The Oathsworn Series Books 1 to 3

by Robert Low

  I grinned and raised a hand to him and he raised one back, though he did not smile. After a moment, he snatched the waterskin deftly up before anyone could stop him and brought it to me. As I drank, he squatted beside me, silent and staring at nothing.

  ‘It was a hard thing, what happened to your brother,’ I offered, handing him the skin. He stoppered it and sighed.

  ‘My mother—’ he began and then stopped. He wanted to be a man, but his lip betrayed him.

  ‘You should go back to her,’ I said, clasping one shoulder, but the look he turned on me was suddenly cat-fierce from a streaked face.

  ‘I want to be one of you. I will take the Oath. I will fight the infidels.’

  Finn overheard and chuckled grimly. ‘Join another army, biarki, for this one is leaving, never to return.’

  He looked alarmed and I caught the flash of disbelief and then his shoulders collapsed.

  ‘Every hand is against us,’ I pointed out, ‘from the Kephale to the General as well as the Sarakenoi. We stole something valuable.’

  ‘That’s what we do,’ added Hookeye, his voice thick with sarcasm. When I looked at him he looked challengingly back at me. At least, I thought he did, though it was hard to feel challenged when his left eye was seemingly staring over my right shoulder.

  The boy was silent and someone called for the waterskin, so he got up and passed it. Brother John slid up to me and whispered: ‘To leave the boy behind will be death for him. Balantes will not believe he does not know anything about this prize. Even if he does not, there is Starkad.’

  The prize. I had forgotten it, still slung by its strap on my back. Now I took it and had a hard look at the outside. Interested, since this was what had caused all the trouble, the men crept closer and craned to look.

  Plain leather, with a carefully fastened cap, which I opened. There was a musky smell and I tipped the contents cautiously into the palm of my hand.

  Dried twigs and a leaf, browned at the edges though it had once been brilliant, glossy dark green. With it came some dark little specks, smaller than peas and hard as beads.

  ‘Is that it?’ demanded Finn huffily. ‘Does not scale up well to our runesword, I am thinking.’

  ‘Not much to look at, Trader,’ said a voice.

  ‘What is it?’ said another.

  I knew, even though I had never seen any of it before. The whole thing of it unwrapped like a folded cloak to reveal the pattern. I shrugged to the men, poured the whole lot back in and fastened the leather top. I had promised them treasure, brought them to a den of wolves where men had died and could not begin to explain what had been found. They wanted treasure, so I gave it to them.

  ‘Pearls,’ I said knowingly, ignoring the shame the word flooded me with. ‘Special ones.’

  That made them nod and smile. Pearls they understood. Pearls could be bartered for a sword with a rune serpent curled on it – Einar would have been proud of me.

  But Brother John’s eyes narrowed, for he knew I was lying.

  I didn’t want to tell anyone the truth of it, though – that the collection of leaves and little beads were mulberry leaves and shoots and the eggs, I was thinking, from silkworms. Silk was so precious you had to have permission to buy it. It had been stolen by two daring monks from the strange people who made it in a far-off land and now the church jealously controlled it.

  If a high-placed Christ priest and a truculent general were handing what was a church monopoly to the likes of Choniates on the sly, there was more here than simple theft and moneymaking. There was the sharp stink of treachery, the sort where kings slip knives in the ribs of rivals of a dark night, and I had been in Miklagard long enough to know that Roman emperors sat on precarious gifthrones. Small wonder Choniates had handed over a runed sword to Starkad for a task such as this.

  Stealing this had been a mistake and a bad one, such a bad one that my balls drew up, tight and scared. Leo Balantes made no secret of being the man of General Red Boots and Balantes was the one who had whipped up the riots in the Great City last year. If Red Boots was also behind this then the Basileus himself was the target. This was no bargain counter for a runesword. It was a death sentence.

  Blood-feuds I knew about, as every Norseman did, but the feuds of the great in Miklagard were another thing entirely. Balantes would snuff us out like pinching a candle if he thought we knew too much – and the only one who could help, the Basileus Autocrator himself, was so far away as to make the sun easier to reach.

  Only two winters ago, I thought wearily, my only worry was how much worm was in the keel of our little faering in Bjornshafen. Now I was wrestling with whether the gods were laughing at me for having the pride to become jarl of the Oathsworn and that this, my first serious raid, would be my doom.

  Worse than that, I was hiding the truth from the others. I could almost hear Einar laughing as we ran on into a dappled day with trees like sentries on the hills behind us, so that every time I turned to look back, my heart surged, thinking they were horsemen.

  But this was bad country for horsemen. I knew that when one of the three we had foundered and we turned him loose, doubling the wounded up on another. The slopes, however, were smoothing down to the sea and, suddenly, Hookeye gave a loud shout and pointed.

  There, rolling gently in the swell in a curve of golden beach, was the Fjord Elk and my heart gave a jolt in my ribs.

  There was a brief moment of capering and backslapping, quickly lost as we realised the Volchok wasn’t anywhere in sight. That, as Finn gloomily pointed out, meant that the cargo was lost.

  ‘Ah,’ said Hedin Flayer cheerfully, ‘turn the coin over, Finn Horsehead. Perhaps the cargo has been rescued. Perhaps your knarr is sailing still, just out of sight.’

  Perhaps. We trotted on, filled with fresh strength and eager to quit the land for the sea. We slithered out of the steep hills and on to a flat stretch leading to the tussocked grass and then the sand. Gulls wheeled, shrieking out their calls, sometimes like the laugh of some mad hag, other times like the cries of a lost child. Many a gull was the fetch of those drowned and uneasy in the silt-kingdom of Ran, Mother of the Waves, according to Sighvat.

  We stumbled across a stubbled field, saw the thread of smoke from a chimney and the shadow that straightened from work, spotted us and sprinted away. We stopped to rest, for even the horses were blowing.

  A cock crowed and Sighvat grunted.

  ‘That’s bad,’ he said.

  Finn spat. ‘Is there one of your animal signs that is ever a good omen?’ he asked.

  Sighvat considered it carefully before shrugging. ‘Depends,’ he said. ‘They warn and seldom praise. Roosters are Odin birds, for they crow to herald the sun, which Odin and his brothers, Vili and Ve, threw into the sky as embers from Muspell. Fjalar is the red cock, who will raise the giants to war at Ragnarok and Gullinkambi the golden one who will wake the gods for that fight. And let’s not forget the One with No Name who crows to raise the dead in Helheim on that day.’

  ‘Duly remembered,’ muttered Finn. ‘Now …’

  ‘When a cock crows at midnight a fetch is passing and if it crows three times between sunset and midnight it is a death omen,’ Sighvat went on mildly. ‘Crowing in the day, as now, is often a warning against misfortune. Can you see if it is perched on a gate? If it is, it means tomorrow will have rain.’

  ‘Odin’s balls,’ muttered Finn, rubbing the sweat from his face. ‘Remind me only to keep hens.’

  ‘Ah, well,’ said Sighvat, ‘a hen that crows is unlucky, as is one with tail feathers like a rooster. You would do well to kill them at once. And a hen which roosts in the morning foretells a death—’

  ‘Thor’s hairy arse!’ shouted Finn in annoyance. ‘Enough cackle about hens, Sighvat, in the name of all the gods.’

  ‘You’d do well to listen, though,’ offered Gardi, pointing behind us. ‘Look.’

  This time there was no mistaking the shape of horsemen, high on the ridge, picking a careful way dow
n the scrub and scree slope. Once they hit the flat …

  ‘Run,’ said Finn, the sweat pearling his face. ‘Run like the wolf son of Loki has its teeth in your breeks.’

  We ran, stumbling and cursing. One of the wounded fell off the back of the horse and the other one checked, turned, saw the horsemen fanning out down the slope, riding hard and shrilling out those ‘illa-la-la’ cries. He galloped for it and the fallen man cursed, got up on to his good leg and started hobbling.

  No one helped him, for the hooves were drumming harder now. There was a familiar bird’s wing whirr and the hobbling man screamed and pitched forward in mid-run, an arrow in his lower back.

  Finn cursed and whirled. ‘Trader …’

  I knew what he wanted and screamed: ‘Form!’

  They slithered and skidded to a halt, swept together like a flock of sparrows while the arrows came in again with the sound of knives shearing linen. A man yelped as one whacked his thigh and he started to drag himself down to the beach.

  We slammed shields and faced them, no sound but the sob and rasp of our breath. Arrows hissed and shunked into wood; another man cursed and writhed, the shaft through his ankle.

  ‘Borg,’ roared Finn and the men behind swept their shields up so that there was a higher wall, angled back. The men in front, me among them, half crouched. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Hookeye splashing through the water to the side of the Elk. His eyes might be squint, but his feet were sure and fast.

  ‘Back,’ I said into the gasping, sweating mass. ‘We have to move back.’

  We were a roofed fort, but only from the front, so had to shuffle, painfully slowly, away from the horsemen, who were sitting nocking arrows and shooting. They seemed content to do that and I saw there were only twenty or thirty of them and none that looked like an Emir – so he had split his forces to look for us.

  One staggering Dane, trying hard to reach us, took about six arrows, one after the other, sounding like wet meat thrown at a wall as they hit him. He went down, one hand still clawing sand and stiff grass to try and get to us.

  We backed off, while the arrows spat and hissed and slammed into shields. I hoped whoever commanded was too wary to work out that, as long as we were moving, we were not safe behind the raven claws that had done for them last time. Without those claws, we’d be hard put to stand against lance-armed heavy horsemen and arrows at the same time.

  Sand slithered beneath our feet, spattered with stiff-leaved grass. Then coarse sand alone and still we moved back, shedding another two bodies, passing two riderless horses.

  One of the cavalry horses suddenly reared up and threw the rider and the rest wheeled round and galloped back, just as someone yelled: ‘Water.’

  It surged round my boots and I almost sobbed to hear it. Behind me, peeling off one by one, men slung their shields on their backs and splashed out towards the boats, while those on board, using the few short bows we had, plunked arrows enough to keep the horsemen cautious.

  Something spanged off my helmet and my head rang like a bell. There was a hiss-shunk and an arrow whacked itself on my shield – on the inside. I snapped the shaft off with my sword and yelled at those in the Elk to watch their shooting, then turned and ran back into the surf, shield over my back.

  I heaved myself over the rail of the Fjord Elk, hearing forlorn splashes as the last arrows missed. On the beach, the horsemen waved bows in triumph and screamed their la-la cries, as well as ‘pig-eaters’ in Greek.

  Kvasir, beaming, dragged me upright and banged me heartily on one shoulder. ‘Aye, a good steady defence right enough, Trader.’

  ‘How many?’ I managed to gasp as, around me, men groaned and sat, heads hanging and lips wet with drool.

  ‘Four dead,’ Finn answered, scooping water over his head. He spat towards the horsemen. ‘Another six wounded, the boy among them.’

  ‘Boy?’ I asked, confused. Not the Goat Boy …

  It was. He had taken an arrow smack in the side and Brother John was kneeling beside the little figure, poking carefully round the wound. The shaft had been trimmed off down to the flesh and the Goat Boy was limp and lolling and pale as milk.

  Brother John muttered a prayer and looked at me, his face hard and sweat-gleamed.

  Gizur came up and said, ‘We have a west wind, Trader. Do we run with it?’

  I nodded, then turned back to Brother John, who was examining the wound again. The Goat Boy moaned.

  ‘Odin’s arse, priest,’ snarled Finn, ‘do you know what you are about?’

  ‘I am about this close to smacking you in the mouth, Finn Horsehead. Fetch some water and shut your hole.’

  Finn stamped off, roaring, and I felt the Fjord Elk heel over, heard Kvasir chivvying tired men into hauling the sail full up.

  ‘Do you really know what you are about?’ I asked and Brother John shot me such a look I thought he was about to snarl at me, too. Then he wiped dry lips and I saw the fear and uncertainty there.

  ‘It is in deep and barbed. I can’t push it through, for I think it is near his vitals. If I try to get it out I will make more of the wound than his body can take, perhaps.’

  ‘If you leave it?’

  ‘Coniecturalem artem esse medicinam.’

  Medicine is the art of guessing. I looked at the figure, shrunken even now; I wanted no more little corpses and said so. Brother John, agitated and fretting, nodded and licked his lips, then started to pray even more.

  I stood, feeling the wind in my face, turned to the prow and saw Radoslav.

  ‘Timely message,’ I said, then told him what had happened and that the boy they had sent it with was dead. Radoslav shook his silver-bound braids, then looked at the little figure on the deck, Brother John hunched over him like some ragged crow.

  ‘His mother will be cursing the day we sailed into the harbour, I am thinking,’ Radoslav said, then spat. ‘Not that we can go back. Your Starkad threw a fox in that hen coop right enough.’

  He told it swiftly and simply. They’d seen the ship arrive and were puzzled, because it was a big Greek knarr, but coming in from the east and labouring against an offshore wind. Then, as it came round the headland, they saw it was full of Norse and Kvasir put it together fast enough for them to raise sail and catch the same wind out that made hard work for Starkad to get in.

  Radoslav was still furious that the Volchok had been left, with Arinbjorn and Ogmund on board, who would have no chance. Worse, in his eyes, was that most of the cargo was on board, too.

  ‘I am sorry for that,’ I said.

  Radoslav shrugged. ‘No matter. The treasure will pay for it when we get it.’

  I said nothing, for I knew now that Radoslav was still convinced we were off to find the hoard – that, after all, was what this chase to get the runesword was about. Yet there was a storm in me, tossing my resolve like a leaky knarr. Driven by oath to get the sword, I had no wish to go back to Atil’s howe. Eventually, I would have to decide and matters would get uglier than Short Eldgrim.

  ‘Where too, Trader?’ demanded Gizur. I had long since worked this out and only the starting point was changed.

  ‘North and then east, round the island and set a course to Seleucia,’ I said. I had listened to all the gossip and knew that Antioch was in the hands of the Miklagard army. It wasn’t the first time they had taken the city and, like all the other times, they’d probably have to give it up and fall back on Tarsus. I just hoped they still held it when we got to Seleucia, Antioch’s port, which was a safer haven than some lonely beach in Serkland.

  Short Eldgrim hefted my shield and fingered the stub of the arrow, visible on the inside, up near the grip. He looked at me and lifted what remained of one of his eyebrows.

  ‘Aye, just so,’ I offered wryly. ‘An inch to the left and I’d be picking the back of my teeth with the point of it. Anyone would think you did not like me, wee man.’

  Short Eldgrim fetched his tin-snips later and worried the point out of the wood, but there was no way of
telling who had loosed it – for which Radoslav and Short Eldgrim and a couple of others were greatly relieved. I pitched it over the side and laughed.

  We swept on, looking backwards for signs of Greeks and rubbed raw with the frustration of it, for Starkad was also there. I prayed that Balantes would not release his own ships to the north, that he would think we were scudding back to Miklagard with our prize, perhaps that we were even in the pay of the Basileus and about to expose him. I knew Starkad would not think so. I knew he would come our way alone and it was starting to irritate me that, every time we got close to him, our chances of making red war on him seemed to be furthest away.

  Of course, I was heading straight into the arms of Red Boots, who commanded the Great City’s army in the east, but I hoped to have slipped away from him before Balantes sent word to watch for Orm Bear Slayer. If Odin held true to us, Starkad would follow and then we could trade – or fight; at the moment, either way was fine with me.

  We turned east with no wind and crept like a water insect along the Anatolian coast, rowing until the snot and drool ran in our beards.

  It was a good hafskip, this new Fjord Elk, and Gizur was well pleased, though the mast had checked in the heat of five untended summers and sprung cracks and some of the planks were a little less tight than was safe. As long as there wasn’t a blow and we had men bailing, he thought we’d make Antioch.

  Brother John had worried and teased the arrowhead out of the Goat Boy without sign of fat on the end, then fed him a broth of leeks and found no smell when he sniffed the wound, both of which were good signs.

  I came on him while he was looking at Ivar, whom we called Gautr for his wit and Loki tricks. Ivar had taken an arrow through the cheek, which was a clean enough wound, but it had nicked his gum and a tooth as well, which bothered him.

  ‘How is the boy?’

  ‘Alive,’ Brother John said, clapping Ivar on one shoulder and straightening. ‘I cannot be after saying how long that will last, all the same. I have cleaned it with vinegar and sewn it with fishing line and poulticed it with malva and wheat bran wrapped in a vellum strip of my best prayer.’