by Mark Coakley
Yngvild saw hundreds of faces, all men, crowding the grassy field below her. She shouted, "I am Yngvild, daughter of Siv, of the town of Starheim. Five years ago, in Starheim, I married Gunnar, son of Torgill. We had no children. We lived in a house in Starheim until he lost it, because of debts from gambling on horse-fights. He was unlucky. We moved into the house of my mother, but he kept gambling on horses and losing, his debt getting bigger and bigger. This went on for about a year, until one day he disappeared. He took all the money in our silver-box. That was two years ago, and I have not seen him since. It is clear that I have been abandoned. I wish a divorce so that I can be free of my vows to Gunnar — that nothing, that cowardly and unlucky failure of a wretch! I wish to re-marry, to Halfdan the Black. Please grant my divorce. I have two witnesses."
Yngvild's first witness was her mother, who was led onto the Law Rock and placed to face the crowd.
Siv said, "I am Siv, daughter of Tordis, and Yngvild is my only daughter. Yngvild is an honest woman. By Freya, I attest that Yngvild does not lie and that everything she told you of her marriage is the truth!"
The next witness was Yngvild's cousin, Tone, who told the crowd of jurors much the same as Siv.
The law-speaker then gestured for Yngvild and her witnesses to move to the rear of the Law Rock. The law-speaker shouted to the crowd, "You have heard the case for a divorce. Now, is Gunnar here? Gunnar, son of Torgill?" The law-speaker called for Gunnar twice more, then said, "Then this will be an undefended divorce. Let me hear the votes of those who agree that Yngvild should be released from her marriage?"
Yngvild was very popular, both for her own qualities and for her closeness to Halfdan. The noise of her support was deafening, as most of the crowd whooped and screeched and bellowed at the Law Rock, pounding handles of swords and axes onto wooden shields. The din of deep voices and wood drumming onto wood frightened birds from nearby trees.
The law-speaker raised a hand for quiet and asked, "And who opposes the divorce?"
Silence.
Then, some joker in the crowd put his lips to his arm and made a loud farting noise.
Folk laughed.
The law-speaker said, "Yngvild, you are now divorced. Next case: Knut, son of Grettir, pleads that the Assembly order Torfinn, son of Gandalf, to compensate Knut for the wrongful poisoning of his sheep."
Nervous-looking, Knut stepped onto the Law Rock as Yngvild and her cousin led Siv off.
As soon as she stepped off the Law Rock, Yngvild untied the key hanging from her belt — the symbol of her disappeared marriage — and casually tossed it into a bush.
At home, Siv went to Halfdan's bedside. "I'm free."
A month after the gut-stabbing, Halfdan was still too weak to leave the bed. He looked strangely thin, with new wrinkles in his face from day after day of almost-unbearable pain. But he was getting better. His belly was much smaller than it had been at his arrival, and pus no longer leaked from the stab-scar.
Halfdan smiled at her and said, in a whisper, "Free? Not for long."
Yngvild rested her head on his bony shoulder, saying, "No, not for long. When you get better —"
Halfdan said, "We'll get married."
"Yes."
Because of Halfdan's health, he was unable to be a candidate for king of Sogn and Fjordane. So he had asked Atli — the wisest man that Halfdan knew, also very brave — to be a candidate. Atli agreed. When it was known that Halfdan supported Atli for king, nobody else wanted to run. Atli was the only candidate.
Late that afternoon, from the direction of the Law Rock, Halfdan and Siv heard the noise of the last vote of the day. They rested in bed — her naked, him wearing only the bandages on his belly, her arm resting on his chest — and they listened to the hundreds of men yelling and pounding weapons outside the town.
Faintly, across the distance from the Law Rock, they could hear many voices yelling together, "LONG LIVE KING ATLI! LONG LIVE KING ATLI! LONG LIVE KING ATLI!"
After his election, King Atli of Sogn and Fjordane immediately started handing out gifts. When the gifts were all gone, a crowd of fighters carried King Atli, sitting on top of a shield, to his hall. A big pile of wood outside the hall was lit on fire when King Atli arrived. Slaves opened barrels of beer and mead, handing cups to everybody. Folk arrived at King Atli's hall, dressed in their fanciest clothes, to celebrate with their new legal ruler. King Atli now wore a long, red gown of silk and pointed whale-skin boots. His paint-smeared face stayed calm and dignified as he sat on the shield, sipping booze from a gold-decorated horn, as his fighters carried him in circles around the fire.
"LONG LIVE KING ATLI!"
Chapter 30
TO JERUSALEM
It is said that almost a year passed before Halfdan's belly fully healed, and that he was never as strong after the stabbing as he had been before. It is also said that the traitor's rusty spear-tip caused unhealable harm to Halfdan's insides; for the rest of his long life, Halfdan would complain of shitting-pains.
Early on in Halfdan's slow recovery — a few days after the election of King Atli, when Halfdan was still too weak to get out of bed — Halfdan told Yngvild and Siv of a strange dream.
"I dreamed of my mother last night," he said. "Aasa floated into this room, to talk to me. She looked just as the old folk in Os described: with skin blacker than the sky between stars, hair like the wool of a black sheep, and eyes just like mine. She wore a strange gown, in bright colours and outlandish patterns. And from her back —"
"What?" Siv said.
Halfdan said, "On her back were two huge wings, spreading to either side of her. One of the wings was black, like the wing of a crow, and the other white, like that of an owl from the far north."
"Like the paintings in that religious building in England you told us about," Yngvild said.
"Yes, except for the black wing," Halfdan said. "Her feet did not touch the floor; she floated to my bedside, the wings flapping slowly, just enough to keep her floating over the floor. I said, 'Why are you here?' and she said, 'You know,' and I did. I remembered that I had vowed to set free one of the slaves from England, a madwoman called Leoba. With the excitement of Venn's stabbing and your divorce and the election, I'd forgotten about Leoba and my vow. I said, 'You emerged from the shadow-world of death just to remind me to free a slave?' And my mother said, 'Yes. Leoba's life is precious to me.' I said, 'Because you are both Christians?' She told me, 'Yes.' That made me feel very angry. She had left me alone for so long, teaching me nothing about who I was or what to believe, and then I almost die and am in agony every day — and when Aasa's ghost shows up, she is more interested in what happens to some outlander slave-bitch than her own son! It was insulting, like my life meant nothing to her. I shouted, 'That's the only reason you came? Because of Leoba?' And my mother said, 'Yes. I am following orders.' 'Whose orders?' She said, 'You know,' and I did — I remembered seeing a statue of that Christ-god, dangling by his hands from a wood-beam, and I knew that this Christ ruled my mother. And my mother knew my thoughts. She said, 'Yes, Christ rules me. I gave my undying ghost to Christ, long before I gave the rest of me to your father, and now I dwell in glory in heaven.' 'What about Odin and Tor and my gods?' She shrugged — it was so strange, seeing a ghost shrug like that, wings growing from behind her shoulders — and she said, 'Your gods are getting weaker every generation. In the long-ago days, they did great things, but now, what? They do nothing but wait for the end of the world and pass the time gambling on human battles. They only hide in the clouds, useless. They are dying. It will not be long before they are all forgotten, forever, and Christ will rule all of Norway, forever.' I said, 'What does this Christ want from folk, anyway?' She said, 'Justice. Love. Forgiveness. Now I must leave.' She turned and started floating towards the door, wings flapping. I tried to get out of bed to follow, but it was too painful and my body too weak. I called out, 'Wait.' At the door, she said, 'What?' There was so much I wanted to ask her. But my mind went blank. What did I most w
ant to ask her? All I could think to say was, 'Tell me something interesting.' She said, 'Do you want to know about your father?' 'Yes!' My mother's ghost said to me, 'Gødrød is still alive. He went to the east, farther east than any Norseman had ever travelled, fighting for many different kings. He was made a captive after a great battle in a desert. The conquerors took him as a slave to their homeland, farther east. He is still a slave, in a land at the eastern edge of the world, building an unimaginably-long wall of stone. Gødrød is now an old man, married to a slave and their children and grandchildren are slaves. When he is too old to lift heavy stones, he will die in that odd, distant land.' I said nothing, wondering at my father's fate. Before she could leave, I asked, 'Mother, what should I do?' and she said, 'You know, my boy," and floated out through the door, gone."
Yngvild asked Siv, "What does the dream mean?"
Siv said to Halfdan, "Set free the slave. I don't know how to interpret the rest of the dream."
"Nor do I," Halfdan said.
The next day, Ole walked to a farm near Eid and spoke to the man who owned it.
"You have a new slave-girl, one of the outlanders from the raid," Ole said.
The farmer said, "Yes. So?"
"Halfdan wants to buy her," Ole said. He held out an apple-sized piece of silver; it was much more than the normal price for a slave of Leoba's age and gender.
The farmer eyed the silver with interest but, being honest, said, "If Halfdan wants her, he should know that she's one of the most useless slaves I've ever owned. Hardly ever wants to work, always rolling her eyes at the sky and weeping. Can't dig a ditch or even clean out a pig-pen. Not even pretty. I can sell Halfdan something much better than her."
"Halfdan wants that one."
"Fine." The farmer took the lump of silver.
Some neighbours were witnesses, as Ole chanted to Leoba, "No longer a slave, now freedom is yours." He chanted it nine times, as the law required, and after the ninth repetition she was legally freed.
Leoba said to the farmer, "You will fry in Hell for what you did to me."
The farmer looked at Ole, saying, "See? I warned you about this one."
"Let's go," Ole said.
He and Leoba walked away from the farm, towards Eid. Her head had been shaved to the skin; she wore cheap grey clothes; half-healed whip-scars could be seen on the back of her neck; more pain-stripes were on her back, hidden by her rough slave-garb. Leoba looked thin and tired and her eyes were dazed. But her odd, rude and fanatical character was almost unchanged.
She said, "Where are you taking me?"
"To the docks."
"Why?"
"To put you on a ship."
Leoba stopped walking for a moment, staring at Ole in shock.
"A ship to where?"
Ole said, "Wherever you want. Come on, I have better things to do than talk with you."
"Wherever I want? Jerusalem!" Leoba raised her face and hands to the sky, shrieking, "O, Mother Mary! You heard my prayers! Blessed Virgin Mother! I am coming!"
Ole snarled, "Hurry up, bitch, or I'll speed you along with a kick!"
Leoba followed Ole to the docks. Many war-ships and fishing-ships and trading-ships were roped to the rebuilt docks, bobbing in the gentle waves of the fjord. Men walked around, carrying loads and shouting orders and making repairs and drinking in small groups and doing business.
Ole said, "Halfdan told me to arrange passage on a trading-ship for you. You can take one of the ones here, or if you want to go someplace that nobody here is going, you can wait for another ship to arrive. So, where do you want to go?"
"Jerusalem!"
"Where?"
"Jerusalem!"
"I don't know where that is, but I'll check."
Leoba waited at the foot of the docks as Ole went from trading-ship to trading-ship, chatting with each ship's owner or its steersman. Now and then, Ole gestured at Leoba or showed someone the silver.
Ole walked back to Leoba and said, "None of them are going to Jerusalem. How about Førde?"
Leoba said, "I don't know where that is."
"It's a Norse town on a different fjord, over there." Ole pointed to the south-west. "Not many outlander ships come to Eid. More of them come to Førde. Over there, you'll have a better chance of finding a ship going out of Norway. I don't know about finding one to Jerusalem — none of these sailors have heard of the place — but maybe you will get lucky."
"To Førde, then," Leoba said.
Ole gave Leoba a leather bag containing various items, including a small piece of silver for the passage to Førde and a much bigger piece to pay for the next step of her journey. He took her along the dock, to a ship owned by fur-traders — it was called "Sea-Slicer" — and she waited on the dock as he finished the arrangements.
Ole stepped back on the dock.
The steersman gazed at Leoba, looking impatient. "Get on, we don't have all the time in the world," the steersman said.
Ole said to Leoba, "You have to do as he says. No more arguing with everybody anymore. That's important."
"Goodbye," Leoba said. "And thank you."
Ole said, "Thank Halfdan. May the gods speed you away."
"And may God's Truth someday touch your soul, brother. It's not too late, for you or anybody."
Ole looked confused.
Leoba half-smiled, crossing herself. She took a deep breath of the warm, salt-scented air. She stepped onto the fur-piled deck of Sea-Slicer and out of this saga.
Chapter 31
CAREER-CHANGE
When Halfdan recovered, he had to decide what to do next in life. He had missed his chance to be elected king of Sogn and Fjordane. King Atli wanted Halfdan to be his second-in-command of the army, but Halfdan was tired of fighting. No longer did the clanging of weapons and the screams of the fallen sound sweet to his ears. King Lambi was dead and revenged and there seemed no point to violence anymore.
When he talked about his feelings to Yngvild, a few nights after their wedding, she said, "We have enough silver to buy a nice farm. We can grow crops and food-beasts. A farm is a good place for raising children."
(She was pregnant.)
Halfdan said, "True. But there is one problem with farming. It's so boring!"
"You don't want to fight anymore, and you say farming is boring. I'm sure that, with your sea-sickness, you're not thinking of becoming a fisherman or trader."
"No."
"Then what do you want to do?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
After a pause, Halfdan said, "I like poetry."
"You want to be a full-time poet?"
Halfdan said, "That does not sound very practical, I know."
"In your dream, when you asked Aasa's ghost what to do, and she said that you knew — do you think that poetry is what she meant?"
"Maybe," Halfdan said. "Or maybe she wants me to become a Christian."
"That silly slave-religion?"
Halfdan frowned. "My mother was not a slave. My father, the believer in our gods, is the slave now."
"Sorry."
Eventually, Halfdan and Yngvild negotiated a plan: they would buy land near Eid and become a farm-family, but Halfdan would spend each winter away from home, earning silver as a travelling poet. That was a difficult, sometimes-dangerous job which usually paid little — but Halfdan believed strongly in his skill at rhyming and alliteration, and he knew that his fame as a fighter and a war-chief would attract audiences. They agreed that he would work as a farmer in Eid for half of each year, and as a travelling poet for the other half. Halfdan vowed to avoid fights and to not cheat on Yngvild.
The sad news of the death of Uncle Harald was soon followed by the good news of the birth of their son, a strong and healthy boy — darker in skin and hair than his mother, lighter than his father — who was called Harald. (Later to be nicknamed "Harald the Messy-Haired," this boy would grow up to be a famous and cruel warrior, the hero of many sagas.)
Chapter 32<
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DUEL!
As a travelling poet, Halfdan spent many winters travelling around Norway by ski, by horse-drawn sled and occasionally (when it could not be avoided) by ship. He visited dozens of Norse kingdoms, many of them tiny and poor.
At each kingdom, Halfdan would first ask the king's permission to stay there and practice his art. As winter-time was boring, most kings were eager to have a famous fighter and war-chief hanging around to provide entertainment. Halfdan would sleep in the hall with the fighters, sharing their feasts and endless booze-fests, collecting and saving the scraps of silver that were tossed at him after a good poem. (Bones and garbage were tossed whenever a poem was bad, or when Halfdan was too drunk to remember the words.) All went well in his new career — with family and hard work every summer, and winters filled with art and friendships and being drunk — until, one winter, Halfdan travelled south to Oslo for the first time.
Far to the south-east of Eid, Oslo was a small kingdom, but under its famous King Haakon it was quickly rising in power and wealth. When Halfdan arrived by horse-drawn sled, shortly after Yule-time, he was surprised to see that Oslo's king-hall was not rectangular in shape, as was normal, but circular.
There were other odd customs in the south-lands of Norway — only women wore face-paint, not men; and folk did not hang dead sheep outside their doors to please the gods; and human sacrifices here were not drowned in a swamp, as was done in most other Norse lands, but were tossed into a hole in the ground full of poisonous vipers.
King Haakon was grey-bearded and somewhat fat, but still a fierce fighter and active sportsman. He spent much of his time playing a game with sticks and a wooden ball on the ice of a lake, and despite his age, he was often the player who scored the most goals for his team. He reminded Halfdan of King Lambi in some ways, and Halfdan immediately liked him. King Haakon seemed to think highly of Halfdan too.
But one of King Haakon's powerful followers, an officer in the Oslo army, was Egil — yes, the son of King Njal, who had helped his father to terrorize Eid and who had run away, hurt and defeated, from the battle of the frozen river.