by Robert Low
‘Hoskuld came to Dyfflin with a monk, but I never saw him,’ Olaf went on, fiddling with his beard rings. ‘Hoskuld came with a preposterous tale of how this monk knew where Eirik’s old axe was and that this monk he had was prepared to reveal the where of it for money. The monk, Hoskuld said, would only come to me in person once assurances had been given — which was not a little insulting, I was thinking.’
‘I thought it the worst attempt to gull you out of silver I had heard in many a long day,’ Sitric rumbled and his father nodded and grinned ruefully.
‘Aye — but Hoskuld is a good trader and valued, so I let him have his night’s hospitality, as if I considered the matter. Truth was I had already decided to send him packing back to his shy monk, or else bring the charlatan before me — but before I could do anything, Hoskuld left my hall. In haste. In the night. That was even more insulting, as if he thought I would do him harm.’
‘Not so stupid, though,’ Sitric growled, ‘since that is what he deserved for such a tale.’
His father looked sharply at him.
‘Yet here is Gunnhild’s last son, come from Orkney looking for a monk,’ he said. ‘A man with the sense of a stone can see that this tale of Hoskuld’s now has legs on it.’
‘Find Hoskuld,’ answered Godred and Olaf soured the jarl with a hard look.
‘Good idea,’ he snarled. ‘I had not thought of it at all now that it is clear Gunnhild seeks him hard enough to send her last son.’
Godred’s cheeks grew pale, then red, but he said nothing, merely picked moodily at a loose thread on the hem of his own tunic and perched on a bench in his own hall while Olaf lolled in his High Seat and his son grinned.
‘I want this Hoskuld,’ Olaf declared suddenly, ‘but unlike Gunnhild I do not have the ships to spare — I need them and you, Godred, for the war that is coming.’
Godred merely nodded and said nothing. Olaf Irish-Shoes had been thrashing around in a fight with Domnall and the southern Ui Neill for years and, only this year, Domnall had finally decided to throw it all away and enter the monastery at Armagh. Good news all round, Godred thought bitterly — but now the old man had decided to wave his sword at the new leader of the Ui Neill in the north, Mael Sechnaill.
‘In five days,’ Olaf declared, levering himself stiffly out of the chair, ‘I want you and your men in Dyfflin. Then we are off to teach this Ui Neill puppy a lesson. Send your best man after this Hoskuld — but no more than a snake-ship’s crew.’
Godred nodded and watched the old man stump off, calling for Sitric and complaining of the damp as he hauled his fur tighter round him. Battles, he thought bitterly. The old fool lives only for battle and will risk everything on the outcome of a stupid fight; he has lost as many thrones as he has gained. The thought of losing everything here on Mann if the old war-dog failed made Godred waspish.
‘Find Hoskuld,’ he snarled at Ogmund. ‘Take the Swan Breath and same arses you got to lie for you over the Gudrod business and see you make more of a fist of matters when next you meet that Orkney bitch-tick. Get this Hoskuld and the secret he holds. I was going to send Ulf, but you have contrived to get him killed. Now you will have to do.’
Ogmund watched Hardmouth leave the hall, the anger burning in his chest so hard that he found himself rubbing his knuckles on his breastbone. He would not have taken that when he had been young, he thought, then swallowed the sick despair at that truth.
He was no longer young when the likes of Godred could lash him and walk away.
The Frisian coast, a little later …
Crowbone’s Crew
He had many names. The Arabs gave him Abou Saal. The Church called him Biktor the Nubian and the True People, the Ga-Adagbes, knew him as Nunu-Tettey — Nunu, because all the Nubii males were called after the Divine Celestial Waters and Tettey because he was first-born.
Here, they called him Kaup. Sometimes they called him Kaup Svarti. Kaup came from their mistake when he tried to tell them that he was a Christian, but not one they knew. Copt, he had told them, but they were stinking, ignorant northmen and thought he was saying kaup, which meant ‘bargain’ in their tongue and they thought that thigh-slapping funny, since they had hauled him from the ruin of an Arab slaver and so had got him for free.
Svarti, of course, because it meant black. Black was a poor word to describe Kaup, all the same; Mar Skidasson, closest thing to a friend Kaup had among the Red Brothers, had likened Kaup’s colour to the wing of a crow in sunlight, that glossy blue-black colour. He knew a good name when he heard one did Mar — his own by-name was Jarnskeggi, Iron Beard, and Kaup had to admit that Mar’s hair was exactly that colour.
Kaup grew no hair on his face and the stuff on his head was a tight nap that never got longer, only a little greyer at the temples, for it had been a long time since the slave ship in the Dark Sea. With little hope of returning home, Kaup had been with the Red Brothers of Grima for years and, after they had crept round the unnerving fact that he looked like a man two weeks dead, most of the northmen found Kaup good company. He laughed a lot and they envied the white of his teeth and the way his black skin always shone, as if buttered.
Still, in all the years with Grima, Kaup had never been sure whether he was a slave or a warrior. He knew slaves of the northmen were treated no better than livestock and not allowed to carry weapons, but Kaup had a spear and a shield and one of their long knives, called a seax. He had killed for them and had his share of loot — yet when something had to be fetched or carried, it was always ‘the Burned Man’ who was sent to do it and expected to carry it out with no mutter.
Standing watch was another of the matters he was expected to do. Wrapped in a wool blanket he had made into a cloak, standing on one leg like a stork and leaning on his spear, Kaup was less happy than he had ever been, for Grima — whom he had liked — was gone and Balle was now in charge. Kaup did not like Balle and neither did Mar, who had had to twist his face into many agreeable positions to avoid the fate of others who had been good friends with the old jarl.
Not long after Balle had thrown Grima and the Wend into the sea they had come down to this old berth, which they had not visited in many years. At this time of year, no-one expected to see another ship, yet before Kaup’s eyes a fat trader muscled in to the shingle and men spilled to the shore.
There was a tingle on him when he ran to report this strangeness and the skin of his forearms was stippled and grew tighter when he and Mar and Balle went to look at the newcomers.
‘A fat knarr,’ Balle said, a shine in his eyes, relief showing in his broad, deep-marked face the colour of old wood. It would be relief for Balle, thought Mar, for he would be eager to show he had better luck than Grima, luck that brought a great plump duck right into the teeth of all these foxes.
‘Teeth,’ said Kaup and Mar jerked at this echo of his thoughts, then looked at the knarr, seeing the helmets and the dull gleam — like still, dark water — of ringmail. His own eyes narrowed at that, for there were more than a few of them and the one who was clearly the leader had a helmet in the Gardariki style, with a white horsehair plume braiding out of it, like smoke from a roofhole. All of his men had similar helms, but his was worked with brass and silver. Truly, this knarr had teeth.
‘A hard fistful,’ growled Balle, studying the men, tallying the possibilities. ‘Yet their leader is only a stripling and there’s no more than a handful of nithing sailors.’
The Red Brothers numbered fifty-eight and, after all their bad raid-luck, even the ones who did not like Balle much and thought he still had matters to prove would follow him: it would be an easy prize with the numbers on their side. Even if it was empty, the knarr alone was worth it.
Mar felt Kaup shift beside him, tasted the big dark man’s unease along with the salt from the sighing sea. It smelled of blood and his hackles stirred a little.
Balle watched and waited, feeling his men filter up in knots and pairs to look, not wanting to turn round to see how many, which would ha
ve made him look as if he was anxious. He was pleased, all the same, when he caught sight of some, out of the corner of one eye; they were armed and ready.
He would wait until the crew of this fat trader had finished unloading whatever it was in the bundle they thought to appease him with. The stripling who led them would come, arms out and easy to show he meant no harm but wanted only to share warmth and food and maybe trade whatever was in the bundle. He does not realise, Balle thought, with a lurch of blood-savage, that all he has is already mine.
The stripling came and with him was a worryingly big man with a hook-bitted axe leading the helmeted ones carrying the burden. The stripling came with a spear in each fist and the walk of a man who did not want to appease anyone, which Mar and Kaup noticed and frowned at, glancing sideways at Balle. They all noticed the youth’s coin-weighted braids, the neat crop of new beard and the strange, odd-coloured eyes.
Balle had seen it, too, and pushed the worry of it from him as if it was a bothersome dog. The shine of that rich knarr was on him and the stripling was still a stripling, who had done as Balle had seen in his head, even if he had a giant at his back, spears in his fists, eyes of different colours and a measure of arrogance which had taken in the Burned Man and showed no shock. Balle had been disappointed at that; the sight of Kaup always made northmen lick uneasy lips and should have made this boy at least blink a little.
Then he saw the truth of what he had thought was a trade bundle and everything in him melted away, running like water out of his bowels and belly, so that he could not move and almost fell where he stood.
It was no wrap of trade goods. It was Grima.
Mar and Kaup grunted, the shock of it stirred through the rest of the Red Brothers like ripples from a stone in a quiet pool. Grima, who was thought drowned and dead, was back, sitting in a throne carried by great mailed warriors, guarded by a giant, preceded by …
‘Prince Olaf, son of Tryggve,’ announced the stripling loudly. ‘Come to hold up the falling roofbeams of Grima’s sky. Come to bring him back to those who tried to foist red murder on him.’
Now this was real luck to men who knew the shape and taste of it, for Grima had gone into the sea with nothing but the cloth on his back and yet, here he was, sprung out of it, with warriors and a prince at his command.
This was god-favour if ever it was seen and if Grima was so smiled on, then the man who had tried to kill him clearly was not — both those who were Christmenn and those who followed Asgard stepped away from Balle. He felt men draw away from him and anger surged in, which was as good as courage.
Then Grima stirred in his chair and Balle felt the better for seeing how weak and near death the old man was, saw the dark stains on the wrappings round his hands. He saw, also, the little figure appear suddenly from behind the mailed throne-carriers, a yellow dog prowling at his heels.
‘Berto,’ Kaup called out without thinking how much delight was in his voice, for he had liked the little man.
Berto raised one hand to Kaup in salute, then curled his lip at Balle, who almost went for the man then and there. Arrogant little fuck! A nithing thrall, with a look like that on him …
‘I speak for Grima,’ Berto said, his chin in his chest as he made himself gruff. The fact that he spoke at all in such a way so astounded Balle that he opened and closed his mouth once or twice.
‘He challenges Balle for the leadership of the Red Brothers,’ Berto went on. ‘He declares Balle a white-livered son of a sheep, who lets himself be used as a woman every ninth night by those who supported him in throwing Grima into the sea.’
There was muttering at that and a hissing sound of sucked in air, for there was no stepping back from that insult. The stillness that followed made the sea-breathing seem to roar and a gull cried out like a lost bairn; the stripling leader raised his head and searched for it.
‘I take the challenge,’ Balle said, ‘and after I have won I will not deal kindly with you, Wend.’
Then he twisted his mouth in a nasty smile at Grima.
‘Will you stand up long enough for me to kill you?’ he asked, knowing Grima was not the one he would have to fight.
The bundle on the throne shifted a little.
‘No,’ said the husked whisper, which a trick of wind carried down the beach to a lot more ears than should have heard it. ‘Yet you cannot kill me, Balle. I will live longer than you.’
Folk made signs on themselves and Balle had to resist the temptation to cross himself, or touch his Thor Hammer, which would have been as sure a sign of weakness as dropping to your knees and babbling for mercy.
‘I stand in his place,’ said the stripling with two spears.
Mar, looking at Balle as the youth spoke, saw the sudden flood of relief wash the man.
He thought it would be the giant, Mar realised, but thinks he can beat the stripling. That is wrong; if the stripling fights a big man like Balle, whose name is a warning since it means ‘dangerously bold’, it means he is their best. Better than a giant with a hooked axe. Mar studied the youth more closely now, but saw nothing in him that spoke of greatness, or even of prince. He was a tall youth with tow hair and a spear in either hand, nothing more. It was clear Balle thought this, too.
‘If you have a god,’ he growled, low and hackle-raising, ‘you had better ask him for help now.’
‘I have a god,’ the stripling declared, ‘and I dedicate you to him. I claim the Red Brothers for Grima and you are the price of it. Will you stand aside or fight?’
Kaup caught the unease that flickered on Balle’s face, a moment only, like a flare from a firestarter’s spark. Enough, all the same. Balle will lose this and the youth already knows it. Yet the little prince’s face was as innocent as a Christ-nun’s headsquare.
Balle spat on his hands, hefted the long axe and rolled his shoulders, which was answer enough. The youth smiled and the delight in his voice was a rill of pleasure.
‘Odin, hear me — take this Balle, as blot for this victory. I, Prince Olaf of the Oathsworn of Orm Bear-Slayer, by-named Crowbone, say this.’
There was a rustle, as if a wind had come up and rushed through unseen trees, as men stirred and sighed. Suddenly, the famed Oathsworn were here, launched out of a clear day and a calm sea like Thor’s own Hammer; Mar looked at Kaup and licked dry lips, for the grim mailed men with horsehair smoking from their helmets were now even more fearsome than before.
Balle, too, felt the chill lick of it, but was instantly ashamed and the anger that brought to him was a forge-fire. He hefted the long axe and calculated the distance between him and the stripling — then signalled for Mar to pass over his shield.
Mar paused, then handed it over with a look that flared Balle’s rage into his face. He would remember that scorn when this was done and then Mar had better look to himself. Overdue for having his head parted from him, Balle thought.
Kaup watched carefully, for he tucked all such matters of these northmen away in the sea-chest of his head and knew that this was no holmgang, with ritual and measured fighting area, but an einvigi, unregulated and unsanctified, which most vicious combats were. It did not rely on any god — though Ullr was claimed to be the deity who watched over it — but on skill and battle luck only. Once, when his people were young, Kaup knew that they had worshipped false gods, such as Bes and Apedemak, the god of war, who would have presided over such matters as this.
No matter which of the Asgard gods watched here, Kaup had to admit Balle looked the better man with his long axe on one shoulder, and shield held to cover most of himself against the stripling with two short throwing spears. They faced each other on the sand of a nowhere beach, where the tide-birds scurried, beaking up black mud from a strand silvered by the fading light of an old day.
‘You are a big man,’ Kaup heard Prince Olaf say said softly to Balle, ‘and no doubt of some value to Grima, once, before Loki visited treachery on you. At half your size, I will still be twice as useful to him and three times the fighter you
are.’
Balle blinked a bit, worked the insult out and came up spitting and dragging the axe off his shoulder with one hand, though it was unwieldy like that. Yet everyone saw the battle-clever in Balle, for he was about to rush the stripling who had two throwing spears and a seax snugged across his lap.
The youth would get one spear off, which the shield would take — then Balle would throw the shield to one side and close in with the two-handed axe, before the youth transferred his second spear to a throwing hand. Everyone saw it. Everyone knew what would happen — except the youth, it seemed.
Balle lumbered forward; the spear arced and smacked the shield hard — harder than Balle had imagined, so that he reeled a little sideways with it and saw the point splinter through on his side. A powerful throw, but harmless, ruining only the shield.
With a great roar of triumph, he hurled the speared shield to one side and threw himself forward. He had him; he had the youth, for sure.
Something whirred like a bird wing and there was a sharp tearing feeling in Balle’s belly, then he tripped and fell, rolled, cursing, scrambling upright and appalled at his bad foot luck. Ready with the axe, he spun in a half circle and almost fell again, looked down and saw a blue, shining rope tangled round his ankles. At the same time as he followed it back to the bloody rip in his shirt and into the very belly of him, a shadow fell and he looked up.
It was the stripling, a thoughtful look on his face and Balle snarled and went to strike, but the axe seemed stuck to the ground. Then something flashed and there was a burning sensation in Balle’s throat, harsh and fierce enough for him to drop the axe and spin away. He did not want to touch his throat, was afraid to touch it, but thought to get away from the stripling for a moment, get his breath and then work out how to get back in the fight, for it had clearly gone awry.