As he was leaving, Fjölvar had returned with the big cauldron, now full of water, and hooked it back onto its chains above the fire. For a moment it had rocked and swayed dangerously, its contents slopping about above the still-meagre flame. Fjölvar tapped the cauldron with his knuckle. "Every man aboard is depending on you," he said, encouragingly, then, with a single slap on Atli's shoulder, had made off, back to a small area near the mast that he was now using for food preparation.
The first thing Atli had realised, once things had settled down, was that he was faint with hunger. Somehow, the events of the day had managed to keep his mind off his stomach, but suddenly, he felt his head swimming. His hands shook as he fed wood into the fire, his stomach tightening as if it were about to cave in. The mere mention of food had brought him crashing back to the reality that not a morsel had passed his lips since early morning. It had been a rough meal porridge with some dried fish in it. The fish had had a particularly rank taste today - it could get like that when the weather wasn't good for drying - but right now Atli would have given anything for a bowl.
"Here." Atli had jumped at the voice beside him. It was Gunnar. He set down a bowl of drinking water, and then, reaching into a black leather bag - of a type that all the men seemed to wear at their belts - he drew out his huge fist and held it towards the boy. Atli offered his cupped hands, and into it was deposited a huge handful of hazelnuts, shrivelled berries and small pieces of what looked to be dried meat. "Keep your strength up," said Gunnar with a curt nod. He stood awkwardly for a moment, scratching at his black beard, then, with a grunt, turned and went.
At first, Atli had simply stared at the small feast, almost too exhausted to eat. Then a wave of hunger overwhelmed him again. Having no hands free, he simply shoved his face into the mix and chomped on it like a hog. The sweet bitterness of the hazelnuts and sharpness of the berries made his saliva run like a dog - his cheeks ached with it. Then came the pungent, deep flavour of the meat. It was the most delicious thing he had ever eaten. Its effect was like magic. Within moments, he felt his strength and his resolve returning - enough to realise that here, now, food was a commodity too valuable to squander. Half the mixture remained in his cupped hands; it would be wise to pace himself. But, as he looked up, he realised the fire was already dying. Scooping the remaining half of the mixture into his left hand, he shoved a stick into the dwindling blaze then looked around for somewhere to put his precious food. He eventually drank the bowl of water, put the dried mix into it, then turned his full attention back to the fire, piling up the embers with another stick and coaxing it back to life with his breath.
Bjólf, who had been watching from a distance, smiled at the boy's ingenuity. He'd be alright. They could adapt to anything at that age - it was the best time to go to sea. Or maybe he was just getting sentimental in his old age.
A thought struck him. Returning to Steinarr's chest, he pulled something from it and made his way back to the prow.
The sudden slap of leather on the deck had given Atli another start. At his feet lay a bag that had been repaired in one corner, with a bronze clasp and two straps that had been designed to fit neatly over the belt now at his waist, and of the same brown leather. "You'll be needing that," Bjólf had said, towering over the crouching boy. "Unless you want to keep all your possessions in a bowl."
Atli had wasted no time in putting the bag where it belonged - on his belt, next to his shiny new knife. And it had not been the last gift of the evening. Later, when he had been struggling to break some of the thicker pieces of wood, another of the crew - the one called Thorvald; a short, stocky fellow - had taken pity and given him the axe. Its owner, he said with a laugh, had no further use for it; a trophy of their battle on the beach. But before Atli could ask him further about that, he had gone. It had made his task easier, that much was certain, but, more importantly, it had made him feel trusted, one of them. A warrior. When not in use, he tucked the axe proudly, if a little awkwardly, into his belt, and became all the more determined to make this the best cooking fire the crew had ever seen.
Atli's great worry now was his supply of wood. He had tried to make it last, while getting the best blaze he could to heat the water as quickly as possible - for his hunger, and, he supposed, that of the others, demanded more than dried fruit and nuts - but already, half of it was gone. How long did they want him to keep this going? Until the cooking was done, certainly. But how long would that take? And how much longer after that? An hour? Two? All night?
Emboldened now- and realising he must act before the need made itself too keenly felt - he built up the fire as much as he dared and set off on a foraging mission about the ship. As the men worked around him, sometimes ruffling his hair or making a quip about his size, his eyes darted about in the darkness, searching for anything - anything at all - that might keep the fire going. He found the shattered remains of a shield - Godwin indicated with a stern nod that he could take the boards from it - and then, remembering the broken trap below the boards, in his old hiding place, sought permission to drag it up and put it to better use. As word spread about his quest among the crew, more offerings came - an old broken chest, a pail that had rotted through, a couple of warped spear shafts, an oar that had split its blade and been sitting below deck ever since. Up in the bow, Atli had seen a choice piece - a big, roughly conical chunk of oak, about the length of his forearm, tucked into a gap at the edge of the planking, beneath the prow. He had pulled it out and was about to add it to his hoard when he saw Magnus shaking his head discreetly.
"That's part of the ship," the old man whispered.
Atli returned it without a word.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A GRIM CATCH
By the time he was done ferrying his spoils to the fireside, Atli had fuel enough to last a night and a day at least, and plenty of work for his axe. Breaking up the wood proved an arduous task, but it was one that his mind and body welcomed; his limbs ached with it, but it was a good ache. He felt somehow connected. Focused. Useful. Before he realised where it had come from, a saying of his father's drifted into his head: "Good firewood heats you up twice - once when you chop it and again when you burn it!" Atli attacked the wood harder and tried to shake the memory from his head.
He had saved until last what he knew would be the most difficult - the tough, thick wood of the broken oar - and had only just begun the painstaking task of chopping it into usable lengths when a sudden movement nearby caught his eye. For nearly the whole time he had been working, Finn had been sitting practically motionless astride his sea-chest, chewing silently on a strip of dark, unidentifiable dried meat, the taut fishing line that stretched over the gunwale tied to the nearest of the three upright bird-perch-posts behind him. Some time ago, he had removed his right boot, and for the past hour had sat with his bare right foot propped up on the long chest, and the line between his toes, waiting, Atli supposed, for the twitch of a fish. Now, something had Finn's full attention. He was sitting bolt upright, his mouth stopped mid-chew. For a moment he remained utterly frozen, his gaze focused somewhere out there, where the line met the sea. Then, never once taking his eyes off the line, he eased his foot off the chest, stood up and carefully replaced his boot. Atli saw the line slacken for a moment, then suddenly tighten again. Finn gave it a gentle pull. It responded, pulling so tight, so fast, it reverberated like a bow-string.
"Something here..." he called, still chewing. Close by, two other men - Thorvald, and the one called Njáll Red-Hair - stood; a third - Eyvind - abandoned the tub of water in which he was meticulously washing his neck and shoulders and moved to join him.
"It's big," said Finn.
Eyvind tested the tension of the line. "Cod, maybe. Good eating. I've seen them as big as deer."
"Bigger," said Finn.
Eyvind laughed. "It's not a fishing contest, north-man!"
Finn's eyes remained fixed on the point where the line disappeared below the surface of the water, a frown creasing his heavy brow.
Reaching down, he flipped open his sea-chest, dug out a pair of tough, reindeer skin gloves and pulled them on. "Not fish," he said.
Eyvind chuckled again. Thorvald and Njáll looked at each other in bemusement.
"Well, what else is it going to be out here?" asked Eyvind, spreading his arms wide and surveying the blank desolation that surrounded them. "Sea serpent?"
Finn said nothing.
"Whale?" muttered Thorvald, squinting at the slowly heaving sea, trying to penetrate the thick fog.
"Seal maybe?" ventured Njáll.
"Not seal. Or whale," said Finn. Then, after a pause, added: "Nothing I know."
Thorvald and Njáll exchanged anxious looks. "But there's nothing in the sea you don't know," said Thorvald.
"Something different here."
By now, the small knot of men had attracted Bjólf's attention. "If it takes four of you to haul it in," he said, approaching them, "I'd be more worried about it eating us." But the looks on the faces of Thorvald, Njáll and Finn immediately killed the humour in his voice. "What is it?"
"Something out there," said Finn, nodding towards the black waves.
Bjólf frowned deeply.
"Before you ask," said Njáll, "he doesn't know what." Bjólf looked uneasy at his words.
"Well, let's just wind it in and have a look," said Eyvind matter-of-factly. He picked up the winding frame, and, leaning forward, went to hook it into the line, but, at that moment, as if responding to his words, it fell slack at his feet. Eyvind tugged on it gingerly, and met no resistance. He pulled harder. It kept coming.
"So much for your prize cod!" said Eyvind. "That'll be more hooks lost." And, taking up the limp line he started swiftly reeling it in by hand, letting it fall in a wet heap at his feet. "Just got caught on something, that's all. Some old bit of flotsam or..."
Before he could finish the sentence, the line whipped through his hands with such speed it sent a mist of salt spray into the air. Eyvind howled in agony as the line sliced through the flesh of his palms. As it snapped taut, his body jerked violently forward and he collapsed to his knees, blood coursing from his right hand, the trembling arm stretched out awkwardly before him in a curious, twisted gesture. For a moment, the stunned onlookers struggled to make sense of what had just happened. Then it became clear. Without thinking, Eyvind had wound part of the line around his right hand; now, pulled tight, hauled seaward by whatever lay below the surface, it had him caught like a rabbit in a wire trap, suspended between post and gunwale, cutting him to the bone. If the line were to break now on the seaward side, he would be saved, but if it snapped behind him, he would either he dragged into the sea or have the flesh stripped from his hand. Finn was the first to act, flying past Eyvind, grabbing the line with his gloved hands and pulling with all his strength, his feet braced against the gunwale. The line slackened. Eyvind fell back. Thorvald and Njáll leapt forward in an effort to free him, desperately trying to untangle the line from the afflicted hand.
"Cut the line!" called Bjólf. Thorvald pulled his knife, but before he could act the line whipped through Finn's gloved grasp, sending the smell of salt and burning hide into the air as it snapped taut again and sent Thorvald's blade flying. Eyvind fell forward once more, screaming with the pain like a trapped animal, desperately trying to pull with his free hand as Finn fought to get a grip and, baring his white teeth like an animal, tried to bite through the line.
"Cut it!" bellowed Bjólf, searching urgently for a blade, any blade. The commotion had caught the attention of the entire crew now.
Atli, stunned and horrified by what had occurred in the past few seconds, stood helpless. Only when Bjólf called out for the second time did he realise that he alone, of all those within reach, had within his grasp the means of Eyvind's salvation. The axe hung idly in his hand. With everything seeming to slow as if in a dream, he stepped forward, and raised his axe.
Without warning, as if a spell were suddenly broken, Eyvind and Finn fell back with a crash onto the blood-soaked deck. The loosed line whipped backwards over the gunwale, and something - still attached to its end - flew from the water, arced high in the air with a trail of salt spray, and landed with a wet thud on the deck next to them.
Atli glanced at the axe - still in his raised right hand - then, in the moment of stunned silence that followed, at the dumfounded faces of the crew. Bjólf stared at the thing on the deck, a look of disbelief on his face. Behind him, Gunnar looked on, his characteristically stern features now fixed in an expression of horror. Njáll took a step back. On the deck, Eyvind, nursing his hand, shuddered, and scrabbled to get away from it.
Atli looked. At first, he struggled to make sense of the weird, white shape in the gloom. It was like no fish he had ever seen, and certainly did not seem large enough to have put up such a struggle. Then his reeling brain saw it for what it was. The hand and forearm of a man - or what had once been a man - its grey flesh bloodless and nibbled by fish, its skin bleached by the sea and barely covering the extent of bone and wasted muscle beneath, its elbow ragged with gristle and tendon as if freshly wrenched from its joint. Wrapped around its length was the remainder of the tangled, hooked fishing line.
The first wave of recognition was followed by another, but of a worse kind. With all that had happened, Atli had had little trouble consigning the ghoulish apparition in the water to a place somewhere in his imagination, a place of safety. But now, he knew for certain it was real. It was out in the world - here, on the ship, amongst them.
Bjólf pushed past Thorvald and Njáll and knelt over it. "Give me the axe, boy."
Atli passed the weapon haft-first over their grisly catch, never once taking his eyes off it, then hopped back again, putting as much distance between him and it as honour would allow. Bjólf prodded the skeletal limb, turning it over slowly. A length of limp, green weed entwined its white, bony fingers, now curled skyward like the legs of an upturned crab. A putrid smell rose from it. Around its wrist, Bjólf now noticed, was a twisted bracelet, tarnished green at the ends, its plaited strands coloured black and red.
"Gunnar?" called Bjólf. The big man stepped forward. Bjólf looked at the axe for a moment, turning it around in his hand. "The former owner of this... he left something else behind. What did you do with it?"
"Over the side. Back in the estuary."
"Could this be it?" Bjólf prodded the forearm again.
Gunnar shook his head. "It is... different. This one, there's more of it. And anyway, this has been in the water longer."
Bjólf nodded. "A drowned sailor then? The rest of him down there somewhere?"
"Must be."
"A drowned sailor who pulls," growled a voice. It was Finn. "I felt that line. The dead do not fight back." A few of the men muttered, unsettled at his words.
"This is bad," said Úlf, shaking his head. "The raid. That madman at the village. Steinarr. Hallgeir. Kjötvi... And now this."
"Enough!" Snapped Bjólf, rising to his feet. "We've all seen dead flesh before. Enough to know we should thank our lucky stars we're better off than this wretch." He gave the limb a kick. "He's half eaten by fish. That's what pulled at your line."
Several among the crew nodded or exclaimed in agreement as he spoke, some nudging the more superstitious among them. But, in the very next moment, a gasp came from all their throats. Expressions fell in horror.
Bjólf followed their gaze, and recoiled. The thing on the deck was moving.
Its fingers twitched, writhed, then slowly curled into the palm, its forefinger last to join its fellows, as if beckoning to all those who beheld it. Atli backed away involuntarily, suddenly aware, once again, of the angry scratches upon his calf.
Bjólf raised the axe and brought it down hard, cutting the line. Without a word, he picked up the limb and hurled it out to sea.
"Haul in all the lines," he said, his face and voice grim. "Let's eat."
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE CORPSE-PICKER
It was not long before
Fjölvar was serving up steaming portions of fish stew from the cauldron over Atli's fire. The catch had been fair. The fish was sweet and tender, some barley meal and dried cod had gone into the pot to add substance, and Fjölvar had even managed to rescue enough of the onions to give flavour to the broth. And, most of all, it was hot. Atli had lapped it up hungrily, burning his mouth in the process, but unable, for the moment, to think of anything else. Magnus, meanwhile, had succeeded in spooning some of the hot liquid between Kjötvi's lips, and the stricken man was soon eating as hungrily as his fellows, miraculously returned to life by the brew. Eyvind's wound had been bound, and by great good fortune he had escaped permanent damage. He would be left-handed for a while, but it would heal, and he would still have the use of his fingers. Only Gunnar had had the nerve to grumble.
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