by Fabio
At last he heard the hiss of their breathing. A hard, lanky form crashed against his back—then another, and another, and he was hurled painfully to the frozen ground. Flipping over with a grunt, he yanked his forearms upward to protect his face from vicious teeth and sharp claws, fully expecting to be devoured alive by these hounds from hell. Yet in the next instant he heard soft whimpers, felt a rough tongue licking his face and playful teeth chewing on one of his fingers.
In the meantime, his warriors had gathered around him and the wolves and were roaring with mirth.
"What is going on here?" Viktor demanded, sitting up, only to be knocked down again as two of the frisky beasts leaped against his shoulders with their forepaws.
"Jarl! Do you not recognize your pets?" inquired one of the men.
"Pets!" Mystified, Viktor was at last able to sit up and hold the three rambunctious animals at bay. "These are my pets?"
"Yea, jarl. They have come to play."
"Play?"
Several of the men chuckled; then Orm explained. "Verily, this is the manner in which all of you cavort, amid much growling, chasing, chewing, and rolling about on the tundra."
With a scowl of lingering suspicion, Viktor eyed the wolves. Having expended their initial exuberance, all three now stood around him, watching him expectantly and panting with their tongues hanging out, sending up white puffs into the icy atmosphere. They were really magnificent creatures, he mused, with plump bodies, silver fur, fluffy tails, light faces and eyes. He reached out tentatively to pet the nearest one. The animal wagged its tail and licked Viktor's hand. Giving in to impulse, he hugged all three, and they responded with more licks and affectionate sounds. For the first time since he had arrived in this mystifying netherworld, he felt a moment of true happiness and bonding.
"What are their names??' he inquired of the men.
"You are petting Hati, the female," Orm answered. "She is named after the wolf of creation who chased the moon."
"The males are Thor and Geri," added another. "Named after the god of thunder and one of Odin's wolves."
Grinning, Viktor stood, and clucked softly to the animals. "Very well. Let us all move on, then."
With the wolves following closely at Viktor's heels, the men continued across the tundra. Soon they came to a huge longhouse with walls and roof composed of thick turf. Smoke curled from a hole at the center of the roof. Surrounding the longhouse were several smaller outbuildings of similar design; in the distance sprawled a small village.
"That is my home?" Viktor asked, jerking a thumb toward the large house.
"Yea, jarl."
Most of the warriors bade their jarl farewell, but five of them, as well as the three wolves, followed Viktor inside. As soon as they moved through the carved door into a crude foyer, Viktor began choking on the heavy odors of smoke, spoiled food, hay, and dirt. A smoky lamp Viktor assumed was filled with whale oil provided the only scant light.
He blinked at the men through smarting eyes. "My God, it's like a burning trash heap in here. Haven't you ever heard of ventilation?"
"Nay, jarl," answered all five in unison.
Viktor rubbed his eyes. "Do you have any idea how harmful it is to inhale all this smoke?"
The men exchanged bemused glances.
Suddenly Viktor felt bone-weary, and his pounding head threatened new waves of befuddlement. "Never mind. We will discuss this tomorrow."
"You do not wish to convene your war council tonight, jarl?" one warrior asked.
"What is that?" Viktor said.
"Whenever Wolfgard attacks, you discuss the outcome and plan future strategies with your war council."
"And I suppose you men comprise my war council?"
Five heads nodded. "We are your retainers, jarl," one man answered.
Viktor forced a smile. "I'm sorry. I seem to be forgetting myself ever since I returned from the dead. I haven't even asked you your names."
"We understand," replied Orm. "I am Orm the Bold, and the others will be pleased to state their titles to refresh your memory."
"I am Svein the Sagacious, your blood brother," said a tall, handsome blond fellow with twinkling blue eyes and a small, pointed beard.
"I am Rollo the Robust," added a brown-haired, brawny man with hazel eyes.
"I am Ottar the Good," said a fair, reedy lad. , "I am Canute the Cunning," said a tall, bearded, blond giant with a heavily scarred face and an eye patch.
Viktor shook the hand of each man in turn? prompting more perplexed looks. "I am most pleased to meet all of you, gentlemen. However, if you will excuse me, I don't think I am quite up to hosting a war council right now."
"As you desire, jarl," answered Svein. "After all, 'tis not every day that a warrior sails off to meet Odin and lives to remember it. You must tell us your story once you recover your wits."
"I may indeed, but you will never believe it," quipped Viktor.
"Think you 'tis wise you remain here alone, jarl?" asked a dubious Ottar. "We are fearful of your state of mind."
"Believe me, so am I." Viktor grimaced and rubbed his temple.
Canute pulled forward a young, blond wench who had just come forward to join them. "Iva will see to your needs tonight," he said gruffly. "In the morning, your housekeeper, Helga, will prepare your repast."
Viktor smiled at the servant. Short, blue-eyed, with her flaxen hair in braids, she was staring at Viktor agog, and appeared to be no more than sixteen. "Hello, Iva."
"Master, you are alive!" she cried.
"So it appears."
"But how can this be?"
"You tell me," Viktor replied dryly.
"Yea, slave, your master has returned from Valhalla," Canute informed the wench with a menacing frown. "And now you must atone for your own cowardice."
Watching Iva shrink back in fear, Viktor asked, "What cowardice?"
Canute's scowl deepened. "Iva was selected as the virgin to be sacrificed with you and launched to Valhalla, but she ran away to the mountains and hid with the elves. Mayhap you should now beat her dead for her treachery, jarl."
Hearing the slave gasp in terror, a bewildered Viktor replied irately, "Beat her? For not wanting to die? Never."
Surprisingly, the giant laughed. "Then you will find a more befitting punishment, eh?" He jabbed Viktor's side with his elbow.
"Punish her?" repeated Viktor.
"I think our jarl needs his rest," Orm said to the others. He nodded sternly at the wench. "See you watch over our master carefully, slave, or I shall thrash you myself. Our jarl is much confused at the moment,"
"Yea, master," said Iva, curtsying.
"We will seek your counsel in the morning, jarl," added Svein, and the men trooped out.
In the wake of their departure, the young woman was staring at Viktor with reverent eyes. "Master, how may I serve you?"
He cleared a raspy throat. "I don't suppose you have a bottle of Evian stashed somewhere."
She stared up at him blankly.
Viktor glanced from the slave to the eager wolves wagging their tails. He coughed again. "Is there anywhere in this house where the smoke isn't thick enough to choke on? I'm already developing a raw throat and a very nasty headache."
Iva smiled and took his hand. "I will show you to your bedchamber, jarl."
She led him through several poorly lit chambers, then behind a wooden partition to an area furnished with a high-backed chair, a sea chest, and a crude, narrow bed covered with animal pelts. At once the eager dogs bounded up onto the bed, their large bodies covering most of it.
Viktor glowered at the trio. "Now wait a minute, beasts! Where do / sleep?"
Iva giggled and squeezed his hand. "You can share my chamber, jarl. 'Twould be an honor now that you have returned from the dead."
Viktor jerked away and glowered at her. "You! But you are so young."
"Nay, master, I am the eldest virgin in the tribe, an adult for four winters now. Tis why I was selected to be sacrificed and laun
ched with you—and I do regret my cowardice."
Viktor received this information in consternation. His headache was not improving at all!
To the wench, he said sternly, "I don't care if you are the oldest virgin in the tribe. You may not offer to share your chamber with any man, not until you are at least eighteen winters old. Is that clear?"
"Eighteen winters old?" she repeated, crestfallen.
"And married," he added.
She smiled, displaying charming dimples. "Wed? But slaves do not marry, jarl."
He scowled. "I can tell already that there are going to be some big changes around here."
"But, jarl—"
"Am I the boss here or not?"
"The boss?"
"The master."
She lowered her gaze. "Yea, you are master."
He smiled. "Then go to bed, Iva."
She trudged off.
Eyeing the three huge wolves occupying his sleeping place, Viktor drew a heavy breath. Dio, he still felt chilled to the bone, and utterly exhausted! He removed the wool cloak and blanket, his chain-mail tunic and soaked garments. Shivering, he strode to the bed.
"Move over, beasts," he scolded, gently pushing them away from the center of the cot. "Wherever in Hel I have landed, I am whipped. This journeying through time is not all it's cracked up to be. I feel as if I've just lived through every one of those thousand years."
Somehow, Viktor managed to wiggle under the pelts and squeeze himself between the wolves' bristly bodies. He groaned as the monsters again licked and chewed him. His "pets" were loyal and winsome, but his head was still smarting from the Valkyrie's blow and the acrid smoke, and he felt utterly drained from his struggles against the frigid ocean— not to mention the emotional shock of what had just happened to him! Given all he had endured, he was hardly in a frolicsome mood.
He had been plucked from his cushy existence in the twentieth century and thrust back to the savage Dark Ages, complete with a raging blood feud and a Valkyrie determined to kill him. He had sailed through a door in time to land smack in the life of Viktor the Valiant—and God only knew what would happen to him tomorrow.
Across the fjord in her own bed, Reyna the Ravisher tossed and turned. Why could she not stop thinking about Viktor the Valiant, reliving their bizarre encounter, and even wondering if he now thought of her? Mayhap he had not returned from Valhalla a god at all, but some sort of warlock who now perversely tormented her.
Whatever the rhyme or reason, Reyna knew she could ill afford to become even more intrigued with her enemy. Viktor was no different from the other brutal barbarians who had carried her off as a child, taken her freedom, destroyed her life, and caused the deaths of her mother and baby brother. She would not rest until she had killed all Vikings, and she would not let this odd bewitchment with Viktor the Valiant deter her from her goal.
Tomorrow she would journey across the fjord and infiltrate his territory. Tomorrow she would slay him ... Mayhap after she had assuaged her curiosity a bit more.
SIX
“GOOD MORROW, MASTER.”
The following morning, Viktor first encountered his housekeeper next to the open hearth in the large chamber at the center of the house. The woman was stirring bubbling gruel in a huge iron pot suspended by a tether over the stone fire pit. Viktor rubbed eyes that smarted from the acrid smoke.
He had been awake for most of an hour, and the reality that he was actually living in the Dark Ages continued to sink in on him. If this experience was some sort of dream—or a nightmare!—he certainly was not waking up.
The wolves had roused him well before dawn, and he had let them out for a run in the cold blackness before proceeding back to his bedchamber. In the sea chest, he had found some of the former Viktor's clothing—a coarse white tunic and leather jerkin, brown leggings, and soft leather boots. The garments had fit him well, and he had completed his toilette with only a polished silver tray to serve as a mirror. He had shaved his face with some sort of loathsome, stinging soap and a crude razor, and had raked order into his hair with a primitive comb carved of whalebone.
Viktor had explored the house, surveying several partitioned-off rooms in which various female thralls had greeted their returned jarl with a combination of reverence and shy smiles: in one cubicle, he had marveled at spinning and weaving; in another, he had scrutinized buttermilk and cheese being processed, and butter churned; in a third, he had watched dough being kneaded, and vegetables chopped for a stew.
Now he had come face-to-face with the housekeeper—a tall, thin, middle-aged woman with silver-streaked hair flowing from beneath a dark house cap, and sharp, thin features that did little to enhance her leathery face. With interest he eyed the two brooches holding together her brown garment: one seemed ornamental, a combination of iron filigree and small stones of amber; the other gave evidence of her station, since it was shaped like a ring and held a variety of small household implements: keys, scissors, needles, a small knife, and a couple of tiny leather pouches.
"You must be Helga," he murmured.
"Yea, master," the woman replied, lowering her gaze. "Canute the Cunning informed me you have returned from Valhalla."
"I suppose it's the talk of the village by now," Viktor quipped.
The woman stared at him blankly. "You are hungry, master?"
Realizing he was indeed famished, he clapped his hands and smiled. "Yes, rising from the dead does give a man one hell of an appetite."
With a perplexed frown, Helga picked up a soapstone bowl and ladled some gruel into it. Grabbing a spoon, she took the repast to a nearby table.
Following her, Viktor settled his large body into a high-backed chair that was supported by beautifully carved wooden pillars. He lifted the rather misshapen, roughly finished iron spoon and took a bite of the hot cereal. The porridge seemed to be a bland corn mush, and though it was far from tasty, at least it was edible.
Helga placed before him an iron tankard containing a smelly, lumpy-looking white brew. Viktor grimaced. "What is that?"
"Whey, master. You drink it each morning."
"There is nothing else?"
"Yea, there is ale—or buttermilk."
"Ah, buttermilk sounds good," he said.
The housekeeper shrugged and trudged off with the tankard. Momentarily she returned with a different chalice containing a portion of thick buttermilk that Viktor found palatable, if tepid.
As he ate, Viktor examined the chamber in greater detail. Like the other rooms in the house, the central hall had a soaring ceiling composed of thick panels of turf supported by stout wooden beams. But here me resemblance to the other chambers ended. Whereas the cubicles he had explored this morning had contained only floors of packed earth, this central eating hall had been built up on a platform of light, smooth wood, save for the sunk-in fire pit. Viktor sat at a long table with a plain, scarred top, yet the high-backed chairs surrounding it were, like his, throne-style and beautifully carved with etchings of warriors, horses, and odd writing symbols Viktor guessed were runic characters. Against both walls rested long benches with dark leather coverings. Above the benches hung tapestries—intricately woven, colorful panels depicting Viking warriors battling dragons, elves, ogresses, and trolls.
Obviously, Viktor mused, this chamber served as both dining hall and council chamber. It was doubtless here that Viktor the Valiant met with his kinsmen to feast or plan battle strategies. Although the surroundings were attractive, Viktor's eyes and throat still felt raw from the haze of smoke, grease, and stale food—especially with the large, hot, smoky fire pit at the center of the room. The fact that his head was still throbbing from his encounter with the warrior woman's battle-ax last night only exacerbated his malaise. Assuming he remained here in the Dark Ages, he must insist that the servants air out this rancid longhouse—and he must teach these people how to properly vent their fires.
After breakfast, Viktor ventured outside. The day was chill but not unpleasant, and actually, it was
a relief for him to escape the acrid interior of the longhouse. He took several deep, bracing breaths of cool air, and judged the temperature to be in the low fifties.
For the first time, Viktor examined his surroundings by full daylight, and the reality that he was very, very far away from twentieth-century California struck him profoundly. His eye scanned the panorama—the mountains in the distance with their gleaming ice caps, the craggy foothills, and closer, the vast, gently sloping tundra carpeted with mossy grass and a few brave, stunted silver birches and willows. He knew that a mighty fjord carved the land to the west and that rocky cliffs and the beach stretched to the south, but otherwise he could not gauge this island's boundaries. However, like Iceland, Vanaheim must be quite large, he mused. Judging from the rock formations, he presumed the island had been born from ocean volcanoes, from basalt rock, just like Iceland.
Closer to view were sprawled all the accoutrements of a crude fanning village of the Dark Ages. Viktor the Valiant had obviously been both a chieftain and a gentleman farmer. Most of the outbuildings and cottages were smaller versions of the longhouse itself—primitive structures composed almost entirely of turf, with wooden doors and support beams. Viktor spotted storage sheds, vegetable gardens and haystacks, and small cottages with yards of caked dirt, where women boiled laundry and children played with primitive toys made of rocks and sticks. One large building on the edge of the settlement appeared to be a barn—chickens, pigs, and cows roamed the fenced yard. Just beyond the small village, several men tilled the fields with oxen-drawn wooden plows.
Viktor shook his head and smiled cynically. He was off living in another age, all right. Logic declared that he should feel horrified to be wrenched so suddenly from his safe, established existence in the twentieth century—and, on one level, he still felt disoriented and bemused. But in another sense he felt challenged and intrigued by the possibility of living in a time that would test his physical strength and mental abilities, a time in which he would live or die by his own wits and fortitude. And oddly, the nagging feeling of displacement he had known in his "other" life was somehow absent here.