And now you may go… As if he was some servant, some stable hand to be dismissed. He walked along. He heard her voice.
“You are carrying our child!” he shouted into the rain, but the words came out as more of a protracted groan than as real communication.
Harald had no idea whose tent they had been in, but clearly Brigit did. Her words had stunned him like a club to the side of the head. If they had not, if he had been able to think, he would have pulled his sword from his sheath and killed them all, save for Brigit. Killed them all and taken Brigit back to where she belonged. He would have killed them or he would have died in the attempt.
Instead, he had been so dumbfounded by her casual dismissal that he could do nothing but obey. He was halfway back to his own people before it dawned on him what he should have done.
“How could you do this?” he cried. The depth of this betrayal was more than he could wrap his mind around. He thought of those times when they had sailed out of sight of land, when he had looked down into the sea below the ship and wondered how many miles deep the water ran. It gave him an unsettled feeling, bordering on panic, to think on it. This feeling was akin, but now he had no ship below him; now he was sinking down, down into the darkness.
He was pretty sure that he was crying, but with the rain he could not tell, which was something of a blessing. Water ran down his face, into his eyes, which were not really focused anyway, so at first he did not see the two men moving toward him. When he did, he stopped in his tracks and blinked the rain away. He reached for the hilt of his sword, but he realized he did not have the will or the strength to even defend himself, so he let his hand drop to his side once again.
They drew nearer, and Harald could see there was something undeniably familiar about them. He wiped more rain from his eyes and watched them approach. And then he recognized them.
Father? Starri? Of course… he thought. He had been walking back to them, back to his people, without even thinking about it.
The sight of the two men coming for him filled him with hope and comfort, like stepping out of a cold night into a home with a fire blazing. That was what his father had always meant to him.
He was right… The realization dawned on Harald. About Brigit, about all of it, he was right…. And with that thought, all of the good feelings were gone, and in their place, humiliation, despair. He, Harald Thorgrimson, Harald Broadarm, had been so certain. He had learned to speak the Irish language. He had insisted he did not want to return to Vik, that his new life was in Ireland. He had defied his father on that point, had actually fought with him. He had envisioned himself on the throne of Tara.
And Thorgrim had been right all along. It was more than Harald could stand.
No, no, no… he thought. His father would not gloat or hold it over him, but that would make it worse, in its own way. His grandfather would laugh. He could hear it.
No, he could not stand it, any of it. He would do what he should have done. He would take Brigit back or he would die in the attempt. Now, of course, that second option was all but certain, but that was no matter. He could not go back to his people, not after having been played for such a fool.
His father and Starri were close enough now that he could see them clearly. His father was waving, and through the constant drum of the rain he could hear him calling his name. Harald felt his determination wavering, but he clenched his teeth and forced himself to recall the agony he had been feeling an instant before.
His hand reached across his waist and his fingers wrapped around the familiar grip of his sword. He pulled the blade from its sheath, the weapon nicely balanced in his hand.
I have never named you, he thought, his eyes running over the long, double-edged blade. He had often cast around for a good name, but none had ever come to him.
Vengeance Seeker, he thought. Yes, that’s good. Vengeance Seeker. He looked at the sword. “You shall be Vengeance Seeker, for as long as we are together,” he said. “But I don’t think it will be long, not on this earth.” With that he turned and faced the camp from which he had come.
He could see the soldiers standing in a loose line, not a shieldwall, but something like. He started walking toward them, his pace purposeful and determined now. He moved faster. The walk became a jog, then a flat out run. He held Vengeance Seeker over his head. A battle cry formed in his chest and then burst from his mouth, a wild undulating howl of pure mindless bloodlust. It echoed around the field as he plunged, single handed,
into the fight.
Chapter Forty-Three
In fury we fought battles,
fire swept through men’s homes,
we made bloody bodies
slump dead by city gates.
Egil’s Saga
Thorgrim and Starri stopped in their tracks, drawn up short by Harald’s utterly unexpected move. “What by Thor’s hammer does he think he’s doing?” Thorgrim asked.
For a moment they just watched him as his pace increased, as he raised his sword above his head and shouting out across the field. “What, by the gods…” Thorgrim said. He looked over at Starri, but Starri’s eyes were fixed on Harald and he was rubbing the arrowhead hanging around his neck. He was grinning.
“He’s taking the fight to the enemy,” Starri said. “None of us old women standing around would do it, but he will.”
“The enemy?” Thorgrim said, nodding toward the camp. “We don’t even know who they are. Anyway, he can’t fight them all, not all by himself. What do we do now?”
Starri turned his gaze from Harald and met Thorgrim’s eyes. He had that crazed look that Thorgrim had seen before, when there was fighting to be done and Starri ready to do it. “Thorgrim Night Wolf has to ask this?” he said. “What to do? We join him!”
With that, Starri dropped the arrowhead, pulled his short sword from its sheath, his battle ax from his belt and leapt forward, bolting like a startled deer, going from dead still to a flat out run in the blink of an eye. And not just running. Running and waving his weapons and howling like the mad berserker he was.
Thorgrim felt suddenly very alone, his friend and his son racing off to join a battle that had not yet begun, his men back at the tree line and himself standing alone in the middle of the open ground, the rain pouring down. For a second, no more, he looked back and forth, lost in indecision. Then, with a howl of disgust, disgust with himself, mainly, he pulled his sword and turned to the men in the woods behind him. “To arms! To arms! Follow me! Rally to me!” he shouted, as loud as his formidable voice could shout. “To me!”
The men came out of the trees like a breaking wave. One moment there was nothing, just the still and motionless woods, and then the Vikings burst screaming from the trees, weapons raised, cresting and roiling and charging forward. Thorgrim waited one second, two seconds, until he was sure that they were all on the move, that their momentum would carry them across the length of open ground without his having to urge them on. And when he was satisfied that they were moving forward, that they would join in the fight as quickly as they humanly could, he turned and raised Iron-tooth and ran after Harald and Starri and the distant enemy he did not even know.
Ruarc mac Brain saw them first. The others, Breandan mac Aidan, his officers, Brigit, were looking toward Tara when Ruarc noticed the movement to their right.
“Here they come,” he said. “Bloody fools.”
At that distance, the better part of a mile away, he could not make out much in the way of detail, but the sight of a hoard of men making a disordered attack was unmistakable. They came rushing out from what had been the effective cover of the trees – Ruarc had not even known they were there. But they had tossed that advantage away. Even from Norsemen he might have expected a more orderly approach, a shieldwall or what they called a swine array, but this was just a headlong rush. Suicide, really.
“Is this a reason to be concerned?” Brigit asked. She did not sound very concerned.
“No, I think not,” Ruarc said. “It was clev
er of them, hiding the right wing of their force in the trees. Might have been put to good effect. They would have done well to make an approach through the woods, the way that young Northman brought you here. Never saw you coming. If they’d done that, and timed their attack well, they might have had our right flank, rolled it right up. As it is, they will exhaust themselves running across the field, and we’re not just forewarned, we practically have time for a nap before they get here.”
The others grunted with amusement at that. “These fellows here,” Breandan said, pointing toward Tara and taking up the narrative for his lord, “will make an attack as well, hope to catch us between two armies, as it were.”
“They will catch you between two armies, will they not?” Finnian asked. “After all, they have two armies, and you but one.”
“We’ll divide our force, left wing and right wing. We’ve men enough, and these are only heathens, here,” Ruarc said, “or so it appears. We’ll advance a few hundred yards and meet them on the field, no need to fight with our arses resting on the camp.”
He said that for the benefit of Brigit and Father Finnian. He had no need to explain his thinking to Breandan mac Aidan and his other officers. They were skilled enough, and they had all fought together long enough, that such elementary orders were unnecessary. Indeed, Ruarc was still explaining the situation when Breandan and the others made quick bows in his direction then hurried off to form the men up.
So who are you? Ruarc wondered. These men coming from the woods, they were the fin gall who had accompanied Brigit from Dubh-linn. Or so she said. But what of the men who had come through Tara’s gate? They seemed to be working with Brigit’s men, or they probably would have retreated in the face of his army. Did Morrigan have her own fin gall army? Was Brigit playing a double game here?
Ruarc shook his head. “Father Finnian,” he said, “why does everything in Ireland have to be so damnably complicated?”
A shieldwall was meant as a stationary defense, or a line moving forward. It was not intended as a formation for retreat, which is why the men under Arinbjorn’s command had covered no more than twenty yards when the others burst from the woods, three quarters of a mile away, coming from the exact direction in which Arinbjorn’s men were going. Arinbjorn did not even notice them until Hrolleif the Stout bellowed, “Now who’s this? By the gods, these people are dropping out of the sky!”
Arinbjorn turned. He saw a hundred or so men, emerging from the woods on a run, following Harald Thorgrimson, who was now running back in the direction in which he had come. Arinbjorn frowned and shook his head and tried to imagine what all of this could mean. Who were these men? Was Thorgrim with them, or in that distant camp? Or nowhere at all nearby?
Hrolleif was shouting again. “The gods don’t think much of our retreating, and come to think on it, neither do I!”
“See here, Arinbjorn,” Ingolf said. Arinbjorn pulled his eyes from this new host and looked where Ingolf was pointing with his sword. A moment before, the men-at-arms in the distant camp had been standing in a loose and undisciplined line, taking little interest in Arinbjorn’s retrograde motion. But they were taking interest now. Down the long length of the hill they could see the armed men forming in two divisions, one to meet the threat from the men from the woods, one to advance against Arinbjorn’s shieldwall.
“Those men, they must think these fellows who’ve come from the wood are part of our force,” Arinbjorn said.
“Of course they think that, you god-forsaken idiot!” Hrolleif shouted.
“Very well, then, Hrolleif, who is so wise,” called Bolli Thorvaldsson, who was standing at Arinbjorn’s side and pointing toward the men from the wood line, “who are these men?”
“I don’t know! How by Thor’s arse should I know? Ingolf, do you know?”
Ingolf shook his head. “I don’t know and I don’t much care, right now. These men-at-arms yonder are making ready to attack. We can either turn and flee back to the ships like a bunch of girls, or we can advance like men. What will it be?”
The rest apparently felt as Hrolleif did, that they were done with retreating, and their fighting spirit was bolstered by the sight of the hundred or so screaming Northmen on their left flank, now a half a mile away and racing headlong for the enemy. A cheer rippled along the line and built in strength, swords were held high or beaten against shields, cheers turned into battle shouts, and with never an order given, the shieldwall, which had stopped in its retreat, now rolled forward, down the long hill, down at the enemy advancing toward them.
Thorgrim’s left foot snagged in some imperfection hidden by the grass. He stumbled for a few steps, caught himself before he fell, and ran on. He had nearly gone down, and worse, he realized that he had nearly allowed himself to go down. His chest was burning, his legs were aching, his breath was coming in gasps. He actually longed to stumble and collapse into the soft green grass, to lay motionless in the rain. To stop. Just stop.
He staggered on for a few more yards and then he did stop, because he could not physically go any further. The old wound in his side throbbed, but it was too far healed now to open up again without significant help. He bent nearly double, hands on his knees, gasping. He looked up. Harald and Starri had been drawing away from him since he had first gone after them. He had envisioned catching up with them, ordering them to stop, making them join the others. They would be slaughtered if they charged the enemy’s line, just the two of them.
But he soon realized that he could not catch them, and then he realized he could not even run all the way across the open ground. There had been a time, a decade or so earlier, that he would have kept up with them and likely beaten them, but those days were gone. So he had called out for them to stop, but by then he was so winded that he could not make his voice heard over the rain. And then he was done.
He was still heaving for breath when he straightened and turned to see where the others were. He had started with a lead of a quarter mile on them, but now they were only a few dozen yards behind. And behind them, quite far behind, Ornolf the Restless was stumbling and staggering after.
At least I am not the most pathetic old man here, Thorgrim thought. He straightened and as the men grew closer, he held up his hands to stop them. He could not prevent Harald and Starri from making their death run, but he could prevent these men from being butchered for want of discipline. And maybe they could reach Harald and Starri in time.
“Swine array!” he shouted, his words coming out more like a gasp than the powerful command he was trying for. “I’ll take the lead, form up on me!” He ran his eyes over them, men he did not really know, until he found the one he was looking for. He was more bear than man, over six feet in height and broad and stable as an old oak. His sword was like a toy in his hand, his shield like a dinner plate.
“You there, what’s your name?”
“Godi.”
“Godi, with me. The rest of you get in order, quickly now.” The swine array, Odin’s arrow, was designed to break sheildwalls. Two men took the lead, with three behind them, and then four and then five, creating a great human arrowhead that could break through the wall of interlocking shields and reduce the fight to a massive brawl, to the great advantage of the Viking horde.
“Thorgrim, take my shield,” one of the men – Thorgrim did not know his name – stepped up and handed him a bright painted red and white wooden disk.
“Thank you,” Thorgrim said. He had left his own shield behind, because when he had gone after Harald he had not expected to be racing into battle, and in the agony of running it had slipped his mind entirely.
Harald does not have a shield, he thought, nor does Starri. Starri, of course, never carried a shield because he did not want anything that might interfere with his being killed on the field of battle. But Thorgrim did not like to think about Harald hitting the shieldwall with no shield of his own.
“Let us go!” he shouted, his voice coming back. “Let us go and let us bring bloody murder to t
hese sons of whores!” A cheer went up, loud and gratifying, because the men were charged with fighting spirit and it had not occurred to them that they did not know who this enemy was, or why they were doing battle with him.
Thorgrim turned and headed off across the field once more, his breathing restored, his sense of purpose renewed, because he, at least, knew why he was fighting. The enemy was closer than he had thought, and that too gave him hope. He could see Harald and Starri ahead of them, halfway between them and the enemy line.
Maybe they won’t be such fools, Thorgrim thought. Maybe they’ll stop before they are cut down. He knew, however, that it was too much to hope that Starri would do the reasonable thing, and he could only hope that Harald would. And so he ran, shield thumping against his side, his soft leather shoes parting the wet grass, ran to get into the fight before any hurt came to his son, his boy, his boy whose feelings he had so callously, thoughtlessly brushed aside.
There was nothing, Harald realized, that cleared the mind and honed it razor sharp quite as effectively as a mile run through driving rain at an enemy that outnumbered you two hundred to one.
His breath was starting to come hard as he and Starri closed the last ten rods. Running across the field, he had watched the enemy forming from a loose line into a real shieldwall, and he was pleased that they considered Starri and him as threat enough that they needed to take such measures. But as the physical exertion drained the fury away, and Harald considered the solid shieldwall before him, he began to see that they were not quite the threat he hoped, and that they would be lucky to take even a few of them out before they were cut down.
Dubh-linn: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 2) Page 36