by M. K. Hume
Awake before sunrise, the village menfolk slid their small hide-and-wood craft into the sea and rowed out beyond the breakers to cast their nets into deeper waters as soon as the sun crept over the horizon. Their womenfolk cured the cleaned fish in small smokehouses while the children scoured the shoreline for miles in search of shellfish, crabs, and the seaweed that bulked out their diet. More young boys and youths were busy tending livestock in the hills above the village where cows and sheep were allowed to graze. Fattened pigs were kept in pens at the edge of the cliffs outside the palisades, cared for by the women. On the bleak pastures that lay above the cliffs, shepherds’ huts that were little more than ramshackle kennels provided shelter for the older youths who cared for the village’s livestock. When winter came, the animals were penned in deep caverns in the cliffs similar to other caves where surplus food, hay, and the valuables of the community were stored behind the stockade. If attacking marauders should pierce the defenses of the village and reached the deep caves, the breach hardly mattered, for all the villagers would be dead.
World’s End was as self-sufficient as the populace could possibly make it. The small, dark people were quite unlike their Dene cousins, and surely harked back to earlier settlers who had tamed this inhospitable coastline long before the Jutes, Angles, or the Goths appeared in these lands.
The villagers had lived in much the same way for a thousand years and were sustained by their isolation, their worship of Mother Sea, and a respect for all things that lived in the whorl of their narrow world. To face the capriciousness of the ocean, day in and day out, required a courage so fundamental that it shriveled the contest of man against man, or army against army, into mere exercises of avoidable self-preservation.
Beyond all logic, and with the full knowledge that their frail boats could capsize in high seas and tidal flows could sweep them far out into the ocean where their oars could never hope to bring them home, these fishermen went out to sea, again and again, with smiling faces and laughing eyes.
Arthur was learning to see into the inner hearts that people kept hidden behind cheerful facades. As Bedwyr had often explained to him, eyes rarely lied. The disproportionately large number of single women of all ages in this community, coupled with a deep sadness that rested behind their eyes, reflected the losses of their menfolk to a power stronger than any god—the power of the sea.
When Arthur was woken by his host, Ivar Rhunsen the Netmaker, he was informed that Stormbringer awaited him with the elders, and that many of the decisions to be made would affect him and the other captives. With alacrity, Arthur dressed, paying particular attention to his tangled hair and trying to slick his curly locks down into some semblance of neatness. He regretted that he had no time to wash his filthy feet, but his boots would cover the worst of the grime. Chewing on a twig and with his face glowing from the cold water that he’d used to sluice his hands and face, Arthur hurried in the wake of his elderly host, who was amazingly nimble for a man in his fifties.
A council had been called in one of the largest of the village huts, which housed strange stones marked with odd symbols that Stormbringer called runes. Woodcarvers had created the likenesses of boars, bears, wolves, great whales, fish, serpents, and birds out of bleached driftwood and painted them naturalistically. Stormbringer told him these figures were totems of the ancient clans who had once lived in this village. Around the familiar fire pit, three elderly men and one old woman sat quietly as they waited for Arthur to be seated. In the shadows of the windowless hut, Arthur caught a glimpse of Maeve’s white face, but she slipped back out of the light to join two other shrouded female figures.
“Please apologize to Eamonn pen Bors, for he hasn’t been invited to attend this meeting,” Stormbringer began. “Sigmund, the village headman, deems that you should speak for your fellow Britons. I speak for the Dene but, as you’ve probably divined, the people of World’s End are an older tribe than my own people. We need their help if Sea Wife is to be made ready for the voyage we must undertake because we have no other way to leave these shores.”
Nodding his head in greeting, Arthur bowed respectfully to the three elderly men, one of whom was his host with the forked beard. Then he seated himself cross-legged on the sod floor.
As the three old men spoke together in a language that Arthur couldn’t hope to decipher, the young man spent his time examining his hosts through careful eyes. These folk were even shorter than Eamonn, and were quite dark in hair and skin coloring, despite having paler eyes.
The old woman was a withered crone. Her empty breasts sagged within a cowl of sealskin while a necklace of bear claws, obviously very old, adorned her scrawny neck. But her eyes were youthful, snapping and bright brown like berries that had just come to ripeness. Under her cool gaze, Arthur felt exposed and vulnerable.
The meeting continued in the same tongue, while Stormbringer translated for Arthur’s benefit whenever such a service was needed. Stormbringer was told that Sea Wife had been beached in a nearby cove. Out of respect for Erikk, their erstwhile master, the villagers had dragged his vessel onto wooden rollers and positioned it above the level of the highest tide. Then the enclosure used for repairs had been made watertight to stop the winter storms from dragging the hull back into the deep waters.
These precautions had meant that Sea Wife was in far better condition than Stormbringer would have expected. The villagers had known that such a valuable craft would be needed one day, so basic maintenance was carried out assiduously. They still cared for Erikk’s craft as if she had been one of their own fishing boats, by keeping her timbers supple and checking her hull for sprung boards.
Arthur was forced to marvel at the combined efforts of the villagers as they strove to complete these nonessential tasks when the strain of their daily battle for survival was so critical.
Stormbringer was pleased to hear that little maintenance would be required to make the ship seaworthy for its new owner. Her sails would need repairs, and she needed all her joints waterproofed with pitch and resin. Other smaller repairs would take very little time for skilled sailors, and these could be carried out at sea.
With luck, Sea Wife would be ready for a sea voyage within a week.
The council decided that Stormbringer’s warriors would be put to work on Sea Wife. The villagers would assist where they could, and would provide food and shelter for the thirty-three men and two women who had arrived on their doorstep unannounced, despite this decision straining their resources to the very limit.
“We can provide some assistance to the village,” Arthur announced determinedly when he was given details of the village headmen’s discussion with Stormbringer. “I can’t help with the ship’s repairs, but I can hunt for whatever game exists along the foreshore. Eamonn knows small boats and fishing far better than I, and Blaise is expert at making traps to catch wild game. Meanwhile, Maeve can help me when she is able to walk freely.” He shook his head with regret. “The only skill I have in abundance is the world of killing, war, and death, but I will offer my services to Stormbringer and to the village in any way that they can use me.”
Stormbringer translated Arthur’s words while the three older men listened with bland, unreadable faces. Then, after conversing quietly with the other two men, the headman nodded towards Arthur and spoke rapidly in his own tongue.
“Sigurd insists that there is no debt to repay, for the Mother requires that all travelers who are in need should be given food and shelter,” Stormbringer translated. “But they will accept our offer of a gift in the Mother’s name, although there is no debt as such.”
Arthur pondered the similarities between the simple people of all lands. The worship of gods such as the Celtic Mother of All Things, Don, or She Who Must Not Be Named, seemed a common one the world over; he sometimes wondered if Mary, the Holy Virgin, simply presented another face of the Mother to the world. Nervously, Arthur crossed himself, for blasphemy still
remained a sin, even if thought on rather than uttered.
During the silence of the morning, the fire pit glowed with a small explosion as a collapsing log flamed into sudden life. The old wisewoman rose and moved around to stand at Arthur’s side. Without any words, another woman picked up the old woman’s stool and placed it beside Arthur so the old woman could rest her old bones comfortably while she was speaking to him.
Her power was tangible, and her status was so high in the eyes of the villagers that she had no need to flaunt it
“Give me your hand, young man,” the old woman demanded in the Dene language.
Then she smiled for a brief moment, and Arthur could imagine the beauty she had once been under her drawn bones and wrinkled skin.
“I am Freya. I am the wisewoman of this village, and I’m sorry if I appeared to be rude. The people in the village treat me far too well, perhaps because I have a little knowledge of herbs and I am able to read the signs of weather that are given to us by Mother Ocean. May I be permitted to read your hand?”
The force of her nature almost overrode the warning voice in his head, but Arthur complied without a second’s thought. The old woman began to massage his open palm and his long callused fingers with her own still-strong fingers and thumbs.
“Aiee! Your life is written in the scars on your hands, and you have worked overlong at your craft.
“Both of your hands are so marked,” she said quietly as she examined his other hand, paying attention to all the old breaks from battle injuries and the years of weapons practice.
“Will you cast my stones for me?” she asked. “I know you don’t believe in them and have sworn your life to the Crucified One, but please permit me my curiosity. As you can see, they are only black pebbles that have been washed up by the sea. They have been marked with ancient runes and handed down to me by my mother and her mother before her. I swear they cannot hurt you.”
Arthur took the smooth, black stones in his right hand. The faces of the pebbles were inscribed with linear patterns that had been scratched deeply into the stone. Even after the touch of hundreds of fingers, the lines had scarcely been blurred. Arthur closed his eyes, and then rolled the stones onto the sod floor.
He heard the indrawn hiss of breath from between the woman’s missing teeth, but he refused to open his eyes. Once again the stones were returned to him—this time in his left hand.
“Cast again, young man,” the old woman murmured. “What is, and what will be, are only shadows of possibilities, so you should have no fear.”
Arthur threw the pebbles onto the sod floor again, this time from his left hand. He could feel the silence that followed the gentle thuds when the stones hit the foot-hardened earth.
He opened his eyes and stared directly at the old woman seated next to him.
The headman and his two companions looked questioningly at Freya. And so, slowly at first, but becoming faster and more assured as she warmed to her task, Freya began to speak. Stormbringer refused to meet his eyes and the three old men were looking at him with unreadable expressions.
When she was finished, Arthur tried to capture the Sae Dene’s attention, but the tall captain kept his eyes steadfastly on the members of the council. Then, when they were dismissed, and Stormbringer and Arthur rose to their feet, they bowed to the elderly headman and backed out of the central hut. By the time they had moved away from listening ears, Arthur’s curiosity was unbearable.
“What was that all about, Stormbringer? What was the purpose of the stones?”
Stormbringer’s golden eyebrows furrowed with a blend of irritation and consideration.
“Freya is a soothsayer who has won fame as one who has been touched by the gods. In the past, she regularly traveled throughout these islands, but, twenty years ago, when her daughter was murdered during a Jute raid, she retreated from the world. Only a select few know that she came here to World’s End, so I ask that you remain silent about her presence—to everyone!”
It was Arthur’s turn to be confused and distracted.
“But why? Why must we be silent about her, even if she’s genuine and can read the future like an opened scroll? And why does everyone bow and scrape around her?”
“Why can’t you take me at my word? Must everything with you be explained and kicked to death until you’re satisfied with the answers you’ve been given?” Stormbringer was cross but, given Arthur’s stiff mouth and impatient walk, he wasn’t surprised.
Then, as they reached the seafront where the Dene warriors waited with their borrowed tools, Stormbringer came to a decision.
“The wisewoman spoke mostly of Maeve, whom she called the Woman of Blood. She is certain that your sister will be the mother of a line of kings that will, in time, rival the Scylding line. She ordered me to protect the Woman of Blood, or death would come to us all. She told me that Maeve would save us from the Great Horror—whatever that is!”
Arthur absorbed this information. If he was honest, he was a little disappointed at not being at the center of the wisewoman’s advice. However, he nodded and felt a frisson of pride in his sister.
“I’m pleased that my sister has been placed under your protection, my friend. I can’t think of a safer place for her to be if I can’t take her home to Mother Elayne and Father Bedwyr.”
He paused because he knew that his eyes were beginning to tear up from homesickness. “They must be desolated after losing both their eldest son and their youngest daughter on the one day. I hope they are well, and I pray for it nightly.”
“I should also tell you, my friend, that Freya swears that you will eventually return to your own lands and you will become the King of Winter, whatever that means! To set your mind at ease, Freya is a daughter of Hrolf Kraki’s grandfather. She is of noble birth and is much beloved, but she was forced to leave the court while Snaer ruled, if only to ensure her own survival. Later, after Snaer was dead, the runes told her that she must remain in World’s End, for it is a place where she can perform a great service for her people.”
“Hmmmff! That would be a wise decision to make, given the murderous ways of those persons who rule in Heorot at the moment. Can you imagine that bitch, Aednetta, allowing a noblewoman with the Sight to remain in her ambit? Freya would have died of poison before the first month was out.”
Stormbringer clapped Arthur on the back. “Freya asked if you might stay in the village with a detachment of my men under your command. The rest of us will be working on Sea Wife by day and by night, so I can only spare six men. We won’t be far away if any trouble should arise, but Sea Wife must be our first priority.”
“Of course!” Arthur agreed with pleasure, for he would have promised anything to repay these villagers. “We haven’t seen the last of Hrolf Kraki or Aednetta Fridasdottar. I don’t need to be a sorcerer to know that he’s not about to let us go free.”
Stormbringer nodded. Long years of serving the Dene kings had taught him that men of power will never forgive someone who has offended them.
Within half an hour, the Dene warriors had been formed into two lines. Then, burdened with tools and packs of supplies, they trotted along the beach while Arthur, Eamonn, their two sisters, and the six men who had been detailed to stay behind watched their departure with the full gamut of emotions written on their faces.
The warriors who remained were eager to be part of the renovation and seaworthiness of Erikk’s old vessel, so to be ordered to guard the village, to fish, to hunt, and to work like farmers was almost an insult. Arthur understood the waves of resentment that hummed out of them.
Bedwyr had been more than a father throughout Arthur’s childhood and young manhood, providing a living example of how a man should live and act. In recent times, Stormbringer had also filled parts of that role in a totally alien world where Arthur had no rights and no power. The young Briton was even forced to accept his captor’s charity in t
he provision of food and shelter. The man in Arthur resented his loss of autonomy, but under a thin veneer of resentment, he both liked and respected Stormbringer as his lifeline for a return to Britain and the felicity of his family.
Arthur’s booted foot scraped at the pebbles, mud, and sand of the beach in a circular motion. The pebbles were like Freya’s rune-marked stones, so Arthur was sure that she, or an ancestor, had picked them up on a similar shore in days gone by before they had been turned into a conduit to whatever power guided the universe. Lost in thought, Arthur barely noticed that the last of the departing warriors were clambering over the rocks on the headland, while the main body of the troop had disappeared beyond the breakers. When he looked up again, the black beach with its tide line of seaweed, the grey sky, and the heaving, slate-colored sea were all bare. A single gull swept over the waves, screaming raucously at a sighted prey that was too large for its claws.
“Well, Eamonn, it’s time to do what we promised,” Arthur said to his friend as bracingly as he could before turning to Blaise. “I’ll need your clever fingers to make me some particularly vicious and effective rabbit traps. Meanwhile, we continue to eat the supplies provided by our benefactors, so it’s time to work and repay some of the debt we owe to them. I won’t be happy until we find stores for these kind people that will replace the food we’ve eaten.”
Without needing to speak further, the Britons climbed up the shelving beach towards the village and the path behind it that led up the cliff. The first day of Arthur’s stewardship of World’s End had begun.
The Battle of World’s End
Chapter XV
BLOOD AND COURAGE
It is perfectly certain that the soul is immortal and imperishable, and our souls will actually exist in another world.