The Golden Wolf

by Linnea Hartsuyker

  * * *

  All of Harald’s forces feasted well that night, devouring the last of Thorstein’s stores, as well as a few old heifers that Thorstein claimed no longer gave good milk. The meat was tough but welcome after too long eating only salt fish and hard rye bread.

  Ivar and Einar stood on the dim beach with the rest of their small crew, both already armored for the long night and day ahead. Ragnvald wanted to talk with Ivar alone, so he sent Einar off to find out how many would be crewing the other ships.

  “My son, this is a needless risk,” Ragnvald said.

  Ivar gave him a confused look. “What kind of king do you want me to be?” he said. “You would have me let Einar go and face danger without me while I cling to your skirts?”

  Ragnvald tensed at the insult—Ivar should not imply that any man was really a woman, not unless he wanted to die in a duel. He opened his mouth to scold him but instead simply said, “You are my heir, and my first true-born son. You must survive.”

  “Then you should go in my stead,” said Ivar. When Ragnvald did not reply, he added, “Why won’t you? Halfdan says it is because you value your life too highly. Now that skalds sing songs saying you have risked your life for Harald and his dream, you no longer need to.”

  Ragnvald grew hot with anger, but clenched his fists and willed it aside. It was not cowardice that kept him from the bait ships; he needed to survive to secure Ivar’s inheritance. He drew breath to speak, but before he could, Ivar said, more quietly, “They sing no songs of me, Father.”

  “Fight well on land, and they will,” Ragnvald replied. “You have a long life to have songs made about you. This is too dangerous.”

  Ivar tucked in a strap on his flank. “You made me fight without my brother once and I was captured. I will not break my oath again, and neither will he.”

  “Then he should have asked you before volunteering for this,” said Ragnvald.

  “His plan is good, and he is brave,” said Ivar. “Why do you not love Einar as you should a son? He would not tell me what he has done to anger you, only that he deserved your anger. But he is your son too, and you should forgive him.”

  “I have,” said Ragnvald. He was surprised that Ivar did not know of the affair between Einar and Gyda. Surely Einar, who shared everything with his brother, would have told him that. But no, he had kept his promise and that secret. He took a deep breath. “Before you were born I swore to your mother, Hilda, that I would never put another woman’s sons ahead of you, and I have not. I never break an oath.”

  “But you made Einar and I break ours when you separated us, Father,” said Ivar. “I am going with my brother, who has always protected me and never tried to hold me back, and when we have our victory, I will demand a gift from Harald: to elevate Einar so he and I are equal. North Maer and South Maer were once separate districts, and can be again. We will rule side by side, and it will not be your doing, and Mother cannot blame you.”

  Ragnvald’s chest felt tight. Ivar could inspire men to follow him, but he was not wise enough to rule without Einar by his side—his behavior in Skane had shown that. Ragnvald had always wished to have as close a companion as Einar and Ivar were to one another, but he had lost Oddi through his ambition, and Harald’s kingship had always stood between them. “Your love for your brother does you credit,” he said thickly. “We will discuss this when you return. Please take care to keep yourself safe.”

  “I will take care of my brother,” said Ivar, “and he will take care of me.”

  * * *

  Ragnvald crouched down in the high grass of the plain that led down to the Bay of Scapa. Sigurd was somewhere to his left, and Harald to his right. Nearly three hundred of Harald’s other warriors hid in the grass around him. Ragnvald worried that the absence of the birds that usually fed on the wild grains here would give them away.

  He had slept poorly the night before, imagining all the ways that a battle could go wrong, and now, waiting in the grass, he could not stop running through his conversation with Ivar. He was still angry that Ivar had questioned his bravery for not wanting to crew one of the bait ships himself. Ragnvald had a kingdom that depended on him, and could not risk himself like that. Ivar should not either.

  As to this idea that Ragnvald should divide Maer between Ivar and Einar, it was pure foolishness. Hilda was already angry with him for allowing Rolli’s brief outlawry, and would be even more angry if Rolli did not come to Orkney. He would not compound it by setting up Ivar and Einar as brother kings.

  Somewhere below, three ships—Einar and Ivar’s, Halfdan’s, and another crewed by a captain from Halogaland—were leading the attackers on a chase. They planned to sail as though they were trying to escape the Orkney Islands toward the Scottish mainland, then allow themselves to be blocked, and flee to the Bay of Scapa. No matter what the enemy suspected, they should give chase.

  The knees of Ragnvald’s trousers were wet through from kneeling on the ground, and he would be stiff when he stood. How long had it been since he had fought in a true battle? Long enough that he feared his damaged hands and aging muscles would not be a match for a young opponent.

  Mist clung to the field where Ragnvald hid. Dawn turned into day with a slow brightening of the sky and air. Finally, after Ragnvald had begun to worry that the trap had failed, the scouts whistled their signals, and he readied himself to charge with the first wave of warriors.

  Between stalks of grass, he saw that Halfdan’s ship had beached, along with six other ships belonging to their enemies, crowding the small landing. Halfdan’s stature made him easy to pick out as he raced up the hill, leading a crowd of warriors behind him: some his own, identifiable by their clean new armor, and others—the enemy, in salt-stained armor that showed years of wear.

  Ragnvald, Harald, and Sigurd led their forces down to meet the attackers. They could not form a shield wall without crushing Halfdan and his followers between the two groups, so the battle quickly turned into a melee. Ragnvald advanced toward the most expensively armored of the enemy fighters—the leaders of the battle. Kill them and the rest might lay down their weapons.

  He fought through a few lesser warriors armed only with small axes, whose armor did not protect them from his Frankish sword, before reaching the center of the fighting, where the tallest and ablest warriors crashed against one another.

  For a moment Ragnvald thought he saw Einar among the enemy. A strange vision, and it could not be true. If Einar was here, it was only because he and his ship had landed and drew more of their enemy behind them.

  Another young man attacked Ragnvald with a ferocity that made it hard for him to hold his shield. Each blow made Ragnvald’s hands tingle, and he dreaded a return of the weakness that had plagued them since Solvi’s torture.

  Ragnvald was growing short of breath, with his grip slipping on his sword, when something wet thudded against the side of his opponent’s helmet, splattering blood over his sparse beard. Ragnvald took advantage of the distraction and smashed the boy under the chin with the splintered edge of his shield. As he reeled back, Ragnvald lunged forward and slashed his throat open.

  Then he saw Einar again, with his golden hair and beard, his angular face, dealing a blow to Harald’s son Dagfinn. Had Dagfinn joined Halfdan’s rebellion, midbattle, or had Einar changed sides?

  Ragnvald fought his way toward the two of them, but when he drew closer he saw something alien in the movements of Dagfinn’s opponent. His face was a little longer than Einar’s, and fuller as well. This was Ragnvald’s stepbrother Hallbjorn, the son of Vigdis and Ragnvald’s stepfather, Olaf, whom Ragnvald had killed more than twenty years ago. And he was getting the better of Dagfinn, who was bleeding from two gashes on his forearms that had laid the flesh open to the bone.

  Ragnvald maneuvered in beside Dagfinn, who fell back, letting Ragnvald advance on Hallbjorn.

  “I always knew we would face one another, stepbrother,” said Hallbjorn. “My mother will be glad when I kill you. She has bee
n trying to get me to do it since I was a boy.”

  Ragnvald was too out of breath to reply. He tasted blood in his throat from his exertion.

  Hallbjorn lunged at him. Ragnvald could not raise his shield in time so he had to block the blow with his sword; the force of Hallbjorn’s strike made his fingers spasm in pain. His sword fell from his hand. All he had to defend himself now was his rapidly fraying shield.

  Suddenly Sigurd appeared, fighting Hallbjorn back. Hallbjorn looked suddenly frightened. “Brother!” he said to Sigurd. “Do not kill me.”

  Ragnvald picked up his sword as Sigurd glanced back at him. In that moment, Hallbjorn lunged again, ripping a long slash through Sigurd’s forearm. Sigurd yelled in pain. “Will you kill your brother?” he asked Hallbjorn.

  Hallbjorn did not answer, only attacked again. As Sigurd fell back, Ragnvald scrambled forward and blocked Hallbjorn’s blow with his shield. Hallbjorn’s sword snagged in the last of the wood still attached to the shield boss, while Ragnvald hurled it toward the ground so the momentum carried Hallbjorn down onto one knee.

  Hallbjorn tried to push himself up to standing again, but before he could, Ragnvald brought his sword down on the back of Hallbjorn’s neck. A lucky blow—Ragnvald’s sword sliced between the neck bones, parting Hallbjorn’s head from his body. It rolled onto the ground and stared up at him, looking sickeningly like Einar’s again, an omen that was too frightening to dwell upon. Ragnvald looked down the slope toward the bay where ships now crowded the harbor. He could not see the other bait ships, and Einar and Ivar had not appeared in the battle.

  “Brother,” said Sigurd. Ragnvald looked up at him—he had now killed Sigurd’s half-brother, as well as his father many years ago. “I think he would have killed me, and I couldn’t move.”

  “I’m sorry for it,” said Ragnvald. “I always thought better of him.”

  “Me too,” said Sigurd.

  Ragnvald glanced down at the head again. Its face, now blue and bloodless, still looked like Einar’s. Hallbjorn had been Ragnvald’s stepbrother, and at least deserved a warrior’s burial.

  The battle had begun to subside, with Harald’s forces victorious. Some pairs and trios still fought, but many of the attackers were retreating back toward their ships. Harald and some of his warriors gave chase. Ragnvald was glad to let them go. He had never been in a battle more taxing. Only fate had kept Odin Alfather from marking Ragnvald for death this time.

  Some healers had already begun to drag the wounded off the field. Ragnvald made his way toward them. That task would suit him. He still had the slow, plodding strength of an old man, but he hoped he would never have to face a true battle again. If he and Oddi were still friends, Oddi would laugh at him for his grim thoughts after a battle where he had been successful. But Oddi had left him long ago, and Ragnvald had seen a vision of his own son dead on his blade. And he had, in truth, killed Vigdis’s son. Even if Sigurd forgave him, Vigdis would find a way to revenge herself for that, Ragnvald feared.

  32

  The sky was the dark blue of a late spring midnight, and down at the bay, shadowed by the high cliffs, men’s faces took on the same hue. Einar tightened one of the straps on Ivar’s wrist-guards, and checked the other. Halfdan’s men started to push his ship off the beach. Einar and Ivar would go next, followed by the third, crewed by some Halogaland men Einar knew less well.

  Ivar touched his wrists, checking the fit. “I told Father I would ask Harald to make you king of South Maer, and me king of North Maer,” he said.

  Einar’s eyes burned with sudden tears. He did not deserve a brother like Ivar, who hated any honor they could not share. “And what did he say?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I don’t remember,” said Ivar.

  “He could not have been pleased.”

  “I don’t care,” said Ivar. “You deserve this.”

  Einar only smiled, and then it was time to depart. He steered their ship to follow Halfdan’s out into the bay. As he had hoped, as soon as the sun rose after midnight, the raiders sighted them and gave chase. None of the bait ships carried enough men to work the oars, which Einar hoped would not give away the game. At least their lightness meant they moved quickly when the sun climbed higher and the day’s breezes strengthened.

  It was just before breakfast time, or so Einar’s growling stomach told him, when a rainstorm swept across the water, alternating mist and squalls. Halfdan’s ship fled onto the beach at the Bay of Scapa, and six of the enemy ships followed. The warriors who disembarked quickly fell to fighting with Harald’s forces, who charged down from the grassy hill.

  Another of the ships descended on the Halogaland ship and used lines to draw the two together into a fighting platform. The attackers were more heavily crewed, and Einar feared they would slaughter all of the Halogaland men. Then a gust of wind knocked the attacking ship around, spinning it out into a channel where another gust smashed the two ships against a cliff.

  They rebounded from it, but as the current pushed them out between the two islands the attacking ship’s starboard side dipped under the surface and then the Halogaland ship began going down by the stern.

  “We should help them,” Ivar called out from the prow.

  “We have to finish this,” Einar replied. They still had to draw their pursuers onto shore. The winds were tricky here between the islands, and Einar needed all of his attention on the steering oar, and all of the men on the lines, to keep the ship from crashing into the cliffs.

  He made a few runs at the shore, only to be turned away by gusts and downdrafts. His pursuers had better luck, and landed, so Einar decided to try to rescue some of their fellows after all. Landing against this current would require a far better sailor than he was—the fates must want him to go to their aid. He ordered the men on the lines to swing the sail around to help take them closer to the foundering ships.

  The attacking forces had managed to loose their ship from the Halogaland ship, and were bailing and rowing at the same time. They made the narrow shore below the cliff just as their efforts began to fail. As soon as the men jumped out onto the strip of pebbles, they engaged with more of Harald’s warriors. Good, that would make the rescue go more smoothly.

  Ivar ordered his men to pull survivors from the sinking ship on board. Einar could spare an arm to help a few times, but mostly he held the steering oar to keep the ship from being dashed on the rocks or flung against the other ship in this narrow strait.

  His attention was so concentrated on those tasks that he did not see another ship approaching until a rock hit his shoulder, hard enough to make his hand slip from the steering oar for a moment. His teeth banged together and he had to shake his head to clear it.

  He glanced behind him to see the ship upon them, its prow close enough that within a moment they would collide and the steering oar would be crushed between them. Einar hauled up the giant board with an effort that felt as though it would tear his shoulders out of their sockets. Raised to lie alongside the ship, it might not be torn loose in the fighting. But now he could not control the ship at all.

  The warriors from the attacking ship flung hooks across—the captain was willing to risk it, even in these treacherous currents. Einar ripped his ax from where it was strapped on his back and began hacking at the lines as they landed. But too soon a tide of men poured after them and Einar could not stop them.

  He transferred his ax to his left hand and drew his sword with his right. A man with a battered leather helmet attacked him. Einar had the longer reach, and was able to land a killing blow on his neck before he could strike. Einar pushed the body toward the boarding sailors so they would have to deal with that dead weight for a moment while he caught his breath.

  A shadow crossed the ship as it drew under the looming cliffs. Einar braced for impact, but the current caught the linked ships as it had the two before and began carrying them out into the broader, deeper waters of the bay.

  Einar had no time to notice anything else for, in
a moment, more men were upon him. He fought back wildly. Someone cut his arm and he did not notice it until his hand grew cool and itchy from blood drying upon it. He did not know if he killed his attackers or if they only fell away from the ferocity of his attack.

  During a moment of respite, he saw Ivar fighting at the prow. Ivar looked desperate, beset by three men, hardly able to move. A tide of red flooded Einar’s vision, Odin’s battle madness, which made men invulnerable when it touched them.

  He cut through the warriors surrounding him, swinging with ax and sword, with a strength that felt like it did not belong to him. He swung his ax so hard it became stuck in the head of one of his opponents, so he left it there and drew his dagger instead. Warriors parted before him, fear in their eyes, until Einar reached the prow where Ivar still fought.

  Now Einar recognized one of Ivar’s attackers—he looked very like King Heming of Halogaland, so this must be his brother, the outlaw Geirbjorn Hakonsson. Ivar fought hard against him, better than Einar had ever seen, but his attention wavered when he saw Einar approaching, and in that moment Geirbjorn struck, a wild blow that nearly severed Ivar’s neck. His eyes went wide and he collapsed backward into the water.

  A part of Einar felt the blow as though it had been aimed against him, choking him on steel, killing him and Ivar in the same moment, but Odin’s red tide still moved his limbs. He rushed toward Geirbjorn and slashed him across the throat, not caring that Geirbjorn’s sword could reach him too. Let Geirbjorn kill him, as long as Ivar could be avenged. He did not see the blow Geirbjorn landed as he died, only felt a searing pain rip through his cheek and eye. He lashed out unseeing. His sword encountered nothing but air, and he too fell.

  * * *

  As Svanhild approached the Orkney Islands, a fine soaking rain began to fall, so she was nearly under one of the cliffs before she could see anything of them besides vast dark shapes in the mist. She heard the sounds of battle, but the hiss of the rain distorted it, and when she sailed toward the noises, she only found another cliff that must have been reflecting the sound from some other place.