Loch Garman: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 7)

by James L. Nelson

  Bécc nodded and seemed to consider this for a moment. Then he spoke. “He asks, ‘you decided to do this, go after your son, without speaking with me first?’” Failend said.

  “I spoke to you,” Thorgrim said. “You said you would not fight because it was some holy day. So I acted.” He was starting to grow annoyed with this line of questioning. “I took our mutual enemy prisoner. Most would consider that a good thing.”

  “Brother Bécc asks why you didn’t tell him Airtre held your son hostage.”

  “Because it isn’t his affair. I agreed to help protect the monastery against its enemy. That enemy,” Thorgrim said, pointing at Airtre. “I’ve done that. Me and my men. My son is my business, and I will attend to it as I see fit. And I’ll fulfill the bargain I made.”

  Thorgrim let Failend translate his point before he made the next. He wondered if Bécc would ask how he knew Airtre held Harald hostage. He was not sure how he would answer that.

  Once Failend finished, Thorgrim continued. “Now tell Bécc that this fellow’s men have lost their leader. They’re camped half a day’s march away. If we are to attack them, we should do it now. No time will be better.”

  Bécc nodded again, his eye moving from Thorgrim to Airtre and back. He spoke.

  “Brother Bécc says that taking Airtre might make things more complicated,” Failend said. “He says he will take charge of the prisoner now, and decide how we will proceed.” There was a hesitancy in Failend’s translation. She knew that Thorgrim would not be happy with Bécc’s words. And he was not, not at all. And he was getting sick of hearing her say “Brother Bécc.”

  “How does this make things more complicated?” Thorgrim asked, the question directed at Failend, not Bécc.

  “I don’t know,” Failend said. “But my guess is that the monastery does not want to look like the aggressor. They want to defend, not attack. Now, having taken Airtre prisoner, they look as if they are the ones waging war. And using heathens to help them. Airtre’s men might not be willing to attack without Airtre to lead them, so once again Brother Bécc looks like the one provoking things.”

  This made sense to Thorgrim. He understood the problem. But he did not much care about such niceties. “Tell Bécc that this Irishman is my prisoner, not his,” Thorgrim said.

  Bécc sat up a bit straighter as Failend translated the words, the biggest response the man had yet made. Bécc spoke.

  “He says Airtre is rí tuath here…like a jarl…and so it is only fit that he, Bécc, should oversee him. He says that you are correct, that you only agreed to help protect the monastery. The affairs of this country are not your concern.”

  Thorgrim looked into Bécc’s eye and Bécc looked back and neither man betrayed anything of the thoughts that were swirling around inside.

  He’s right, Thorgrim thought at last. This is not my affair. He had to keep that in mind. Beyond seeing that Harald was safe he did not have any reason to worry about what the Irish did to one another. He stood.

  “Tell Bécc this,” he said to Failend, who had stood as well. “Tell him he can have the prisoner. Tell him I don’t care at all about their affairs. Tell him I will do as I promised, help defend the monastery. And then I will collect my sailcloth and will leave here for good.”

  Failend translated. Bécc nodded. Airtre looked relieved, though he hid it fairly well.

  “But tell Bécc this as well,” Thorgrim continued. “If my son escaped the way Airtre says he did, then I’ll expect him to show up in a few days. If he does not, then this will become my affair, and I will be asking Airtre some more questions. I’ll be asking in the manner that I see fit. And there is no one within five days march who can stop me.”

  He turned and left the tent, Failend at his heels. He trudged off across the open ground, toward the heap of furs that made up his bed. He could barely recall a time when he felt more in need of rest.

  They did not leave camp that day. Instead, Brother Bécc, with a handful of men-at-arms as escort, rode back to Ferns where Bécc was able to confer with Abbot Columb. In the abbot’s private chambers Bécc told the tale of Airtre’s taking Thorgrim’s son as hostage, and Thorgrim’s capturing him. The old abbot had sighed at the news, as Bécc had known he would.

  “Do you think, Brother Bécc, that Airtre would have attacked your men, if this heathen had not taken him prisoner?”

  “I don’t know, Abbot,” Bécc said, with more candor than he would ever show in front of his soldiers. With them, Bécc knew he had to project an air of certainty. He could show no weakness or allow them to think he did not have an answer to everything. But with Abbot Columb it was different. The abbot was a holy man, a good man. A shrewd man. The abbot was Bécc’s confessor. There was nothing the abbot did not know about Bécc.

  “He certainly would have attacked if the heathens were not with us,” Bécc continued. “But as I told you, Airtre was conspiring to work with the heathens to sack Ferns. He was holding this Thorgrim’s son hostage. When he and some of his men-at-arms appeared at the mouth of the Bann, I believe they were there to meet up with the Northmen for that reason. Airtre denies it, but I don’t believe him. I suspect there is some devil’s work below the surface.”

  “I suspect you’re right,” the abbot said. “Where the heathens are, the devil is not far behind.”

  Bécc nodded. He felt the same. Which was the chief reason he was not entirely comfortable with the current arrangement. He did not feel it was hypocrisy, exactly, to accuse Airtre of acting with the heathens when they themselves were doing so. He and the abbot were conspiring to protect a holy place, Airtre was conspiring to raid it. But he still was not comfortable.

  “Airtre’s men, they are to the east?” Abbot Columb asked.

  “To the south and east. Half a day’s march. Near Rath Cloon.”

  The abbot considered this. “You’ll keep them out of the hills to the north, right?” He fixed Bécc with a look meant to convey the seriousness of that order, even if he did not want to convey it with words.

  “I’ll keep them out of the hills,” Bécc assured him. Because he did understand the seriousness of that command. And he knew, ultimately, that that was what it was all about, even if Airtre and Thorgrim and even Faílbe mac Dúnlaing and Tuathal mac Máele-Brigte, the tottering high king of Laigin, did not.

  “Good,” Abbot Columb said with evident relief. “You do that and there’s no more you need do, unless Airtre’s men attack first. Your job is simple, Brother Bécc, almost a waste of your great talent and experience. You keep anyone from raiding this monastery, and you keep anyone from getting up into the hills to the north.”

  With those instructions Bécc left the old abbot and returned to the camp. Columb had not actually clarified what Bécc was to do, simply what he was to prevent others from doing. The old man had given him considerable latitude, but that was fine. Bécc was no foot soldier, he did not need someone to direct his every move.

  It was dark when he finally rode into camp. He could sense the restlessness there. The men had expected to move that day, but instead they had remained where they were, with no explanation given, because Bécc was not much given to explaining.

  The Northmen and Irish together were like two hard things rubbing against each other, creating heat. The men knew that Airtre was there, as prisoner, but they did not know why, or how. It was all peat dumped on the fire, the heat and flames building.

  But Bécc was thinking only about his evening prayers as he entered his tent. If he had a servant he would have sent him to fetch flame for his candles, but Bécc did not feel it would be right for him to have such help. He was a monk now, and one who had taken a vow of poverty, and no longer a captain of soldiers, despite the current task that Columb had set for him.

  He picked up one of his candles and went in search of a fire. When he returned, a flame dancing on the wick, he lit the second, then eased himself to his knees and prayed.

  The guard at the door to the tent, well trained by no
w, waited until after he finished to knock softly and call, “Brother Bécc?”

  “Yes?”

  The guard pulled the door open and looked in. “I’ve a message from Airtre, Brother. He begs a word with you.”

  Bécc looked at the man as he considered this. It was not a surprise—he expected that Airtre would want an audience, try to talk his way out of the mess he had got himself into.

  “Very well,” Bécc said. “I’ll meet with him now.”

  It was a few moments later that Bécc heard footsteps outside, the door drawn back. Airtre stepped through. His posture was erect, more defiant than broken, but he did not look like he was in terribly good shape. The blood that had seeped into the cloth of his right sleeve was dried and crusty. He had various bruises on his face and the welts from where his hands had been bound were still visible.

  “Sit,” Bécc said, gesturing toward a chair. Airtre nodded and sat. Bécc sat across from him and regarded him for a second. He did not hate Airtre so much as pity him, he realized.

  “Ale?” he asked and Airtre nodded and he looked grateful. Bécc poured him a cup and handed it over and Airtre took a big gulp and Bécc wondered if they had given him water. He should have specified that Airtre was to be shown courtesy, but he had not thought it was necessary to say as much.

  “I had no intention of attacking Ferns,” Airtre said after he put his cup down. Bécc nodded. He had expected this argument, but had thought Airtre would circle around a bit, rather than getting right to it.

  “No?” Bécc said. “But you had your men under arms.”

  “Of course I did,” Airtre protested. “As did you, as did Faílbe. The heathens have come ashore and they are setting up one of their…what do they call them? Ship forts. Right there at the mouth of the River Slaney. Of course I had my men under arms.”

  Bécc looked at him. Airtre was a talker, that was for certain. Smooth, like a serpent. “This Thorgrim says you had his son hostage. Not a prisoner, mind you, a hostage. Fairly exchanged. He says you were conspiring with the heathens to sack Ferns.”

  “Not to sack Ferns,” Airtre said. “I did it to save my men. The heathens had come north looking for some ships they had abandoned there. Not far from Rath Knock. They came on us by surprise and they outnumbered us. I made an arrangement with them, let them think I wished to join with them, only so they wouldn’t butcher my men. I’m not ashamed of that. I’ll go to any length to protect my people.”

  Bécc considered that. It was a believable story, though he did not believe it in the least.

  “I had no intention of keeping my word to this Thorgrim,” Airtre added. “It’s no dishonor to lie to one of these murderous heathens, since there’s no truth in any of them.”

  Still Bécc did not respond. His silence put Airtre on edge, made him continue speaking. And in that way Bécc knew he might lure the man into saying more than he intended.

  But Airtre was cleverer than that, Bécc realized, and had been practicing this interview in his head for some time.

  Now he leaned closer to Bécc, a gesture that implied something conspiratorial. “In my mind,” Airtre said, speaking softer and slower, “it’s foolish to trust one of these heathens, and it’s an outright sin to cooperate with them. To join with them. I think you agree with me, Brother Bécc. And yet here you are, welcoming the heathens into your camp. Feeding them. You might as well invite the devil to warm himself by your fire.”

  Bécc held his eyes, thought about his words. Airtre was trying to be clever, to strike at his weakness. And in truth he was being more clever than even he realized. Because Bécc agreed with Airtre on that point. Very much.

  He had been torn since the moment that Abbot Columb had made this pact with Thorgrim to protect the monastery at Ferns. Use heathens to fight against Christians? Even if it was in defense of such a holy place as Ferns, Bécc did not see how that could be pleasing to God. He had managed to convince himself it was a just thing, but his doubts had been growing. His talk with the abbot had not allayed his worries.

  It had been Abbot Columb’s idea, of course, not his, and the abbot was a holy man. But sometimes, Bécc felt, Columb’s obligations to the monastery blinded him so he could not see the true path he should tread.

  “If all the Christians in this country were willing to defend such holy places as Ferns,” Bécc replied, “and not sack them like the heathens do, then there would be no need for such bargaining with the devil.”

  Airtre leaned back. That barb had struck, but it did not push Airtre off the path he was on. “One can justify most things,” he said. “At least to one’s self. The judgment of the Lord is another thing.”

  Bécc said nothing.

  “See here,” Airtre said, leaning in again. “I won’t pretend that I didn’t have designs on Ferns. And I think my demands were justified, frankly.” He put up his hands to fend off any protests that Bécc might make, but Bécc remained silent. “But right now, the heathens are the biggest threat, and they are a threat to all of us. I don’t know what sort of bargain Abbot Columb made—and I expect it was him who made it, not you—but you can’t bargain with those men, and you know it. They’re beasts. They’ll turn on you at any moment.”

  “What do you suggest?” Bécc asked. Airtre was playing the right tune. Bécc knew it and was helpless to resist, because so far Airtre had not said anything with which he did not agree.

  “Don’t let them turn on you,” Airtre said. “Turn on them first. You have your men-at-arms here, and I have mine. If we march as if to battle with each other, and then join forces at the last moment, we could crush the heathens. Smite them. Not just defeat them but stamp them out like the vermin they are.”

  “And then you march to Ferns? Complete your work there?” Bécc asked.

  “No,” Airtre said. “No, I will not do that. I give you my word. As a Christian.”

  He let that hang in the air, the implications clear as a bell. Thorgrim could not give such a promise. A promise as a Christian. His was only the word of a heathen, and already he had proven himself unwilling to submit to Bécc’s command, going out on his own, taking Airtre prisoner.

  The abbot had given strict orders. Strict but simple. Keep Ferns safe. Keep anyone from going up into the hills to the north. He had given Bécc considerable scope with regard to how he made that happen.

  “So tell me,” Bécc said, “if we were to turn on these heathens and crush them, how exactly do you propose we do it?”

  Twenty-One

  That we were known for warriors mighty;

  There with sharp spears wounds we scored,

  Let blood from wounds. And reddened the brand.

  Prose Edda

  Harald was heading north, up into the hills, or so he guessed. He had run and then walked as fast and as far from Airtre’s camp as he had been able. Miles, by his guess. He was pretty sure that he had been going east when he first ran out into the dark, and then he had turned and run off in another direction, and he suspected that was north.

  When he could walk no farther he had found a thicket into which he secreted himself and he beat down a patch of earth and lay down and fell asleep. The sun was up when he awoke, the overcast breaking up, having threatened rain but not delivered these past four days or more. He was stiff, his bruises ached, he was ravenously hungry and terribly thirsty. But he was alive. And for the moment, apparently, safe.

  He sat up and peered out of the thicket. He could see nothing save for meadow rolling along. He listened. Birds, insects, nothing more. He remained like that for a long time, listening for the sound of horses, men shouting, the jingle of chain mail. The sounds of pursuit. But there was nothing.

  Slowly, suppressing groans as he stretched stiff joints, he stood and once again looked around, but even at full height there was nothing to change his belief that no one was hunting for him, at least no one nearby. He stepped out of the thicket and walked a little ways until he had as unobstructed a view as he could get. With the su
n on the rise he now knew which direction was which, and though he could not tell the direction from which he had come the night before, he still felt as if he had been walking north.

  North… he thought. Very well. It didn’t really make much difference, since he had only a vague idea of where he was, or where he needed to go.

  This doesn’t happen at sea, he thought. It’s better being at sea. Under sail, skirting the coast, he never was faced with the problem he had now, not knowing where he was. As long as the coast was in view, a sailor had a road to follow. Now Harald was reminded of those few times when he had crossed open water, journeys of several days out of sight of land. His father seemed always to have an idea of where he was, but Harald did not, and he found it a bit unnerving.

  He felt like that now.

  So, I began on the coast, and fell in with Airtre, and from there I think we traveled north and west. Mostly west, I think… Harald tried to picture a map in his head, but other than the coastline, which he knew somewhat, having sailed past it, he had no idea of what the country looked like.

  Father and the rest of them, they should be to the west of here… Harald thought next, but he knew that was only another guess, and with each guess he was drifting farther and farther away from any certainty. Wherever his father was, he would probably be near the place called Ferns. And even if he wasn’t, Harald knew that from Ferns he could get to the new longphort at Loch Garman. His father had described the small river, and the larger one.

  So all he needed was someone to tell him how to get to Ferns.

  Just then his stomach gave an audible growl and he felt it twist from hunger. On a normal day Harald was given to eating great quantities of food. Now it had been a full day at least since he had had a proper meal, and he had done considerable fighting and running and walking since last eating.

  All right, then, he thought, revising his plans, someone with food who can tell me how to get to Ferns, that’s what I need.