A Companion to Wolves

by Elizabeth Bear

  Othwulf snorted laughter. “Does he like it?”

  A shrug, as they drew up beside the wolves. “He wouldn’t know,” Isolfr answered, as dryly as he dared. “And Hrolleif would have his balls if he tried. Theirs is a closer than usual partnership, or so I am told.”

  “Aye, they’re shield-brothers as well as wolfheofodmenn,” Othwulf said, crouching beside Vikingr where the big wolf sprawled on the flags, soaking up the thin springtime sun. “It’s not unheard of, and makes a strong pack when it works. There’s other options, you know, for all a wolfcarl cannot marry.” He regarded Isolfr steadily, and Isolfr knew that Othwulf had seen through him as if he had no more substance than the scraped membrane of a sheep’s gut. “Widow-women are grateful for a strong protector, a strong provider, and they say men who know wolves are more gentle than those who do not.”

  Isolfr snorted mirthlessly, remembering Hjordis soft and willing in his arms. “And do they ask why that is, Othwulf?”

  “Not in my experience. Nor do they wish to know what pertains when a man returns to the wolfheall and his brothers there. But women—it’s good to remember women, Isolfr, although not many a warrior will say it. It reminds us why we fight. And there are not so many women in a wolfheall as for that. And there are other things—if the blood runs strong, it’s a shame to spill it unbred. I’ve two sons of my own. The younger, I’ll wager, will be a wolfcarl himself.” Othwulf smiled, rising and crossing his arms. “Maybe even one like you.”

  Isolfr stepped back, wishing Viradechtis were beside him. “How can I shift him?” he asked plainly, hoping for some spark of knowledge in Othwulf’s eyes, but Othwulf shrugged and spread his hands.

  “Scare him,” Othwulf said. “And show him that you are no less a man for what you have become.”

  Before Isolfr could speak, the doors of the wolfheall swung open, and twenty-two wolfheofodmenn emerged. Every one of them looked grim. But the pack-sense carried determination as well and the resolve that came with having settled on a course of action. One that, looking at their faces, Isolfr thought they half-knew was doomed, though it would be glorious in song. He knew what the answer was before Grimolfr raised his voice to announce it.

  With summer, they would take the war to the trolls.

  Somehow, Isolfr had to earn his father’s forgiveness before then.

  He thought about it that night, lying wakeful and cramp-limbed among fur and flesh and the dense heat of the sleeping pack. Thought about his father’s pride and his mother’s solemn patience, thought about the specter of Othwulf-who-had-been-Sturla that had hung, without his knowing it, over his childhood. Thought about his brother Jonak, now his father’s heir, and wondered if his own shadow was lying cold across Jonak’s shoulders.

  He rose as soon as there was light enough to see. Bathed and dressed and braided his hair carefully, and with Viradechtis padding at his heels, slipped out of the compound. No one saw him leave, and even if they had, they would only have assumed he was going hunting.

  He supposed, with bitter humor, that they would not have been entirely wrong.

  Viradechtis liked the village and was happy to go there, but he didn’t feel the sharp force of her interest until they were starting up toward the keep. They passed by the cottage that Hjordis shared with her sister and brother-in-law, and Viradechtis was disappointed; he promised her a visit on the return. But the keep renewed her excitement.

  Here she had not been—here, as a pup, she had in fact been forbidden to go—and although she had always been sensible about the matter, her curiosity was wide-awake and eager. Her enthusiasm eased some of Isolfr’s own apprehension, and he reminded himself that no matter what his father might say, he, Isolfr, was a man of the werthreat and, moreover, had sixteen stone of trellwolf to guard him. After all, he said to himself, as they rounded the last curve of the switchback, he has already refused his help to the wolfheall. There is nothing you can lose.

  The scrawny young armsman on guard at the gate did not know what to make of him, and was hard pressed to keep his gaze on Isolfr’s face instead of on Viradechtis, standing in the sunlight with her tail waving good-humoredly, clearly capable of eating the armsman in two bites if she felt like it.

  “Tell Lord Gunnarr that Isolfr Viradechtisbrother wishes to speak with him,” Isolfr said and watched, carefully not smiling, as the boy’s eyes widened and he squeaked, “Yes, sir!” and bolted.

  “Come, sister,” Isolfr said to Viradechtis, and they stepped together into the courtyard of the keep.

  It was much as Isolfr remembered it, clean and orderly, the walls gleaming with whitewash and the cobbles swept clear. Viradechtis leaned against him, interested in what she saw and smelled, a little puzzled by his thoughts. He gave her a memory of the birthing-box she had spent her first few months of life in, and she tilted her head, bumping up into his armpit, and thought of puppies playing catch-me across these clean, clean cobbles.

  Isolfr was smiling at the thought when someone said, from the main door to the keep, “Njall?”

  He turned and for a moment had no idea who the girl was. But he saw Halfrid in her face, and said, “Kathlin?”

  “It is you!” She came down the steps, her blue eyes very wide. “Is this your wolf?”

  “This is my sister, Viradechtis,” Isolfr said. “Viradechtis, this is my sister Kathlin. And I’m Isolfr now, sister.”

  “Oh.” Her dismay was plain. “I forgot.”

  “It does no harm,” he said smiling. “You’re lucky I remember your name at all.”

  “You didn’t come,” she said, and he heard all her hurt piled up in her voice. “You said you’d come, Nja—Isolfr.”

  “I am here now,” he answered, without looking down. “And if Father will permit it, I may come again.”

  She bit her lip and glanced down at Viradechtis, in patent avoidance. “Will she … may we clasp hands?”

  “I would hope you might have a hug for your brother,” Isolfr said, and she blushed and sidled close enough to hug him hesitantly.

  “I have missed you,” she said, as shyly as if she spoke to a stranger. Isolfr was not sure who he hated more at that moment, his father for forbidding him the keep or himself for making no effort at reconciliation.

  “Would you like to pet Viradechtis?” he offered. “She’ll love you forever if you scratch her ears.”

  “Oh, may I?” Sincere delight, and he nodded. “Give her your scent first, as you would with a dog.”

  She did, and Viradechtis snuffled her hand, licked her fingers—sausage she said happily to Isolfr—and ducked her head invitingly. Kathlin took the invitation, and smiled blindingly when Viradechtis’ tail began to wave back and forth.

  “I’m glad you have her,” Kathlin said. “I worried about you, when you went and Father was so—”

  “Kathlin! Get away from that beast!” It was a roar; Kathlin, Isolfr and Viradechtis all startled and turned. Gunnarr Sturluson stood in the doorway of the keep.

  Kathlin hesitated; Isolfr said, “Please, tell Mother I would speak with her before I leave,” and she gave him a quick, grateful nod and fled.

  Isolfr looked up at his father and was bewildered to find him so small; he was accustomed to think of his father as imposing, stern and knowing as a god, but that had been before he learned to look Grimolfr Skaldsbrother in the face.

  Isolfr wondered how he could not have noticed, that spring day four years ago, that his father was afraid of Vigdis. Afraid, but willing to stand up to her to protect his son.

  Isolfr licked dry lips.

  Viradechtis did not care to be called beast, and she did not care, either, for men who smelled like Isolfr but not as nice. Isolfr caught a twitch, there and gone, of what his father smelled like through Viradechtis’ nose, and was reminded with sudden painful humor of what Ulfmaer had told him his first day as a tithe-boy, and of Hroi’s emphatic agreement.

  He coughed instead of laughing and said, “Father. Greetings. It pleases me to find you well.
”

  “Does it?” Gunnarr growled. “And I suppose you want me to tell you it pleases me to see you in the company of that—”

  “I should warn you, Father, that Viradechtis understands our speech tolerably well.” The blood drained from Gunnarr’s face, but he continued forward, and Isolfr remembered his duty—both the duty of honor he owed his father, and the greater duty he owed the wolfheall—and said, “I do not ask your blessing, Father, only your help.”

  “Help?” For a moment, there was light in Gunnarr’s eyes. “You mean you want to come home?”

  “Help for the wolfheall,” Isolfr said patiently and told Viradechtis that if she moved so much as a paw, he’d put her to hauling firewood all summer long.

  “You’re here on the wolfjarl’s errand,” Gunnarr said, face darkening again. “Is it not enough that he’s made you his wolf-bitch? Must he make you his errand-boy, too?”

  For a moment, the matter hung precariously in the balance. Isolfr’s fists were clenched so tightly he could feel his nails digging into his palms, and Viradechtis was growling, a low oscillation of menace, just barely at the threshold of audibility.

  Gunnarr heard and went up on his toes, too proud to step back; Isolfr heard and reined his temper in. “Father, I will tell you once and tell you truly. Lord Grimolfr does not bed me, nor would wish to. And I come on the business of the wolfheall, not at his bidding. I come to tell you that what Lord Grimolfr told you is true. The trolls are coming south in greater numbers than the oldest man in the wolfheall can remember seeing. The wolfjarls have held Wolfmaegthing, and come summer, they will march north. And I tell you also, Father, if the wolfless men do not march with them, then the Wolfmaegth will die in the mountains and you will have nothing standing between you and the trolls but these beautifully whitewashed walls. And your walls will not save you.”

  He stopped, panting for breath. He had never said so much to his father at one time—had never heard his father let anyone say so much without interruption. And his father was staring at him as if he had never seen Isolfr before.

  Gunnarr said, abruptly, “I must think on’t,” and turned away, disappearing into the keep.

  Isolfr wanted very much to go home; Viradechtis, leaning into him, agreed. He turned toward the gate, and his mother emerged from the shadows of the stables. “Isolfr.”

  “Mother.” He crossed to her; they clasped hands as adults.

  She looked at Viradechtis. “And this is your …”

  “Viradechtis is her name.”

  “A beautiful creature,” said Halfrid, and Viradechtis told Isolfr that she liked this one much better than the unpleasant-smelling man.

  “She thinks well of you, too,” he said to Halfrid.

  “You have found your way to manhood, I think,” she said, touching one of his braids.

  “Maybe,” Isolfr said, and they smiled at each other ruefully. “I remembered what you said about honor. It has helped.”

  “Good,” said Halfrid. “It is little enough a woman can give her sons.”

  Isolfr hesitated. “Will Father—”

  “I will speak to him. Give him a little time.”

  “A little time we have, but not a great deal.”

  “I heard.” Her face was grim. “And I believe you. I … I honor the wolfheallan for the choice they are making, though I fear it.”

  “We all fear, Mother,” Isolfr said, and in some part of his mind was astonished that he was admitting as much to a woman. “But fear doesn’t …” He shook his head helplessly. “It changes nothing.”

  “Yes,” said Halfrid. “So it always is. So it has been with your father. I will speak to him.”

  “If it will help …” He hesitated again. “Othwulf—my uncle Sturla—came to the Wolfmaegthing. I do not know if Father should be told or not.”

  “Not,” Halfrid said calmly, decisively. “You do not want to be raking up old bitternesses, old injuries.” And without the slightest change in tone: “Is he well?”

  “Yes,” Isolfr said and immediately banished forever a question he had been wondering whether or not to ask. “He is well. Happy, I think. He has two sons. His wolfbrother is named Vikingr; he’s bigger than Viradechtis.”

  “Impossible,” said Halfrid, laughing. “And in any event, he cannot be more beautiful.”

  Viradechtis liked this one very much.

  Hjordis was not alone at her spinning wheel when Isolfr came to her home. Her sister, Angrbotha, stood up abruptly, though, and went to stir the fire with only a cursory greeting to the visitor. Isolfr and Viradechtis came to Hjordis, padding across the rammed earth floor, and she held out her hand so he could help her rise. Her expression was a little pinched, as if she worried, and she shook her skirts a little more firmly than usual after he claimed his kiss. She still had a scratch and a cuddle for Viradechtis, though, and he noticed that Angrbotha made herself quickly scarce.

  “What’s wrong, Hjordis?”

  She looked up from the wolf and back down as quickly, her hands never stilling. “I’m with child,” she said, plainly, and stole another quick sideways look as if to judge his mood.

  The words made no sense to him at first, but then Viradechtis whined and nudged him, encouraging him to join the petting, and he blinked himself out of shock. “My child?” he said stupidly.

  Hjordis laughed and straightened. “No, it could be any of a dozen men—yes, your child, Isolfr.” She had her pride. She didn’t give ground or drop her chin. “If you want it.”

  It hung there quivering in the air between them for a moment. She wrapped her arms around herself, raw-boned, ungraceful, strong—a handsome country woman, unpretentious and merry. “Don’t be a fool, wench,” he said, and pulled her roughly into his arms. “Of course I want it.”

  It wasn’t until she relaxed into his embrace that he realized she was shaking. He kissed her forehead, took a breath, and swallowed hard before he said, “But we go to war at the equinox, and I cannot say when I’ll return.”

  She didn’t step back, just took a vast breath and let it out again. “You’ll live to name the babe,” she said against his shoulder. “I demand it.”

  “I will,” he promised, and hoped he did not lie.

  SIX

  Gunnarr Sturluson mustered thirty dozen men by the equinox, and marched them out to meet Grimolfr, Isolfr and the traveling three-fifths of the wolfheall on a day when the sky was slanting fine needles of frozen rain down on the tawny and gray and red and dark heads of warriors and wolves alike. Grimolfr never said a word, but Hrolleif, who had ridden out with them on a stout yellow pony, shot Isolfr a sideways glance. Isolfr kept his face stern, as befit a wolfcarl, but Hrolleif gave his elbow a quick squeeze and Isolfr did not think he had fooled the wolfsprechend.

  Then Hrolleif returned to the wolfheall, because while Vigdis’ pups were old enough for her to travel, the tithe-boys were not of an age to be left without a wolfheofodman to instruct them, and in any case—

  At least a few konigenwolves would have to survive, if things went poorly for the Wolfmaegth, and Vigdis and Hrolleif would be a greater loss to the Wolfmaegth than Viradechtis and Isolfr. Vigdis had fifteen years of litters left in her, and both she and Hrolleif were experienced leaders. Isolfr was painfully aware that his wolf was still little more than a great, gangling pup, and while he was a man, he was a young one and he had not Hrolleif’s canniness.

  Besides, Sokkolfr and Frithulf were traveling with the war party. Gunnarr or not, Grimolfr would have had to chain Isolfr to the wall of the roundhall to keep him in Nithogsfjoll, and everybody knew it.

  Werthreat and wolfless men alike pressed north despite ill weather and cold. They made a wet camp in the lee of a rose-and-gray granite cliff below Ulfenfjoll. Sokkolfr thought the name auspicious, and Frithulf laughed about it, but Isolfr did not miss the way he tucked his bronze medallion inside his shirt. It was a Thorshammer and hung on a knotted rawhide thong around his neck. He’d had it as long as Isolfr could recall.<
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  It was not easy to make fire under those conditions. Ulfgeirr and Sokkolfr finally made shift to keep the rain off with a hide stretched on peeled poles while Skjaldwulf managed flint and tinder. Once one fire was lit, the others were easier; wood could be dried in the heat of the flames to make it burn more adequately.

  Isolfr paced the camp, speaking to no one at first. He nodded to Eyjolfr and Grimolfr, didn’t even attempt to enter the part of the camp claimed by his father’s men, and finally fetched up against the rocks near where the Great Ulfbjorn crouched, checking little Tindr’s paws as if there could possibly be something wrong that his wolf wouldn’t tell him about.

  “And how fare you this night, tithe-brother?”

  Ulfbjorn stood, his teeth flashing through rainy dark. “Wet,” he said, succinctly. “Tindr is asking to hunt. He wants meat with blood in it. Will you join us?”

  Isolfr had to crane his neck back to look Ulfbjorn in the eye. “I’d be honored.”

  They fell into step side by side, the wolves ranging ahead. “I’m glad Tindr chose you,” Isolfr said, after a little while.

  “I’m glad we’re brothers too,” Ulfbjorn replied, which wasn’t what Isolfr had said. But maybe was what he had intended. “How are you—”

  “Oh, Gunnarr?” Isolfr couldn’t quite bring himself to say, my father. He shrugged. “The real entertainment will begin when we reinforce the Wolfmaegth at the base of the mountains and he meets Othwulf. We’ll want a skald along to tell that tale.”

  Ulfbjorn’s laugh was a bass rumble low in his throat, almost a wolf’s mutter. He seemed about to say something further, but just then Tindr howled on the scent of a stag, and they were off through the mud and leaves and the half-melted earth.

  The character of the land changed as they toiled north, and they caught and passed the spring. Despite the cold, Isolfr was grateful; travel was easier over frozen ground, and it kept men huddled close to their fires at night, limiting the opportunity for mischief between wolfcarls and wolfless men. Gunnarr seemed content to ignore his existence, and as Grimolfr looked to Viradechtis to head the pack in her mother’s absence Isolfr was kept almost too busy to worry. They proved more than a match for the few trolls they met, dispatching them with axes and the cross-barred troll-spears wielded by the wolfless men.