‘Forgive me, I just had to,’ Egill said, laughing. ‘If you can’t laugh, what can you do? These will be times of death and murder. I have heard tell of you too, Ingi. The voices on the wind call you Iceblood. Your crew is said to be the best, most disciplined and most consistently alive of all. I salute you.’
Ingi nodded. ‘I take great pride in the safety of my men.’
There were grave nods all around. ‘An honourable position,’ Egill added. ‘I do the very same.’
Ingi sneered. ‘How can you? You have berserkers.’
‘Yes I do. And my men are safe, because the mad dogs do what I say.’
‘And can you really control them? Or will my men find themselves fighting next to spitting, snarling animals just as like to turn their swords on friend as foe? Maybe we should nail these last dregs up like all the others to be on the safe side.’
Egill leaned down until he was very close to Ingi’s face. His voice quavered with fury. ‘Yes I can control them. I can and will control them. You are safe and your men are safe. I know what I’m doing. And if you so much as look at me or my men wrong again, you quivering little bitch, I will rip you limb from limb and eat you.’
Ingi did not flinch. Instead, he smiled back. ‘Good,’ he said, conversationally. ‘The last thing I would want is to find myself on the wrong side of a crazed half-giant. I would be forced’ – and here he shot Egill a look no less fierce – ‘to poison the food of all his men and murder him in his sleep if he ever threatened me again.’
The two men locked eyes for what seemed like an age. Neither budged an inch.
Skargrim stroked his beard. ‘But wouldn’t it be much better to look funny at Egill and then eat poison yourself, Ingi? That way, when he tears you limb from limb and eats you, he’ll die.’ The two men blinked, their gazes wavering. ‘Revenge will be yours, and you’ll be known as the brave warrior who killed the mythical Egill Jotunn.’ Matching looks of confusion flitted across the two angry captains’ faces. Skargrim continued. ‘And then, when you’re both dead and have hopefully stopped posturing like two young pups with a cock-size problem, I can take over both of your parties.’ Torn between staring each other down and listening to Skargrim, the two chieftains slowly backed away and turned to the grizzled old captain. ‘I might give Thrainn some of the skilled fighters, split the hard bastards in three between all of us and give the berserkers to Hrafn here. I’m sure he’d have fun going crazy with them,’ Skargrim continued. Hrafn’s eyes sparkled with joy and his Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. Ingi and Egill seemed to have forgotten their quarrel. ‘So can we agree, now, that we all know what we’re doing?’ Skargrim added. Ingi and Egill mumbled their agreements. ‘Good. Now go see to your crews, have your ships ready to fly at a moment’s notice and try to keep your men alive. There will be plenty of killing to go around when we get there.’
Thrainn left at once, saluting as he moved away. Hrafn bounded along after him. Neither Ingi nor Egill moved.
Skargrim sighed and stepped pointedly between them. He turned to look at the shorter man. ‘I can understand your concerns, Ingi. But I have every faith in Egill and I humbly request that you consider showing faith in me, if not him. Allow his men to prove themselves in battle. All precautions will be taken.’
Ingi peered up at Skargrim, but nodded before he turned and headed towards his camp. When he was gone, Skargrim turned to Egill. ‘I am nowhere near your height, my giant friend. But one thing I share with you. I too have seen men grow furious for no cause, when the real reason is’ – Skargrim marked Ingi’s height just below Egill’s chest – ‘beyond their control.’
A smile cracked the giant’s scowling face and continued to spread, impossibly wide.
‘I too will have faith in you, Skargrim. Your reputation alone demands it. But you also know how to lead, and for that I will follow you, and my men will follow me.’
Skargrim gave Egill’s hand as solid a shake as he dared. The giant grunted in acknowledgement, turned and headed towards his encampment.
Behind him the sun started its descent.
STENVIK
‘It’s not my fault.’ Harald sat and sulked in the corner of Valgard’s house. ‘They’re being unfair, and I don’t think I should be paying those stupid bastards any of the gold I’ve personally stolen.’
‘I can see that,’ Valgard muttered from his workbench. With his back turned, he could limit himself to just sounding sympathetic.
‘I mean, I was just doing what Sigurd told me to, right?’
‘Yes,’ Valgard said, while keeping his eye on the point of the knife slicing into the root. ‘They’re not treating you right, Harald. I agree.’
‘Damn right they’re not,’ Harald fumed. ‘No one is. Well, no one but you, Valgard. You respect me. You listen to me. I don’t have to threaten or beat you.’
‘Of course I listen, Harald.’ A drop of sweat broke free of Valgard’s hairline and slid gently down his forehead. ‘We’re … friends.’
‘Damn right,’ Harald muttered, anger and frustration rising in his voice. ‘I don’t care what they say. A man has to think for himself. Only it seems Harald is not allowed to. Harald has to obey the rules. And then they change the rules, and Harald has to pay. Always Harald.’
Valgard felt the familiar tingling in his scalp. He gripped the hilt of the knife as if his life depended on it. Images of the forest flashed through his mind and he forced himself to breathe, to regain control. Suddenly the board appeared in his mind. The move was obvious. He steeled himself, made sure he had a voice.
‘Do they have any family here?’
‘… What?’
In his mind, he heard the click-clack as the pieces moved.
‘The pig farmer and his kin. The people who started all this. Do they have any family here?’
‘How the hell should I know that? Do you think I asked? Hello, I’m going to beat the shit out of you, do you have any uncles in Stenvik? Don’t be stupid,’ Harald snapped.
‘Think, Harald,’ Valgard snapped back and turned, eyes ablaze. Harald stared dumbly at him. ‘Think. Do they have any family?’
‘You keep asking me! I don’t know! What does it matter?’
‘Because if they don’t have any family … then who is going to miss them?’ Valgard left the sentence hanging in the air but kept his eyes locked on Harald’s. He watched as the thought was born in the brute’s head; saw the expression on that big dumb face turn from hurt to comprehension to malice.
‘So you’re saying …’
‘I’m not saying anything. But sometimes simple country folk get scared in a big town and just run off home. As if they’d …’
‘… disappeared,’ Harald finished, whispering. The grin had spread to his eyes now. ‘Valgard, you are a true friend.’
‘Thank you. Now have a word with your boys. We’ll see what happens tonight.’
Harald rose, an oversized troll of a figure in his little hut.
‘Will do, Valgard. Now, do you have my mixture?’
‘I do.’ Valgard put the cork in the flask, heart thumping in his chest, and took a leap.
‘But first, Harald.’
Harald’s eyes darkened, his hand stretched out for the flask.
‘What?’
‘I know you. Have done for a long time. And I know it’s hard for you to control your moods. But try and go a little easier on Lilia for a couple of days.’
‘Are you telling me what to do, Valgard?’ Harald’s voice was a mixture of doubt, confusion and disbelief.
Now or never.
‘Do you think I’m an idiot?’ Valgard hissed. Harald recoiled and he pressed the attack. ‘Do you think I’d ever give you an order? Do I look like a fool?’ Valgard swung the bottle around for emphasis, feeling Harald’s worried eyes on it.
‘I just want you to think, Harald. If you hurt Lilia more now, she will break. If she breaks, Sven will take her. If he sees what you’ve done to her already’ – Harald winced �
�� ‘he will tell Sigurd. And everyone else. Do you want that to happen?’
Harald shook his head.
Valgard nodded slowly.
‘So … ?’
‘Don’t hurt Lilia,’ Harald repeated as if in a trance.
Valgard handed him the bottle.
‘Now go. We’ll see about tonight.’
WYRMSEY
Skargrim looked at the camps. Fires had gone up with the setting sun, casting flickering shadows over ships and men. Sixty-three ships, raid-hardened crews. Nineteen hundred men quietly attending to their murderous tools. By themselves, each of those crews would inspire fear in anyone. He’d gathered a host that the whole of the north would deem legendary if they knew it existed.
Which they would, soon enough.
This time he saw Skuld approach. He suspected it was because she let him. She stopped a respectful distance away and inclined her head. ‘You have done well, Skargrim. The gods are pleased.’
He smiled a tired smile. ‘They’d better be. This is a host worthy of Valhalla, with tempers to match.’
‘I know. Rest, my brave captain.’ She placed a delicate hand on his arm and looked in his eyes.
‘I … will.’ Skargrim felt her fingers like delicious fire. Sweet weariness spread through his whole body, and his knees threatened to buckle.
Summoning up the last of his strength, he turned towards their camp.
‘Wait.’
Before he realized what had happened, he’d turned around. A brief twinge of pain on his chin brought confusion to his sleep-addled brain, but then she touched his arm again and everything was good.
‘Go now. Sleep.’
Skargrim turned around again and staggered towards the camp.
She watched him leave.
As he disappeared among the men, her gaze travelled upward, to the stars, and she started speaking in a soft, low voice.
You who are darkness
Swift and cunning
Move like the north wind
Old and wily
Drift on the wings
Of the wandering spirit
See all and know all
Come to your mistress.
She waited.
A faint sound on the wind turned into the flutter of wings. A large raven landed by her feet and cocked its head at her. She looked it straight in its sparkling black eyes, all the while rubbing together her thumb and index finger. Her voice quieted down to a whisper, and she offered her hand to the raven.
In it was a single, coarse, grey hair. The raven hopped towards her, nudged her with its head and plucked the hair from her hand.
The big black bird shot up into the air with the hair in its beak and streaked eastward into the night.
STENVIK
The words echoed in Lilia’s head.
Don’t move.
Don’t move.
She’d pushed everything else out, allowing just enough space for those words, repeated again and again.
Her body screamed at her, but she didn’t listen.
Don’t. Move.
She lay on her side, curled up into a ball. Everything hurt. Her scalp, where he’d pulled her hair. Her lips, where he’d bitten them. The salve that Valgard had applied on her back felt like cool breath on the burning skin, but it was not nearly enough. Harald had been nothing if not meticulous with the leather strap. The splints on her little fingers only framed the dull throbbing. She could picture his face all too well as he’d broken them. He’d come home furious about something, furious and miserable.
She hadn’t given him the pleasure of seeing her cry.
Instead she’d gritted her teeth and hid inside the stone woman, closed her heart to the world. She’d watched as his expression changed from anger to anguish.
He’d tried to take her but he had been limp, unmanned. And thinking back, she realized, he’d been afraid. Desperately afraid.
Right then, somewhere in her, something changed.
She shifted and lay down on her back.
Pain exploded like a blossoming flower in her head, filled her senses.
The tears came, flowed hot and silent.
She embraced them, embraced the pain. Wielded it, moulded it and relished it. She shaped it into a hammer and hefted it. She swung it with all her might at the stone woman, the granite prison all around her.
It bounced off, but so did a chip of stone.
Fuelled by the pain, by the soaring sensation of it, she swung again. The hammer smashed into the stone woman, sending a jarring blow through her arms up into her shoulders, making her teeth tingle.
Just before she lost consciousness, she saw the crack forming on the inside of the stone woman, reaching from head to heart.
*
Oraekja yawned. They’d been sitting and waiting since sunset. This could hardly get more boring. And Ragnar wasn’t one for idle chatter.
He just sat there, completely still.
It was quite unnerving how he could do that, just sit down and stop moving. Oraekja was almost sure he stopped breathing as well. He’d watched with incredulity as the damned old goat seemed to melt into the background.
Oraekja jumped when the raven landed in front of him.
Ragnar was on his feet. His voice was calm.
‘Right, puppy. That is our signal.’
As quickly as it had landed, the raven took off again.
*
The old longhouse was full of people. Valgard had to watch the entrance carefully, but he spotted them at last.
‘Fellows! Over here!’
All he got in return was a matching set of guarded looks from the two bruised and battered farmers. He waved them over nonetheless.
‘Come on, lads. Have a seat.’
The red-faced one looked at him with suspicion. ‘Why do you want us to sit with you?’
‘Are you in a position to choose?’ Valgard countered. The sound of a heated quarrel drifted towards them from the far end of the longhouse. The farmer was about to start arguing when his cousin pushed him towards the table. ‘Shut up and sit. I’ll go get drink.’
‘Better, better,’ Valgard smiled. ‘I just wanted you to know that your kinsman is recovering as well as could be hoped, even better. Our goddess of medicine is surely watching over him.’
The red-faced one scowled. ‘Never should have needed to in the first place.’
‘You’re right, of course. I—’
‘Hate this place,’ he sneered, daring anyone and everyone to object.
Valgard decided silence might be the best course of action. Luckily, the fat cousin soon appeared with three mugs of mead. ‘Ah, the saviour of parched throats. Sit and talk.’
‘About what?’ the red-faced farmer mumbled.
‘I reckon you have a good chance at damages.’
‘Do we?’ The fat one’s face lit up.
‘Don’t be an idiot,’ his cousin snapped. ‘That bastard Harald has friends all over this town. We have no chance.’
Little do you know, thought Valgard. He felt for the satchel on his hip, felt reassured by the shape. ‘We shall not complain, though. That does no good. For now, let’s drink to our health – and your kinsman’s! As Eir is my witness, I tell you his health will soon be like it’s never been before!’
The fat one smiled at that, while the other one frowned. Valgard did his best to down the sour ale. ‘Come on now – you’re not going to let a shrivelled town boy like myself drink you strong country men onto the floor?’ he managed to splutter between gulps. The red-faced farmer took to his ale with belligerent enthusiasm.
Soon their mugs were empty.
Valgard shot a look at red-face. ‘You or me?’
‘Much like cock-rot, rather you than me,’ he shot back.
Valgard raised his hands in mock surrender. ‘You have a way with words! I think you’re right. My turn now – you’ll go later.’ With that he left the table with mugs in hand and a sour taste in his mouth.
NORTH-E
AST OF STENVIK
The raven flew like a black arrow to its target, a hillside strewn with moss-covered boulders and pines leaning at strange angles, reaching up to the starry night sky.
It landed in a clearing and hopped two steps forward, blinking and cocking its head as if listening in on a silent conversation.
Suddenly its head snapped round. It beat its big wings and pulled towards the air, towards the stars.
Too late.
The knife took it in the chest, whipped it sideways and pinned it to the trunk of a pine, killing it instantly.
Moments later a man emerged from the shadows and walked across the clearing without making a sound. With the practised movements of a hunter he pulled the knife free and wiped it clean on his old, ragged clothes. Behind him two big, burly men stepped into the clearing.
‘Good shot,’ one of them mumbled.
‘’s always a good shot,’ the other replied.
‘Always.’
‘Maybe next time something bigger, though. Like a … bigger bird.’
The man with the knife smiled. ‘Now now, boys. You’ll have your fill again. We fed well tonight; we’ll do so again tomorrow. This’ll keep you happy for a while.’ He tossed the bird to the two lumbering men, who set to tearing it apart with their hands. ‘That’s our signal. When you’re done, go tell the others.’ Grunted assent was mixed in with sounds of teeth crunching brittle bones. The man sheathed the knife, untied a leather strap from his wrist and tied up his dirty, matted hair into a loose ponytail. ‘It’s time,’ he said quietly.
STENVIK
Valgard took a hearty swig of the mug in his left hand, passing the two mugs in his right to the two cousins. ‘Round two!’ he declared and set to finishing his ale. The others did their best to keep up. Soon the mugs were empty again.
‘Right. Your turn,’ Valgard said jovially to the red-faced man. Seeing the frown on his cousin’s face, the fat one quickly volunteered, staggering towards the pots for more mead. ‘They pack a fair bit of punch into this piss,’ red-face slurred.
The Valhalla Saga Page 11