Estrid (The Valhalla Series Book 2)

by Johanne Hildebrandt

  “They smell blood,” Sigrid said bitterly. “Those ungrateful pigs.”

  Without her sacrifice, Valhalla would fall, the Christians would enslave the Nordic realms, and the world would plunge into Ragnarök. She was the mother of Olaf, their savior, chosen by the gods. Everyone had seen how the gods blessed his coronation, and yet they were whining like pathetic slaves at having to cede a little of their power, those two-faced weaklings whom she’d saved from war and ruin. Suddenly the water in the tub was freezing cold.

  As soon as the Scylfing chieftains had swallowed their loss, they would realize that the Geats and the Svea were going to need to stand united against the enemy.

  “They’ll come crawling when I celebrate my revenge against Erik with Estrid by my side,” she said, and stood up in the tub, dripping.

  Vanadís had chosen her. Her will was Freya’s will.

  Edmund wrapped the cloth around her as if she were a child. Sigrid pushed him away, filled with distaste. He went way too far in his attentiveness. Any false expectation he had was her own fault. She had grown used to his strength and proximity and had let him warm her bed far too often. He was still just her jarl and not her husband.

  Edmund watched her, worried.

  “There’s no guarantee that Estrid is even alive.”

  “She’s alive,” Sigrid snapped.

  Vanadís would never permit her to lose Estrid on the same day that Olaf was swallowed up by Erik’s power.

  “You know the girl is dying of her illness and that her mind is feeble,” he said, eyeing her uneasily.

  She couldn’t think about that now, not on this day, never again.

  “Not as feeble as the Scylfings who believe my strength is severed.”

  “Sigrid,” Edmund pleaded, trying to stroke her cheek.

  “Don’t touch me,” she roared, knocking his hand away.

  Just then Ylva ran into the room, her hair sticking out every which way.

  “What’s going on in here?” she said, glaring angrily at Edmund. “This isn’t right.”

  Edmund gave Sigrid a pleading look and hesitated before nodding his head.

  “I’ll leave you, ma’am.”

  “Go to your wife. She needs you more,” Ylva muttered.

  Sigrid stood silently on the animal hide on the floor, naked and shivering.

  “Estrid’s going to die,” she said, and suddenly she started shivering so much, her teeth chattered.

  Ylva’s stern look softened into pity.

  “You poor girl,” she mumbled, and wrapped a cloak around Sigrid’s shoulders. “All the things you have to bear.”

  Sigrid shook her head matter-of-factly.

  “The gods will protect her, and she is not alone. Katla is watching over her. No one protects her as well as Katla.”

  When Estrid was three, she had gone missing. The whole estate had searched for her everywhere, including the well, but she was nowhere to be found. Sigrid had been out of her mind with worry, certain that she had drowned in the sea. But at nightfall a village boy had found her by a creek deep in the woods. She was sitting on a rock, relaxed and laughing. She was enjoying herself so much that he had a very hard time convincing her to go home.

  Estrid later explained that she and her closest kinswoman, Katla, had been playing with the dísir in the woods. At that moment Sigrid understood how well the gods watched over her little girl.

  Ylva sighed heavily as she dressed Sigrid.

  “Your daughter is sickly and has been missing for a long time. You know that as well as I do,” Ylva said, shaking her head pessimistically.

  If anyone other than Ylva had spoken to Sigrid that way, she’d have had that person whipped, but Ylva was the relative she was closest to, and she couldn’t deny that there was good reason to be worried.

  “Estrid has never been normal, and people have been terrified of her ever since she almost killed her brother. We know she is consecrated to Hel, but her absence now could mean that she’s been captured and forced into marriage . . .”

  Sigrid clenched her teeth as the noose of grief pulled tight around her throat. She couldn’t bear the thought of her daughter suffering in captivity.

  The Anund clan abducted women and sometimes made them aid in battle. Even her own stepmother had secretly aided the enemy, and Toste had ultimately killed her for that betrayal.

  “Estrid will be brought back home soon, and the Anund clan will be wiped out, down to the last child,” Sigrid said flatly. “Even if I need to go personally retrieve her from Hel’s halls, she’ll come back home.”

  “Well,” Ylva said with a smile, “if we’re lucky, she’ll scare the enemy to death and come home with Ragna’s head in a sack. Those poor Anund folk don’t know who they took.”

  Sigrid smiled wanly.

  “No, they really don’t.”

  “Do you have any more gold? Give me your gold.”

  The boy who had pointed her out to the chieftain squatted in front of Estrid, his mouth hanging open. His hair was long and straggly, and his face was covered with dirt and sweat. There was dried snot under his nose, but his eyes were sharp and malevolent.

  When she didn’t respond, he shoved her.

  “Answer!”

  Estrid moved farther away from his sour stench of poverty.

  She yawned and curled up on the ground while the boy’s taunts grew quieter and quieter, as if they were coming from somewhere far away.

  Her body felt light. It floated through the air, and nothing mattered anymore. Strips of moonlight filtered through the scaffolding poles, and tiny motes glittered in the air around them like stars in the sky.

  She took a deep breath. The pressure on her chest was gone, and she could breathe more easily. Everything was as it should be.

  “The Scylfings will find us, and then you will lie dead on the ground, drowned in your own blood,” Estrid muttered to the boy, and giggled at the hilarious thought and the stupid expression on his face.

  A moment later she was dreaming again, her footsteps light, moving toward the shimmering radiance at the top of the mountain. There was no fear or sorrow here anymore, just the sparkling light that lured her and drew her.

  “You will be liberated.”

  Estrid slowed her steps and was filled with a trembling fear, because now she saw that the cross worshipper stood atop the mountain like a shimmering light dís.

  He reached out his hands to her and pulled her to him. Estrid tried in vain to resist. Screaming in pain, she was surrounded by the light that burned into her flesh and reduced her to ash.

  “Yea, and though you wander through the valley of the shadow of death, do not fear.”

  The voice was a roar, and Estrid threw herself back and forth on the ground as the white light burned her skin.

  “You are not alone, my child.”

  “Hel, dark mother, save me!” Estrid pleaded.

  An instant later she felt Katla holding her and sank into her safety. She wasn’t alone. Panting, Estrid curled up in the safe darkness. He couldn’t reach her here. Her heart calmed as the light faded, and she fell peacefully into this little death.

  “She’s completely unconscious.”

  The shield maiden’s long braids swayed as she leaned over Estrid. Suddenly wide-awake, she looked around in confusion. The cross worshipper had hurt her, sullied her with sickly evil. Her head ached as if a red-hot band had been cinched tight around it, but where he’d touched her, there was no burn or wound. It was only a dream, or maybe it was real.

  “Have fun, Chieftain,” a warrior said, revealing his brownish-black tooth stumps in a suggestive grin. “I’ll be happy to have a go when you’re done.”

  What in the name of Vanadís was happening to her? The cross worshipper was a phantom sent by Ragna, so how could he come to her in a dream? She pulled her hands over her face and tried to collect her thoughts but to no avail.

  “Pain and suffering are all that await you, you cursed bitch,” the shield maiden
Turid hissed into Estrid’s ear. She smelled of sweat and rancor.

  A moment later Estrid was alone with the beast, who filled the crowded hut with a stench of death.

  She sat up and looked around for Katla, but she wasn’t there.

  What would she do if the beast attacked her? Fight, or lie still, close her eyes, and pretend the whole thing wasn’t happening? The chieftain undid his belt with a heavy sigh and dropped it on the ground. If this has to happen, let’s get it over with. Estrid raised her chin in defiance.

  I am the daughter of Sigrid, descended in an unbroken line from Freya. My strength is in my blood, and not even a cross worshipper’s evil can overcome me.

  “Here, eat,” Agnatyr said, and placed a wooden bowl beside her before sitting down cross-legged and gobbling up the gray sludge with his fingers.

  Estrid looked in surprise from the enemy to the gray sludge sloshing around in the bowl.

  “Never turn down food,” he said irritably, and kept eating with his mouth open, revealing his pointy teeth.

  Estrid cautiously took a piece of black salsify, and when she tasted it, she felt hunger ripping through her body. She quickly swallowed the sludge of cooked roots, and when she put the bowl down, she was so full, her belly bulged.

  “Tell me,” Agnatyr said, and then burped loudly. “How many chieftains attended your mother’s feast?”

  If information was what he wanted, then he wasn’t going to have sex with her, not yet at any rate.

  Estrid counted the eight Scylfing chieftains who had been at the estate.

  “Twenty.”

  Agnatyr gave her an amused look.

  “How many men ride with your father, King Erik?”

  Without hesitation, she looked him in the eye.

  “More than I could count, but they’re coming for me, to be sure.”

  The chieftain leaned closer to her, so menacing and nasty that she could hardly maintain eye contact.

  “They won’t be able to find us,” Agnatyr scoffed. “The forest of Iron-Wood is our sacred turf. The trees and the dísir in the mountain lakes and marshes protect us and lead our enemies to death. The only chance of living you have is if you willingly assist me. Understand?”

  Estrid wound a loose thread around her finger from her simple frock without daring to look up at the beast.

  “To answer your questions is to betray my family,” she finally said.

  The beast laughed and leaned forward, taking hold of her hair and pushing her into the ground. Her heart raced as she lay completely still.

  “I have other ways of persuading you to speak. Shall I call the others so they can screw you into submission?” He squeezed her breast so hard it hurt. “Is that what you want, you Scylfing bitch?”

  He let go so Estrid could get up, and she angrily pressed herself back against the lean-to’s poles.

  “Are you such a worthless man that you have to force yourself between a woman’s legs? I’d rather die than part my legs.”

  Agnatyr wiped his mouth on the back of his hand before he grabbed the dagger he carried in his belt and held it out to her.

  “So, kill yourself, then.”

  His eyes told her he was serious. Estrid’s hand shook as she closed her fingers around the dagger’s simple wooden handle. He’d said they would make good use of her, but if she killed herself, she would rob the Anund clan of whatever fate they had in store for her.

  What if she jabbed the knife into the beast’s throat and killed Agnatyr like Skjalf had killed Agni? The chieftain crossed his legs, and she read only indifference in his face.

  “Stick it into your neck or heart.”

  Estrid longingly placed the tip against her beating heart.

  It would have been so easy. One sharp pain, and she would return to the peace of Niflheim. She took a firmer hold on the dagger with both hands and pushed it between her ribs.

  Her longing for liberation ached through her body, but she couldn’t take the easy way out of Hel’s test without being punished in the afterworld. Nor was it certain that Katla would be able to follow her. They had to die together, otherwise they would never find each other again.

  Estrid looked at the knife, aching with yearning, and then reluctantly let it drop to the ground.

  She needed to descend into the underworld, into the nightmare, and if she was strong enough to make it up to the light, past the cross worshipper’s allurements, the trial would be over. That was Hel’s will.

  Agnatyr leaned back so he was half lying down, propped up on his arm.

  “Looks like you changed your mind.”

  Estrid huddled up in a ball, wrapping her arms around her knees.

  “Let me not have to sleep with you,” she pleaded quietly.

  Agnatyr’s cheek twitched, and he regarded her in silence for a long time.

  “I’m not going to kill you, nor am I planning to have sex with you,” he finally said. “Instead I wish to form an alliance, one that will benefit us both.”

  He held up a leather cord with a bit of bone hanging from it with symbols carved into it.

  “If you give me what I want, of your own free will, I will give you this,” he said, and swung it back and forth in front of Estrid’s face. “It will give you my protection, and no one will touch you. You will keep your life, with your honor intact.”

  She looked at the yellowed piece of bone swinging back and forth with its promise of safety in return for treason and betrayal. It was a trick. That was all too clear to her. Agnatyr didn’t have her best interests at heart, but forming an alliance with her would-be assassin still seemed the most sensible course of action. She was descending deeper and deeper into the abyss.

  “Swear that no one will touch me.”

  He put his hand on his arm where the sign of Loki wound across his skin.

  “I swear by my god.”

  Estrid gulped.

  “Then you shall have what you request.”

  Agnatyr leaned back, pleased.

  “Now tell me how many chieftains attended your mother’s feast.”

  “The men lost the trail at the river, where Anund’s men must have continued by boat,” Edmund reported. “They’re searching the shoreline, but that may take time. They probably went to the Iron-Wood or even abroad.”

  Sigrid’s heart sank. Even the renegades among the Anund clan weren’t so foolish that they would enter her realm without being able to quickly flee to safety.

  Impatiently she crossed the courtyard, where the Scylfings had already mounted their horses, but they didn’t show any interest in looking for Estrid or the enemy.

  “What are you good-for-nothings waiting for?”

  The Svea had already broken their camp out on the moors, and Erik’s men seemed ready to pursue Anund’s men. But nothing was happening. Damn these lazy men who wouldn’t even go bring back their own blood relation.

  “Why aren’t they leaving?” she asked, but Edmund just shook his head.

  “We’re waiting for Erik, our king and ruler,” her brother, Ulf, said bitterly.

  Sigrid turned around and watched Ulf strolling toward her with heavy steps, dressed for battle, his iron helmet held under his arm. His face was angry and his eyes spiteful.

  Sigrid sighed impatiently. It was inconceivable that Ulf blamed her for Erik’s malevolent tricks.

  “I didn’t know that Erik would force you to swear an oath of allegiance to him as king,” she said, exasperated. Surely he must see that?

  Ulf regarded her as if she were a stranger.

  “Your aspirations to put Olaf on the throne of Svealand have cost the Scylfings dearly.”

  She laughed at her brother’s stupidity.

  “That was your aspiration, too, and Father’s. I’ve sacrificed everything to comply with your wishes, and the family is stronger now than ever. How can you turn your back on me at this moment, when the enemy is holding my daughter captive?”

  There was no sign of reconciliation in her brother�
�s eyes.

  “You filled us all with lies to convince us to give Erik Geatland. I see that now. My own sister, the traitor.”

  Sigrid stared at him, her mouth hanging open.

  “Are you out of your mind? You know how much I hate Erik. You sat next to me and heard every word that was spoken.”

  “Not all of them,” he said, and put on his iron helmet so his face was hidden except for the narrow openings for his eyes and mouth. “Erik spoke loudly of how you begged to be allowed to live as his wife again, and after he’d graced you with his prick, you came up with the trick for how he could bring the Scylfings to their knees.”

  Sigrid shook her head in surprise, unable to fathom how Ulf could believe those lies.

  “You know Erik lies, right? Why are you letting his false words sow discord between us?”

  Ulf put his hand on his sword and stared indifferently at her through the openings in his helmet.

  “Will you take care of Ingeborg and the children if I fall in battle?” Ulf asked.

  She nodded angrily, and without saying any more, he walked over to his horse. What kind of madness clouded Ulf’s mind? This was absurd. Her own brother.

  Sigrid took a deep breath, anger burning in her breast. If only they could find Estrid and bring her home, she would expel the poison that Erik had spread. She would come up with a punishment later for those who had been disloyal.

  “Mistress, I’m ready.”

  Dressed for travel, Asta was more beautiful than ever as she smiled and bobbed her head to Sigrid. Sigrid took the girl’s hands and held them tight. Amidst all these deceivers at least she could rely on her beautiful dagger.

  “Beloved kinswoman, you will be amply rewarded for your loyalty,” Sigrid said, and caressed the young woman’s cheek.

  Asta had already entrapped the king with her beauty and shared his bed. Everything Sigrid asked of her she did willingly.

  Asta’s eyes shone as she kissed Sigrid’s fingers.

  “Have no doubt, I will do as you and Vanadís wish,” Asta said without the slightest trace of fear in her eyes.

  “She honors you for your courage.”

  Asta’s laughter rang with an icy lunacy.

  “I know, mistress.”