Dragons from the Sea

by Judson Roberts

  “How much do you want for this one?” I asked. I did not need so fine a chest, but its beauty awakened in me a longing to possess it.

  “That one?” the old man asked, and paused a moment, while he let his eyes slowly take my appearance in, from head to foot. “That one’s my finest work. I’ll sell it for three silver pennies—Hedeby penny-weight,” he added.

  The price, and the old man’s look, brought me back to my senses. The chest was beautiful, but it was not for such as me. I looked at the one the man was seated on. Though of a similar size to the fine chest, it was far plainer. Its planks were of pine, and its hinges and catch were rough iron forgings.

  “May I look at this one?” I asked. The old man stood up, straightening his back slowly as if it hurt him to do so. I opened the lid of the pine chest. It moved smoothly on its hinges, and mated well with the main body when closed. The planks were joined tightly together at their edges.

  “How much do you want for it?”

  “One silver penny,” the old man replied.

  Torvald snorted, and began making a show of scanning the market square, as though looking for another seller of chests. I appreciated the hint.

  “I’ll give you a half,” I said.

  “Hedeby weight?” the old man asked.

  His readiness to accept my offer seemed a sign that even at half a penny, I was paying too much, but I nodded, and fished from my belt pouch one of the English pennies I’d taken from Toke’s men when I’d killed them. The old man took a small set of scales from a pouch at his belt, weighed the coin, then set it atop a nearby block of wood and laid the blade of his knife across it.

  “Do you agree this cut is fair?” he asked.

  I nodded again. He hammered on the back of the blade with the stick he’d been whittling and it was done.

  As I’d suspected, we ended up having to locate a blacksmith to find the tools I needed. It turned out there were two smiths in Hedeby. The first had no tools to sell, but the second, an old man, had an extra set he’d once carried on sea voyages: a mid-weight hammer, its head flat-faced on one side and wedge-shaped on the other; a set of short iron tongs; a block of hardened steel about the size of one of Torvald’s fists to use as an anvil; and a small bellows made of leather and wood. I paid him what he asked without haggling, and felt myself lucky.

  I loaded my newly acquired tools into my sea chest and hoisted it onto my shoulder. We used the rest of Hastein’s silver to buy five bars of rough cast iron, which Torvald threw up onto his shoulder like they were sticks of firewood, and carried with far less apparent effort than my sea chest was costing me.

  When we returned to the campsite, Hastein was gone. Cullain was busy preparing the evening meal for Hastein and the captains of his other two ships, who would be joining him. Torvald immediately invited me to eat with him that evening.

  “You may share my tent tonight, too,” he said, gesturing grandly at a large cloak draped over crossed sticks to form a simple lean-to shelter, standing beside Hastein’s tent. “We have a large tent pitched on the shore for the rest of the crew to sleep in, but since they do not know yet that Jarl Hastein has invited you to join us, you would not be welcome there. Cullain,” he called, before the little Irishman could escape. “When you cook the evening meal for the jarl and his guests, be sure to cook enough for Halfdan and me, too.”

  Cullain, the top of whose head barely reached the middle of Torvald’s chest, glared at him but said nothing.

  “When will the crew be told about me?” I asked Torvald.

  “I think it best that they not learn until we’re ready to sail,” he replied. “I have a plan.”

  While I arranged my helm, cloaks, quivers, and other gear inside my sea chest, Torvald disappeared. He returned bearing a section of oak plank roughly as long as a man’s forearm, and as broad as the span of a hand. I wondered if it had been cut from one of the broken strakes removed from the Gull’s hull, for it was weathered, stained from being coated with pitch, and was pierced on one edge by a hole for a rivet. Two fresh holes had been bored in one end of the board, and a length of rope, knotted at one end, was draped through one of these holes.

  “What is that for?” I asked him.

  “You will see,” he replied, smiling. “In time.”

  During the last hour of daylight, and later by the light of a small fire we built in front of his shelter, Torvald sat working on the board, digging a shallow hole in it with the point of his knife. When I asked him what he was doing, he answered only, “In time.”

  I watched with interest when Hastein returned, accompanied by the captains of his other two ships. Both men looked to be as much as ten years older than Hastein, if not more. Their tunics were well made, of fine, brightly colored linen—expensive, though not as fine as the silk Hastein wore—and fine swords hung at their belts. Torvald told me their names: Svein captained the Sea Wolf and Stig the Serpent. Both appeared to be what Harald would have called “men of consequence,” yet they were content to follow Hastein, a much younger man. I longed to learn more about this jarl whom I, too, was now committed to follow.

  We ate and drank well that night, dining on the same food and drink Cullain prepared for Hastein and his captains—a privilege, I gathered, granted to Torvald as the jarl’s helmsman and personal guard. I found myself becoming quite fond of wine, despite my initial mistrust of its appearance. Torvald entertained me during our meal with more tales of his adventures with Hastein.

  After we finished, Torvald returned to his project with the board. He continued picking at the center of the plank with the point of his knife—a large seax poorly suited for such work—until he’d dug out a round hole in the wood almost as deep as the thickness of my finger. Finally he pulled a silver coin out of his pouch, laid it over the hole, nodded with satisfaction, and—after buffing it on his sleeve until it shone brightly in the firelight—hammered it with the pommel of his seax until he’d seated it firmly in the wood. Torvald looked quite pleased when he’d finished, and held it up for me to see.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “If it is supposed to be a silver coin hammered into a board, it is very fine indeed. Otherwise, I’m not sure.”

  Torvald laughed.

  “What is it for?” I asked.

  “In time,” he answered.

  The repairs on the Gull were completed by mid-morning of the following day. Hastein and Torvald summoned the crew, and with much straining they pushed the ship back down the log rollers into the water. Once she was afloat, an anchor was set to keep the ship lying parallel and close in to the shore.

  All around me, members of the crew stripped their clothes off, stowed them in their sea chests, and began wading out through the waist-deep water to load their gear on board the ship. Provisions—barrels of salted pork, live chickens in cages, kegs of ale, sacks of barley, and barrels of fresh water—were brought to the shoreline and ferried out in the Gull’s small-boat.

  Torvald bustled from one end of the ship to the other, supervising the crew as they loaded the provisions and their gear. As helmsman, it was his responsibility to see that the weight aboard ship was evenly distributed.

  Hastein, who’d been watching the refloating of his ship from the shore, walked over to where I was standing, watching the loading.

  “Why haven’t you loaded your gear on board yet?” he asked.

  “Torvald told me not to,” I replied. “He said to wait until he summoned me.”

  Hastein frowned at my answer. “Why?” he demanded.

  “I do not know,” I answered. I’d been wondering the same myself.

  “We need to finish loading the ship and get underway. Get yourself and your gear aboard. And find a position near the stern,” he added. “If we fight at sea I will likely be there, and I like my best archers near me, so I can direct their fire.”

  I’d brought my sea chest and the pigs of iron to my vantage place on the shore, so I could bring all aboard ship when Torvald
signaled that it was time. I bent over, picked up two of the rough iron ingots, and laid them across my shoulder.

  Hastein looked amused. “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “I am taking these pigs of iron out to the ship,” I answered. As you directed, I thought. I was surprised it was not obvious.

  “Are you going to wear your clothes in the water?”

  Actually, I had intended to. I was already nervous about the crew’s initial reaction to me. It could not help if I was naked when they first met me. The contrast between my youthful body and their heavily muscled and scarred ones would only highlight my lack of age and experience. But I did not want Hastein to think me a fool.

  Reluctantly I stripped, stowed my clothes in my sea chest, and began carrying the pigs of iron out to the ship. The water was extremely cold, and the rough metal ingots heavy and uncomfortable against my bare skin. It took two trips to carry all of them. Each time I arrived at the ship’s side, Torvald reached over and took the heavy bars from me like they weighed nothing.

  On my final trip, I carried my sea chest on one shoulder and held my shield and bow, which were too large to fit in the chest, high with my other hand. When I reached the ship’s side, Torvald was away, up in the front of the vessel. I stood, my teeth chattering, wondering how I was going to get on board. Finally, a pair of hands reached out and took my bow and shield. I waited, but they did not come back for my chest.

  “Some help,” I called, and a man leaned over the side.

  “Are you lost, little one?” he asked. He took my sea chest from my shoulder and set it on the deck, then extended an arm and helped me climb aboard.

  “Thank you,” I told him, once I was on deck.

  “It was nothing. I enjoy fishing,” he replied, “and you’re the biggest fish I’ve caught in a long time. Though still a little small for this ship.”

  The men around us laughed. Their faces were all bearded and weathered from lives spent outdoors, and even the youngest of them looked years older than me.

  As I stood there naked, cold, and shivering, I felt painfully aware that to these men I must have looked no more than a boy. The effect of the cold water had accentuated that appearance. I found my sea chest, dressed as quickly as I could, then turned to look for my bow and shield.

  A man seated on a chest nearby was holding my bow across his lap. He had strung it. When he saw me looking at him, he spoke. “What’s your name, boy?” he asked.

  He was not tall. In fact, he was shorter than me, but below his thick black beard his torso was massive, thicker twice over than mine, and his arms, bulging under the short-sleeved tunic he was wearing, were heavily muscled.

  “Halfdan,” I answered, and hoped there was nothing more he wished from me. He had a thick, heavy brow above his eyes, jutting out now in a scowl.

  “I am Tore,” he said. “I was looking at your bow.”

  When I said nothing, he continued. “It is well made, and has a heavy draw. Few men choose to shoot a bow this strong. I am the only man among the crew of the Gull who does.”

  No longer, I thought.

  “This is a very fine bow for a boy like you to possess,” he continued. It had angered me that he’d presumed to string my bow. The tone of his voice and the sneer on his face were angering me even more.

  “I agree,” I said. “It is a very fine bow, for anyone to possess. But it is mine. And I am not a boy.” I held out my hand for it, but he did not give it to me.

  “How did a boy like you come to own such a fine bow, and what are you doing on this ship with it?”

  “I made it,” I answered through gritted teeth. “My bow and I are aboard this ship because I am an archer, and a member of this crew.”

  Tore’s face turned red at this news. “I am the chief archer on this ship,” he said. “I was not aware we were getting another archer in our crew.”

  Torvald’s voice came from behind me. “And I was not aware, Tore, that Jarl Hastein was required to ask you before he added a new archer to the crew. I do not think he’s aware of that, either, but he’s up at the bow right now. Come, let us go ask him, if you’d like.”

  “The jarl chooses whom he pleases,” Tore said sullenly. “But we are all experienced warriors here. A boy like this does not belong in this crew.”

  Torvald tugged at his beard and looked puzzled.

  “I confess, it seemed strange to me, also, that the jarl should invite him to join us. He is a blacksmith, though, and we have none. Perhaps that is why the jarl offered him a position. And I understand he does have some skill with his bow.”

  “Some skill!” Tore roared. The loudness of his voice caused men the length of the ship to turn and stare at him. “Many men have some skill, yet few have the right to serve on the Gull.”

  Torvald shrugged his shoulders. “Perhaps he has more than just some skill,” he suggested.

  I wondered what Torvald’s plan was, and when I would see it. So far, things did not seem to be going well.

  Hastein made his way to the rear of the ship. “Is there a problem back here?” he asked. “Torvald, you are supposed to be getting my ship under way.”

  “It is this boy, my jarl,” Tore said. “It dishonors us all to have one so young and inexperienced serve with us. We are all chosen men who have proved our worth.”

  A number of the crew had gathered around us by this time, and they murmured their agreement with Tore. I saw no friendly expressions on the faces staring back at me.

  “You speak the truth, Tore,” Torvald said. “We have all proved our worth, but this boy has not. It is not only an insult to have him in our company. It could be dangerous, too. We do not know if he can be depended on in a fight.”

  “Aye, aye.” The men around us murmured louder now, and their glares at me were even more hostile. I stared at Torvald, stunned by his words. Hastein also looked surprised—and displeased. The muscles in his jaw clenched, and his face began to turn red, the color creeping up his neck above his tunic like a rising tide.

  “Perhaps, Tore,” Torvald suggested, “we should test him now. We could set a mark, and you could shoot at it against him. A boy this young should not hope to serve with us unless he can beat our best. Only if he outshoots you can he stay. If you win, you can throw him back overboard.”

  Jarl Hastein and I both glared at Torvald, but he smiled broadly back at us. “I like this plan,” he said. “I think it is a good one.”

  Tore seemed to like the plan, too.

  “Do you want to leave on your own now, boy?” He sneered at me. “Or do you want to be thrown off the ship?”

  Torvald had walked over to his sea chest and opened it.

  “This would make a fine mark to shoot at,” he said, and pulled out the board with the coin embedded in it.

  Torvald walked the length of the ship to the bow and, using the rope attached to the board, tied his target to the front stem-post of the ship, below the gilded dragon head. Then he sauntered back to where we stood, whistling a tune as he walked. By now, everyone in the crew had taken an interest in what was unfolding.

  “That coin is a small mark,” Tore said. “Where do you propose we shoot from?”

  “From the stern deck, of course,” Torvald said. “You’re a master archer. Too easy a shot would insult you. One arrow each. The closest to the coin wins the contest.”

  I held out my hand to Tore.

  “What do you want, boy?” he snapped.

  “I cannot shoot without my bow,” I answered. He turned his head and spat.

  “You think you have a chance of besting me?” he demanded. I said nothing, but met his gaze without flinching, and hoped I looked more confident than I felt. Finally Tore slapped my bow into my outstretched hand, then reached behind him and lifted his own from where it lay, wrapped in a deerskin case, behind his sea chest. He stripped the case off the bow, stood, and strung it.

  I opened my sea chest and carefully selected an arrow from one of the quivers inside. I checked
and smoothed the feather fletching, then sighted along it, to be sure it had not taken a bend since the last time I’d shot it.

  Tore, apparently not one to brood or ponder before taking action, stepped up onto the small, raised deck at the stern of the ship, beside the steering oar, and laid an arrow across his bow.

  “I will shoot first,” he announced.

  “Tore,” Torvald said, “I will bet you three silver pennies to one that this boy outshoots you.”

  Tore lowered his bow and glared at him. “Damn you, Torvald,” he said. “Do you think to throw me off that easily? That is a wager I will take and win.”

  Up and down the ship, other men began to call out. “Will you give me that wager also, Torvald?” “Three pennies to one for me on Tore, Torvald.” “I’ll take your silver, too.”

  A look of concern flitted across Torvald’s face, as though he was regretting the words he’d spoken. Then he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Very well. Who wants the wager?”

  In all, thirteen men came forward—fourteen, counting Tore. Torvald stood to win fourteen silver pennies if I outshot Tore. But if I lost, it would cost him forty-two. I wondered if Torvald was still pleased with his plan.

  Tore raised his bow again and pulled it back to full draw. Men scurried away from the center of the deck and the arrow’s path. The ship was rocking gently from the waves lapping against her hull. I watched Tore’s knees flex with the motion, compensating, while his upper body remained still as stone. He held his arrow at full draw for a long time, aiming the shot.

  When Tore finally released, all heads turned, following the arrow’s flight. It streaked the length of the deck and thudded solidly into the oak board, two finger-widths below and only slightly to the left of the coin. Had it not been low, his arrow would have nicked the coin’s edge.

  I was impressed. Tore, judging from the broad grin on his face, was also. He stepped down from the stern deck and swaggered past Torvald. As he did, he reached out a hand and jigged the pouch at Torvald’s belt. “This will soon be lighter,” he said with a smirk.