Mad and cruel.
She wondered what generations to come would call her father. Sviggar the Good? Sviggar the Proud? Sviggar the Weak?
He sat beside her on his huge oak chair, a dark blue robe trimmed with fox-fur around his shoulders. The sun glinted golden off the band circling his head. Beyond him stood Queen Saldas in a flowing white gown, adorned with golden combs in her hair, golden brooches at her chest, golden lacing around her body, her hand light as a bird on her lord husband’s shoulder.
Behind them stood a herd of other worthies – lords and heirs of the largest estates of Sveäland – a gaudy array of polished hilts, gleaming buckles and brooches, embroidered shirts and tunics – and somewhere among them, Erlan. The one name she had tried a thousand times to expel from her mind. The one face she couldn’t bear to look upon. So instead she looked ahead.
For her husband.
There were dozens of them, but among them she saw no one who could be the great Danish king. This Wartooth. His banner was there – a boar blazoned on purple cloth – but no proud old man with the bearing of a king. Instead, to the fore were riding three younger men.
These, she realized, must be the three Danish princes. In the middle rode an enormous man with a large head of curly hair, and legs so long they almost touched the ground. On his right, a fresher face – surely the youngest – and handsome, even from that distance. But there was something nervous about him. His eyes flashed at everything and everyone.
The third brother was not like that. He sat tall, his eyes fixed ahead – perhaps on her – while the breeze flicked strands of sandy hair about his face. His garb was the most splendid of the three, with a cloak dyed black as jet-stone, adorned with silver brooches and embroidered with silver trim, over a shirt of crimson linen.
The column halted.
It was he who spoke: ‘Greetings, Sveär cousins! We ask the favour of a hearth for humble travellers.’
‘Greetings, Danish cousins,’ her father intoned. ‘Welcome to our royal seat. You must be Ringast Haraldarsson. You’ve become a man since last I saw you.’
‘Fifteen years will do that to a boy. Happily we only spied each other from a distance that day or one of us might not be here to reminisce... Yes, I’m Ringast. My father favours me Lord of Eastern Gotarland.’
‘And with the Danish crown hereafter.’
‘Could be. Though I find it doesn’t profit me to forecast my father’s whims.’
‘Where is your father?’ Sviggar said in a voice hard as flint.
‘Why, he sits on his throne at Leithra, far as I know.’ Beside Ringast, the larger brother, whom Lilla guessed must be Thrand, sniggered.
‘Why isn’t he here?’
‘Alas, our lord father is old. He cannot travel so far as once he did.’
‘Not even for a meeting of such import?’
‘You mean to see his son wed?’ Ringast replied obtusely. ‘Fear not, he sends me with his blessing.’
‘Do you make mock of us?’
‘Not I, Lord Sviggar.’ Ringast bowed his head dutifully. ‘We are your guests.’
Sviggar stroked his chin, seeming unsure what to make of this young prince. ‘We understood your father is willing to end this feud between our families. Did he not deem his presence necessary to such a thing?’
‘Cousin, don’t doubt the weight he gives this meeting. But he is satisfied that his sons speak for him.’
‘A man’s oath is his own.’
‘My father has a saying: “My sons are my seed, my seed is me.”’
‘So your oath binds him?’
‘Undoubtedly.’
Sviggar gave an impatient snort. ‘Well, if you’re the future Danish crown, heed well what happens here. Now – you present your petition.’
‘Our petition?’ Ringast looked puzzled.
‘You have a request, do you not?’
Understanding slowly dawned on the prince’s face. He shrugged. ‘As you wish.’
He dismounted and approached the foot of the Tiding Mound. He looked up at them, gave a rueful chuckle and set himself to the slope. The climb was undignified – he had to stoop to keep himself from falling – but he soon reached the top.
This is the man I’m to marry, thought Lilla. He would be a king one day, and she, his wife – just as she had always been told. And in that moment, she felt death to be a long and weary distance away.
He had the look of a wilful man, his face not unappealing, a little too broad to be handsome, his nose a little hooked. He wasn’t old, though his face was weathered, the corners of his eyes a web of crow’s feet as though he had been squinting too long at the sun, and his beard was cut close, very precisely. She had the sense of a man who needed control, and was used to getting it.
Not exactly a relishing prospect in a husband.
Her father offered the prince his ring. Ringast dropped to his knee, took the proffered hand, kissed the ring, fulfilling this high-flown mummery.
‘I come to do you honour, Lord Sviggar. It’s said you are father to the most beautiful daughter in both our kingdoms. I see now that is true.’ He looked directly at Lilla for the first time with steady, grey eyes. She saw intelligence there but little warmth. ‘I come to ask her hand in marriage.’
This had been a condition of her father’s offer – that the Danish prince formally request her hand. A face-saving detail. A mockery, since all knew the union was Sviggar’s idea. Her father looked grave as Ringast got to his feet. ‘Do you wish to bind your house to mine by a solemn marriage vow?’
‘I do.’
‘And bring all bad blood between us to an end?’
‘Aye.’
Sviggar nodded.
‘Of course, we do no more than accept your most honourable offer,’ Ringast added.
Lilla heard a scoff and realized it had come from her brother. She prayed he would hold his tongue. Sigurd’s thin skin was not helpful right now. As to the barb in Ringast’s voice, Lilla had no doubt her father had caught it, but he said nothing.
‘Do you accept my proposal?’
‘I do,’ her father replied, and a small part of her died. She knew she should be happy. Hadn’t she stopped an ocean of bloodshed, after all? She focused on holding her lips steady, fearing that if she didn’t, her face would melt into a cataract of tears.
‘And do you, princess?’
She could feel the prick of Erlan’s eyes at her neck. Even so, she nodded graciously.
‘Good. We have gold and silver to mark this alliance, cousin. And you?’
‘We give gold and land to my daughter as dowry… But come, you must be tired from your journey. Tomorrow we shall agree on terms for this union and be bound to one another by solemn oath. And the two of you shall be wed. But today, let us feast as friends and kinsmen!’ He clapped his hands and the crowds echoed his applause.
Ringast raised a hand. The applause ceased. ‘Just one small detail I must address first, dear cousin.’
‘Detail?’
‘A little enough thing, but my father was quite insistent upon it – he being a man of the old ways.’
‘Well?’
‘It is somewhat delicate. He asks that he see proof of Princess Aslíf’s purity. After the wedding night.’
‘Her purity?’ her father repeated. But Lilla understood at once. Understood only too well. It was an older custom, to be sure, not often practised those days, except by bondsmen families in woodland backwaters. It held that the marriage bed linen, stained with the flower of maiden blood, should be produced and presented to the husband’s kin as proof of the bride’s virtue.
‘Do you question her honour?’
‘Forgive me, cousin – it’s a mere formality. But my father was quite insistent.’
‘Why, there’s never been a father more certain of his daughter’s virtue! I would stake my honour on it.’
‘Oh, you need not go that far. Just to follow the old custom will suffice.’
Her father turn
ed and looked at her. She was struggling to keep her features still, terrified some streak of colour in her cheeks would betray her.
‘Very well,’ her father declared. ‘It shall be so.’
‘Excellent! Alas, our father has a certain sensibility when it comes to his future heirs.’
‘Enough! We shall settle our new guests. And then, we feast!’
The crowd of nobles stirred, happy to be released from these stiff formalities. Some were already making their way down from the mound-top. But Lilla found she couldn’t move.
Her body was rigid with dread.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
As bodyguard to the king, Erlan had been far closer to the events of the last two days than he could stomach. By the second day, he had a belly so full of bile it was all he could do not to vomit over these highly honoured guests.
That first night, the mead flowed in abundance. But suspicion, too, had stalked the benches like a spectre, in silent mockery of the endless backslapping and clashing horns. Everyone knew that, until the wedding vows were spoken, a misplaced word might see steel drawn and blood spilled.
Erlan hovered at the edge of things as much as he could, brooding over his cup, a watchful eye ever on the king. Sviggar at least seemed in good humour. And why not? He was the only man in the mead-hall who was getting exactly what he wanted.
And all the while, Erlan felt a fool. The things he’d said to Lilla. The things he could not say. And now another man would have her. This Danish prince...
‘Surprised they came?’ He turned to see Earl Bodvar beside him, rolling a horn cup between callused fingers.
‘Aye. After all that Kai said, I am.’
‘Hmm. There’s plenty about this doesn’t make sense.’
‘So you don’t trust them?’
‘I wouldn’t trust them further than I could piss.’
‘I don’t suppose Sviggar does either. But maybe he’s right – better to risk a broken oath later than face uneven odds now.’
‘If that’s the game he’s playing. I’m not sure he knows what he’s doing.’
‘Any word from Huldir?’
Bodvar shook his head. ‘Not since two days ago. Seems he’s laid low with a fever.’ He gave a wry snort. ‘Let’s hope it’s fatal.’
‘Why?’
‘You wouldn’t catch me swearing oaths of peace and friendship with a man who’d flayed the skin off my son’s back.’
‘Hasn’t Huldir sworn to Sviggar? He might not like it, but he’s honoured his oath this long, at least.’
‘Well, that’s it, isn’t it? Which is stronger – blood or oaths?’
At noon next day, the nobles of every house – Dane, Sveär and Gotar – gathered before the Great Hall, sore-headed and full of talk, ready to swear the oaths that would end their enmity once and for all.
King Harald Wartooth had sent with his sons near a hundredweight of gold as Lilla’s bride price: two large chests carried all the way from Zealand. Sviggar’s dowry for her matched this mark for mark, adding to it five bales of the finest furs from the northern forests of Botten.
After thanking Sviggar for his generosity, Ringast pledged ten hides of cleared land as Lilla’s morning-gift. A generous endowment, though Erlan had his doubts it would ever change hands. Not if Ringast’s first night with his new bride revealed the secret that only Erlan knew.
But what could he do about it? Call a halt to the whole proceedings and confess what they had done? Sweep her away to safety, out from under the gaze of every highborn lord in not one, but two kingdoms? No. She didn’t want his help. Didn’t want him. She had chosen this and the Norns would soon show what was to be her fate.
Meanwhile, everything unfolded as the king had wished. He and Prince Ringast swore their oath, laying hands on Adils’ Oath-Ring, each gripping the ancient circle of iron and reciting their words before Var, the goddess of truth, who was said to bless and bind all compacts between men. After them Ringast’s brothers swore with Prince Sigurd, and so on, earl with earl, thane with thane, until the alliance was stitched tight by each and every oath. Thus peace was restored between the two lines of Ívar Wide-Realm; the long-lived feud, which had seen Sveär and Danish blood flow like the spring meltwater so many times, was at last laid to rest. All that remained was to put the final seal on it – the marriage bond between their two lines.
Erlan watched the ceremony with Lilla’s rejection lodged like a fish-bone in his throat. Part of him felt anger. But another part secretly longed for her to look at him. Just a glance, to show that she too was hurting, that she too was mourning something that could not be.
But she never did.
So here they were. The sacrifices had been made to the greatest of their gods: a wild pig for Thor, a horse for Odin, a bullock for Frey. Prosperity, victory, fertility. Such were the blessings of these gods. Lilla sat on a throne under the boughs of the Sacred Grove in a gown as white as a swan’s new plumage, pale blue cornflowers in her hair, a hammer nestled in her lap betokening Mjöllnir. Next to her sat this noble prince. A sneer twitched at Erlan’s lips. Yet at the same time, he despised the jealousy snaking through his heart. Love isn’t mine to keep, he reminded himself. Hadn’t life shown him that, clear as water?
Meanwhile, the white-beard Vithar stood as goði, propped on his crutch, intoning the final prayers to the goddess Frigg, the mother of marriage, to bless their union.
Erlan suddenly caught a scent on the air, subtle... and familiar.
‘Beautiful, is she not?’ Glancing aside, he found Saldas’s green eyes studying him.
He scowled and looked away. ‘That’s not for me to judge.’
‘Come now. You’re not jealous, surely?’
‘Why should I be?’
‘That another man should have his moment. This Ringast... He’s very striking, is he not?’
Erlan didn’t answer.
‘It’s indiscreet of me, I know. But the talk among the women is that he’s quite the man. If he sees something he wants, he takes it... Mmm. And tonight he will claim his reward.’ Her lips came closer. ‘I wonder, will he find her as sweet in body as she is in nature?’
‘Better sweet than bitter.’
She laughed through her nose. ‘Bitter? I think you remember what I taste like better than that.’
He drew her scent deep down into his lungs, letting it linger there. Aye, he remembered. ‘Shouldn’t you be with your husband?’
‘Always so serious!’ She smiled. ‘We should be friends, you and I. Isn’t this a day for enemies to become friends?’
‘Today, perhaps. Tomorrow, who knows?’
Despite himself, he found his mind wandering over her, remembering the press of her body. Lilla didn’t want him. This woman had. He snatched his mind back from her. Vithar was calling out the last of his blessings.
‘Think on what I said,’ she murmured. ‘I’m not so ungracious that I can’t overlook any little misunderstanding of the past.’ Then she was gliding away to rejoin her husband, leaving only the ghost of her presence in his nostrils, while Lilla and her new husband led the crowd of guests back towards the hall.
Custom held that, on the first night of the wedding feast, once vows were exchanged, the bride and the other womenfolk dined separately from their men. So, while they took their places in an adjoining hall, the king entertained his new son-in-law in the Great Hall.
Only the loveliest thrall-maids waited on the menfolk that night, steamed and bathed that day, clothed in fresh white robes, white ribbons circling slender necks, and each maid’s hair arranged in the traditional style of the marriage feast.
Songs were sung until every throat was hoarse. There were drinking contests, bouts of arm-wrestling, rounds of storytelling, while a sea of drink was drained away, and still they yelled for more. Despite all this, Erlan doubted any man’s mind was far from his blade.
It was late. The weakest drinkers were already slumped around the hall, where they would stay till morning. Erlan had
retreated with a half-filled cup to the shadows behind the high table, from where he could watch the king. He was still sober. He hadn’t forgotten his own Feast of Oaths when his head had been stewed in drink. Nor had he forgotten the heap of trouble that led to.
He took another modest swig, hoping to detect some sign of fatigue in Sviggar that would mean he too could soon retire.
A serving-girl came over and proffered her pitcher. ‘Tempt you?’
‘Thanks. I’ve had my fill.’
‘Something else, then?’ She smiled – a smile that promised much. She had one of those elfin faces of the folk across the East Sea – high cheekbones, a neat, straight nose that flicked up at the end. But she was tall, her movements smooth as molten silver, and the white ribbon in her hair belied the mischief in her eye.
‘I’m good for now.’
‘The other girls said you’d say that.’
‘Don’t they have something better to talk about?’
‘What’s better than a mystery?’ She grinned. ‘Anyhow, they think your ankle ain’t the only thing of yours doesn’t work so good.’
‘Don’t you believe them?’ he asked, looking past her.
‘I believe in finding things out for myself.’ She stepped closer. So close he could smell the chewed mint-leaves on her breath. ‘Want to know something else about me?’
‘Not particularly.’
‘I don’t take no for an answer.’
Erlan glanced at her – saw her pupils were dark and wide as whirlpools. He felt a flash of desire, he couldn’t deny it. But somehow it didn’t feel right. For other men, maybe. But for him, that was too precious a thing. Too painful a thing...
‘What are you, an Estlander?’
‘A Finn.’
‘How did you come here?’
‘Sold. Brought here when I was a child.’ Apparently that was enough explanation.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Rissa.’
‘Well, Rissa,’ he murmured, ‘I appreciate the offer. But I think there’s someone over there wants you more than me.’ He nodded at the high table where Prince Thrand was thundering for his cup to be filled.
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