The Raven's Table

by Christine Morgan

  “What shall I tell Fjal?” Gunnar asked.

  “Tell him to lick a pig’s ass.”

  This, more than anything else Sven had said, seemed to convince Gunnar that he was indeed himself. Snorting a laugh, he went out.

  Sven glanced over once to see that the crone-whore who’d bitten him was well-secured at the post. Without her cloak, she wore nothing but a grubby linen under-tunic, no wool apron-dress, no belt, no brooches.

  Before, he’d thought her bone-moon pale, but by the whale-oil lamp’s faint glow she looked almost ruddy. Nor did she seem as scrawny as he remembered, but he supposed that was because he now knew first-hand of her strength.

  Whoever she was, he decided, she would make a fitting sacrifice, and much please the gods. Ugly, yes, but fierce and tenacious.

  When he woke some time later, he was thirsty enough to drink dry the Hvergelmir, wellspring of all rivers. But beer, mead, wine and water all tasted sour; only when Gunnar had the servant-woman Islunn bring a pail of warm milk could he keep it down. As for hunger, he had it, a faint growl in his belly, but the mere thought of food made him gag.

  His head still ached and his sweat was still clammy. His eyes watered with protest at the wan light. Gunnar, bringing their mail-coats that had been sand-scoured so they shone, did not find his countenance reassuring of health, but Sven waved away his brother’s hen-fussing.

  Dawn had not yet fully come, but the sky brightened. Fires were re-kindled and more torches lit. By the silvery sheen of that misty morning, men armed and armored themselves and readied for war. Their foes, encamped along a hill-ridge to the west, would be doing likewise.

  Sven washed and dressed, trimmed his nails, combed his hair, and brushed his full beard. His mirror, antler-handled, had been a gift from his mother. Either the polished metal had gotten smudged and tarnished, or his watering eyes were more sensitive than he’d thought, because of his reflection he saw only a distorted, misshapen dark blotch.

  No matter. Those who faced him in battle would not be impressed by handsomeness or grooming. He had other, better ways to intimidate and strike fear into them.

  He touched the side of his neck, wincing in expectation of a pain that proved not to be there. Upon removing the bandage, his probing fingertips found the spot sore and tender but otherwise nicely healed.

  The crone-whore’s bite had not been so bad after all. He glanced at her, where she lay bound and tethered to the post. She slept deeply. So deeply, in fact, that he had a bad moment of worry she’d died in the night. Not even when he nudged her ribs with his boot-toe did she stir in her slumber.

  She would wake soon enough, if only briefly.

  After donning his mail-coat and leathers, he opened a wooden chest carved all about with intricate knotwork and designs of wolf-heads and ravens, and, on the lid, a magnificent eight-legged horse. Inside, folded in cloth of soft wool dyed rich red, were a smooth soapstone basin and a short-bladed knife.

  The whore’s eyelids fluttered weakly when he lifted her head by the hair. He set the sharp edge to her slender throat.

  “Now I give you to Odin,” Sven said. “And to Thor and to Tyr, to the battle-gods for whose honor and pleasure my arm strikes!”

  He slashed hard and sure, with the skill of much practice.

  Now the whore’s eyes flew open, black and glittering like jet. She uttered a glottal cry that drowned in a gurgle. Her body lurched with a convulsion that snapped the bonds at her wrists and her ankles.

  The blood flowed, but not in a hot red flood to the likes of which Sven was accustomed. It flowed slow and thick, dark and strange, oozing into the basin. It flowed like tree sap and tar, like winter honey.

  A hand clawed at Sven’s chest, fingernails scraping for purchase on the links of his mail-coat. Then it fell away, and she twitched once more, and then she was still.

  Sven raised the basin. Its contents had the color of mire-mud streaked with crimson. The smell was raw meat and turned soil and sea-salt and death.

  Never had he seen blood such as this. It must, he knew, have some meaning, be some sign or omen.

  Just then from outside sounded the first horns, summoning men to their places. Sven heard his jarl calling out jovial encouragement. They would, he told them, butcher their foes and strip them of plunder where they fell, do great deeds and make great names for themselves, win victory and honor!

  Lusty shouts of approval met these words. Eagerness swelled in each man’s breast, and no less so in Sven’s. He tipped the basin over his head and laughed as the dark, strange, thick blood coated his hair and coursed down his face.

  As it had smelled, so too did it taste as it ran in his mouth—raw meat, turned soil, sea-salt and death. Earlier, the mere thought of food made his gorge heave; this should have sent him to all fours vomiting like a dog, but it only wakened from nowhere a wild and ravenous hunger.

  He laughed again. He pushed his head into the basin, sopping up the dregs until his beard stuck to his chin in a wet plaster, lapping the smears with his tongue.

  Then he set the basin back into the chest, strapped his sword-belt across his back, hung an axe at one hip and a stabbing-blade on the other, picked up his round shield painted red and yellow, grasped an ash-shafted spear with a barbed iron point, and strode forth from his tent.

  Sven Bloodhair would bring terror and slaughter to his enemies.

  And on that day, he did.

  Never before, in all his many battles, had the war-passion held him so strongly, the killing-purpose burned so clean and decisive a force. Each thrust of his spear, each stroke of his sword, each block of a blow with his shield, seemed god-guided. The steel blade sang, the iron rim and boss rang.

  It was exhilaration, exultation, a violent and savage and beautiful joy. He felt invincible, unstoppable. Nothing could harm him beyond slight nicks and scratches; he’d suffered worse wounds as a boy, picking thorn-berries!

  The dead and the dying dropped before him in droves. Sven offered no mercy, nor granted it when men groveled, begging, on their knees. He did pause to gather a few scraps of wealth here and there—a gold neck-chain, a brooch set with amber, a ring of twisted silver wire—but, for the most part, it was the blood… the blood and the killing, the blood and the death.

  Only once, when the sun’s rays shot through gaps in the clouds to stab at his eyes like needles of fire, did he falter. Such a pain split his head that he thought his skull had been shattered.

  Gunnar called out and began hacking his way toward his brother, but two men in green cloaks and boar-bristle helms were already there. With a long-hafted axe, the taller of the two hooked the edge of Sven’s shield and yanked it down. The other drove a spear at him. The tip pierced Sven’s mail-coat and sank into his side.

  Then the cloud-gaps closed up, the sun obscured again by cool shadow. Sven roared. He cast off his shield from his arm and swung his sword two-handed in a fast, sweeping arc. The blade, all but whistling in the air, caught the taller of the men just under the ear and took off his entire head with one stroke.

  The boar-bristled helm spun high, the severed head still inside it. Blood leaped from the neck-stump in a fountain.

  Sven wrenched the spear-point from his side, barely feeling it, as Gunnar’s sword cleaved the second man’s mail-coat to tatters. The spouting blood held all his attention. The body had only begun to topple when Sven sprang upon it and buried his face in the red, pulsing life-gush. He fastened his mouth to it as if sucking from a punctured goatskin wine-sack, gulping and guzzling, glutting himself on it, the blood overflowing his lips.

  The hunger, oh, the ravenous hunger roared in him now! There was nothing to be done but indulge it, to drink and drink and drink until he was sated!

  When he at length let go of the corpse, he sat back on his heels, gasping, exhausted, more spent and more fulfilled than he’d ever been with a woman.

  Elsewhere on the field, battles yet raged. Nearby…

  He looked up at a ring of men. Enemies
and allies alike stared aghast at him, their quarrel forgotten in that moment.

  Even Gunnar, his brother, had recoiled, eyes wide with horror. The spearman’s blood glistened on his blade, which dangled all but forgotten at the end of his strengthless arm.

  No one spoke.

  The war-clangor seemed very far away.

  Then a horse shrieked, its galloping hooves a shaking thunder on the earth. Wounded, wild, foaming with panic, it crashed into their midst with its dying rider clinging to the saddle.

  The spell was broken. Men remembered where they were and why they had come.

  “Attack!” someone cried.

  “Kill them!” yelled another.

  “Fight!” Sven’s jarl brandished his sword, and his standard-bearer blew a loud horn-blast, and once again the weapons met in the clashing steel storm.

  They fought on. They fought until the battle was done, the battle was won. Their foes fled in retreat. The slain and the injured littered the vale. Already, the ravens gathered, black-winged harbingers eager for their share.

  Word spread of Sven’s deeds—his strength and skill, his fearlessness, how no weapon seemed to hurt him. He had been, they said, more like legend than man. But word spread as well of the beheading, and his actions that followed. As he left the field, many uneasy looks were cast his way.

  Only Gunnar, his brother, dared broach the subject. “What happened out there?” he asked. “You drank that man’s blood, gorged on it like wine.”

  Sven shook his head. He had never felt so weary, and the westering sun through the clouds pained his eyes more than ever. “Later,” he said to Gunnar. “I want to rest.”

  “There will be a feast tonight,” Gunnar said. “I’ve heard the king and our jarl both wish to give you rich gifts.”

  At some other time, this news would have pleased him most greatly. But treasures of gold and silver did not much interest him now. Sven made a noise of acknowledgment, squinting against the sun’s glare that felt summer-hot against his skin. He groaned.

  “How bad is it?” Gunnar asked. “The spear-wound?”

  “Hm?” That, he had all but forgotten, craning his neck now to look. The point had gone through his mail-coat, through the quilting and clothing beneath. Dried blood had crusted. But when he wiped it away, he revealed just a small scab, and bruises already fading. “It’s nothing. A pin-prick.”

  “It looked far worse than a pin-prick.”

  “You are my brother, not my mother or nurse.”

  They returned to their tents. Gunnar continued to look troubled, but held his silence.

  “Let me sleep for a while,” Sven told him. “Then, if you still must fuss and fret, have someone bring me another jug of milk, and perhaps some bread, before the feast.”

  He went into his tent, into the welcome shade.

  The crone-whore’s corpse lay where he’d left it. Sven supposed he should dispose of her, but was too tired. She did not yet smell of rot, or if it did he was so covered himself in blood and viscera that he could discern nothing else. Besides, there’d be no shortage of graves dug and pyres built the next day for the fallen.

  In the meanwhile, he simply flung a wool blanket over the body, then stripped off his arms and armor, splashed his face with water, and collapsed into his bed. Dark sleep dragged him down like an iron ship’s anchor.

  A thump and a muffled outcry awoke him some length of time later. He sat up to cool dusk and the single flame of a whale-oil lantern set on a stool by the foot of his bed. A milk-pail had been set beside it, its top draped with a cloth.

  His head felt clear, his body rested. But for a soreness in his jaw, as of many teeth aching, not the slightest pain remained from his wounds. Had he been hit in the face and could not remember? He worked his tongue around, seeking missing teeth or looseness… finding them all firmly rooted and accounted for… and if they seemed overlarge, oversharp to his probing, he attributed that to the fog of just-waking.

  Fresh blood-scent slid into his nostrils. Eager saliva filled his mouth and hollow pangs rumbled his belly. He looked around for the source of the smell and gasped when he saw it.

  An old woman, Islunn, Fjal’s servant, lay flat on her back with one outstretched hand fitfully twitching. A figure crouched over her. It was the crone-whore, bone-moon pale and scrawny in her grubby linen under-tunic, her head buried in the hollow of Islunn’s shoulder the way an ardent lover might affectionately nuzzle… but the blood-scent and the sucking, slurping sounds said otherwise.

  She lifted her head, jet-black eyes glittering, hair falling in knots and straggles. Crimson-painted from nose to chin and ear to ear, she bared her red teeth in a malicious snarl. Of the cut he’d made when he slashed open her throat, only the faintest white trace of a scar-line could be seen.

  The side of Islunn’s neck, however, was a savaged, ragged hole from which more blood sluggishly bubbled. Sven had to swallow before he began drooling into his own beard.

  He forced himself to meet the crone-whore’s cruel gaze. “I killed you,” he said. “I sacrificed you to the gods.”

  “The gods don’t want me,” she replied in a voice like the scraping of flint. “They don’t want the accursed, Sven Sveingunsson.”

  “You know my name?”

  “I know enough,” she said. “And you, you know nothing. Nothing of what you do, nothing at all.”

  Sven’s mind spun with stories he’d heard… stories of ghosts, yes, and barrow-wights to protect burial mounds… stories of unburied corpses that rose to walk again… stories of shape-changers who donned the pelts of bears or of wolves… but…

  “What are you?” he asked.

  “What you’ll become.”

  “What have you done to me?” He stood up from his bed, swiping the back of his hand across his mouth, feeling the oversized jut of his newly-sharp teeth. “What have you done to me, you blood-drinking bitch?”

  “What have you done to yourself? You brought this fate down upon your own head. Asgard and Valhalla will have no place for you.”

  To be dead but deathless, ancient but ageless, eternal. Would that, he wondered, be such a bad thing? No one would ever say again what a great and fearsome war-lord he’d been in his time… not when he would be greater and more fearsome than ever, not when his time did not end!

  With his full attention fixed upon her and these thoughts, he had not been aware of the heavy footsteps approaching until the tent-flap opened and his brother-in-law stepped inside.

  “Sven? Is Islunn here? I heard shouting—”

  Fjal’s jaw dropped into the rolls of his chins. He struggled for breath. His right hand clutched at his lard-layered chest. His shocked eyes met Sven’s, brimming with dread and accusation.

  “And,” said the crone-whore, slicking the tip of her grey tongue over her fangs, “you must be hungry.”

  A rage and madness took him.

  Somehow, his arms shot out to seize Fjal by the shoulders. Somehow, as Fjal gibbered and screamed, Sven dragged him forward.

  Fjal’s terror-sweat stink sharpened as his bladder let go. He was an immense and disgusting creature, globs of fat encased in greasy sausage-skin, but when Sven’s teeth dug through the blubber to find the hot, savory blood pumping fast through Fjal’s veins…

  The blood, oh the blood, a rushing scarlet river, well-flavored with melted butter and bacon drippings! Sven grunted and snuffled like a feeding beast, unable to help himself, the greedy feasting sounds, the ravenous ravaging! He felt his hunger inflame all the hotter even as it was quenched.

  Then Fjal’s considerable weight went to dead-weight, seeming to double, and despite Sven’s newfound strength he could not hold on. Fjal dropped like a felled ox. Loose limbs wobbled. Fatty flesh jiggled and bounced.

  Sven went to his knees. Sensation surged and seethed through him, a lightning-struck power. He looked at the crone-whore, and began to wolfishly grin.

  She had by then moved to the back of the tent, and torn a hole there larg
e enough to go through. As she readied to do so, she smirked at him. “Across every land of Midgard, you’ll be hunted and hated and feared, an out-cast among men. No jarl, king or lord will want you. You’ll have no hall and no home.”

  His grin faded.

  “Your wealth will be worthless,” she said. “You’ll never again marry… no more children… no family at all, Sven Bloodhair.”

  A deep shiver touched him. He stifled a sound of despair.

  “They’ll call you monster!” She barked a laugh as inhuman as a gore-crow’s caw. “And they’ll be right. Look at you already! Murderer! Oath-breaker and kin-slayer!”

  He glanced at the quivering body beside him. His brother-in-law, his sister’s husband… he had not liked Fjal, true, but there were laws, there was honor, there were oaths and obligations…

  “Will his son avenge him?” the crone-whore asked. “Only a lad, but that is his duty, is it not? Or will you slaughter the boy as well? Your own nephew, your dear sister’s son? Who, then, must be called upon to avenge young Frodi?”

  He tried to retch but managed only a juicy and meaty red-misted belch.

  “And what of Gunnar?” she pressed on, relentless. “Your own brother, think what a place you’ve put him in—”

  “Enough!” he wailed, sinking his hands into his hair, clotted and congealed with dark, sticky blood.

  Outside, out front, coming closer, were many more footsteps and querying voices drawn by the disturbance. Gunnar would, Sven knew, be among them.

  “But, what of it?” She spoke in a light and mocking lilt, and gave a revoltingly girlish giggle. “You got what you’ve always most dearly wanted.”

  Sven looked up again, disbelieving.

  Her smile was grave-cold as she slipped through the gap at the back of the tent, leaving him with only her final words as the front flap was pulled open.

  “All a man has forever is his reputation.”

  THE MOTTLED BEAR