by MD. Lachlan
The next morning the bright winter sun woke the boy and he wondered if he had dreamed the night before. But the wolf pelt was beside him. His father was up and making some porridge. He smiled at the boy as he came out of the tent.
‘I didn’t know we had a famous storyteller among us, Snake in the Eye. Where did you get that tale from?’
The boy walked to his father’s side. ‘Didn’t you tell it to me?’
‘One like it,’ he said. ‘It was said your great-grandfather once fought a great wolf, though few believed him when he said he had.’
‘He returned with a great treasure, didn’t he?’
‘He did, and tales of the east.’
The boy nodded. ‘Perhaps one day they will tell tales of me.’
‘Perhaps they will, Snake in the Eye, for you have a poet’s heart and so will be sturdy in battle. The emperor will let you write your own story.’
‘I will write it with my sword on the bodies of my enemies,’ said the boy.
‘You are a poet and a warrior,’ said his father. ‘I am proud to call you my son.’
‘I will be a great slayer.’
The boy touched the stone at his neck for luck. In the clear morning the ocean was visible. In a day they would sail towards the dying sun, he thought, west for Miklagard, for hope and for a future of blood.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Adam Roberts for reading the first draft of this book and for his supportive comments. Thanks to Claire my wife for taking more than her fair share of childcare to give me the chance to finish this. Apologies to Eddo Brandes for taking the biscuit.
A Gollancz eBook
Copyright © M.D. Lachlan 2011
All rights reserved.
The right of M.D. Lachlan to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in Great Britain in 2011 by
Gollancz
The Orion Publishing Group Ltd
Orion House
5 Upper Saint Martin’s Lane
London, WC2H 9EA
An Hachette UK Company
This eBook first published in 2011 by Gollancz.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978 0 575 08966 2
All characters and events in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title
Dedication
Also by M.D. Lachlan from Gollancz
Part One: Sword Age
1. Wolf Night
2. The Confessor
3. Death and the Raven
4. A Necessary Sacrifice
5. Voices in the Dark
6. Captives
7. An Awakening
8. A Meeting
9. Alone
10. Bargains and Threats
11. Hrafn
12. A Matter of Will
13. The Reward of Honour
14. A Discovery
15. The Agonies of Confessor Jehan
16. Running
17. A Deal
18. Royal Blood
19. A Fight for Saerda
20. Caught
21. Last Rites
22. Helpless
23. Wolf’s Blood
24. At Ladoga
25. A Change of Identity
26. Shelter
27. Munin
28. Ravens
29. Strange Companions
30. A Question of Fear
Part Two: Wolf Age
31. Helgi’s Sacrifice
32. Saved for Christ
33. One Gift Demands Another
34. A Haunting
35. The Valley of the Black Saint
36. Rescue
37. What Happened at Saint-Maurice
38. The Wolfstone
39. Song Everlasting
40. A Commercial Decision
41. A Changed Man
42. The Shattered Lands
43. View of a Monster
44. A Defensive Action
45. Blood on the Sand
46. A Wolf’s Treat
47. Shadow of the Wolf
48. The Word of God
49. A Parting
50. An Encounter with Death
51. Friends and Enemies
52. The Charge
53. A Fireside Tale
54. Dark Magic
55. The Tides
56. Werewolf
57. Alone
58. A Hunting Party
59. The Lamps in the Garden
60. Thought and Memory
61. The Devouring Now
62. An Impediment to the Journey
63. A Choice for Jehan
64. A Seat at the Oar
65. The Ice
66. A Merchant’s Tale
67. A Reckoning at Sea
68. Prayers Unanswered
69. Helgi’s Salvation
70. The Price of Lore
71. The Table of Demons
72. Unexpected Welcome
73. Helgi’s Destiny
74. Brave Fatty
75. A Leap of Faith
76. Down
77. The Dread Wolf Fenrir
78. Byzantium
Acknowledgements
Copyright