A Sacred Storm

by Theodore Brun

  ‘It’s time. If you want her, you must find her now.’

  ‘I’ll find her,’ Kai grinned.

  ‘I’ll ready the horses. You’re sure they’re in the same stall?’

  ‘Put ’em there myself.’

  ‘And you fed Idun?’

  ‘As much as she’d take.’ They’d considered stealing better horses, but wanting to leave undetected, they finally decided to take their own. Erlan wondered whether Idun would thank him for removing her from her easy life of lush meadows and juicy apples. Indeed he half-wondered whether she would even make it to Sigtuna. But he trusted her. She was lucky.

  Kai pulled up the hood of his cloak and went to the door.

  ‘Kai! For all our sakes, be... subtle.’

  Kai winked. ‘As a snake. And twice as slippery.’

  He pulled aside the drape, lifted the hook, and the door swung open but Kai didn’t move.

  ‘A bit late to be going out, isn’t it?’ Erlan recognized Vargalf’s nasal twang at once. In an eye-blink, he had thrown his cloak over their weapons. ‘Is your master here?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’ Kai let the drape fall behind him. Quickly Erlan snatched the torch from the wall. If Vargalf came in, he meant him to see as little as possible.

  ‘What I have to say is for his ears only. If you want to keep yours, you’ll tell me where he is.’

  Before Kai answered, Erlan threw aside the drape. ‘What do you want?’

  In the torchlight Vargalf’s gaze was disdainful as ever, his skin sallow as a corpse. He was flanked by two house-karls. It was the second time that day Erlan had seen Aleif Red-Cheeks. Beside him stood his friend Torlak, his huge half-lit face ugly as a dung beetle. ‘The king demands you attend him.’

  ‘Isn’t the king dead?’

  ‘Lord Sigurd is king now.’

  ‘Really? I don’t know much of Sveär law, but isn’t it for the high lords to name your next king?’

  ‘Mere formality. But it will be done. At any rate, your lord Sigurd commands—’

  ‘Sigurd is your lord, not mine.’

  Vargalf’s lips twisted in a smile. ‘For now. Nevertheless, he says his father would have wanted you at his vigil.’

  Erlan looked at the two karls. ‘It takes three of you to tell me that?’

  ‘Sigurd was anxious lest you got lost on the way.’

  Erlan ran a tongue over his lips. Vargalf couldn’t know what he and Kai intended. There was no way. ‘Isn’t the vigil for high lords only – for earls and the clan-fathers?’

  ‘Are you not an earl?’

  ‘You know that Sviggar had yet to seal the title.’

  ‘Ah yes. That is unfortunate. Still, the service you did him merits a place. My lord is eager you have the opportunity to say your farewells to his father.’

  The two men glared at each other.

  Erlan handed Kai the torch. ‘Supper will have to wait. Keep it warm till I return.’

  ‘Better the boy readies your breakfast,’ said Vargalf. ‘The vigil ends at dawn. And tomorrow, Sviggar will be buried.’

  The son of a bitch had him. For now. But he was equally certain that Vargalf was ignorant of their plans. Perhaps he had some of his own. Either way – Erlan had little choice. Fighting their way clear was out of the question. They must slip away by stealth. So they would have to bide their time and watch for their moment.

  ‘Get some sleep,’ he told Kai. ‘And come to the hall at dawn.’

  Kai frowned, but Erlan nodded to reassure him. ‘Lead on, Vargalf.’

  ‘I’m afraid you need to dress a little better than that.’ Vargalf cast a disapproving eye over Erlan’s scruffy tunic and breeches. ‘You honour the passing of your lord and king.’

  Erlan snatched the torch back off Kai. ‘Fine.’

  Moments later he returned, dressed in his finest garb: kidskin half-boots on his feet and a cloak dyed black as a midnight sea around his shoulders; at his waist, the belt he had fashioned from the Witch King’s tail, and circling his neck his golden torque, the lavish gift from his dead lord.

  ‘Your sword?’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘Every man wears steel. Respect demands it.’

  Erlan and Kai exchanged a look. ‘I’ll fetch it,’ said Kai and soon retrieved it. Erlan fastened the sheath to his belt.

  ‘Well then, best not keep the old man waiting.’

  Outside the darkness was thin. The long days of midsummer left little time for the night. He followed Vargalf up the slope towards the hall, thinking of the stories Tolla used to tell him as a boy. Far to the north, she’d say, there were lands where the midsummer sun never set, where the pale stallion, Skinfaxi, bore Dag tirelessly around the circle of the sky without rest.

  But as they approached, the night seemed to grow darker, deepened by the blazing flares that lit every corner of the yawning mead-hall. They walked its length under two lines of dancing flames strung out like a dragon’s spine up to the high seat of the Sveär lord. And there, raised high on the platform, was the body of the Bastard King.

  They had lain him on a plinth covered with black furs. Around its base figures kneeled, heads drooping, but his eye was drawn to the king. His clothes were splendid – breeches dyed black crossed with oiled leather leg-bands that scattered the torchlight, a finely embroidered tunic bleached white as milk under an ocean-blue cloak. Erlan saw the glint of gold around the old man’s head, saw his beard, braided and oiled; and lying the length of him, clasped in his withered grey hands, was the ancestral sword of the Sveär kings, Bjarne’s Bane.

  As they passed the fire-pits, some of the kneeling figures looked up. He recognized Heidrek, Earl of Helsingland, pallid and sickly from the wounds he’d taken in Niflagard. And others – the Kvenland earl with his snow-white beard; the young Sodermanland earl, his face smooth and hard as bronze. Last of all, he saw Sigurd – head bowed, lips moving, with not a glimpse in their direction.

  Vargalf led him to the steps up and there stood aside. ‘I leave you to your mourning, Aurvandil. But we will not be far away.’

  Erlan offered no reply. He mounted the steps, conscious his uneven gait announced him better than if he’d yelled his name. But few paid him heed. The noblemen knelt in a ring around Sviggar’s body. Those nearest gazed up at it, muttering sombre words. Erlan tried to discern what they were saying. He caught a few words – names he did not recognize, places he had not been. Memories perhaps, which Sviggar was meant to carry with him into the next world. Whichever world that is. Further back, other nobles knelt in silence, waiting their turn to pay their homage.

  Erlan fidgeted with the torque around his neck, unsure what to do. One of the figures rose and came towards him. The shadows brushed over the man’s features.

  Bodvar.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ the earl whispered, turning him aside.

  ‘My presence was requested.’

  ‘Sigurd?’

  Erlan nodded.

  Bodvar grunted and turned his back on the kneeling figures. ‘Our prince has been quick to throw around his authority.’

  ‘Well, he will be king...’

  ‘Maybe. By the end of the Summer Throng, it’ll be clear whether the nobles accept him. Or someone else.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘H’m... If it had been Staffen, there would be no question...’ The earl trailed off, brow furrowing. It was a little late to be mourning Prince Staffen, Erlan thought.

  He looked past Bodvar at the body of his dead lord. The scent of pine resin skirled from the censers around the plinth, mingling with the smell of something altogether more pungent. ‘Last I saw him, I’d have sworn he was back to full health.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘Two days ago.’

  ‘I saw him this morning. It was grim. He stank. Like something was rotting him alive.’

  ‘Quite a change in fortune. I mean, after the peace.’

  ‘And a quick one, too.’ Bodvar’s nostrils wrinkled. ‘Some
thing in all this stinks worse than that body.’

  Bodvar touched Erlan’s elbow and steered him another step away from any attentive ears. ‘The ground is shifting, my friend. Be sure you’re ready on your feet.’ An unfortunate remark to a cripple.

  The earl squeezed his elbow then moved away, circling to the far side of the plinth till he was out of sight.

  Alone, Erlan looked at the mask of Sviggar’s face. The hair on his sunken cheeks looked coarser in death than life. For a moment, he thought of his own father. One day he would burn and Erlan would not be there to see it... But if he had put his own father on the pyre, could he have knelt and prayed as Sigurd did now?

  He studied the prince, looking for any clue that might betray some darker truth. But there was nothing. If Sigurd had secrets, his features cloaked them well.

  Suddenly the prince glanced in his direction and saw him looking at him. He rose and came over. ‘So you’ve come to honour my father, after all.’

  ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

  Sigurd grunted. ‘And I, for yours.’ The words hung in the stagnant air. ‘He wished to honour you greatly.’

  ‘More than I deserved.’

  ‘You’re too modest.’

  ‘Your father was a generous man... A great man.’

  Sigurd snorted. ‘Great men don’t die in bed.’

  Erlan’s eyebrow gave a rueful flicker. They had the same expression where he came from. But back there, people also reckoned it bad luck to speak ill of a father on the day of his death. He let it pass. Instead he nodded at the kneeling nobles. ‘What are they saying?’

  ‘They pray to Odin, reminding him of my father’s deeds, of the men he’s slain, of the victories he’s won. And since he didn’t fall in battle, they petition on his behalf, asking Odin to choose him for the benches of Valhalla... Idle words,’ he added.

  ‘Idle?’

  ‘Odin has no place for a man whose last deeds were lower than a worm’s.’

  Erlan listened to the earnest prayers of these highborn men and suddenly a memory arose, of those cold words the Watcher had spoken in that cold cavern: There are no gods. His carcass will rot and his soul will remain in the shadows with us.

  ... There are no gods...

  ‘Are you so certain?’

  ‘Why, any child knows as much.’

  Perhaps Sigurd was right, and Odin would have his heroes while the unchosen would pass into the realm of the goddess Hel. After all, hadn’t the Watcher been a weaver of lies? Why would he have spoken the truth about this? Erlan couldn’t say. But one thing he knew: there was a god who spoke no lies. The god of the white wilderness, of the northern sky. The god who did not speak.

  The silent god.

  ‘Be that as it may,’ Sigurd added. ‘We must play out this foolishness. But his body is old. The corruption comes on apace. Tomorrow, we shall burn him.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Kai was bone weary.

  He shook his head, hoping to shake his bleary eyes into focus as he trudged along with the procession.

  Ahead, he could see the top of the dead king’s head, circled with its band of gold. A dank mist swirled about the plinth on which they’d lain him in his funeral wagon. A wheel hit a rut. The grey head jerked, but the crown stayed on. Another jolt as the horses tossed their white manes and Kai heard gold clank against the wooden boards that were carrying him to his final end.

  His end in this world, anyhow.

  Drums boomed through the mist – slow and heavy, shaking the ground like a giant’s footfall. Above them a ram’s horn sent a plaintive melody spiralling into the sky. Goat skulls, grim and forbidding, bobbed on poles, riding above the flames that burned beneath them like wights of the deep. Among them banners hung limp, their gaudy embroidering dulled by the mist.

  Kai yawned. He’d hardly slept a wink, having spent half the night searching for Bara. He’d looked everywhere – the cookhouses, the stables, the dairy, the washhouses, the brewery, though why the Hel she’d be there he couldn’t think. He’d even snuck into the private section of the Great Hall briefly until a house-thrall turfed him out. And even she admitted she hadn’t seen Bara all afternoon. He’d slouched back to the house tired, annoyed and more than a little anxious for her. Sleep had been next to impossible, what with wondering what had become of her, or indeed of Erlan. But part of his mind had been racing with excitement too – that they would soon be away, the three of them, and on to new adventures. So instead of getting the sleep he so badly needed, he’d sat up all night, wound tight as a bowstring.

  ‘How much further, you reckon?’

  ‘Another half a league or so to the ness,’ replied Erlan, walking beside him.

  Kai swore. ‘The sun’ll be past the morning mark by the time we get there! Not that you can see the damn thing in this fog. Hey – how come those buggers get to ride while we all have to walk?’ He shot a resentful look at the nine men on horseback, riding escort to the funeral wagon. Their fur-covered shoulders glistened silver with the dewy mist.

  ‘If you ever become a clan-father, you’ll get to ride. Till then, you walk like the rest of us.’

  ‘Right now, I’d happily trade places with Sviggar. Least the old bird gets to lie down.’

  ‘You’re not the only one who hasn’t had any sleep.’ True – Erlan’s eyes didn’t look much better than his felt. Kai lapsed into a gloomy silence, and for the twentieth time that morning wondered where Bara had got to.

  The horn fell silent. A man began to sing. Sweet and deep his voice was, swelling from his throat with a sound almost as rich as the horn. After a phrase or two, others joined in until soon most of the mourners were murmuring along to his song. They sang to their king, to the dead fathers who had gone ahead of him. They sang to the High God Odin and his brothers and sons, calling them to gather as the great Lord of Sveäland took to the fire-road.

  ‘Master?’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘When are we going to – you know – be off?’

  ‘Shh.’

  ‘Why? They’re all bloody singing.’ Which was true enough.

  Erlan dropped his voice. ‘We’ve to bide our time. The Norns have thrown the pieces in the air. Let’s see how they’ll land.’

  ‘What if they land badly—’

  ‘Look, we need a night’s head start if we’re to get away clean. Vargalf can’t watch us all the time.’

  ‘So we just wait?’

  ‘Aye. Until all this is done. After that, first chance that comes, we’re gone.’

  ‘What are you two whispering about?’ They turned to see the drooping jowls of Einar the Fat-Bellied, his cheeks blotched a little redder with the morning chill.

  ‘Just trying to answer this one’s damn-fool questions,’ Erlan replied. ‘I suppose you’ve seen all this before?’

  ‘Well, they burned his son last year, of course. But a king? I never saw that. Ívar Wide-Realm fell into the drink off Estland twenty odd years ago. Before that... it’s been forty years since that madman Ingjald went to the dust. Can’t be many still alive who remember that – and fewer who cared.’

  Erlan looked around at the droves of mourners. ‘You think they care today?’

  ‘I’d say so. Don’t you?’

  ‘Mmm. Guess I owe him a lot.’

  Einar grunted, then dropped his voice. ‘You know, there’s some talk about.’

  ‘Talk?’

  ‘Vargalf’s been oiling up to a few of the lads – aye, and not the best of ’em.’

  ‘To what purpose?’

  ‘Can’t say I’ve heard. Don’t suppose I would from him, neither. But whatever it is, it can’t mean no good.’

  ‘Things are moving.’

  ‘Well, I wish they’d move a bit bloody quicker.’ Kai nodded at the train of mourners. ‘We’ll all die of old age before this thing is done.’

  The road south began to fall away towards the water’s edge at the tip of the ness that jutted into the Uppland fjord. />
  The sun’s rays were finally beginning to break through, though thick skeins of mist still lingered. And suddenly out of the murk appeared a ship’s prow: a great dragon’s head glaring down at the train of mourners with proud and pitiless eyes, its worm teeth cut sharp into the timber. The ship was not large, far smaller than the war-ships Kai had seen in months past, but big enough. A trading vessel by the look of it, hauled up the beach and onto the tufted grass that overlooked the fjord.

  A boat like that didn’t drag itself out of the water. It must have taken thirty men at least. Even then, it would have taken most of the night.

  Someone must know what they’re doing, anyhow.

  The procession turned off the path and filtered past the ship. The hull lay on great quantities of timber and brushwood – kindling for a king.

  The crowd spread about the ship. Meanwhile the clan-fathers dismounted and, lifting the pallet down from the wagon, carried Sviggar into the boat. Inside, a kind of canopy had already been erected, made from swathes of hide and four wooden posts. They laid his body inside.

  The air was filled with wailing as the torch- and skull-bearers formed a ring around the ship. But once the ring was formed, the wailing died and there was silence.

  ‘What now?’ Kai whispered.

  ‘Why not shut up and watch?’

  Kai gave an indignant shrug. But he didn’t have long to wait.

  A clan-father shouted a command to the thralls attending the wagon. One of them hopped into the wagon and began handing down the articles accompanying the dead king on the fire-road. Arm-rings, brooches of gold and silver, mirrors and basins of bronze, elaborate drinking vessels sculpted in glass, all manner of weapons – spears, shields, axes, war-hammers, great chests containing Kai knew not what, casks of food, skins of drink – perhaps mead or even wine for a king, he guessed. A veritable horde of precious things, and every one was taken to the ship, passed up, and arranged carefully around the fur-covered pallet.

  Two large hunting dogs were then led forward to the prow. There a third thrall-boy was waiting, knife in hand. The work was quickly done – two slits and the dogs were kicking and shuddering, dark blood gushing from their gullets into the grass. Once the dogs lay lifeless, the thralls picked them up and threw them over the gunwale like sacks of grain, each landing in the bows with a bump.