Estrid (The Valhalla Series Book 2)

by Johanne Hildebrandt

Yngvald gave a start, staring at her as if he thought he might not have heard her correctly.

  She watched as the anger took root in them and smiled at their drunken fumbling for their weapons.

  “What are you going to do? Assault the king mother the same way you violated my maidservant? Tell me, what are you going to do?”

  She’d reigned for a long time, and she knew what it took to hold on to her power when challenged. Yngvald’s conceit didn’t just give her the legal grounds to get rid of them; his death would also strengthen her position with the Scylfings who had turned their backs on her.

  Yngvald looked around at his warriors, who had gathered around them, weighing the possibility of victory over twice as many Scylfing fighters.

  “What can you do?” Yngvald asked.

  Sigrid smiled serenely.

  “Leave my estate, or I’ll order my men to kill you.”

  The warriors in Sigrid’s hird pulled their weapons, and Yngvald’s arrogance vanished when he realized Sigrid was serious.

  “King Erik won’t allow—”

  “No.” Sigrid cut him short. “Be off with you now.”

  Yngvald gave her a quick nod, and then turned to his men.

  “Fetch your backpacks.”

  “You got rid of them without a fight,” Edmund said admiringly as the Svea rode away from the estate with their tails between their legs.

  “There’ll be more after them,” Sigrid replied, looking out over the greening moorlands and the fields where the rye was getting tall.

  The lush fields were pleasantly warmed by the sun, and the cattle had eaten until they were plump on the juicy grasses. This winter there would be no famine. The crop failures were over, and even Ylva was satisfied with the coming harvest. Sigrid took a deep breath, relieved to be in charge again.

  “Did Ingemar and his men leave with my message?” she asked Edmund offhandedly, as if it weren’t important, but the jarl’s cheek twitched, and she could sense his uneasiness.

  Something was wrong.

  Sigrid turned to the twelve men who had served her long and well, kinsmen and brave warriors: Hawk, with all the facial scars under his beard; Torleif with his shaved head; and the strong Gynde, whom she’d known since she was a child. Of all the men of her hird, only Ingemar and Odd were missing. Edmund had sent only two men to carry her message to the king of the Danes, and without any warriors to protect them, it was far from certain that they would make it. This was treason. Was Edmund so foolish as to believe he could keep her from her beloved, when they had been blessed by the gods themselves?

  Sigrid studied her handsome jarl speaking with the warriors as if they were his own hird. Garishly dressed in expensive leggings and a wadmal tunic, he looked more like a cuckold than a warrior. She could see that now. Still, the men seemed to have confidence in the jarl, because they listened carefully when he spoke and they laughed at his jokes. Was her own hird plotting behind her back? More than one ruler had been betrayed from within his own ranks, stabbed to death by those who had sworn their loyalty. If the hird was on the jarl’s side, it was going to take some cunning to win them back.

  “Loyal warriors, Scylfing iron,” she said, looking at the brave men, “each of you shall be rewarded with one piece of silver.”

  Their grim faces broke into smiles, and Hawk cheered hurrah and raised his ax.

  Sigrid smiled tenderly.

  “You must know how much I honor and respect you, always.”

  Nothing could buy loyalty like silver and pretty words, and she needed her warriors. It would be hard to avenge Edmund’s treachery by herself.

  Estrid stood silently in the doorway of the house, watching Ragna place herbs in her basket. Vervain, dís-herb, and sorcery root: the seeress was going to make a concoction, and it was going to be lethally strong.

  “Are you going to poison me again?” she asked, and smiled when the seeress jumped and turned around.

  Ragna placed the last cyme in her basket and put on her cloak.

  “Try not to run away. Ofrid is watching you.”

  Estrid just smiled at the seeress’s words and watched in relief as she hurried across the courtyard, past the hens pecking at the ground and the two big yellow dogs sleeping in the shadow of the storehouse.

  “She’s finally gone,” Katla said, and then laughed. “She’s terrified now that she’s seen Hel’s power.”

  Fear was a marvelous force that took root in the heart of the weak and poisoned their minds.

  “Where is she?” Estrid asked.

  A warm wind blew through Katla’s hair as she pointed to the herb garden by the apple orchard. Estrid could see Vidya, the slave, kneeling over the plants there.

  In the meadow on the far side of the stone wall, the cattle were grazing, and beyond them rose the mountains. It wasn’t far, and if they ran as fast as they could, they might make it. There was bread to steal, and Ragna had left a dagger on the bench next to her herbs.

  They had to get out of here as quickly as they could.

  Vidya stood up and was brushing the dirt off her knees when she saw them approaching.

  “They’ll see you if you try to escape over the mountains in the daytime,” Vidya said. “Better to wait until the new moon.”

  “What makes you think I’m planning to escape?” Estrid asked sharply.

  “Just idle gossip from a dumb slave,” she mumbled. “I’m sorry, mistress.”

  The poor skinny thing stepped over the fence of woven willow branches to return to weeding the garden.

  “How long has Ragna owned you?”

  Something flashed in Vidya’s eyes, a sudden anger.

  “Seven summers,” she muttered, and went back to yanking up weeds as if her life depended on it.

  “Why does she keep you?” Estrid asked, looking puzzled.

  Vidya stiffened and stared down at the dirt.

  “I’m good at having babies,” she said quietly, and kept ripping out weeds with her dirty hands.

  That explained it. Slave women who bore healthy babies were valuable.

  “How many have you had?”

  Vidya put her hands to her shift, to show her swelling belly.

  “I’m expecting my fourth.”

  That couldn’t be right. Children usually stayed with their mother until they were old enough to be of some value, but there were no children here on the farm.

  “Have the others already been sold?”

  Vidya paled and shook her head, but didn’t say any more. Something had happened to her children. Maybe in her insanity Ragna had murdered them or sacrificed them to Loki. There was no telling what that giantess would do.

  “I would have set you free if you’d served me so well,” Estrid said gently. The light in Vidya’s eyes told her this was the right way to win her over. “Your children would have been free, too, and you would have had a roof over your heads and never needed to go hungry. If you served me, that is. But for that we’d have to escape from here and make it to the Scylfings.”

  Vidya stood up and scanned the area with suspicion before coming over to stand beside Estrid, so close that no one else would overhear her.

  “Do you swear you’ll set me free if I escape with you?”

  The slave’s body was so tense, she was trembling.

  “I swear in the name of Vanadís,” Estrid said with a nod.

  Vidya watched anxiously as Ofrid, a strong-looking male slave, stepped out of the house and gave them a dull glance before he continued to the fields.

  “It can’t happen yet. They guard you day and night. You’re too valuable to them.”

  Estrid nodded. She knew this would change as soon as the messenger returned and it was made clear to everyone that her father didn’t care in the least about her.

  “When?”

  The slave shrugged.

  “They’re keeping a close watch on the road into the valley, but there’s a path over the mountains. You’d have a chance there, especially at the new moon
. But we couldn’t survive in the woods without weapons.”

  Up into the mountains, toward the light. Her heart was pounding.

  “Then we’ll find weapons and flee,” Estrid said decisively. “Prepare yourself.”

  The slave nodded.

  It had been that easy to win her over.

  “That went well,” Estrid told Katla with a relieved smile.

  Her kinswoman took her hand and led her to the shade under the trees.

  “It’s a long time until the new moon. Let’s hope the messenger from Erik takes his time.”

  They sat down in the grass at the far end of the orchard, where no one could see or hear them. Estrid leaned against a tree and surveyed the field separating them from the mountains.

  “What’s important is that she tell us the way through the woods before we run away, otherwise we can throw her to the hounds.”

  Katla laid her head in Estrid’s lap, and Estrid distractedly ran her hand over the girl’s blond curls.

  “I think there’s hope,” she said, letting her finger slide over her kinswoman’s soft lips and into her mouth.

  “I know you’ll save the Scylfings,” Katla said. There was no doubt in her voice. “Your name will live on, as renowned as any of the great queens in the tribe’s lineage.”

  Estrid leaned over and tenderly kissed her darling. Her mouth tasted as sweet as honey, and her breast was as silky as the finest linen in her hand.

  This was how Gefjun demanded that their ardor be enjoyed. Katla’s nipple hardened beneath her fingers, and she squirmed with desire under Estrid’s hand.

  “They can see us,” Katla panted, her mouth against Estrid’s.

  Estrid coaxed Katla’s skirt up, caressing her thighs until she lay naked and trembling in the grass.

  “They can’t hate us any more than they already do,” she whispered, allowing her hand to find its way between her kinswoman’s legs to bring her release.

  There were so many ships that their sails filled the sea, and Rán herself eagerly carried them toward the victory that awaited. Sweyn stood on the prow and watched the Jómsvikings tacking into the wind toward them. A warrior stood at the bow with his shield raised, the sign that he wanted a word.

  “That’s Gunnvald Handfast,” Ax-Wolf cried with pleasure, recognizing one of his men.

  Sweyn waited impatiently until they pulled up alongside his ship and their steersman lithely hopped over the gunwale onto Sweyn’s deck.

  “Good news, my king,” the Jómsviking said, kneeling with his head bowed.

  “Speak,” Sweyn said.

  The warrior stood back up, and his blond-bearded face broke into a jubilant grin.

  “King Erik is dead!”

  Sweyn stared in amazement at the messenger. The news was immediately shouted from ship to ship, and the men began to cheer and bang their weapons against their shields, the rumble echoing across the water.

  “Are you completely sure?” Sweyn asked, disconcerted.

  For half his life he had yearned for the opportunity to kill Erik, and now that honor had been stolen from him.

  The Jómsviking nodded so enthusiastically that his beard whipped against his armor.

  “Completely sure. I saw his body being carried to the ship. They say he was poisoned by a mistress who ran off after his death. The new king, Olaf, is sailing to Svealand now with his father’s dead body.”

  Sweyn had been given the most powerful of swords for this fight. He had used all his means to gather every warrior willing to fight for his cause. And a mistress had taken the life of his sworn enemy.

  Poisoned by a mistress. Sweyn doubled over in laughter at the whole thing, and it was a long time before he was able to breathe calmly again.

  “Freya must have sent a valkyrie to clear the way for the realm’s legitimate king,” he said loudly, and everyone nodded in agreement, still laughing uproariously about the king’s ignoble death.

  The battle against the Svea was over before it had even begun.

  “We must find this heroine so that I can repay her for her services rendered to the king of Denmark.”

  Sweyn looked up at the sun in relief, shining benevolently from the clear blue sky. With Erik dead, it would be a long time before Svealand constituted a threat again. King Olaf was far too young to go to war, and he would need to fight hard to hold on to his power. Unifying the Svea chieftains would be no easy task. Sweyn had learned that all too well when he acceded to his father’s position as king.

  They still needed agreement with the Saxons. Sweyn had sent word to Emperor Otto and Odo, promising to protect the church and honor the tax alliance they had, but the messenger had not returned to confirm their concurrence.

  He would have to start with his double-crossing brothers.

  “Toste and his Geats are leaving us to go secure their land,” Ax-Wolf called from the prow of his ship, pointing to the Geats, who were letting the wind find their sail to head north.

  But not all of them. Several of the Geatish ships remained with Sweyn, not as many as promised but still enough.

  “They stuck around longer than I’d hoped,” Sweyn called back.

  “Chicken-whipped milksops,” the red-haired berserker replied, and the men guffawed at his words.

  “We sail for Lejre to show that I’ve returned,” Sweyn said. “We’ll take Erik’s jarls captive if they’re still around, as well as my brothers and their families.”

  “Erik still has a jarl in Trelleborg,” the messenger said.

  Sweyn exchanged looks with Åke and Palna. Things were really going his way.

  “Then that’s where we’ll go ashore.”

  Erik was dead! Sigrid leaned back on her throne, the sweetness of triumph simmering in her blood and filling her with inexhaustible happiness. Thank you, Vanadís. Thank you, ancestors. Thank all the gods—the dragon is finally slain. She was finally free of the shackles that had bound her for fifteen long years.

  Asta, blessed girl, had succeeded in poisoning the insane pig, thereby liberating the world from the iron fist of Erik the Victorious. She should never have doubted her maidservant’s devotion or that the poison she’d sent with Asta would work. Erik was dead, and now Olaf was the king of Svealand. Sigrid grinned, happiness coursing through her body.

  This meant that she was the most powerful woman in Geatland and Svealand, because no one’s power measured up to a king mother’s.

  “A Scylfing sits on the throne of Svealand now,” she told Björn, her father’s brother, who had brought her the message.

  Stern and sullen, he stood in the hall with three Scylfing chieftains. The four of them were the advance guard heralding the others’ arrival, and they had traveled all night. Björn’s clothes were covered with dust, and his face was streaked with dirt.

  A cold trickle of worry ran through Sigrid’s triumph.

  “Where’s Olaf?”

  Please, the Svea cannot have taken revenge on my son. She couldn’t lose Olaf like she’d lost Estrid. That would be far too much to bear.

  Björn pulled his hand over his black beard, his eyes dark with sorrow.

  “King Olaf is accompanying his father’s body to Ubsala. Jarl Axel is watching over the boy and has sworn to mentor him to make him a worthy Svea king.”

  Sigrid slowly exhaled, her sense of relief returning. Her son was alive and was learning to wield the power that he would now shoulder alone, if the gods stood by him. Everything had gone as she had planned during those interminable winter nights, when the frost giants scratched their claws over the land. This was good news, but still, her uncle Björn stood before her, looking depressed, his head lowered.

  Then she heard the muted and heavy funeral drums rhythmically heralding the death of a highborn Scylfing. Sigrid took a deep breath. Someone from the family had died.

  “What is it? Who died?”

  The sound of snorting horses and a rattling cart could be heard outside through the open doors. Björn’s face was awash in an
ger.

  “I have the worst possible news,” Björn said.

  Sigrid stood up and watched in dread as four men bore in a fallen soldier lying on a bier. The helmet covered his cheeks and nose; the armor bearing the mark of a Scylfing chieftain, the sword on his chest—all were far too familiar. Excruciating grief stabbed through her heart and took her breath away.

  “The Scylfings’ finest.”

  The scarred warriors set down the low bier and took up position beside the fallen man as the drums fell silent, and all that could be heard were women crying and men lamenting.

  Sigrid’s legs shook as she walked up to the fallen soldier and fell to her knees beside him.

  “My brother,” she whispered. Numb with grief, she gently laid her hand on Ulf’s chest.

  Her closest relative was gone. She stared in shock at the lifeless face of the man who had always stood by her during adversity and victory.

  When she had been alone and living under threat in Svealand, he had hurried to her side and loyally protected her life and those of her newborn children. All the same, their parting had been marred by disagreement and anger, and now they would never have the chance to make up with each other.

  Sigrid put her hand on his stiff fingers and gently stroked them.

  “Who did this?” she asked, her voice choked with rage.

  The warriors’ expressions remained unreadable as Björn spoke.

  “They forced him to drink Erik’s poison.”

  Sigrid could hardly breathe.

  “The Svea cleared him out of the way?”

  A brief nod confirmed his murder.

  “Oh, Jarl Axel was furious. He blamed your brother for Erik’s death and forced him to drink the wine they found in the king’s chamber, the wine that bitch of yours poisoned.”

  Björn seethed with hatred as he took up position beside Ulf’s dead body.

  “Ulf downed the wine like a man after swearing that he and Olaf were innocent. His final words were in praise of Erik, and he said he was looking forward to going to the afterworld and being able to sit beside Erik the Victorious in Valhalla. The courage he showed that day saved the lives of all the Scylfings.”