The Extremely Epic Viking Tale of Yondersaay

by Aoife Lennon-Ritchie

  “Look,” Granny said.

  While Granny and Dani had been standing in the middle of the beach, bewildered, arguing with each other about whether the creatures which had slowly but solidly emerged from the water lapping up on the beach were in fact green or blue, the creatures, the Yondersaay tarantulafish, as large as Mum’s mauve hire car, had slowly and quietly, unfettered and unencumbered, crawled closer.

  And closer.

  And closer.

  “We’ve just been standing here when we should have been running for the hills!” Granny said.

  “And now that they’re right beside us, Granny,” Dani said, “I absolutely see what you mean; they are definitely a bluey shade of greenbottle blue.”

  “With rusty legs.”

  “Hairy rusty legs.”

  “And bright orange underbellies.”

  “Their faces are black, though,” Dani noted.

  “Very black,” Granny said, and Granny and Dani moved closer together.

  “Can they kill you?” Dani asked.

  “Well …” Granny hesitated.

  “Well?” Dani turned and faced her great-great-great-grandmother.

  “Their bites are pretty nasty, I’ve heard. Poisonous,” Granny said. “And they have fangs. But before they even get close enough to bite you, they can sting you with the barbed hairs full of venom that they flick off their bellies with their back legs like poison arrows.”

  “Poison! Venom! And is it lethal?” Dani was getting very worried now.

  “It won’t kill you outright, I don’t think,” Granny explained, “but its effect can be medically significant. When you’re down on the ground writhing in agony, they wrap you up in their silk, bring you back to their underwater burrows, and eat you with those things on their faces.”

  Dani’s voice came out in a high-pitched shriek. “Writhing in agony! Eat you! Medically significant! What the hell does medically significant mean?”

  “I think it means we should get the heckadoodle out of here,” Granny said.

  “At last we agree on something!” said Dani.

  They made to run, but Granny and Dani were completely surrounded. Some of the tarantulafish were already lifting their back legs to pluck poisonous hairs from their bellies, ready to flick them. Granny and Dani could hear sickening clicks coming from the faces of the tarantulafish. The man-eating, venom-flicking, poison-fanged tarantulafish were getting ready to feast on an old woman in her good maroon coat and her good maroon hat with the puffin feathers and a young, red-haired girl in multiple layers of winter clothes.

  The Wooing of Róisínín Rose White

  Mum was having troubles of her own. “Put me down, Brokk the Chiselled and Kind of Heart,” she said. “I have not assented to marry you. You have further wooing to do.”

  “But you will, you will assent, Róisínín Rose White,” he said. “And by the way, you’re beautiful when you’re angry.”

  “I mean it, Brokk. I know you’re intent on this wooing business, but you are coming on a little strong. It’s very kind of you to tell me I’m beautiful, but the compliment loses a lot of its impact when you imprison me against my will. Now please. Put me down.”

  “You won’t run off again?”

  “I won’t run off again, I promise,” Mum said.

  “You’ll let me woo you?”

  “I’ll let you try to woo me,” Mum said.

  Just as Brokk was loosening his grip on Mum, they heard a voice shouting at them. “Hey, you! Let her go!”

  “Another one?” Mum groaned.

  Brokk looked around and saw a man, soaked to the bone, approaching. “I’m very sorry, Róisínín, I can’t really let you go now he’s told me to. I’ll look weak.”

  “I’m the only one here; Aldis has gone to fetch more mead. And I certainly do not think you weak, Brokk the Chiselled and Kind of Heart. You really can let me down,” Mum said.

  “All the same, if you don’t mind,” Brokk said, “I’ll keep hold of you for just a few minutes more. Who knows who heard him shouting like that? It really will not look good for me if I let you down now.”

  Mum sighed and rolled her eyes. “Men!”

  “Who is this dripping person anyway?” Brokk said motioning to the approaching man.

  “I have no idea,” Mum said.

  The man striding up the embankment from the shore was very tired-looking, very wet, and not wearing Viking clothes.

  “What has come over all of you?” he said. “Why are you all dressed like that? Lewis, why are you manhandling my wife? Really. I expected more from you.” At this, Dad looked Lewis MacAvinney, the baker, up and down. “Or should I say, I expected less of you.”

  Brokk and Róisínín looked at each other, puzzled. They did not move.

  Dad waited for a minute, then said again, “Go on. Let go of her!”

  Brokk took a step toward Dad. A big man, Brokk growled fiercely at Dad, who instinctively took a step back.

  “Are you all right, Róisín?” Dad croaked.

  “Róisínín,” Mum said.

  “Róisínín then,” Dad said.

  “I was until you showed up,” Mum said.

  “Oh, you were, were you?” Dad said.

  “Yes. He’s wooing me, but he was about to let me go until you ordered him to. Now he can’t without losing face.”

  Dad looked at Brokk, who shrugged.

  “What are you talking about, Róisín? Come on now. Stop messing around. Get out of the arms of Tarzan here, and let’s go and get a coffee.” Nobody moved. Dad tried again, softer this time. “I’ve had a long night. I’m exhausted, I’m hungry, and I’m wet—I had to wade to shore from a boat. I’m really not in the mood for this!”

  “I’m not going anywhere with you,” Mum said, pleasantly but firmly. “Sorry.”

  “Look, if this is about the fight we had before you left with the children, I’ve already apologized for that. And I’ve come all the way here. That should be enough for you. You can stop punishing me now.”

  “It’s not about that,” Mum said.

  “It’s not?” Dad asked.

  “No, of course not. I don’t know you. I’ve never seen you before. How could it be about … whatever you just said?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! I don’t have to take this nonsense!” Dad said and blustered off. Mum noticed him glancing back to see if she had relented and was following him. She was not. She was still in Brokk’s arms, letting him stroke her hair. Dad stormed straight back up to the two of them and grabbed at Brokk, trying to lever his arm away from Mum. But Brokk’s arm didn’t budge an inch. Dad put both his hands around Brokk’s forearm and pulled. Nothing. Dad walked up Brokk’s leg to his knee, and yanked hard. He was all the way off the ground, almost horizontal, but it didn’t work. Red in the face, Dad climbed down. He spoke to Mum again as if none of it had happened. “If it’s not that, then what’s stopping you?”

  “Even if I were to agree to go for a stroll with you, whoever you are, I can’t. Brokk still has a pretty firm hold on me, as you can see, and he’s not going to let me go just because you say so.”

  “Right,” Dad said and backed up a few feet. He ran at Brokk and barged into him with his shoulder. Brokk barely raised an eyebrow as Dad glanced off his muscles and fell backward onto the ground. Dad tried that one more time with the same effect. “Okay then,” he said midrun, “what can I do?”

  “You can go away,” Mum said.

  “I’m not going away,” Dad said, standing up again and crossing his arms.

  “Or you can meet him in combat,” Mum replied.

  “Meet him in com—what?” Dad said.

  “You know, hand-to-hand or with battle-axes, whatever you decide between the two of you,” Mum explained.

  “I vote battle-axes,” Brokk said.

  “I do love a good battle-ax fight, don’t you?” Mum said.

  “I’m not going into combat wit
h him!” Dad said.

  “Oh!” Brokk and Mum said together.

  “Not much of a catch, is he, Róisínín?” Brokk said to Mum. “Refusing combat in such a cowardly fashion.”

  “I know!” Mum said. “And for a minute there, I sort of thought he was quite attractive, you know, in a puny, pasty sort of way.”

  “Please stop talking about me as though I’m not here. Look at him,” Dad said. Brokk and Róisínín both looked Brokk up and down, nodded, and smiled, “and look at me.” They turned and looked at Dad and shook their heads.

  “I would cleave him verily in two. There is not much doubting it,” Brokk said.

  “It would be murder—and as he says there would be heaving and in-two-ing—and I really don’t want to be responsible for a respected member of the Yondersaay community going down for the rest of his life. It wouldn’t be fair on him,” Dad said.

  “Going down?” Mum asked.

  “To prison,” Dad explained.

  “Oh, he wouldn’t go to prison,” Mum said.

  “He wouldn’t?”

  “Of course not! You challenged him. I saw you. He’d be hailed a hero,” Mum said.

  “Not much of a hero, let’s be honest,” Brokk put in. “He doesn’t seem to be the most threatening of adversaries.” Brokk turned to Dad. “No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “We’re just saying,” Brokk said.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Dad said.

  “In fact,” Mum said, “I couldn’t really get out of marrying him after the heaving in two.”

  “You would be so impressed by my manliness,” Brokk said, puffing out his chest.

  Mum ignored him. “It would be bad form on my part. You know, he goes to all this trouble with the wooing and the combat and the heaving, and I reject him anyway? I’d get a reputation as impossible to please. It would be very bad form.”

  “But if I walk away,” Dad said, “then it looks like I’ve given in, so you’re very unlikely to allow me to woo you.”

  “It wouldn’t look so great,” Mum said. “I mean, why would I marry a coward?”

  So,” Dad said, “if I go away, he’ll let you down, but he’ll be able to woo you and I won’t and you’ll probably marry him. And if I don’t go away, he’ll kill me, and you’ll definitely marry him?”

  “That’s about right.”

  “You see my dilemma?” Dad said.

  “Not really.”

  “What’s not to get?” Dad asked.

  “I still don’t really get your concern,” Mum said. “For a start, who are you? What are you doing here? And, honestly, why are you so interested in me all of a sudden?”

  Dad said nothing for a moment. “You’re my wife,” he said finally.

  “You say I’m your wife; I say I’ve never seen you before. What is your real reason?”

  Dad thought about what Mum had just asked him. He looked into Mum’s eyes and saw no recognition. He was about to speak when he saw that Brokk was looking intently at him.

  “Perhaps I could have a word with you?” Dad said to Mum.

  “I accept,” Mum said.

  Nobody moved.

  “In private,” Dad said.

  Róisínín looked at Brokk; they both shrugged. Brokk held Mum out toward Dad and turned his head away from them. “Go ahead,” he called.

  “This is the best you can do?” Dad asked Brokk.

  “’Fraid so.”

  “No chance you’ll let me take her over—”

  Brokk was already shaking his head. “I’ll count to myself,” he said. “I won’t listen in, I promise. Not much, anyway. I shall count up in prime numbers.”

  “Fine,” Dad said. “Wait. You can do that?”

  “Certainly. It’s not hard.” Brokk started counting quietly to himself. “Two, three, five, seven, eleven, thirteen, seventeen—”

  Alone at last, after a fashion, Dad looked into Mum’s face and said to her, “The first time I saw you, I knew instantly you were my Heart’s True Love. I have felt that love in my heart every single day since that first day. The real reason I’m here, is you.” Dad stood back and took off his coat. “I will do what you ask,” he said.

  “What do you mean?” Mum asked.

  “I will fight Mr. Muscle here,” Dad said.

  “You will?” Mum asked. “Are you certain? You wouldn’t just rather go away while you still can?”

  “I’m certain,” Dad said uncertainly.

  Brokk was whispering to himself, “Four hundred and one, four hundred and nine”

  “Lewis—I mean, Brokk,” Dad said. Brokk stopped counting to himself. “I wish to invite, or rather re-invite because I think I inadvertently did it earlier, you into combat for the hand of Róisín.”

  “Róisínín,” Brokk said.

  “Róisínín, whatever,” Dad said.

  “No,” Brokk said. “Róisínín Rose White!”

  “There’s going to be a combat! Ooh, I love a good combat.” Everyone turned around to see Aldis the Irregular returning with jugs of mead. “Hand to hand or battle-axes? Please say battle-axes.”

  Dani’s Backpack

  “I know what to do,” Dani said over her shoulder to Granny, as the circle of greenbottle-blue tarantulafish tightened around them.

  “I’m all ears,” Granny said.

  “I’m sure there’ll be something in my backpack to help us.” Dani swung her backpack down from her shoulders. “If I shine a torch in their eyes, maybe they’ll be blinded, or if I swing the rope round and round, it will keep them back for a while. And if that doesn’t work, I have my Swiss Army knife. They’d have to be pretty close for that to do any damage though.”

  “All sterling ideas, my dear Dani. However …”

  Dani looked into her backpack. Her face dropped. She lowered her bag, stood up straight, and swivelled to eye Granny. But Granny sensed it coming and quickly shuffled in a circle to keep her back to Dani. Dani took a big step around to face Granny, but Granny was too quick for her; she inched away again.

  Dani grabbed her great-great-great-grandmother by the shoulders and yanked her around, so she could look her in the eye. “Kindly explain!” Dani said to Granny as she raised her open backpack and shoved it under Granny’s nose.

  Granny looked into the backpack.

  “Please tell me my matches and my rope and my Swiss Army knife are underneath all this,” Dani said as she lifted out handfuls of mince pies and sandwiches and sausage rolls.

  “There wasn’t enough space for everything,” Granny said, throwing her hands up. “I made room for the essentials.”

  “And what exactly is essential about mini quiches?” Dani said, her voice starting to get high-pitched again. “You have enough food in here to last us a week! Where did you put everything else?”

  “In the cupboard under the stairs.”

  Furious, Dani grabbed a fistful of sausage rolls, wound her arm around and around like an Olympic shot putter, and said, “What good are they to anyone under the stairs?” as she flung them away from her in a rage.

  Dani immediately noticed a vicious-looking tarantulafish react by snarling and snapping the things on its face. Coiling back on its back legs, it bounded straight for Dani.

  Dani sprang away in terror. Granny caught Dani in her arms. They both stood there with their eyes tightly shut thinking this was it, this was the end.

  “Bloody mini quiches,” Dani mumbled, opening her eyes to see that the bounding tarantulafish was circling the food she had flung. It wasn’t snarling and snapping at Dani or Granny. It was snarling and snapping at another even bigger, bluer tarantulafish. “They’re getting ready to fight each other for the food!”

  “Quick,” Granny said, reaching deep into Dani’s backpack, “throw more!” And Granny and Dani threw handfuls of sausage rolls and mini quiches and ham sandwiches into the circle of tarantulafish. In less than a minute, all the tarantulafish were bu
sy eating or fighting each other over the food.

  Quickly and quietly, Dani and Granny tiptoed between clumps of tarantulafish. As soon as they were clear, they sprinted up the beach, over the dunes, and onto the slope at the bottom of Volcano Mount Violaceous.

  “I think we are being followed,” Granny said as she looked back over her shoulder. She was right; a lone tarantulafish scrambled after them across the beach, hissing and baring its fangs. It was nimble … and fast.

  “Quick, in here!” Dani said as she dove into a cave opening behind a large shrubbery.

  Granny dove in after her. “Let’s hope they don’t have good eyesight,” Granny said. Dani and Granny sat as quietly as they could in the mouth of the cave. They saw the tarantulafish’s legs before they saw its head. It was creeping quickly but silently over the top of the sand dune. Its slow movements were purposeful and elegant. It reached one leg languidly out and rested it down before stretching out another slim leg. The tarantulafish cast about in all directions, lowering its head slowly, and dreamily raising it up again.

  “He seems to be following a scent,” Dani gasped and watched as the tarantulafish effortlessly picked up speed again. “Maybe he’s picked up Hamish’s scent. Thanks goodness he’s a butcher. He reeks of meat.”

  “Oh, no. Hamish has Ruairi!” Granny said.

  The tarantulafish picked its way over the boulders and rocks at the base of the volcano and began a languorous climb.

  “It’s going up the mountain!” Granny said. “In that case, I have an idea. When Eoin Lerwick and I were little, we used to spend a lot of time in these caves.” Granny turned around and squinted into the cave. “This one leads right to the top of the mountain.”

  “Are you sure, Granny? We don’t have time to make mistakes. Rarelief said that Ruairi would be sacrificed at sundown. That must be only an hour or two away.”

  “I’m sure, I remember. And the firemen often do their drills in this cave. Come on. Let’s go.” Granny walked forward into the cave.

  “You know, my rope would have come in very handy around about now. We could have tied one end to the shrubbery and unrolled it as we walked so we could always find our way back.” Dani thought for a minute. “I suppose we could drop bits of food every few minutes.”