Lord of the Sea Castle

  Dismissed, Raymond bowed to the Konungr of Cluainmín and turned back towards the harbour, trailed by Geoffrey, Amaury and Fionntán. He walked past the patch of blood where the slave had been killed by Jarl Sigtrygg and frowned. ‘We are staying on Waverider tonight,’ he announced. ‘Every man sleeps in his armour with his weapons at the ready. If Jarl Sigtrygg decides to make a fight of it, I want us to be ready.’

  ‘We will have nowhere to run if he wants trouble,’ said Fionntán as he scratched at a louse beneath his long orange cloak. ‘The channel to the main river is so narrow that two bowmen could kill us all from the shore.’ He stuck his thumb in his mouth before holding it up to test the wind. ‘And worse, we will not be able to rely on the sails.’

  Amaury nodded his head in agreement. ‘Sitting ducks on a still pond.’

  ‘We will be ready,’ Raymond insisted and, with one final look into the marketplace where Jarl Sigtrygg’s men plotted their revenge, he began walking back towards the harbour trailed by Amaury and Fionntán. ‘A man who believes in the blood feud can always be relied upon to act before he should.’

  ‘A blood feud?’ Geoffrey of Abergavenny asked as he eyed the patch of bright blood on the ground of the slave market. ‘I don’t like this at all,’ he added before scampering after his comrades.

  Music and the smell of turf fires drifted across the shimmering river to where Waverider lay under anchor. Water lapped and gulped at her wooden hull as men snored on her creaking benches. The day had been hot and cloudless so the night was cold, and Raymond watched his breath mist before his eyes, catching the light of the bright moon and the flickering yellow glow of whale-fat lamps from the town walls. The eastern bank was a gaming board as firelight cast by the revellers’ torches passed through the masts and stowed rigging of longships in the harbour.

  Loud laughter from the town made Raymond turn and examine the western bank where Cluainmín stood. His eyes easily identified Trygve’s large feasting hall over the riverside palisade. The dancing firelight emanating from within told the Norman that many men had attended the konungr’s feast and he felt a pang of disappointment that he had been not able to join them. Another peal of drunken delight lanced across the night-time scene. A number of men sang a hearty seafaring tune which ended in a bawdy splatter of laughter and ovation upon table tops. Raymond turned his back on the merrymaking and grabbed a water skin from where it hung by the steering oar. He drained a mouthful as he walked across Waverider‘s deck towards the darkness of the eastern riverbank. He could see little amongst the pouring vegetation, and he urged his eyes to focus. Nocturnal animals were making a racket in the gloom, not as much as the men on the far bank, but certainly sufficient to mask any careful assault on the crew of Waverider. Not even the light from the full moon could penetrate the depth of trees on that riverbank. Above him he could hear a bat flying around the rigging, but he only had eyes for the shrouded shore to the east. Something out there drew his attention. Yet he could neither see nor hear anything in the heavy foliage.

  Unheralded, Basilia de Quincy entered his mind. Usually, her image stirred feelings of guilt and desire in equal measure, but now he felt only regret. Soon, Basilia was replaced by the memory of Alice’s angry outburst at the cattle pens and he exhaled loudly, wiping his hand over his face as the frustration and confusion returned. As he turned to walk back to the steering oar, a noise from the dark shore caught his attention and he turned on his heel and stared out over the still water of the river to where he thought that he had heard the delicate scrape of metal upon metal. Nothing moved and no more sounds echoed from the gloom.

  Raymond held his breath.

  ‘There are people in the trees,’ Fionntán whispered as he appeared silently at Raymond’s side. ‘I’ve been watching for many minutes.’

  If Raymond was spooked by Fionntán’s sudden appearance, he did not show it. ‘Warriors?’

  ‘I can’t see who they are, but they are armed. I only count two of them,’ the Gael said and Raymond did not doubt that he was correct.

  ‘Dubhgall,’ Raymond murmured. The Dark Foreigners.

  ‘Indeed.’ Fionntán nodded. ‘But which ones – Veðrarfjord or Cluainmín?’

  Raymond’s eyes narrowed. ‘Why would Trygve’s men guard the eastern bank rather than the town harbour?’

  ‘It would seem pointless,’ Fionntán whispered. ‘Unless he means to get rid of us. Should I raise the crew?’

  ‘No. Whoever it is, I doubt that they will attack us with only two men. They are watching us.’

  Fionntán sniffed. ‘And if it is Jarl Sigtrygg?’

  ‘He has no vessel so his only option is to hit us with arrows from the bank. If it were me I would wait until a little before daybreak when we are at our most vulnerable.’

  ‘We could sail away.’

  Raymond shook his head. ‘It makes no sense for Trygve to guard the eastern shore – it must be Jarl Sigtrygg. But if Trygve hears us under oar he will become suspicious and you are correct, he will send a handful of bowmen out onto the point,’ he indicated downriver to where the river, unseen in the darkness, narrowed. ‘He could spray Waverider with arrows as she tries to pass. With this small wind we would have to take to the oars and we would have no cover. It would be a massacre.’ Raymond blew a lungful of hot air through his hands to warm them up. ‘No,’ he decided, ‘we stay put.’

  ‘What about the Ostmen?’

  ‘It is troubling,’ Raymond replied. ‘Jarl Sigtrygg would be mad to attack. He’ll be hard pressed to hurt us and it will accomplish nothing other than driving Trygve to our side, or at least away from his. He might believe that Veðrarfjord can defeat us without Trygve’s help?’

  ‘You did call him a hog-faced prick. Some men cannot let an insult like that lie. It plays on their mind and until they see the blood on their swords they will carry it with them.’ He cleared his throat and shook his head perhaps, Raymond thought, to eliminate a memory from his own background.

  ‘Anyway,’ the Gael continued, ‘the Ostmen love a good feud and you may have started one with the worst brigand these islands have seen in fifty years.’

  ‘“May have” started a feud,’ Raymond repeated and rubbed his face as he considered his situation. ‘There is nothing for it, I’ll have to find out who they are,’ he said. ‘Get the men awake and tell them to make a bit of noise like we are drinking and getting rowdy.’

  ‘What exactly is your plan?’ Fionntán asked as Raymond swept off his cloak and began unbuckling his sword-belt.

  The captain smiled as he took off his surcoat, decorated with Strongbow’s arms, and draped it over the edge of the ship. ‘I’ll have a quick and quiet look around. Whoever is over there,’ he nodded towards the riverbank, ‘they are up to something and I want to know what it is.’ He pulled his long red bliaut over his head and threw it on top of his surcoat leaving him in only his hose. He then kicked off his sabatons and tucked them into the front of his breeches. Picking up his sword-belt, he buckled it over his right shoulder. The heavy leather scabbard was cold on his spine. Around him, his milites growled as they were shaken awake by Fionntán.

  ‘Go away,’ Geoffrey of Abergavenny told the Gael and rolled over, wrapped in his cloak. A swift kick to the esquire’s backside had the boy to his feet as well as providing a warning to several other sleeping warriors not to mess with Fionntán.

  Raymond waited until the Gael had everyone on their feet and his milites had started to growl in anger at being woken. He then crossed to the steering oar and, with a deep breath, hoisted himself over the wale and down the wooden clinkered hull. He gasped as his bare feet struck cold water and used his arms to lower himself downwards into the river.

  ‘Holy St Nicholas’ beard,’ he whimpered as his shoulders went under and his breath scattered the surface as he panted and paddled. With one hand on the hull, he waited for several minutes while his body adjusted to the temperature, sweeping his feet in circles as his father had taught him during their
lessons of his youth. Soon, his breathing became less shallow and, covered by the ongoing noise from his men aboard Waverider, he pushed away and began silently swimming upstream, helped part of the way by the rope which tugged on the anchor.

  The light from the town flickered on the surface of the water and mixed with the constant white of the moon. A fish popped to the surface a few feet in front of him, preying on flies which buzzed around. After only a few seconds the anchor rope went deeper than he could reach and Raymond continued the slow progress for many minutes, paddling northwards against the flow of water. He was almost blind as he swam into the blackness, but in his mind’s eye he pictured the shoreline that he had studied during daylight hours. When he adjudged that he had swum far enough, Raymond turned to his right as quietly as he could and made for the shore. He knew that any noise could draw the Ostmen to the waterside and a single arrow could end his involvement in Strongbow’s great adventure. Raymond swept the thought from his mind and, almost immediately, he felt mud beneath his toes and tough stalks of rushes strike his face. Now wading, he paused as water flowed from his bare shoulders to drip noisily into the Banneew. His eyes adjusted to the darkness. He could now make out the sandy shoreline and the trees beyond, but could see no sign of the warriors that Fionntán had spotted. He started forward through the deep rushes and buzzing bugs until the water came up to his knees and soon the mud became stone and shingle, making it more difficult for him to move quietly. Shivering, he slowed his progress but, before long, his feet hit a tangle of grass and bramble. Above his head a bent tree bough arced downwards to touch the river. He had entered the forest.

  Nothing moved ahead of him and Raymond turned to look across the bay at Waverider, outlined in front of the lamp-lit town. Despite his efforts in the water, he had only ended up about twenty paces upriver of the ship and that realisation made him pause. He could still hear the noise from his men and he prayed that it had been enough to mask the clamour he had made while swimming. A splash from the river made him jump and was followed by a shout of derision and a bout of laughter. Someone, probably Fionntán, had hurled something heavy overboard to conceal his movements. Raymond smiled at the Gael’s ruse and turned back towards the darkness of the trees, hoisting himself over a huge tree root where he quickly rammed his sabatons back on his feet. Reaching down to the ground he found some soft mud and scrawled markings across his face, chest and arms to aid his concealment.

  No man could stay silent in the heavy vegetation, but Raymond was more nimble than most his size and he carefully and patiently made his way through the forest with barely more than a sound. He could only have been walking for a few minutes when a voice in front of him, more a whisper, spoke a few words in the Danish tongue. Had the man not spoken Raymond would have bumbled right into him where he stood with his back to a tree. The Norman froze and silently sank to his knees, his eyes searching the darkness for threats and a path to retreat if one came about. A second man, with a deeper voice, replied to the first Ostman’s question in hushed tones. A gap in the trees allowed the moon to shine through and Raymond caught a glimpse of the second warrior as moonlight reflected off his shimmering fish scale armour. He was seated and had a long blonde beard, a gold clasp at his shoulder and was emptying a skin into his mouth. The sound of sloshing wine emanated around the trees. At the seated man’s shoulder, Raymond could see a shield bearing a snarling boar mask. They were Jarl Sigtrygg’s men.

  Raymond slowly reached over his shoulder and gripped the sword at his back and waited, his eyes unblinking as they locked on the nearest Ostman. That Sigtrygg was planning to attack Waverider he did not now doubt. Raymond had never responded well to intimidation and promised that the two men would die as a warning to their jarl to back off.

  He waited, barely breathing and watching. He waited, fingering his sword pommel. He waited until the noises emanating from Waverider increased and then he sprang at the nearest of the two men, cleaving his head in two with a vicious downward cut as he dragged the weapon over his shoulder. The second Ostman, seated on the ground, yelped at the sudden appearance of an enemy amongst the trees and rolled away towards a spear propped against a fallen bough. Raymond was on him in a second, crying a shout of venom as he swung his sword one-handed at the man’s head. Somehow the blond warrior hoisted the boar-faced shield and deflected the thrust away from his body. Raymond stumbled after the clumsy lunge, taking the shield with him, but the Ostman did not take advantage and attack the Norman. Instead he took his opportunity to flee and sprinted away from the river and into the depths of the forest.

  Raymond cursed and picked up the man’s abandoned shield. He feared what would occur should the warrior report back to Sigtrygg, likely drunk at the feast in town. The jarl from Veðrarfjord would be furious and would seek revenge. Worse, Trygve would be infuriated that Raymond had broken the peace and any hope for a deal with Cluainmín would be finished. With the noise of the fleeing Ostman still echoing around the trees, Raymond took off after him.

  Jarl Sigtrygg’s warrior was panicking, he quickly realised as he tracked his path. Rather than make his way back towards safety and his jarl’s side, the man was running inland into the forest. Perhaps he believed that he could lose his pursuer in the dark depths, but it did not take much effort for Raymond to shadow his quarry as he noisily smashed through bush and briar. The terrain suddenly sloped uphill and the Norman captain’s thighs burned as he forced himself onwards. He considered stopping his pursuit and doubling-back to the river for surely, he thought, the two had taken a boat across from Cluainmín and the remaining man would return to the vessel. He was neither gaining nor losing any ground on the noisy Ostman. And something else was perturbing Raymond - a faint glow of firelight above the trees. He slowed to a stop, confused at the sight coming from the depths of what he thought was the uninhabited eastern shore. Ahead he could hear the Ostman using his weapons to cut his way through the tangle. Raymond followed more methodically, his ears alert and suspicious, as he moved ever eastwards and uphill. He suspected that he and Jarl Sigtrygg’s warrior must have come at least half a mile into the forest when, up ahead, the shouting began.

  Raymond froze and gripped the straps on the back of the circular shield. Creeping forward, he heard the crash of steel weapons and the thump of many feet. A man bellowed in fear and was silenced. Raymond again went still and urged his eyes to penetrate the dimness. Curiosity pushed him further in spite of the danger. Ahead angry voices spoke and orders were shouted at warriors unseen. Heavy feet stomped on hard earth. Why were there warriors this deep in the forest, he wondered and slowly began sneaking forwards. As he approached the pinnacle of the hill he espied torches between the trees and again slowed, crouching and making sure that he made as little noise as possible. Ahead was a vast area of hewn stumps and rough bracken-roofed hovels. The whole expanse was arrayed in firelight from a hundred torches which ringed a mass of Ostman warriors, oxen, carts and filth-covered slaves.

  ‘Oh no,’ Raymond said quietly as he stared around floodlit expanse, ‘Fionntán is going to kill me.’ For he had stumbled upon the secret which the Gael had warned him to avoid at all costs - it was Trygve’s silver mine. If he was discovered by the men of Cluainmín, all his hopes for a treaty with Trygve would certainly be finished, he knew. From his hiding place, Raymond watched as oxen teams carted iron ore from the mouth of the mine, fifty paces away, to where chain-bound slaves toiled with shovels and picks at debris from deep in the earth. Dung and burning wood tickled his nostrils. Above everything was a fort, simple in construction though Raymond did not doubt that it would allow the warriors to protect their new found treasure-trove from any attack.

  But Trygve would trust to secrecy first. Raymond could see that Jarl Sigtrygg’s warrior had already died to protect the knowledge of the silver mine’s location and he did not want to join the Ostman on that particular journey. The man’s body was lying prone on the ground with three men surrounding him and more gathering with weapons at
the ready. One man, who Raymond remembered from the slave market that morning, was issuing loud orders and pointing into the trees.

  ‘Time to go,’ the captain said quietly and began to slide back into the forest. He cursed as his foot strayed into a dry, rustling bushel a few steps into his flight.

  The shout echoed clear through the still forest and Raymond knew immediately that he was in trouble. Abandoning any attempt to remain unseen, he began running through the forest in the general direction of Waverider. He cried out as he ran headlong into a low branch which whipped across his face, but he was on his feet in a second, treading more carefully as his eyes adjusted from the flickering firelight at the silver mines to the dank darkness of the forest. Behind him, he could hear the heavy stomp of warriors, their jangling chainmail and the clash of steel weaponry on leather, leaf and wood. Many men were chasing him.

  He did not doubt that he could outpace the armour-clad warriors, but he worried about what would happen if he led them straight to Waverider. If Trygve thought that one of the Normans had discovered his mines, not one of his small crew would leave the settlement alive, of that he was sure. Raymond looked back over his shoulder where he could see a number of torches amongst the trees. Despite their weaponry, the Ostmen were making fast progress through the forest which they understandably knew better than he. Clambering over a tree root, his eyes espied the glow from Cluainmín and he redoubled his efforts to race in that direction.

  Movement and a yell came from his left and it took all of Raymond’s speed to get the boar-faced shield up to deflect a spear thrust by a young beardless youth coming from the other direction. The Ostman squealed as he struck, the war cry of a novice, young in battle but keen to mark this night with his first kill. Raymond didn’t give his adversary the chance. He twisted his shield to throw the boy off balance and drew his sword, all impulse and reaction. He deflected the beardless boy’s next lunge away to his left and for a second the two warriors circled each other like fighting cats. The young man had lost the element of surprise and now was faced with an enemy ready to meet his attack. He hesitated.