During the past few days, every horse worthy of the name had been collected, and somewhere around seventy animals were now staked out in the fields beyond the ringfort at Ráth Naoi. The mounted warriors would be the first into the fight, with foot soldiers right behind them. But if Grimarr swept in too quickly for the riders to react, then all would be lost.
Lorcan was muttering to the men on either side of him, but finally he turned back to Sandarr. “When we move our warriors to the coast, we leave Ráth Naoi undefended. We cannot do that until we are certain that Grimarr is going after the hoard.”
“Why is that?” Sandarr asked by way of Ronnat. “Are your enemies so numerous that they will fall on Ráth Naoi when you are gone?”
That was translated, and Lorcan’s reply as well. “There is no one in Cill Mhantáin or beyond who would dare make an attempt against this ringfort, whether my warriors are here or not,” he said. “But I cannot be certain that the dubh gall in Vík-ló are not waiting for their chance to strike here.”
At that, Sandarr nearly laughed. “Grimarr has no interest in this pathetic, stinking, shit-filled pig sty of a ringfort,” he said, giving vent to his true feelings on the matter, certain that Ronnat would make the reply more palatable. “He only wants the silver from Fearna, and he will go after it the very moment he is able. And he’ll keep you dancing around here as long as he can to keep you from moving to the coast where you might stop him.”
Lorcan’s suggestion that Grimarr might wish to attack the ringfort was absurd, of course, but there was more to it. Beneath the words, even through the girl’s translation, Sandarr could hear the suggestion that Lorcan did not entirely trust him. The Irishman, he knew, suspected that Sandarr might still be working for his own countrymen.
That, too, was absurd. Sandarr had no countrymen. He was, in his own eyes, a country of one. Dane, Irish, Norwegian, he hated them all and he felt he owed allegiance to none but himself. He and Lorcan had been making their plans for months. It was because of Sandarr that Lorcan knew to attack the longships on the way back from Fearna. Fasti’s hiding the plunder had been something Sandarr could not have foreseen, but he had the sense that Lorcan did not entirely believe that.
It was no matter to him, however, if Lorcan believed him or not. Sandarr offered loyalty and trust to no one, and he did not expect to receive it. When this was all done he intended to be lord of Vík-ló, and to have no real threat from the Irish countryside. He was not entirely clear on how he would achieve that. He did not possess the resources to make such an outcome happen. But he knew that it would involve bringing Lorcan and Grimarr together so that they might decimate each other’s forces and, with luck, kill one another as well.
He needed Lorcan to go along with this idea, to fling his warriors at Grimarr’s so both Irish and Dane would be badly hurt. He needed Lorcan to do so unwittingly, and he had reason to hope he would, as Lorcan was a witless creature. But he was starting to despair that Lorcan would listen to reason.
“See here, Lorcan, you great, stupid ox,” Sandarr said, now finding amusement in Ronnat’s habit of cleaning up his words, “here is a thing you do not understand. These goats that you Irish call horses might move faster than a man may move, but they do not move faster than a longship. If we are not in place and ready for Grimarr, we will have no chance of intercepting him. The wind blows from the northeast today and has this week past. If it continues to do so, it will drive Grimarr’s ships down the coast faster than your fastest horse could run. Ships do not need to stop for food and water. They do not need rest.”
Sandarr sat back. He expected a wave of Lorcan’s hand, his words dismissed. He expected Lorcan to make a sneering comment to his men that Ronnat would choose to not translate. But that was not how Lorcan reacted, not at all. Somehow the mention of longships seemed to have struck a nerve, and when Lorcan turned and spoke with his chief men, his voice was low, his tone was not what Sandarr would have expected.
And then Lorcan turned back to Sandarr and spoke, and Ronnat translated, and the words came as a surprise. “Lorcan says, ‘Very well, we will move out on the morrow. All the horse soldiers and the foot soldiers as well. We’ll position them where we discussed and wait for word of Grimarr’s sailing.’” Ronnat paused as Lorcan added more, and then said, “And Lorcan says, ‘You had better hope that you are right.’”
For all the preparation, it was no easy task to get Far Voyager moving toward the water. The days of rain had made the ground soft, and the rollers did not roll, and sliding the ship on its cradle proved more difficult than expected. It was only when Aghen had secured buckets of tallow and the skids and the rollers had been well greased that the ship showed any willingness at all to move.
As the River Leitrim approached its zenith, Thorgrim’s men began pushing against the hull and heaving on lines run aft from the bow. The water was visibly retreating by the time Far Voyager floated free. One moment she was stuck fast, a nearly immovable object, and the next her stern floated off and she twisted a bit in the current. And then one more heave and she was alive again, not the dead weight of a vessel on the hard, but the graceful creature she was meant to be, moving to an easy pull of the ropes that ran to the shore.
And even that, that magic metamorphosis, a moment of joy for every mariner, was not enough to lift Thorgrim Night Wolf from his black mood.
He had been well enough during the day, despite the aggravation of having Grimarr Giant arrive on the riverfront in an attempt to placate him and win his fealty for the next week at least. Grimarr reckoned he was doing Thorgrim a great honor, making the trek down to the water rather than sending Bersi or Hilder to summon Thorgrim to his hall. Thorgrim understood that, but still felt something less than honored. And then for all that Grimarr raced off with barely a word spoken between them.
Far Voyager’s stubborn resistance to being relaunched was another source of annoyance. It truth it was no more than the general sort of difficulty one encountered when working with ships. There was always something. But Thorgrim was finding it hard to be sanguine about this particular problem. He did not like the fact that his ship seemed reluctant to return to the sea. It did not seem like a good omen to him.
And so, even after his ship was floating free and was secured to the shore by walrus-hide ropes, Thorgrim felt the black mood enveloping him, this ugly, sometimes violent spirit that on occasion possessed him as the sun went down. It was something for which he was well-known and feared. It had earned him the nickname ‘Night Wolf’, and because of it, those who knew him knew to keep clear when the black mood struck, and they whispered warnings to those who did not. There were rumors that Thorgrim was a shape-shifter, that in the darkness he took on more than just the mindset of a wolf.
Now, with the sun moving fast toward the hills in the west, Thorgrim stood about fifty paces back from the water, arms folded, his cloak clasped around his shoulders as if he was trying to hide underneath it. Far Voyager was pulled as close to the bank as she could get and Thorgrim could tell by the angle of the mast, which had already been re-stepped, that the ebbing tide was starting to settle her in the mud. He felt much the same; mired, stuck.
His crew had formed a line from the shore to the bow of the ship, like ants swarming over a drop of honey on the ground, and they were passing stores and weapons and gear from the grassy bank to the men who leaned over the ship’s rails. When they were done there would still be a substantial pile left on the shore. They were taking only what was needed for a trip of a week or two; food water, and the gear required for sailing and fighting. The rest would be loaded aboard after they returned to Vík-ló, richer for the Fearna hoard and ready to continue their voyage to Vik.
Starri Deathless came ambling over. After all the years, Starri was the only man who had ever been able to approach Thorgrim when the black mood was upon him. That worried Thorgrim, in his more lucid moments, because it suggested that his grip on sanity might be no greater than Starri’s.
When he re
ached Thorgrim’s side, Starri stopped and turned and the two of them looked across the open ground at Far Voyager. There was something oddly calming about Starri’s presence. In part this was because Starri was not afraid of the Night Wolf. He did not step carefully around Thorgrim when the black mood was on him. Also, because Thorgrim knew Starri would not say anything stupid. Starri somehow always knew the words that would dovetail with Thorgrim’s mood.
“She swims,” Starri said at last.
“She swims,” Thorgrim agreed.
They were silent again for a long moment. Then Starri turned to Thorgrim, reached out and squeezed his arm, then walked off again.
Often, when Thorgrim was in his black mood, Starri would take a place nearby and sit vigil through the night. Now, perhaps because they were not on a battlefield but safe within the walls of Vík-ló, he did not, but rather made his way toward the temporary Norwegian village of West Agder. The camp’s most prominent feature, the mead hall made from Far Voyager’s sail, was gone now, the sail and the oars that made up the frame being needed once again aboard the ship. But the tents and tables were there still, and food and drink were flowing. The men of West Agder had much to celebrate.
Thorgrim did not join them, and no one asked him to. He stood in his place looking at the river until darkness came and the noise and the fire from his men’s encampment grew as the light faded. Then Thorgrim moved further off, down the river bank, closer to the sea, until the sounds from the camp were muted and distant. He sat, his legs drawn up near to his chest, as near as his aging joints could flex, and stared out into the dark.
As he had grown older the black moods had come less and less frequently, and he had even hoped that they might be a thing of the past. But now the anger and despair at his inability to leave Ireland in his wake, the desperation and the fury at how Grimarr had thwarted him, swept him up like a winter squall, tumbled him and tossed him about, and he knew that he was not done with these terrible visitations, not yet. He knew he might not be free of the black mood until he reached Odin’s great hall.
His awareness of those things around him began to fade as the tumult of emotions overwhelmed him. He knew from experience there was nothing he could do, he could not fight it, he could only remain where he was and let it pass. Whatever he did when the black mood was on him he knew he would not remember, and he could only hope that it was not too terrible.
He pulled his cloak around him and stared out at the sea. Time passed but he had little awareness of it. He heard the sound of the waves on the shore and smelled the salt air and he felt the call of the sea.
And then suddenly he was aware of another presence, someone behind him. He felt the dream-state slip, felt himself pulled back into the world of men. He turned his head and he saw the distant firelight glint off something swinging fast through the air. He had an instant to register the hardness of the thing, the cold dampness of the iron as it connected with the side of his head, and then all was blackness again.
Chapter Nineteen
I felt my life’s blood run
down both my sides.
I had to bear that bravely.
Gisli Sursson’s Saga
The first thing Thorgrim realized when consciousness returned was that he was buried. He was covered completely, and the weight of whatever covered him pressed down on him, head to feet. He felt a spark of panic to think he had been buried in the earth, buried alive. He tried to determine if he still had Iron-tooth; to die in this way was horror enough, to die without a sword in his hand was worse still, but to die without even having a weapon in his possession was unthinkable.
It was then he realized that his hands and his feet were bound, lashed tight with thin cordage that dug into his flesh. He could feel the warm, wet blood from the places where the lashings had broken the skin. And then, awareness growing stronger, he realized that he was lying on something that was swaying and bumping. He was not under the ground, and this weight pressing down on him was not dirt. It had a familiar smell, a comforting smell. Hay.
Cart… Thorgrim thought. I’m in the back of a cart… He cocked his head one way and another, trying to pick out some sound, but the hay muffled everything save for the squeaking of the wheels and axle which seemed to come through the fabric of the cart itself.
He could hear nothing, see nothing, smell nothing save for the hay. He had no idea of where he was or how long he had been unconscious. He tried to shift his position and the pain in his head flared like a funeral pyre and he moaned despite himself. He worked his wrists against the bonds but the pain was terrific and the cords did not yield in the least.
And then the motion stopped. He felt the cart sway as it came to a halt and the creaking and the bumping ceased and he could hear muffled voices through the hay. He could make out no words, and he had the sense that the men around him were purposely speaking soft. He heard a knocking, then more muffled voices. And then another voice, loud and commanding, making no effort to be quiet.
“He is here?”
“Yes, Lord. Under the hay.”
A pause. Then, “Why in Odin’s name is he under the hay?”
“So his men would not find him. If they happened on us.”
This was greeted by a grunt, a suggestion that such precaution was stupid. Then the louder voice demanded, “He lives still?”
“Yes, Lord.”
“Bastard!” The hay did nothing to dull the sharp note of Grimarr’s voice. “Bastard!” he said again. “Bring him in.”
Thorgrim felt the weight of the hay diminish as hands dug him out. A knife flashed and the binds around his ankles were cut free. More hands grabbed his arms and legs and dragged him off the end of the cart and stood him up. His head whirled, light flashed in his eyes, tears ran down his cheeks. The crushing pain in his skull made it hard to stand or form a thought. Under it all he could feel that the dark mood, the night wolf dream, had not gone away. It was there, lurking.
More hands half pushed, half dragged him through the door and into Grimarr’s hall. Grimarr was seated in his big chair, the one that Thorgrim had always suspected was meant to suggest a throne. Oversized as it was, Grimarr filled it completely. His legs were thrust out in front of him, he was slumped back, head cocked to one side. He looked weary. He looked furious.
Thorgrim staggered across the floor on legs that barely functioned, and if the men on either side of him had not been taking most of his weight he would have fallen in a heap. Grimarr’s men maneuvered him until he was facing Grimarr, then let him go, let his legs collapse under him, catching him again when he was on his knees so that he was left kneeling at Grimarr’s feet.
Bersi stood behind Grimarr and to his right. To his left was Hilder, holding what Thorgrim recognized as the iron spit that had put Grimarr down during the Irish raid.
“Thorgrim Night Wolf,” Grimarr said, speaking the name slow, savoring the words. “Late of Dubh-linn.”
Thorgrim looked into his eyes, though in truth he could hardly see. His vision was dulled and tears were welling in his eyes from the pain in his head. Even if he could have spoken he would have had nothing to say to that.
Grimarr continued. “You may know why you are here. Or you may not. It does not matter. The gods know and I know.”
Again, Thorgrim made no attempt to answer. Such an effort would have been pointless on many levels.
“Before you die, Thorgrim Night Wolf, I want you to know this one thing.” Grimarr sat up and leaned forward, as if he was suddenly interested in what he had to say. He leaned close to Thorgrim, their faces inches apart. He spoke soft, his voice a low, animal sound.
“Many of your men will die helping me get the Fearna hoard,” Grimarr continued. “All of them, if I can manage it. All but your son. Him, I’ll bring back to Vík-ló and I’ll kill him here. I will take a long time to do it, and his end will be the most humiliating death I can arrange. He’ll shriek like a girl, and when at last he dies he will join you in the frozen wastes of Hel. And
my only regret is that you will not see your son die. So I want you to know that he will die with no sword in his hand, and his body will be left for the pigs and the crows.”
For a long moment the two men stared at one another, inches separating them. Thorgrim’s mind was clearing, but still he had no idea of why this was happening, why Grimarr had suddenly changed in this way. He had a vague memory of Grimarr’s earlier trying to ingratiate himself but that seemed more a dream now, and trying to recall any of it was like peering through thick fog.
And suddenly Thorgrim was filled with hatred for Grimarr, hatred so bitter it was like a terrible taste in his mouth, a sharp knife in his gut. It swept over him and engulfed him and with no idea that he was even going to do it he lunged forward, teeth barred, a howl in his throat. He snapped at Grimarr’s cheek and felt the flesh between his incisors and he bit down hard. He heard Grimarr shout and felt him pull back, the flesh pulling free from his teeth, the taste of blood in his mouth.
Grimarr pushed himself all the way back in his chair, eyes wide, hands up, blood running down his face Thorgrim launched himself forward, pushing off with his toes, just clearing the floor when the man to his right, unseen, kicked him hard and sent him sprawling off to the side.
It was no more than a heartbeat before Grimarr recovered from the shock and leapt to his feet, wiping at his bloody cheek with his sleeve. More hands grabbed onto Thorgrim’s arms and hefted him up and he snarled and snapped at them, but Grimarr’s men were careful to keep clear of his teeth. They held him up and Grimarr pulled his sword from its sheath and took a step closer.
The Lord of Vik-lo: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 3) Page 18