by Jason Born
“Honesty and upright negotiations are valued even among what you call pagans, I’m afraid,” Leif answered. “They’re not just a Christian concern. You see, had we let this Welshman go to his king early,” lied Leif as he pointed to Ketil’s flaccid body, “that would have ruined the trust we’ve worked so hard to build between both our sides. You may have thought that we’d release more of your people before you’ve met a single demand. We can’t allow such a misguided notion to enter your mind.”
“Trust!” said ugly Maredubb with amazement. His large horse’s tack rattled as the beast angrily shook its head in agreement with its master. Maredubb sighed. “So what are these terms of this Godfrey you call King of the Isles? I heard he lost to a bunch of monks in Dal Riata last year.”
“And he chopped up those monks on Christmas night. Now, don’t lie to me,” warned Leif. “If you accurately tell us where and how much silver and gold is in your treasury, we’ll simply return through those gates and take half. We’ll be gone in our ships by morning. If you lie and make it difficult on us, we’ll take all we find, haul away slaves to be sold in Dyflin, and burn the town anyway.”
I hadn’t heard these parts of the plan. It was elegant enough, simple enough. It had Leif’s tracks all over it. He had inherited his good sense from his mother, whom I missed, his sense of adventure from his father, whom I missed more. Together, they blended to make a formidable combination in Leif. He gave the Welsh king a tempting choice. His army, his capital, and much of Maredubb’s treasury would be intact should he take the chance that we told the truth and agree.
Nonetheless, Maredubb stewed. He curved his narrow mouth into a frown, the downturned corners drawn even closer together than usual. His face flushed with anger so that his cheeks were now redder than the rash on his forehead. Another of Magnus’ or Aoife’s horns blew.
“You’d best decide quickly,” encouraged Leif. “The ringing of the notes tells me that our army is in place and ready to begin a massacre, a slaughter that you can prevent by cooperating and trotting away for a single night.”
“I’ll slit your two throats right here and assault my own walls. I’ll burn the place down myself before I leave it to the likes of you! I’ll burn it, burn it, burn it,” shouted Maredubb. The Welsh king stood tall in his stirrups and called up to Godfrey. “You bastard! This affront will not go unpaid!” He settled back to his rump and chewed on his chubby lips.
We sat in relative silence for a long moment, the nearby sea with its constant rolling the only sound. I gave Leif a nervous sideways glance that, thankfully, Maredubb did not notice. Leif looked as paradoxically relaxed as he had the day we left for our exile. Then, he had had an experienced, pendulous-titted woman in his bed to help settle his tension. Today, he had only his own secure confidence in both his plan and the place the gods had made for him during his life in Midgard.
Leif incrementally sweetened the pot for Maredubb. “Agree now and I’ll have Halldorr here leave behind your townsman. He’ll stay with you tonight as a token of our appreciation that you’ve already agreed to our terms. Of course, you’ll interrogate this man when he wakes up. What you’ll find is that he tells you there is no way you’ll succeed in taking the citadel by force. Remember, without another drop of blood, we’ll be gone by morning.”
“I’d take the offer if I were you,” I said. I felt like I should add something to the negotiations.
Maredubb’s next in command, who must have understood most of what was said, was nodding in agreement with our offer. He whispered some words into his king’s ear. The king sat up in his saddle nodding. “Agreed. I’ll take my peasant. If you are not gone by sunrise, we’ll slaughter the lot of you. But know this,” Maredubb said wagging a crooked finger. “I did not lie when I said that there would be an answer to this. Godfrey will pay.”
Leif was grinning. “I’m sure he’d have it no other way.”
And the game continued.
. . .
As Leif and Maredubb finished up their verbal volley, I rapped Horse Ketil in his face a few more times. While no one was paying me or the supposed peasant any mind, I wanted to be sure that Ketil would be long unconscious. Otherwise, if he was able to talk too soon, Maredubb would know the ruse, attack, and slaughter us all. “Wake up from that!” I whispered to the unconscious lump. When my knuckles were bloody and Ketil’s face properly tenderized, I threw him down face first into the mud by the side of the main road leading into Aberffraw. Maredubb noticed the thump, looked over, saw his peasant released, and went back to spilling his information.
After Maredubb delineated the location and amount of the treasure stored in his keep, Leif and I nodded and walked our horses back the way we had come. It took a few moments for the same terrified Welsh boys to open the gates for us. We stared straight ahead at the oaken doors, confidently showing Maredubb our backs. Leif was ebullient when the scurrying boys let us in. He tossed each a small penny for their trouble as we passed back into the fortress.
The gates slammed shut. Killian bounded his way down a ladder and helped Leif shove the timber in place. Godfrey stayed at his post with the rest of his army. The two kings, one Welsh, one Norman-Manx, eyed one another, continuing their war in silence.
“What was all that about?” asked Killian.
“We temporarily eliminated a traitor,” muttered Leif.
“I knew it! He’d let everyone know his feelings. We just couldn’t do anything about it. I knew Ketil was no good,” said the priest. “We’ll have to deal with the repercussions back home.”
“I guess it was good that we kept him close,” I said. “Otherwise, he could have already taken over Man.”
Leif held up a hand. “We don’t have time for this. We’ve got to move quickly before Maredubb gets suspicious and probes the walls and the sea,” said Leif. “We’ve got to run before Ketil wakes up and is able to talk.”
“That will be a while,” I said, showing the bruises and cuts on my hand.
Leif was already beginning to stride toward the main citadel where the treasure was to be found. Half the citizenry was probably hidden there too. They would have to be dealt with. The other half was concealed in lofts, barns, storehouses, cabinets, or anything in which a curled human could wedge himself.
Snorts from horses and jingling reins announced that Maredubb had at last finished his duel with Godfrey. My king then slid his way down the nearest ladder, barking orders as he came. “Twenty men! That’s all I want on the wall. Walk and rotate patrols so that their watchers think we’ve got hundreds guarding the palisade.” Godfrey was grinning from ear to ear as he walked up to Leif and me. Still he barked orders over his shoulders as his small army began pouring down ladders. “Randulfr, Loki, Brandr – gather three men each and select Maredubb’s best ships for our own. We might as well take three!” He was laughing now.
“I never should have doubted the two of you.” The king shook his head in pleased disbelief. “Let us get some treasure and use it to build an army! I can already taste the revenge. First Anglesey, then Lismore.”
CHAPTE
R 5
We moved through the town toward the Welsh king’s castle. I feared that we would be forever in breaching or climbing or in some other way entering the curtain wall surrounding his keep. We would spend the night without success, and in the morning King Maredubb would uncover our trickery and see us killed. But, when we turned the last corner past a bakery where some of the morning’s bread was still sitting warm on shelves, I saw that we had nothing to worry about and began to breathe easy.
I took the opportunity to run into the bakery and snatch all the bread I could press between my arms and chest. There was a boy aged about ten who hid under a table in the corner of the shop. He slowly tried to pull a sack of flour in front of him. I paid him no more attention and pushed my way out into the streets. When I again caught up with the rest, I doled the bread out to Godfrey first, then Killian, and then the men, holding back the warmest loaf f
or myself. For my troubles the men all gave me an approving grunt as they tore large hunks off with their teeth while they walked. Only a few bothered to brush off the dried, red flakes of blood that dusted the loaves from where they rubbed against my chainmail.
As I was saying, the thick stone wall would have been a problem. We would have had to send men down to the boatyard below the fortress to retrieve grappling hooks along with more long ropes. Since our ships were on the other side of Anglesey we would have had to pilfer the hooks from Maredubb’s own navy’s ships. Then, once we had torn apart the docks to find the iron talons we would have had to launch them high up into the crenels or over the merlons of the curtain wall. Time would have been wasted. We would have died. You know, however, that none of that was necessary because here I am scratching out my tales. Yawning wide, each on four sturdy iron hinges, rested the curtain wall’s two doors. Whoever had fled into the castle had done so in such a hurry that they never took the time to slam the gates closed. We marched right in.
In truth, Maredubb’s castle was more of a keep that sat in the middle of the southwest side of the town, near the widening river and bay. Toward the rear of the yard, a narrow set of stone steps had been cut into the steep slope that led down to the quayside.
Sensing danger, our men became keenly aware. Some crammed uneaten bread into their jerkins; others, like me, stuffed the last bits into our mouths and gripped our swords as we passed into the bailey. As if the gods had spite for our readiness, nothing jumped out at us. We again relaxed. Brandr chuckled at his own nerves.
Godfrey and Killian nearly bound toward the central structures. The keep consisted of two buildings that were clearly built by two different peoples. One had clean lines and near perfect uniformity, it was of lower profile. The other had two walls that appeared plumb, but two more that could have done with a better mason and a straighter string. The odd thing to me was that the better built part of the keep was weathered and worn, much older, hundreds of years older. The newer one had rocks that appeared as if they’d been pulled out of the earth that very morning. Those same fresh looking stones were bound by clean, though flaking, mortar. A short passage way with a single, squat wooden door in the center connected the two disparate buildings.
The door, which had been held open a crack, slammed shut as King Godfrey moved toward it. A heavy iron bar was loudly slid into place on the other side. “Damn!” barked Godfrey as his shoulder rammed into the immovable tree. “Leif, take a group of men around north. Randulfr, take a group around south. Find me a way in!” The king said it like he didn’t expect their search to prove fruitful.
As soon as the two groups peeled away in opposite directions, we heard a hoarsely whispered shout from behind the door. At once, the door popped back open and armed men poured out into the bailey. One of Godfrey’s Norsemen, who had his back to the door, fell with a spear jutting from the back of his knee.
Killian reacted in a flash, closing the distance between himself and the attackers while simultaneously drawing his long blade. The sight of a Christian priest with blood splattered all over his robes, startled one of the Welshmen, for the man’s spear went from being aimed directly at Killian’s unarmored chest, to angling to the side and being held almost limply. Killian did not allow his life to fall into the hands of the norns or his Providence. With his two small hands, the priest sliced the blade upward, halving the warrior’s thigh.
Others teemed through the doorway, engaging us one at a time before we would have a chance to assemble into our impenetrable shield wall. Our cohesion was broken. I saw a Greenlander fall. Another of Godfrey’s men had a spear jammed into the top of his boot. A second Welshman used his sword to hack down with force enough to dislodge most of our man’s head from his blood spurting neck.
Two attackers saw me and approached. I had my sword at the ready. They did the same with theirs. My blade struck the sword of one of them so that the two of us came together chest to chest. He grasped my beard with one of his hands and jerked at it. I held firm and howled as I saw him come away holding a fistful of my blonde whiskers. His comrade was swinging around to my side and was a heartbeat away from slicing at my dilapidated mail. The blade might not cut me on the first or second stroke, but anything more and I knew I’d be feeding my blood into the turf.
While holding the first attacker at bay, I reached down to seize my father’s saex. I felt it lifted away before I could grip the handle. Its sole edge cut my awaiting fingers as it danced.
My future was to end. My present was to be short. The thread of my life had found its end and the norns were cackling under the Yggdrasil tree. They had gotten their fun and were done sporting with me. They’d move onto someone else. I pushed myself closer into the first attacker, trying to use him as a partial shield for the blow that would come.
It didn’t come in the slightest. A confused look appeared on the second Welshman’s face. His sword leapt from his hand and bounced relatively harmlessly off my shoulder. He toppled over sideways.
The first attacker’s eyes went wide in horror as the slight Aoife twisted and then withdrew my saex from the second man’s groin. She scrambled onto the prone guard’s chest. Aoife raised the blade in order to ram it into his face, but the man wouldn’t give up so easily. He swatted at her with a balled paw and she rolled off. The saex fell onto his chest.
I don’t know if it was the potential loss of the only thing of sentimental value that I had left from my real father, or if it was the second time in as many days that I saw someone harm the dirty nymph. One of the two inspired me. After the battle that day I said only that my entire motivation was the former. But closer to the truth – and I can admit it now that I’ve raised a fearsome daughter of my own – is that it was the latter that sent lightning through my muscles.
With the howl of a wolf I drove my face into the face of the man with whom I still grappled. I bit his nose and pumped my legs so that I propelled him backward. He slammed into one of his countrymen and still I continued on. We abruptly halted when his back was crushed against the stone passageway. I heard him gasp as his breath was taken away. I dropped my sword and clutched his leather coat at his shoulders and, like a woman repeatedly rubs laundry across a river rock, I rapidly pounded him again and again against the stone wall. He grew heavy and limp and still I pounded. My anger swelled.
I cast him aside and saw that Leif and Randulfr had at last returned from their unsuccessful tour of the bailey. Their numbers were welcome and they, with interlocking shields, edged into the fray. They stabbed with efficient bursts, then inched forward. There was nothing glamorous about it. There was no swashbuckling. Those dancing motions were the things of fanciful tales from skalds who had never once found themselves knee deep in the shit and blood of the shield wall. Slash, stab, hide behind your shield. Pray to Thor, heave on the timber that you gripped and that rested against your forearm, pray to Thor, and inch forward. It was grisly. It worked.
The Welshmen began falling.
I saw the man that Aoife had stabbed was crawling with my saex in one hand. He had just been able to catch the wild Irish girl by her heel. She kicked madly, but his grip, despite the blood that seeped from his groin, remained firm. He slashed and cut the sack she wore for a dress. I barreled toward them. He swung the blade again and caught her shin. The girl screamed and cried. I dove onto his back, gripped his face with my hands from behind, and dug my fingers into anything I could find.
The bleeding Welshman bit my finger. No, he gnawed and tore at it. Instead of withdrawing, I squeezed harder. One of his eyes burst and the pressure on my finger abated. Three more of my fingers found their way into his cheek and I used his flesh like the rope handle on a pail to jerk him over. His one eye fixated on me with pure hatred which told me he still didn’t know that he was a dead man. And, like I’ve said before, in that denial he was like all men, not quite sure it was possible that one day his body would be empty of his warrior spirit.
He swung the sa
ex at my side. It glanced off my mail. With all my might and all my weight I leaned on his throat with my forearm. He gurgled and grunted, but I believe I rumbled even more. I spat into his face. I clenched my teeth. Air raced into and out of my flaring nostrils. I roared while he weakly hammered me with one of his knees. He wriggled his chest beneath me. With each passing moment, his strength was sapped further. His convulsions slowed. At the same time I gained strength. I felt my muscles bulge and tense. It was like what left him was entering me.
Then my opponent stopped moving. I gave one last shove into his windpipe and rolled off to grab my saex and meet another warrior.
There were no more challengers. The only men still standing were Godfrey’s, his men of Man and his Greenlanders. We panted. Some rested hands on their knees, still fighting, but for air and not their lives. Leif, splattered with fresh crimson, sat on his rump and wiped his blade across a random body next to him. Aoife clutched the long cut on her leg with a grimy palm. Her tears were already drying, but the girl still shook and whimpered. I could see in her eyes that for all her talk, she was still just a frightened creature who had no idea what the norns had in store for her.
She was like me in that regard.
Godfrey clumsily walked over the scattered dead and rested a hand on my shoulder. He gripped it tightly. “Up,” he gasped to catch his breath. “We’ve lost a fine batch of our men. Defending ourselves for the rest of the night will be even more difficult now.” He paused to pant and survey the scene. “Send runners to the sentinels at the city gate. Tell them to pull back here when night falls. We need to take whatever we can and be gone.”