rule, we knew we needed tree and earth, rock and river.’

  Leif thought about this. ‘You mean, that Haralt also needs the land?’

  ‘Yesss. He cannot rule alone, without the will of this land behind him.’

  ‘We’re talking of the jarls, aren’t we?’ said Leif.

  ‘So young,’ they said, ‘so quick! Yesss, that is the key. He will only take the step, if he knows the kingdom will go with him.’

  Leif got to his feet, paced about the grove, the little stone-eyed squirrel bounding after him. ‘I cannot fight the beast,’ he thought, aloud. ‘But if the moment were to come for words …’

  ‘We are balanced on the point of the knife,’ came the hiss. The squirrel had leapt to a branch in front of him, on a level with his face. ‘The tipping point will come. Then will be the time to use word-magic, to turn the jarls’ backs upon the priest. He would be cast out!’

  ‘Truly, I could best him in a flyting,’ Leif said. ‘I will challenge him to a war of words.’