by Jason Born
“Watch where you lumber,” said Leif, uncharacteristically short-tempered.
“At least Brandr watches the hogs on another ship,” I said. “Otherwise, all of us would smell as bad as you will.”
“Oaf,” said Leif, reaching over the gunwale and dragging his hands upward against the wet strakes.
“Do we have a problem?” I asked, feeling ready to fight. I had hoped we did.
“Huh! We have an enormous problem. If you can’t see it, you’re blind.”
“Goat’s ass,” I said to Leif. It wasn’t anything like a common curse. I believe I made it up on the spot. It fit the moment. I gave him a shove.
“Godfrey is our problem.” Leif didn’t shove back. I was disappointed.
“How so?” asked a cooler Magnus from the rudder.
“If Maredubb and his Dal Riatans knew we were coming to Lismore as everyone along the coastline of the Irish Sea did, why did they not lie in wait there? Why not let us land, fight a small force at the edge of town, and then swoop from the woods while we sleep like babies curled up to our treasure.”
“And curled up to females,” offered Tyrkr.
“Goat’s ass,” I said to Tyrkr. He shut his mouth and went back to sharpening Leif’s sword. It had received several nicks during our skirmish on Lismore.
Leif continued, “And why tell all your plans to the abbot so that he could pass a challenge onto Godfrey?”
“You seem to know. You always know so tell us, soothsayer.” I was exasperated. I wondered how I was to survive thirteen years of exile with such a man. He was normally moderate and fair, but oftentimes maddeningly condescending.
“Because they know Godfrey and his hubris.” Leif sniffed his chicken shit hand. He scraped it on the salt-water-washed strakes a second time. “Our opponents have come to appreciate that Godfrey, once his interest is piqued, will not stop. He is a bear come from the cave in late winter, so hungry that the mere scent of blood inflames his mind. They tell the abbot to pass on the challenge after a small bloodletting on Lismore so that our king may be pulled into the boat. The hook has been set. Horse Ketil probably pulls us to land! We will be on a dinner plate, feeding Maredubb and the Dal Riatans.”
“Why say nothing to Godfrey, then?” I asked.
“Would it have made a difference?”
Magnus and I looked at each other. “No,” we agreed.
“Gudruna. You could say something to her,” I said.
Leif frowned. “The queen likes me for a romp, nothing more. You see her look at the king. You see her drive him. She’s used me to drive him. It’s easy to see her as the wise one, the brains. The facts are murkier. He often looks the fool, because it is Godfrey who has to work at the edge of the sword. Gudruna stays behind and pushes her man for more and more.”
“Not today,” I said.
“No, not today,” agreed Leif. “The queen rides with the king. They make up over there under covers. When they emerge, they’ll be of one body and mind. They will drive us like oxen. Gudruna and Godfrey, both, want all of Dal Riata.”
“So we are stuck,” said Magnus.
Leif threw his hands up. “We are oath bound to an animal and his bride who are not crafty enough to avoid the trap set in plain sight. We will die in Dunadd.”
And where is Dunadd, you might ask. Dunadd sat in the middle of a narrow, jagged finger of land that jutted southwest into the northern tip of Irish Sea from Scotland. It was the ancient capital of Dal Riata, which itself was built by an Irishman hundreds of years earlier. Now Godfrey, the Scots, and the Irish all laid claim to various sections of the old kingdom.
I had never been there, but many of the men in our widely travelled crew had. They said that despite the fact that it was situated on a formidable hilltop, the capital was not insurmountable; a distantly comforting thought since there had to be a reason Maredubb and the Dal Riatans chose it as the place to meet. The reason was, of course, that the site gave our enemies some advantage. What those benefits were, I knew not at the time. I would soon enough.
Our discussion had gone on and on as we drew closer. “Then you’ll have to find a way out. You did it on Anglesey. You had us build ladders at Watchet. You’ll do it again,” I said, though not entirely convinced by my own words.
Leif reluctantly nodded and flopped back onto the baggage heap. His head bumped a tough leather sack and he angrily pulled it out and peered in. The bag contained the five short iron rods that Leif had stolen from the mint at Watchet. The sight of them calmed Leif. He smiled, cinched the bag neatly, and set it back under his head. This time he lowered himself slowly and used the rigid sack and its hard contents like a pillow. Leif stared up at the small pennant that snapped smartly in the wind. He was preparing to retreat into his mind. Leif could be a-Viking in his head for a long while.
I plopped down on another man’s war chest with the intent to polish my saex. It was important that I try to push the fear of the coming engagement from my head, lest it take root in my heart and the souls of the entire army. Like the insane, I forced myself to laugh as I drew out my short blade. I chuckled at the thought of silly Aoife and how she had tried to throw a whetstone. I peeked over at her small head on the king’s ship. At least she refrained from trying to kill us today.
“You two are unbelievable.” It was faithful Tyrkr.
“You are a race of men descended from Sigurd the dragon slayer. How can you fret about a yapping Welsh king?” Tyrkr flapped Leif’s sword accusingly. “While I may be a thrall here and now, I am from the line that gave the world Arminius of the wald.” I didn’t know who that was at the time. Since then, and with my reading of the Latin and talking with learned men, I understand that Arminius had led a set of disorganized tribes to an improbably fantastic victory over the world’s greatest army, wiping every one of his enemies from the battlefield – every one.
“The legends say that Arminius never lost hope. He pushed his way through every trial. Is Maredubb the greatest king the world has ever seen?”
I thought the question rhetorical, though he waited for an answer. “No,” Leif said at last.
“He is not!” agreed Tyrkr. The thrall was as clear on this topic as any he’d ever bothered to speak on. “And the Dal Riatans are they on the rise or on the fall?”
“Fall,” I said quickly. I nodded and smiled, for real this time. I did not laugh like a crazy person.
The lowly thrall, simple, but utterly dedicated beyond reproach to Erik and his sons, made a speech in his accented Norse. Where he fell short of words as he translated his native German into our tongue, nothing of his vigor and heart was reduced. His passion and ferocity shined through his oration. I straightened my back as I listened.
“The thralls talk around the dung heap. We carry our master’s shit to the mound and congregate there. The talk all last night was about Dunadd. What this man said about the citadel. What that man said about a time he visited the hill fort.” Tyrkr pointed again, this time with a balled fist. “Know this. Godfrey is a king who fights. I’d rather follow a master who fights than one who lounges in the longhouse rubbing his hands in worry. The same goes for you. You’d rather charge after a king who reaches for more. You say he doesn’t think about his actions beforehand. So what! He’s led us this far. The other thralls say that Dunadd had once been among the great northern strongholds. Kingships were bestowed atop its rocky banks. Yet, King Godfrey was right to leave straight away. Dal Riata and its crumbling capital are mere vestiges of their former glory. They were grapes, fat and ripe for the harvest by our sea king and you, his Ring-Danes and Ring-Norse, are his reapers.”
Those in earshot sat in stunned silence. Or, maybe it was more like shamed silence. We had doubted our victorious king and his eager queen. It took a slave to set us on the true path.
Leif slowly climbed back to his feet. He took the whetstone from Tyrkr and his sword. Leif began sharpening it himself. “And don’t forget his Ring-German,” said Leif with a smile.
Our concerns were gone. We were young and we would win. There was no doubt in our minds.
We were also foolish.
. . .
The tide and the winds were in our favor. The breeze smelled of victory as we slipped into the small mouth of the River Add. The lands to the right side, or southwest, of the river were higher, populated with a forest of oak. The shores and terrain to our left, northeast, were lower and consisted mostly of swamps and bogs.
“Terrific,” mumbled Magnus.
“What?” I asked.
“Where there are swamps, there are mosquitoes.”
There were. After moving upriver just several fadmr, we swept through thick swarms of the pests. Magnus slapped at his neck and flapped at his ears in order to drive the bugs away. He’d remove a hand from the rudder, swat, and replace it. Maddeningly, he repeated the feat time and again. I let the critters feast. At any one time I had three mosquitoes nursing from my bloodstream. Sure, it was more than bothersome. Yet, I was confident that in just a few more weeks as the days shortened further and the nights grew colder, I would survive and the pests would die.
I had to survive the coming encounter first, however.
Raven’s Cross quickly ran aground in the very center of the Add. Magnus reacted properly and slid us to shore before Charging Boar saw a similar fate. The boats behind us did likewise, making an open lane down the middle of the river. Our crews all began hopping out, shields ready for war.
“Thor’s beard!” Godfrey swore. He and Gudruna walked next to one another. As Leif had predicted, their determined faces showed unity. They would both lead us in the coming fight. “Dunadd is inland a few of the English miles. Stop acting like nervous old women. We’re not under attack.”
“Who puts a capital city inland away from the sea?” I asked. “It can’t be more than a dung pile.”
The king splashed down into the river himself. “And if it’s not, we’ll make it into one before we leave. We’ll also make it a pyre.” His men followed, gathering their rucksacks for the trek over land. “Halldorr, name fifteen men to stay behind and guard the ships.” The king and queen were already marching to the northeast, into the bog.
“Wouldn’t it be best to stay on the higher ground and move on the other side of the river?” asked Leif.
“It’s deceiving to look at from here,” answered Killian for the king, since Godfrey was already out of earshot. “The River Add quickly curves and moves away from the heights. Once it turns, both sides will be thick swamps. The Dal Riatans call it the Moine Mhor, the Great Moss.”
“Swamps and mosquitoes,” mumbled Magnus.
“I’m afraid so, lad,” said Killian.
I called out the names of fifteen men just as I was ordered. I left a healthy split of Norsemen, Danes, Manx, a Greenlander, Welsh, and Irish so that no one band could overpower the other. The newcomers, I believed, still needed plenty of supervision.
“And what of the king’s ship?” one of them asked as I lost my boot into the bog. It was the first of several such occasions on the march to Dunadd that day.
“That’s why there are fifteen of you,” I shouted. I may have cursed at the man. If I did, it was out of frustration from the buzzing pests and the slop, for he asked a valid question. “Disperse five of you as an outer perimeter. Stay awake. The rest use ropes to dislodge Raven’s Cross.”
All I heard as I plunged into the muck after the others was a fresh round of swearing and the telltale slap of a man’s hand against the back of his neck.
Swamps and mosquitoes. And death.
. . .
All day we marched in the thickest, wettest shithole I’ve ever encountered. The equinox had come and gone, but laboring as we did under the weight of armor, supplies, and weaponry made even the lightest and fittest among us – Killian – sweat and gurgle for breath. The river was usually within sight on our right side. Godfrey sent a scout to the far side of the waterway to shadow us and warn us of any danger. He also ordered a small screen of men to run ahead of us and to our left. The king took no chances that day, even though he had a reputation for being impulsive. We even had a rearguard of a dozen men following behind and keeping the king apprised of the situation.
As you may guess, the situation was dismal. It was wet, stinking, and foul.
“The idiot Germans don’t even put cities in places like this,” said Leif.
Tyrkr smiled at the barb. He just nodded in agreement while reaching for a branch on a rotting tree trunk to prevent himself from falling into a sinkhole.
“Why put a capital here?” Brandr asked. He stunk of hog manure from the booty he hauled from Lismore. Combined with his sweat, the hot stench of the bog created a force so powerful that every man kept a solid five paces between the hog man and himself.
Godfrey, who’d seen Dunadd in passing while raiding, remained ebullient. “Tsk tsk. It’s all the bastards have got. Don’t judge them too harshly.”
“But why do we want this?” I asked.
“Want this?” asked Godfrey. He swatted a mosquito on his forehead. It had been sucking his blood for a while and created a horrible mess. The king, trying anything he could to keep his men’s spirits high, pinched the crushed beast off and popped it into his mouth. “Ah, the little creatures taste like iron.” He slapped one on my arm and did the same. “Want this? I don’t want this place. Who would put a city here? The Picts didn’t even do this. It was the bastard Irishmen who founded Dal Riata ages ago. I don’t want this place. I do want to keep anyone else with any power away from my lands, though. If King Maredubb is holed up with what’s left of the weak Dal Riatans, we’ll use this as a chance to rid ourselves of both. We’ll then take Anglesey by the winter’s thaw.”
It made sense. Since those days, I’ve been a leader. I’ve been a chieftain of a people wholly unrelated to anyone I had ever met before. What I know is that even simple men who hunt in the forest without any steel and who have never heard of a wheel understand power. Families try to lord over other families so that their children become rulers in the next generation. Tribes fight to lord over other tribes so that the prime hunting grounds are teeming with their warriors and not someone else’s. Godfrey was a king and to stay a king in the cruel world meant that he had to forever beat away the wolves that nipped at his heels. The wolf was watching the longhouse, always.
Evening had now fallen. We sat on water-soaked logs that were slick with snotty algae. Each man grimly ate whatever he had brought for himself. There were no fires. Even if we hadn’t been in hostile territory, finding a square fadmr of land that wasn’t covered in more than an ell of muck was impossible. I ate two boiled eggs that had become crushed in my pack from the day’s walk. They dried out my palate. I washed them down with fresh water from the River Add, which was now more like a creek. My pot of ale, I vowed to save for after the battle. I was going to climb that hill fort, no matter the height, and drink my ale while relieving myself on the corpse of Maredubb. Maybe my piss would cure the rash on his face. The thought made me grin. Perhaps I’d take his fancy black boots for myself, though few men’s feet were as large as mine.
“You were born for this,” whispered Killian in the night. “I see it on your face that despite the conditions and the pending terror, you live for this.”
I shook my head. “Now, maybe. Before and after, no. One day I want to be a raider. The next I want to raise cattle. I’ve wanted nothing more than a woman to rut and land to till for my entire life.”
“Your entire life? Are you even eighteen?”
“I’ve lived twenty-one winters as best I can tell,” I said defensively.
Killian patted my shoulder. “You’re young, that’s all I meant. You’ve got many years to find your dream and then live it.”
Or, I wondered, did I have many years to waste following things my heart only thought it wanted?
The moon was cresting the horizon. I could see the priest’s face. He was a good man trapped in a world that he woul
d not have created had he been given the choice. Or, maybe he was living right where he wanted. It was just hard for him to accept. “Thank you,” I said.
“Do you mind if I pray for you and for our king and for our mission?” asked Killian.
“Now? With me? Why not just pray out loud for the whole mess? Plenty of others are Christians. I’m what you call a pagan, remember.”
“I recall well enough,” Killian said. “If you’d rather I didn’t, I won’t force it on you.”
Something about his demeanor at that moment made me say, “No, I want you to pray. Go ahead.”
Pleased now, Killian began by crossing himself. Before closing his eyes and bowing his head, he physically stuck his fingers on my eyelids and closed them. He also shoved my head down so that my chin sat on my chest. Then he began his talk, first in Latin, then in his native tongue, then in Norse. It was a fine prayer. He mentioned men and deeds about which I knew nothing at the time. He spoke of a man named Gideon, especially. Killian finished by saying what I now know as a Psalm of King David. “Blessed be the Lord my strength, which teacheth my hands for war, and my fingers for battle. My goodness, and my fortress, my high tower, and my deliverer, my shield, and He in whom I trust; who subdueth my people under me.”
When I repeated his word, “Amen,” I looked up. All around me the men, Christian and followers of the old gods alike, had listened to Killian’s words. The priest’s face brightened more than I’d seen it in some time. He’d again found the Christ.
Splashing in the river caused every man to jump. Bows were drawn, spears raised, and swords pointed at the sound. “It’s Loki!” called Loki in a harsh whisper. He moved into the soggy clearing. His eyes widened when he saw all of our raised weapons. “Easy, I’ve got nothing but news.” We relaxed.