You Die When You Die

by Angus Watson

  Despite their redundancy, Finnbogi had to admit that the Hird made an impressive sight, the iron and steel of their well-preserved weapons reflecting firelight and their muscles glowing in the evening sun. Of course, Finnbogi would have had muscles like that if he spent all day leaping about, and anyone can dress up and hold a weapon. But how many of them would keep their cool in a real fight? Not all of them, by any means. Finnbogi knew that he would. And he reckoned he’d beat all of them in a running race, too.

  Thyri was talking to her fellow Hird member, the fork-bearded Gurd Girlchaser. She laughed and placed a hand on one of his beefy biceps. Gurd said something else and loomed over her like a troll over a fawn. Thyri laughed all the more, her hand lingering on his arm. It was disgusting. Gurd must have been fifty years old. Despite his age, he still thought it important to brush his beard into two separate pointy beards every morning and plait his greying dark hair into a tail at the back.

  Finnbogi dragged his eyes from them and saw Sassa Lipchewer. Her lips were pursed obliquely as she chewed the inside of her mouth. It wouldn’t have been a good look on anyone else, but the way her permanently twisted lips interrupted Sassa’s otherwise flawless beauty paradoxically enhanced that beauty. That’s what Finnbogi thought, anyway. She was wearing a simple, bright dress embroidered with flowers, which Finnbogi guessed she’d made specially for the Thing. The way it gathered at her narrow waist made him feel a little faint.

  Sassa spotted Finnbogi and smiled brightly. He raised a hand in reply. Bodil Gooseface, standing with her, grinned, waved with both hands and gestured for him to come over. Finnbogi held up a finger to indicate that he’d join them in a minute, then went back to staring at Thyri. Tor’s tits, Gurd was a disgusting man, letching all over Thyri like that. And she was lapping it up. Her hand was on his chest now!

  Finnbogi spat onto the packed earth ground, looked up and saw Garth Anvilchin, standing behind Thyri and Gurd in his stupid helmet and smirking right at him. He knew.

  “You are dead!” Finnbogi jumped as something poked his back, hard. He spun around. Keef the Berserker was standing there, his long-handled axe Arse Splitter held across his broad chest as if he was ready for inspection.

  “Hi, Keef.”

  “Kneel, mortal, and kiss my axe! Ya!” With this last word, Keef swept Arse Splitter forward so its leading point was inches from Finnbogi’s midriff.

  “Kneel!”

  “Uh …?” Finnbogi managed. Keef’s jaw was set, his small eyes narrow but shining with promised violence. He looked like a hero from a saga, albeit one with a strangely small head and very long hair. If he hadn’t known Keef, he would have been terrified. As it was, it was still unsettling.

  “I said kneel, dog. This is your final chance.”

  A few people gathered to watch, all smiling. Finnbogi was not going to kneel.

  “Why should I kneel?”

  “Your little bro says we’re going to be attacked. You look like the sort of person who’d attack us.”

  “He said we’d be attacked by Scraylings. I’m not a Scrayling.”

  “That’s not what he said, your little sis just added that bit because it seems the most likely. But she doesn’t have the brain of a warrior god. I, Keef the Berserker, do. I’ve analysed every possible scenario and you are the most likely attacker. So kneel!”

  “But I …”

  “KNEEL!” Keef pressed the tip of his axe into Finnbogi’s blue tunic.

  By Loakie’s sleeves, he was serious. He’d finally gone mad. Slowly, Finnbogi bent his knees.

  “Ha!” said Keef, leaping back, face split by a manic grin. “I was joking, fool! Ha!” He relaxed into a Thing-going demeanour. “Why don’t you have a drink in your hand? Come, follow, let us drink!” Keef slapped a big hand onto his back and propelled him drinkwards.

  Finnbogi breathed out. “Shit, you mustn’t do that.”

  “Do what?”

  “Freak people out like that.”

  “I had to check it was you and not a demon.”

  “Ha ha.”

  “No, really. We are about to be attacked.”

  “You believe Ottar?”

  “Yup! Kid’s never been wrong. Last year he said a diamond-sided monster was coming. Next day, biggest fish I ever saw, biggest fish anyone ever saw, lying dead on the beach. And the pattern all down its flanks? Diamonds.”

  “It was a sturgeon. Not that unusual. Poppo caught one a couple of years ago. That’s where Ottar had seen one before.”

  “Not that unusual that there’s a sturgeon in the lake maybe, but there’s never been one dead on the beach, before or since. And the tornado? Same deal. He said there was a circle wind coming, and the next day there was a big bastard whirlwind out on the lake. The boy’s a prophet, no doubt about it.”

  “But who’s going to attack us? The Scraylings—”

  “Let me stop you there.” Keef darted off between two groups of Hardworkers and disappeared. Finnbogi realised after a long moment that Keef wasn’t coming back and had done something he considered hilarious, so he gave up on the strange man and walked on alone towards the drinks table.

  “Look around!” said Keef, appearing back at his shoulder. “Notice anything off? Anything a tad untoward?”

  Finnbogi scanned Olaf’s Square, unsurprised at Keef’s reappearance. The man did enjoy arseing around. Finnbogi was flattered that he should want to arse around with him.

  All around them were laughing, chatting Hardworkers enjoying the Thing. The trio of trumpet, harp and flute was playing (they sounded a little more together up close, or perhaps they’d drunk more and found some harmony) and the buffalo were roasting away. He couldn’t spot anything particularly unusual.

  “Nope, nothing wrong here.”

  “You look but you do not see.”

  “I do see.” Finnbogi was proud of his observation skills.

  “Do you see any Scraylings?”

  There were no Scraylings nearby. Finnbogi turned, then leapt to get a view over everyone’s heads. No Scraylings at all. Usually a load of the Goachica came to Hardwork for the Things; most of them, it seemed, to try it on with Thyri. But that day there were none.

  “Wow,” he said.

  “Wow indeed,” said Keef.

  “They must be gathering to attack us.”

  “Yup.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “We leave, man. We go west, like the boy told us to.”

  “Leave? West? But the Scraylings say—”

  “They lost their right to tell us what to do when they decided to kill us.”

  “But we don’t know—”

  “I trust the boy. You should, too. He’s your brother.”

  “He’s not.”

  Keef shook his head. “More to brothers than blood, my friend.”

  “But where will we go?”

  “To The Meadows.”

  “Where?”

  “To where Ottar said we should go. The Meadows. West of west. Do you listen to your family?”

  He didn’t much. But that wasn’t the point. This was madness. “But you’ve heard what’s west of here—dagger-tooth cats, man-eating beasts that make bears look like chipmunks, cannibal tribes, one-legged giants who’ll kick you to death, three-headed trolls, rivers too wide to swim, mountains too high to climb, plants that’ll catch you and suck the flesh from your bones, swarms of wasps which can kill you with one sting, fire-beasts with—”

  “Arse Splitter will split all of their arses.”

  “Arse Splitter will split a wasp’s arse? And a mountain’s? And a plant’s?”

  “No problem.”

  “So you’ll head west and die trying to split a wasp’s arse while all its friends sting you to death because of something a six-year-old girl told you her mute brother said?”

  “It’s not just the prophecy. This place is finished. Where do those buffalo come from?”

  Finnbogi looked across. Two busybodies dressed in the purple tunics of
the people who volunteered to help out at the Things had swung one of the buffalo away from the fire and were carving its cooked edges. One was capering around to show what a jolly fellow he was and the other wore a self-satisfied “oh look at me, I’m helping” expression. Finnbogi didn’t like the purple-clad volunteers.

  “The buffalo come from the plains to the west.”

  “Do they? That’s what the Scraylings tell us, but we’ve never been there, so we don’t know. But I have to know! I need to explore! All of Midgard and beyond! The Scraylings bring us all our food and hem us in. We’re no better than farm animals here and I wasn’t born to be an animal. I am a hero and I mean to act like one. I am going. You should come with me. We’ll be like Tor and Loakie going to the land of the giants. But don’t tell anyone. And now I must leave you, I have important people to impress.”

  Finnbogi stared after him. As much as he wanted to leave, the idea of actually doing it was terrifying.

  Frossa the Deep Minded climbed effortfully onto the platform. The Fray-cursed steps got higher every Thing, or perhaps her new smock and hat were heavier than last time. Her huge, brightly coloured garments were very much part of the Frossa that everybody loved, so she couldn’t disappoint. Every Thing, she considered it her duty to wear a bigger and brighter outfit than last time. Sassa Lipchewer had outdone herself with this latest, spectacular creation. Just a shame the girl with the unfortunately twisted face hadn’t had the intelligence and consideration to use lighter material.

  Lawsayer Rangvald the Wise, or Rangvald Tuberhead as everyone amusingly and accurately called him behind his back, followed her onto the platform. He was dressed very boringly in black trousers and a white shirt, which fitted his boring role.

  Rangvald took his seat and Frossa walked to hers, on the other side of Jarl Brodir’s throne. All three chairs were built with wood from Olaf the Worldfinder’s own ship. She nodded to the trumpeter. He brought their dirge to a halt with a blaring flourish and all faces in Olaf’s Square turned to the platform to await the arrival of Jarl Brodir the Gorgeous.

  The Jarl bounded onto the platform with the energy of a much younger man, but the cheers were more muted than usual. Frossa knew why. There was trouble brewing. By the time the Jarl sat on his throne, the crowd was sullenly silent, other than for the cheery purple-clad volunteers trying—and failing—to gee everyone up.

  Frossa scanned the sea of surly faces and sought the cause. There he was, standing and staring at the cooking buffalo and flapping his hands in some mad excitement or possibly despair. You never could tell what the poor little halfwit was thinking. Ottar the Moaner, the dangerous little boy who should have been killed at birth. Who, in fact, had nearly been killed before birth.

  Frossa loved all children, but living like Ottar must be dreadful, and the sooner the boy was helped from this life, the better. It was something of a shame his parents hadn’t managed to kill him in the womb when they’d tried. People had bleated horror at their actions, but anyone intelligent enough to separate practicality from emotion could see that it would be easier for everyone if the moron had never been born.

  Freydis the Annoying skipped up to her brother and directed Ottar’s attention to the platform. There was something about that little girl. It was downright weird that she could understand what her brother was saying when nobody else could. Everybody simply accepted it, but Frossa was not called the Deep Minded for nothing. Who was to say that the girl wasn’t a mischief-maker who was inventing all Ottar’s pronouncements? And besides, the boy’s predictions were laughable when compared to Frossa’s own divinations. The tornado and the great fish had been lucky guesses. Frossa had divined much more impressive prophesies from her offerings to Fray. Who had foretold the cold of the previous winter? Who had foreseen the death of Skapti the Old?

  Frossa suspected that her skills came from being part Vanir, the family of gods that included Fray and Fraya. She never told people her suspicions, modesty was the Vanir way, but her divine heritage did afford her a private and justified sense of superiority.

  “Welcome all, to the Thing!” shouted Jarl Brodir. There were a few half-hearted whoops. “Will you all please join me in praising Tor by sharing these two buffalo with our god and protector!”

  Frossa sought Gunnhild’s face in the crowd. It was always satisfying to see the Krist lover’s reaction to people praising Tor. She found her, and, sure enough, Gunnhild looked like she’d just taken a deep sniff from a sackful of a fox shit. Frossa stifled a grin.

  “It was Tor’s arm that guided Olaf Worldfinder across the Salt Sea, up the Mighty River, past the Waterfall of Certain—”

  “What about Ottar’s prophecy?” Some young, ill-mannered fool cut him off. Brodir graciously ignored her. “Past the Waterfall of Certain Destruction and—”

  “And where are the Scraylings?” yelled someone else.

  “Yes! Are they coming to kill us right now?” asked another. Soon everyone was shouting questions at the Jarl.

  Frossa smiled benevolently at the simple people, stifling her urge to scream at them. It wasn’t their fault that they were so gullible. She loved them all like a mother but, like a mother, sometimes she became exasperated by them. Sometimes, for their own good, they needed to be spanked.

  Jarl Brodir raised his hand. He would know what to say to quell the ignorant. “All right people, all right. I see we’ll get nothing done until I address your concerns. You chose me as leader and I lead you for your benefit, not my own. I have other matters to talk about, important matters, but if you all want to talk about Ottar’s prophecy, then I will be guided by your wishes, as always.”

  The crowd quietened. Frossa looked over them. That idiot boy Ottar and his smug sister were smiling and taking nothing seriously as usual. Behind them Wulf the Fat, Keef the Berserker and Jarl Brodir’s unfortunate son Bjarni Chickenhead were talking to each other, rather than helping the Jarl control the masses. Why couldn’t all of the Hird be like Garth Anvilchin? He’d make a much more fitting Jarl’s son than the mushroom-eating, bouffant-haired dimwit Bjarni Chickenhead.

  “First,” said Brodir, “you’ve asked where the Scraylings are. There is a very simple answer. As you all know, our local Scraylings, the Goachica tribe, are part of the Calnian empire. Every few years there is a gathering at Calnia, three hundred and fifty miles to the south. That is where they are.”

  “They’ve never missed a Thing before!” came a shout.

  “A Thing has never coincided with their pilgrimage to the south before.”

  There were nods and shrugs in the crowd. That had appeased the fools.

  “And Ottar’s Prophecy?” yelled Poppo Whitetooth, Ottar’s adoptive father and a trouble-maker. Frossa loved the people of Hardwork so deeply, she was their spiritual mother, but she’d have loved them even more if she could have removed a few individuals like Poppo Whitetooth.

  Brodir gave him a hard stare and said: “Let us have no mystery. Where is Freydis the Annoying?”

  “Here I am!” shouted Freydis, cocky as ever.

  “Young Freydis, I know that you’re a clever girl, and you understand just how much trouble you could get into for making up stories, especially stories that upset so many of the more credulous adults. So please tell us, what is it exactly that you’re claiming your brother has said?”

  The crowd in Olaf’s Square spread away from Freydis and stared back at her. That should have isolated and intimidated the girl, but she stood defiantly unflapped. Such arrogance!

  “He says that we must leave and travel west of west to The Meadows,” said the girl. “If we stay here, we will all be killed.”

  “By Scraylings?” said Brodir.

  “That’s right.”

  “I see. We will be killed by the Scraylings, allies for a hundred years and more. And this place, The Meadows, did your brother say where it is?”

  “West of west.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You go west and when you’ve
got there you go west some more.”

  A few people laughed.

  “Can you try giving an adult answer?”

  “She’s six!” Poppo shouted.

  “And she has spread a rumour that is disrupting the Thing,” said Brodir reasonably, “so she must answer my questions. Now, Freydis. How far away, in miles, is The Meadows?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I see. Can you ask Ottar?”

  “That’s not how it works.”

  Jarl Brodir chuckled. “That’s not how it works … I see. So you understand his prophesies when it suits you to?”

  “It doesn’t matter how far it is.” The girl was still aggravatingly calm. “We are all going to be killed if we don’t go, so we have to go.”

  “Freydis, do you know what lying is?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you lying now?”

  “Right now?” The girl cocked her head in a pose of mock confusion. She was so precocious! Frossa would have spanked that right out of her.

  “Er, no. Were you lying when you said Ottar said we’re all going to be killed by Scraylings.”

  “I was not.”

  “You were.”

  “Was not.”

  “Well, I know you were. Ottar’s prophecy is simply the creation of this small girl’s mind,” said Brodir. “I’m sure that Poppo will punish the silly child appropriately.”

  No he won’t, thought Frossa, and that was the root of the whole problem—that brat had never been spanked in her life.

  Gunnhild, standing next to Poppo, muttered something.

  “What’s that, Gunnhild?” asked Brodir. “Do share it with all of us, please!”

  The lover of Krist coloured. As well she might, butting in like that, thought Frossa.

  “I said, For the weak man, rudeness is substitute for strength.”