Obsidian

by Suzie Wilde

  ‘You’re in a good mood cos you’re going on an old boat,’ he said.

  She cuffed him, laughing, and they made their way to the narrow cleft where Faelan waited. Rakki leaped aboard. Bera ignored Faelan’s hand, stepped down into the boat and took an oar.

  ‘You might want to rest,’ he said. ‘Rowing’s hard on the stomach.’

  ‘I’ve rowed bigger boats than this, alone,’ she said, though she hadn’t had a baby then.

  Heggi slid in beside her and took the other oar. ‘Faelan calls this boat a vole.’

  ‘A yole,’ said Faelan.

  ‘Faelan can swim and everything.’

  ‘We all can here,’ said Faelan. ‘There’s a hot spring nearby. I’ll show you.’

  Bera liked that he deflected admiration. She gave Heggi the stroke and they backed up, then turned. The water thrummed under the hull and she felt it in her skin, with another skin pressed against her. She was held by a swimmer beneath her and she let go, drifting, even though it was not her husband but Faelan. With a guilty start, Bera stopped her too-vivid dream and concentrated on rowing. It struck her how in tune she and Heggi were. He really was growing. Then she simply let the smells of the sea and the song of a boat, even one as ill-found as this, welcome her home. The time of being landlocked was over.

  Rakki leaped ashore, barking, scaring off the gulls and carrion birds that flew up in a billow. Demented by new smells, he darted and lunged at the whale’s head. Bera left the dog’s mind to its frenzy and walked to the other end, where a whale calf was trapped at the point of birth. She touched her beads. There would be no other baby, for her. She would make sure of it.

  ‘Look for some driftwood,’ she said to Heggi. ‘And take Rakki with you.’

  ‘There’s usually some over there,’ shouted Faelan.

  Heggi saluted and vanished over a line of black rock.

  ‘Let’s unload the tools.’

  ‘Wait,’ said Bera. She placed a hand on the whale, feeling a huge sadness. ‘I’m going to do what I should have done a long time ago to a narwhale.’

  Faelan came and stood at the whale’s head, which pleased her. His respect freed her to behave like a Valla and Bera began to sing as she moved right up to the whale’s unblinking eye. Its amber glaze was like one of her beads. She sensed a similar ancient wisdom even in death, like the old lore of iron; deep magic.

  Amber, next to the black, keeping you from its harm.

  ‘I thought my skills were gone but the deep magic is rousing some new power within me.’

  Then softly blow on it to make it catch light, sweetheart.

  Faelan touched her hand. ‘Thank you, Bera. We have forgotten to be grateful on Ice Island.’

  They fetched his tools from the boat.

  ‘We hardly ever saw a beached whale where I grew up,’ Bera said.

  ‘These ropes are made from walrus hide,’ said Faelan.

  She tugged it and smiled. ‘My father always used them on his best boats.’

  ‘This jerkin is walrus skin too,’ he said. ‘It’s weighty, but the sharp flensing knives could cut your chest open.’

  He pulled out shoes with nails driven through the soles and then some large hooks.

  ‘What are these for?’ Bera tried to pick one up and dropped it.

  ‘Careful! That’ll take your foot off. It’s a flensing hook.’

  ‘It’s so heavy! What is flensing?’

  ‘Stripping the flesh off,’ he said.

  Some children arrived, running ahead of folk with carts. Faelan said they would come from all over for the first stranded whale. There weren’t that many but it was still more children than Bera had seen for a long time. It made her feel unnatural to have just vowed never to have more.

  ‘Monster! Monster!’ yelled the boys.

  She flinched and Faelan was quickly at her side.

  ‘Ignore them,’ he said gently.

  ‘You know what they say about… the twin?’

  He nodded. ‘Folk always want to frighten each other. There was nothing, Bera, trust me. No monster, just a lot of blood.’

  ‘I owe you,’ she said. It didn’t feel so bad this time.

  More carts appeared. The faces of these older folk were weather-beaten and stern. A few men were on sturdy horses.

  ‘Are they settlers, like us?’

  ‘Long time ago,’ Faelan said. ‘There won’t be any trouble now plenty’s coming. This stranding’s early but just out there is a crossing of the whale roads, where they meet and mate. Sometimes we get nine, ten or more in the breeding season.’

  He left her to beckon carts up above the tideline. No thrall would ride a horse, so were they on a level with Faelan, who also rode? Bera tried to work out the grades of standing here. How would her folk look with no horses at all? How could she be a leader without being able to ride? Perhaps she could learn, if Faelan taught her.

  Bera felt how that first lesson would be, with his lithe body behind her, making sure she was safe. And she would be, because she would bond with the mare. She would feel Miska’s mind as one with hers so they could ride faster and faster and it would be like sailing on land.

  Her skern tickled her ear. You’ve no idea, have you?

  ‘I’ll find out.’

  Bera checked the mountaintop.

  No smoke, so stop looking. You make me nervous.

  Faelan joined in the joshing and laughter while folk got ready. Bera wanted to make sure the fellowship lasted and mark out her role, so she called them over to the whale.

  ‘Let’s stand shoulder to shoulder as one to work for the good of us all. And so we can reckon the length of our whale.’

  They were just enough, with all the children, to range its length with linked arms.

  Faelan reckoned it as forty ells. ‘Good idea of Bera’s. Now, let’s get to work.’

  It was all new to Bera but for them it was a practised skill. Men coiled ropes precisely then threw them over the body. Faelan told her that these would anchor the whole carcass so that they could safely work and then turn it over once one side was processed.

  ‘Heggi’s too close, look at him!’

  ‘They haven’t started cutting yet.’

  ‘I don’t want him near them.’

  Bera could not describe the revulsion she felt at Heggi being close to blood. Was it the horror of him seeing Thorvald, his guardian, cut down? Or was it the worry that he might turn out like the man who had done it? His own father. Perhaps Heggi would feel stirrings here, like she had, from the whale; except his would be blood speaking to blood.

  ‘I’m going over there now,’ said Faelan. ‘I’ll keep him out of danger.’

  If only it was that easy.

  Three of the team used ropes to haul themselves up onto the whale’s back, wearing the special nailed shoes for purchase. Two of them clung on with one hand and cut slits along the length of the body while another climbed on top of the whale to cut there. It was perilous work. She was glad Heggi was safely on the ground, setting up winches with Faelan. Men pulled off two huge strips of blubber, which crackled like dry kindling in a fire. The smell was intense. Each long strip was torn with the large flensing hooks and cut into blocks. The carcass was rolled over and a third and fourth strip of blubber was pulled off. Women cut the large blocks into pieces that were taken up to the carts. Bera grabbed Heggi and they helped stack the blubber, keeping busy all day, cutting, dragging, stowing, sluicing, piling.

  When the sun was lower, Heggi came over to her cart.

  ‘Do we need more driftwood?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. We won’t finish before night.’

  ‘There’s quite a lot in the next bay. Can I take one of the bigger carts to fetch it?’

  Bera had a suspicion, confirmed when she saw his face. He would start a careless whistle next.

  ‘I know you, boykin, and don’t think I haven’t seen you fussing around those horses.’

  ‘I bet I could ride if I wanted, like Faelan!’ />
  ‘He’s been riding his whole life.’

  ‘Miska likes me.’

  ‘You’d go too fast and break your neck, even on Miska. Take one of the push-carts.’

  Heggi walked over to where Ginna was deep in blubber. Bera supposed he wanted to show off his riding skills to her.

  ‘Leave Ginna to do her own work,’ she called after him. ‘Rakki’s eating the blubber, look. Take him with you!’

  She caught the eye of a woman, who smiled. ‘He’s at that age,’ she said. ‘Are we rendering the oil at Faelan’s farm, as usual?’

  Bera was flustered. ‘I’m not his kin – I mean, I’m his neighbour. Let’s finish loading the carts, then I shall ask.’

  By the time they stopped, Faelan was working the new flank. The whale-men were swapping shoes with his team. They were as bonded by death as any war fleet; bathed in dark red blood, dried black on their faces. The smell was thick and they crawled with flies. The resting team staggered over to the flagons and poured Faelan’s thin ale down their throats.

  So it went on: turn and cut, winch and drag, flense and chop until, at last, the whale was unpeeled. Bera looked west, to where the sun was an orange ball amongst purple clouds. When Faelan finished his shift she suggested they walk together to the shallows. They sank down onto the shingle, washed their sticky hands and scooped water onto their faces. Bera dried hers with a cloth.

  ‘We won’t be able to work much longer,’ he said.

  He used her cloth on his own face. She liked how clean it was, without a beard to catch the dirt.

  Bera looked out to the darkening sea. ‘When I was young, folk used to say they could walk across the Ice-Rimmed Sea on the backs of fish.’

  ‘Not so many round the shore here, ever since…’

  ‘Since I lost the twin. They sense that the world is out of kilter.’

  ‘It’s been worse in the past,’ he said. ‘And will be again.’

  She nodded. ‘I don’t think it’s yet – but I have to find the remedy.’

  ‘Ask my mother,’ he said. ‘Whatever it is, I’ll help you.’

  ‘I already owe you too much.’

  ‘Is that what frets you?’ He touched her like the quickening air. ‘Or have you foreseen a death?’

  ‘I can’t scry here.’ Bera was surprised by her confession. It mattered that Faelan should know she trusted him. ‘Please don’t tell anyone. I need my skern, my twin spirit, to warn me.’

  ‘A Fetch, we call it. It’s the likeness of the person who is going to die.’

  Bera thought about that. ‘Our skerns don’t look like us. Sometimes they look like who we might have been, though.’

  ‘Our Fetches often appear in the distance. Then come closer.’

  Like the Watcher!

  Faelan went on, ‘They sometimes bring a message ahead of the death.’

  So far the Watcher showed no sign of trying to speak to her. Was the message for someone else, or was she entirely wrong? It was a test of her old skills to find out.

  ‘Can you touch a Fetch?’ she asked.

  ‘My mother says that back in Iraland more than one fisherwoman has lived with the man they think is their husband, only to find the real man was at the bottom of the sea all the time.’

  Bera shuddered. Hefnir was a man in the shape of a husband, who turned out to be without human kindness. He was flesh, though, and Heggi had his blood.

  ‘Our folk’s skerns silently rejoin them at the end. Only Vallas like me can talk to our skerns our whole lives. The trouble is, he uses words I don’t know, or riddles.’ Bera shook her skirts to get the sand out. It was one thing to share a secret but not to sound muddled or weak. ‘I think my powers are coming back. We’re always right in the end, my skern and I.’

  ‘Is he here, now?’

  ‘Not so you could see him. But if there’s any danger my scalp would prickle.’

  She wanted to warn him about the evil on his farmstead edge but a loud graunching noise startled her. The huge jaw was being winched up into the sky. There was a cheer. Faelan took her hand and they ran back in time to see it being carefully lowered to finally thump down onto the ground, where it lay beside the whale calf, part-butchered to provide their meal.

  ‘Sad,’ said Faelan.

  ‘Do you mean that?’

  He raised a black eyebrow in a way that made her stomach flip.

  ‘I never say what I don’t mean.’

  Faelan praised the weary men, who kept sawing until others wrenched off the lower jaw from the upper. He sent the carts away to unload at his farm, ready to return the next day. Every last scrap of the body would eventually be used.

  By the time the sun sank into the sea they were bone-weary.

  ‘Look!’ Bera said.

  There was a flicker of yellow in the thickening light, over by the ridge of rocks. Heggi had built a fire. They rallied enough to stumble over to its warmth and clap his back and cheer. Bera was glad they saw his worth. He was smiling like a hero, nothing like his father. Perhaps they had reached the bottom that winter, and now everything would get better.

  Inland, in the thickening light, a reddish light glowed at the mountain’s peak. Bera told herself it was the last rays of the setting sun.

  ‘So you render the whale oil?’ Bera asked Faelan. ‘A woman said you usually did.’

  ‘It’s one of the ties that binds,’ he said. ‘Food and light. Settlers who work together stay together.’

  ‘We’ll be staying together on the beach tonight,’ Bera said.

  A flash of awkwardness passed between them and Bera took herself off quickly. Folk were stripping and wading into water that was as cold as an ice-shark bite to wash off as much blood as they could before they froze. She joined Heggi and Rakki, who were splashing each other, and then Faelan followed and everything was all right again. They all raced about, laughing and play-fighting, adults and children, then rubbed themselves down with their cloaks and bundled themselves back into stiff clothing. Spirits restored, they set up a proper camp.

  They ate well, with plenty of Faelan’s ale. Bera saw how he managed the crowd and was liked.

  ‘Are there beach-boggelmen here?’ Heggi asked.

  Bera made her eyes go wide, showing all the whites and staring at him, unsmiling. Heggi laughed at first but when she got up and lumbered towards him he ran backwards and fell over.

  ‘Stop it, Bera!’

  She opened her mouth in a snarl, flung herself on top of him and tickled him until he wept and laughed so much he was crying.

  ‘Get her off me, Faelan!’ he shouted.

  Faelan and Ginna came and tickled him instead, until they all fell over, laughing. Happiness. And then guilt overcame her and Bera went off alone to fetch some blankets. Surely no mother should forget her child was with another, even Sigrid. Ottar always used to say the greater the joy, the worse the pain.

  So you never feel happy without being braced for sadness.

  ‘I worry the land will have its revenge.’

  When she got back she made up for it by mothering Heggi, making a rough bedroll for him and kissing his forehead. He got his dog where he wanted him and shut his eyes.

  Then rolled back. ‘We’ve got meat now…’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I could have my coming-of-age, couldn’t I?’

  Bera guessed why it was important to him and kissed the top of his caffled hair, not wanting him to grow up yet, and not with Ginna. She went a short way off, wriggled on the shingle to make a hollow, put down a rug and lay on her back with the blankets right up to her chin. She looked for the stars that she once sailed by and smiled. Then a heart-shaped pattern became the outline of her mother’s face and grief came in a buffet.

  6

  Bera started awake as the first bird began to sing. For a moment she thought she was in the longhouse but the pain in her back reminded her she was on pebbles. There was a sudden squabble of gulls and cawing.

  ‘Crowman hears us, standing
at the threshold of understanding,’ croaked some voices. ‘Crowman hears us, standing at the threshold.’

  Crowman? Thresholds were important, she knew that much. Crows were the cleverest of the birds, so perhaps it was them speaking. Her skills really were increasing.

  Heggi was fast asleep, his blankets a tangle. She slid out of her bedroll to straighten them, gave Rakki some water and then went to see what the others were doing.

  Faelan had cut away all the baleen and was sleeping where he had dropped, tools in his hand. She gently roused him and led him over to her place. He was too tired to resist.

  ‘Lie there, it’s still warm,’ she said. ‘The rest of us can get to work now.’

  ‘It’s the lemmers soon. I’ll just…’ He was asleep again at once.

  Bera covered him as she had Heggi, and nearly as tenderly.

  The carts had returned. After a steadying drink, the men set to work. The remaining meat was flensed with sharper hooks than the blubber, with the carcass being rolled in the same way as before. It was long, hard work for them and the support team, who were taking the blocks of flesh to the carts. When Faelan woke he took charge again. Loading, taking to his farmstead, returning, loading throughout the whole long day. Bera was one of them, glad to follow and not be the one with all the worry. She liked the rhythm of it, like hoisting a sail, or rowing.

  ‘The lemming!’ shouted Faelan.

  The sun was low in the sky again when the lemmers cut out and sawed up the best bones and collected the useful inner organs. Bera insisted they should leave behind the pile of guts as an offering. They washed their tools and then themselves before trudging back with all the tackle to the carts, piled with riches that would make life easier in the long dark of winternights.

  Bera was the last to leave. The immense coils of grey gut were swarming blue-black with flies. It made her think of the Serpent King’s coiling tattoos. She touched her necklace. The black bead was hot, more than neck heat. She, too, stood at a threshold.