Erik the Red

by Tilman Roehrig

  “I don’t want to become a beast.”

  “Patience, Erik!” Thorbjörn had reassured him and Tyrkir two days ago. “You’ll find enough shelter here in the Twin Bay for a time. Wait for me and let’s think in peace.” With this, he was back on the ship to pick up the two landowners from the Thorsness Thing. To any questions from the tent city, he had only one answer: “The condemned man submitted to the verdict. As is my duty to my friend, I gave him a head start, nothing more. As my last service, I bring his ship to his family.”

  Together with Styr and Ejolf, he had then broken down the tents on Oxens Island and stealthily brought the Mount of the Sea, along with all its belongings and the maidservants, through the maze of countless islands and reefs farther north up to the secluded bay.

  The associates had been sitting on the beach with Erik and Tyrkir for hours, advising them. There was no danger of being surprised. A little farther out, Thorbjörn’s Sea Bird was acting as a scout, and the ships of the two landowners were anchored across the narrow entrance to the bay. Their crews were aboard, bows and arrows ready. Should a pursuer discover the hiding place by chance, he would be duly received.

  A soup simmered over the fire. Katla did not move from the cooking place; with a worried look, her lips slightly open, she listened to the men’s planning.

  “This is beneath me.” Erik refused. He even rejected the offer of spending the three years somewhere in a remote cattle hut on the south side of the goden’s district, well taken care of by friends.

  “Why?” The judge rubbed his nose hard. “Your wife could even visit you there from time to time in secret.”

  Tyrkir backed the suggestion. “Down there, it would also be easier for me to look after you. Nobody will notice if I disappear from Warm Spring Slope for a few weeks now and then.”

  “You mean well.” Erik took a flat stone and threw it over the water. After a few skips, it struck the side of his knarr. “Do you want me to lose my pride completely? In front of Thjodhild? In front of you, Know-It-All, and you . . . ?”

  He broke off. A new idea replaced the lament. “It would be better if I left Iceland. An outlaw is free to do that. That way I’m not violating the Thing’s verdict. I could go back to Norway . . . No, that’s where they chased me away. No, better still farther down to that trading place. What was the name, Know-It-All? You know. Where my father bought you and your mother?”

  “Haithabu, on the banks of the Schlei.” Tyrkir nodded thoughtfully. “Not a bad idea.”

  Hard clanging made them all turn. Katla hit the ladle against the soup pot. “I’m going with you!”

  “Don’t you interfere,” Erik barked at her. “See to it that we get something to eat.”

  She shot him a reproachful look. “That’s why I want to go.” The maid puffed out her chest. More to herself than the men, she murmured, “That’s why I won’t leave you alone.”

  To this point, Ejolf from Hog Island had only listened. Now he said, “So late in the summer, you still want to dare the long trip to the southeast? The wind is no longer favorable for it.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “If anything, I’d sail west.”

  Grinning slightly, Erik looked at the landowner. “So, to the west? Very good. Only there is, unfortunately, nothing there. Should I frighten the whales as a ghost of the sea?”

  “Mock away! But here at the Breidafjord, we hear that there’s supposed to be land.”

  “Who told you that? Who’s seen land there?” The others also stared at Ejolf, wishing to hear more.

  “I can’t swear to it, but my brother-in-law told me.” He told them about Gunnbjörn, the son of Ulf Crow. The young merchant came back from Norway one summer and was driven west beyond Iceland by a violent easterly storm.

  After a few days, the wind had eased. Rain set in, and heavy clouds hung over the ship. Finally, the weather cleared up. “And then Gunnbjörn saw rugged rocky islands in the haze a few sea hours away. Something rose behind it, gray or blue. In any case, it covered the whole horizon. Either it was a mountain, or there was a giant. Gunnbjörn didn’t dare to get closer, and because there was finally a westerly wind, he took advantage of it and went back to Iceland.”

  “How long did it take him?”

  “I don’t know exactly, but less than a week.”

  The audience was silent. Erik kept scratching his beard. Eventually, he grumbled, “Land where nobody has been before. If I find it . . .”

  Tyrkir rose and looked west across the bay. “Then it’s yours.”

  Silently, he added, My Viking, don’t lose yourself in a dream. If there’s really land there—land that’s habitable—only then is it valuable.

  “What is it, Know-It-All?” Erik’s gaze had gained a new glow. “Or does the newly freed master want me to go alone?”

  “Why do you ask when you already know the answer?”

  With a ladle in her fist, Katla stood tall before her master. “Don’t you dare say no. I’m coming with you, and so are the other two girls. After all, you must be taken care of.”

  The giant wanted to reach for her but remembered himself in time. With a look at Tyrkir and the others, he said, “No slave has the right to demand anything! You follow me because I command it. And now give us some soup.”

  The grace period had expired four days and three nights ago. Erik’s friends didn’t care. Although they now had to reckon with punishment themselves, they tirelessly attended to the equipment and condition of the Mount of the Sea. Lines were checked, the red sail was set and reefed again, the spare cloth was checked for tears. With great effort, the maids greased the outer wall with seal fat.

  Since only Ejolf lived near the Breidafjord, he had sailed to Hog Island and returned with provisions: barrels filled with salted meat and dried fish and full leather skins. “Thought a sip of sour milk now and then might do you better than water.” He almost lovingly patted the two smaller skins. “I filled these with mead. Drink it when you’ve found the coast and think of me. But if there’s no land, you can at least get drunk again before you . . .” He didn’t finish this sentence. “You have to get out of here. And soon.” The Breida farmer had assembled armed hordes. They were searching for the banished man island by island, and they had already come dangerously close to the Twin Bay. “It won’t be long before they find us.”

  “I can’t put you in any more danger.” As soon as the sun rose again on the eastern horizon, Erik wanted to leave the hiding place. “If I have the sun at my back, I can’t miss the right course. Besides, it’s looking good for us.” With an easterly wind and a cloudless sky, the weather promised to stay constant.

  Erik whistled and waved to gather the maids and his small team. “Break down the camp. Stow everything aboard. I’d better not find a cup or ladle anywhere. And then sleep.”

  The ten slaves he’d trained for the war had been left to him by Thorbjörn. It wasn’t much, but enough to crew the ship. Erik cheerfully turned to the judge and the landowners. “I’d better memorize the smell of fresh grass and earth now. Who knows when we’ll be on solid ground again?”

  Tyrkir stretched out next to his friend. He didn’t want to sleep, but at least he tried to rest and enjoy his last hours on land. For a long time, he stared silently into the pale sky. His thoughts wandered across the mountains to the south side of the snowy rock. Poor Thjodhild. She knew nothing of the canceled war, nor about the court ruling. How hard the news would hit her!

  He sat up and hugged his knees. “Are you awake?”

  Erik just grumbled.

  “Is it hard for you to leave without saying goodbye to her?”

  “Be quiet.” The friend turned his back to him.

  “Say it!”

  Only after some time did the answer come. “She is my wife . . .” Erik’s voice became fragile. “And strong. She’ll have to understand. . . . And we’ll come home again. Thorbjörn will tell her that. I will miss her, and the boy. . . . By Thor, be quiet now!”

/>   Tyrkir looked at his friend’s trembling shoulders but remained silent. How empty my heart will be without Thjodhild. But you can never know it, my Viking. He stared at the ship. No matter where it takes us, we must come back.

  The call of an eider duck broke the silence. Tyrkir listened. It didn’t come from anywhere in the grass behind him. It was coming from across the water.

  Again, he heard the call, this time much closer. It wasn’t a duck cry. Danger! The scouts on the Sea Bird had sounded the alarm, and the knarr crews at the entrance to the bay had passed the signal along.

  Erik had also heard it. “Onto the ship,” he ordered in a low voice through the funnel of his hands. “Hurry up!”

  Immediately, Thorbjörn and the two landowners were on their feet. Nobody had to be told. The maids ran into the shallow water, the servants lifted them on board, the masters climbed in themselves, and Erik grabbed the tiller. “Let’s go now!”

  Rudder blades clapped into the water. The Mount of the Sea quickly drew away from the shore. It reached the narrow gate of the bay where the two guard ships had already left their hiding place and were waiting.

  “Knarr to the south,” Erik was informed when his ship came alongside the other vessels. “Half an hour away.”

  Without hesitation, he urged his faithful helpers, “Better you climb across and disappear. I can do this alone.”

  The judge shook his head. “We’ll be with you until you reach the open sea.”

  There was no time to argue. Now Thorbjörn had taken command; he sent Ejolf and Styr to their own ship. They should take the Mount in the middle. “Sail!” he ordered his friend. “Set a full cloth. Your red sail will be hard to spot between the others at a distance. They’ll take you with them, and as soon as we reach my Sea Bird, it will join behind us, so no one will know for sure which egg our fleet is carrying away in its nest.”

  A weak wind barely reached the sails. Side by side, the convoy fought the ups and downs of the waves. In the meantime, the pursuer had sighted the ships and changed course. No doubt they would try to cut them off.

  “This brainless fool,” Thorbjörn cursed. “Does he not see that we’re the greater force? If he comes too close, we’ll turn him into a ghost ship.” Resolutely, he raised his arm. “Hold your weapons ready!” His order had been addressed to the escorts’ crew. “You, too,” he ordered the ten slaves on the Mount.

  Tyrkir had gone pale. “Do something,” he whispered to Erik. “Before another misfortune happens.”

  “You’re right.” The giant left the tiller to his friend and quickly went midship to the gode. “I didn’t know that you were so battle-addicted. I always thought I was the ruffian and you were the more prudent one.”

  “What choice do we have? After my failure at the Thing, I want to at least deliver you safely to the open sea. I swore that to myself.”

  “You’re a true friend. But perhaps we can do it without a battle.” Erik suggested that as soon as the pursuer had come within calling distance, he would lie down in the hold with the provisions. “Let them come close and ask for me. You are the skipper here, and you are just transferring my knarr to the south side, as you announced in Thorsness. And since we haven’t passed the glacier yet, we’re actually going in the right direction.”

  The gode rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand. “Why didn’t I come up with that myself?”

  Erik was silent. Suddenly, the breeze increased. To the right and left, the sails swelled. The red cloth also turned into a bulging wind belly. The men on the tiller adjusted course, and the formation skimmed faster and faster across the crests of the waves. The Sea Bird flew in their wake.

  One eye squinted shut, Erik estimated their distance across his stretched thumb and compared speeds. After a while, he grinned. “No battle today. And no questions, either. He can’t stop us anymore.”

  The tension faded, and the judge sighed from the bottom of his heart. “Would have been the first time that I . . .” He waved his hand. “I’m really much better at other things.”

  Standing next to each other at the mast tree, they watched as the pursuer finally gave up the hunt and turned back. Only a swarm of hungry seagulls held their speed effortlessly. “It’ll be a good day,” said Erik.

  The four ships reefed their sails when they reached the tip of the snowcapped peninsula. It was time for farewells. Styr and Ejolf from Hog Island came aboard the Mount once more.

  “When I find the land, I’ll come back.” The red one looked gravely from one man to the other. “I will never forget this—what you did for me. And if one of you ever needs help, I’ll give it freely, I swear.” They reached out their hands; then Ejolf and Styr returned wordlessly to their knarrs, accompanied by Thorbjörn.

  While the crew set the red sail again and the Mount detached itself from the formation, Erik called after the goden: “And tell Thjodhild, three years is not long. Tell her that!”

  Tyrkir stood at the stern stem. He waved. When the friends’ ships became smaller, he whispered, “Three years. That’s three long winters and three summers.” He turned around and went forward to the dragon’s head. The wind bit his scar, tasting salty on his tongue. He shivered.

  Hallweig

  Thjodhild did not cry. She’d listened to Thorbjörn with a stony face. When he fell silent, she took her son off the play mat and carried him outside through the hall. It was raining. The clouds hung low. She left the courtyard of Warm Spring Farm and walked spine straight along the narrow path to the steep cliff. There, she hid the little one’s head on her breast. The view to the west found no horizon; it was sucked up somewhere between the sea and the rain clouds.

  “Both of them. They both left us alone.” Thjodhild pressed her lips together to stop her chin from trembling. I would have gone with them. Whatever lies ahead, I belong at your side, not Katla.

  The thought of the maid alarmed her. Her helplessness turned into burning anger. Katla, with her round bottom and rocking breasts. No, don’t be unjust, she reproached herself. When the men started their war against the Breida farmer, you sent the maid aboard yourself. Because she is capable. And now, instead of you, she goes with them on the Mount into the unknown. Surrender to your fate!

  Thjodhild smiled bitterly—what a cursed phrase. As soon as Erik desires it, Katla will obey with joy. No, no breach of marriage. If a housewife is ill, absent, or just in a bad mood, the master used his slaves. “I must also accept this terrible tradition,” Thjodhild whispered. “But get used to it? No, I will never get used to it.”

  Leif thumped her with his arms and complained loudly about wetness and cold. “You’re right, we have to go back. It’s enough that your father and your godfather are wandering around out there in the rain.”

  The rumor of Erik’s banishment had probably reached every farm in Hawk Valley long before. Thjodhild feared the lies, and as soon as the weather improved, she had Thorbjörn send a servant to her parents. Through him, they should learn the truth: Erik was not a murderer, even if it seemed so now.

  Hallweig felt that her friend, full of sorrow, was withdrawing more and more. At the end of August, she asked Thjodhild to help her sew the long-promised women’s trousers.

  “Will you leave us?” Hallweig had bent deeper over the fabric.

  “What makes you think that?”

  “I don’t know exactly. Maybe because you’ve been talking more about your mother in the last few weeks.”

  Thjodhild absently pushed a loose strand of hair from her forehead. It is true, she thought. In my dreams, I am often at home again. But I don’t want to go back there.

  “Believe me, Leif and I feel safe here.” Nausea rose up in her. She breathed rapidly against it.

  “Are you ill?”

  “No, no. I’ll be all right in a minute.” Thjodhild had resolved to remain silent until she was sure herself. But Hallweig’s searching gaze demanded an answer. “Something has been going on in me for some time now,” she began slowly. “My bod
y is changing.”

  It was not necessary to say more. “Really? And I thought . . . Can it be, then?”

  “It is possible. Erik was with me the night before he sailed to Breidafjord. And since then, the blood has been absent.”

  “Such happiness.” Hallweig embraced her friend. “No, you must not leave, promise me. You must have your child here with me—with us—on Warm Spring Slope. Nowhere else.”

  “What about the father?” Thjodhild still struggled against her joy. “Only he can admit a baby into the family. He will be away for at least three years.”

  “Don’t think about that now! Men just get in the way of childbearing, anyway.” There was enough room in the sauna house, and Grima of Eagle Farm would have to be called in time. Hallweig’s cheeks glowed—she planned as if the birth were imminent. “Our Grima is the best midwife on the south coast.”

  “Slow down. It’ll only come after the next snow.”

  “I should hope so. The little one must have properly grown fingers and toes.” A thought drove the lady of Warm Spring Slope to the table. “Our trousers! I’ll extend the waistband of yours immediately, or they won’t fit over your belly.” Breathing sharply, she picked up her needle and fabric again. “What will it be?”

  Thjodhild raised her shoulders.

  “Then it will be a boy.” When Hallweig saw the puzzled look, she added, “I knew immediately that I was carrying a girl. That’s why you will have a son.”

  “I didn’t even know that particular wisdom.” Thjodhild was trying to remain straight-faced. “You really are a clever woman.” The corners of her mouth twitched treacherously, and as Hallweig returned the smile, they both laughed, each happy to hear the laughter of the other. Hallweig struggled for air, coughed, and continued to giggle. For the first time since Erik and Tyrkir had left, Thjodhild felt cheerful.

  Hallweig stood, turned in a circle, and held her trousers in such a way that the air puffed up the legs. “Well, what do you think?”