Dragons from the Sea

by Judson Roberts

  Thrice I found arrows embedded in Franks who still lived. The first time it happened, I drew my dagger and approached the wounded man cautiously. He was whimpering and clutching at the arrow sticking out of his chest. He coughed, causing blood to trickle from his mouth, and looked up at me with pleading eyes. If he had been a wounded deer, I would have cut his throat and thought little of it. He was a man, though, and I found I could not kill him as he lay there helpless. I left my arrow in him and moved on.

  Wulf followed me around the battlefield, wringing his hands and urging me to make haste. While we were searching, Ivar strode out of the tunnel’s mouth, surrounded by a heavily armed group of his housecarls. Seeing me, he called out. “You are Hastein’s man, are you not—the young hunter? How goes the battle?”

  “The Franks broke and fled,” I said. “Hastein’s ruse succeeded, though once inside the gate, we were hard pressed to hold it until the first of the reinforcements arrived. The Gull’s crew will be short many men after this night’s fighting.”

  “Why are you still here if Hastein and the rest of his men are gone?” Ivar asked. “You do not look to be wounded.”

  The meaning behind Ivar’s question seemed clear. He wondered if I was a coward who had fled from the fight. I was too tired to feel offended.

  “Hastein ordered me to stay with this Frank. He pledged that we would protect his family in exchange for his help. But first I must recover some of my arrows.”

  Ivar cocked his head and listened. Sounds of battle, the clash of steel on steel, could no longer be heard. The screams and weeping had swelled though, till they seemed to fill the night.

  “If the Franks ran from the battle here at the gate,” Ivar said, “then they are broken, and Ruda is ours. Fear spreads through an army even more swiftly than the plague.”

  Wulf lived on a narrow side alley not far from the main street leading to the river gate. He cried out in dismay as we approached his house. The door was open, and as we drew nearer I could see it had been kicked in and was hanging from only one hinge.

  “We are too late,” Wulf cried, and tried to rush past me. I put my arm out and held him back. “Let me enter first. Wait here and hold my bow.” I knew it would be of little use in the close quarters inside.

  As I approached the open doorway, I slipped my small-axe from my belt and tightened my grip on the handle of the shield I’d picked up from the battleground. The room beyond the door was dimly lit by a torch someone had carelessly laid on a table, and by the glowing embers of a low fire in a small hearth against the far wall. Two warriors—men I did not recognize, though clearly they were Danes—were in the room, rummaging through Wulf’s possessions. They had gathered the corners of a cloak to fashion a makeshift bag in which to carry their plunder. No one else was visible, though behind them, to the right of the hearth, I saw another doorway. From the darkness beyond that door came the soft sound of crying.

  Both men turned when I entered the room, and one drew his sword from its scabbard. The warrior with the sword stared at me with cold eyes. He was tall, with long blond hair woven into two plaits that hung below his shoulders, and a mustache that drooped down almost to his chest.

  “This house is ours,” he said. “Go elsewhere.”

  “I have been sent by Jarl Hastein,” I replied. “I am one of his men. This house belongs to the Frank who helped us gain entry into the town. It and all who live here are under the jarl’s protection.”

  The blond warrior glanced at his companion and flicked his eyes sideways. The second man, who had brown hair and was wearing a jerkin of black fur, stepped back and grasped a spear and shield that were leaning against the wall of the room.

  “I am not accustomed to being told what to do by a beardless youth,” the blond man said. “I am not inclined to become accustomed to it now.”

  The man with the spear began edging sideways, so he and his comrade could come at me from different angles. I stuck my axe back in my belt and stepped back through the doorway, reaching my hand out toward Wulf for my bow as I did.

  I had felt numb from fatigue in the aftermath of the battle at the gate, but now anger flooded over me.

  “You have made two mistakes this night,” I told the men who faced me. “Either could cost you your life. Your first mistake was to refuse to leave a house under Jarl Hastein’s protection. The jarl gave his word to this Frank. If his oath is broken by your actions, you will have to die to cleanse the stain from his honor.

  “Your second mistake was to insult me. While you sat safe atop a horse outside the walls, I was in the fight to win the gate. I have already killed more men this night than you have fingers on your hands. I had thought to kill only Franks, but your arrogance urges me to change my mind. Still, I will give you one more chance. Leave now, taking nothing with you, and I will let you live.”

  As I backed farther out into the street, I handed my shield to Wulf, drew an arrow from my quiver, and readied it on my bow.

  “Wait!” a voice called from inside. The brown-haired man stepped into the doorway. “We did not know this house was under the jarl’s protection. I am leaving.”

  He skulked away down the street. For a few moments there was only silence, then a woman’s scream ripped out from inside the house. Wulf gasped and stumbled toward the gaping doorway. “Bertrada!” he cried.

  “Stay back,” I snapped, and pulled my bow to full draw. “Do not block my view. I can save her. You cannot.”

  The blond warrior stepped into view, lit by the flickering light of the torch that was burning on the table. He was holding a woman dressed only in a thin white shift. One arm was about her waist, pinning her tightly against his body, and the other held the blade of his sword across her throat.

  The blond man laughed. “So this is what the Frank bargained with the jarl to save? Her and her brats in the other room? Hear me now, boy, if you want her to live. You have offended me. You know not how to talk to your betters. Lay down your bow or I will cut her throat as you watch. You and I will fight man to man, and I will teach you manners before you die.”

  He watched me, looking for a reaction, with his cold blue eyes. I stared back, unblinking, into them. Into his right eye. And released.

  9 : The War-King’s Ire

  “Wake up! Men are outside again.”

  Wulf was shaking me by the shoulders. I knocked his hands aside and staggered to my feet, struggling to remember where I was and what had happened.

  Earlier, knowing that other looters would surely come, I had dragged the body outside and positioned it next to the door as a warning. With his legs splayed out in front of him on the ground, and his back against the wall of Wulf’s house, the dead man looked almost like someone who’d sat down to rest and had fallen asleep. Almost. The gaping socket of his ruined eye and the stream of blood that had run down his face and onto his chest told anyone who came close that this man was in the sleep from which no one awakens.

  Whenever looters had approached, I’d stood in the doorway, an arrow ready on my bowstring, and warned them away. “This house is under the protection of Jarl Hastein,” I’d told them. “Pass it by.” Some looked at the body and muttered angrily, but no one had challenged me.

  As dawn approached and the street gradually filled with gray light, men passed the house less and less frequently. Finally, as the first rays of the sun lit the rooftops, I could no longer see anyone, Frank or Dane, moving through the town. The sounds of shouting, laughter, and screaming had tapered off, too. Even looters must eventually tire, and when they do, their victims find some respite.

  I’d found myself unable to stay awake. “Wake me if anyone comes,” I told Wulf, and curled myself in a ball in a corner of the front room of his house.

  Wulf had taken me at my word. Three times earlier he’d shaken me awake, and I had resumed my position in the doorway. Each time it had been harder and harder to force myself out of my exhausted sleep. Fortunately, the men who’d passed had been stragglers, wanderin
g aimlessly through the captured town, and had shown little interest in the house or the dead man.

  This time was different. As I rubbed my eyes, trying to wipe the blurriness from them, I heard angry voices outside. I snatched my bow up from the floor and readied an arrow on it as I edged up to the open doorway and peered out.

  “There he is! There is the man who murdered Sigvid!”

  It was the brown-haired looter, the comrade of the man I’d killed. He was pointing at me and talking to a group of men standing in the street in front of Wulf’s house. They were all wearing helms and bearing shields and looked angry and eager for a fight.

  “Stay back!” I shouted. “This house is under the protection of Jarl Hastein. He has sworn that all who live here will be safe. I will kill any man who acts to break the jarl’s oath.”

  A stocky warrior with traces of gray in his beard, one of the few in the crowd who was wearing a mail brynie, stepped forward.

  “Who are you,” he demanded, “that claims to speak for Jarl Hastein?”

  “My name is Halfdan,” I replied. “I am one of the jarl’s housecarls.”

  The warrior stared at me silently for a few moments. “You look very young,” he finally said, “to be in the service of the jarl. His housecarls are all experienced warriors and chosen men.”

  I shrugged. I could not change my age or my looks. These men could believe me or no. “I serve the jarl,” I told them. “I am here at his command.”

  The gray-bearded warrior pointed at the corpse.

  “That man’s name was Sigvid. He was a member of my crew and from my village. Are you claiming that the jarl ordered you to kill a fellow Dane?”

  “I told your man that this house is under Jarl Hastein’s protection, but he refused to leave and threatened to kill the wife of the Frank who lives here. Had I not stopped him, the jarl’s oath would have been broken.”

  The brown-haired looter spat on the ground. “We did not come here to talk,” he snapped. “Sigvid was our comrade. We came to avenge his death.” The men standing around him nodded their heads and muttered their agreement.

  “I have been ordered to defend this house,” I repeated. “I will not allow you to enter it. There may be enough of you to kill me, but I will not die alone.” I backed deeper into the room and raised my bow.

  “Hold!” the gray-bearded warrior shouted, and turned to face his men. “I am still captain here. I will decide whether we fight or not. Or do any among you wish to challenge that?”

  No one answered. The brown-haired man looked away.

  The captain pointed back over his shoulder at me.

  “This warrior claims he is a housecarl serving Jarl Hastein, and was following the jarl’s orders. What if he speaks true? If you slay him, will the jarl not be angered? Will he not avenge the killing of his own man?”

  “How will he know?” the brown-haired warrior said. “How will the jarl know we killed him? I will not tell him.”

  “I will not conceal a killing,” the captain answered. “That is the work of a Nithing. We are not murderers who skulk in the dark and kill when no one sees. I must know the truth before we act.” He turned back to face me.

  “This matter is not over,” he said. “We will find the jarl and learn whether you are truly his man. But whether you serve Jarl Hastein or no, I do not believe you should have killed Sigvid. My name is Gunulf. Remember it. You will hear from me again.”

  Pointing at the dead man’s body, he spoke again to his men. “Bring Sigvid. He was our comrade. It is our duty to bury him.”

  Torvald and Tore found me in the afternoon.

  “We have been searching the town for Wulf’s house,” Torvald said. “You have stirred up trouble. We are to bring you before Ragnar at the palace of the Count of Ruda.”

  “Will Hastein be there?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Torvald replied. “And Ivar, and most of the captains. The fleet has been brought upriver to Ruda.”

  “You have been accused of murder,” Tore said. “Is it true?”

  Tore’s question infuriated me. It was his fault I was in this predicament. Had I truly been a murderer, at that moment he would have been at risk. I ignored him and spoke to Torvald.

  “Someone must guard Wulf and his family if I am to leave. Hastein promised they would be protected. He entrusted their safety to me. And to Tore,” I added, glaring at him.

  Torvald looked over at Tore and smiled. Tore’s face flushed red. “Do not expect me to stay here playing nursemaid to a Frank and his family,” he blustered.

  I turned on him. “It is your duty,” I snapped. “Jarl Hastein ordered you to protect them, as he did me. If you had remembered last night, I might not have had to kill the man.”

  “So it is true,” Torvald said, shaking his head. “You did kill one of our warriors.”

  “It was not murder,” I told him. “I had no choice.”

  “You will have to convince Ragnar of that,” he replied.

  The Count of Ruda had fled the town as soon as he’d learned Northmen had broken through the town’s gate. His palace, which Torvald led me to, was the largest building I had ever seen. We entered through massive double doors of oak, crossed a huge entry hall that our army had already converted into a stable for its captured horses, and climbed a broad, winding staircase of stone. At its top was a second level as large as the first, also constructed entirely of stone. I could not understand how its weight did not cause it to collapse onto the level below.

  We entered a long open room illuminated by the afternoon sun shining in through tall windows. A narrow table stretched across one end. Hastein, Ivar, and some other warriors—chieftains all, I suspected, since Hastein’s captains Stig and Svein were among them—were also seated at the table, or talking in small groups scattered across the room.

  Ragnar was pacing back and forth in front of the table. His raven was perched on his left shoulder.

  “Do any of you know how many warriors we lost in the attack?” Ragnar was asking as we drew near. “Do any of you know?”

  No one answered. Ivar looked bored and picked his teeth with the nail of his little finger. Hastein appeared to be giving all of his attention to two bolts of cloth spread out on the table in front of him.

  “Ah, Torvald,” he said, looking up as we approached. “You are back, and you found Halfdan. Excellent. Look what Stig found in a merchant’s storehouse last night. These are silk. I bought them from him.”

  One roll of fabric was a brilliant crimson, and the other a deep blue. “These colors are very fine, don’t you think?” he continued. “I am going to have two new tunics made from them.”

  Ragnar ignored Hastein.

  “I know how many died,” he said. “I know, because I am the war-king of this army, and I am responsible for it. Twenty-seven of our warriors died, and fifteen more have serious wounds.”

  “It was a remarkable victory,” Ivar volunteered. “Hastein’s plan was clever and worked well.”

  “The crew of the Gull paid a heavy price for it, though,” Hastein said. “Eight of the dead are my men, as are four of the wounded.”

  Ivar shrugged. “Men vie for the chance to sail with you because you are bold. They know there is often great risk, but there is also greater chance for glory.”

  I thought Ivar’s words sounded callous. How many of the dead had wives who were now widows, or children left with no father? These were men who’d served Hastein with loyalty and courage. I did not believe he would so easily dismiss their deaths.

  Hastein turned to me and spoke. “Halfdan,” he said, “You can speak the Franks’ tongue. Before you leave the palace this afternoon, I want you to question the Count’s servants and slaves. Ask who among them sewed the garments for the Count of Ruda. I shall have the same person make my new tunics.”

  “A remarkable victory?” Ragnar said to Ivar. His voice had a dangerous edge. “I’ll tell you what was remarkable about it. Of our twenty-seven dead, only fifteen died dur
ing battle with the Franks. Seven more were cut down from behind while they were too busy looting and raping to even see the Franks who killed them. And five were murdered by our own men, their comrades, in arguments over plunder or women.”

  As he said this last comment, Ragnar turned and glared at me. I swallowed nervously and looked at Hastein, but he was busy examining the bolts of cloth. Did he not know what I was accused of?

  Ragnar waved his arms at the walls of the huge room we were standing in.

  “Look at this palace. Look at the walls of this town. Wonderous structures, built all of stone. The Romans built them many hundreds of years ago, yet still they stand, greater by far than any longhouse or palace of our greatest leaders. And these same Romans conquered countless kingdoms and peoples. For a time they ruled the world.”

  Ragnar paused in his pacing, and turned to face Hastein and Ivar.

  “What do you think the Romans possessed that we do not?” he demanded. “Does anyone know? Do any of you care?”

  Ivar looked around at the huge room’s walls and high ceiling. “Many slaves?” he suggested. “It would take the labor of hundreds of thralls to build such structures as these.”

  “Discipline!” Ragnar shouted. The raven on his shoulder squawked and flapped its wings at the noise. “The Romans possessed discipline. Our army does not. Even before this town was cleared of Frankish troops, our warriors scattered and began looting. It was fortunate the Franks did not regroup and counterattack. Our men’s greed was so strong, some killed their own comrades over plunder. But I suppose that should be no surprise,” he added, “when even the greatest of my leaders is more interested in preening like a peacock than in enforcing discipline among our warriors.”

  “I, too, know something of the Romans,” Hastein said. “Their soldiers were little more than thralls who were forced to serve in their armies for years—or until they died. We are not Romans. We are Danes. Our warriors are all free men. Each chose of his own free will to risk all and come to fight with this army deep within the land of the Franks. You know as well as I that they did not come here to avenge some ancient wrong the Franks committed against our people. They have come because they hope to better themselves and their families, and because they hope to win wealth that could never be theirs if they stayed at home on their farms.”