by C. R. May
Sturla teased his beard as he thought. ‘Now that the weather has warmed up a bit from the depths of winter, it does look like our night-walker has picked up the scent of death. We call this full moon the Hunger Moon at home but up here it goes by a different name, the folk here call it the Wolf Moon.’ He nodded as he reached his conclusion. ‘He will be back.’
‘Good, the days are lengthening and the seas should be calmer by now; we will float the ships tomorrow and be on our way. That leaves me just tonight to skin the bastard, Wolf Moon or not.’
Erik shifted on the stool and pulled his cloak a little tighter. All was still and calm down in the clearing, and he rocked from arse cheek to arse cheek as he sought to restore the blood flow, cursing himself again that he had not thought to bring one of the furs along to soften the seat. Sat in his hole on the hillside every part of the compound fell under his gaze, and he watched as the burly figure of Thorstein paced the shoreline, the moonlight reflecting dully from helm and spear point as he tramped another lonely circuit. He fought down a yawn and checked the position of his spear once again. The moon was low in the West now, casting the long shadows of the upturned ships away to the East; even at this time of year the dawn must be close.
The large island which they had been forced to call home for the duration of the northern winter was connected to the mainland by a narrow causeway; it was perfect for defence, the monster would have to cross here if he was to make another grab for the body of his friend, and in doing so he would have to move directly across his line of sight. Erik would emerge from cover and cut off the fiend’s retreat as the hue and cry was raised and armed men erupted from the shelters. Whether the ganga stayed to fight or turned to flee mattered little; he would fall to their spears one way or the other.
Erik was about to turn back to face inland when a movement caught his eye, slight, all but unseeable, almost as if the shadows themselves had taken on life. His head spun back around to search out the gloom, but nothing moved save his huskarl pacing his lonely beat. Erik stared hard, but the darkness in the lee of the larger ships was as black as jet itself. Thorstein was approaching the point where he would pass from view as his route took him past the drying frames, out beyond the hogback arcs of the skei to round the eastern end of the island.
Erik stared again: nothing.
He was about to turn away when he realised that a small part of the darkness was denser, more solid than that which surrounded it, and he squinted into the gloom as his mind attempted to make sense of the image his eyes were sending him. Suddenly he had it as the unmistakable outline of a snout hardened from the background, and before he was even aware that he had moved Erik was out of his hollow and running hard. With what little tree cover there had been removed over the winter to feed Norwegian fires the winds had scoured the snow on the hillside to runnels, and soon Erik was on the well beaten track which led down to the crossing place. In a heartbeat he was across, calling out a warning to Thorstein as the spearman became lost from view. Men were beginning to tumble from the doorways as Erik couched his spear and shot between two hulls, crowding in his wake as he burst out into the darkness beyond.
Erik dropped into a fighting stance as he waited for his eyesight to become accustomed to the murkiness, bracing himself to receive the attack he was sure was just moments away. A figure moved towards him and he tensed his muscles for the fight to come, but the flicker of moonlight on steel caused him to stay his thrust, and a moment later a familiar voice hailed him from ahead. ‘I have seen nothing, lord. He has not come past me.’
Erik snapped out a reply. ‘He is here, I saw the outline clearly.’
Dozens of men were pouring through the gaps between the shelters, spreading out across the strand and crowding protectively about their king as they too searched the shadows for the attacker. Erik’s mind swam, the beast was among them, he knew deep in his gut that it was, and a cry from further down the beach brought them all running towards the northern perimeter.
‘Here, lord! It’s here!’
Erik pushed through the crowd and rushed towards the sound, hefting his spear and loosening the peace bands which secured the handle of his short seax within its scabbard as he ran. Within a few paces he was up with the man, and he scanned the shadows for a glimpse of his opponent as the others fanned out along the foreshore.
‘Where?’
‘This must be what you saw, lord,’ the man replied, ‘this old pelt.’ He gave the wolfskin a contemptuous flick with the point of his spear. Erik looked as men began to chuckle and joke in their embarrassment. The skin of a wolf hung balanced on a pole, its lips drawn back into a snarl as it regarded them through the rheumy eyes of the dead.
Something was wrong. His father had told him that no man remained a king for very long if he failed to develop a sense of danger, even while surrounded by lesser men who played the fool and thought it a good way to spend their days sinking their face in ale horns. ‘Back!’ he cried. ‘None of us are wind drying wolf pelts. This is a trick!’
Erik thundered between the whalebacks of the upturned ships, breaking out into the moonlight just as the gangly form leapt clear of the grave. Erik checked his stride as the moonlight played upon the figure for the first time, and the breath caught in his throat as his eyes locked with those of the nátt-ganga. The beast curled its lips back in a snarl, but if the action was intended to make him stand his ground it had the opposite effect. Erik roared with anger and burst into a run, drawing back his arm to hurl his spear with all his might at the inhuman form straddling his old friend’s grave. The spear cut the night air, and Erik’s heart leapt in his chest as he watched it dip towards its target. At the final moment the monster threw itself aside, and Erik watched in anguish as the missile glanced off a rock and disappeared into the gloom. He drew his seax and raced across the clearing hoping to bring his tormentor beneath his blade, but the fiend was already across the causeway and drawing further away with every bound.
Erik drew up at the midpoint of the raised track and watched his enemy go. To his surprise the thing paused at the place where he had spent the night, just long enough to cock a long leg and piss into his old hiding place. Turning back, it cut the chill air with a final snarl and loped away into the darkness.
Thorstein’s voice sounded at his side as they watched him go. ‘It’s a good thing that you swapped poor old Alf for that seal carcass. Who would have thought that a night-walker would be such a crafty bugger?’
19
HALFDAN’S CUNNING
‘Well,’ Ragnar said. ‘We made it back in time for the spring tide, just like I said we would.’
Erik turned and pinned him with a look. ‘Thanks to you.’
The jarl of Halogaland snorted and shot his king a grin. ‘Somehow I think that Erik Bloodaxe would have seen off a king of Finns without my help.’
‘Your modesty does you credit, Ragnar,’ Erik replied. ‘But we both know that’s not what I meant. I was all for pushing on home last autumn, even when the seas were breaking over the wales of the Snekkjur and the rollers were prow beast high. If I had blundered on into the teeth of those storms it would have been both myself and the rest of my army who were guests of Ægir, and not just the old Skipper there.’
The comment caused both men to look out beyond the fire-drake headed prow of the Draki to where the sleek hull of the Fjord-Ulf was edging closer to the centre of the great whirlpool with every moment. The flames were roaring now, the mast a wand of flame as the pair, ship and master, neared the end of their final voyage together.
They had left the place which they had been forced to call home for the winter a few days after the last attack. With the underside of the ships easily accessible the men had used the short daylight hours of the previous months to careen the hulls, removing every trace of the barnacles and other creatures which had made the lower strakes and keels their home over the course of the cruise. Freshly caulked, cleaned and repaired, the ships had quickly put the fjord b
ehind them as they made for the open sea and home.
For once the sea god had been in a benevolent mood and they had made good time. Within the week they were back within the necklace of offshore skerries which gave the country of Norway its name; safe from storms and hurtling southwards in their rejuvenated hulls, the men had watched with renewed interest as the moon had waxed above them. Sturla had told them that this month it was the Crow Moon which would shine in the night sky: the man was popular; knowledgable; a skilled hunter. Erik had been delighted when he had accepted his offer of a place within his personal hird.
The light of the Crow Moon had changed the waters surrounding the Moskstraumen into a steely bowl, with just the darker shapes of the hulls of Erik’s fleet and the saw-toothed ridges of the mainland and islands which ringed the bay to contest the night with the flames. The Fjord-Ulf was gaining speed as they watched, now bow on to the churning waters, and Erik thought back to his conversation with Ragnar, back at the beginning of the campaign. ‘Come up in the spring, lord,’ Ragnar had said then. ‘The Moskstraumen is in full flow then, that’s when Ægir collects his tribute.’ They had not thought then that the tribute would be Skipper Alf and the Fjord-Ulf, the very same pairing they had raced across the surrounding seas on the far-off day. The sea god had turned away their tribute at that time, but Erik was certain that Ægir would be satisfied tonight once he saw who and what had moored alongside his sea floor hall.
A hush fell over the watching men as the bows of the Fjord-Ulf pirouetted on the spot, and the stern scattered an arc of glowing embers as it gyrated through the night sky. Gaining speed as it neared the boiling centre of the Moskstraumen, the wave tops were painted red as the pyre teased out to larboard and the little ship nosed down. A sudden jerk and the waters were cascading over the bow, and Erik watched as the snarling wolf head which he knew so well slipped from the sight of men. Almost vertical now, the flames cleared away just long enough for the awestruck men to catch a glimpse of the body of their old friend surrounded by booty and the trappings of war and then he was gone, the keel slipping beneath the waves as Ægir reached up to embrace his offering.
Erik caught his breath at the potency of the scene which was unfolding before his eyes, and a heartbeat later all that remained on the surface was a pall of smoke and steam. To a man the crews at their benches stared pale faced at the scene as the breeze teased the brume apart, and Erik turned away as Kolbein called the stroke, the rowers bent their backs, and the ship began to pull away.
‘It’s not the welcome we were expecting, that’s for sure.’ Erik followed the points of light from hilltop to hilltop as they winked into life. ‘Surely they must recognise us for who we are, so why are they lighting the warning beacons?’
Thorstein clicked his tongue as he too watched the signal fires begin to smoke. ‘Do you want me to get the men battle ready?’
Erik nodded. ‘Look to it. There is no telling what we are going to find when we arrive at Avaldsnes.’
Anlaf had been conversing with Kolbein as the big man worked the steering oar, and he added a comment as Thorstein began to move down the ship. ‘King Harald could have died or been overthrown while we were away, lord. We have not put in at a town or even stopped to share news with fishermen all the way down the coast. It’s been a long year, and it’s not like we were in the South where traders carry news from port to port with their cargoes.’
It was true Erik thought as the men began to dig into sea chests and slip into mail shirts, they had been out of reach of any news from home since the previous springtime. His father could have died, been overthrown by one of his brothers or even be away from home on some foray or other. He brightened a little at the thought; even in his dotage, King Harald Fairhair was never slow to crush any opposition to his rule. ‘You are right,’ he replied. ‘We should have been more cautious on the way down but what is done is done. I was eager to get home and I made an error of judgement.’ He glanced down at the battle horn which never left Anlaf’s side. ‘Make the signal to the other ships.’ He looked outboard, and despite the uncertainty of the moment Erik thrilled to the sight as the flotilla ploughed the home waters of Karmsund. Even without the Fjord-Ulf and the ships from Halogaland, Romsdal, Moerr and Arinbjorn’s Sea Stallion this was a powerful force of battle hardened warriors, fresh from a stunning victory in the North. Most of the men had been together now for more than two score years, and they knew each other better than they did the members of their own families. He spoke again as the sound of the signal horn began to fade. ‘The king has already named me as his heir. Let us hope that if my father is dead that one or more of my brothers has seen fit to usurp my gift stool,’ he said with a snarl. ‘It will save me the trouble of hunting them down.’
Thorstein returned and held out his king’s brynja, and Erik waggled like a landed fish as he thrust his head and arms inside and the mail shirt slipped down his body with a metallic swish. He looked outboard again as he fixed his baldric back into place. The ships had cleared the strait and were turning into the landing place, the jetties and boathouses of Avaldsnes coming into plain view ahead as sails were shortened, oars run out, and the momentum bled away.
‘Well, there is no shield army there,’ Thorstein said as Erik fixed his helm into place and fumbled with the straps, ‘and that looks like Helgrim Smiter and a few of his lads come down from the hall. They must have recognised us at last. It doesn’t look like we will have to fight our way ashore at least.’
Erik looked as the remaining snekkjur, Okse, Reindyr and Bison moved in to flank the Draki, before twisting to call across his shoulder to his styrisman, confident that the smaller ships would hold their station and steer clear of the wharf. ‘Beach her, Kolbein. The tide is out and I don’t want us to have to clamber up onto the jetties when we are unsure of our welcome.’ He threw his banner man a look as he took up Jomal. ‘Anlaf, make the signal to form a battle line.’
As the notes rang out Erik and Thorstein walked towards the bow, the king raising his voice so that all could hear as he went. ‘A last shield wall and then a night on the ale. Let’s make it a good one!’
The oars were being shipped by the time the pair reached the bows of the long skei, and Thorstein gripped the handle of his shield as he prepared to protect his lord. The big battle axes were two handed weapons, devastating in a confined space, but their defensive qualities were almost non existent the moment that an attacker got within the arc of the swinging blade and it was then the duty of the axeman’s right hand man to step up and counter the threat.
A slight tremble beneath his feet told him that the keel of the Draki had finally come into contact with its home shore after a year away and Erik was over the side, the first man in the army ashore as was right. As he waded the shallows Thorstein came to his side, and a quick glance to left and right told him that what had only moments before been little more than a stony strand devoid of life was now a seething mass of warriors as the ships disgorged the fighters. As the men reached the high water mark the shields came together with a crash, and Erik walked proudly forward as the battle cry thundered out.
‘Blóðøx!’
The leader of King Harald’s guard had left his companions and was walking towards him, and Erik was pleased and a little relieved to see that he was not only alone and unarmed but smiling widely. Thorstein and Anlaf Crow eased away a pace as the man approached, and Erik rested the great haft of his axe on his shoulder as he hailed him. ‘Helgrim Olavsson! This is not the homecoming we expected, warning beacons and deserted strands. What news have you brought us?’
Helgrim’s smile was replaced by a frown. ‘I apologise lord, many things are not as you left them. You father…’ His voice trailed away, and Erik could see the man struggling to find the right words. Finally Helgrim shrugged as he came to realise that there was no easy way to describe the king’s condition. ‘Your father’s mind is addled, lord,’ he said sadly. ‘But we sacrificed to the gods for your safe return,’ the hu
skarl added with a tight smile, ‘and here you are.’
‘How long has he been like this?’
‘Ever since the autumn, lord. As the days grew darker so did his mood, until the black cloud seemed to overwhelm him completely. There was some talk that the jarls should invoke attræðr but your wife Gunnhild set herself against it, arguing that they should await your return as it was well known that you were the king’s declared heir.’ Erik’s eyes widened in surprise at the revelation. If Harald had been declared attræðr he would have reverted to the legal status of a child. It was a necessary safeguard in a society where honour and status were jealousy guarded, where a drunken remark by mad uncle Thorkil at the Thing could spark a feud which would cost the lives of kinsmen yet unborn. But it was not without its dangers, as patriarchal powers waned and sons grew impatient for their inheritance. Erik’s brother the king in the Trondelag would likely have been declared High King, and Erik would have returned to almost certain death. ‘She is one of the few who can get any sense from the king,’ Helgrim added. ‘The bairn probably helps…’ Helgrim winced as Erik looked at him in astonishment, before King Harald’s huskarl cleared his throat. ‘I apologise lord, it was not my place to break the news. You have a son born just after Jule; he is hale and hardy, everybody loves him.’
Erik nodded. ‘There is no tougher fighter than a mother who fears for the life of her child. So all this,’ Erik said with a wave of his hand. ‘Sour faced spearmen and jumpy signallers. With the king ailing and me away and unable to protect my family, you were expecting a visit from Sigurd Jarl and my brother Halfdan the Black?’
‘We didn’t know what to expect lord,’ Helgrim admitted as they began to make their way towards the hall of the king and the ship’s crews began to relax and follow in their wake. ‘The last we heard was that you were raiding in the White Sea, after that,’ he gave a shrug, ‘nothing. We knew that you would be victorious if you could tempt the Finns to take the field against you, but the storms came early last autumn so you could have been lost at sea.’